Whats left? -rant-

[L0RDTemplar]

For every game you play, there has to be some driving force to keep you playing. This can be achieved in many ways. Take a game like Half-life, Mod's and the like, new maps, they keep coming, allways something new. Diablo II has the adiction with rewards. You get rewarded new spells, new stats, and a very, very wide variety of items. Random maps, and a large landscape. These things keep you playing, and they are neccesary for most online games.

Unfortunalty, I fail to see a reason to keep playing PSO. It's allways going to be the same 4 levels, the same skills, the same char types. And as for items in PSO, they might have been the reason.

And where there is a solution, there is a large problem just around the corner. This time it takes the form of duping ass holes, that fail to realize they are killing the game for more than just themselves. Items have become useless, piles of trash. A stag cutlery or soniti mag is about the equivelant of finding a blade of grass on your lawn.

Oh, but wait, there may have been some hope. Sega fixing the servers in their own way to prevent this. But not only is it literally impossible to prevent cheaters without server-side saving, but they fail to prevent duping, and piss honest players off in the midst. Nice job flipping everyone off sega, but I don't blame sega. They are trying as best as they can.

So this week, I tryed to play PSO, but there was no reason. I don't play with normal people, only freinds. And I ended going back to DII. A game I have had since the begining of last summer, and it still has that driving urge.

In a mer 8 days, I got my lvl 1 paladin to lvl 50. Now thats something special, for a game to keep me that long.

I guess the point is that PSO has failed to keep me going. I dont want to return the game to the store, the people that made it did a good job, and deserve it. But the game just feels so empty.

I just want to ask everyone "whats left?" why the hell should I keep playing? The stupid ass dupers? The same damn levels? The millions of varsitas? The fear of item drop? what?

I'd also like to end this with a thought on dupers and the like. Cheaters and Piraters alike, you ruin what you claim to be a hobby. You are fake and I hope you get hit by a car with rusty jagged parts when your walking down the street with your burnt Limp Bizkit CD, thinking about that new Egg blaster you ripped off. F*CK YOU. You have single handedly ruined this game, and others.

"Whats left?"

<font size=1>[ This message was edited by: L0RDTemplar on 2001-03-11 02:07 ]</font>

[L0RDTemplar]

best part about this post is it'll be buried and dead in a day with the rate this forum is going. Could we possibly not make the same post 10 times a day?

[Azel]

Just out of interest, with Diablo 2, do you pay a monthly subscription? Or is it free (excluding your net access)?

It's just, I love PSO, but I quite liked Ultima Online too, but for UO you had to pay $10 a month - is it the same for Diablo? I don't really mind, but it makes the difference between just buying a game and playing it (maybe like PSO) and wanting to 'stick with it' cause you're paying a subscription.

Hmm... PSO better be sorted with the duping, and get more levels (and maybe characters) or else it WILL die... oh well, there's always PSO2 - hopefully that will have PSO's graphics, but Ultima Online's options and 'persistant world' features. http://www.pso-world.com/images/phpbb/icons/icon_smile.gif

[Lord_Ariakas]

Diablo II is completely free to play online. But you have to put up with extremely laggy conditions during peak times.

[L0RDTemplar]

DII has the largest gaming service (Battle.net) and it's free. No payment beside what you dish out at the counter. And to top it off, there chars are stored server side, so there is NO duping on realms.

[Lord_Ariakas]

Templar, if you want to enjoy playing PSO find some people you like to play with(that don't cheat) and play passworded games with only those players. Most of the people that frequent this board are good people and NOT cheaters. I'm also sick of entering open games on oberon and finding that everyone is using a spread needle. You have to realize that most of these dupers and cheaters are 12 year old kids and don't give a rats ass about game balance....they just want to look cool. The cheaters and dupers that don't have the excuse of being immature....well those ppl are just plain sad.

<font size=1>[ This message was edited by: Lord_Ariakas on 2001-03-11 02:57 ]</font>

[L0RDTemplar]

I want to stress that this is a PSO topic, not DII for anyone that will be posting. Msg me if you want DII info.

