Guarding Vans... again!

It's no good... I gave in.

And now SOE have decided to raise the cost of Station Access, it's a good idea (cause I'd be paying for it anyway).

I bought Vanguard...

I know, I know... anyone who played on beta (or heard me complain about it) will be saying "Why?!?" but the truth of the matter is... it's actually quite good.

Well... it's better than it was on beta anyway. There are still a lot of rough edges and bugs, but you can see the potential, understand why they have created it. And when it's working as it should... it will be great!

So far I have yet to see a player's house or boat... but I'm sure it won't be too long (I know there are some out there from the Vanguard forums). I've already got my first horse at level 10 and it makes a fantastic difference because the world is HUGE. This obviously has it's pros and cons. It's great that there is so much space and so many places to go... but it's a pain that it can take (what seems like) forever to get there. Despite original claims that there would be no instant travel facility, they have caved-in to public opinion and now added this to several main areas (so I'm told).

The combat is pretty standard for this sort of MMO with the addition of special attacks and counter-attacks (which flash up when they are available). This makes it immediately accessible to anyone who's played an MMO before but also adds a little extra. And it's quite impressive to watch some of the more martial-arts based combat; my main character is a bladed-staff wielding Dark-Elf Disciple who seems to spend a lot of time spinning the staff around his head in a threatening manner that would give even the most hardened Health and Safety Inspector a heart-attack.

The crafting, on the other hand, is quite unusual in that it is turn-based and requires a little planning and thought to be able to successful product of any real quality. Each item, whether it's refining some raw material or creating a final product, go through four main phases. Each phase requires you to take several steps to increase the quality and/or progress of the crafting. Each of these steps will cost action points of which you only get a certain number (2000 to be precise) for each crafting session. Depending on the difficulty of the item you are crafting you'll find that you'll get a few 'complications' along the way that can change the effectiveness, quality or progress of your crafting... it can get quite complex and, for the first time crafter, seem quite daunting. Personally I've grown to like it... it's not quite as 'laid back' as the EQ2 twitch-crafting and far more involving that the casual instant-crafting of something like WoW.

All in all, it's a strange beast. Most of the people I'm spoken to have got some thing to complain about but, at the same time, something they REALLY like about it... and they're enjoying it.

Personally I like the fact that it's like EQ1... I don't necessarily like having everything handed to me on a plate like some of the 'current generation' MMOs. I was a little disappointed to see some really quite unforgiving reviews being given. PC Zone in particular gave it just 45 and from what they had written, it sounded like they'd only been playing the beta. On top of that, the general comments gave away the fact that they are quite obviously big fans of WoW and I couldn't help feeling that it was clouding their judgement unfairly (read it for yourself and by all means tell me I'm wrong). Perhaps some people have forgotten that these games are supposed to be RPGs... that's Role Playing Games. Not PvP perfect 'build' raid-a-thons. WoW is popular... and that's very different from being the best. I've got a WoW account (check out my character from the link on the right of my page) but because I wasn't really interested in the race to the end game, it proved quite boring. The graphics are cartoon-like and blocky, the mechanics all a bit 'Fisher Price' and the community is spoilt by childish 'duel me cause I'm 10+ levels higher than you' idiots (a bit like most non-clan Counter-Strike Source servers). But then I've said this all before...

There is a need for a decent MMORPG at the moment... something that really gets people excited. This isn't it... but it fills a hole.

We'll see what comes of the other new contenders this year... we may even see a return for one of the original heroes of MMORPGs, Ultima Online, as it hits it's 10th anniversary and a promise of something special.

At the end of the day, there's a lot going on and, in my opinion, it can only lead to bigger and better things...