Yuck-O-Meter Summer Edition

[Green Rowan]

It has been quite a while since I’ve thrown the Yuck-O-Meter at you lot.

There have been a lot of changes in the last couple of months, so I think that it is time dip our toes into the pool and take the water temperature again… so here goes: Until somebody tells me otherwise, we are in the game for entertainment. It doesn’t matter if you are a bushy tailed orange noob, or a cynical uber in an outrageously expensive coat, we log in to have fun, and if we can, hit that illusive HOF. It is all about how you feel... That’s why I’m posting this poll . I’m asking you a simple question (I am deliberately keeping it vague):

On a scale of one to ten, (where one means “yuck”, five means “meh” and ten means “wow”), how would you rate your game play experience in the Entropia Universe?

What’s the point of this poll? I simply want to see how my own impressions compare with the rest of Entropians…

NB. I’m not talking about what you hope, or what you want, but about what you feel.

Should you feel so inclined, feel free to explain your vote.

Green

 

[Green Rowan]

After thinking about it for a while, I had to give it a reluctant 7. Why? There is A LOT of new content in the game, and the communications channels between us and “them” seem not to be so clogged up anymore.

However…
• I sometimes have the impressions that the technical stuff lags behind the creative part of the game. I especially hate it when I’m confronted with an army of buggs after every VU. (I sometimes wonder if these things are tested before release.)

• I still haven’t got used to the terrain. I know that they are working on flattening things out, but I wish they’d hurry up”

• I miss some of the “features” and places from the pre VU10.

• The AI seems to be different… the mobs behave strangely sometimes. I particularly hate it when they take off for no reason, or when they start to walk sideways just after you put the crosshairs on them.

• And of course: loot sucks!

 

[ranpha]

Game ruled before .And it becomes better every day. And stop focusing on loot and focus on having fun. For me i can have days with fun without even dropping a single cent


Voted 10 -Wow because there was no 11

 

[Prescott]

Alot of fun things has ben implemented sofar this year, such as.

Enhancers
Mindforce
vehechles
Missions

also the game runs alot smoother now and is better optimized than ever before.

It feels like they are doing everything right now!

Im very happy with the service

10

 

[Mega]

• The AI seems to be different… the mobs behave strangely sometimes. I particularly hate it when they take off for no reason, or when they start to walk sideways just after you put the crosshairs on them.

I find that an advantage.

 

[Green Rowan]

I find that an advantage.

for whom? ...

 

[Immortal]

"better than WoW"

 

[Mega]

for whom? ...

If it is doing some fancy dance moves, moving sideways, its taking its time coming towards me. So that's a definite advantage for me. I'm sure it'll be fixed at some point though.

In general terms, I think EU has never been less buggy, and I've not heard any complaints of lag even from the hordes hunting the Eomon and Longtooth, so sounds like some improvements have been made there too.

Loot is as it always is, sometimes good, sometimes not so good.

 

[Mariko Ninja]

Game ruled before .And it becomes better every day. And stop focusing on loot and focus on having fun. For me i can have days with fun without even dropping a single cent


Voted 10 -Wow because there was no 11

Focusing on having fun ?

Seriously, the game is slowly improving on some points, but declining rapid on other points. Currently if I want to have fun and skill at my level. This ‘game’ would cost me $20 a day in losses. In 2008 and early 2009 I was able to cycle though 30k to 50k ped on ammo a month. I would do 4 to 8 hunts a day losing big on maybe 2 or 3 hunts. But at the end of the day my ped card would be down a few hundred peds. One time a month I would deposit for the losses, and didn't find it a big problem.

Yet these days my hunting is reduced to 2 or 3 days a week. Losing 1k peds a day is easy now, even when I hunt eco on the same mobs as I did back in 2008 and 2009. Now I only dare to do 1 or 2 hunts a day, if loot is good, I might do more. Yet again my return on the last 5 hunts was less than 60% on the ammo alone. Not even counting repairs and weapons decay. Nice these ped migration events. Bad luck I’m sure, but that seems to become the norm these days for many. When I global or hof it happens after losses, global sprees like in 2008 and 2009 are rare these days.

Back then, when loot was bad, I used to skill my pets, somewhere this skill went out the window. Yeah I know, it will be back some day, nerfed more like MF.
Sweating was fun to do, while chatting to other people around me. Now it’s a ‘follow-the-mob’ game with a tool, bye bye fun, bye bye social aspect. Now recently I bought a car, had some fun driving from A to B, but that gets old rapidly. Since my crafting and mining returns have been very bad the past three years, I now hardly touch those skills. Those are a ped sink hole for me, so I’m reduced to hunting mostly.


