Welcome t’ today’s Bookahneer’s Geekwatch! Th’ place about miscellaneous interestin’ news related t’ Guild Wars 2 – an’ on occasion, other games.
This time, we be havin’ a slightly different Bookahneer’s Geekwatch. ‘t does, fer once, nay focus on Guild Wars 2.
I have to admit that I have not been paying too much attention to the gaming world outside of Guild Wars 2 in the last few weeks as I usually do, but a few things did catch my attention and I did look at those games more closely. As much as I would love to be a one-game-woman, I am not. ;) I like getting into other games every now and then for a change of scenery. Right now, I am very much looking forward to Torchlight 2. It releases tomorrow! According to a forum post, they are aiming for a release at around 7pm CEST (Paris, Berlin time. 1pm East Coast USA). That fits perfectly to my schedule as I should be home 1 1/2 hours before that and then still need to do some exercise before I can sit down and play a game.
But this is not all that Runic Games has for us. They are giving us the soundtrack for free! You do not even need to have bought the game if you want to download the soundtrack. But, of course, it would be nice to give them something in return. ;) You may be interested in the current Humble Indie Bundle offer which gives you Torchlight 1, among other games. You set the price and support charity at the same time. This is quite a nice deal! Oh yeah, and Torchlight 1 will be playable on a PC and on Linux! Oh, and on a Mac as well. Speaking of which, so is Guild Wars 2 (I’m referring to the Mac, not Linux, unfortunately ^^).
Aventurine has finally announced Darkfall Unholy Wars. I did know that they are kind of, maybe, reworking Darkfall Online and that something will happen and players may have to start all over again because all data will be wiped… maybe. As you can tell, Darkfall Online is not my kind of game, so I haven’t been following it too closely. I like PvP, but I prefer other PvP modes than “open world everybody vs. everybody” like team-based PvP matches. I did recommend the game to bookahnerk’s cousin, though, because this really is the kind of game that he loves playing.
So why is this game even mentioned here then? Because I think they’re doing something very bold and that’s worth mentioning! They are not just upgrading their current game or redesigning things here and there. They apparently developed a new game. I am curious how far they took it and how different this new game will be. The game will be released on November 20, 2012. They have written a blog post with some more information if you’re interested, although I don’t think it has enough information in it. The game’s website seems to have a bit more information, at least.
It’s been postponed but the new date for the next Lord of the Rings Online expansion, Riders of Rohan, is getting closer: October 15. That’s four weeks from now. Lotro is one of those games that will see me again sooner or later. My main character, a hobbit warden, never saw the max level that got introduced with Rise of Isengard, but even though I don’t like playing that class too much anymore, I really don’t want to level another character. Lotro is the only game so far where I never liked playing alts too much. I am not a big fan of how the characters look (link to previous entry – aesthetics!) and I do not like the combat feeling too much either. The world design, on the other hand, is still gorgeous and I do hope to get around to seeing the new parts of the world one day.
And, of course, there is World of Warcraft. The infamous panda expansion is really close now. The expansion will come out next week (September 25 – look here for exact launch times) and I am really curious how many people will still be complaining about pandas afterwards. To be honest, I still don’t get why people are upset at Blizzard for including them. Why are two-legged cows with humanoid breasts okay, but pandas aren’t? I know that the space goats weren’t taken too seriously, but people didn’t complain about them that much either. And it can’t be because of the film “Kung Fu Panda”, because Blizzard’s pandaren are much older than that. But maybe it’s because people are scared that their favourite MMO will now be called “a game for kids” even more often than it already is. To this I say: Who cares? Play what you want to play because you like it.
Oh well, my time in World of Warcraft is definitely over. I like reading up on what’s been happening in the game, what’s being added or changed, etc. but nothing makes me want to renew my subscription and log on again. I am curious how the expansion will effect Guild Wars 2 and its servers. Will we notice a drop in active players?
Nerdy Bookahs 
I don’t know that the average WoW player is familiar with Pandaran’s role in the lore. I’d heard mention of them back when I played but always thought it was a joke until the expansion was announced. The tauren are basically minotaurs so not that big of a stretch, and bulls are associated with toughness. Not so much the virility-challenged pandas. I do remember a fair amount of complaining about the space squid goats, and even more so about the worgen.
What kills me is when GW1 players make fun of the pokimon minigame for being childish as if we didn’t have polymock. Granted I’m partal to polymock as they were more like animated pieces battling it out rather than actual animals, which I just find disturbing, but I don’t think we have room to criticize. Some gamers take themselves and their hobby too seriously. I like a dose of silliness in my games. It was the all-that-and-the-kitchen-sink feel of WoW that bothered me. I think GW2 does a nicer job of blending fantasy, sci-fi and steam punk. I do hope they show restraint when adding additional races or professions in expansions.
I tried LoTR a few months ago but couldn’t get past the character appearances either, and the game play did not appeal.
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You’re probably right. Having them be relatively unknown and as an April Fool’s joke may have not been so smart.
I know people complained about the space goats but the complaining didn’t seem as bad as it was with pandaren where even the biggest fans I know were ranting and rambling. Oddly enough, I hadn’t heard any complaint at all about worgen. But eh, this is usually very subjective as I have no objective sample of WoW players, of course. ^^
I never understand why games can’t have silly aspects. Especially if you’re not forced to do them yourself. I guess it’s what appealed to me in WoW as well. It wasn’t 100% serious and there was always a place for joking in the game (especially with subtle easter eggs here and there).
It took me several tries until I finally got into Lotro. But in the long run, the game just seemed… slow. Both the combat feeling (ugh! I really don’t like that) and the development. It was the usual “we would really love to add X or Y and we can see how you players would really love that feature, but we have to be careful about our resources (read: we have neither time nor money to do it)”. And then all they seemed to be doing was adding more of the same. That seems to have changed now with the newest expansion, but we’ll have to see.
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