Meta tags:
description=Games and Whatever;

Headings (most frequently used words):

share, this, ardwulf, eso, and, the, lair, 2024, convention, plans, back, maybe, we, are, 15, years, old, open, worlds, blizzard, dumpster, fire, new, world, recent, main, menu, as, waiting, room, forward, brave, whose, story, is, it, hill, folk, pursue, part, post, navigation, twitverse, posts, comments, games, whatever,

Text of the page (most frequently used words):
the (283), and (169), that (95), but (80), new (70), this (69), for (55), share (50), are (47), not (43), you (43), world (43), opens (40), window (40), which (40), there (38), with (35), game (34), like (33), has (32), from (30), out (30), was (28), have (26), than (25), more (23), will (22), now (21), posted (21), facebook (21), would (21), can (21), tumblr (20), reddit (20), very (20), been (20), get (19), see (19), all (19), just (19), open (18), other (17), eso (17), they (17), convention (16), even (16), about (16), some (16), 2024 (15), much (15), ardwulf (14), years (14), could (14), thing (14), what (14), one (13), where (13), story (13), lot (13), people (13), blizzard (12), its (12), games (12), may (12), those (12), beta (12), loading (11), comments (11), lair (11), his (11), their (11), though (11), over (11), pvp (11), play (11), then (11), event (11), maybe (10), commentary (10), around (10), rather (10), think (10), gary (10), mengle (10), time (10), wow (10), into (10), going (10), events (10), content (9), back (9), off (9), part (9), least (9), them (9), many (9), had (9), mmorpg (9), actually (9), find (9), mmorpgs (9), also (9), players (9), seems (9), crafting (9), doing (9), wargaming (9), again (8), post (8), these (8), did (8), who (8), well (8), two (8), seen (8), any (8), being (8), great (8), launch (8), both (8), year (8), only (8), stuff (8), day (8), blog (8), held (8), plans (7), old (7), when (7), him (7), likely (7), run (7), first (7), should (7), right (7), still (7), amazon (7), current (7), room (7), while (7), zone (7), gear (7), probably (6), later (6), before (6), few (6), big (6), days (6), mostly (6), weapons (6), through (6), work (6), progress (6), feel (6), make (6), started (6), pretty (6), although (6), good (6), three (6), 2021 (6), away (6), playing (6), does (6), youtube (6), large (6), gaming (6), load (6), instancing (6), here (6), already (5), recent (5), worlds (5), enough (5), long (5), better (5), hours (5), such (5), problems (5), folks (5), less (5), full (5), really (5), either (5), issues (5), month (5), most (5), end (5), settlements (5), guilds (5), sure (5), point (5), forward (5), obvious (5), additional (5), same (5), zones (5), nice (5), couple (5), august (5), every (5), blogging (5), instance (5), rpgs (5), several (5), 2023 (5), list (5), fire (4), hill (4), found (4), looking (4), were (4), small (4), running (4), war (4), group (4), whatever (4), place (4), fantasy (4), primary (4), whole (4), need (4), online (4), definitely (4), made (4), space (4), way (4), anyway (4), last (4), main (4), video (4), lack (4), how (4), your (4), don (4), housing (4), dungeons (4), skills (4), far (4), next (4), area (4), limited (4), start (4), added (4), kind (4), phase (4), whether (4), months (4), strong (4), plenty (4), say (4), able (4), development (4), things (4), because (4), screens (4), instances (4), finder (4), board (4), wargames (4), october (4), origins (4), ohio (4), view (3), sign (3), subscribed (3), subscribe (3), investor1965 (3), dumpster (3), posts (3), try (3), once (3), numbers (3), until (3), thought (3), pace (3), true (3), larger (3), set (3), something (3), writing (3), july (3), character (3), ffxiv (3), affair (3), elder (3), scrolls (3), guild (3), combat (3), mmo (3), mentioned (3), nor (3), square (3), enix (3), final (3), xiv (3), pull (3), ground (3), ever (3), major (3), characters (3), queues (3), haven (3), speaking (3), during (3), gonna (3), potential (3), experience (3), course (3), tuning (3), specific (3), too (3), modern (3), variety (3), selection (3), player (3), level (3), looks (3), ways (3), after (3), attention (3), giving (3), another (3), expansion (3), everyone (3), model (3), actual (3), let (3), played (3), various (3), aside (3), hard (3), currently (3), voices (3), loot (3), fully (3), works (3), didn (3), date (3), waiting (3), delves (3), certainly (3), focus (3), form (3), deal (3), might (3), worse (3), money (3), working (3), company (3), include (3), having (3), dungeon (3), public (3), tabletop (3), prolific (3), historical (3), recall (3), attendance (3), winter (3), travellercon (3), designer (3), fest (3), ocs (3), name (2), required (2), comment (2), subscriptions (2), site (2), log (2), wordpress (2), shawn (2), torno (2), feed (2), down (2), older (2), folk (2), pursue (2), therefore (2), front (2), elm (2), rest (2), facing (2), especially (2), against (2), low (2), take (2), fair (2), alive (2), each (2), surprise (2), number (2), men (2), call (2), night (2), himself (2), urge (2), began (2), officer (2), legion (2), diminished (2), between (2), hear (2), second (2), considered (2), driving (2), scene (2), factor (2), classes (2), appeal (2), contrast (2), along (2), wake (2), evident (2), mine (2), general (2), fairly (2), however (2), tried (2), multiple (2), times (2), talking (2), target (2), lag (2), client (2), gameplay (2), bigger (2), justin (2), accounts (2), compelling (2), bad (2), anything (2), genre (2), decade (2), solid (2), deep (2), pockets (2), nearly (2), relaunch (2), since (2), scheduled (2), trying (2), traffic (2), copies (2), ludicrous (2), buy (2), login (2), massively (2), put (2), wiped (2), exciting (2), usual (2), bugs (2), network (2), expects (2), card (2), feels (2), fine (2), available (2), behind (2), achievements (2), pve (2), clearly (2), claimed (2), battle (2), paper (2), survival (2), slower (2), ones (2), quite (2), easy (2), different (2), pitched (2), action (2), opt (2), huge (2), leveling (2), abilities (2), craft (2), single (2), weapon (2), ton (2), tell (2), nowhere (2), pay (2), getting (2), steam (2), cosmetic (2), items (2), won (2), ongoing (2), via (2), without (2), places (2), happen (2), basically (2), titles (2), gaps (2), map (2), limits (2), mounts (2), use (2), enjoying (2), aspects (2), always (2), why (2), term (2), pillars (2), plan (2), title (2), moving (2), possible (2), stay (2), know (2), weird (2), none (2), remains (2), balance (2), short (2), further (2), myself (2), elsweyr (2), love (2), sunk (2), week (2), finish (2), closed (2), nobody (2), screen (2), rewards (2), bank (2), wasn (2), maps (2), surveys (2), grabbing (2), skyshards (2), skill (2), points (2), bunch (2), making (2), interested (2), predict (2), outside (2), september (2), weeks (2), check (2), blaugust (2), boycott (2), complicated (2), companies (2), almost (2), released (2), meaningful (2), address (2), anyone (2), warcraft (2), best (2), trivial (2), brack (2), doubt (2), tiny (2), activision (2), side (2), imagine (2), worked (2), stories (2), dead (2), incentivized (2), pop (2), sit (2), town (2), want (2), remove (2), loadout (2), itself (2), finding (2), middle (2), instanced (2), finders (2), require (2), quick (2), used (2), private (2), hands (2), literally (2), read (2), reading (2), watched (2), livestreams (2), hit (2), hobby (2), home (2), 2022 (2), channel (2), regular (2), become (2), intense (2), december (2), planning (2), expo (2), miss (2), covid (2), surprising (2), expense (2), offensive (2), trip (2), presence (2), dates (2), tbd (2), san (2), diego (2), season (2), initial (2), committing (2), successful (2), lancaster (2), chaosiumcon (2), organizers (2), priority (2), north (2), pandemic (2), including (2), addition (2), columbus (2), buckeye (2), multi (2), battles (2), winterfest (2), playtest (2), monsters (2), definite (2), website, email, write, collapse, bar, manage, reader, report, privacy, com, account, join, subscribers, error, occurred, tweets, twitverse, navigation, broken, hillock, unclimbable, rear, tall, protect, strewn, thick, aspen, stopped, panting, yerayka, upon, minutes, selected, stout, limb, smith, forearm, snapped, tree, blade, copper, axes, clansmen, eased, breathing, uttered, prayer, desheng, dimly, recalled, youth, chant, afterlands, gamble, decided, arrow, knife, dark, ending, yerayn, cookpot, flayed, rack, forsaken, wilderness, woodlands, clans, fought, tactics, predicated, stealth, assault, chose, terrain, favorable, defense, limit, foes, face, diminish, advantage, superior, surely, greater, bait, soldier, bluff, deny, engagement, force, flee, overtake, sleep, jerkin, torn, ragged, careening, brush, bled, handful, cuts, cold, forest, enemies, wear, hides, themselves, obtain, cudgel, easily, pure, flight, abated, slacken, solder, shentegha, merely, man, fleeing, others, sought, kill, pursuing, cries, rang, south, echoing, wintry, boughs, changed, direction, pursuers, somewhere, ambush, breath, heavy, labored, four, close, fastest, known, stamina, sustain, longer, appreciate, feedback, enjoy, introduction, 