Lord of the Rings Online

Anyone eager to play it?

My cheese was totally choked when I found out that it is designed with solo play in mind. I can't play a RPG unless it is solo play - I hate the team based ones (unless the team is NPCs).

I am quite excited at the prospect of losing myself into the world of Middle Earth night after night, month after month.

It appears that they are doing a one off payment of $100 for a life-time subscription - so I might grab one of those.

I never got to play the Beta - this turned out to be due to the fact that I somehow (probably their error) signed up to the US beta from a European site and thus didn't stand a 'Johnson of a sausage' chance of ever playing it - in fact, I was continually refused the beta. Much later I (not them) spotted the problem of them trying to sign me up for a US based beta. Anyway, mother has written a rather stern letter.

Anyways - I am quite looking forward to this little sausage being released. Apparantly, solo playing is tougher - but you can (apparantly) beef your character up and become well hard.

I've re-applied for the beta - considering they keep emailing me to do it - yet I haven't got my beta key yet. I'm not quite sure what kind of "Mickey Mouse" admin they have but I rather think they should be attending to me as a 'special case' requirement.

Where did you read that? I read it was $200, only available as a preorder and not available outside the US and Canada.

Their error - it is £99.99 (UK) for a Lifetime Membership.

The problem here is their constant belief that I am in the US.

It's starting to become most unfunny. I certainly hope there are no screw-ups when this thing goes live. Having said that, it is cheaper to pay in USD - so I rather hope they stiff me $99.99 USD.

Just be be clear - unless it is another of their continual screw-ups:

Spend time with a bunch of overanxious Tolkienphiles and their preciouses? No thank you.

True - which is why I am glad it supports solo play.

Been playing since closed beta, is loads of fun.

Its crap..

Played the beta for ages and I have to say that although the GFX Engine is far better than that of world of warcraft, its not a patch on it for Gameplay.

So if your only after visuals go for it, but if you want stylised visuals with game play then take wow.

Wonder when someone will make an MMO that doesn't completely rip WoW's interface...., or at least improve upon it.

Anyhow, aside from FFXI & WoW, I ain't touching any other MMOs, too much of a waste of my life, not to mention what FlameDuck mentioned...
(took 2½ years before new players started not naming themselves after Final Fantasy characters in FFXI...., only god knows how many Xxfrodoxx & SsjLegolas will appear on LoTR)

I played the beta too and felt that allthought I liked the single player aspect, it was overly simplistic. Go here talk to this person, go kill something there and come back to collect one of 3 choice items. Start over till you complete a sequence of 6-7 missions. Level up when you have enough experience and buy new skills.

Thats about all there is to it really. Graphics are quite nice though :)

@Puki
I signed up one and one half months ago and they haven't sent me anything besides links that say "Join the World Tour Now" and it ends up only leading me to screen shots and videos...
There's only 15 days left for the beta so we most likely won't be able to play for free :(

Played the beta and will give LotRO a try.

I think there are just two fantasy-games in the moment one could play.

LotRO is a casual game. You can get very far with few affort. Nice visuals, moderate hardware needs, nice to play for a few hours a week.

Vanguard is more complex in every aspect and completely different from LotRo. Better visuals, exorbitant hardware needs and very time comsuming. It's virtual work, like EVE is.

I'm waiting for Age of Conan. If they will fulfill 50% of the features they had promised it could become a great game.

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Heh, I didn't keep an eye on this one- The company I work for were supposed to fund them for the technology to run the online side but they weren't totally honest about their ownership rights- Funny story there- I was the one who realised and subsequently saved our company a whole crapload of cash- i'm talking something like £12m here.

I probably shouldn't go deeper into detail here really, so that's all I'm going to say- but it was a fun time at work!!!

Played the Beta too.

I'm gonna give up WoW for a while to play this.

It seems a perfect substitute to wean me off my WoW habit, it is much more casual and doesn't feel like the game only starts when you get to the end-game. (WoW players will understand what I mean here!)

