Sorry for the lack of updates guys! It’s finals week and I’m busy studying on top of playing Cataclysm. Since my priorities are straight, that means blogging gets the least amount of time. It’s Saturday though and I wanted to give you guys our joint impressions on the zones that we have done in Cataclysm so far. Don’t worry, there won’t be any spoilers until after the ‘read more’ option at the end.
Azshara – Fantastic quests. They start you off slow and ease you in with a bit of an introduction and you quickly bounce hub to hub completing quests quickly and racking in amazing experience all the way to 21. We enjoyed the new goblin city there, but wish it was a real capital city instead of just an implied one. There isn’t an auction house or bank which makes it tough to want to put your bind point there.
Ashenvale – Terrible. Some new stuff, but overall it’s the same thing. There’s something about the zone that makes us physically sick. We did a few quest chains and a hub or two but once we reached level 25 (with the help of a dungeon, see below) we moved on. There are only a few zones in the game like Ashenvale that didn’t improve -enough-. Do dungeons or grind and skip this one.
Shadowfang Keep – Great dungeon! The bosses were pretty hard and the new mobs made it a bit refreshing. We wiped four times on the final boss which is actually a great change from the constant steamrolling that these low level dungeons used to be. Do yourself a favor and make sure you do this one while it’s still yellow. Decent loot too!
Stonetalon Mountains – AMAZING zone! It used to be awful and not even worth the space it took up but now it’s without a doubt one of our favorite zones. The theme to the zone is military as the orcs try and reconquer the territory for the Horde. There is a massive amount of story woven into the zone and you’re lead nicely around the entire zone if you enter from the top (Ashenvale entrance). There are great references to other games, fun and zany quests, some very serious quests (See after ‘read more’) and they do it all in ~40 quests. That is, they give you 5 levels in ~40 quests which is something we can appreciate.
Desolace – We’re currently not even halfway through the zone but so far it feels just a tad tedious. The naga quests were a bit overkill in their gathering requirements and some of the Satyr quests have been tedious too. Hopefully things pick up now that we’re headed to the newer looking part of the zone. We’ll let you guys know what we think after we’re done!
Read more for a deeper look at Stonetalon (Spoilers ahead).
SPOILER ALERT!
Here are a few screenshots of Stonetalon mountains from lastnight. The story here is extremely good as it involves a bit of tension between the new Horde leadership and some of the subsidiary Horde factions like the Tauren people. In this screenshot, the leader of the Orc fortress in Stonetalon has taken it upon himself to literally nuke the Tauren off the zone map.
In the first picture the nuke is being delivered via air balloon. This balloon is actually the focal point of the main story quest here are you ready it for departure and ride it around the zone to various hubs. Now it’s being used by Krom’gar again our own people… that doesn’t bode well. You can see how the once thriving village is now a crater in screen 2 and in screen 3 you can see that Garrosh, who arrives by portal, is pissed. He kills Krom’gar for his actions. Krom’gar claims he did what Garrosh would have done (which we agreed with since Garrosh is a harsher leader), but Garrosh claims he’s not a murderer and that he knows honor from his time in Northrend.
Great phasing use in Stonetalon and a zone you simply can not afford to skip.
I found the leveling experience mindnumbingly linear. You have to go one place then your have to go to the second place, then you have to go to the third place, then you automatically are taken to the fourth.
Everything that I liked about WoW, open world, exploration etc is missing.
The world hasn’t changed at all in the sense that it is still a quest hub to quest hub game. You still have options of where to go to level, ie. I can level from 25-30 in several different zones.
The only difference now is that it’s more clear on where you can go next. After Stonetalon, on that catwalk we’re on in the pictures, they tell us our services are needed in Desolace or Southern Barrens and they say the choice is ours where we go. That seems way cooler to me than “Where now?” in a themepark quest hub game. In a sandbox game its fine though. Sandbox, this game is not.
Ashenvale may suck for the Horde but it seems pretty darn good as far as Allaince quests go. Make sure you hit badlands. Badlands has a quest chain worth of a bioware RPG and I do not say that lightly.
Is it worth going to Badlands if you are Horde also Holgranth?
I was told that Badlands for Horde is amazing by several people.
It’s a pair of neutral quest chains that make badlands incrdible. One is hilarious, one is very serious. Both are amazing.
I started on the 6th to check out the changes and so far haven’t left Azeroth for any other game since.
My new dwarf shaman has been leveling like crazy which is cool but also gives me plenty to go back and do later on once we all hit that wall where we are waiting on the next content to be released.
So far besides the changes to the low level areas, the phasing of those areas is my favorite. The one thing I thought was lacking was the environment changing after you do things and now it does. It was really noticeable in the Hinterlands today for me.
On another note, World of Warcraft has finally lost its luster to another new shiny MMO….as everyone I know now calls the game Cataclysm.. not WOW or Warcraft.
So it was all true, it took Blizzard to kill off Warcraft
God, I forgot how bad WoW graphics were. They are absolutely horrible. Quest lines seem interesting though, so I guess thats good. A lot better than the infantile stuff that seems to be part and parcel of the Goblin starting zone.
