Why is it that RIFT does not have that "holding power"?

[Osmeric]

I tried to come back to Rift with the SL expansion.

I bought it, installed it, logged in to my main character...

... and was immediately struck by how terrible the frame rate and camera panning felt. It was literally unplayable, compared to the smoothness of WoW. This was especially the case in situations where there were objects "above" me. I guess original Rift also had this problem, but it hit me with full force coming back fresh.

I logged off and never came back.

[ro9ue]

I think aesthetic is Rift's biggest weakness. The game design itself I find to be much better than WoW. The soul system smokes WoW's talents and class differentiation. The leveling structure in Rift is better. The boss and enemies are designed better from a gameplay standpoint.

Unfortunately, the world feels somewhat dead. It's easy to get immersed in the story of Arthas, and just enjoy the scenery of Karazhan. All gameplay aside, I would explore Azeroth if that's all there was to do in that game. It makes you want to stay and connects you on a deeper level.

I think Rift has way better class design and gameplay, but all that does is draw you in when you have the itch. Sort of like CoD. You get an itch to shoot a few people so you hop in, but you can jump out any time. With warcraft it's about being present in Azeroth, even though the content is stale and the gameplay and class design isn't as good as Rift's (IMO).

Basically that whole X factor/polish people talk about with WoW and Blizzard games in general. It's just so hard to match.

I still prefer all of Rifts classes and gameplay. But there's just no deeper attachment to the lore/world that keeps me subbed and logged in. WoW has that, Where people for whatver reason people will pay $15/mo to sit in Shrine lol.

There also might be a factor of "I want to play where all the people are". People like to bang out achievements to brag. If I have rank 1 in Rift it matters to far less gamers than if your Rank 1 in WoW.

[Deleted]

- Blablabla to "clone" WoW

WoW is the most filthy model copying everything from the past, present and future feature of every other mmo, PLUS in a fucking bad quality.

WoW is simply shit now

- Unappealing character customization = Heard of the same face stand alone complex ?
- WoW-clone = nuff said
- Old news = Wow is never ahead the curve, wow is a community before being a game... this game is alive thanks Wowprogress and tiers addons, race for world first, then blizzard and lazy devs at the fucking very bottom.
- The story is lame = Was merely a set back style ?

Gameplay wise = Rift at lv 30 >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Wow lv 100. /Figurepalm....


@ro9ue: Try SweetFx, the light and colours are much better with.

[Kioshi]

I would give rift another shot, but i can't stand with the character design. It's simply not appealing for me.

This is my reason, I liked the game play but the character design just turns me off.

[Edge-]

- Gimmicky builds - the problem with the games that offer "open customization" like Rift, FFXIV:ARR, GW2, SWTOR and even pre-cata WoW, is that only about ~5% of the builds matter.

While your other points are entirely subjective and I won't bother arguing with subjective opinion, this is flat out false. The variety of viable builds for just about everything outside of serious raiding is staggering. There are dozens and dozens and dozens of builds that are perfectly functional for world content, experts, chronicles, and raiding on a more casual level. Like, literally. Be they slight alterations to existing optimal builds for personal preference (such as my slighterly tweaked pyrochon build that provides more AoE damage and slightly better single target damage at the expense of a small bit of bonus group damage) or having multiple different souls all capable of adequately performing the same role.

^ Also this god this!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I specifically left WoW thanks to FOTM builds and Rift devs fell into the damn min/max trap of forcing players (especially warriors) to learn a new build and rotation every damn patch.

I can't think of any second generation MMO that isn't mathed out so that players who are looking for peak performance aren't changing their builds/rotations each time there are changes to their class, and FotM builds don't exist.

[Lathais]

I guess this is the case for you, but I doubt this would be true for most. I disagree with all of these points, some quite strongly. It makes me wonder if you've even played the game to any real extent. I won't go into detail as this would just devolve into a WoW vs Rift argument.

