Everquest 2: Welcome Home

So, that happened earlier this week (Monday to be precise) we returned to Everquest II and have had a blast all week.  The yearly All Access pass is simply to good of a deal to pass up, so we bought two.  Hubby has the week off and so we have been playing AA (Alternate Advancement) catch-up on my wizard and his paladin.  No potions, no bonus, just slider set to 100% AA experience and catching up on language quest lines and involved quest chains.

I can honestly say, that while I despise the AA catch-up grind most of my other characters aren’t in as big a hole and thus it won’t be like this when they hit level 59 and only have 132 AA points (or 123 like hubby).  But then again, characters were active before there was AA and thus it was inevitable there would be catch-up.

One thing that would make AA grind easier, would be the ability to mentor down in the field.  I had to blow several opportunities for AA points yesterday because I couldn’t mentor down while on the Draconic language quest line.  Not the end of the world but it certainly would have been nice to mentor down and gain those points in Stormhold.

Also I hate fighting in the lower levels of Solesk’s Eye, those clear pathways over lava (pictured above) made me nauseated.  Hell, I was always afraid I was going to fall over and off.  But that being said, we earned a lot of AA finishing up quests and getting lost trying to find our way to Nagafen’s Lair. 

There we are hanging out in Sanctum of the Scaleborn.  The zone is beautiful and full of decent AA to be had.  I think we are coming back after we finish Clefts of Rujark, where I might add we managed to duo (with the 10-year SK merc and the Inquisitor merc) Rak’jaller (Epic x2 triple up).  It was fun and intense and satisfying when he went down. 

So, even though I moved houses and overwrote my house layout save by a not-enough coffee mistake, we are having fun in EQ2 once again.  It is like coming home.  There have been some serious improvements made (bag/inventory changes are AWESOME) and overall I don’t think we have any complaints.  Not sure if either of us will be boosting to 85 but that possibility does exist.  I’m sure we will decide next month when Heroic Characters go on sale. 

Maintenance will be done shortly, time to clean the house and find coffee before then. 

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MMO Mobile Apps: Where are they?

The ultimate goal of MMO developers and producers is to make the game so engaging that you are willing to pay out your monthly subscription without a second thought.  And yet, they all fail to fully integrate their game into their customers lives.  Where are the mobile apps that let me manage crafting or research while waiting at the dentist office or on the train?

Truth is, we live in a world where mobile is integrated into almost everything we do on a daily basis.  Players are much more likely to be long term invested in a game that let them check goods for sale, research, crew members, etc. when they can do that from the comfort of the office during a boring meeting or while sitting around the airport waiting for a flight. 

Mobile apps shouldn’t be limited to checking out a players item level or what achievements they’ve earned.  Mobile apps should encompass non-combat, non-quest oriented gameplay, like crating in SWTOR or researching in TESO.  Mobile apps should also be available on all three mobile platforms and not just iOS platforms.  There is no logical reason MMO providers should limit their audience base to iOS.

Maybe, just maybe, game developers are waking up to  the fact that they can only benefit from inclusion of mobile apps into their core game structure.  Right now, I would love to be crafting on my SWTOR characters while catching some early morning sun but …

Never mind Corso is done crafting, here’s hoping I learn that reverse engineering schematic!

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Xbox: Shadow of Mordor

Weapons & Runes

Game just keeps looking more and more interesting to me, wonder if it will be worth it?  Hubby has yet to be truly happy with a  single XboxOne game purchase, same would have been true on the PS4.   Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor releases on 7 October 2014.

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Gaming & Sexism

Plate bikinis in World of Warcraft are but one example of blatant sexism in the gaming community.  Another would be the hate that is spewed when a female speaks during multiplayer matches on a console game.  There are more examples of sexism in games than I can reasonably relate, however does this blatant sexism require special treatment for the female of the species?

No, quite simply it does not.  I’m a woman and I have the power to decide what gaming companies get the benefit of my money.  Money is the only currency that matters to developers and publishers of games for computers and consoles alike.  So long as the myth persists that men are the overwhelming majority of the gaming population, and it is a myth, then the money will follow the gender.

Women hold the power here, not men.  Don’t like how a game portrays women in the game?  Take your money elsewhere and support a game that treats both sexes equally.  Money talks and where the money trend goes, so will gaming follow.

It isn’t complicated.  All these cries and whines demanding that women get special treatment or that men play nice because there are women present is degrading.  All players, men and women alike, should treat other players as if they were sitting in the same room and were held accountable for their actions by a real living, breathing human when the mouse and controllers are set aside for the day.  Doesn’t matter what sex you are, what your sexual orientation is, or what color your skin is, no player deserves special treatment because of these things. 

