The Mines of Moria are pretty linear, but there are enough side quests as you unravel the story to keep you sane. The art direction in the game is simply gorgeous and Turbine deserves kudos for that accomplishment. The story is involving, and most importantly of all, fun. It's not a game for a MMOG purist who prefers their games to be 100 percent massive 100 percent of the time, but it is a game that will be enjoyed by fans of the Middle Earth lore, and fans of LotRO alike. Legendary items and two new classes add a lot of replay value and longevity to the game, which was quite needed.
Turbine has released five new images showing the Gathburz area in the upcoming expansion for Lord of the Rings Online; Siege of Mirkwood.
IncGamers' MMO Editor Bill Vaughan runs through all the big MMO News from the last seven days:
"As always, there's been tonnes of MMO news around this week, and because I know it's hard to stay on top of it all, I've wrapped it all up in one place. Read on for the very latest on Star Trek Online, EVE, Lord of the Rings Online, World of Warcraft, Champions Online, Stargate Worlds, Star Wars: The Old Republic and Age of Conan."
Shame about Stargate Worlds.
Unless something big changes, I don't think we'll see that for a long time, and by that time the game will be outdated :(
The discussion about the creation of the Republic's capital, Croissant (or whatever) was pretty cool, I missed that, thanks :)
I have friends who are really looking forward to stargate worlds, although not all hope is lost it does look grim...
I don't think Stargate World was ever going to do well, it was always riddled with problems, and it was only a matter of time before this announcement was made.
Veyr very tempted by the eve tester call out but it's such a huge timesink I'm hesistant to go down that road.
Jeff Hollis is back with another opinion piece looking at failed launches of MMOs. We've asked him to go into marketing, but he's not interested. This is a taster of his popular weekly feature:
"It's not like players aren't looking for something new. If anything, the initial launch figures of several games indicate that players are, in fact, sniffing around for a new MMO. For example, both Conan and Warhammer sold over a million copies of their game early on, only to have their subscription numbers dwindle later. It's rather widely believed that LOTRO, Warhammer, and EVE all boast similar subscription figures, at around 300,000. Of course, hard information on all this is very challenging to come by."
Hehe, there that international group that does sales figures should do subscription figures :)
WoW is an aberration, and analysing why it's done quite as well as it has, I think, comes down to the fact that it was a polished game that hit at just the right time and has kept pushing and pushing.
Very good point in the mid-game content, though. Online, there's a lot of people vocal about the endgame, but that tends to be the hardcore minority. The beginning content is obviously important as it's what pulls players in and keeps them there, but yes, the mid-game is hugely important. Weird how I can still think of areas in WoW that I hated so much I've never, ever done again, but that there were always others for me to do. I'd not really thought of the mid-game as being that important before.