As you can probably tell, I like the overwhelming majority of what I have experienced so far in Rift. My cleric is 31, and I’m still having fun with her. Although I wanted to save Defiant until after launch, I broke down and started levelling a baby rogue (Ranger – Marksman, pretty much just like a Warcraft hunter). There are just a few things that I would change:
1. Quest interaction. In an MMO, you take and turn in thousands of quests. In Rift, this is made irritating by a second quest window that pops up after you accept a quest that has an option for “tell me more about your history, or the events leading up to the quest, or about this region, etc.” If you could choose to click on a quest NPC for the extra information, it would be a very nice feature. Accepting a quest and then having to close the second window time after time after time…not so much.
2. Racials. I know it’s only a “by 10” factor, which hopefully will be irrelevant in higher levels, but still – since they are all main class stats, it seems as though you’re supposed to be locked into a choice. As a cleric, I want to play my big blue Bahmi girl with the tatts and braids. I don’t want to play the pretty, girly Ethian just because of her Intelligence buff. Racials in Warcraft work much better – give me a plus crit, plus hit, or more of an affinity with bow or gun. Don’t make the main racial involve a core stat.
3. The map. It’s almost there, but there is a limitation to show only five quests at a time. That means that the five that you are tracking are the only ones on the map…meaning that there are others that you could totally run by. Quest turn-ins that you can miss. Fix the map, please…it’s so close, but it does have a usability shortfall.
4. If you click “Join Public Quest” at a rift, then it should automatically add you to a raid. If you are the first one, you are in a party, and it is your responsibility to change it to a raid. I’ve been stuck in three- or five-person groups without realising that there was a proper raid setup with everyone else. (Bad if you’re a healer – you can’t see the people that you need to be healing.)
That’s it, really – for the most part, I love the game. I love the way that Trion devs actually listen to the feedback from the beta, and every time you log in in the morning, there is a new patch with things that they’ve fixed or streamlined. I’ve never known a game company with that much dedication to their player base.
Headstart feels so far away…
<3!
My feelings exactly! Except for point 4, I've not got past level 6 and hopefully it will stay that way until live, don't want to spoil too much, after all. I recommend you post this on the beta suggestion forums – would be brilliant if they did actually change these things. On the map, there's an option to make it see-through so that you can see where you're running to fairly easily which is an option I always loved from Aion, but it would be even better if we could perhaps have a smaller see through version so that I stop running into mobs because hey, some of us are ditzes! xD
Also looking forward to it now. Pre-ordered the digital collector's edition today from Direct2Drive so I'm all ready to start, and pretty eager. It's funny, I wasn't really *that* bothered about Rift until I gave the beta a go out of curiosity. I spose this is what they meant by 'curiosity killed the cat', eh? I'm still looking forward to Guild Wars 2 a little more but it'll be nice to have something shiny new to play now that WoW's not going to be my go-to boredom buster. And they have achievements and vanity pets – can't be that bad!
Oh, I can’t wait for GW2 – that is the game that I am anticipating the most! I don’t want to jinx it by saying that it will be “The Game” for me, but damn am I excited about it!
Headstart does feel so far away…especially with a whole week of beta coming up. In Aion it felt as though they had way too much beta time. By the time launch came, I was so sick of the early areas. I don’t want to feel that way with Rift.
I’m thinking the same if it really is as good as it sounds! Might even give the books a read, and I usually hate tie-ins.
That’s exactly why I’m not playing beta much. As much as I’m itching to play, rather wait for the live game than ruin it.
You forgot the hate for the cloth and leather – ‘sacks’ ; )
btw – avoid the hassle of changing party status by setting your own to ‘private’. This way no one gets to jump into your party at random, but allows you to ‘join public quest’ as and when you want.