What needs to be fixed/addressed

This is a great game with lots of potential, but I feel that there are somethings that need be either changed or addressed. I know the game is not released yet, but it is important to address such things, so that members of the Ultima community do not become discouraged before the game is even released.

A fast travel map/system is great for a single player game, but it takes away from immersion in an online game. Running around on the fast travel map reminds me of Zelda II for Nintendo, you get pulled into an annoying fight while wandering around, and then simply just run out of the screen to get it over with. This is probably one of the worst ideas ever! Use something similar to recall runes/books and allow players to mark locations. Give mages the ability to open portals. It makes the game more realistic. Fast travel /maps does not work for a MMO. The instances really kill the immersion as well.....What next a dungeon finder menu like in WOW? Some people say they are necessary, but I find that to be a crappy excuse for poor development. With multiple shards/ servers, dungeon crowding should not be an issue. If there are multiple dungeons and they are setup with different levels you will never have a crowding issue. Plus, crowding isn't necessarily a bad thing......if you have that many players then you should have the funding to expand on the world. I realize that the fast travel map might be something that has been temporarily implemented to allow the game to function mechanically at this early stage. PLEASE ADDRESS WHETHER OR NOT THIS IS PERMANENT. Also, what of the instances? Will everything be instanced in the finished product? Can we expect to see an open world? Is this just another game with a leveling system? What happened to skills? I like the fact that weapons and armor do not have a required level for use, will this remain this way? If you look on steam you will notice that difficult games, zombie survival games like DayZ have become popular. This is because people are tired of easy, sugar coated games that are forgiving. I hope multiplayer online has some real teeth to it (If you die, you can lose all of your items on your corpse). We need victimization! I am on the fence when it comes to the combat system. I really don't know if I hate it or like it. It will require a lot more gameplay to determine if it is appropriate or not. Currently you cannot place items on the ground, will this change eventually?

I want you guys to realize that not a single UO player will play this game without an open world (no fast travel), or any of these instances. I guarantee you that is the biggest killer of all. Even if you left out the victimization you would still gain the large group of PVM players, but without making this change you will fail. In the end Shards Online will be more successful. And believe me I really hate to say that because in SotA the graphics, gameplay, and content so far have been spot on! Please don't let us down, this is your chance to redefine the genre when many have stopped playing MMO's.

 

You are seeing the evidence that this is not an MMO.
It has some MMO-like features.
The overworld map and instances are here to stay, assuming Portalarium doesn't change direction.
I don't foresee them changing direction.

Their intent is not to keep you playing continuously.
Their intent is to have you play Episode 1, and then go do something else until Episode 2 comes out.
Then play Episode 2, and then go do something else until Episode 3.
Wash, rinse, repeat.

 

The "Fast Travel" map is not exactly fast travel since you actually have to traverse the map to get to point A to B to C. This map is still work in progress, it was said that eventually you will be able to see the mobs roaming on the map and avoid them. Also you should be able to see other players traversing the map as well. Personally I like it and is a way to "connect" the world that would normally be separated by "zones" or "scenes"

Also, not sure what you mean when you say you don't agree with fast travel, but then suggest an actual fast travel mechanic like recall shards, portals.

I played UO, will play this game.

Even if say most of people that play/ have played UO don't play SoTA, there are actually other folks out there that play games too that would play SoTA. Let's say for some odd reason not a single UO player picks up SoTA, it can still be successful.

 

SotA is a Selective Multiplayer Game, not an MMORPG as you may know it.
You can play the game offline (or online) just like a single Player RPG.
You can play online with just a few friends visible or you can play in an open online mode with strangers visible.

There is a strong focus on telling an epic story. But you can also just live in the world as a crafter, hunter, explorer etc.

SotA is not UO and it is not UO 2.

Go, read through the Kickstarter page of the game if you want to know exactly how this game is planned:

https://www.kickstarter.com/project...-the-avatar-forsaken-virtues-0?ref=nav_search

 

Please do not assert your own motivations and desires as being representative of the whole. I'm an old UO player (98-2010) and I'm quite happy with the direction SotA is taking. I think that the easy teleport in UO ruined the sense of place and of distance. Furthermore, once the Overland map of Novia is introduced and it takes 20 minutes or more to get from one side to the other then the "immersion" of having to walk it at the scale of an instance will be, at the least, tedious.

