Warhammer Online Release Date Sept. 18

[vor_lord]

Official Press Release

When I tried to use this link their server was too slammed (and this at 1 am) to view, but it will come out on September 18th according to my newsletter

Personally I really like what I've seen about the game but trying it out is high investment for me. I'd have to buy <strike>beg/borrow/steal</strike> a Windows license of some kind, and pray my old hardware would run it. I'd hate to shell out that kind of money and be disappointed. Plus I'm still enjoying comfortable old WoW, if not as much as I used to.



Who is going to be playing it?

[LtWarhound]

If you can find it on your local Target's shelves, there is a $0.99 pre-order offer. You get the pre-order benefits, most notably access to the Open Beta. Which starts Sept. 7th. And a $5 off coupon if you buy the game when it comes out.

But it doesn't reserve you a copy of the game.

So, for $1, you get to get an idea if the game runs on your machine, and if you like it enough to buy it.

[Chesspiece_face]

Official Press Release

When I tried to use this link their server was too slammed (and this at 1 am) to view, but it will come out on September 18th according to my newsletter

Personally I really like what I've seen about the game but trying it out is high investment for me. I'd have to buy <strike>beg/borrow/steal</strike> a Windows license of some kind, and pray my old hardware would run it. I'd hate to shell out that kind of money and be disappointed. Plus I'm still enjoying comfortable old WoW, if not as much as I used to.
Who is going to be playing it?

A friend of mine preordered this game for me for my birthday. I played 2 hours of the open beta and i can sufficiently say that, despite having a free copy of the game, I will not be playing it. Probably not even bother to install it just to play the first free month.

I could just be spoiled by WoW, but the stuff this game does well is essentially ripped straight from WoW and the stuff that isn't just a warcraft clone is extremely questionable. When i heard they were removing content from this game left and right to make a release this year i began to raise my eyebrows and after playing the beta it is obvious that this game needs at least a year to bake.

Edit: and if your hardware is questionable i can pretty much gaurantee this game will be ugly, with a capital UG.

[vor_lord]

So, for $1, you get to get an idea if the game runs on your machine, and if you like it enough to buy it.

I'll have to check that out -- sounds like a good option for my situation.

[DeeBye]

If you can find it on your local Target's shelves, there is a $0.99 pre-order offer. You get the pre-order benefits, most notably access to the Open Beta. Which starts Sept. 7th. And a $5 off coupon if you buy the game when it comes out.

But it doesn't reserve you a copy of the game.

So, for $1, you get to get an idea if the game runs on your machine, and if you like it enough to buy it.

So you have to pay to "pre-order" the game, which doesn't guarantee you a copy of the game, and it allows you to participate in an "open beta"?

I dunno what your definition of "pre-order" and "open beta" are, but I'm getting all confused here:huh:

[Bolty]

All I know is that their videos beat the snot out of Blizzard's WotLK ones in terms of content. Blizzard's are more graphically excellent, but Warhammer's are just plain cool.

-Bolty

[Greyce]

A friend of mine preordered this game for me for my birthday. I played 2 hours of the open beta and i can sufficiently say that, despite having a free copy of the game, I will not be playing it. Probably not even bother to install it just to play the first free month.

I could just be spoiled by WoW, but the stuff this game does well is essentially ripped straight from WoW and the stuff that isn't just a warcraft clone is extremely questionable. When i heard they were removing content from this game left and right to make a release this year i began to raise my eyebrows and after playing the beta it is obvious that this game needs at least a year to bake.

Edit: and if your hardware is questionable i can pretty much gaurantee this game will be ugly, with a capital UG.

Thanks for your input. I've already preordered and am quite curious about the specifics of WAR.

Personally, I won't be too bothered if Warhammer turns out to be a remake of Warcraft. In fact, I'm hoping for it - WoW is popular because it works, and if they implement all the PvP (or RvR as they seem to like calling it) features they've announced, I'll be happy with their rendering. A PvP-oriented version of Warcraft would be a nice change from the demands of raiding.