I voted 5 meh… because that is where I’m atm.

.

 

[SpikeBlack]

If I'd been answering this when I had started almost 4 1/2 years ago I'd have said a 7 or 8.

Now 3 or 4, its not that the possibilities aren't there its that I've been priced out of progression. Unless I'm willing to invest very large amounts of cash I'll make extremely slow progress in skills or be willing to spend hours grinding which I won't do as I have no wish to have a mental breakdown. 1 or 2 hours fine but I would like to know I'm actually in a game not in a contest to click mouse buttons or sit back and use the auto tool.

Actual gameplay hasn't changed that much at all since I began. There have been additions but mostly these are just add-ons - the auto tool, vehicles both of which I'm unlikely to use.

The real thing I'm missing are beacons, it was the final activity in EU that I enjoyed (usually) and their loss with no sign of them coming back soon has hit my gameplay hard to point where I login for a couple of hours once a month.

I now spend my cash on books, so far since vu10 I'm averaging one a week and atleast those I can go back to and read again

 

[mike jones]

10 - all the new content is just awsome

 

[Jamira]

...

I voted 5 meh… because that is where I’m atm.

Same here. There was one important aspect for me before: Role playing.

I bought nice clothes, spent a lot of time and PED at Sorg's beauty studio, I asked ETOPIA for crafting a special jacket and paid some PED to Sarah for coloring it and other clothes. And I asked Trance for special makeups. The most important makeup was done by myself: a face tribal - my brand label. It was part of my colonist identity. Now I do look like all other Barbies.

I stopped depositing. And since this Barbie-avatar isn't really Jamira anymore, I stopped logging in. Because nobody shall see my face naked.

I gave all my stuff to a friend, including apartments with furniture and pictures, all my clothes and so on and vanished into thin air.

That was a harsh step for me. For nearly five years I was online almost every day for 3-12 hours (including the required deposits). Now I've learned: I can handle my addiction. At the moment I think I will be back when my face tribal is back. But if this period persits for another long time, I will probably lose concern.

 

[xaph]

The real thing I'm missing are beacons

Absolutely

 

[Mariko Ninja]

Same here. There was one important aspect for me before: Role playing.

I bought nice clothes, spent a lot of time and PED at Sorg's beauty studio, I asked ETOPIA for crafting a special jacket and paid some PED to Sarah for coloring it and other clothes. And I asked Trance for special makeups. The most important makeup was done by myself: a face tribal - my brand label. It was part of my colonist identity. Now I do look like all other Barbies.

I stopped depositing. And since this Barbie-avatar isn't really Jamira anymore, I stopped logging in. Because nobody shall see my face naked.

I gave all my stuff to a friend, including apartments with furniture and pictures, all my clothes and so on and vanished into thin air.

That was a harsh step for me. For nearly five years I was online almost every day for 3-12 hours (including the required deposits). Now I've learned: I can handle my addiction. At the moment I think I will be back when my face tribal is back. But if this period persits for another long time, I will probably lose concern.

I didn’t even go far in making masks, only black eyeliner on the one I used.
It’s already long ago sold to my trade partner, the trade terminal.
Most my clothes come from auctions, selected careful to some nice sets, so only lose on Markup there if I sell those. Spend hours with Sorg to make my avatar look like my real self, that went out the window when VU.10 came. Countless hours and peds wasted for nothing. But I took this loss, hoping things would improve.

In the past I got the idea to support my crafting from mining and hunting, loot and mine the materials myself. I decided to try to get the materials to make breer p1a’s myself. Took me over one year before I had enough for 100 clicks. So being self supportive I can forget, doesn’t work for me. So I now play an RCE, where I do not take part in the economy, I watch from the side lines, and trade with the trade terminal. Only rarely I loot a weapon, esi or some armor to put on auctions. But I learned to live with it and go my own way, solo. And I know there are many others out there that are in the same boat as me.

It is these little things where FPC and Mindark fail, add it all up and people will walk. If they would only stop adding new stuff for a while and fix everything, then maybe they have a game again that is fun to play. I don’t know if I will be around another three years to see it finally happen.

.

 

[JingyiDai]

I voted 1 - Yuck , because if you expect the worst -> you may be surprised ! how wonderful it is...

