DC Universe

I started playing this when it went F2P I tried a little of it at beta but my old computer kept crashing it so I had to stop.

It had a few bumps in the terms of lag and bugs. Lag was due to all the people attempting to play it and only 2 servers being up to try and handle all the people. So I figured that would smooth over soon. The other was bugs that should of been fixed a long time ago but were apparently still there and after it went Free to Play did they bother to fix them.

The game plays a little different then others, it's level based of course; but your attacks are based on what weapon you have equipped and that weapon gives your character stats or moves depending on where you put your skill points. You can at least add a new weapon to play with after level 10 plus.

You select from a small list of powers that have two branches you can put points in depending on the role you want to play. Some have different versions of a role in either tree just different ways of doing that role with them. Light was released near the time it went Free to Play but you either had to buy it or be a subscriber to get it; just recently Electricity was released which is a new healing power.

Hero creation was not as extravagant as City of Heroes or Champions where you had a decent amount of costume pieces to use. City of Heroes (in my own opinion) had the best costume creator. You can build up a nice selection in Champions or DC universe but you had to either find or buy the costumes.

You will have some fun with this game if you liked the other two hero games, but which one you choose in the end is up to you.

Star Wars The Old Republic - A game I've played before

I've been beta testing Star Wars for about three months. I had high hopes being a BioWare game with their story telling, and I wasn't disappointed in that aspect.

The plus area

• Great Voice acting for missions and story plots. I am glad that I'm able to skip some with spacebar after already experiencing that part.
• The stories are written out very well which like I said I wasn't surprised with Bioware.
• It's Star Wars!

The Negatives

Really these are the big negatives I find and what makes them stand out the most.

• They didn't branch off from World of Warcraft/Dark Age of Camelot or Rift (to name a few). It still has that leveling grind feel from constant questing with quests that don't stimulate or capture myself in the world.
• Once you max level which I know some will attempt with-in a week or even less. What are they to do next in a level based game? PvP and Raid constantly in the same area, or make a new character to meet the same fate at the end. It's the eventual wall you meet with these types of games which I'm glad that the eventual ArcheAge is going to remedy (hoping, always a dread there)
• Crafting is done by companions, there's hardly any involvement by you, they really wanted people not to have to bother with this; and that's a very sad feeling I liked doing crafting in Galaxies.
• Planets - They say there are numerous ones, but it's limited to a small area of that planet. I'm left wondering why am I traveling to these when so little is explored of these huge planets
• Space Combat - There was no free flight in this, you are left on a set patch only using the mouse to move your cursor to attack. I hope they improve this feature with a later expansion.

The Neutral feeling

• Companions - They are nice to have to fill a spot, but otherwise they make the game more solo play then groups as like I said the companion fills a spot. So you have a healer or a tank companion and you do the other part and go off to do elite quests.

If I was to compare Star Wars Old Republic to Galaxies (early edition not what Sony did to it) I would choose Galaxies as I had more fun, it was open world and wasn't limited by levels or small worlds.

1-5-12 After playing it further

Giving the game that after release play through; I'm still on the fence about the game. One part of me likes it, the other part of me doesn't like all the quests; and I mean there are a lot of quests to do. Even after you think you're done with the planet they throw bonus missions at you as you're heading to your ship. Not that you have to do them, but sometimes you feel compelled to do them.

I noticed something new that a few other share are the graphic glitches. I didn't experience these during beta but now I'm seeing weird flashes of light or character faces act distorted at times; among the bugs or character movements that still lurk in the game.

Space combat is still lackluster with no improvements to it that i've seen.

Why MMO's are losing appeal.

First let's go with saying that Level based games are becoming and should be a thing of the past.

- Once you hit max level you are not left with many options beyond PvPing in designated zones (instants) and Raids.

- It becomes a grind of gear to get anywhere after you hit max level so it's doing the same thing over and over and over.

- You are hard pressed to play with friends as you might be more hardcore and they are casual, so you can't have them in your group with their level being 10 or more below yours.

Why is level based system still used? It's currently what works, as displayed by World of Warcraft and there are few who are being brave enough to leave this style.

Why skill based games work?

- You can pretty much go anywhere with low level skills. You will have difficult time with tougher areas, but still a chance.