2020, critical, investment, create, gender, locked, thread, revolves, endedness, convincing, simulation, agency, core, storylines, elsewhere, pushing, dragged, visible, gw2, immediately, beat, wars, black, desert, pleased, softly, bounced, standard, generally, acceptable, tab, responsive, pacing, yours, ride, slowness, breaks, status, quo, real, rags, riches, launched, 2010, universally, panned, credit, recognized, saw, damaging, franchise, needed, backstage, redesign, grown, steadily, expansions, fourth, fall, podcast, bit, hot, button, bigshot, streamers, flowing, measures, overtaking, temporarily, briefly, sold, technical, reasons, sounds, cannot, servers, lengthy, bananas, digital, whose, honestly, inclined, chilling, hour, serve, chill, relaxed, spectacle, hope, diversion, continue, tells, avidly, regimen, quirks, famously, alleged, bricking, high, gtx, 3090, hardware, fault, manufacturers, replacing, got, weaknesses, shallow, customization, rudimentary, thoughtful, touches, faces, hairstyles, genders, roughly, customizability, aaa, elements, questing, tacked, quests, procedurally, generated, super, grindy, feature, mmos, accept, avoid, altogether, flag, yourself, challenge, invade, owned, piece, 50v50, resolve, timing, sessions, neat, improve, higher, tier, stations, particular, obstacle, totally, ignoring, care, crafted, furniture, décor, early, starting, difficulty, ramps, steeply, superficial, sensible, approach, turns, ago, turn, vision, realignments, 2005, kia, simple, fabulously, chewy, seamless, environment, distances, spectacular, distinct, visual, style, tons, increasing, provide, eliminating, necessity, alts, reaching, cap, near, gotta, honest, sufficiently, disinterested, zero, loomed, launching, pre, ordered, access, brave, cash, shop, perfectly, moment, completely, amenable, called, convenience, backdoor, win, justified, complaints, fund, revenue, delivery, publisher, spec, trees, equivalent, tiers, caution, lest, power, treadmill, tradeskills, divided, harvesting, refinement, production, robust, creating, cloth, glyphs, obviously, edges, concealed, mists, opposed, architecture, accommodate, hunch, bundled, reasonable, concern, noisy, advocates, overwhelm, went, alpha, consensus, devs, sucked, happy, mechanism, question, depth, support, leaving, suspect, ahead, curve, curious, matter, niche, rests, gankfest, themepark, sandbox, commit, fleshed, audiences, clean, expand, deepen, overall, needs, develop, strengths, grows, shiny, preferring, record, pan, northern, aware, runthrough, azoth, staff, questline, concluded, launches, shows, damned, refreshing, coming, building, interior, gated, dutifully, grabbed, daily, writs, move, rimmen, preferred, hangout, everything, stables, sellers, vendors, wrapped, mats, remembered, giant, horking, pile, treasure, crafter, sitting, taking, erstwhile, figure, wait, wonders, prefer, fixes, improvements, distracted, operating, denied, rumor, hidden, parts, surprises, polish, regarding, sooner, concerns, spreading, populace, thin, reliant, dynamic, tricky, landmass, populations, smart, team, metrics, pushed, hand, irritating, polished, swimming, filled, extra, lots, humorous, serious, personally, stable, situations, rubberbanding, framerate, cause, significant, healing, 100, coincidence, resumption, discord, server, festival, familiar, names, whom, participating, inactive, kept, blogosphere, mean, everybody, demonstrably, remember, union, carbide, killed, 000, injured, half, million, deadly, gas, residential, consumers, product, community, friendship, escape, turbulent, shittiness, comprise, lives, give, cost, unless, steps, taken, telling, follow, own, conscience, holding, feet, choose, differently, incidental, damage, done, humans, impact, pointed, decisions, cluelessly, disconnected, trenches, toxic, hellhole, riff, creepy, allen, mike, morhaime, baby, culture, valued, sycophancy, talent, built, allowed, government, torture, advocate, specialist, helping, powerful, evade, accountability, crimes, hired, chief, compliance, door, accompanied, millions, golden, parachutes, exercise, authority, paradise, gangs, drunks, wandering, corridors, employees, harassed, suicide, somebody, prolly, ask, opinion, clusterfuckalypse, inadequate, yet, proven, court, highly, credible, beyond, pale, insta, fired, shadiest, absolutely, explanation, insanity, negligent, incompetent, leadership, takes, populated, social, hubs, lovingly, detailed, wasted, sense, queue, random, randoms, help, faster, battleground, alternatives, meant, nevertheless, tuned, groups, soloed, decent, champion, suboptimal, incentives, materials, questlines