Wild Star Beta Report: Thumbs Up!

The Open Beta continues through tomorrow. I do not think I’ll get much play time in so here are my thoughts:

Playing this morning I wished I had more time to play. More time with my character and the world. I’d like to get just a bit farther, see a bit more.

The game is so very smooth, “polished” as they say. For a game I paid no attention to before this open beta opportunity, I really like it and am likely to play at launch.

As I’ve been thinking about what I like, the exploration is a lot of fun. I do like the Explorer Path. It reminds me of the old Tomb Raider games where you’d get into a new section of the tomb and you could see where you needed to go, but dang, how on earth were you going to get there?

I like the combat, though I’m not a fan of those red fans of stun/knockdown the enemy drop on the ground in front of you. Neverwinter is the other that does that, right? What I’m doing is hitting them as fast as I can with my own shots then as they lay down the red stuff I use my ability which slams/stuns them and moves me out of range behind them. It works nicely with single targets and has some utility with multiple. When in doubt, JUMP.

Looking at Zone chat this morning things were pretty mellow. I’m seeing people asking how things work, asking advice on builds, armor and skills. This bodes very well.

Often it seems people are in the chats slamming the game, comparing it to other games, just being nothing but critical as Trolls do like to do.

Saying goodbye to my girl for now, I’ll bring her back in June 🙂 Happy testing!

WildStar a peek at the Dominion

I really didn’t have a chance to play this weekend. I like my Aurin so much and would really just like to play her until she reaches one of those invisible walls where it becomes harder, less pleasant to advance. Every character has them, which is one reason for having multiple characters, areas, quests and play styles available to you.

You don’t want to kill the character off, but you need a break.

I thought I should at least try a Dominion character. They definitely are The Bad Guys as far as I can see. The Mechari seemed most pleasing so I created a pretty cool looking character.

I don’t suppose you can see very well the cool pokey things protruding from the sides of her head like Pippi Longstocking antennae.

Her earliest tasks included sort of torturing some citizens who weren’t thinking correctly. Bad guy City.

The Fearless Robot Leader spoke in a breathy voice that was more icky than menacing.

There was low, Jazzy music playing. I hate Jazz.

These things added up pretty quickly to a character I didn’t wish to play.

With so little time left in Open Beta I think I need to get my Pink Pony Tailed Aurin as far along as I can so I get a real feel for the game.

I’d like to see as much as the game has to offer, and I’m curious about housing, character development and whether there really is open world pvp, which would be a game breaker to say the least.

Before the open beta I did not look at anything about the game at all, I only saw the trailers which looked frenetic and unappealing.

I’m not finding the game to be frenetic at all. The “cartoon” style which may be putting some people off doesn’t feel that way in game. I have had no graphic or audio issues though I could see in Zone Chat many people were having them.

The only other bizarro thing I would comment on is that apparently you only get more bag space a slot at a time and by leveling. You can’t give your low level character reasonable bags to adventure with, they won’t be able to equip them. In a subscription game that is beyond unacceptable, especially if you work on crafting.

Wildstar: Level Up

I finally got to level 5 which I would have expected to hit much sooner. I killed a boatload of things on the spacecraft and did a lot of quests and came out of there at level 3! Yoikes!

Down on the planet it is all very forest like and the game reminds me now of Guild Wars 2, the Sylvari and Asura areas. I’m hoping to make my way out of the nature-y ecological theme of this forest into a more city scape feels-like-science-fiction-again area.

I’m enjoying filling in the map and getting progress points towards exploration. There are also Explorer path quests which are challenging my brain.

There was an odd little timed Event where you were supposed to jump up and get six butterflies. Not a fan. Except, I had a lottery chance to win two bag slots! Not two bags, nooo but two additional slots in my existing bag! This boggles my mind.

Watching zone chat the beta testers seem young. Open beta is a different animal but I can’t think of anything where I got that impression before.

Someone also said you can’t get a hearthstone type thing to easily return to your home base till level 8 or 9. What would be the purpose of that? Maybe I’m that far off from seeing a city agh.

Combat is easy peasy. I can easily kill something a level above me, unlike in Everquest 2.

My character can jump, really jump and there are places in the environment to test her skills. Really cool.

WildStar: Way Cool So Far

I’m still in the tutorial but I like the game so much so far. It hits everything that I wanted.

I love the science fiction environment. It opens on a ship that is so cool.

I chose an Aurin Spellsinger with an Explorer Path. Then, intrepid Explorer that I am I had trouble finding the “bottom” floor for a quest. I did look down below but it was all red and looked like a drop into space at a glance. There are alot of mobs on the deck and they respawn fast so you can’t stand around thinking hmmm.

I do like that they had quests right away for my “Path”.

I love the Rockin’ Rowsdowner Space Bar. The Relic Room, where I’m currently looking to defuse a bomb is right out of an Indiana Jones game. It has been a long time since I looked around at an in game environment and said “this is really cool”.

The music in a game really affects my liking it or not, the music here is just lively from the very beginning.

I’m completely smitten so far.