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[niclam]

That sounds interesting,

Can you further describe why the AO beta was really bad? I would like to know to have more perspective of the problems that other games have encountered. Ive played WOW and Ragnarok Online betas and they were pretty playable (the former being as polished as they can get, the main problem was the lag but that's reasonable).

Regards

[tandcemerson]

Oy ... so long ago. Most of the issue was the massive lag such that RO had also experienced. If I remember correctly, they were one of the first to try a server setup where there was only one world, yet many layers. It was strange, but whatever.

They released into closed beta right when Asheron's Call was starting to hit it's down-swing and EQ hit it's first bad time too and so there was great interest.

I remember also that some of the classes weren't working right either.

Ok ... I found this old IGN article which was written even after it went to production. For the record, I never played it except during beta.

http://pc.ign.com/articles/161/161500p1.html

Originally Posted by IGN

However, as pretty as it looks and as brilliant as some of the ideas and concepts in the game are, Anarchy Online is a far cry from being perfect. The most problematic of the hitches is that the game is still plagued by a myriad of technical issues at this point. Anarchy Online suffers from what hampers every online game -- lag and latency. Moving in the crowded urban areas is an often laborious affair, and although the frame rates are higher and the ping rates are more stable than they were a month ago, running around the city is often like running through a strobe light, as your character will jump around the landscape as the game tries to catch up with your location.

Lag can also plague you in combat, and this is when it's the most dangerous. It can literally take a couple of minutes for the game to catch up with you and register what has happened to your character in the middle of combat, and I would often come out of a fight only to find that I had already died. Yes, it's frustrating to say the least.

I'm also still experiencing a fair number of crashes that kick me out of the game, although a few weeks ago I wasn't having as many problems as I am now, and they seem to stem from a recent patch that may have done more harm than good, at least for me.

Another problem lies in the skill system. Although there are plenty of skills, many of them are pretty useless or not even implemented at this point in the game. For example, I spent a few points climbing early on, but I have yet to find anything to climb. Also, with the exception of one or two, the trade skills are not yet implemented in the game.

While the graphics are tight, there are plenty of graphical errors that detract from the game. The most glaring of these are the frequent clipping problems and the fact that the walls aren't always "solid." One of the most exploitable bugs in the game is the fact that you can shoot through walls. This can be a good and bad thing, as you can shoot things far afar that can't see you, but it can be bad since you can also be shot at and have no idea what is pegging you.

I recall in the game that the beggest challenge during beta was to make it from the training area into the outdoors where people were less concentrated and then the game was only just a bit playable. When the article says that the game took minutes to catch up ... I don't recall that but it was around 30 seconds.

I never played WoW or Ragnarok betas, but I did play Saga of Ryzom beta and it was much more of the same ... lag issues. For Asheron's Call 2 beta I don't recall there being much lag issues, but then again it was Turbine's second MMORPG. I never really judge a beta on content because my hope (often) is that each game tries to be somewhat independent and those features may suffer because of it. In my opinion all those games were pretty playable aside from horrendous lag.