, occupies, examples, raids, battlegrounds, latter, doodads, accrue, automatically, desirable, sets, means, avenue, equally, faction, gate, keys, enemy, neatly, reductive, struck, answers, extant, developed, solve, issue, deployed, example, overwhelms, modes, took, together, necessarily, return, restock, supplies, dump, stand, vendor, port, never, essentially, lobby, comparatively, process, hub, occurs, exists, unrewarding, drudgery, waved, develops, traditionally, abandons, imitators, keeps, shame, hilariously, nominal, objection, apologists, subject, comes, undesirable, okay, agree, design, decision, exact, dim, prehistory, talked, amount, hay, relatively, rare, among, removed, barriers, immersion, peripheral, important, consideration, thank, helped, inspiration, sounding, halfassed, doomed, idea, thanks, recalls, giveaways, videos, boat, trouble, vaguest, clue, fuck, tiktok, instagram, twitter, twitch, fatter, grayer, youtuber, blogger, watching, supporting, placeholder, land, isn, anywhere, wheelhouse, attests, 2015, increasingly, drawn, history, thereby, oldest, dating, 1979, interest, everquest, specifically, marks, 15th, birthday, appearance, sites, exist, anymore, impossible, rate, earlier, official, hatch, coinciding, heyday, school, drew, consistent, tagged, creative, 80s, motivation, rhythm, orders, magnitude, past, related, nowadays, unsubscribe, please, left, timers, ancient, averaging, shock, discombobulation, our, fishbowl, forever, brief, stints, eve, analog, wargame, occasional, foray, consider, step, attempted, conventions, attend, notice, compass, john, bill, hosts, usually, meet, come, consimworld, tempe, bucket, monstrous, combined, committed, preclude, considering, seriously, mmp, january, given, unlikely, squeeze, budget, little, sdhist, wishlist, prohibited, hopes, massive, makes, california, wbc, primarily, venue, tournaments, labyrinthine, ski, resort, interesting, con, split, lodging, arrangement, expensive, overpriced, pedestrian, food, offsite, dining, options, substantial, drive, jul, seven, springs, pennsylvania, boardgaming, championships, wanted, roleplaying, bowing, focusing, unfortunately, keep, do9ng, ends, appear, stuck, rpg, location, practicality, reason, discern, hotel, costs, astronomical, thus, option, chaosium, five, total, keeping, intentions, pendragon, cthulhu, runequest, traveller, apr, ann, arbor, michigan, hopefully, contingent, arrange, financially, sound, fool, size, extremely, attendees, expect, center, frame, notional, northeast, ardycon, order, lowest, highest, marquee, america, comical, mismanagement, gama, recover, bgf, 80th, anniversary, normandy, invasion, corner, theme, college, unofficial, informal, formed, enhance, reclamation, dedicated, floor, flux, safe, packed, gets, closer, jun, starts, monday, thursday, struggled, draw, came, roaring, booming, coin, guys, aid, plus, smaller, show, talk, revolving, series, stones, river, under, discussion, grow, labat, american, civil, bataille, april, club, service, favorite, top, tend, discussed, thanksgiving, expected, preorder, antony, birkett, effort, accommodating, gts, army, 10km, per, hex, 10k, mega, flames, symphony, destruction, greatest, utah, beach, ostfront, forgotten, feb, sandusky, wraps, slotted, bins, understanding, boing, trips, experiences, calendar, rss, skip, menu,

Text of the page (random words):
tube where this month there ll be a bunch of livestreams all with giveaways and plenty of other videos both about wargames as well as tabletop rpgs the livestreams also hit twitch if that s your boat and certainly nobody should have much trouble finding me on twitter instagram facebook or even tiktok where i haven t the vaguest clue what the fuck i am doing i do want to say thank you to everyone reading this or not who s helped or been an inspiration over the years and everyone who s read a blog post watched a video or been a sounding board for a halfassed and doomed idea that s you thanks share this share on facebook opens in new window facebook share on x opens in new window x share on reddit opens in new window reddit share on tumblr opens in new window tumblr like loading 5 comments posted in commentary eso and open worlds posted by gary n mengle on august 20 2021 if you read back into the dim prehistory of this blog i talked a lot about open worlds and made no small amount of hay about those open worlds which lack or mostly lack load screens this is still relatively rare among mmorpgs as we ll see but while a lack of load screens removed barriers to immersion it s probably a peripheral point