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The Lich King… Getting Ready To Go!

And so the Wrath of the Lich King beta is ready to go with Blizzard officially lifting the NDA. All the usual candidates are revealing a lot of new information so I thought I’d take the time to talk about my thoughts on Wrath, based on what I’ve seen so far anyway.

First off, I’m VERY excited about Wrath of the Lich King. I came to WoW pretty late and it will be exciting to explore the new expansion when everyone else does.

There are a LOT of class changes coming, Hunters and Paladins are getting shuffled around a lot, with every class getting altered in some way.

Stats are being shaken up as well with +Healing and +Damage being replaced by Spellpower and adjusted via talents, there seems to be a move to remove the emphasis on Hit Rating as well.

But the one big thing for me in WotLK is the addition of achievements, now achievements aren’t new, WoW isn’t even really the first Online game to include them. Guild Wars had an achievement-lite scheme to unlock titles and Lord of the Rings Online has the Deeds system.

Looking at WoW’s implementation is interesting because they’ve retro-fitted both Classic WoW and The Burning Crusade content into it. Which is both the right and a GREAT thing to do!

As WoW grows with each expansion, the old zones will slowly empty as there is less reason to be there. While having achievements that involve those old zones isn’t the solution, it’s a great start to getting folk to go back to places they’ve levelled out of.

Some of the achievements involve killing bosses in Classic, The Burning Crusade and Wrath dungeons and raids, while others involve levelling professions and exploring the continents. Based on the screenshots at WorldofRaids, there is a really varied assortment of achievements.

The REALLY interesting part for me though is what will these achievement points be spent on? The Blizzard Achievement page hints at tabards, non-combat pets and titles, but will there be other stuff, perhaps non-combat gear and other novelty items.

I’m sure we’ll find out as the beta progresses…

Tags: Achievements, hunter, paladin, wotlk, wow

Distractions…

In between GTA4 sessions I’ve decided to restart The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion to get the achievements. I’ve never actually completed it either so it’ll be nice to actually do that.

I’ve restarted just because I can’t remember what point I actually got to in my prior save (I THINK it was just before the Bruma gate section).

I’ve always found Oblivion (and Morrowind before it) to be a really beautiful and fun game, I just tended to get distracted before finishing it so hopefully I can get through this time :-).

As for GTA4, I am half-way through my pigeon collecting (I’ve done Broker/Dukes, Bohan and half of Algonquin) and I’m finding it pretty tedious, for some reason I’m not enjoying it as much as I did the hidden packages in GTA3. I also have 2 or 3 more random character missions to perform as well as the majority of the police crime and most wanted missions but those are pretty fun.

After doing those I’ll restart the main storyline and try to blitz it in under 30 hours for the achievement, then onto multi-player…

It’s frightening just looking at how many Xbox 360 games I’ve got that I’ve really enjoyed playing but have put to one side due to getting distracted.

I’m a stone’s throw away from finishing a couple of titles, games I’ve really enjoyed. When it comes to gamerscore (which I guess is a subject worthy of another post, but I’ll just say I really LOVE the achievement system) it’s even more indicative of how easily I get distracted.

I have 19 retail 360 games and 5 Live Arcade titles, according to MyGamerCard.net that’s a potential gamerscore of 21150 with me earning 3395. That’s 17755 gamerpoints just waiting to be earned.

Only 5 of those 24 games have over 25% of their achievements unlocked. With GTA4 being 61% unlocked so far.. easily the most achievements I’ve unlocked in a game.

I’m setting myself a target of finishing all those games I’m “almost” done with, then I’ll work at unlocking a few of those achievements.

Tags: Achievements, GTA4, Oblivion, xbox 360, XBOX Live

Not MORE GTA…

I’ve been working on getting to 100% in GTA 4, which involves the usual gallivanting around for hidden packages (this time they are pigeons) and doing various side missions, such as using the police computer to “catch” (read, kill) criminals.

I checked my MyGamerCard.net profile and found I’m currently ranked 1,533rd out of 507,300 which completely surprised me… I’m currently missing 8 single-player achievements, which I’ll collect as I work towards 100% completion.

The multi-player ones are a tad harder but hopefully I’ll grab those through normal play eventually. (At least all but the “Let Sleeping Rockstars Lie” and “Auf Wiedersehen Petrovic” achievements anyway :-))

Oh yes, the Pigeons, how on EARTH did they expect you to find them without some sort of guide. Yes, they coo and are lit when in the dark but they are really hard to see as they blend in so well with the environment. Still, I have half of Alderney’s flying rat under control as well as Happiness Island. I’ll continue pigeon extermination tomorrow and onwards.

I’m also half-way through getting the text message car deliveries done. And I’m sure I only have one random stranger to find, they just don’t want me to find them…

I haven’t even begun with the Most Wanted and Vigilante missions from the police computer, well except 2 Most Wanted ones I did for fun, so I have those to go at as well.

GTA4 has an absolute TON to do, and with it’s pretty great multi-player it could last ages.

I do wish there was a more effective way to eliminate 12-year olds on XBOX Live who like to shout through entire matches than just muting them though. Like perhaps a gunshot to the temple…

Tags: Achievements, GTA4, XBOX Live