I've no problem with you voicing an opinion, just don't go on about how it represents anyone but yourself. My opinion as a fellow UO player is almost diametrically opposed to yours.

edited for typos

 

Wow....I got bashed pretty quickly!

I did suggest recall runes/book/portals! It is not an open world, just a bunch of zones!

 

The one reason I got interested in this game was I thought it would feel a bit like UO I have never played a game since that was as exiting as UO with its red players/justice system the awesome crafting, open packs where you had to drag items from one backpack to another, there has not been a game like it since, ok maybe eve but that's a space based game. I am so tired of wow clones, I turned off the inventory list so I could get that UO feel (glad they gave me that option) the only sad thing is people using the inventory list can loot faster which is kind of unfair to those that don't use the list but oh well it gives the game a more realistic feel when using open packs. thank god there are no question marks, quest helpers ect. I wish they had opted for skill instead of the level system but its a better set up then wow due to players are on more equal footing even with the level's. I played ultima as well but I don't remember it as well as I do UO, My brother was always hogging the computer back then.

 

Firstly: No one bashed you. Unless you read the same counter arguments in gray and black that I did and take differing opinions and/or facts that run counter to your opinions as bashing...

...in which case, yes, I guess you were bashed.

Second, had Garth not beat me to it, I was going to make the same observation: You decry fast travel options, then propose fast travel options.

They already did. Yes, it is permanent... from day one of the Kickstarter:

As of now, not going to happen. Current thinking on this is that there will be no open loot, and opt-in PvP. No victimization... period.

 

Zarad,

I hear ya! It is good to know that there are people with similar views. I am going to continue to follow SotA, because I think that it will still be a good game, just not what I was expecting. I am putting my new hopes for what I was looking for in Shards Online.

 

Is there any public discussion of this? I understand that you believe that to be the intent (unstated reasons for your belief). Is this opinion or publicly disclosed intent on the part of Portalarium? I have a hard time believing Richard has this intent and an even harder time believing Dallas would be involved if that was the case.

 

Archibald,

I believe that his statement is probably accurate. I never noticed it before but the way that this game plays you could play it pretty easily on a mobile device. It is still both a single player and multiplayer game.

 

A couple of presentations made by Portalarium people at game conferences lead me to believe this is the case.
Here are slides from one Lum gave.
http://lumthemad.net/presentations/letitgo/
There's a video somewhere too.

I'd have to dig deeper to find (pretty sure it was Richard) the others I've watched.

 

so basically what your saying is that people paid 11 thousand dollars to play a single player game.......that is in no way gonna be an online thriving virtual world. wow

 

Well, yes. I paid $5K for 5 episodes of an RPG.
And I couldn't really give two hoots if one mode is a thriving almost-MMO.

 

its understandable Sir Frank and no one is faulting what a person spends or doesnt spend their money on, it is more of a disappointment towards the game in general from my point of view. I keep reading pre-alpha and hoping that means the issues are gonna change but apparently the issues are working as intended. which means this probably will not be a game I will play, so once again its back to the search mill hoping somewhere someday someone actually makes a modern Ultima Online

 

To be clear, the "Let It Go!" presentation Sir Frank linked was not made by Portalarium, but by myself in a personal capacity.

Ideally we will have a story (which for the most part will be single-player) which will take part in an online world. Stories by definition are not easily replayable, while online worlds have to be. The challenge is making the two co-exist.

There are also people who are more interested in one or the other and that's OK.

 

But we know it isn't true......I know I didn't pledge what I did for a single player experience. I see no evidence to suggest that I should view the game in any other form as an MMO, sure if people want to play single player they can call it single player. For me it's an MMO and I just see the words 'selective multiplayer' as a dumbing down of 'MMO' for marketing purposes geared to a particular audience.......for all intents and purposes, it's an MMO.

 

its not an MMO when its not intended to be massive in any way. they have a total of about 1000 house plots and many people have multiples, so that means they really didnt plan for SOTA to be a large scale game. which is rather unfortunate since thousands of UO players have been waiting 20 years for UO's successor

 

The main map hasn't launched yet; you can't judge your current housing experience based upon an Alpha release. Yes plots will be limited and when the game launches many players won't be able to place; that is in the design and is intended as it creates a housing market.

 

Have you read this on the Kickstarter page of SotA?
https://www.kickstarter.com/project...e-avatar-forsaken-virtues-0#project_faq_49469