Make your dollars spent mean something and then you will see a change in the industry.  Don’t like a community, then leave and find a better community.  Play with like minded people and make the world a better place.  I’m sorry but if you stay and pay to play a game that offends you then you are part of the problem and whining isn’t a solution.

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Elder Scrolls Online: First Month of Launch

Elder Scrolls Online released a month ago and while the game is stunningly beautiful, did it live up to my expectations of perfection once I started playing the game on a daily basis?  Complicated question with a short answer, not really.

Don’t misunderstand, I love the game.  I love the depth of character immersion and questing.  I love that I can get lost and uncover quests I would have otherwise missed and that not every NPC is young, fit, and wrinkle free. 

What I’m not loving is the inventory management nightmare and the horribly unbalanced gains in crafting.  It makes no sense that provisioning (cooking) can be leveled to the maximum before a player reaches level fifteen but any other skill you are lucky if you make it to level ten.  Enchanting is the worst of all the skills with the least available raw materials out in the world.  It levels slower than a glacier moves and deconstructing every glyph you craft for a slightly larger miniscule gain is frustrating and irrational.

Inventory management is a mini-game all it’s own.  I don’t mind the high costs associated with increasing bag and bank space.  I would prefer it if I got more space for my gold however.  What truly irritates me to no end is that each and every time I open my bank it is sorted automatically from Z to A and not A to Z.  This one thing makes me grind my teeth every time I open the bank.  I love that there is shared storage, what I don’t love is that there is no individual storage.  Having to create characters just to hold crafting goods, maps, pets, etc. is poor game design.

The director’s letter just released did not give me hope.  There is no mention of housing, not one.  Housing is an integral part of every Elder Scrolls game since Morrowind.  Housing had the potential to solve inventory issues for a lot of players.  Instead, they are working on horse racing?  Really?  Horse racing is a quality of life improvement?  I could care less that other players will now have the ability to kill guards and NPC’s.  All that is going to lead to is an unplayable world where quest givers can be killed by the bored to irritate others.

So now the question becomes, do we renew our subscriptions and give Zenimax and Bethesda the benefit of the doubt?  Or, do we rationally cut our losses now and wait for the bots and gold spam to lessen while the game loses players at an incredible rate?  I’m on the fence.  Part of me desperately wants to play ESO and love it and lose myself in the world but the other part of me is extremely tired of reporting gold farmers, dealing with botters, shuffling inventory, and crafting skills.

I do know that right now, as the game stands it is beautiful, immersive, and frustrating.  I can’t imagine it will be that much better on the consoles either.  Speaking of consoles, not a word of a beta is mentioned in the producer’s letter and not a hint of if they will hit their target release date of June.  My guess is that it will be pushed back.  And honestly, the game is either going to be much better on the console or so frustrating controllers will be flung across rooms globally.

I’ll confess, I haven’t logged into ESO in almost a week.  We have been playing SWTOR and enjoy ourselves.  I will log into ESO this week but probably more out of guilt than a desire to report gold farmers, botters, and to juggle inventory.  I love the beauty and questing but that experience is marred by the negatives for me at the moment.

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Star Wars: The Old Republic: Continuing Adventures, Treek, & More

My Consular is currently on Hoth, the cold and icy Hoth of the  movies.  Hoth is very large and very spread out and beautiful in the way that only extremely cold winters can be.  Being a content and happy desert dweller, I can admire the icy, blue beauty that is Hoth without bringing back awful memories of winter.

I’m finding the quests on Hoth interesting and engaging.  But then again, I love all of the unique races you discover within the universe of Star Wars.

She has helped the above Ortolans save their geothermic power plant from the Empire and is off to stop a madman she has already killed once.  Her biggest “issue” these days, is reviving Qyzen from the floor after a battle, despite the fact that she’s split her tree points up for some heals to keep him alive.  So, given his apparent love of dirt naps, hubby and I both purchased the Treek mercenary contract from the Cartel Market yesterday.

Treek has been available for a while but I was too stingy in spending cartel coins to acquire her services.  I was an idiot!  The initial meeting with her makes me laugh every time and I admit it, I love Ewoks and always have.  So, once you get her and get her gear up to speed (she comes pre-equipped with Adaptive Armor appropriate for level nine) I took her into battle.    She not only holds aggro, she HEALS herself during battle.  Yep, that’s right, she heals and tanks which leaves you free to dispatch enemies as quickly as you like.