The announced cuts to content I'm a bit more ambivalent about. On one level, if the removal of the Elf/Elf and Greenskin/Dwarf capitals is reworked into a functional RvR system, I won't be bothered by their absence. The class cancellations are much more troublesome for me, however; I had hoped to play a Blackguard on release, and I'm not sure what appeals to me now.

The hardware requirements are also a bit of a concern for me. Honestly, nothing is quite as frustrating as a game which does not function smoothly - I've been playing a bit of Tabula Rasa nowadays, and while it's a fun game it's a headache of a program. I'm due for a hardware upgrade anyways, but a shoddy code job wouldn't bode well for the long-term stability of WAR. Given the tortuous development history we've seen with the Warhammer Online project, I won't be surprised if the code isn't as clean as it should be.

Again, thanks for your post and maybe I'll run into you in the Open Beta.

[vor_lord]

Thanks for your input. I've already preordered and am quite curious about the specifics of WAR.

A couple of good places to get information:

http://warhammeronline.wikia.com/wiki/HammerWiki : This has a lot of information if you want to know some basic things about mechanics. I'm not sure how up-to-date it is.

http://wardb.com

[Tris]

So you have to pay to "pre-order" the game, which doesn't guarantee you a copy of the game, and it allows you to participate in an "open beta"?

I dunno what your definition of "pre-order" and "open beta" are, but I'm getting all confused here:huh:

The situation is quite plain and simple. Send us your money, and we might, may, possibly could, send you something, eventually. A great business plan if you can get people to buy into it.

[vor_lord]

Picked up one of these today. $1, even if it is just a few hours worth of diversion, seems worth it. Even if I hate it, at least I won't keep wondering if the grass was greener. So I'll be there giving it a go on Sept. 7th.

[LtWarhound]

So you have to pay to "pre-order" the game, which doesn't guarantee you a copy of the game, and it allows you to participate in an "open beta"?

I dunno what your definition of "pre-order" and "open beta" are, but I'm getting all confused here:huh:

Its not 'my' definition, its Target's. Its still a pretty good deal, since you are getting all the benefits and a $5 off coupon, so if you decide to buy it in the end, you come out ahead $4. If you don't, you are out a dollar, and didn't have to wait for Mythic to come up with a free trial offer.

As far as Chesspiece's post, well, think of how interesting WoW is during your first two hours.

In my first two hours of WoW I get to ... kill some rats. Can't do crafting, can't do PvP. Can barely get out of the newbie zone, and probably can't get to other newbie zones to join my friends - okay, the alliance mostly can.

In first two hours of WAR, you could do some PvE...okay, killing 10 rats is killing ten rats. Or you could get involved in a Public Quest or 3, jump into PvP with both feet, fly off to one of the other two newbie zones to join your friends. More towards the end of that two hours I could get training in crafting, but that's not too impressive right now.

If you play WAR like you play WoW, don't expect much. Its not going to impress you enough to pull you away from WoW, and that was never the intent. Its decent, but we've all done WoW already, it won't be new. As far as the non-WoW stuff being 'questionable', I honestly don't understand what he means. The WAR unique features work well, do exactly what they are intended to do. For example, its possible to ignore the PvE, and just PvP, and level up doing so. You get loot and experience, you can buy gear at the warcamps. You could PvE and never do a regular quest - just do the Public Quests. Those can be fun, 3 different ones in the starting zone alone, and more in each new zone. Or mix and match, Pve/PQ/PvP - which I expect most people will. I can't personally vouch for the 'Living Cities' or the 'Living Guild' features, I didn't do anything with either of them during the Preview Weekend, but I hear good things about them from players that did.

I'd also consider his statement 'removing content left and right' to be a gross exaggeration.

Another note, yep, the graphics are limited. Oddly enough, that's due to the software still being in Beta. No, really, its beta software. Keep that in mind, they are still working on it, and will still be working on it come Sept 7th - when the Open Beta starts. Expect patches, bugs and more patches. This is not a Marketing Open Beta to generate buzz. Its a working beta, so please do submit any bugs you find. My personal opinion? If they fix two flaws (Pet AI got broke when they set up the Preview Weekend and level 10 PvP gear issue) - which they are working on - then the game is ready to go. It will be playable, enjoyable and will have the features they are promising, on launch day. Unlike, say, Age of Conan.