And thats true Ariakas, but the thing is. I like being able to play wiht new people. I like showing off my items. I like trading for something cool.
Most people I really enjoy playing with, arent just noraml people on these boards. They have to have that unique touch that makes me smile. And to top iit off, most of these people are busy. At this point I'm only playing wiht only 1 person, and that is during his 20 minute lunch break.
Duping sucks, and it's no justified. I want the freedom

[Azel]

Hmmm.... PSO just managed to replace my HalfLife:Counterstrike addiction. (which initially replaced my short-Ultima Online addiction). I think Diablo 2 might be just the thing to replace my PSO addiction once I've played it through. (Though, Diablos graphics do look lame... and i guess it's not a persistant online world like UO).

Thing is, PSO will be good till I reach level 100 (currently level 38, been playing for two weeks). And then I might start a second character maybe... and go search for rares that i might never find.... but after that, what is there? There's hardly any new quests, or items (well... a few) or STORY... so what is there?

It kinda reminds me of a 4 player online ZELDA 64, but with character development, and less plot... I'd kinda prefer a persistant, developing online world, or else, just a BIG STORY, either online or off.

[myau1]

Duppers or not PSO is boring. I had fun with it until I beat it on hard. Then the run through very hard was a drag! Same levels, same enimies same ending. Even playing online is gotten to be boring. It's stil the same online as it is off. If I want to talk to my friends well go out to dinner not log onto pso. I really enjoyed this game in the begging, but now that I finally got Skies of Arcadia, I havnt picked up PSO in about a week! I prefer a REAL RPG not a repetive adventure game with a lengenday title slapped on the case!

[L0RDTemplar]

Thing is, PSO will be good till I reach level 100 (currently level 38, been playing for two weeks). And then I might start a second character maybe... and go search for rares that i might never find.... but after that, what is there? There's hardly any new quests, or items (well... a few) or STORY... so what is there?


You say that now, but realize there is little diffrence from normla-hard-vhard. I have a lvl 80 char, and no desire to make another. What do you get from starting a new one? Some spells that have a very badly handeled hotkey system for spells? The choice of using a dagger that will get you killed quick? A shotgun that can be imitated by a needle spread, which are handed out in bucket loads by 13 year old morons?

What is it that you are looking for?

[Sheogorath]

Well, PSO isn't the problem, it's your back luck, LT, thats your problem. I "Quit" PSO the start of last week. I swore it off, the very same things that got your ire up happened to chase me out as well.

But then, I thought, what do I run to?

Diablo 2? Me and my friends bought that on launch day, played for a month, got to around level 80, and ditched it. The intelligence level of the people in chat left much to be desired, and the realms were so pathetically lagged that the only time we could play was 4AM on a weekday.

Everquest perhaps? Thats a power-gamers paradise. No RPing going on there. I remember in the beta for EQ, the Fenin Ro server was designated as the "In character" server, but once me and my Beta friends got into the retail game, Fenin Ro was about as "RP Freindly" as PSO's Oberon, block-1!!!

Ultima Online? If you want to be PK'ed, sure.

A MUD (Like Illusia, which I enjoyed...for awhile) Too many "Cliques" can't make friends unless you brown-nose.

So I ended up joining PSO world this week, and thanks to this place, have 10 new people on my card list. Let's hope they stick around longer then the 35 people I just deleted because they are never on. http://www.pso-world.com/images/phpbb/icons/icon_frown.gif

It's all about how "lucky" you are with finding buds in a game. You have peeps you play with in Diablo 2, cool. I do not. I only ever found p0rn-peddlers and psychos.

PSO may be very boring, but when you have 3 guys behind you who make you laugh your butt off every 3 seconds, the game takes on a whole new life.

[Lord_Ariakas]

When you make a new character, especially a different class, you have the experience of a different playing style, an opportunity to create a new mag, and the chance to find different rares(maybe). If you want to keep the game interesting make new characters, if your not finding anything interesting with your lvl 100 character, delete his/her sorry ass and start over again. I know that you probably spent a lot of time on that character but if your not have fun and not finding items I'd say that character is dead.

