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I usually like to complete something - or nearly complete it - before I get into discussions about games, but Lord of the Rings Online is obviously an MMO, so short of marching on Barad Dur, that's not going to happen anytime soon. I can fuck up a whole host of Shire-bound goblins, I'll tell you what, but the Witch King is pretty far out of my league.
I've played two MMO games thus far, and LotRO is pretty much the total opposite of Final Fantasy 11; their primary similarities are that they're both fantasy settings and they're both played online. Final Fantasy is probably more sophisticated on the whole, but LotRO does a lot of things right that FF11 really hasn't.
First, LotRO is more accessible. It's free to download, it's really pretty, and it's largely free to play. There are a lot of extras that you unlock with something called 'Turbine Points' which the game parcels out modest amounts of, and small things are cheap to buy. For larger things, you can spend money to unlock them instead if you'd like, so if you're in a hurry - pay cash. If you're not, totally free. So that's nice.
Most things in LotRO can be done solo, which is perfect for me. I'm a little anti-social when it comes to gaming. I'm playing to get away from others, basically. If I wanted to deal with waiting, being rushed, drama, and others expectations, I'd play 'Bistro, the Role-Playing Game' some more. It takes 5 seconds to load and after a few hours, I'm out 20 bucks and I have to wait an hour to drive. Basically, I have social interactions all the time - the only time I want to deal with other people while playing online is to buy or sell something for huge values at the Auction House.
The team behind LotRO figured its shit out with their quest system. You can load your plate with up to 40 at a time, a list on the side of the screen displays up to 5 active ones, color-coded with their approximate level, the mini-map shows where the leading quest is actually located and how far away it is, and the main map shows you exactly where in Middle Earth you're expected to go. This leads to a chain reaction where I sit at the terminal, directing my Hobbit Burglar like a guided missile at wherever the quest icon is pointed to on my screen. I have a slight complex about checking things off of a list. It gives me this weird rush of endorphins, and when I do, the game emits a ding and produces numbers and money that I hardly care about at all.
I guess the downside is that the game, at least to where I'm at, is ridiculously easy and mostly mindless. Crafting things is trivial, providing you can get the materials, and you never risk failing. Most quests are very easy to complete solo, at least in my experience. It's very easy to keep questing things slightly below your level, getting slightly below average experience points for them, and getting to a level where you're never really challenged by what you're doing. I think there's a good chance that's due to playing a character who can mostly turn invisible and stun 2-3 enemies at a time, but my friends report they've got their means as well. In a way, though, that feeds the mindless addictive properties because you're never really forced to work that hard. It's just 'go to a place and kill things or talk to people until something goes Ding.'
LotRO has qualities very, very similar to Fallout, actually. The list, the 'go to a place and do a thing'. The mostly straightforward combat options. The simplified item creation system that facilitates interaction with the game world - it's all pretty 2-dimensional, but it serves for the time being. It is, however, the kind of thing that I imagine being really into for a little while but when I tire of the surface level, there's not much beneath that to keep me going, and I'll eventually drop it.
I've played two MMO games thus far, and LotRO is pretty much the total opposite of Final Fantasy 11; their primary similarities are that they're both fantasy settings and they're both played online. Final Fantasy is probably more sophisticated on the whole, but LotRO does a lot of things right that FF11 really hasn't.
First, LotRO is more accessible. It's free to download, it's really pretty, and it's largely free to play. There are a lot of extras that you unlock with something called 'Turbine Points' which the game parcels out modest amounts of, and small things are cheap to buy. For larger things, you can spend money to unlock them instead if you'd like, so if you're in a hurry - pay cash. If you're not, totally free. So that's nice.
Most things in LotRO can be done solo, which is perfect for me. I'm a little anti-social when it comes to gaming. I'm playing to get away from others, basically. If I wanted to deal with waiting, being rushed, drama, and others expectations, I'd play 'Bistro, the Role-Playing Game' some more. It takes 5 seconds to load and after a few hours, I'm out 20 bucks and I have to wait an hour to drive. Basically, I have social interactions all the time - the only time I want to deal with other people while playing online is to buy or sell something for huge values at the Auction House.
The team behind LotRO figured its shit out with their quest system. You can load your plate with up to 40 at a time, a list on the side of the screen displays up to 5 active ones, color-coded with their approximate level, the mini-map shows where the leading quest is actually located and how far away it is, and the main map shows you exactly where in Middle Earth you're expected to go. This leads to a chain reaction where I sit at the terminal, directing my Hobbit Burglar like a guided missile at wherever the quest icon is pointed to on my screen. I have a slight complex about checking things off of a list. It gives me this weird rush of endorphins, and when I do, the game emits a ding and produces numbers and money that I hardly care about at all.
I guess the downside is that the game, at least to where I'm at, is ridiculously easy and mostly mindless. Crafting things is trivial, providing you can get the materials, and you never risk failing. Most quests are very easy to complete solo, at least in my experience. It's very easy to keep questing things slightly below your level, getting slightly below average experience points for them, and getting to a level where you're never really challenged by what you're doing. I think there's a good chance that's due to playing a character who can mostly turn invisible and stun 2-3 enemies at a time, but my friends report they've got their means as well. In a way, though, that feeds the mindless addictive properties because you're never really forced to work that hard. It's just 'go to a place and kill things or talk to people until something goes Ding.'
LotRO has qualities very, very similar to Fallout, actually. The list, the 'go to a place and do a thing'. The mostly straightforward combat options. The simplified item creation system that facilitates interaction with the game world - it's all pretty 2-dimensional, but it serves for the time being. It is, however, the kind of thing that I imagine being really into for a little while but when I tire of the surface level, there's not much beneath that to keep me going, and I'll eventually drop it.