Now, I’m not going to lie I kill quicker (at least on my Sentinel) when I bring Kira along but I tend to take more damage and spend more time recovering after a battle.  Also, Treek gains no affection from conversations while out questing so I have found myself swapping her out with other companions for the affection gain whenever possible.  Treek only gains affection from gifts and completing her companion missions. 

And lastly, look what arrived this morning after maintenance!  My characters are happy and T7 will have a friend to hang out with!

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Catching Up on the Larger World of Assassin’s Creed

Despite the frustrating and non-Assassin based gameplay of Assassin’s Creed: Black Flag, the franchise remains one of my favorites.  This is in large part because of the incredibly complex and rich story telling Ubisoft released with the Ezio trilogy.  There is a confirmed new game release for the Xbox One and the PS4 entitled, Assassin’s Creed: Unity and I have high hopes that given it’s setting in the era of the French Revolution there will be no sailing missions.  (Dear God help me if there are because I cannot promise not to hurl my controller in frustration across the room!)

The French Revolution awaits us all

This morning I decided to catch up with the world of Assassin’s Creed outside the games and jumped right into the AC Initiates database.  Initiates is a site run by Ubisoft still in Alpha release, despite being available for months.  A couple of side notes/observations about Initiates it is incredibly frustrating that the site isn’t accessible on mobile devices (not even so-called mobile devices that do not have cellular access) and it defeats the purpose of having missions related to Assassin Creed games that are heavily played on consoles but in order to get credit for those missions the gamer needs to interrupt game play to leave the room and seek out a non-mobile device.

Gripes over, despite the grumbles about the site Initiates has a wonderful amount of detail relating to the main characters of the game.  I loved reading about young Haytham long before we meet him in Assassin’s Creed III or the invention backstory of Benjamin Hornigold.  But most interesting is the dossier on Gavin Banks current Master of the Assassin Brotherhood.  The details and relation of the game to real life events we are privy to every day.  A great example is the Tunguska blast in Siberia and the Apple of Eden.  Old favorites from the Ezio trilogy are alive and well on the Initiates site and are still active.  It is incredibly satisfy to get a glimpse of Rebecca and Shawn outside the games and enjoy the intrigue and humor in brief snippets.

The Brotherhood is rebuilding in the present day world.  Abstergo may be far more in the public eye but the present day Brotherhood is rebuilding cells world wide.  It was fascinating to read who leads the Japanese cell and the activities that were going on in Russia.  It is nice to read about women in the Initiates database and surveillance reports because women are still missing from the actual games.  There is also a mini-game called Lost Memories which allows users to find memories around the world.

Adding to the already rich world of published material related to the world of Assassin’s Creed, there is a new book scheduled to release November 4, 2014 entitled Assassin’s Creed Unity: Abstergo Industries Employee Handbook by Christie Golden who also wrote Assassin’s Creed IV Black Flag: Blackbeard: The Lost Journal.  I’m far more interested in the Handbook than the Blackbeard’s book.

  Access the Animus is an Italian fan site which summarizes the various extraneous materials published for the franchise.  If you don’t have time to read the various novels and comics, and trust the review of someone else, then Access the Animus is a great place to catch-up and learn about the other Assassin’s roaming the planet in various times and places.

So, if you are in need of an Assassin’s Creed fix before the release of Unity then it is worth checking out both Initiates and Access.  Little snippets of a glimpse of what is happening between the Assassin’s and Templars is certainly one way of filing the void between the release of major titles.

 

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Xbox One: Dragon Age: Inquisition

October 7th I can be found safely curled up in my sofa lost in the latest adventure from Thedas.  Dragon Age: Inquisition finally has a release date and I am ready for what looks to be a significant improvement from Dragon Age II.  It looks to be a promising Fall for Xbox One games, although Inquisition is also releasing on the Xbox 360 and the PS3, PS4 and PC.  Id the videos, screenshots and gameplay footage can be trusted, then Bioware looks to be well on their way to saving the Dragon Age franchise.

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LOTRO: April’s Producer’s Letter

Lord of the Rings Online can be an incredibly beautiful game and it always seems to suck me in when my subscription runs out.  We resub (and bought two new expansions) and once again LOTRO goes and does something foolish and I regret the “investment” we made not to be nickel and dimed to death.  Look, $200 a year isn’t going to kill us but it is more a sign of faith in the future.  This year however, LOTRO has finally managed to kill my interest in the game completely.