As a side note: If you ppl really want to play good RPGs play the Baldurs Gate Series and Icewind Dale on the PC.

[L0RDTemplar]

Yes, DII is a hassle. Luckly I have a really cool person that is on most of the day, and whom I'm talking to right now, to play with. The other people in DII are simple mobs of exp flesh.

But as for PSO. You may have some freinds on there to talk to, but is it really that fun? Arent you getting a bit sick of the same stupid crap over and over?

Whats left for me? I'm accualy catching up in the PC game area. Giants:Citizen Kabuto, No one lives forever, Sheep, and GBA laucnh are the waves I'm riding. And in truth, they are much funner then the caves level in PSO will ever be.

[Marlboro]

Well PSO burnout hasn't caught up with me yet. Then again I cruising through worrying about having fun with all the people I've met here and elsewhere over the other stuff. Personally I got UT preordered so I'll be pulling out the Panther DC and playing frag-a-thon for awhile when it's released.

I'm still gonna play but I'm taking my time and wondering if there really gonna put out a exspasion disk.

But till then it'll be headshot time for the most part.

[Sheogorath]

I can understand what you are saying, LT, since I am, first and foremost, a PC Gamer myself. (If you play BG2 or ICewind Dale online, you might have seen Gildiss, thats me on Gamespy/mplayer)

Unfortunately, the PC Gaming scene right now is dead. All the good RPGs are OLD (Icewind dale..beat it 3 times, beat BG2 4 times) and the good RPGs for the PC wont be out until summer (Arcanum, POR2, Anachronox)

So i've been depending soley on console RPGs for my daily fix. It's so bad I bought Paper MArio for the N64. (Yes, THAT bad!!)

As for the question, "Doesn't the same old crap get old after awhile?" Well LORDTemplar, lemme tell ya friend, what makes the game for me is the human interaction.

Diablo 2 is no different then PSO. Heck, I thought D2 was boring as all heck. My level 80 Barb has a 2-handed sword in each hand, and doesn't even have to worry about skills or technique. I just walk around with the left mouse button held down. Whack..Whack..whack..dead. PSO and Diablo are cut from the same mold. I'm NOT dissing you or your passion for it, but just pointing out how similiar the games are. I thought d2 was even more repetitive. At least PSO has..ummm..light switches. LOL Ok, maybe not.

Though I will agree, PC RPGs are vastly superior. (No flames please, just an opinion)

A government conspiracy? Wait, you mean that a country that had a spy in the FBI for 15 years can hide an alien in a mountainside? Yeah, right?

-DocSavage, #cosmic-fantasy-fans

<font size=1>[ This message was edited by: Sheogorath on 2001-03-11 04:07 ]</font>

[Lord_Ariakas]

Have you tried the Heart of Winter Expansion of IceWind Dale, Sheo? Its a good(if short) addition...adds a lot of new items and makes some battles thru out the original game way more difficult. Plus the 800x600 resolution looks awesome...almost better than BG2.

[Sheogorath]

Oh god, don't mention heart of winter. http://www.pso-world.com/images/phpbb/icons/icon_smile.gif

That was a big mistake. LEt's see, I take my party of six level 12 Adventurers into the expansion area at 6PM on a Saturday evening...

My Group slays the pathetically weak White Wyrm at the end of the third mini-dungeon 4 hours later at 10PM.

Of course, the folks at the HOW boards told me I had to go through the WHOLE game again to see the new changes, such as new weapons in Kuldahar, and a tougher Belhifet.

But what I wanted was a Tales of the sword coast style expansion..you know..something with some substance. (And difficulty)

The black Dragon in BG2 was a god compared to Icasracht in HOW.

Then again, Black Isle has been known to...well...drop the ball in their games.

(Descent to undermountain, fallout 2...)