seems to me that the more important consideration for mmorpgs is actual people out in the world doing stuff hilariously this has always been the nominal objection from blizzard and its apologists when the subject of player housing comes up it is undesirable so it is claimed to have people out of the world and doing stuff in a private instance which okay i agree with that but then why does literally every other design decision that wow has made in the last decade or so do this exact thing modern wow is essentially a lobby game after you finish the comparatively quick leveling process you sit in a hub waiting for the instance finder to pop all meaningful play occurs in private instances open world content exists but is unrewarding drudgery by and large hands have been waved at open world play but then when it develops issues blizzard traditionally just abandons it rather than trying to address its issues instancing as used by wow and its imitators keeps people out of the world which is a shame because wow s open world is really very nice it would be quick to say the enemy is instancing or some other such neatly reductive thing but as usual there is a balance to be struck and the answers are complicated there were extant problems in mmorpgs that instancing was developed to solve those problems do not go away if you remove instancing so the bigger issue is not instancing as such but how instancing has been deployed in for example world of warcraft where it overwhelms other play modes used to be before the modern instance finders that it took some doing to get an instance run going you had to put the group together not necessarily a trivial thing and then you had to actually go there and at some point you d have to return to town to restock supplies or dump loot now you can stand next to that same vendor and just let the dungeon finder port you in and out never having seen the open world new world to name the obvious new big thing not only has mostly no load screens but while it has instanced content those are by no means a primary avenue of play nor are players massively incentivized to run them you can get nice gear out of them but you can get equally nice or better gear by crafting or from your faction both of which require you to be out in the world doing stuff and there s an additional gate in front of the instances in the form of keys now contrast this with the elder scrolls online which in a lot of ways occupies a middle ground between these two examples eso has plenty of instanced content in the form of raids dungeons and battlegrounds and there are instance finders for the latter two the rewards for these though include things like titles and achievements and cosmetic doodads that accrue to them there s gear but this gear is not automatically better than anything that you might find out in the world or can make via crafting and just as much desirable loot is in zone gear sets that you get out in the world or in public delves or dungeons eso s dungeon finder works basically the same way as wow s you queue up for either a random or specific dungeon with randoms incentivized once a day to help queues pop faster same deal with the battleground finder you can sit in town and just run these over and over if you want but eso has alternatives that do not remove you from the world eso s delves are instances meant for single players but which are nevertheless public and there are public dungeons which are tuned to groups but can be soloed if you have decent gear and champion point loadout in almost every zone even during suboptimal hours you find people in those or out in the zone itself because there are strong incentives to do those things not just gear but finding crafting materials and grabbing skyshards and doing the zone questlines for the skill points so even though eso has a ton of load screens and any zone to zone load screen takes a good long time the world is populated and feels alive i am not the most social of mmorpg players but i also like having other players around wow is dead outside of the instances and a small number of hubs that lovingly detailed world is just wasted even though eso is open world only in a limited way its at least open in the sense of having players actually in it share this share on facebook opens in new window facebook share on x opens in new window x share on reddit opens in new window reddit share on tumblr opens in new window tumblr like loading comments off on eso and open worlds posted in commentary the blizzard dumpster fire posted by gary n mengle on august 13 2021 somebody