This message should prolly be posted somehwere else, but i'm posting it here, for now,
I just want to tell you about my experince with AO.
I remember ordering my credit card in the bank, since I had just got my hands on this fantastic Online multplayer game that requiered a small payment to play each month.
I got the game 3 days after ordering it, and waited another 10 for the damn card. I was like a little child again, waiting for that Credit card, as I was so damn excited about getting online, and finally playing the game. I read a little about the professions, a little about the gameplay, and read about game quests etc. to make time pass, wich had the effect of me getting even more excited to play.
It turns out that the day that I got my credticard was the day for pathing to 14.6. (More waiting)
I finally got online, and made my first character.
I was impressed by the graphics in the game, and couldnt quite understand funcom stating that you only nedded a 56K to play the game.
I played for 10 straight hours before my GF dragged me of to bed.
I played more and more as the days passed, and met some very plesant people online, some being kind enough to give me a little spare cash, just to get me started.
More days passed, and I experienced that black doors for the first time. The lag that I had, I expected, it is MMORPG after all.
But the black doors i had not. some more days passed, and the lag just got worse. I came to Newland for the first time, and i acctually thought my computer froze. The lag there was of another world. I was impressed i didnt get kicked of server, as i lagged for 5+ seconds at the time, and i took me 2 minutes to move from the Newland whompa entrance to the Newland Dessert Whompa entrance. From that day I have tried to avoid NL as much as I can. Well, I have played for about 2 months now, and have 4 Characters. and lately I feel the lag has gotten, if possible even worse. Back in the early 90's when i had my 486 i got a memory "expander" program to expand my memory, as RAM was VERY expensive back then, wich resulted in me buying a new motherboard the next week. Since that day i swore to NEVAH use any so called memory expaning programs. Guess what i am runnning now? Mem Turbo.
The meory demands for AO is huge. Well, relativley huge I guess, it CAN run on 128, but I wish i had 512.
The mem program makes AO run a little bit more smooth. Not much, but keeps me from smahing my keyboard when I get killed from an mob I couldnt see.
Ok, enough rambling, the servers are up
My point is, The game is great. People whining about nerfing, and game being unfair etc. etc. obviously havent tried programming, and understand that a program can run problem free on 1 computer, and utterly crash on another.
If you think the game is unfair, or the profession you put 350 hours into is nerfed, understand that thats what roleplaying is all about. I read something about MA being nerfed, or was it NT or? -whatever. you get an character, with certain downsides, and you play the character with the downside that are made obvious to you, and rely on you strong sides, as in real life. Some of us cant put 2+2 together, but is more articulate than the most. While some of us is more or less mathematical geniuses, but can barely make oneself understood. I hope you can see my point.
I have played Rolepalying games for quite some time.
And I have found out, that playing an "uber" character is not fun... It is fairly easy to make an Uber character, but playing an "challenged" character is tons more fun.
Errh, i just keep on rambling dont I?
Trying to get to the point =P
I guess what i am trying to say is;
Funcom has done a good job, so far.
A bit too high RAM requirements perhaps.
All the players whining like little crybabies, should try playing some reolplaying IRL, and try to give funcom a break once in a while. They are nust normal people like you and me, trying to make a living from what they enjoy the most.
