Got my beta key last week and got to play the game for 10+ hours today. Wanted to share my thoughts on it(without breaching NDA), and rant a little.

First of i gotta say i'm really impressed with gameplay and mechanics of ESO. I'm a long time MMO player(started with UO) and ESO fan(from arena on) so, i'm not easily impressed. Combine that with all the bad reviews i've been reading all over the interwebs; honestly i was prepared to be disappointed with this game. First login did nothing to dispel that notion(20+ minutes loading screen with OCed i7 @5Ghz and SSD) I was like "If the loading screen of the game is this buggy, i don't want to imagine what's inside". Fortunately i grit my teeth and pulled tru loading screen. And realised, long loading screens was not actually a bug but "mega server" queuing players. I can live with that.

Firstly i gotta say, graphics are tremendously good. My Skyrim is modded to death and ESO' graphics could easily be compared to it(wouldn't win tho ).

Music and VO's are quite good too. Although knowing that Soule was involved in it, perfection was to be expected.

I'd love to discuss some of the game mechanics too, but don't wanna breach the NDA(hope i haven't already). My general feeling about it was something along the "If nothing else, it's original" lines.

Overall, i'm quite impressed with what Bethesda came up with. What i'm not impressed is, Zenimax' stand on this title.

First of let me make some things clear.

1)Money is not much of a problem for me. I would pay 300$ for this game.

2)As I stated i'm a long time TES fan. I know Lore probably better then 60% of TES players. But i'm not bothered by minor inconsistencies. I won't say things like: "Look at noob devs, that imperial NPC is too tall to be an imperial!"

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3)I absolutely hate the so called "Free to play model". The day it was invented, ruined whole MMO genre for me. You might say, "Hey, X isn't all that bad". No i don't care how "fair" developers are. "Free to play" just doesn't suit my way of life. I like to pay for things up front. And to know that every player has equal opportunity in a game.

Disclaimers out of the way, let the rant storm began.

1)Game costs 80$ for Americans 80€ for the rest of the world. Seriously? Are customers this dumb?" Oh since it's the same number it must be same value!" Is this how gaming companies imagine their customers think? If you are too lazy to convert yourselves, 80€=110USD. Admitedly this bizarre pricing convention wasn't Zenimax's invention, it's been around for quite some time. Can someone please explain the reasoning behind this?

2)Imperial Edition. Don't just say "oh another dude whining about that" and skip the thread, my point is actually a little different. I don't care about Zenimax trying to milk the calf before it's born. It's a company, and companies exist to make profit. I understand that. My question is: "Who do you think will play this game?" MMO fans? Do you think when this game releases WoW players LoL players, LotRO players will flock here?

-WoW guys have been playing it for 10 years. They have guilds who literally live and breathe together, they won't switch to ESO just for pretty graphics.

-80% LoL players won't pay 110$ for a game and keep paying 20$ monthly.

-LotRO players? Same with the LoL, since it turned to F2P, it lost it's core players. Now it's full of 10 y/o kids. Their daddy's won't be willing to pay 110$ for ESO+ 20$ monthly.

Some of those guys might try out the ESO, but the core players (people who will keep paying sub fee after a year) will be mostly TES fans. When you remove TES lore from it, this game is just a weird WoW and Age of Connan hybrid with no particular target audience.

Why am i telling those things? Just to make it clear who not to agonize. After advertising locked factions for months, just throwing "Imperial Race" out there, it's not cool. The thing that excited me most about this game was the "Us vs Them" feel. Remember Skyrim. People were discussing whether the imperials or the stormcloaks had the right of it months after games release. When you make one race that can play in every faction, it breaks the "immersion". It's no longer "Us vs Them" but "Red team vs Blue team"

You might say, "Dude i'm a huge TES fan too but this stuff just isn't important to me". I can respect that. Honestly if it was just this "Imperial Edition" fiasco, i wouldn't be bothered by it all that much. But that kind of behavior is a clear indicator of the producers willingness to make money of the product any way they can".

Did you know there are pools going on about when will ESO turn to FTP? I'm dead serious. Most bets are around 6-12 months. I think it'll be closer to 12. Now think about this. You paid 120$ initial fee for the game, 20*12=240$ sub fees. At the end of the year you spent ~360$, and suddenly game is free to play. You might not care about that loss(i don't) But now all the 10 y/o kids and assian gold farmers flock to game, in game economy collapses, your beautiful mature guild is filled with shrill voices of screaming kids, when you look for group of players to do some raid action; all you get is anatomically impossible suggestions regarding your mum, the things you could do freely in game a month ago, now requires you to pay a visit to "in game shop". You think i'm dramatizing things? Showing them under the worst light? No way such a thing could happen? Five words: Lord of the Rings Online. Not enough? SWOTOR.

