Stars Gone Wild

Over the last couple of days, I was invited to take part in the beta weekend for a game called WildStar. I only heard about this new MMO a few months ago, but apparently it's been in development for nearly a decade.

Developer Carbine Studio is co-founded by 14 ex-Blizzard employees wanting to make a game that wasn't World of Warcraft. The entire game is built around action-based combat. This is unlike many other MMOs in that usually you just target your enemy and start hitting buttons to use your abilities. In WildStar, all the abilities at your disposal are skill-based, making your proficiency to dodge and land abilities the main focus instead of just having to micro-manage all your skills. I personally welcome this addition as I feel it makes the combat more dynamic and visceral overall.

Another thing WildStar does nicely is differentiating all its classes. A big reason for this is each class has a unique weapon. Some people might see this as a bad thing—I'm not one of them—since in most other MMO's, if you're a warrior, you can use axes, maces, swords, spears, etc. I can see the appeal of that, but what does it actually change? Not a whole lot. Having unique weapons really allows the developer to play with each class's style of play, instead of the big difference only being what skills your character will learn.

The Medic class I chose uses this defibrillator type weapon—at least that's what they look like. He doesn't do a ton of damage, but attacks a large area, so I can at least hit everyone I'm fighting.

The Warrior uses a massive sword along with an arm cannon—not unlike Megaman's. Much like any other Warrior, the main style of play is pretty straight forward, you just beat down people.

The Spellslinger actually combines a pair of pistols with magic sigils, definitely a lot more interesting than your typical Mage. Being highly mobile your main objective, aside from dealing tons of damage, is to never get hit.

The Esper is a master of illusions; he/she uses their psychic abilities to mess with enemies minds and employ all manner of crowd control abilities (stuns, knockbacks, roots, etc.). The weapon of choice is like Xena's chakram, just with spikes coming out of it, also instead of throwing it they use their psychic ability to control it.

Esper's Weapon

The Engineer is a bit of a mixed bag. With lots of versatility, an Engineer can stick back and launch experimental ammo from a grenade launcher, or they can activate tank mode—turning into Iron Man—and run head first into enemies. Did I mention they have robot minions? 'Cause they do! It's like a pet class, with the ability to do stuff on their own.

Last up is the Stalker who is a crazy mix of a ninja and wolverine. The Stalker has retractable claws and can go invisible. The class is built to stay up in everyone's face and does a ton of single target damage. They're kind of like a Rogue, but more badass.

All the classes sound interesting and unique, much like the game in general. Choosing a class also comes down to what race you are, which is cool and makes sense, even if it just ends up stereotyping. Honestly, the giant guy I took would never be a stalker, I just couldn't see it, but he could easily pound your face in as a warrior.

Overall the game is pretty fun: I enjoy the combat; the replay value is actually there since making a new character is a whole new experience; the visuals are a cartoony style; and the dialogue matches it perfectly. With the look and feel of it, they're essentially trying to emulate an 80's or 90's sci-fi cartoon, with the grandiose narrator and the crazy dialogue.

My main problem with WildStar, is the same problem I have with every MMO I try (which is a lot of them): I don't ever feel the need to invest a ton of time into it. Time is precious and with the amount of crap I do all the time, I just can't/don't want to spend my time only playing an MMO, as much as I might like to sometimes. There are countless other games released all the time vying for my attention, and having to spend 15 bucks a month on a game almost forces you to play it over other games.

Being in a beta state, there are some bugs, which I won't go into. What I will cover though is a grave omission I desperately hope they rectify before release: There is no "Sell All Junk" button! If you've ever played any MMO, then you know every single one needs this. For all you people who have no clue what the hell I'm talking about, "junk" is useless crap you get off enemies you can sell for money. If you've got 50 items in your backpack, having to click back and forth to sell everything gets tiresome...FAST! A lot of old MMO's, *cough* EverQuest, didn't even have the button. Heck, I don't even remember them referring to the items as junk, you just sort of had to figure it out for yourself. In this day and age however, I figured it was a standard feature, but apparently I was wrong.

All that being said, it was fun enough for me to probably play it for one to three months, which is the going rate for my attention span.