Today I got a little bit of game time in with LOTRO. I’m playing on Silverlode and my name is Cuppiecake in case anyone is interested in saying hello =) Unfortunately my name Cuppycake is either taken by another character or it was my beta character that still ‘owns’ the name. Regardless, Cuppiecake will be just fine.
First of all, what a nice smooth launch as others have been noting. My server is one of the busier ones, but the longest wait I’ve waited was like 3 min or less. Upon logging in I am seeing tons of newbie players, which is refreshing after experiencing Vanguard’s dismal population from day 1. I didn’t experience any slowdown or lag; framerate was good and everything went great.
I can’t wait to get out of Snowville though. I’ve never been a big fan of snow type zones in games (although Everfrost in EQ2 is gorgeous.) Regardless, it definitely is immersive. The draw distance is great, and the new high res graphics I’m experiencing after updating from the cd really do make a difference. I’m not able to play the game with full graphics on, but its looking pretty damn beautiful so far. I am impressed thusfar.
Anyway, here are a couple pictures. I made it to level 4 only, and I am a minstrel of Rivendell =)
Tami Baribeau is the Associate Producer for Metaplace, Inc, currently working on Island Life. She is also the Lead Editor of feminist gaming blog The Border House, and the National Facebook Games Examiner for Examiner.com. She can be reached on Twitter or by email.
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
You’re on my server, Cuppy! Look for Begud, and send me a mail if I’m not on when you are next. If you’re in need of a Kin, the Dreamcatchers would love to have you.
I’ll keep an eye out for you, even if you’re an elf, I guess I can play with you…
To me, the problem with LoTRO is that it is way too much of a WoW clone. Turbine obviously decided that the way to compete was simply to copy as much as they possibly could, and I think that’s rather sad.
I don’t particularly like WoW, I have little desire to play World of Middle-Earth, either. Even if the graphics are nicer.
I don’t agree that its a WoW clone. Personally though, I enjoyed leveling up my first character in WoW. I got a good year of entertainment out of WoW, which was just fine for me. If LOTRO keeps me entertained for that long I’ll be VERY surprised, yet satisfied. There are a lot of great elements of WoW that I appreciate and think they are worth keeping around in future MMOs.
Don’t you just hate it when your name is taken in a game.
I have used Dathmar in nearly all the games I play ( a name I thought I “invented”) – but I tried to use Dathmar in the Pre-Release and was told it was taken.
I sometimes wonder if people take the name because they cannot think of there own…?
About the game…I too think it might be a little thin on content (well when compared to WOW and EQ2) but I hope that Turbine will keep rolling out more free content over the next year.