3)In game shop. I'm not positively sure about the nature of this yet. Will they just sell thing like character rename and world transfers? Or will they begin directly with selling "little, inconsequential, cosmetic items " If the second is true, i'll just sell my copy and start waiting for Star Citizen to come.

Same thing happened when LotRO gone F2P, at first they had only cosmetic stuff in shop. Things like armor dye, vanity mounts etc. When they started selling "beginner gear". I raised my voice, everyone was like "no man that's just lvl 10 armor, it doesn't matter". Now, you literally can't play the game without spending about 20$ monthly. Before you began, sure everything you get from item shop has a chance to drop from mobs too. And you have a chance to win lottery.

Conclusion: Now that i look at it, this is a rather long post. My tone might sounded quite negative, but the fact that i bothered to write a post this long attests to my love for the potential of this game. I really don't want it to get crushed under the heavy boots of corporate greed. All is not lost yet. I still have belief in Bethesda. What is done with imperial edition business is done. No turning back now. What i beg for Zenimax to not do is, "Don't alienate loyal TES fans" You might win in the short term, but you will loose in the long run. People wonder why WoW is so successful. Reason is, they never alienated their fans. Sure they made lots of mistakes. No one is perfect. But even after 10 years, WoW still manages to retain lots of it's core player. This is the key for it's success. If wow were to become F2P today, it would gain millions of new players in a day. And die out in a year.

I really want this game to succeed(both for developers and for player) The last time i was this excited about an MMO was LotRO. Played it from 3 years. from beta to it's bitter end(aka F2P). If same thing happens to ESO, i'll form my own game developer company

PS: What's the deal with the mentalhealth.gov banner at the bottom of the page? Is someone trying to tell us something or what?

I wish people would leave the mentalhealth link alone.

At one point a poster with a lot of personal and family issues made posts that showed he was planning on harming himself. Although a lot of posters, mods, and the admins tried to gather enough information to intervene, and did in fact get enough to contact the local police, it wasn't enough, or in time. And it wasn't a hoax; a family member's facebook page and the obituary in his local paper was clear enough.

The link is there in case. It may never get used. If there is a chance someone might find it useful, wonderful. If no one needs it, then they don't have to click on it.

Holly mother of God. I thought link itself was a prank or something. May he rest in peace.

On topic; I did get in the beta.

I'm having a ball.

I've made a few bug reports. Run into a few issues. Most of my aggravations though are probably self-inflicted. I wanna see what's over there, over the hill, behind the rocks, in the caves, whatever. On several occasions I did have the to be expected result: "You have been eaten by a grue.", if anyone is old enough to recognize that line.

Honestly, most of the issues I'm having could possibly be due to the fact I've been playing Skyrim; I have a level 40 something character, wearing legendary ebony armor and using legendary dragonbone weapons. Going back to level 1 means I'm not doing the damage I'm used to doing, and my character gets hurt a lot. In Skyrim its been a long time since I needed to worry about the damage a mudcrab can deal out.

I thought the same earlier with "Aww theres a wolf ...... aaagh!"

And FAO OP

You are over a decade late with that grumble. The way tax is administered on game sales is very different between US and Euro countries. VAT and similar gov tax is why the price conversion never balances out. And I only read down that far. I never read posts that large in full that start with a grumble

Interesting, i actually found the game quite easy overall. Although my experience might be a little different because i never get the chance to kill a mob all by myself. This being beta an all, there were tons of people in every place i've gone. I think this game needs some instanced dungeons. In most of the "go the end of that cave and kill the boss" quests i actually haven't seen any mobs along the way. Road was all cleared. This issue probably won't matter all that much when the game launches, but still...

Btw, do you know if the "short movie length loading screens" error got fixed?

The second it goes F2P I'm done, SWTOR was ruined for me the second it went F2P and I haven't touched it since I'm like you in the sense I have no problem spending the sub fee and the initial game price.

you got me - the same feeling I got when going to cinema to see same movie one year later in TV channel (or earlier on some coded channels).

Perhaps you are right, but still I will go to cinema and want to play this game, do not care for other games.

German cars cost more in U.S. than in Germany. You don't hear people in the U.S. complaining.

Yeah it's true, it's a two way street. It's not only German cars, it's just about everything. For example, Americans go mad for an Italian motorbike called "Ducati", which is basically the 2 wheeled equivalent of a Ferrari. It's resaonably priced over here (sort of if you don't touch the exotic models which cost around 30k+) and parts and service is only marginally higher than ordinary bikes. But in America, hahahaha...let's say Ducati charge the Earth for parts and the motorbikes are mega expensive to buy (even second hand) over there. I know all this because being a big Ducati fan myself, I follow an American Ducati owner on Youtube. We Europeans fleece Americans for what it's worth when we get the opportunity...don't you worry about it.