User talk:Redgin

MMO's
I haven't had that much experience with MMORPG's compared to some. I have only played two of them. For the last two years I have made them a big part of my recreation time. The two MMO's are City of Heroes and, of course, Guild Wars.

City of Heroes
My baptism into the genre... My friend (and roommate at the time) is a really big fan of comic book superheroes. He was so excited for this game to come out, but I had no idea. I had some left over money on a gift certificate and saw it sitting on the shelf. Thinking it was a different game, I picked it up. I was very disappointed when I got it home and it was just the prerelease package for a game I had never heard of. It sat on my desk and gathered dust for months.

One evening, my friend decided to introduce me to a game he was excited about. City of Heroes was going to be great. He had been following its development for about a year. I remembered that disappointing game purchase gathering dust on my desk and told my roommate I bought it. He was a little surprised. I dug out the CD and told him he could have it. He jumped right in and started playing the beta. For the next couple of weeks, I watched him play and got sucked in. At 12:01AM on release day, my roommate and I were waiting to start up our accounts.

I played that game religiously for about a year. It was a lot of fun. I would probably still be playing it if it weren't for my roommate and many of my friends getting into Guild Wars.

Guild Wars
I was brought into it through gentle peer pressure. Basically nearly all of my close friends were playing it and telling me how great it was. They had a profession picked out for me and everything. My experience with City of Heroes told me what sort of character I would enjoy playing. I am much more into support. I love to make a team more effective. Monk was my choice. I haven't looked back.

I got married a couple of months ago and my wife loves to play computer games as much as I do. It is crazy. I never thought I would meet someone so perfectly matched to me. God really gave me a gift in her for more reasons than I can count... but back to video games. :) We play most nights before going to bed. It is fun to share the fun with a friend all the time. We love to take on PvE challenges that people say are "impossible with henchmen". We are currently on a quest to get three swords on every mission. We'll see...

What I miss and what I don't
City of Heroes was a fun game. I miss some things. It was light so I didn't have to worry about dumb junk like farming or money. It was all about being a superhero. I don't really want to go back to it though. There are some things I don't miss too.

One of the things I don't miss is "The Grind". Achieving max level was a huge undertaking requiring months and months with intensive play. This is normal for MMO's and one way the devs give longevity to the game. It takes a long time to do anything. Another thing is the inflexibility. Once you create a character, that's what he is for as long as he exists. Of course, they offer "respecs" occasionally, which allow you to rebuild you character, but that's the exception. And of course there was the monthly fee. If my wife and I were to drop 30 bucks a month for the pair of us it would add up quick.

There are some major components that I do miss too. There is an upside to "The Grind" and the aforementioned inflexibility. You fall in love with your character. CoH's character design was AWESOME. My heroes looked like I wanted them to and there was no one in game who looked like me. I recognized other heroes on sight and didn't have to just remember their name. Also, there is the teaming. Teams in City of Heroes were completely different animals than in Guild Wars. In CoH, I would log in on a Saturday morning, find a pick-up group and play with them ALL DAY. It was about one in four Saturdays that I wasn't able to do this. If people were jerks they left and the mission adjusted itself to be appropriately difficult for the new team. And if I got disconnected, I just logged in again and jumped right back in. People were friendly and warm. In GW, I am lucky if I get a pick-up team to complete ONE mission, let alone spend all day with one team completing several missions. In general people are not as friendly and really only want to complete the task, not meet people or make friends.

Even still GW is great fun. And my wife and I, as well as my friends, more than make up for the less than friendly community. On to getting our swords!...