While I agree with most of what you say, I have to disagree with where you say you doubt it's true for most. If it was true for most, Rift would have a much larger playerbase. It is no surprise that Rift is a niche game. It does not appeal to most MMORPG players, it was never meant to. It fill a niche in the market and attracts it's small sub-section of the players in the market. Also, this already pretty much is a Rift vs WoW thread, but so far has remained a constructive one.

[Selah]

For me, it's the amount of grinding that has come about with the Torvan/Lycini rep and just the long grind for decent raid gear. If I remember right SL came out close to the same time MoP did (give a month) and I chose to pursue raiding with my brand new Monk over playing SL thinking that I'd play the catch up game between patches and what not.

Then Blizzard surprised me with the speedy patches so I figured I'd just hold out for the post-MoP down time to catch up in Rift, but now with the F2P and the massive amount of time I would have to spend grinding out instances, raids, rifts, rep, ect. I feel like trying to get geared now would take half the year, of course by that time it'd be pointless because Nightmare Tide will be out.

Plus this game needs multi-thread support for CPUs sooooo bad, my computer can play Tomb Raider at max at a nice smooth 45 - 60 FPS, Watchdogs at 60, ESO at 80, GW2 at some amazing frames, WoW at 120+ frames, AC4 at 60 frames, D3 at 60+ frames, PvZ:GW at 80, but Rift? 20 - 30 in a player populated area, might push 50+ in the middle of Shimmersand with only NPCs. Poor optimization will hurt this game so much right now.

[Tankendog]

For me, the attack animations are bland, The character animation is bland, And there is very little flashy ways to customize your character. The lack of visual stuff in battle is probably the most annoying to me.

[xuros]

Rift isn't that bad. Yeah the toons look meh but the environments are gorgeous, and the spell effects are great. I raided hardcore at the start and kinda petered out in River of Souls content. I LOVED the raid and 5 man content! I just got sucked back into WoW again. Came back a few times in SL but couldn't find a guild to run with around my play times and pick ups were horrible to try to learn with since everyone was so impatient.

That was my reason to shy away again. The game ran perfectly on the highest settings. My issue wan't the game, it was more to do with the catch up to learn everything and not being given a chance to learn content with out the fear of getting booted lol.

[CandyCotton Marshmallows]

I didn't stick with it initially for reasons unknown. There was something about the 'feel' and art style that didn't keep me long term, even with several attempts to come back over the years. Then, when I tried it again with F2P early access for past subs, I was quite enjoying it. I enjoyed it all the way until the point I hit the brick wall in leveling. It started to feel a bit 'sludgy' in the mid-late 40s; but mid-late 50s started to become a chore to say the least. I went from doing zone events and IAs, having fun leveling at a decent pace; to dreading logging in because the experience completely changed to grind from fun, and the IAs for the new zones had almost no one in them as well.

I wanted to like the game, but I was just done with 2 months of WoW dailies and any grind was unacceptable at that point, or at least that intense of one was. Then, I heard they changed the gearing path from basically, play how you want and earn excellent gear (even if it takes you longer) to raiders get it all, which means there is one path, even if isn't the right path for you. The choice, of play it your way to advance your power in an RPG was something good; not something to be taken away for the narrow formula of (one) tier raiding.

The gear treadmill is actually something keeping me from getting into any mmo much right now even though there are a couple I quite enjoy. I just don't want to do the limited weekly currency grind and boss farming that end up feeling mandatory, not something you do with friends for fun and challenge. The mandatory feeling is going to be what kills the game for many adults, since most already have one job and entertainment should not feel forced.

[Deleted]

Yeah, that's my problem now.

Most of the time I will play PoE, Hardcore only, just because, I don't care anymore.... the grinding is killing my mind and I don't want to buy items or reach a very high level in a boring and safe manner, no vast planification anymore.

So in a way, I am playing to lose my time, my character isn't important anymore, only for the excitement and the ""Zero fault "", this is my last pleasure, now.

