What? Blog? Where? No. Rift so far.

So once again I've gone close to a month without updating here. That's largely because I've recently been playing Rift, which is of course absorbing a lot of time and isn't something I can really review. But what I can say, is that so far it is quite a lot better than World of Warcraft, really it comes off as sort of an unofficial sequel to WOW. But as I never get as involved in these games as some other people I haven't gotten to the high level stuff, and I haven't participated in any of the dungeons so I can't comment on those. But what I can say is that the random Rifts that pop up all over the world are extremely fun, and the fact that they allow you to automatically join a group with everyone else in the rift, that's convenient. The only major complaint I have so far, is the fact that any settlement can be randomly raided by an NPC army. Normally that's not that big of a deal, if anyone else is around you can typically fight them off without too much trouble. But when you find yourself alone, on your way to turn in 4 quests in a town, and you find it completely overrun, you lose your sense of humor fast.

it's hard to see but this was an invasion, and a massive pain in the ass

Also I have only played a warrior thus far, but it's worth mentioning that the variety in armor designs is startlingly low. My character is level 29 and I have only seen 2 types of armor thus far, they are simply given different colors or patterns. This is more than a little bit disappointing but again, the maximum level here is 50 so I'm far from seeing everything.

Combat is great, and feels a bit more involved than your typical MMORPG, right off the bat I got several retaliation attacks, one that works only after I get a critical, and another that works after the enemy dodges my shot. There is another that I just haven't unlocked yet but these make the combat feel more interesting and less like I could just walk away and come back in a minute to loot the bodies. The combat animations are also pretty decent. In fact the graphical presentation overall is fantastic, everything is bright and vibrant, without being cartoonish and overstated. And almost all of the environments that I have seen so far have been a pleasure to look at.

The community is a pathetic and depressing caricature of MMO players as a whole. I mean it's honestly pathetic. Now as a rule, I do not chat on global channels, and I avoid grouping at all costs in all MMO's, but I still pay attention to some of what is said in these channels. And in this case, every time someone asks a question, no matter what it may be, they are met with a smartass remark, or by someone just generally giving them a hard time. For example, someone came on, and said something along the lines of "Hey I've never played an MMO before, how should I get started?" and several people responded, most saying things like "go ask your mother" or "just press alt F4". It's like the games community is comprised entirely of the population of a certain website that I'm not going to name because you shouldn't go there. And then comes the constant WOW hate. I mean really guys, you're really going to complain about WOW when you are playing a game that is very nearly identical to it? But that's based off of just the one server, it could be different elsewhere I don't know.

Anyways that's about all I want to say at the moment, ill update this if I ever have enough to write you a full review but for the time being Rift is a pretty fun game. It's really nice to finally have another good fantasy MMORPG, World of Warcraft is REALLY showing its age, and unless the boys at Blizzard get their shit together and at least update their graphics (MORE THAN JUST THE FUCKING WATER) they are going to find themselves off the market relatively soon. I'm not saying Rift is going to force WOW out, but someone is going to, and it's going to happen soon.

Rift is property of Trion
All else is ©Alex Jenkins 2011