The graphics are actually great. Those screenshots are just a low quality render compressed and destroyed.
People can’t knock WoW’s graphics anymore — they’re superior to 90% of every other MMO out there.
@ Keen Eeeeh some of the older textures and models still look kinda crappy but when everything is turned up as high as it goes in the newer areas WoW looks pretty fantastic.
Although there will of course be those who bash it unless in has Crisis level graphics just because nothing WoW dose can be considered good.
Sorry Keen but your bias is really showing. WoW looks better than it did but it is still not up to par with AoC, LotRO, Aion, EQ2, Vanguard or upcoming games like Rift, Tera or Gw2. The art direction of WoW is fantastic, as always, but the actual graphics are mediocre at best.
I think it looks waaaay better than EQ2 and AoC. I also think it looks better than Aion in most ways. LotRO could give it a run for its money.
The problem with AoC and EQ2 is the realism factor. It looks nice the first year or two but then it ages very, very quickly when the technology is old.
The polish is the main difference here. Sure you might end up seeing some re-used textures, but you see that in every game.
The fact that they use phasing to -change- the landscape can re-shape they way a zone feels in an instant. I’m pretty sure your heart sunk when you’d seen the damage that bomb did, huh? That kind of experience is wholly unique to WoW at the moment.
Did they up the polygon count in Cataclysm? I know one of the concerns was that Draenei and Blood Elves were looking “smoother” than the other races, and needed to be addressed in the next expansion.
Lotro does look nice graphically…but once I logged into WoW again it was like coming home to something great you haven’t seen in a long time.
Besides, both games graphics lean in different directions..
Lotro goes towards realism more and Wow is semi cartoonish but that fits their original IP anyways…you can’t really compare the 2 against each other
You’re catching up to me. Zones I can vouch for, Stonetalon and now Thousand Needles. I blew off the end of Feralas to go to Thousand Needles at 39 and it was totally the right decision (you should do the lines at the Feralas ogre fort though, the ending is great).
Zones I can’t vouch for but have heard very good things about: Westfall, Redridge, Hillsbrad, Badlands, EPL, WPL.
I thought Ashenvale was ok. South Barrens and Desolace were both pretty lacking.
As far as instances, I liked SFK and can see how it will suck in heroic mode. I hope you checked out the revamped Deadmines and Stockades, which are both fun. I can see why they nerfed dungeon quest xp after going to Scholo, I got into the game too late
to do it at level so it was fun to run the revamped version even if I stupidly died to the exploding corpses once.
I think in terms of artistic direction and design, WoW is indeed the best looking MMORPG by a long shot, and looks to continue being so for quite some time. The style isn’t for everyone, but once you get beyond issues with it being “cartoony” or whatever, there is very little to criticize.
That said, there are some things that deserve criticism: For example some of the models that are still around from vanilla days; the human models, particularly, which never looked good to begin with, and haven’t aged well. Some of the older areas also look very sparse in terms of set dressing and other doodads compared to the newer areas – for example compare the density of flowers, shrubbery and the like in Gilneas, with the re-worked Stonetalon (at least based on what I’ve seen).
And as always, WoW blows everything else away in terms of animation artistry as well as animation technology.
I have a lot of issues with WoW, even after the improvements made in Cataclysm, but the graphics aren’t one of them. 🙂
As to the improved quality of the questing content… I watched the TotalBiscuit video guides to the Worgen starting zone and the new Stone Talon, and honestly I’m just not very impressed. Maybe you just have to play it to understand?
Question: I have made a noob goblin and worgen and so far the early quest lines are awesome…what about the new revamped zones…are they equally great or are they still a step down from the beginning levels?
@Keen
Keen, you are completely delusional if you think WoW’s graphics are anywhere near the quality of AoC. There is simply no contest.
WoW: http://www.videogamesblogger.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/world-of-warcraft-cataclysm-screenshot-big.jpg
AoC: http://www.latoro.com/wallpapers/games/17015-desktop-wallpapers-age-of-conan-rise-of-the-godslayer.jpg
There is simply no comparison. The texture work alone sets AoC eons past WoW. The detail of the textures in AoC are phenomenal and much, much more detailed than that of WoW. WoW still has very low detail in its texture work and lots of tearing.
Preferring WoW game-play to AoC and other MMOs is one thing, trying to make the argument that WoW has superior graphics is another thing entirely and borders on fanboyism. I completely understand if you think WoW has the best game-play of any MMO out there. I disagree but I understand. This is something else entirely.
1.03MB 1262×706 image vs
124KB 604×43812 image
Gee, I wonder why one looks better?
AoC: http://www.gamingangels.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/age-of-conan.jpg
WoW: http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/news/2010/cataclysm/cataclysm_zones/11927/sandbox/grimbatol_06.jpg
Look at that! AoC looks to be a few generations behind WoW!
I think people too often confuse art style with quality of art. You can totally hate the art direction of wow, that is perfectly understandable. You don’t have to like the cartoony look. But accusing it of having terrible graphics is just ignorant.
@esloan: What’s the point of showing that superb quality when very few can realistically run it in endgame situations? If they’d spent more time thinking through their combo system rather than making shiny things they;d have a much bigger and better community than they do now.
