Broken Toys

If you go to the Nodiatis site with JavaScript disabled, you get this informative message: “Nodiatis is the best free online PVP RPG MMO MMORPG Multiplayer Roleplaying browser game with no downloads that you will ever play in your life so love it up.”

I tried to play this game. really I did.

sadf.

But does it have fetuspults?

how could anyone dislike a game that has alcoholic as a class? it sort of reminds me of ProgressQuest, but with worse graphics.

Bah, everyone else got in the catchphrases first.

bleh, underline tags don’t work in the comments field. The last sentence of that news item was supposed to be underlined…

What the f? I’m gonna go dig up a Dawn post and rez it on Nerfbat.

I’ve killed a few mobs on the docks and unlike other browser based rpgs I’ve tried, it kind of makes me want to play it again.

Don’t call me gay, jus’ sayin.

Everything is customizable, duh. They use the mmorpg api!

You know, the art isn’t too bad and the game shows a lot of work gone into it. I even managed to fish. And the map is one of the prettiest I ever seen.

Still a crappy mud with little brain though…

That site crashed my browser, very glitchless indeed.

FINALLY, we have a true WoW killer!

I am actually still playing this game on and off at work, no joke. I couldn’t really get into text based RPGs, I tried that Grendel game too, this one is just better imo. It is like diablo meets final fantasy in a browser, I am all about that.

Zero to kill ten rats in one minute thirty seconds. That’s got to be a record.

I played it for a while. It struck me as being a MMO’d up version of Racewar: Kingdoms. Except without Yoyo the HiHi Samurai.

I’m reminded of the folktail of the mountain that gave birth to a mouse. After all that groaning and straining, Glitchy came out with what’s basically a Java front end slapped on a MUD, except that MUDs were doing this stuff a couple of decades ago. Better. And it’s glitchy. For example, the sound made some horrible squacking noises, then cut out completely.

But it’s got permadeath. Because, y’know, losing everything you’ve built up for the past six months and starting over from scratch is so fun. That’s why we all delete our characters in every few months in other MMO’s, right?

On July 6th, 2008 Nodiatis, a new online multiplayer RPG went live. It is not your ordinary carebear RPG with cookie cutter class builds, goofy graphics, and amenities for the weak.

Nope, it’s your ordinary amateur RPG with character classes ripped from every other game (and the occasional film … The Drunken Master for the win!) ever seen, static graphics, and amenities for the griefers. Well, I’m just assuming the latter, since I never actually encountered another player, except in the incessant chat spam that scrolls, in teeny letters passing by at near lightspeed, up the middle of your screen.

Even the lore doesn’t make sense. For example, there’s one moderately interesting game mechanic where you deposit “battle trophies” (crab eyes, rat ears, etc., at newbie levels) on four altars representing the four traditional character archetypes (which this “innovative” game can’t seem to get away from) … yet the lore says that people have abandoned the gods, or vise versa (I didn’t go read the forums to find out the details). Also, these “battle trophies” decay. Dinner was ready during my test playing last night, and I was informed that my battle trophies would “decay” overnight — meaning that you have to perform the awkward and arduous process of leveling up whatever skills you want to put exp into every day, or all that exp is lost. Hardcore, I guess … for basement dwellers who don’t get spouse aggro, or suddenly have to go deal with a flooded basement, or have a client who needs something dealt with right now if not yesterday.

The UI itself blows. For example, there’s no “loot all” option, or any other way to loot items save for dragging them, one by one, to your inventory. You can’t close the loot window before you’ve looted them all, either, so I’m not sure what happens when you’ve run out of space (I doubt if I can endure the game long enough to find out). Gold, on the other hand, depends on watching for a treasure chest to appear at some random point on the screen and clicking it before it fades away again in a couple of seconds … apparently gold, unlike rat ears, goes bad almost immediately … and if it’s on top of the “exit” button, oh, well, tough. That’s hardcore.

After half an hour of the game (all I could endure) I have to say the design was derivative, the UI was terrible, the gameplay was boring, and the game as a whole was eminently forgettable … but hey, it’s got permadeath, so it’s … um, it’s still terrible.

Their opening page tells me that they’re really focusing on attracting the under-served female segment of the MMRPG market. Cleavage in bondage, anyone?

^^
Someday, if you’re nice, I’ll tell you all the things wrong with that post…

Lum > Dawn + [Dawn Fanbois and/or "'nonny mus" Dawn devs who R pohst teh bad](hereinafter known as: “You”).

But don’t let anything that I say here dissuade you from posting more… I need more humor with my frosted flakes this morning. Keep the hits coming!

^^

“Anyway, unles he was 9 years old hen he set up the Dawn website and announced the imminent release of Dawn…”

Given the wondrous clod (yes, “clod”) that is Nodiatis, would this in any way, shape, or form surprise you? After spending about 5.2 minutes “playing” with it, I would probably believe you if you told me it was written, designed, and coded by a drunken casaba melon.