[philefluxx]

I played on and off, lots of things I liked and lots of things that just felt over done in the industry. But I think the worst part about Rift is as population declines, even in ups and downs, what really makes the game fun for me requires people. The leveling experience was fine, but the random Rifts and Invasions is what made this game great. But after a while zones just started to feel dead and Rifts and Invasions start getting out of control. Its like with Warhammer, which I thoroughly enjoyed during its short prime, when you were grouped up doing sieges the game was amazing. Once people started leaving for various reasons all you were left with was a mediocre leveling experience. While Rifts leveling experience is superior to that of Warhammer, it just pales in comparison to its dynamic world events, provided people are around and want to participate

[Pyromelter]

Here are the reasons I left Rift, and these are also the reasons it doesn't have staying power:

1. It's drab. You can say what you want about the landscapes and art, but overall the game just feels like there is a coat of dust on everything. People may complain that wow is a bit cartoon-ish. Well, the Trion devs decided it would be better to make it more realistic. The problem with realistic is that things just look drab, sallow, uncolorful, dark, just... unappealing.

2. Transportation/no flying. This is a hot topic for some, but after a while I couldn't take ground mounting. I want to fly. I like games where I can fly. I am not alone.

3. Gameplay: Some of the gameplay is solid, no doubt. But Rift does not have that hair-trigger responsiveness of wow. Most games don't. I noticed this playing EQ2 as well. The only lag in wow is either your own computer, or your ping, there is virtually no input lag in wow.

This has ruined a LOT of games for me. I mean... I take that back. Because I'm so used to the responsiveness of wow, it's like I'm driving a 250,000 dollar sports car, and every other game with any kind of input lag just makes me feel like I'm driving a semi-truck through mud. I couldn't finishing Dragon Age: Origins, can't deal with MOBA's, can't deal with RTS hero games. That lag is just... I can't deal with it. Moba/RTS players can, but we in the MMORPG world have gotten so used to the buttery smooth and fast responsiveness of wow, any slight input lag just feels wrong.

4. Bugs. No idea if the game has had it's bugs fixed, but there were some gamebreaking bugs more than 6 months after release. This is completely unacceptable, I'd rather just not play a game than deal with bugs.

5. Story. Asha Catari is awesome. Regulos is a fine ultimate villain. Literally everyone else in the game world is just completely "meh." There's no racial pride or rivalry. A lot of the story is frankly just boring. When Blizzard makes factions, often times you have a rather clear idea of who they are, and what they stand for (Cenarian circle, earthen ring, etc.) There are also multiple main heroes involved with these organizations (malfurion with cenarian, thrall with earthen ring). Factions in rift are like... just some dudes standing there who exist just for you to collect mats and give rewards.

6. Grind. This game is ridiculously grindy. And I'm sorry, maybe in Asia insanely time consuming grinds are favored, but not by me or many western players. This is another place where wow really screwed up, by re-introducing too much grind into the game. This also relates to transportation, because no flying = more time wasted grinding transportation.

I don't doubt that it is a big challenge to get all these things done very well. Rather, I just find that many people who talk about rift, talk about it like it's a great game but they don't play because their friends aren't there. I say bollocks to that. Rift just isn't a good game, for the reasons listed above. It has some fun mechanics, and some well implemented ideas (I particularly like how they do rogue cp's and warrior action points), but on the whole, the few fun class mechanics cannot overcome a game that is drab, boring, no flying, input lag, gamebreaking bugs, almost no compelling story or characters, and is insanely grindy, you get a game where you just feel like... "meh, wow is better."

And you'd be right, because wow IS better.

[willowe]

1. Lore
Seriously, I've never heard a game basically throw all the Vanilla Lore in the trash (okay everything but the Dragons). Rift did it. They literally once said that Planetouched Wilds would 'never come' because they changed the lore. Then they lol changed the lore for 1.9 (Conquest Factions of the Random) and again for 1.10 (Defiant and Guardians all hugging in a field for no reason). There's been zero talk about the original Lore to the game being 'added' to, nothing about the former Eth Kingdom, or Port Scion, or anything like that. They re-wrote everything, and as much as I liked parts of Storm Legion, I felt it was pretty much like taking a portal to a different game. One that I didn't enjoy the lore of.

