the good.
1. the graphics. stunning. from the smallest details like rings to the largets mountains and everything in between. this is as close to vertual reality as you can get on a monitor. they did a fantastic job with shading. they didnt miss a trick with motion either, even clothing wrinkles in the right places. the water looks fantastic. not to mention some of the best animated boobs you are ever going to see.
2. the melee classes. nice work. the blood spatter, the beheadings, and fight animations are unequaled in any game except DDO. DDO had the best combat engine i have ever played in any game. very intuitive. but AoC is certainly a step above the rest.
3. characters. see graphics. very well done.
4. the cities. very alive. tons of npcs and tons of quests in them.
the average.
1 the quests. same ole same ole. they are better than EQ1, EQ2, or vanguard because you can actually complete 90 percent of them without wasting hours begging for a group. but the quests themselves are not any better or any worse than anythign else out right now. the rewards are good, the xp is good, the story lines are good, but so are most of the rest.
2. game play. same ole same ole. whack-a-mole for levels and loot.
3. career advancement. think WoW. no better, no worse.
the bad.
1. characters. you play a human man or woman. end of story. the only choices you have are one of three nationalities. i understand the story line, but that doesnt make up for it being less fun than having many choices like most other games.
2. trade skills. seriously lacking. some ingrediants are not even in the game yet. but they are working on it i read.
3. a complete and total lack of "just for fun" stuff. no parties, no social gatherings, no gm sponsered events, nothing. if people wanted "serious" only in their games, we would all still be playing EQ1.
4. class diversity. there is none. the only differance between casters and melee is the melee classes get cool fighting animations while they spam their hot button bar, and casters only get differant color smoke animations while they spam their hot bar. the fighting is EXACTLY the same. spam your hot bar, ae spells first while you stand there taking a beating. ALL classes tank. warriors get armor, casters get buffs, but they all stand there taking a beating while spamming their hot buttons.
the ONLY thing saving it from being absolutly tedious is the short fights. unlike EQ2, and EQ1 and VG, the mobs dont have unreal hitpoints so it atleast doesnt feel like your standing there sawing wood. you dont need CC, and what CC you get is all but useless. root lasts like 5 or 6 seconds. and melee classes getAE taunts so you really dont need it anyway, especially since casters get buffs that let them tank as well as any melee class.
there are NO DEFINED class roles to play in a group other than healer and tank. there are no differances in fighting styles. pull, take a beating while spamming your hot bar buttons. the end. no stratagy other than try not to pull to many at once. all classes.
5. casters suck. thats the only word i have for them. you have damage spells, either one target or ae, you have buffs to let you tank, and you may have one root/fear/snare spell that lasts for such a short duration it is usually gone before you can get more than one spell off. you pull, you tank like a melee class, you spam your hotbar. and your trade off for not being a melee class? you dont get cool armor, you dont get cool weapons, you dont get cool fighting animations, you dont get cool abilities.
you get...squat. mabe a pet to beat on theri back while they beat on you, but other than that, nothing. they really had no clue as to how to make a caster fun to play. infact, only AC2 and LOTR did as bad or worse.
6. ONE STARTING AREA. yep, want to try a new class? mabe a new nationality? you get the exact same experience as the first time around. same place, same channel, same quests for the most part. yawn. absolutly no incentive to try something new other than you are board with what you already have. not only do you have no choice for races, the first 20 levels of any class/race are identical. even EQ2 gave you 2 starting areas at first.
my openion,
good starting platform to make a game from. as it is now, it is too one dimensional to hold peoples attention for any length of time even with the fantastic graphics. they need to add differant races, dwarfs in particular. they need to add some just for fun stuff. they need to develop the casters. i would say develop them better, but as it stands, they are not developed at all right now. they need to develop class diversity. for instance, the rogue, its justa melee class that gets a first strike attack. no locks to pick, no traps to even find much less disarm. no purpose.
play it till the wow from the graphics wears off or the boobs dont do it for you any more then come back in a year to see if they found a creative clue from someone other than their graphics department. its better than Vanguard because they understand forced grouping is dead. but all they have delivered to us other than boobs and fantastic graphics is whack-a-mole with quests. and ALL of them give us that.
loved it. time to go.