Though looking at this review, looks like some of the old EQ dev team moved to Lotro. Staying away from this game then, never again will I subject myself to the hell (yes it was HELL) that EQ put me through, lol!

But…they have 4 million characters ™

Anyways, great review…and I plan to read your site more…bookmarked (as I just read the Tabula Rasa review and AGAIN you nailed it…as I am in closed beta…and it sure was fun at first…but, then…I had LOTRO syndrome after that…ah well…went back to EQ2!)

The investment made by so many active members was high in terms of time and content of constructive analysis ranging from system design, class variation, and the health of the lore in relation to the game. There were small independent fansites that sprung up, player gatherings were held without any game yet to even play, and people from various countries even personally participated. It was a very active, very intelligent, and very amazing Community.

As the game development changed from Middle-earth Online into Lord of the Rings Online:Shadows of Angmar, the Community also shifted. Many people fell away, and in less than a year hardly any of those people remained. The few who did ended up awash in a sea of anonymity and most retreated to the comforts of personal websites and private communication.

I should know… I was a leading member of that early Community, ran an independent fansite for it, and helped host two player gatherings all while the game was still in development. I didn’t buy the game when it released and I am not playing it, today. The Alpha and Beta periods were enough to tell me that the game was engineered for reasons completely antithetical to why I choose to play a game.

I think LotRO is fun, and it’s absolutely engaging in many ways, but like most games designed to this model the repetition and grinderific love-fest that is leveling, even the end-game is about as palatable as road kill. I’ve been down this road before with too many games to think that what looks like, smells like, and walks like a duck is going to end up being a swan.

I do believe Turbine can find a way to make the 40+ levels a lot less painful, and I am confident that they will. Unfortunately, that isn’t going to be enough to get me to shell out any money to play the game I’ve played before – EQ, DAoC, WoW (and a lot more titles) all come down to variations on the theme with the most nauseatingly monontonous parts being shared between them. LotRO is an addition to the list, and I look forward to the day when I feel otherwise, but for now, all I can do is read reviews like this one and look back over the years with a heavy heart that so much invested ended up being so much lost.

I think that the biggest and probably only downfall of lotro is that it is a brand new game made upon dying standards of second gen MMOs

I play it , I enjoy it ,and will continue to do so all the time until AOC(or pick your 3rd gen) release

Then i will uninstall it , never to look upon it again…this is LOTRO

I agree so much, in fact, that the first time I posted your review on the official LOTRO forums, I got shut down and wrist-slapped:
http://forums.lotro.com/showthread.php?t=72976

Then, another poster decided to raise it again:
http://forums.lotro.com/showthread.php?t=73008

..only yet *again* we’ve ended up being leaped upon by curiously rabid fanbois, who have decided that you and I are singlehandedly attempting to usurp LOTRO from underneath Turbine’s feet.

See: http://forums.lotro.com/showthread.php?t=73008&page=9 for the way it’s eventually made it’s way back to me, even though I didn’t start the thread this time..

Fairly hilarious, but at least it’s all good PR for your excellent review.
(obviously, an *opinion* is not something one is allowed to carry around over there, according to the fanbois.. scary)

Here’s hoping that future content updates will address the gap post L40, but as it stands *now* (as you make extremely clear in your review) it’s left a little wanting…

Thank you (and, in keeping with tradition, that’s not sarcasm either). I wouldn’t write in the first place if I didn’t welcome criticism, but I much prefer it when it’s reasoned and makes some valid points, such as yours.

>There’s little to no mention of the questing content or what the author thought of the storyline. Did you find the post 25 areas interesting, or boring?

I realized that I had passed over most of the levels from 25-39 in the review (which was not a diabolical plot against Turbine, but a reality of space constraints and a deadline), which is why I specifically changed the Note: at the beginning to read “the later levels.” You may thank my esteemed editor for writing “levels 25+” in the introductory text.

If you really want my review for those levels, see Part One. Much of my prior gushing praise applies right up until level 39.

>There’s no mention at all, that I can spot, of the new non-raid content introduced by the patch.Those “horrible” quests in the North Downs? skip them. There’s plenty of 30-40 content now. The new dungeons, or quest instances?

As I said in the review, I was level 50 before Evendim came out. My next highest character was 22, which would have made it difficult to properly gauge the quality of the new areas, being either too high or too low. I will say I did enjoy the quest text for A Striking Absence of Boar.

>There are PLENTY of worse grinds out there. Not just FFXI (which I have no experience of) but WoW.

Which is probably why I never claimed that LOTRO was worse than either of them, overall.

Once again, my complaint was that they marketed the game as being grind-free (the slap on the wrist deaths, heavy bonus exp, fast leveling, enough quests to get to 50 twice over, etc.) and then turned around and introduced… a grind.

>Your complaint with the Helegrod drops and Onyxia’s head now seems to be one of presentation. You’d prefer it if the item starts the quest. This is a distinction without much of a difference.

I tend to disagree. Having written a fair number of quests in my time, it’s been my experience that once Joe Q. Player starts one, they want to finish it, and they are frustrated when unable to do so, particularly when due to arbitrary restrictions and timesinks.

>Well, I did. And plenty of people I know did as well.

When I said “a mission to go in and get it” I didn’t mean a determination on the part of a particular player, but an NPC giving you a quest in advance for the head, which would have aroused the same complaint from me as the Helegrod quests, for the reason above.

>Heck, after you’d got your T2 helm or whatever, what else did you hope to win in rerunning Onyxia again?

