Lord of the Rings Online

Played on PC

When is the appropriate time to evaluate an MMO? I usually post a review of a game after I finish it, but MMOs are designed to have no end to them. I could give a first impression, but many of the finer gameplay elements are not immediately available or apparent. In fact, MMO systems are generally so large and complex that I might not understand the “bigger picture” until the time I’ve invested is approaching triple-digit hours. So it is that I’ve gone so long without saying much about Lord of the Rings Online.

I’ve mentioned before my transition from World of Warcraft (WoW) to Lord of the Rings Online (LotRO). There’s no mistaking the influence the former has had on the latter. Out of the box the familiarity definitely worked in LotRO’s favor; I was immediately about to jump in and concentrate on the content. As time went on I think the similarities accelerated my fatigue, as it was very clear that although I had not “been there” I had indeed “done that.” All of this invites comparison, and there’s no doubt in my mind that WoW is a superior game. But when you’ve exhausted all of WoW’s content, and you haven’t written off the genre as a whole, you can do worse than to slum it out to LotRO.

I’m going to say some not-so-nice things about LotRO, so I really have to preface it all by reminding you (and myself) that I like LotRO. It has some really excellent moments in it. I’ll never forget the time I wandered into the Barrow Downs and encountered my first shrieking screen-shaking undead. Or when I got thoroughly lost in the Old Forest. Or when I turned the bend and saw Weathertop, and refused to do anything else until I had climbed to the top of it. Or when I snuck my way into the valley of Rivendell, far earlier than I really should have. These moments where the game connects you to the fiction are amazing. Unfortunately they’re few and few between.

As powerful as the Lord of the Rings license can be, it is also the source of many of this game’s flaws. You see, the books are primarily about travelling, and as such the world of LotRO is huge. The developers have done an excellent job of honoring the scope of the fiction, such that if you were to walk the footsteps of Bilbo or the Fellowship, it would be an appropriately epic journey. Unfortunately, you can’t really do that. For one, like WoW this world is broken up into level banded regions. Four Hobbits could not make it from the Shire to Rivendell in this world without having their asses handed to them by any number of bears, spiders, and orcs on the way. Instead they would have to stop every mile or so to grind until they were ready for the next leg. I’m beginning to see why Bilbo had to travel with thirteen dwarves and a wizard.

But I can forgive all of that and write it off as a gameplay necessity. I mean, that’s how WoW does it and it works. WoW’s locations are extremely varied, each with their own palette, landmarks, and local fauna. The world of Middle-Earth is certainly full of amazing locations, but unfortunately as LotRO exists today you’re only getting a very small percentage of them. The currently available land mass covers from the Shire to the Misty Mountains. Comparing to the fiction, this basically only allows access to locations where events started to get interesting. There’s no Lonely Mountain, no Moria, no Isengard, and certainly no Mordor. Spending hours of your time grinding through a field that the Fellowship breezed through doesn’t exactly leave a heroic taste in your mouth.

I hit my first real slump somewhere shy of level 25. I had reached Weathertop but wasn’t really high enough level to push much further beyond. I stopped playing for some time until the game got patched to increase the viability of my class (minstrel). Reinvigorated, I powered through the next ten levels relatively quickly. I hit the landmark level 35 and spent all my hard earned cash on a mount. Getting my mount had granted an amazing feeling of freedom in WoW, but now that I had mine in LotRO I quickly realized that I didn’t actually have anywhere to ride to.

I sit now at level 37, not too far from the level cap of 50. And I’m having a hard time mustering up the willpower to get through those next 13 levels because I know that I’ve already hit all the landmarks that are most important to me. I want to see the Misty Mountains, sure, but that’s about it. It’d be different if I weren’t so invested in the fiction. I’d probably be more excited about visiting some random ruin if I couldn’t think of a dozen more intriguing places I’d rather go to. Spending this much time tooling around in Eriador just feels wrong. Long travel times are okay for a one-way trip, but when you’re doing all the back and forth grunt work of your typical MMORPG, travelling around becomes a chore. And this is where I think the license is working against the game: In trying to own up to the epic size of the world the developers have created an epic amount of work for themselves. If it’s taken this long to get us to the Misty Mountains, how long will it be until we’re at the steps of Mount Doom?

I’ll see my character through to 50, but it’s mostly for the potential of what’s to come. The developers of LotRO have done an amazing job with the material they’ve presented so far. The environments are truly gorgeous. I genuinely look forward to seeing how they interpret the rest of Middle Earth, but I hope they establish better pacing so that I can see it in this lifetime.

