Category Archives: Games

Review: Sanctuary, “Out of the Blue” + Thoughts on Rift

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Two topics in one post; it’s a delicious blog sandwich!

Firstly, I recently decided to take a few days off from WoW and give the free trial of the much-hyped new MMO, Rift: Planes of Telara, a whirl.

I was immediately struck by the fact that, in terms of gameplay, the game is virtually identical to WoW. The similarity is frankly absurd at times. I won’t quite go so far as to use the term “rip off,” but… I can’t think of a way to finish that sentence.

There are only two substantive differences between WoW and Rift. One is the class system, which allows you to build your own class by choosing one of four broad “callings” and then smashing together different subclasses. This system is both a blessing and a curse. The opportunities for customization seem virtually endless, and many of the potential classes are very, very fun, but it’s also incredibly complex and overwhelming, even for an experienced gamer like me. This is made worse by the fact all this complexity is hurled your way before you even hit level five; I’d much prefer it if you chose your subclasses slowly over time. I can only imagine how lost a total newbie to MMOs would be.

The other difference is the Rifts themselves, which create a dynamic world in which rampaging hordes of demons can come out of nowhere and sack your town. This, too, is a double-edged sword. It creates for a much more dynamic and interesting world than WoW, and it allows for some genuinely epic and fun times, but it can also be very inconvenient to have a small army of elites appear between you and your objective, and I see this as a gimmick that could get old fast. The Rifts are not solo friendly from what I’ve seen, so once the player base matures and low level zones become underpopulated, I imagine newbies will be screwed pretty badly. Though to be fair, I only played for a few days, and there may be some failsafe to prevent this I’m not aware of.

Rift is, on the whole, a pretty good game, but one thing prevented me from getting into it: it has no character. Love it or hate it, no one can argue that WoW is a game oozing its own unique style and personality. On the other hand, everything about Rift feels generic–the artwork, the world, the story, the characters. I felt like I should have liked it, but I got bored very fast and have already gone back to the lush, cartoonish pastures of Azeroth. I’m sure a lot of people will love Rift, but it isn’t for me.

If anyone else out there has given Rift a try, please comment. I’d be curious to hear your thoughts.

Now, onto the latest episode of Sanctuary. “Out of the Blue” is, frankly, not an episode that inspires a lot of commentary. It was neither good nor bad. Merely predictable and ordinary.

Like the past episode, it is a very generic concept–Magnus and Will* are stuck in a hallucinogenic fantasy world a la the Matrix and several dozen episodes of Stargate and Star Trek. It’s well told, but feels exactly like every other version of this story I’ve ever seen. The only real spike of drama was their ultimate plan for escaping, which I won’t spoil but was pretty cool–at least in my opinion.

*(Why is it always Magnus and Will? Couldn’t something horrible happen to Magnus and Henry for a change? Should be careful what I wish for; I might get another Kate-heavy episode. *Shiver.*)

What is exciting, however, is the ad for the upcoming season finale, which featured both John “Jack the Ripper” Druitt and the show’s best villain to date: Adam Worth, AKA Dr. Jekyll. Those two (or three, if you count both of Adam’s personalities) can only mean awesomeness is approaching. If Tesla shows up, too, I might just have to hug someone.

Want to give Rift a go? Feeling ready to catch up on Sanctuary? Pick them up on my Amazon affiliate.

Warcraft: The Backstory

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As mentioned in my opening post, it is likely that World of Warcraft is going to come up frequently in this blog. I thought I should take a moment to explain just how and why I came to be so fiendishly obsessed with this game.

If you are of the impression I think WoW is the greatest game ever, let me remove that preconception right away. The list of things I dislike about WoW could fill an epic poem (“Yea, the dungeon was hard, and plagued by many a huntard…”). No, it comes from my history with the franchise. Simply put, I am a Warcraft fan first and a WoW fan a distant second.

Warcraft was not always an MMORPG (massively multiplayer online role-playing game, for those of you who still have lives and/or souls). It began life about fifteen years ago as a series of RTSs (real time strategy games). And I got in on the ground floor. I can remember playing Warcraft: Orcs and Humans (the first Warcraft game and one of the first RTSs as we have come to understand the concept) on my father’s knee at the tender age of five. Flash forward a couple years and my favourite thing to do after I came home from school was play Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness and its expansion, Beyond the Dark Portal.

This is when I began to get properly obsessed. I loved the noble Alliance and slaying those evil Orcs. I was particularly obsessed with the Elven archer units. I liked that they were the only unit in the game that could fight from a distance without dirtying themselves in melee combat, as well as their pretty capes and smoothly confident voice-acting. Hey, I was seven; I was easily impressed.

Jump ahead another couple years. I’m now about twelve or so, and Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos comes out.

Bombshell. This game blew me away. Its gameplay was a completely new take on the RTS genre, but even more importantly, it featured a sweeping and epic story with a wide cast of interesting, well-written characters that was better than anything I’d seen in a game before.

Reign of Chaos brought a more mature take on the Warcraft universe, just as I was myself maturing. I was beginning to understand that there is more to the world than the rigid black and white of good and evil, and low and behold, now the humans are no longer perfect paragons of virtue but also include racists and bigots; the Orcs are revealed to have been corrupted by Demons and are now struggling for redemption; my beloved High Elves are but the descendants of a Night Elf nobility who betrayed the world and authored all of Azeroth’s woes.

I could prattle on about the awesomeness of Warcraft III for ages, but I’ll rein in my fan boy gushing, but for a mention of its expansion, The Frozen Throne. TFT, while awesome in many ways, was probably where the franchise began its decline, but is noteworthy for introducing the Blood Elves.

The Blood Elves are the most recent iteration of the race that began life as those stylish Elven archers. In Reign of Chaos, the Undead Scourge razed their magic kingdom, slaughtered 90% of their population, and destroyed the Sunwell, the fount of magical power that had sustained them for 10,000 years–an act which caused agonizing and sometimes fatal withdrawals in the entirety of their species. In TFT, the survivors had taken on the new persona of Sin’dorei, Children of Blood, as a memorial to their slaughtered kin and were struggling to survive in a world where no one cared about them and all their allies had betrayed them in their hour of need. I was now entering my teen years, and these edgy, sexy, morally ambiguous new Elves had everything to inspire the adoration of a teenage boy. My undying love for them was cemented.

This turned into much more of a “OMG WCIII was so awesome!!1!” post than I intended, but the point I’m trying to make is this: I grew up with Warcraft. For better or for worse, Azeroth has become my second home;  the characters are almost like my oldest friends. I flirt with the boundary of sanity in my obsession with this universe, but at this point, I couldn’t stop if I wanted to–and I don’t.

I don’t pretend that Warcraft is Shakespeare. Once in a blue moon, it can put out an intelligent story, but these are the exceptions and not the rule. It’s a fun romp and nothing more. But it’s my gaming comfort food. It’s nostalgic.

Sometimes I worry I’m like a Star Wars who convinces themselves Attack of the Clones was somehow a good movie; but I am very vocal about WoW’s flaws, and I try not to blind myself to them. It’s merely the nostalgia that keeps me playing–although to be fair, Wrath of the Lich King was a pretty amazing game.

Curious about the Warcraft games? The entire series is available on my Amazon affiliate.