Revamping Old MMO’s

I don’t necessarily want this to be a rant, but I really am started to get frustrated with all of the people who keep asking Turbine to rebuild Asheron’s Call with new graphics. Do people really not see the problem with this, or rather the wide variety of problems with this? Let’s think here for a couple minutes.

Combat

For those of us who played Asheron’s Call, let’s reminisce about the mind-numbingly HORRIBLE melee combat the game implemented. For those who don’t know it consisted of a slider for speed vs. power, as well as an ability to hit high, medium, or low. That’s it. Flash forward to today where you have dozens of skills to choose from for each encounter. I tried AC’s system for a few weeks a couple months ago, and let tell you…it get’s old FAST. Granted the magic system was much more in-depth and intricate, but that’s not good enough. No one would want to play them. “Why does this even matter?” some might ask, and I’ll tell you why. It’s because when you change a concept this important to an MMO, it effectively changes the game, enough so to make it very difficult to call it simply a better-looking AC.

Leveling

Ahhh, let’s not forget about the wondrous time spent grinding innumerable tuskers and olthoi… hundreds of thousands if you make it to 126 and beyond. For those of you in a rush (myself included, as it took over two years for the first person to reach 126,) While you might have forged friendships in these dungeons, you can’t say it was a blast spending four hours every night camping the table room.

I’m sure you remember the xp chains, where you’d have to leave the guild you actually liked so that you would be forced to earn a certain amount of xp each day or get kicked. For some it was worth it, for some not. For others, they thought you sold out in a way if you joined one.

—

There are many other things missing from AC (such as auction houses, quest-based leveling, etc.) stuff that don’t make or break a game, but things that would fly in the face of the original. Granted, there are tons of things that AC did right, and as it’s my first MMO, and I spent four years playing it, I’ll never forget the awesome times I had playing it. That said, times have changed, and expectations are higher. People need to understand that it would be financially asenine to duplicate AC with nothing but a face-lift, and if they incorporated all the other innovations into the game, it would be pointless to even try to call it Asheron’s Call (aka Asheron’s Call 2 🙂 ). Let’s remember all the great times we had playing this game, and wait for something that will hopefully bring us the same level of enjoyment.

~Kanthalos

« Questing Woes

Sorry »