Halo 3

Played on Xbox360

It feels silly to do a review of Halo 3. Given the ridiculous sales, chances are you either already own it or have decided you’re not interested. But it feels equally silly to not comment on the “largest entertainment launch of all time.”

Fundamentally, Halo 3 is more of the same. But that’s not a bad thing. You’ve got to remember that the first Halo established the viability of the shooter genre on consoles. We have it to thank for a successful gamepad control scheme, melee attacks, an evolution beyond health kits, more strategic gameplay due to a limited weapon load out, offhand grenades, engaging vehicles, a cooperative campaign, and revolutionary enemy AI. This game alone was enough to get me back into console gaming for the first time since the SNES. The all-nighter where I first completed the campaign (co-op, of course) stands as one of my most memorable gaming moments ever.

The first Halo had excellent multiplayer (albeit with a crazy overpowered pistol), but it was limited to LAN parties. The second Halo set the bar for online multiplayer matchmaking so high that it’s yet to be rivaled. Seriously, playing any other game online is downright painful. They place the burden on you to find a server with good connection that’s not empty, not full, and has competitively skilled players. With Halo all you have to do is say “I want to play,” and the rest is taken care of.

The third entry doesn’t deliver any more grand revelations to the shooter genre, but it does clean up its remaining blemishes. The moment-to-moment tactical gameplay has always been so intense that we almost ignored the atrociously repetitive level design. Halo 3 rights this wrong at last with some truly varied environments, creating a singleplayer campaign that is well paced, rewarding, and thoroughly replay-able. I’ve milked it for every achievement point available and I still sometimes itch for another go through. The multiplayer is less dramatically improved, but with tighter balance, better voice options, and the ability to review films of your matches, I’m certainly not complaining. No, the jump to Halo 3 is not as large as those before it, but there’s no denying that this game is a solid package.

There are some that have called Halo overrated. I’m sorry, but they’re just haters. Get over yourself, overlook the Dew-fueled frat-boy underbelly, and acknowledge this series for the huge impact it has made. The Master Chief’s latest battle may not bring much new to the table, but it is a solid game and well worth your time.

Freedom Writers

I recently watched Freedom Writers via the Xbox Video Marketplace. It’s not a standout film by any means. In fact, you’ve probably seen it before. It’s basically the same as Dangerous Minds or Take the Lead, or to a lesser extent Dead Poet’s Society, The Emperor’s Club, Mr. Holland’s Opus, or even Save the Last Dance. Take disadvantaged/disillusioned students, throw in an inspirational teacher, and have them overcome the system to create a heart warming, life changing story. This particular “naïve white teacher thrown in with inner-city kids” movie isn’t bad, but it certainly isn’t revolutionary either.

So why am I talking about it? Well, in this (true) story, the teacher in question stays with the same students for four years before moving on to a job at a university. She doesn’t try to recreate her direct teaching impact with another generation of disadvantaged kids. Throughout the movie she alienates her fellow staff members instead of motivating them. And the extreme focus on her students leads to the failure of her marriage. Nothing about her story seems repeatable or sustainable.

Yet the tale is supposed to be inspirational. We’re supposed to look at this and say “Hey, if you just put enough elbow grease into teaching, those kids will stop stabbing each other and become world leaders!” Hard to validate, because her success story is singular. But somehow this four year experience with the same class of students is supposed to create a foundation for educational reform. Maybe I’ve been watching too many documentaries lately, but I expect a little more critical thinking and a little less tear-jerking.

I realize that I can’t completely relate to this story. I went to school in Gig Harbor, which is about as far from the inner-city as you can get. I had some great teachers at times, but I never experienced anything close to the life-altering hug-fest depicted in dramatic teaching movies. I spent a short stint in college studying education and practicing on real kids in real schools (much more real than the schools I went too). I definitely have concerns over the education system, but to be inspired I need more than “Hey, I tried this thing once and it kinda worked.”

There are some interesting ideas to extract from this story, like having students progress year to year with the same teacher. With an extended exposure the teacher has an improved chance to connect with individual students. And by being forced to work with the same peers students can learn that family is something that can grow out of other sources than blood or ethnicity. When people deal with each other for a prolonged period of time they have to work out their differences, even if they still don’t like each other. In my opinion that’s the most important lesson of family, and it’d be great if school reinforced it. If you can just float on from class to class you never really have to learn how to resolve individual differences.

There are drawbacks, of course. If you only ever deal with the same set of people you won’t be as good at meeting and befriending new people (something that I personally am still terrible at). And creating a new scope of “us” has the side effect of designating a new “them” (although I’d argue that the more tribes you belong to the less of a problem that is). So I don’t think this is an idea taken to the extreme. But some more non-elective social persistence in the schools sounds like a good thing.