Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning - Progress Report Part 2

Solo-playing

Jeff gives us the heads-up on that:

"You'll get a different experience playing solo than you would with a group or guild or with a Warband, but you can experience almost all of the content fully as a solo player." Paul has a small correction. "You can experience all of the content fully! I don't talk to another human being in that game and I've taken part in PQs - other people just have to be there, attacking the King - other people just have to be there. You can take part, but you can't do it alone. Point is I've had a blast of a time never actually having to talk to anyone."

Josh added "It's designed to take players like Paul who are malicious, belligerent, anti-social, malcontent and trick them into making friends. It's the Holy Grail of video games - tricking you into having a social life!"

Paul continues "I'm always getting invited into groups. I'm always getting tells of people saying 'hey you're really good, join our group' and they won't leave me alone!"

Another interesting part is that you won't have to go around a city for hours in search of a group in this game, going 'looking for group, looking for group, looking for group', and then being forced to log off because you've run out of time. Paul again adds "for those of you that say you hate everyone and you don't want to be forced to group... you don't have to."

PvP & RvR

An interesting question came up about the viability of advancing solely by PvP. Jeff answered:

"Great question. I'll tell you that right now, in beta, it's something that we're looking at very closely. It's our goal that players can do that. Right now you can progress in RvR, it's slow right now and we don't want it to be as slow as it is." They're basically watching every move made by players. "We're watching what you're killing, how fast you're leveling, how much XP you're getting over time. We're constantly looking at all that and tweaking it. That is absolutely a goal of ours. Not only do you gain renown in RvR, but you also gain XP so you can actually level in RvR, you gain gold and loot just like you would fighting monsters. Some of the best equipment comes from RvR."

Wrap up

When we reached the end of this lengthy, but informative, conference call, the developers summarized on most of the stuff mentioned. They also said that there's a lot they still haven't talked about and that the variety of things you can do during your time within the world of Warhammer Online should really compel gamers to just keep on playing, even after they've reached the highest level with their avatars.

So, that's all we have for you for now, kids. By the way, the launch date was also a very brief topic. When asked about the release date for the game, the devs. unanimously declared that Fall 2008 would be an approximate time-frame.