They just released the Producer’s Letter for April and in it, they once again break yet another promise to the player base.  There will be no update to housing this year despite it’s repeated promises that the update was coming.  However, there will be a new class which I am sure will be heavily monetized and poorly implemented.

The competition is too good for a seven year old game to be fooling around with crap like a new class and broken promises to an already frustrated and fleeing population.  Realms are empty, trying to play on a new realm means losing real world money tied to the old realm, housing is a joke, the game play can be incredibly boring, and gorgeous screenshots aren’t enough to keep players logging in.  If you want to retain a player base, don’t nickel and dime them (ESPECIALLY players that subscribe to your game), don’t break promises, don’t have secret player councils, and don’t have you corporate heads buried so far in the sand you don’t even realize you have serious competition.

My twitter feed alone shows long time players leaving LOTRO for games like Landmark and Elder Scrolls Online.  The team at LOTRO seems oblivious to the fact that players are finding new games to play and sink real world money into, I’m being kind.  I actually believe that the LOTRO team is intentionally burying it’s head in the sand and break promises and ignoring the flight of customers so that they feel “justified” in closing the game down in the next six to eighteen months.  I know that we won’t be buying any more expansions and that we definitely will not be paying for two yearly subscriptions this year.

Rant over, opinion spoken and now I’m off to write for my ESO character blog and get in some ESO playtime before exploring the awesome changes to Wildstar in the upcoming beta weekend.

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Is WOW the old and dying dinosaur on the block?

World of Warcraft announced its technical Alpha for the Warlords of Draenor late last week, hours before The Elder Scrolls Online officially launched. Anyways, Hubby and I got around to talking about WOW yesterday afternoon. Neither of us is even remotely interested in WOW for different reasons. But what we were discussing was whether or not WOW was even relevant to gaming any more. We are both of the opinion that the answer is no and below is why we’ve come to that conclusion.

First, WOW is flat out an old game that is being left behind by the competition. It isn’t fully voice acted, the quests are simple and repetitive, and game play mechanics are bloated and aged. Combat is basically pressing the same combination of buttons over and over again. There is no active dodging for instance. You can just stand there and whack on a creature while doing your nails and watching a movie. The game doesn’t actively require player engagement to avoid death.

 

Second, WOW doesn’t seem to understand that the gaming audience is no longer just young men. It is now a much broader audience of both sexes of all ages. BlizzCon 2013 was the nail in the coffin for me, comments like “It’s a boy’s trip” from Chris Metzen was the straw that broke the camel’s back. If I’m going to play a subscription game, then it isn’t going to a company that devalues women and refuses to include women in their games as anything more than objects of sexual fantasy.

Third, the competition is just so much better in every way. TESO has strong women characters everywhere, active dodging mechanics, and it requires players to think and manage how they play. Wildstar is just flat out funny, once again active dodging mechanics, and unique systems like Path. Landmark, while we haven’t played it nor have any interest in doing so, has a strong legion of fans that enjoy building and creating in the Everquest environment. And those are just three games off the top of my head that are better.

Fourth, WOW just takes too damn long between updates or expansions. Subscribers and fans play the same content over and over and over again for months on end. The endless gear grind progression style is boring. Why stay on the treadmill of the same content when the competition has a large variety of end game content and not just raids. Adventure zones, two-person content, and group content immediately spring to mind. Why would you run the same raid content week after week for months on end with no new content on the horizon when the competition releases content patches ranging from every two weeks to once a month.

WOW has its die-hard fans that want nothing more than to see the competition fail. I get that, I get that I won’t be changing any of their minds. No one single game will be the proverbial “WOW killer” but the competition taken together will kill WOW. Well, the competition and the “boy’s club” that is the team of WOW management. I don’t begrudge those players their fun and enjoyment. The hubby and I won’t be going back ever again.

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Elder Scrolls Online: So, Did it Meet Expectations?

Surpassed every expectation I had from beta, which was high.  I’ve run across one bug so far and it is on a side quest.  I’ve reported it and will come back to complete the quest later.  The game sucks me in, literally time flies by and next thing I know it is time to cook dinner and I wonder where the day went. 

The game reminds me so much of Oblivion that I forget there are other players in the game.  I am wandering around exploring and gathering raw materials for crafting.  I haven’t reached level ten yet on any character, in part because I’m having so much trouble deciding who to play.  The choices are endless and a small change here or there can completely alter game play. 