Im sorry, I had to say it http://www.pso-world.com/images/phpbb/icons/icon_smile.gif

[Lord_Ariakas]

Actually Belhifet is still quite weak. He just gains two more demon type body guards(which i just resiliant sphered neway, after demolishing the iron golems). And all the badge boss' gain new friends and some of them are tough. The white wrym is a complete push over....I found the hardest part of the expansion was burial isle....those drowned dead destroyed my fairly weak party.

[Azel]

ultima online with PSO's lush graphics and ease of use and gameplay....

thats what i want! pleaseeeeeeeeee!

[Sheogorath]

Thats the beauty of the AD&D games. There is always some way to hopelessly exploit the game in a legal fashion to make everything easy.

Like The Irenicus/slayer fight in BG2. My strategy is simple:

Imoen: Summon nishruu (Eats up his spells, and he wastes his spellbook reserves on the immune nishru)

Summon some monster fodder to sop up the rest of his spells, and then enter the black, fogged-off area with a haste spell. Piece of cake.

One thing I did notice about HOW:

Did you ever find Mithril Field Plate Armor? In the earlier version of IWD, Mithral Field plate was considered non-magical, and you could wear rings or cloaks of Protection with them.

However, My Paladin (Fear not, Mostef) died during the sahaugin fight before icasracht's chamber, and when I Res'd him, I found out that he could no longer equip the ring with the Mithral Armor on.

I noticed that my Dwarf Gildiss, once he took his Ring of Prot. +2 off, he couldnt put it back on either. (Unless I took off my Mithral field plate)

JMy point? Don't take off your rings of Prot if you are wearing mithral plates.

God, this isn't an AD&D site, if I keep this up, I'll get banned. http://www.pso-world.com/images/phpbb/icons/icon_smile.gif

Night All, I'm gone.

[Bman]

I understand and sympathize with your burnout. After I hit level 100, I quickly stopped having any desire to play PSO. Items don't interest me, nor do the other character classes. And I'm sick of the "we don't know how to write save game code" Sword of Damocles hanging over my head all the time. I hardly visit this site any more. I think I've spent about 10 minutes playing PSO all week.

More than anything else, I really miss Asheron's Call these days. It was repetitive too, but not nearly as much as PSO. The world was much larger and more engaging, and the chat interface was better. PSO does best AC in serveral areas, but none of them are the kind of things that provide lasting interest.

I quit playing AC around June last year, but only because I was angry at myself for playing so much, not because I didn't still enjoy it. In retrospect, however, that was a misguided decision. I spent just as much time playing games before AC and after; I just played different games. At least when I was playing AC, I was interacting with other people in some way. (Think of it as a glitzy IRC client if you must.) Playing games alone - even great ones - sucks after a while.

When I finally get another PC, I'm going to strongly consider going back.

[Azel]

ooh... isn't asherons call abit like ultima online? but 3D.

Does it need a good graphics card? As I've got an 800Mhz P3 LAPTOP -Which is fast, BUT has a CRAP 3D graphics card (well... not that crap - it's 8mb, and can handle half life brilliantly)... will asherons call run well on my system?

And is it a persistant online world, like UO?

[Bman]

Yeah, I guess you could say AC is like UO, though the games play very differently. The biggest similarity between them is that they are both persistent worlds.

AC has a software renderer, so even a totally unaccelerated PC can run it. An 800 MHz P3 should run it great. I used to play it on a P1/166 (stop laughing) with a Voodoo2 card. It was a little chunky on framerates, but mostly fine.

I should be getting a new PC (laptop) in the next week or so. I think it has an ATI chip in there for 3D, but if it supports D3D, maybe AC will run accelerated on it.

If you want more information on AC, have a look at http://cod.xrgaming.net/.

[pcmorris]

Haven't played Ulltima Onlinebut if you're persistantly PK in that, I'm glad I havent, as from playing AC, I notice that anyone who's ever been a PK has also had an ego too big for his britches.