[vor_lord]

The situation is quite plain and simple. Send us your money, and we might, may, possibly could, send you something, eventually. A great business plan if you can get people to buy into it.

This post makes no sense to me. There is no uncertainty associated with this offer.

For what it is worth, the Target package is $1 to buy the "pre-order bonus content", according to the box. It's not actually a preorder, and this is made clear on the packaging. This gives you access to everything doing a pre-order does, except for actually reserving a copy of the game (even preorders at stores don't necessarily guarantee a reserved copy for you, I found this out with WoW).

The bonus content includes:

1. Open beta access (for me this is a $1 trial to see if I like the game, I didn't know about the preview)
2. Early start (pre orders get a code to let you start a day or two ahead--presumably this would need to be combined with some kind of real start code... without a preorder not sure how to get this though:))
3. Bonus item in game


I _could_ decide to spend $50, install Windows ($99), etc., only to find the game isn't my cup of tea. Or I could try it for a few days for $1 and see if it's worth it. Or, I could do nothing and wonder every day if I would be having more fun playing WAR.

The Target package is great. It is not, however, a pre-order.




FYI: If anyone else out there tries this, there is a comical error on the Target printed access codes. I think they (wisely) decided not to use 0 or O in the code. However, their Q looks just like an O. So if your code doesn't work but has O's in it... replace them with Q's. Worked for me;)

[Kevin]

The Target package is great. It is not, however, a pre-order.
FYI: If anyone else out there tries this, there is a comical error on the Target printed access codes. I think they (wisely) decided not to use 0 or O in the code. However, their Q looks just like an O. So if your code doesn't work but has O's in it... replace them with Q's. Worked for me;)

I ran into a special offer that had zero's and 'O's in them but found out that it didn't care which you put in that slot. I could tell the difference but you could put an O for the zero or a zero for the O and it would still work. But yeah, I think just avoiding those if you aren't going to bother with a font that has a slash in the zero (like they ALL should) then don't use those 2 characters. But that is really funny that the Q didn't print well either. :)


And reading about this makes me wish there was a Target anywhere near where I live (I think the closest is still an hour and a half to 2 hours of highway/interstate driving away) so that I could check it out. I'm very leary of how my machine will run it.

I can play WoW at 1280x1024 (yes I still have a CRT) and stay at 15-20 FPS in most 25 man raids (which in WoW is plenty). I can drop settings and resolution and always be above 30, but I'm so barely at or above minimum requirements that I'm not sure it will handle WAR. I'm pretty significantly above the WoW min reqs. Which for those who don't recall are an an 800 MHz process 256MB of RAM and a GeForce2 or better video card. Recommend is a 1.5 GHz proc, 512 MB of RAM and a 64MB video card that can do pixel shading (an FX 5700). That info came from my WoW box.

WAR mins are a good step above WoW recommended.

[Zich]

I will be playing WAR for at least 3 months, and did the Open Beta weekend (if only for a few hours) recently.

Mostly I am giving it a try because most of my real life WoW friends have quit or changed servers. Some wanted to be alliance, some horde, some hated PVP, some would only play on a PVP server. But they are all into MMOs, and have got their friends, and their friends friends to come together and try WAR, all on one server. This should eliminate the issues of people not being on bc they are playing with a friend on a different server (in theory).

One reason I think our plan will work is the way WAR does classes, each race has unique classes, and because of this you can roll both sides on any server. There are no PVP/PVE servers, since its largely a players play style that will determine how much of each they can get into. I think it will keep the inherently good and evil, and the inherently PVP/PVE inclined happy in one home.


I only got in 5 or 6 hours of game time, but overall I liked the game. It was a little too hectic, being swamped with players, I was camping spawn points all over. Also the AI at this stage was silly at best, mobs would run around buildings to get me, rather than turn around, and aggro ranges were non-existent it seemed on some mobs.

Still it looked good, the animations that were in (I think many are still missing) were impressive. Since I was playing on a system that was clawing at the minimum reqs, I had a few fun errors, but once I got the settings right it looked nice. Nice looks aren't enough though, D&D online also looked beautiful, but the gameplay was unbearable to me. I like this gameplay and interface, partly because it is extremely WoW-like. I will need more time at it to really say if it will compete, so sept 7 Ill hit the beta again.