2. Quality
They try over and over to run at WoW, but it always ends up like Horridon in ToT: they hit the door instead of going through it. They, especially pre-SL, try to push out these patches, and over and over there are crazy bugs and problems, some that make them disable whole major features of said patches for days on end. I understand that's partly the playerbase not testing, but playing other games (not WoW) makes me always want to go back to WoW in the end, because WoW always seems to have an extra layer of polish. Yes, there have been bugs, yes there have been problems, but I'd rather pay for one or two issues per expansion, than one or two issues per patch.

3. Dalgar
I despise him. His "hardcore raid or gtfo" ideals just rot me. He's short-sighted, and imo, the moment he became Lead Dev was the moment the game started to nose dive. The fact he called LFR Raiders "window lickers" on a live stream was the reason I quit. They need to shut him up because he only pisses people off.

4. The Community Team
Elrar and Co. were just that good. Seriously. I will play any game he's on the Community Team of, just because he's awesome.

[Halicia]

I can't disagree more with Willowe's post.

I didnt care about the lore. I felt the quality was WAY AHEAD of anything else in the MMO market. Rift created so many new gameplay systems that kept me tied up for hours on end. Heck, I ENJOYED pvp, and I'm usually not a pvp kind of person. I could care less about who makes the game, what they tweet about or say in their offhours. Never really got why people give a !@#$ about who actors are dating like it influences whether their latest movie sucked.

The reasons I left Rift was that I never really felt that sense of attachment to my character. I seriously CANNOT tell you what race my character was, because at no point in time did I really notice it after creation.

The other reason was that after I hit levelcap, I *wanted* to raid, but found the 'onramp' to knowledge & gear kinda insurmountable. the gear grind wasnt such a turnoff, so much as the fact that i didnt really know what item alterations and such were out there, and which were preferable for me.

i also didnt really want to commit the same amount of time to learning, so returning to WoW that I already understood was kinda like choosing to return to a comfortable pair of worn old shoes rather then deal with the discomfort of breaking in a new pair of better shoes.

[barrsftw]

My problem with Rift is that there's no backstory. You walk in and you get what you get.

With WoW, I had the continuation of the story from Warcraft that I was already familiar with. I was already engaged in that story; Everything from then on was that much better because I was seeing more of the story unfold. It made me interested in seeing what happens next because I know of so many potential plot twists that could come up at any moment. (Less so now of course... But that's why my interest in WoW is fading.)

With Rift, sure it had a cool idea. But I wasn't as engaged. At first, it just felt like Defiants vs. Guardians during a time when the world was falling apart, and that was kind of upsetting. There was a greater enemy, sure. But there wasn't really a side-enemy. It felt like we were chasing Regulos and nobody else, while WoW had us chasing Dark Iron Dwarves, Naga, Elementals, Dragons, Old Gods... All of which are different enemies with the same goal. That kept me interested.

Pretty much this. Whether you're a lore buff or not, the lore in WoW makes a difference. The game becomes more enjoyable because there are endless factions/races/characters with such a rich history.

[Deleted]

Wanted to get back into it and maybe play a marksman or necro mage. Judging by the forums both builds suck ass. Yeah, screw it.

[Graeham]

I haven't played since shortly after launch but I did find Rift to be pretty intriguing at the time and judging by what I've read about it since a number of cool features have since been added to the game. Unfortunately I could never get into it as I'm also a role-player in MMO's and the lack of individual racial lore made it difficult for me to invest. I did like how the high elves could be designed, though I'll always give out points for gritty muscular elves!

[Vodox]

I think Rift lack personal impact, the game seems to stereotyped. The graphics is great, but they should not make it free to play.

[Tankendog]

Wanted to get back into it and maybe play a marksman or necro mage. Judging by the forums both builds suck ass. Yeah, screw it.

Marksman is 4th Highest rouge DPS I believe. Realistically if it is a dps soul, it is playable in raid. Marksman is required for GA due to purge.