Hello! I've got some feedback to provide, hopefully I express my points well and you see where I'm coming from.
First, it is important to note what kind of player I am. I'm a solo player. After competing in fighting game tournaments since I was 15, now at 30, I enjoy beat 'em up and hack and slash games the most, and I'm basically resigning myself to playing them. Torchlight 2 is where I began with Torchlight, and I was instantly sucked into the world, the art style, and the satisfaction of the combat.
So, what makes solo enjoyable for me? I don't have to coordinate with people, first and foremost. I have a lot of time on my hands, a lot of time. I can wake up and play until I go to bed time. Now, say you implement a raid type dungeon in which I am required to have party members to have a chance. Well, its 4 AM, I want some gear.... and... yeah. The simple convenience of being able to play on my time and my time alone makes or breaks a game for me.
What makes the combat satisfying to me? I primarily use melee weapons (even though I'm the wrong class for it at the moment :D). The satisfaction of the thud, slash and general "oomph" as I hit an enemy is what made me fall in love with fighting games, beat 'em up games and hack and slash games. This game nails that so far.
On the topic of combat, I enjoy watching enemy patterns and being rewarded for it. I fought a boss in the first Frontier that was essentially a bigger version of the goblin that slashes and leaves fire. It took me a good minute, but with no potions, I was able to dodge and chip him down to a victory.
Here's the thing though, this is not supposed to be God of War, and I realize that, but without an evade or parry, if I ever do have lower gear, I'm pretty much going to die. That's how MMO's work, or at least that's what people tell me. I'd personally love to see the design, at least on the key tough fights, that allows me to win if I can avoid the attacks correctly, rather than spam spells and potions. That could be a just me thing though.
On the topic of loot, I love getting the shiny new item to drop and equipping it. Who doesn't? That's what looters are for, right? So far, I'm enjoying the loot at level 20 in the first Frontier. I am noticing a pattern though. White items are a waste of inventory, blue items are generally the same, and the legendary items I've seen (2) have been worse than my green items. Some play for loot, some play for combat, some play for both. I play for both, and the combat is fun enough to keep me going, but I would like to see the loot tuned up a bit.
Now, I don't want a super awesome weapon drop from every single monster I kill. I don't want to kill the final boss of the game at level 1. Loot triggers the reward center in ones brain, thereby telling the person they accomplished something, which makes them want to play more. If my blue weapon does 100 damage, and next one that drops does 101 damage, mission accomplished. However, as is, most of the drops boil down to computing whether my .1 poison is better than a .1 poison with a .1 health regen attached to it. Obviously, the latter is better, and obviously the example and the text above it is very similar.
I will feel more accomplished getting 1 point of damage, than .1 health regen with my .1 poison. I'm not sure I explained this well, but if I did, yay. :D
Now, let me get to some stuff I didn't particularly like:
Public area quests are a nightmare. I've played a lot of ARPG games, and they have always been a nightmare. Nothing is more frustrating than running circles and killing what feels like a billion mobs just to find that one elite enemy, or 20 of the rat creatures to spawn the boss rat. Respecting the time of the player (even me, who has a whole lot of it) is important. The game is solid enough, even in Alpha, people will stick without having to run around the same circle for an hour and a half to kill a rat. On the topic, the day/night cycle and the enemies within is good in and of itself. However, killing 100 goblins in the night time isn't really a possible thing, which again goes back to public area quests. Yes, I could go do another quest (I didn't have any at the time, though), but this is my personal feedback, right? :P
A few bosses I fought didn't allow me to dodge and attack. Particularly the last boss of the goblin Frontier. Having a whole bunch of elite enemies that leave fire behind and fire at me turned my melee character into a sniper, and then eventually a Relic tank, followed by 19 potions down before finally winning. Again, I don't want everything to die in one hit, and I'm not expecting Dark Souls combat, but I am of the thought that something can be tough but fair, rather than devolving into "I hope it dies before I do".
Gearing is sort of a problem. At level 1-10, cool. 10-20, eh, at most points I find my level 12 gear better than what level 20 gear is offering. Again, I'm not expecting insta kill everything in the game items, but if I'm a level 20 I expect to be past my piece of gear and have the game understand that. I read the patch notes and the forums, so I get why its happening, just thought I'd mention it one more time here and echo what others have said.
Things I'd like to see:
I would love a twin sword/dagger class that focuses on melee and critical hits. I like speedy strikers.
A proper end game, which, to me is... I have no idea. Generally, when I'm finished with story quests, I just stop playing. I'm not super interested in min-maxing the best gear in the game because my logic is that if I beat the game, I probably don't need a better weapon to begin with. I know that a lot of the ARPG players love that, and since I have no real idea of my own I'll just express my thoughts on it and end this one with "give me something to do". As in, after the story quests, maybe some super duper quests. Basically, I want the game to give me something to do, because as of now, in my finished goblin Frontier, I can self impose getting it to 50 by grinding maps. That seems rather boring to me because I'm not actually accomplishing anything other than raising a number that once raised, provides nothing at all.
A note on bugs:
This is an Alpha, so I suspect you know about these things already but
-I get stuck a lot. I have to portal out, then take my portal back. Sometimes I get a server disconnect error, but I've narrowed that down to me taking the portal back before the Fort is fully loaded in.
-Some enemies are dead, but they don't know that which leads to them walking in place. I find this amusing, but I do imagine you guys will fix this.
-Server lag+poison firing walls on the second Frontier= my pet has fled and now I'm dead because I don't see the damage happening, all I see is me just walking around because nothing else is happening, and then a "you died" screen.
Final thoughts:
Overall, as long as I have something to do I will play. (Refer above for definition of "something to do". However, I will emphasize once again the most important thing for me is solo play. I don't know of anybody who will play Torchlight Frontiers that is currently on any platform or friend list I have. Sure, I told them, sure I showed them, but it doesn't mean they'll go for it.
There is NOTHING worse than being gated by who is or isn't on Discord/Reddit/wherever people post to party up. In fact, before even getting an MMO or ARPG, I always read reviews and forums to make sure that I can solo. Not just mostly solo, but all the way solo. I understand that people play MMO games to, you know, play with people. That's cool. I've made friends on some, but I'm a lone wolf. In my perfect world, I'd love for this game to cater to lone wolves like me, and the folks that enjoy partying up. Perhaps, if nothing else, include a match making system for runs that absolutely demand a partner.
When I say nothing worse, I mean NOTHING worse. Even in a pay to win game, I can pull out my credit card and continue. And on that note, let's address the elephant in the room.
Free to play= pay to win for almost every game in existence. If you do a quick Google search for Black Dessert Online pay to win, you will see how that game is talked about on forums. A new player, especially one with a busy life, will never download that game whether its free or not. At best, a few out of every 100 might.
Point is, you have a great game here, even in Alpha. Don't sell yourselves short by becoming pay to win. Unfortunately, pay to win games will make more than good games that aren't pay to win sometimes. If people can progress for free, why pay? I'd pay for vanity items because I respect the people that make this and would like to thank them for their hard work. You'll probably make more charging people 5 bucks to respawn on a tough boss than off of people like me, I know that, but I have to get my thoughts out there. After all, Path of Exile makes plenty, and even though it isn't really for me, I can say that it is NOT pay to win, and still successful.
I know I don't speak for any other ARPG players, I'm not intending to. This is just what I saw, thought, and wish for in the game. I know it can't cater to me and me alone, but my thoughts were asked for, and so here they are.
Thank you for reading!
Submitted June 06, 2019 at 09:03AM by DarkestHeaven http://bit.ly/2WoXqcQ
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