s prolly gonna ask about my opinion on the current blizzard whatever it is clusterfuckalypse seems inadequate i ve worked at a lot of companies but the stories stories that have yet to be proven in court but which are highly credible out of that place are beyond the pale far far worse than stuff that would get you insta fired at even the shadiest places i ve ever worked there is absolutely no explanation for the insanity that was going on at blizzard that does not include negligent and incompetent leadership as creepy as i think j allen brack is blizzard is mike morhaime s baby he set up a culture that valued sycophancy more than talent he built the company that allowed a government torture advocate or if you like a specialist in helping the powerful evade accountability for their crimes to be hired as chief compliance officer even if he didn t sign the paper himself now brack is out the door no doubt accompanied by millions of tiny golden parachutes and it s very likely that the activision side of the company is going to exercise much more authority over blizzard moving forward there was a point at which that would have been considered a bad thing but while i doubt activision is a paradise it s hard to imagine worse than a company in which there are gangs of drunks wandering through the corridors and in which employees are harassed into suicide incidental to the damage that s been done to the actual humans working for blizzard is the obvious impact on their games and most evident in world of warcraft because it s an ongoing thing that people check into every day it has long been obvious and pointed out by many that at least the people making major development decisions are cluelessly disconnected from the game and the gameplay and the game s not getting the best out of the people in the trenches because they re working in a toxic hellhole maybe i ll riff on this more in another post right now it seems trivial now does all this mean we should boycott blizzard well that s complicated you can t boycott everybody and there are demonstrably worse companies remember when union carbide killed almost 4 000 and injured over half a million when they released deadly gas in a residential area people get more out of mmorpgs than just being consumers of a product they get community they get friendship they get escape from the turbulent shittiness that may comprise their lives i m not going to tell them to give all that up nor is it just about sunk cost me i wasn t giving blizzard any money right now anyway though i was a few months back but i can certainly say that i do not feel any need to start giving them money again unless meaningful steps are taken to address the problems but i m not telling you what to do follow your own conscience i m not holding anyone s feet to the fire should they choose differently share this share on facebook opens in new window facebook share on x opens in new window x share on reddit opens in new window reddit share on tumblr opens in new window tumblr like loading comments off on the blizzard dumpster fire posted in commentary eso as waiting room posted by gary n mengle on august 10 2021 this is 100 a coincidence with my resumption of blogging about mmorpgs and i might end up blogging about other stuff but it is blaugust so check that out if you re interested the blaugust discord server is like a festival of old familiar names many of whom are participating even if they ve been inactive for years and only a few of which i kept up with and many new voices in this diminished mmo blogosphere so anyway new world s launch has been pushed back to september 28 on the one hand this is irritating but on the other a month is no big deal and i d rather have a polished launch even if none of the obvious development gaps like swimming are filled in this extra few weeks lots of folks had a variety of issues both humorous and serious in the recent beta phase i personally had few issues some bugs sure but on the whole the client and network were very stable for me then again i didn t get into any big pvp situations and that s where things like lag rubberbanding and framerate are likely to cause significant problems and of course there is much need for additional tuning of various things like pvp healing or some of the weapon abilities one wonders whether there will be another beta phase now since they ve added so much time much as i would like to play i would prefer we not see more beta i would rather see amazon focus on fixes and improvements rather than be distracted by running an operating game amazon