GamingSF suffered from technical issues that kept him from getting into the expansion initially, but when he did, he recognized that it had some “really nice features.” Why I Game concurs with this sentiment, noting that there are “a lot more nods to exploration this time around.”
“Story is okay, nothing amazing, some funny bits help, and I find it gets better as it progresses onward,” ECTmmo.com wrote. “The actual places you get to travel to and explore in this expansion are what makes it shine, well, that and the mounts.”
We’ve got even more Path of Fire impressions after the break, as well as a look at Star Trek Online, Elite Dangerous, and Ultima Online!
Occasional Hero: Path of Fire launch impressions
“It occurs to me that this expansion offers a lot of returns to the old, pre-Heart of Thorns Guild Wars 2 formula. The map is so much easier to navigate (again, open, flat desert vs. layered, convoluted jungle), and the mob density/difficulty is a lot more similar to that of Central Tyria than that of the Heart of Maguuma.”
Nerdy Bookahs: Guild Wars 2: Path of Fire first impressions
“The soundtrack is really good so far. My favourite song is the one based on the Nightfall Soundtrack. In general, I feel like I’m back in Nightfall when I listen to the music — or look around! Because that’s the next part that I really love, as always: the world design!”
Endgame Variable: Elite Dangerous Horizons
“But the thing about Elite: Dangerous is… it’s not really a game. It’s more of a simulator. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a really cool simulator. Flying around feels very realistic and every solar system’s sights are pretty cool. And landing on planets is very cool, and driving around in the SRV buggy is very cool. But I don’t have any compelling reason to do any of this very cool stuff.”
Me Vs Myself And I: Thoughts on Star Trek Online PS4 edition
“For some reason though, it feels at home on a console. This isn’t DC Universe where it was created with a console port in mind, but it still was a well done port. The controls are fluid and easy to manage, and it’s not a chore sorting through menus.”
Raph Koster: Ultima Online is twenty
“Today marks the twentieth anniversary of Ultima Online‘s launch day. Funny enough, I have no particular memories of that day. I’ve written a fair amount about UO in the past, so I am at a bit of a loss as to what to say, other than ‘thank you’ to the folks who hired me and let me work on it, and ‘thank you’ to the players who played and continue to play it. It has been an honor.”
Parallel Context: On the endangered species list — the story in MMOs
“What is bothersome to me — and to others who prefer the story to be the primary focus of a game — it seems that game companies in general are moving away from the story and more toward multiplayer competition […] While I get that for some people, the story in an MMO is best left to the players, I’m not like that. For me, a story provides a framework for everything else that happens in an MMO, and while you can get away with a generic fantasy or science fiction MMO as a pure sandbox, MMOs based on name properties would have a hard time pulling that off.”
Every day there are tons of terrific, insightful, and unusual articles posted across the MMO gaming blogosphere — and every day, Justin reads as many as he can. Global Chat is a sampling of noteworthy essays, rants, and guides from the past few weeks of MMO discourse.