AC you have a choice of being a PK or remaining an NPK (only things that can kill you are monsters or the ground if you hit it hard enough). Balance issues plague the game no matter where you go, and they are long settled in issues. It has come to the point where if you're not a specific kind of character, you have little lasting potential with said char (it's kinda like your standard HUmar in PSO, just remove the attack spells).

Personally, I'm waiting for AC2 to come out just to see if it'll be good at all (or even a consious step forward in game making for Turbine). Of course, I can aaaaalllllmost bet that it isn't gonna come out for another year.

PSO is a nice timesink for me basically. Gotta put that free time somewhere (just don't have enough of it most of the time to finish up a full run through one of the modes). As I've said quite a few times, I've got 3 characters going at once. Purposely I've been raising them at the same pace within the same timeframe. I like a challenge and always find some kind of challenge any way I can, be it finding multiple mags to raise in different ways (my HUmar just finished his Dex mag, which is now a Garuda, and I have at least 3 more mags on him to raise however I see fit). I plan on working on a mag on my FOnewm that has nothing aside defense and mind built up (of course, I have to try passing the mag off to a FOmarl I made for the specific purpose of raising mags, I can't buy any monofluids with Verge...)

ugh, there I go ranting again (the trains are following each other too tightly).

Essentially what I'm saying is: If a game won't make any challenges for you, you have to make your own challenges.

The game will probably get boring for me when I've hit lvl 100 and all of the mags I have been raising have all hit lvl 200.

[L0RDTemplar]

The PC market is only dead for those who choose to believe that. RPG's are spare, sure, but there have been some great game coming out, and they arent getting the attension they deserve. WE keep going into this and I'll be making a list http://www.pso-world.com/images/phpbb/icons/icon_wink.gif

Whats left for PSO? nothing. What left for me on Dreamcast is Fur Fighters, Rayman2, and breif Samba.

For PC, I also have games on the back burner. I plan to get a nice new comp this september, to replace this P333. Worms, Icewind dale, Earth2150, Fallout 1&2. All game I own, but havent played enough.

DiabloII being more repetitive than PSO? You get to try new spells, tons of new equipment, new randomly generated maps, more enemy types, more towns. I'd say it's just far larger in general.

I also think that the fact I'm conecting on a 56k modemn, compared to my usual cable, also turns me off. And that in order to use the higher speed, I have to buy a 60 dollar attachment that lacks support, and most litkyl wont even work.

[Ambrai]

www.artifact-entertainment.com/horizons/ (http://www.artifact-entertainment.com/horizons/)

This is the game I am waiting for. It has ALOT of potential compared to the other games that are on the way.

The one Dark Ages of Camelot game that is on the way shortly also has potential but I am not to sure about it since I havent read that much.

This is what I play on my PC.

Diablo 2
Unreal Tourney
Just bought Quake 3 but I am very dissapointed in it.
Baulders Gate
Alice
Sacrifice
Rune

[L0RDTemplar]

I'd be playing sacrafice if my comp could handle it decently...

Well, seems like this thread has just about breathed it's last breath. We did, however, acomplish something. We have answered the question with the answer "nothing". Nothing is left in PSO, Sega cannot combat the duping, the levels are always going to be the same, and anyone I enjoy playing with I have ICQ or AIM address's for. Enjoy your time with the game, when you still find joy in it.

Yep, wont be long now.....

[Mrgrfx]

You play the game because it is fun. What defines fun is different for everyone. If you are tired of searching for Rares, or have no interest, then "nothing" is the answer. However, there are those out there that just love the game, I am a huge critic of this game. C'mon enemy variation is not here, you don't actually see anything truly cool until you get to the ruins (dragons, mantis, robots are exceptions) but for the most part the enemies are the same body with different tectures. The game has almost no story, and no variation.

So why does anyone play it? It is fun. . . for now.

[jett862]

Im only level 48 and PSO is losing interest... fast. I think the only game id be addicted to (if they made it) would be suikoden online (suikoden one and two are the best games ever and jsut think with online play... WOW) http://www.pso-world.com/images/phpbb/icons/icon_smile.gif