There are a couple of minor improvements I think they need to work into the game in the first update.  One is a pet inventory system.  Right now I have four pets and that is four bank slots consumed.  Another is for account bound consumables like treasure maps, I had to park one of my characters as a mule simply to hold treasure maps.  They are bank space intensive and clumsily implemented.  Don’t get me wrong, the loot from those pre-order treasure maps is great but having it clutter up bank space indefinitely isn’t great.  Or better yet, give me housing with a trunk and I won’t mind one iota the amount of space the treasure maps consume!

The world is alive and vibrant.  NPCs clearly have lives of their own and while friendly they aren’t intrusive.  The world feels like Oblivion to me, minus all the creepy Oblivion gates of course.  I have discovered more chests and lore books from just wandering around then I would have had I not done so.  The music is amazing and adds so much to the atmosphere.

The Elder Scrolls Online isn’t going to be a game for everyone.  Respec’s are expensive (which I am more than fine with), leveling isn’t lightening fast thru PvE, crafting isn’t make 100 of this and walk away, and grinding mobs is the slowest way to level.  But if you are looking for that kind of game, I can’t imagine you would be interested in TESO to begin with.  However, if you want immersive gameplay with gorgeous scenery, then TESO has more than accomplished that and much, much more.  The launch has been incredibly smooth and incredibly well done and the entire team at Bethesda and Zenimax Online deserve a much needed round of applause.

Now, if you’ll excuse me I need to go make a cup of coffee and head back into TESO.

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Elder Scrolls Online: Quick “Class” Breakdown

So Hubby said I should share, just in case you were on the fence about what “class” to play.

DragonKnight: Ardent Flame – deals AOE

DragonKnight: Draconic Power – increased armor (tanking)

DragonKnight: Earthen Heart – Crowd Control

NightBlade: Assassin --  Close up; quick kills

NightBlade: Shadow – Fears; Pet

NightBlade: Siphoning – Damage over Time

Sorcerer: Dark Magic – Crowd Control

Sorcerer: Daedric Summoning – Pet class

Sorcerer: Storm Calling – AOE

Templar: Aedric Spear – Crowd Control

Templar: Dawn’s Wrath – Damage over Time

Templar: Restoring Light – AOE heals

 

If you are undecided, try a NightBlade DOT Mage.  I played one in Beta, and it was a bloody blast of death and destruction.

 

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Beta: Wildstar–Revised Opinion

I played some more Wildstar today and even got a beta key for Hubby.  My opinion has changed.  Ok, I’m still not a fan of the wildly disproportionate female characters but some things never change.

I played a Medic and an Esper, Settler and Scientist paths respectively.  I am finding the classes a ton of fun to play.  Medic and Esper have no trouble killing anything they come across.  I died twice and both times it was completely my fault because I was distracted by the hubby across the room.  But hey, that’s ok it happens.  Haven’t healed anyone or anything on my Medic but I usually play a dps healer class anyone, healing as an offspec or off-healer.

Hubby had a blast bouncing around and shooting stuff on his Spellslinger, Explorer character.  He was laughing and pointing out all of the NPC’s he wished he could play.

The bouncing and floaty feel doesn’t bother me nearly as much as earlier today.  I can see how it will come in handy later in the game.  I must admit for the several hours we played this afternoon, I never got bored.  It appears there will be sufficient quest for a quester and explorer like myself.

There are still issues that I think need to be addressed.  The UI needs as ability to change the size of quest text and coloring without scaling the entire UI up.  It is incredibly hard to read 10 point font that is light gray in color.  Also, the frame rate being in the dead center of the screen has got to go.  There will be addons but I’m definitely one of those who favor minimal UIs and having to run a ton of addons to handle developer mistakes is irritating.

So, I was wrong.  I committed the ultimate sin I hate in other game reviewers and I apologize.  I should have played more than an hour or two before churning out a published review.  I don’t know if we will pre-order it but we had fun.

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Beta: Wildstar

I finally scrounged up a beta key to Wildstar, even though I’ve been in the beta waiting pool since they opened beta sign-ups.  I’m not impressed.  It certainly isn’t going to be an investment I’ll be making, I’ll wait until the game goes free-to-play.

Basically, it is a space Western WOW clone.  The cell coloration is overly saturated and graphics are flat.  It looks like exactly what it’s creators wanted, a WOW clone. 

Character creation is uninspired, too similar between races and nothing truly unique.  Jewelry is excessively large and gaudy, personal opinion obviously.  After you wake up from stasis you take a step and immediately notice how incredibly floaty walking is, and jumping?  Jumping is like being a living, breathing rubber ball.  It is disconcerting, you just float and bounce alone.  Landing on the planet didn’t change that feeling either.