Not that I could personally do any better, mind you, but that uber MMO API they’ve got just seems to be lacking a bit of… everything.

(It wasn’t? Ohgawd.)

Dammit Lum can;t we edit our own posts? Or am I missing something?

Is that the best review you could come up with Wanderer? You want to take pot shots at the glitchless thing at least have the decency to keep them short and amusing.

The first I heard of this glitchless thing was this blog and yeah.. the transcript read was pretty funny. Frankly though this person\company is out there making games that earn some money (no idea if profitable), and sure, they are making mistakes. Nodiatis isn’t my cup of tea but I recognize there is some depth there and likely a fair amount of work to make.

Really Wanderer, enough of your dribble in this thread. Please post the games YOU have designed so that we all can put your opinion in perspective (and rip you a new one). At this point we are seeing giant design blunders at the AAA 150m level so I honestly don’t really give a shit what glass house you are chucking rocks from.

Alright, let me start this post off by pre-empting the inevitable response that you all will probably make.

I’m a Glitchless fanboy.

I’ve been playing Race War Kingdoms for several years, and am playing Nodiatis now. Why? I enjoy them. I realize that the RWK community is incredibly hostile and does not foster a very enjoyable playing experience, and I will admit I have contributed to that environment in the past. I realize that it’s just a MUD that uses IE instead of telnet. But I’m good at it. And I’ve made a few friends there. I keep on with RWK because I can do well there and I enjoy the company of some of the players.

As for Nodiatis, it’s still very early. I enjoy it because it gives much more ability to specialize your character than RWK did. Yes, there are cookie-cutter classes. There are standard builds. Yes, I play a standard issue tank. Why do I stick with something so generic when Nodiatis is supposed to offer a new breed of game? Easy: Same reasons I play RWK. I’m good at what I do and I like some of the people there.

Now, with that said, why don’t I just go play WoW? As a matter of fact, I did play WoW on a friend’s account for a while. It was fun leveling him from 46 to 60 (back when that was fairly impressive). It was fun getting that Paladin most of his Lightforge equipment. Why not go ahead and get my own account, join his guild, and stick with it? Because I just didn’t have time. In order to be among the best people in WoW, you need to expend EXORBITANT amounts of time grinding for levels, raiding for equipment, running battlefields, etc. I simply don’t have that kind of time. I’m in college right now and I have a job.

RWK, I don’t have to spend as much time, because once you reach a certain point everything gets easier to acquire. Granted, that usually requires a pretty decent initial investment in character upgrades. Yeah – go ahead and say it, Glitchless ripped me off. Say what you want, I feel completely comfortable with the amount of money I spent because it’s helped me get to a point among the top players in that game. That makes me happy.

Nodiatis, on the other hand, actually LIMITS your amount of play time! They say it’s not for the casual gamer, but the Rested Time system actually helps the casual gamer to keep up with those who spend 14 hours a day playing games in mom’s basement.

(for the record i do live in my moms basement but only to save up money while i attend school so that when i graduate i will have a fairly decent amount of money saved for a down payment on something like a house.)

I saw a comment above about how the trophy system goes against the story of Nodiatis, that sacrificing to altars at the church is in direct contrast to the fact that the people of Nodiatis have abandoned their gods. I see it differently: The players are the Heroes of the world. We are those who remain faithful, as opposed to NPC’s running shops and stuff. Our devotion to the gods and our regular tributes allow us to grow beyond the average citizen of Nodiatis, and allow us to take on the trials and tribulations of the harsh world. Through our example, perhaps the people will see the power that faith can bestow upon the individual, thus bringing back mainstream belief.

Granted, the NPC’s will probably never start worshipping gods and go out adventuring just because we did. But this is just storyline material.

As for the programming of the game itself… Jeff has come a long way from RWK. He has a basic storyline explaining the background of the game world. There are graphics. There is a VERY intricate crafting system (so intricate that i am avoiding crafting for the time being… it seems a bit cumbersome). I don’t know how hard it would be to program Nodiatis because I am not a programmer. But I can tell that it’s more complex than RWK was.

Say what you want about Glitchless. I applaud those that actually went and tried the game out. Those who enjoyed it, great! I hope to see you in there some time. Those who tried it for five minutes and turned it down, well, I would’ve appreciated more time spent there for a better evaluation but it’s not for everyone. Those of you who are blasting it without having tried it, though, are worse than any Glitchless fanboy. We like Glitchless because we enjoy their games. You, on the other hand, are determined to ruin Glitchless’s reputation based solely on Dawn and the fact that it has not come out. I doubt it ever will. It sucks. I know. But when a game DOES come out, you don’t even give it the time of day because “glitchless sucks so their games suck too”. No, that’s not a direct quote. It’s just the sentiment I am getting from a lot of people here.

Next time you want to **** all over a game, try playing it first. Some people here expected the worst and found something they enjoyed a little bit. Maybe it could happen to you, too.

-Ehlmaris
Glitchless Fanboy