The MV of some TT junks have been improved, but at the expenses of other MV.

So it is time to try stuffs out I think.... but good things never last long here.

 

[Hurrikane]

Just had the biggest solo loot of my 5 year EU career...640 PED


Not enough to retire on but enough to keep me happy.

I give a 12.



Hurrikane

 

[aia]

I'd give it a 5(10) right now.

When it comes to loots, I feel I'm in "low mode". Since that varies, dunno what to say.

Fun that mindforce is back - on the other hand, my old fuga(/foul) hunting grounds are practically gone. New chips, but the small ones are useless on most mobs. While mindforce itself is back, the top level chips have been prefixed with "First Gen" (probably meaning they won't drop anymore - and there even't were any SGA version of them).

Vehicles: Fun - for those who have one. They aren't fun if you don't (and you don't have a heap of PEDs to spend for buying one - I haven't had loot covering the price of one yet and I feel hesitant of depositing 300 ped to buy a 17 ped (L) item).

MA have had a few item handouts, and items have dropped from say Longtooth - but I didn't even manage to get a car, and with current returns I got broke after 3-4 longtooth. The MA item policy doesn't add to the fun in game playing for me..

The avatar show-up lag (and inventory display lag) has now been expanded to lag when showing landscape and mobs. I remember eomon event at VU 9 when they literally dropped from the sky when they spawned - now teammates can shoot at one for a minute before I see what they are shooting at.

Rocktropia: Rocktropia is cool - but the TP fee is awkward. (Unless they bring Thorifoids there, remove auction transport fee and trade in my CND apartment for a Rocktropia apartment I won't consider "moving").

Gateway: Probably a needed place. I got a feeling though that one week was too little to try it out, and a bit of a pity we aren't able to re-visit it after the bug fixes. The island was cool and I'll miss it - and hope a copy of it will be implemented. I wonder what the players who were on vacation will think when they come back in end of summer, see the new calypso splash screen, wonder what that place is and then realize they can't get there.

 

[Death is Here]

The avatar show-up lag (and inventory display lag) has now been expanded to lag when showing landscape and mobs....now teammates can shoot at one for a minute before I see what they are shooting at.

I give it a 5 for the same reason.

 

[Manique]

A place where i can make cash have fun and with good grafs and diversability
Wow!

 

[aia]

A place where i can make cash have fun and with good grafs and diversability
Wow!

Isn't it illegal (against their EULA) to make cash there?

 

[Aandar]

9



-----------------------------------------

 

[billairboy]

I voted a 8. To get a higher rate they must add more RPG element and other stuff like the beacon missions. I would like the have the possibility to find randoms caves and similar things to explore and maybe find some loot. We need more of that kind of element in the game as a complement to the daily "auto-fire hunting".

 

[Sharkie]

The memories off the past is always better, but i like the way this unique "game" is going ..

7

 

[NightwolfAA2k5]

I voted 6.
They've taken some steps in the right direction. But more (work) is needed.

 

[Commodore]

"better than WoW"

Yeah, he's saying that even EU at it's best is still on par with WoW

I think that's a little harsh, but Meh was all I could muster for all the years robbed from real life. If I was fresh today, then I'm sure it'd be 9.

 

[Anteyu]

I gave it a 3.

Good game, very fun, on just playing experience alone it'd be a 7 or 8, but the cost to play is too high, making it not a game you can come and play when you want to play, making it score very low IMO.

 

[Atraie]

Voted 7, i think the game has the potential for a lot more. And it really wouldn't take that much work to make it a 8-9.

I would have said 8, but too many functions lack the polish for that. I curse every time i have to rearrange stuff in storage for instance. So many little issues with storage, little issues with other functions, etc. Storage alone wont let it go past a 7 and im tempted to lower it to a 6, but thats too close to 5(meh), and i think the game is more then meh.

Until core game play is tweaked to be more interactive/fun/not so simple, it wouldn't be able to go past 8 tho, regardless of how much more content they add.

 

[KrQlle]

well it depends on how my runs go=) sometimes on cnd i would give it a -100 but over all a good solid 7

 

[lilac]

Actually playing the game is awesome... the cost and occasional stress that results from said cost... not so much....

 

[Huskie]

Of course most people here will vote >5, since for most reasonable, not morbidly addicted people, when a game stops being fun (a.k.a. <5) they simply stop playing it, or take a break.