Entry tags:
Fun in 60 seconds.
I've had a chance to try out not one but two trials for World of Warcraft, by the nudgings of several friends who want me to buy the game and join them on raids and all that. The problem being that my MMO heart belongs to another: City of Heroes. They've been trying their best to woo me away, but it's not happening.
It took me a while to figure out why, though -- World of Warcraft is indeed a quality game, with great graphics, history, and personality, and most of all plenty to do. But what it comes down to is the fun factor. How fast can I go from 0 to fun? I'm paying for my time; I should not be delayed in my effort to play. And WoW throws too many obstacles in my path that CoH bypasses neatly:
- A level 1 CoH hero can cross most zones in less than eight minutes with Sprint on. Once he gets his travel power at level 14, cut that to two minutes, and add the ability to get to most zones in less than ten minutes. And cell phones mean frequently you don't even have to return to your contact. So basically you can get wherever you want in 5 to 15 minutes, usually closer to 5. But a WoW character doesn't get a mount until level 40; until then, crossing a single zone can easily take 15 minutes or more, and a griffin ride from one zone to another can take so long I have literally made myself dinner while waiting to get to my destination.
- A WoW character must gather weapons, helmets, chest armor, boots, wristbands, gloves, cloaks, and ammo to be effective. He must gather ore from mining or leather scraps from beasts and combine them with purchased goods to create useful equipment (but only if you've learned how to make that particular item!), or he can hope that a quest gives something he needs as a reward. A CoH hero gets enhancements as regular drops or direct purchases, pops them to a power of choice, and is set; anything else comes automatically with leveling.
- A CoH hero manages enhancements in one inventory and inspirations in another. Mission-related items and single-shot bonus powers take no space whatsoever, and due to the aforementioned speed of travel, selling after each mission is a breeze, so inventory management is minimal. Meanwhile, a WoW character is constantly juggling quest items, equipment, equipment components, ammunition and single-shot items, and several flavors of boosters, such that buying inventory expansions becomes mandatory in a hurry.
Most important (to me) is combat. Put one character in WoW up against two critters his own level and he's got a definite challenge ahead of him; add a third and he'd better be a fast runner. Now toss a CoH hero into three-on-one odds... for most hero archetypes at most levels, those three are all toast. Why? He's a hero; heroes should be able to wade through small armies and come out smiling. Whereas in all the Warcraft games, one orc grunt and one human footman have always been about an even match, and WoW reflects that. This is just a different style of play -- it's also notable that taking on just one target in CoH is impossible in most cases due to the way they group, so you wind up with about the same level of challenge. But it's a style of play I prefer. I like the frenetic combat that results from being surrounded, loads more than the slow grind of pull one guy, kill him, pull another, kill him, rest, pull another... And if I ever find CoH just too easy, and decide I should only be able to take one-on-one odds, then I can crank up my difficulty and all my mission opponents adjust accordingly. But for now, I'm happy to be able to say, "Hmm, six of them, one of me. This will be a bit of a challenge..."
It took me a while to figure out why, though -- World of Warcraft is indeed a quality game, with great graphics, history, and personality, and most of all plenty to do. But what it comes down to is the fun factor. How fast can I go from 0 to fun? I'm paying for my time; I should not be delayed in my effort to play. And WoW throws too many obstacles in my path that CoH bypasses neatly:
- A level 1 CoH hero can cross most zones in less than eight minutes with Sprint on. Once he gets his travel power at level 14, cut that to two minutes, and add the ability to get to most zones in less than ten minutes. And cell phones mean frequently you don't even have to return to your contact. So basically you can get wherever you want in 5 to 15 minutes, usually closer to 5. But a WoW character doesn't get a mount until level 40; until then, crossing a single zone can easily take 15 minutes or more, and a griffin ride from one zone to another can take so long I have literally made myself dinner while waiting to get to my destination.
- A WoW character must gather weapons, helmets, chest armor, boots, wristbands, gloves, cloaks, and ammo to be effective. He must gather ore from mining or leather scraps from beasts and combine them with purchased goods to create useful equipment (but only if you've learned how to make that particular item!), or he can hope that a quest gives something he needs as a reward. A CoH hero gets enhancements as regular drops or direct purchases, pops them to a power of choice, and is set; anything else comes automatically with leveling.
- A CoH hero manages enhancements in one inventory and inspirations in another. Mission-related items and single-shot bonus powers take no space whatsoever, and due to the aforementioned speed of travel, selling after each mission is a breeze, so inventory management is minimal. Meanwhile, a WoW character is constantly juggling quest items, equipment, equipment components, ammunition and single-shot items, and several flavors of boosters, such that buying inventory expansions becomes mandatory in a hurry.
Most important (to me) is combat. Put one character in WoW up against two critters his own level and he's got a definite challenge ahead of him; add a third and he'd better be a fast runner. Now toss a CoH hero into three-on-one odds... for most hero archetypes at most levels, those three are all toast. Why? He's a hero; heroes should be able to wade through small armies and come out smiling. Whereas in all the Warcraft games, one orc grunt and one human footman have always been about an even match, and WoW reflects that. This is just a different style of play -- it's also notable that taking on just one target in CoH is impossible in most cases due to the way they group, so you wind up with about the same level of challenge. But it's a style of play I prefer. I like the frenetic combat that results from being surrounded, loads more than the slow grind of pull one guy, kill him, pull another, kill him, rest, pull another... And if I ever find CoH just too easy, and decide I should only be able to take one-on-one odds, then I can crank up my difficulty and all my mission opponents adjust accordingly. But for now, I'm happy to be able to say, "Hmm, six of them, one of me. This will be a bit of a challenge..."