Personally, I was there for the bags and the Ancient Cornerstone Grimoire (before it was nerfed).

>My experience with the post 25 game has been much more positive than yours.Your bad experience (inevitably, and up to a certain point, fairly) colours your review.

Then we will have to agree to disagree. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion of the game, and I never made any claim in the review to speak for you. I speak only for myself, and, to an extent, my friends, guildmates, and others I know who have had similarly sour experiences with LOTRO after level 40.

- There’s little to no mention of the questing content or what the author thought of the storyline. Did you find the post 25 areas interesting, or boring?
- There’s no mention at all, that I can spot, of the new non-raid content introduced by the patch.Those “horrible” quests in the North Downs? skip them. There’s plenty of 30-40 content now. The new dungeons, or quest instances?

Given that this is marketed – as the author says – as a casual-friendly mmo-lite, people reading the review might be interested by the author’s thoughts on both of these areas.

The claim that this MMORPG “turns into” a grind at 40, or that you should “pretend the cap is 40″ is undermined by the fact that legendary traits and higher level deeds are, as the author notes (at least with respect to deeds) entirely optional. What about the rest of the game at this level? Did that not merit comment (good or bad)?

A couple of specific points

- there are PLENTY of worse grinds out there. Not just FFXI (which I have no experience of) but WoW. Cenarion Circle exalted. Sha’tar exalted. Heck, even AD exalted. You can choose a few stats to max, or one or two legendaries to go for. You can trade books, or sell and buy.

- Your complaint with the Helegrod drops and Onyxia’s head now seems to be one of presentation. You’d prefer it if the item starts the quest. This is a distinction without much of a difference. “Onyxia’s head STARTED a quest, you didn’t go forth to her lair with a mission to get it”. Well, I did. And plenty of people I know did as well. Heck, after you’d got your T2 helm or whatever, what else did you hope to win in rerunning Onyxia again?

My experience with the post 25 game has been much more positive than yours.Your bad experience (inevitably, and up to a certain point, fairly)colours your review. At some point these debates lose their point, so this will be MY last word, at any rate.

Steven, you have single handedly created stickiness on our little site with your wit and excellent arguments. Who will have the last word?

Thank you for that well thought out and elegantly articulated rebuttal of my review. It will surely go down in the annals of history as one of the greatest commentaries since the time of Cicero.

Considerable years??!?! ROFLMAO! “My witto wow waids were so hawd!” LMAO!

The farming Ssra bane weapons and the Vex Thal key for the Luclin expansion of EQ took longer than that entire GAME, lol.

Now, I’m not saying that it was good, hehe. I’d rather shave my butt hair with a rusty razor while sitting in a bathtub full of rubbing alcohol than do my Vex Thal key again.

But I just have to laugh at anyone who uses WoW as an example of time sink masquerading as “challenge.”

>Nobody’s forcing you to max out those traits, or farm hard for those legendary books.

I know, I said that right in the review. Fifth paragraph from the top in the Deeds section.

>The complaint seems to be that maxing out your character in an mmorpg is a grind. This came as a surprise?

My complaint is that they marketed the game as MMO-lite, grind-free, and then turned around and introduced one of the worst grinds I’ve seen since FFXI.

Honestly, I would have preferred to do nothing at all while waiting for new content (lord knows I’ve done it before) than be railroaded like that.

When designers think I have nothing better to do with my life than run their busywork errands so they can buy themselves more time to patch, I’m going to call them on it.

>You “never ran an instance 24 times”, but you did get your Onyxia key (I assume).

Yes, but Onyxia’s head STARTED a quest, you didn’t go forth to her lair with a mission to get it. It also served the dual purpose of both loot and bragging rights… I still have my screenshot announcing that I’d killed her in Org.

Lastly, you’re right, a number of Helegrod quests required “get 30 of some item” instead of a boss drop, but the review was getting on the long side (I was trying to keep it around 2,000 words) so I had to go with the most egregious example.

There were a number of things I would have liked to discuss in more detail in the review that I wasn’t able to… there’s always Part Three.

- Nobody’s forcing you to max out those traits, or farm hard for those legendary books. There is plenty of other content around those levels. The complaint seems to be that maxing out your character in an mmorpg is a grind. This came as a surprise?

- You “never ran an instance 24 times”, but you did get your Onyxia key (I assume). This is kind of ironic, since Onyxia’s head was a 1 drop per 40 man raid item, required for a quest. Similar thing with Hakkar etc. Now, this may suck, but to present the need to kill a boss “Two. Dozen. Times.” as a unique failing of LOTRO that surprised you so much seems a bit odd when you’ve clearly encountered it before. Are you sure “most” quests for Helegrod require single item drops? I think a dev posted on the LOTRO boards and said it was 2, but I’m not sure.

Since the patch, there’s plenty of levelling content between 30 and 40. My experience has been that LOTRO doesn’t turn into a grind until around or about the level cap, unless you want it to. Just my 2p, others will disagree.

Thanks for the advice.

I know it’s long, but if anyone is hesitating reading it, you’re better off spending the time listening to Steven than wasting your time playing this hurried, LOTR-in-name-only game. Im so glad I did not have to go through all of the tribulations you did.

Also, your points about good MUDs from 10 years ago is very important. How is it I can have more fun in a text based MUD than most of the crap that is called MMORPG today? Because the developers spent time on mechanics, game play, and player interaction instead of trying to make a quick buck on name recognition.