So far, I am intrigued by it, and would like to play with some of my lifelong friends again. The flipside, the wife likes WoW, and has no interest in warhammer. Since I won't pay for 2 MMOs for too long. Eventually I will only keep one, right now WoW is still the winner.

If anyone trying it doesn't have any ties, or has ties they can sway, Red Eye Mountain is our beta server, and probably our live server too.

[LtWarhound]

One reason I think our plan will work is the way WAR does classes, each race has unique classes, and because of this you can roll both sides on any server. There are no PVP/PVE servers, since its largely a players play style that will determine how much of each they can get into.

This will not necessarily be the case. Mythic is still deciding on how to handle the two rulesets they will have, Open and Core. Its likely that you won't be able to have both Order and Destruction characters on the same server. We'll have to see how that plays out during the Open Beta.

Also the AI at this stage was silly at best, mobs would run around buildings to get me, rather than turn around, and aggro ranges were non-existent it seemed on some mobs.

The AI wasn't silly. It was broken. Something they did in setting up the servers for the Preview Weekend broke the NPC AI (and the Pet AI). They admitted this, and are working to correct it before the Open Beta.

Still it looked good, the animations that were in (I think many are still missing) were impressive. Since I was playing on a system that was clawing at the minimum reqs, I had a few fun errors, but once I got the settings right it looked nice. Nice looks aren't enough though, D&D online also looked beautiful, but the gameplay was unbearable to me.

Yep, they are still adding animations. The graphics for the Closed Beta client, and the client used during the Preview Weekend, are still being worked out. Supposedly there will be significant improvement before Launch. Have to wait and see on that.

[Greyce]

A couple of good places to get information:

http://warhammeronline.wikia.com/wiki/HammerWiki : This has a lot of information if you want to know some basic things about mechanics. I'm not sure how up-to-date it is.

http://wardb.com

Thanks vor lord. I already knew about the Wiki but the Curse gaming link will be quite helpful.

As an aside, I ordered my new desktop from Dell a night or two ago. I'm getting one of their mid-range XPS 630 so my client performance will be quite decent; but I ended up spending more money than I had expected. Basically, while I bit my thumb about spending money one of their sale offers ran out; specifically, the one where you got a free 20" monitor with the desktop ($260 value). I'm still kicking myself about that one.

Finally, it seems a little stupid to ask this but is there going to be a thread where we can coordinate where us Lurkers are rolling? Most of my friends either refuse to leave Warcraft or refuse to get involved in another time-eating MMO, so I'd really enjoy some company.

[vor_lord]

Finally, it seems a little stupid to ask this but is there going to be a thread where we can coordinate where us Lurkers are rolling?

I don't think this is stupid to ask at all. I'm sure many have the same question.

[LtWarhound]

Preview Weekend....Plus.

Mythic is opening the Open Beta floodgates a bit early. They are opening the servers tomorrow, instead of sunday. So, if you have the pre-order, you might try and see if you can get in friday. Pretty much, if you could get in on the Preview Weekend, you are being welcomed back early.

Returned from restocking the house...check.

Case of Brother Thelonius laid in, check.

I'm on Barak Varr, btw, a dwarf engineer named Smoothbore. Or an Ironbreaker, Noggenfogger.

Khazukan Kazakit-ha!

[vor_lord]

Well I have the client installed. When I start it I get a login prompt to start patching, but even though everything looks right for my master account it just keeps kicking me back to login for the patcher.

So hopefully this just means on Sunday I'll be able to go. I wanted to patch the game before play was enabled but oh well.

[Kevin]

Well I have the client installed. When I start it I get a login prompt to start patching, but even though everything looks right for my master account it just keeps kicking me back to login for the patcher.

So hopefully this just means on Sunday I'll be able to go. I wanted to patch the game before play was enabled but oh well.

Yeah I did the same and checked the forums about the login box and found that it was because the beta clients hadn't been validated yet. I too was really hoping to have the patches installed. I know how long it took to patch up the WoW beta client and while my hope is that it won't take that long for WAR, it still might.