Saturday 27 March 2010

Why WAR will win the battle

Gonna put my serious hat on here for a bit.

Warhammer Online is a great game, and I emphasise that word because that's what it is - a game which I play and enjoy.

WAR is 18 months old, more or less, and it has now reached a position where it can go from strength to strength.

It's inaugural year was not without issue and it's a great credit to the quality of the gameplay that it's come this far and survived.

The pre-launch hype was a factor of Mythic's own-making and the game had to weather the ineveitable backlash.

The Tier 4 RvR element of the game was always going to need refining after launch. Designing a flawless 400-odd player RvR system across multiple zones without proper player testing would've required a team of sheer genius to achieve. T4 RvR wasn't perfect, and still isn't, but it's pretty damn good when you think about the complexities involved.

Changes to Mythic's internal leadership and merger with BioWare must have stunted a lot of the progress the game could otherwise have made and is now catching up on. I can remember a time when there was a different Producer every month. There were staff cuts and a global recession to deal with too.

Despite all this WAR has survived and is improving all the time.

Welcome changes are on the horizon in 1.3.5, the game is being taken to new markets and new content is in the pipeline. I would hope the next 6-9 months sees the improvement to the endgame and new content that players want.

With this achieved there is huge potential to take the RvR game to a new level, with new maps and territories for players and guilds to fight over in true Warhammer-style campaign. Mythic have already shown they can come up with great and original material for players to enjoy. With an established and stable platfrom to build on the future for WAR looks good.

/hat off

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