Classes and paths are unique, I will grant the team at Wildstar that but otherwise it is completely forgettable.  The game isn’t fully voiced, which dates it and sets it apart from it’s competition, which is a good thing because dialogue and text never match up.  As for quests themselves, they could have been written by a third grader.  Language and concepts are overly simplistic and dumbed-down to the lowest common denominator.

If you are looking for a game were you can fully customize your character, this is not the game.  The females are all young and skinny.  Boobs have decreased in size from previous pictures I have seen from the game, but seriously look at the size of my characters waist compared to her boobs.  No thanks, I’m not that unrealistically proportioned in real life and I don’t need to perpetuate adolescent male fantasies in a role playing game.

Happily, passing on Wildstar.  If I want a space opera MMO, I’ll stick with Star Wars: The Old Republic it is much more my type of game.

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Elder Scrolls Online: Changes to Cold Harbor

The very first time I logged into beta for the Elder Scrolls Online way back when I was filled with excitement and trepidation.  Would it live up to previous Elder Scrolls games?  Would my fears be confirmed?  Would I fall in love with the game like I did Oblivion?

Amazing how those answers would be so INCREDIBLY different if this weekend had been my first experience with ESO.  Way back then, the game lived up to its predecessors, my fears were unfounded and I loved the game.  Not just loved it, I told my husband that it was gaming perfection for me.  Now, Cold Harbor DESTROYS that experience entirely. 

The original Cold Harbor was an escape from death as all Elder Scrolls games begin.  Only this time, Daedric Prince Molag Bal was responsible and I had to fight to escape his realm.  It was immersive from the beginning.  A creepy old dude appears and not only can I see and talk to him but I escape from my jail cell as a result.  None of that has changed but here after, the immersive aspect disappears.

The old dude, aka The Prophet, tells me to follow the kind Argonian who opens my cell door and to arm myself.  Used to be you ended up in a forge with a large variety of weapons to choose from, as would make sense in a room known as the FORGE.  New version, there is one weapon and only one weapon choice a sword.  Really a sword?  Yes, I know you can use any weapon in the game with any class but if you are like me and get horrible luck with weapon drops then guess what?  That is your weapon until a better one appears. 

Sucking it up, I equip the sword and moved on.  First play through Cold Harbor this weekend, I played it like every other time I’ve gone through it.  That was a mistake.  Chests and enemies are far less, there is no longer a sense of improving through successful battles.  No weapons, armor, books, lock picks, or recipes dropped and I looted every possible urn, crate, chest, and barrel I could.  I rescued the Prophet, not caring for the first time about Lyris and her sacrifice. 

The new boss battle at Anchor Mooring was a pleasant change however.  But of course I was underpowered with the crappy sword and rags I was equipped with.  The fight which could have felt epic in scale and ferocity, instead felt like I had been thrown to the dogs and would succeed only because the Prophet was throwing heals on me.  Boss done, I felt none of the urgency to escape.  I no longer had to collect shards to assemble the Skyshard, Prophet just magically conjured them up. 

Successful escape from Cold Harbor and I land in some house in Daggerfall.  I walk out the door and NPCs are acting like they’ve heard of my fighting abilities.  Really?  They have sources in Cold Harbor that regularly report back to them?  First reaction?  They are in league with a Daedric Prince and I am OUTTA HERE.  Tried to find a way back to the starter island but no luck there.  I was under-geared and under-leveled for the area I was thrown into and I was dismayed.

I played through Cold Harbor three times since Friday morning and it hasn’t gotten any better.  Now I just rush through to get to the end of a dismal experience that isn’t immersive and isn’t worthy of being in an Elder Scrolls game.  I miss John Cleaves as Caldwell because I flat out don’t believe that Molag Bal has stolen my soul or that I am in any mortal or immortal danger.  I finish the Cold Harbor mess always under-geared and thrown into some random location not caring. 

Luckily, I know how incredibly good the game is but if I were a new player I would be done with the game after this experience.  I wouldn’t give it five more minutes of my time and I would tell everyone not to waste their time as well.  I get that the developers wanted to make skipping “starter” islands a possibility but they implemented that choice in the worse possible manner.  The story is no longer cohesive, immersive, and it makes no sense. Now it is just another random MMO in a sea drowning in random MMOs. 

The forums are filled with other players equally upset with the changes.  I’m praying the developers come to their collective senses in time to save the mess they have turned the game into. 

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