- Friends could play together because there was no level requirements; and your friend will gain skill from fighting even if he/she doesn't hit as often.

What are some ideas to include (progressive list)

Crafting

- Skill gain by use of course, higher the skill the better you get at retrieving resources.

- Reading books to gain new ways to get more resources, special resources or new ways to build something

- Let's make it in-depth like Vanguards or Everquest 2, put the player into it, don't hand it to them like other games have. Adventures travel and sell some of the rare items they find to crafters.

1. Books are rare (maybe 1-5 copies)
2. Takes time to read
3. Can set up as an offline thing, but as soon as you start playing you are hit with consequences be it "Tired" where you are weaker or slower gain in skills.
4. Guilds or people would horde these but you can use another skill to try and copy the book, but it will take time and special materials to copy them.

Combat

- Skill use is still the best way to go with this. The more you use it the better you are.

- Use a stamina system for this. You have to get tired from using combat/spell/craft but the better you are the less impact to it the drain.

- Combat focus lets you center your skills in like One handed fighting to a certain weapon. But you can only go into this once you hit a certain skill level to show you are dedicated to that craft.

-Let's go with masters to learn this, but also books can be used to learn a certain stance once you have the basics from your masters you are able to go with the special abilities in your chosen field. Ex - If you want to learn to leap and kick then you need to find this master and then that master leads you to find a book or item to improve that attack.

- Being able to target spots of a body for special injuries but are harder to get at, would bring something new to combat and allows people to focus on healing skills.

Healing -

Spells seem to be a choice, but depending on the game how far do you want to go with them in this area. Where else could you go with this, well there's the bandaging similar to Ultima Online, which would work but hard to do while in combat (should be anyways). Similar to Star Wars Galaxies where doctors/medics were of value and fun to play where they were needed to fix a wound/sprain. Some actually enjoyed this job starting their own business and having customers come up to them, while they are herbing/crafting potions and ask if they can take a look at their leg/arm or some disease they can't cure with magic.

1. Alchemy items to heal.
2. Injuries from combat or other things like critical failure in crafting a new item; could make you have an broken arm that lowers your effectiveness and you need a skilled medical person to fix you.
3. Areas like a hospital or shrine give you that healing bonus when working.
4. Magic can't cure everything so other means of medicine need to be looked at.
5. Books teach special techniques.

Magic

Terraria

Terraria is a game I found via the Steam Network.

There's not much of a tutorial that I found unless you travel to wiki pages or youtube videos of other's experience in the game. But without those you are greeted by an npc that tells you tid bits on what to do.

I started with digging some holes to gather materials while fighting slimes. After gathering enough stone (could use dirt I suppose, but I wanted a better looking house) to build the outer line of my house while gathering wood to make a workbench and further create the materials like walls or doors that I needed to finish the house.

With enough materials and creativity you can make very extravagant house or castle. Once you have the wall set up inside with chairs, table and lighting you will eventually attract npcs to stay in your rooms.

Once night fell that's when you either stay in your house to watch as the zombies try to beat down your door or you venture out to face them.

There is many things to do in this game, and the world is vast for just yourself. You'll dig down below the earth to discover treasures like heart containers to increase your health or treasure chests with some nice little item in it. And that's to get you somewhat prepared for what else lies in the world. I think building my housing area is where most of my time has been sunk.

The deeper you go the stronger the enemies can get as you fight in underground jungles or the "hell" level that awaits below with dangerous lava's and teleporting imps.

Crafting keeps you busy as you have to gather materials from bosses or meteorites that fall from the sky; and there is a wide variety of items to make to improve your combat abilities at what else awaits you. From crafting armor to light saber style weapons.

Even though this game is considered a Beta still it will keep you busy till further material is added.

What makes it great too is the fact you can start up your own world to have friends join your or join their own game. Trade what you find with them and help them take on the bosses that were giving them trouble.

Downsides - you may find it childish graphics and compare it with minecraft (which I haven't played so can't comment on) and yes the graphics are low but that's not something you'll linger on for long as you get enthralled with what's below that next piece of stone.

Reminded me of Zelda in someways with item names and monsters.

Give it a try you won't be disappointed for it's low price of $10.