Well, I guess my first blog. As far as my FPS gaming goes, I started
with Quakeworld aka Q1 some years ago. We all rushed out to get the
Voodoo 4MB 3D card im sure, and I even bought a second back then to put
in SLI mode. I graduated to Quake 2 when it released, and wound up
playing Matchmod Railgun wars for many years until its untimely demise
when UT came out. I never played any other FPS shooters besides these
two titles, with the exception of very minor stints in ROTT, and UT.
As
far as Counterstrike goes, I never played any version prior to Source.
I started Source in December of 2005, playing in a few clans to start,
and I even joined one Cal-O team to see what regulated competition was
like. I grew very tired of being in a clan however, as most of the
members tended to be teenagers, and well, being in my 30's, I didn't
mesh well with that mentality. I wouldn't mind being a part of a
community such as Spawnpoint ( PHXX ), as im learning that this
community is much more than just a Counterstrike clan. As well, most of
its members are most in my age range, which is a plus.
As an
administrator for a few Spawnpoint servers, I try to be fair as
possible, and recognize the fact that most of the people who inhabit
the servers are teenagers, and to give them a bit of slack. Mostly, I
just wanted to be able to get rid of those who are causing a huge
detriment to our supposedly fun gaming time, whether it be a hacker,
mic spammer, or racist/explicit language violators. Other than that,
you can find me on, silent mostly, trying to concentrate on doing well.
Titan
Greetings. The following is a review of TOP for those interested in trying it.
I will start off with the community. There is a very diverse population within the game itself. I had run into folks speaking in languages that ranged from Chinese, Japanese, Italian, Spanish, Russian and German. I would like to say that the community was helpful and considerate, but alas, it was just the opposite. Alot of kill stealing, thievery and the like take place in Ascaron. It was rare that I truly came across someone who was overly helpful.
Character movement was a pain, because this title employs the point and click method of movement. Very often, my character would get stuck or snagged on the corner of a building, steps, a twig, or an ant, and get warped back 20 feet or so. This caused me more than a few deaths out in the wild. As well, none of the other keyboard commands can be re-mapped on your keyboard. Their concept is that its "my way or the highway". Still however, after awhile, I got used to the movement a bit.
The world itself was nice, although not immense. The scenery accurately reflected the regions it tried to depict. I got a chance to teleport to most of the areas, not including the treasure islands themselves. Travel between the main areas was provided via a teleporter in each town, or the usage of "tickets", which when double clicked, would teleport you to the city notated on the ticket itself.
The quest system is the same old tired routine we see in every other MMO. Collect 10 wolf tails, bring to quest giver. Kill 10 of these, and 5 of those. This system is really to be expected in most MMORPGs however. Quest experience was rather dismal compared to the experience totals that could be gained soloing. Occasionally, a quest would give a nice item reward, but that item was easily replaced most of the time by visiting the vendor. I didn't get much into socketing armor or weaponry, as I wasn't high enough level to obtain the gems via hunting/questing.
The classes were pretty standard overall. You had two different type of melees, healers, and mages. Points are distributed amongst the main attributes such as strength, agility, constitution, accuracy and the like. A decent array of customization is possible, as stat points are awarded every level, and 5 on every tenth level. You are also given skill points, which can be used on various skills, unique to each class chosen at level 9. Each skill is raiseable up to level 10, some requiring prerequisite skills to be raised first for usage.
Leveling was fairly easy up to level 40, as I did most of it solo. I simply found the monsters within my level range that provided the least amount of danger for the experience given. Certain classes can level faster than other obviously, as is common in most MMO's. Grouping became a problem as the language barrier prevented alot of interaction mostly. There certainly were people who spoke english, but finding one around your level who was willing to party seemed a tad rare. I played an Herbalist to 20, and a Swordsman to 40. Both classes were fun and presented challenges unique to each class. Hunting in the ocean on a boat was pretty fun, although easier to level for nuker classes than others.
The reward system was decent as well. The weapon/armors available were very common and cookie cutter mostly, at each level range, people who shared classes were using the same exact weapon as the next person. Once you get to higher levels, everyone is shooting for the same armor set mostly, and socketing them with various upgrade gems according to their liking. Most of the higher level people walked around looking the same exact per class. There are some rare drops available on *all* mobs, so making money comes pretty easily if you know which mobs to hunt.
Once obtaining scores of rare and magical loot ( lol ), you can setup a stall, if you purchased the "life skill" for it. This stall is just like a public auction house, or rather, more of a "yard sale" setup. You can decide what prices you want for which items, and go to work, or sleep, while your "shop" stays up and running, and people can purchase items from you while you are away from your computer.
The one biggest glaring issue this game had, was the botters. Several people were using third party programs to hunt in the wild while away from their computers. In these areas that are needed to be accessed by the average players, you had level 60 and 70 bots area of effect killing and looting everything in site automatically. I found that certain quests and quest items were a pain to get simply because 5-7 bots were strategically planted in big spawn areas, instantly killing everything as it spawned. The company claims to ban/eliminate the accounts, but I saw the same bots gathering rares/loot for 6 days in a row. I deleted the game today, as trying to beat out some of these bots, just to *complete* my quests was very frustrating.
Also, there was no mailbox or transfer system. Everything transfered had to be done using another person, which led to alot of stealing, and untrusting scenarios, based on my impression from general chat. There is no language filter, so I saw and heard every word in the book being used to exchange insults between players who shared a dislike for one another.
All in all, I give the game a decent rating and worth a shot to try out for anyone who may be interested. The download and account are free, so there is no investment lost should you decide to move on from the game, much as I have.
Titan