@Bubble Boy

LOTRO beta finished last Sunday.....

From what I've seen and read, it's another joke of an MMORPG.

Any MMO with an "end game" is a seriously flawed design (yes, I've said this before, and I'll say it again ;P).

Static worlds - redundant quests...nothing dynamic or "world like" about these virtual worlds. Just another assembly line to grind your way through.

Bah.

@Bubble Boy

You can play for free until 24th April in the world tour, can get your key from Gamespot.com.

It is currently in Open Beta.

This game is heaps of fun, and really worth looking at.

It sickens me to the core of my very existence that I still get emails asking me to sign up for the Beta - I do the signing up bit and don't get a Beta key.

I was first invited into the Beta about a quarter of a year ago.

Well, it sickens me.

Having said that:



It sickens me to the very core of my existence that they took so long.

I'll take a long-shot bet here that I now need to spend hours downloading the thing onto my computer.

After all that the Codemasters site tells me I cannot access the Beta until the 14th April.

Well, I hope the maggot Beta key they just emailed me still works by then.

I mean really - what kind of "Mickey Mouse" outfit is this?

Sounds like you just answered your own question puki. Steer clear of it. I used to be a big fan of the leveling treadmill/camping genre but now it sickens me. It's hard to look back and realize how much time I wasted playing MMOs, running around with a sword trying to look cool. Ugh.

hahaha.. Legolas with big yellow hair shooting up into the air and lots of screaming. Awesome.


SOS, have you ever played Ultima Online? over 5 years ago it was almost a completely different game. It has gone through 'ages' and there are all the old items and artifacts from those times that people have hung onto. About once a year there is some kind of huge overhaul on the game. All the areas are the same, but sometimes they function differently (like when they made the moon gates into permanent portals)

It is aged, but I still say it is the best MMO out there. After something like 7 or 8 years... Maybe more, I can't recall.

@Markd, the key is to just dip your toe into it now and then. I'm a NWN2 fan myself - however I'd say I average maybe 1 hour a week on it.

Seen LOTR in Gamestation today for £1.99 - didn't bother getting it of the shelf to analyse what this granted you - what d'you reckon - a weeks worth of play ?

I actually had a dream that I wish I hadn't sold my EQ accounts. Then I woke up and was like "WTH screw that!". So glad I quit that game.

I still have a 70 HE cleric on an EQ server (mithaniel marr). How much is that worth?

No, I haven't. I was too into Gemstone when it was released to consider switching games. One of the things I regret for sure as the original design of Ultima Online was the closest thing to a real "game as world" environment that I've ever heard of.

They ruined a lot of things when they changed the moon gates into a transportation system. Prior, in order to get to some places, it was a real trek. You'd either have to go through ellaborate quests, or find a mage who had a rune and could make a gate for you.

When those mages became really common, they decided to overhaul the moongates. I can see why they did it, but it made it soooo easy to get anywhere. Additionally, they added a new player thing where monsters won't attack you unless you attack them first.. The result, was me going to the bottom of some of the hardest dungeons in the game uncontested.

That was a couple years ago, they might have fixed all that. It could be completely different now. When I left they were talking like the capitol city was going to be attacked by monsters. They did that once, where one of the major cities was over-run for a long time. Like a year.

Today is the day - isn't it?

Anyone Larging on the actual version of the game - anyone playing for real?

Any news?

Boris Yeltsin is dead.

that game sucks. hard. much like FFXI i just cant find any redeeming features. i cant even be bothered to make a constructive post, it just blows me away how void of fun it is

I was a beta tester and I agree with SilentAssaSIN.

I thought it was rubbish too. Just a bunch of triggers that addup to simple fetch item for blah blah, pick a prize and start over. Only there's about 20 other people doing the exact same quest in SP crowded around the quest items.

It gets dull very quickly despite having fairly nice graphics. Way too simple a game.

I tried the preorder last week. It's good, but just not good enough. For the ex-WoW'ers it's just "been there, done that".

The landscape is very nice though.