So, like I said a week or so ago, I had planned on picking up Pirates of the Burning Sea. I am a huge fan of pirates and, as such, it only made sense for me to at least give the game a shot, right? Now I am here, I have been playing the game for about 3 days (I have been super busy this week) and I am starting to get curious as to whether or not other players feel the same things as I do about the game. I guess I’ll start from the top.

First, let me start by saying: Pirates of the Burning Sea is a refreshing take on MMORPGs. The game can be a whole lot of fun at times. This is all, of course, without mentioning the jaw-droppingly beautiful graphics. Seriously, sometimes after a ship battle with some NPCs I’ll just float around some looking at the water and sunset. It is a very nice touch, and one that, I think, breathes life into the game. Suffice it to say, I think that Pirates of the Burning Sea has nailed down all of the ship combat and movement. So what would I change from here?

Well the first, and most important thing I’d change about PotBS is the avatar design. Seriously, they look lifeless and generally give me the feel that they are stringed puppets. Sometimes, if I look closely enough I can almost convince myself that I see the strings. . . This is a very serious concern for the game, not because avatar movement/combat is a huge part of the game (it’s not), but rather because the developers have seen it fit to introduce the player to the game by starting him/her out as an avatar. Not a good idea, in my opinion, with those avatars. This also goes without saying that the avatar combat needs a general reworking as well.

In addition to the avatars, and their combat, the towns are also mostly abysmal. They are quiet, empty, and very much dead. I don’t mean there aren’t a lot of players there either. The starting town I was at had a bunch of other gamers inside and yet the town still felt dead. It could have been a Hollywood set for all I could see. When I say dead, I mean the NPCs don’t have much of a presence there. Now, I really hate to compare this game to World of Warcraft, really I do, but I have to go with what I know. In WoW, you’ll often notice that a lot of the towns have a whole lot of flare and presence. You’ll see guards on patrol, NPCs randomly roaming around yelling stuff out, and sometimes even fighting amongst the NPCs. It makes the towns feel alive, and it was one of my favorite aspects of WoW. I could be in a town with no other gamers and yet still not feel alone. In PotBS, I always feel like I am by myself. Of course I haven’t been to most of the towns so this could vary from place to place.

Well, that’s about it. There are some smaller things that I’d change if I could, but they really don’t require elaborating here. Like I said before, the game nails down the ship combat/movement, and even the economy is pieced together very well, as long as you are able to understand it. However, and I stand by this, one of the main things that is going to hold PotBS back is their avatar gameplay. While it’s not the main focus of the game, itself, it is still a big enough part of the game that it will cause a negative impact amongst new players. So please, Flying Labs, let’s get cracking on some fine tuning for that aspect of the game.

What would you like to change about Pirates of the Burning Sea? Let’s here it!

Getting back into LOTRO about 2 weeks ago, I’ve been looking torwards to the next bid game update, Book 12. Aside from the usual bug fixes, new quests and character balancing, Book 12 actually has some things worth talking about. First up is the new outfit system. While not adding anything to the actual game play, I’m actually pretty excited about this. One of my big pet peeves in MMORPGs is that characters look way too similar, there are usually never enough options to make you feel as though your character is unique. With this new system in place they have added hundreds if not thousands of different outfit combos that you can now use to make you character distinct. While these new outfits provide absolutely no bonuses to your characters stats, they do make you look sexy :)

Second and more importantly Trubine has added a new area, The Delving of Fror, in the PvP zone of Ettenmoors. In an attempt to make PvP worth playing they have introduced “soul stones” which are dropped by mobs within this dwelling. These stones can be traded to item vendors for a number of armor, weapon and jewelry sets as well as consumables and crafting recipes. Creeps can also use these stones to purchase new corruptions, new skills, new traits, special sessions and new environmental mod.

Now the really interesting part is that in order to take control of the Delving of Fror, all other zones within Ettenmoors must be taken over. This now gives PvP players a reason to attack these other zones other then to get valor tokens, which are worthless. Another small but cool feature is that if your in the Delving of Fror when one of the zones is lost, the main doors shut close, trapping you withing the zone while mobs begin to flood in. In cases like this you need to either map out or use a special skill to flee before the enemy gets you.

I’ve been pretty harsh on LOTRO in the past, but it looks like there getting on the right track. Some more work on PvP and they might have a decent game on their hands.

Well, I am back folks, with the second Weekly Watch! This has been a reletively slow week, but I will get you the information you have been wanting.

Our first order of buisness is about Warhammer Online!

Taipei – Jan 31, 2008 – Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ: ERTS), the world's leading developer and publisher of interactive entertainment and GigaMedia Ltd (NASDAQ: GIGM), a major provider of online entertainment software and services, announced today that the companies have entered into an agreement to launch and operate WARHAMMER® ONLINE: AGE OF RECKONING™(WAR) in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau. Based on Games Workshop's Warhammer fantasy universe, the online game features next generation Realm vs. Realm™ (RvR) game play that will immerse players in a world of perpetual conflict.

Next is Age of Conan!

Funcom is excited to announce the launch of the Spanish community forums for Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures, just one week after launching the Spanish marketing site available on www.ageofconan.com.  

Funcom will be launching a Spanish localized version of the highly anticipated massive online game simultaneously with the North American, English, German and French on May 20th, 2008. Launching the community efforts is an important step in that direction.

The upcoming MMO Jumpgate Evolution launched their first newsletter called the “Jumpgate Times”. You can read it here.

MMORPG.com and the new game Mabinogi have partnered and are offering beta keys to be given away! Get yours here. It’s a Japanese anime style game.

Pretty decent week after all! Not too much to get excited about though…Tune in next week for WW #3!

For me. As with most people who move into a new house, I am sitting on the sidelines waiting for TimeWarner to come and hook me up with internet. This also means that over the weekend I have been “out of touch” with my usual circle of information/opinion websites that give me such interesting things to talk about. *sigh* I feel like that kid who can’t go out and play football or soccer because it’s raining. Metaphorically speaking, of course. . .

Anyways, as soon as I get my internet back (Feburary 5th :) ) I’ll be picking up a copy of Pirates of the Burning Sea. I have been waiting for this game for 2 years now, and I won’t let a little internet outage keep me from getting my hands on it. I haven’t actually played the game yet, but, contrary to what our new writer Edward thinks, it looks awesome. I had a friend over to my house the other day and he was explaining the in’s and out’s of the economic system and it sounds like it could actually work without being too complicated, something the EVE Online suffers from greatly. I plan on putting up a review of the first 10 levels as soon as I can (expect it in about 2 weeks). I’m also in the middle of working on a number of interviews for the website from a wide range of MMOs. Hopefully I can snag one of those soon.