has denied the rumor that a bunch of additional content in the form of new weapons and zones will be making it out for launch there are clearly hidden parts of the map even as it was during the beta so i ll be interested to see if amazon has this or any other surprises at launch but again i d rather they focus on polish and tuning regarding new zones though which i m sure we will see sooner or later there may be concerns about spreading the populace too thin in a game so reliant on its open world i d say how that dynamic will work is tricky to predict from the outside until we see the launch landmass and launch populations if amazon s smart their team should have metrics on this and be able to model it speaking of open world though it s damned refreshing to find a new mmorpg that actually has one this coming from a game in which every building interior is gated behind a load screen speaking of eso while playing new world i still dutifully grabbed by daily rewards and did my crafting writs on multiple characters i should probably just move all characters to rimmen which is my preferred hangout with everything housing crafting stables bank guild sellers and vendors in a nice small space what i wasn t doing was playing really but right around the time the new world beta wrapped up i started running out of crafting mats and i remembered the giant horking pile of treasure maps and crafter surveys sitting in my bank so i m taking my erstwhile main and going to those zones grabbing the skyshards running the delves while i m at it and also doing all the various surveys and maps certainly i can use the skill points so i figure i have plenty to do in eso while i wait for new world share this share on facebook opens in new window facebook share on x opens in new window x share on reddit opens in new window reddit share on tumblr opens in new window tumblr like loading comments off on eso as waiting room posted in commentary new world forward posted by gary n mengle on august 3 2021 the new world closed beta has concluded and nobody seems to think there will be a further beta phase before it launches the date of which currently shows on steam as august 31 i will be playing it at that time i m sure that the new shiny factor is part of it but i found myself preferring play of new world over eso the mmorpg that i am currently subscribed to although for the record i did play some eso as well as the current pan elsweyr event is something i ve been enjoying and i love the northern elsweyr zone but even so i sunk more of my limited gaming hours into new world this week even fully aware that progress would be wiped at the end i did a runthrough of a couple more zones than i d already seen and tried to see more of the azoth staff questline but i didn t finish it i think i closed it out at level 22 new world is going for a weird niche it rests on three pillars a pvp gankfest a pve themepark and a survival sandbox but it does not fully commit to any of them and none are fully fleshed out it remains to be seen whether this balance will appeal to audiences in either the short or long term but i definitely found it compelling for the beta what s there is very clean and works well but there s a lot of room to expand and i think a need to deepen all three aspects overall i think new world is as strong a start as i ve seen in mmorpgs in some years but it needs to further develop its strengths as it grows a reasonable concern i think is that noisy pvp advocates will overwhelm voices enjoying other aspects of the game but then new world already went through an alpha phase in which it was an always on full loot pvp game and the consensus of players and devs was that it sucked which is why the current game is not in that place i am very happy with the current opt in mechanism but i question whether the rest of the game has enough depth to support long term play while leaving out one of those three pillars i suspect that it does not but amazon has a plan for the title moving forward and it s possible they ll stay ahead of the curve i m very curious to see what the forward facing model is for new world but we likely won t know for at least a matter of months there are many obvious places where expansion could happen current weapons could get additional spec trees and new weapons could be added for those who haven t played it the various weapons are basically new world s equivalent of classes new tiers of crafting could be added although i would urge caution lest we see the same kind of power treadmill that we ve seen in so many other titles ...