@Keen: Do yourself a favour and a) don’t level a human (I was told Westfall is THE SHIT but found it incredibly bland; likewise with Redridge) and b) go level your 80s. Seriously, I thought I’d be unsubbing since I resolutely refused to level my 80s and instead take a few alts up through the new world; I finally caved in yesterday and quite simply: Hyjal is amazing. It is absolutely awesome, and once you get further afield the number of people starts to peter out.
@Caleb
Give me a break. It makes no difference what resolution the image is at, I can find images of Cataclysm at the same image resolution and the difference is still striking. WoW’s textures are poor. They are getting better but they are still poor. They can not compare to AoC and anyone who says otherwise is just blinded by their WoW love.
It has nothing to do with art-style, I rather like WoW’s art-style, it simply has to do with the quality of the textures and the details therein. WoW has very low resolution textures, their model’s have a much lower polygon count and they are just not technically as good as AoC.
@Dril Actually the game runs pretty damn well for me, with everything up. It actually ran better than WoW did last time I played WoW, which was admittedly a longish time back.
@Caleb
Here ya go, much higher rez image: http://www.videogamesblogger.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/world-of-warcraft-cataclysm-screenshot-will-be-downloadable-at-launch.jpg
Still no comparison, try again.
@ Dril
That’s…interesting. Westfall was TONS of fun to me. I mean, an entire zone dedicated to solving a single murder mystery that ends in the landscape of the zone being forever changed and leading perfectly into the dungeon? Meeting every single boss in the new VC along the way and having perfect reasons for wanting to defeat every one of them? Was it just the content of each individual quest you found bland or something?
@Caleb: I don’t know, really. It just felt very stale and dry. I mean sure, it was a nice story but it didn’t feel like a part of the world at all, just a whole zone dedicated to a satirisation of homeless people going back to rural areas and the like. Hyjal in comparison felt very fresh, very meaningful and very connected to the world and lore, with some interesting mechanics (going into the Firelands etc.) Same with Lakeshire, it just felt too much like the old version half the time and the other half as some stupid parody of the typical “ooorah, blow shit up” attitude that FPSs love to use. I don’t even know if there’s some sort of cultural reference in both zones because, like Bhagpuss, I’m a Britfag so any US in-joke is totally lost on me.
So, yeah. I just didn’t feel like either of the zones were WoW, whereas Hyjal really drew me in. It’s the same reason why I love Hellfire Peninsula as a zone, it just feels so “right” and connected to the world.
@ Dril
Oh, yes, that makes sense then. Those two zones are two of the biggest cultural reference zones there are. Westfall is an episode of CSI: Miami and Redridge is the movie Rambo.
I think maybe you want a little too much though. They are, together, the 10-20 zone. How epic can you be fighting gnolls? I mean, yes, I agree, they aren’t really connected very well with the overall plot but…as a level 16 character you SHOULDN’T be connected with the overall plot yet. A level 16 human shouldn’t even be aware of deathwing except that he is big, scary, destructive, and to be avoided at all costs.
Can you really have all fulbore, all the time? It seems like it is best to slowly ramp your way up. You start out solving murder mysteries and helping a small company of soldiers as a young adventurer and only fight off one of the most powerful beings who destroyed the world single-handedly later.
AoC graphics are starting to show its age. It looks washed out and muddy. We’ll not even get into how awful of a game AoC is to begin with.
WoW’s graphics are stylized and artful. Its not shooting for photo realism because it doesn’t want to. You can run WoW on an ancient computer and still have it look decent.
It’s like comparing TF2 to Crysis.
It’s been shown time and time again that stylized graphics ***always*** come out on top over realism. They’ll always been stylized where realism becomes outdated in only a few months. You’re hating just to hate and you really have no ground to stand on.
Also, remember months ago when I said that you “like to argue just for the sake of arguing?” Now, dozens of post later, you still show up and do nothing but argue about any and everything you can. Found myself smiling and just though i’d mention why.
I like the graphics of most MMOs. I agree that art direction is the key factor. Get that right and the graphic style or “quality” doesn’t matter nearly as much. Obviously you want to avoid technical issues that stick out like a sore thumb. I particularly don’t like objects that are supposed to be flush with the ground but aren’t. After that, it just comes down to personal preference. I enjoy both a very cartoony look and a fairly realistic one.
Discussing different artistic approaches can be interesting. Telling people that the graphics in Game A suck just because you personally don’t like them, though, is just rude.
Keen, I didn’t do Stonetalon as Horde but do they call that a tauren town?
Alliance side, that’s a druid school so I suppose there cold be tauren in it. Either way Alliance side your flying around it in a last ditch effort to save civilians as the bomb hits.
That’s just my nickname for it because on our side a Tauren family sorta runs it and quests for it come out of the Tauren cliff camp. It has other races in it though.
I just played through Stonetalon mountains quests and it was pretty good. I love how the new horde redeemed them selfs at the end.
Thanks Keen and Holgranth I shall visit the Badlands area on my journey through Azeroth on my Goblin 🙂