Greth: "Why wasn't there mention of the blatant drug abuse after reaching hive tech?"
Threefold: "That would be too cliche"
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| #1 Fangrim[165082] | | adsl-70-241-4-184.dsl.hstntx.swbell.net | Hey.
This report took a long, long, long time.
The game itself was played in Saturday, April 16, 2005. Yeah, a long time ago. Since then, Ring Wars has changed a lot. It's practically dead right now, but hey, it was dying anyway.
Rather than a "Ring Wars is bloody awesome!" sentiment, I think this report should be taken as a tribute to the game. When the Lord of the Rings movies came out, Ring Wars was *the* game of B.net for Warcraft. After the movies, it still managed to endure, until Dota came. It all went downhil from there.
Ring Wars suffered from an elitist community that actively took part in keeping others out. Downloaders and noobs were booted, derided for not being part of the community, scorned, insulted, and this led to Ring Wars's downfall more than anything else. Admittedly, it wasn't all the players' fault. Ring Wars suffered from a long load time of several minutes, and lag ruined many games. Ring Wars was also very complex: a noob had no chance against the pros. Ring Wars had too many concepts to be learned at once, too many taboos, and was too harsh on newcomers. The game didn't scale up gradaully: within 30 seconds, if you were a noob Gondor, your team was already cursing you for losing your army and the game.
Yet, even if Ring Wars suffered from a self-destructive elitism, it was good in binding a community together. Ring Wars was a team game, and this showed. Clans rose and fell, devoted to the game, and they demonstrated a tight-nit bonding. Friends were made, partnerships between particularly close players. A universal bot system was created by Sanguine, who more than any other player revolutionized the way the Ring Wars community participated with each other. Clans were integrated with a bot for each channel, and server-wide messages were developed. Eventually, even the different servers were no problem. East and Europe could communicate in seconds, breaking the barrer of realms. Attempts to "colonize" the West were even attempted. A site was developed, www.ringwars.net, with online forums. The community grew almost to the heights of the "movie days."
Ring Wars demonstrated something special. It was a great game, and I loved it. But I, like many others, grew away from it. For me, I just didn't have the time any more. I also got a girlfriend ^^.
I loved Ring Wars. Maybe this report will show how much we all did. I don't intend to make the next part. It's a dead project to me. I just didn't want to leave this unfinished. After two years, it still bugged me.
So thanks for reading. This site, like Ring Wars, seems to be collapsing to me. Maybe this report will give it life, and maybe even breathe freshness to Ring Wars. I don't know. Anything's possible.
You can't count on anything...
...And you can always count on that.
| #2  [165083] | | dblt-216-227-24-25.gtcom.net | | Approved! Can't read all of this right now, but I should be able to get to it fairly soon. | | #3 PeaceableGhost[165085] | | 207.75.229.32 | Initial impression: A new report! Automatic 10. Well, automatic 9, anyway. Then I looked at it, and thought, hey, 8 or 9 seems about right.
Actual impressions: the intro humor was actually very good, and just barely missed getting too long. That's either ridiculous luck or mad skill. At this point I was thinking "at least an 8".
The intro to the game was fairly detailed, provided a good idea of the general game, and so forth. Incidentally, how well balanced is the game? The 8 was still solid, imo.
About the game description: Very clear idea what was going on, even for never having played the game. (Incidentally, I've been reading br.com since before I'd actually played SC, so it's not impossible to follow an unknown game.) That first pun was far too forced though.
Overall, I'd give this an 8.something. Taken separately, each element was very good (it's "struck", btw), together I badly want to say it's 9 quality. But something about the pictures (size, quality of editing, and placement) threw me. It's a very good report, just not "pretty". With so many pictures, it's obviously trying to be a "pretty" report, especially as very few of the pictures added much to the report to my mind.
So, if I were a rater, this would get an 8. But I'm not, and additionally, the reports I've tried to do sucked. (Like, 3s.) I do badly want to see part 2 though. | | #4 micro)machine[165086] | | cpe-71-64-152-211.woh.res.rr.com | Woo, a report.
There's a big block of black text in the middle, needs some fixin'.
When you use colored text for names, make sure it shows up well against the background. Like, using "burlylavender" instead of "purple" on black.
Game intros are good for inexperienced players, but they're best in small doses, and this game (mod?) has so much to it that the intro is battlereport-sized itself. I'd like it more if you just launch into the report and give out info on hero skills/uses in smaller bites when it becomes relevent to the report.
Other than that, it's nice. I'd give it an 8. I'll be waiting for the next part. | | #5 [165087] | | dblt-74-209-36-208.gtcom.net | Whew, that was pretty long. Took me a little over an hour, actually surprised I did it all in one sitting. Though that definitely speaks well for the construction and execution of this report.
In this case I'll get right to the rating and work from there. This SHOULD be a nine. It lacks nothing in length and detail, is very readable even without knowing the game beforehand and obviously has had a lot of effort put into it. However, for me it just doesn't work as a whole as a nine should. I'd say it's definitely higher than an eight, but only an 8.3 or so and that does not a nine make.
Personally, the intro before the game intro seemed just painfully long and not amusing. I had to force myself to get through it several times, and that definitely hurt. The attempted humor in the rest of the report seemed for the most part fine to me (I laughed at some of it.)
For the most part the images were quite good. My only quarrel with any of them that I can remember is I wish pic "isenmoriaown.jpg" had had borders of something around the individual pics used in the collage. It just seemed to sharp to have one pic end and the other begin in such a disjointed fashion without a border to me.
The writing was well done. It wasn't necessarily amazing in its range or anything, but it conveyed what was going on very well and kept the reader enthralled to the game throughout the game (and a good bit of the game intro...which is very hard to do). My one issue was with the putting some text in yellow (like "this is not a starcraft game",) every time I saw the yellow text I had to mouse over it to see if there was title text, though someone not used to that convention probably didn't have the same problem I did there. Other than a few spelling/grammatical errors(minor ones, in fact the only ones I remember at this point are "struck" and "Mordor's spawns very widely in strength." should be vary) it was great.
The formatting was on the whole quite nice. Though I didn't care for the large breaks in the text when you introduced the game, the rest of the report looked very nice.
The report was very entertaining, and definitely leaves the reader yearning for part 2. Which is pretty impressive for someone like me, who not only doesn't know anything about this UMS, but doesn't know anything about war3, either.
So, I'm giving this a well deserved eight and hoping to see part 2 very soon. Though you're very lucky I don't give you a one, what with you saying starcraft sucks and all...that's like insta ban material, dude. ;p | | #6 [165088] | | dblt-74-209-36-208.gtcom.net | So, after reading the comments: I don't see a block of black text in the report at all. I may be missing it (though I highlighted the entire report at one point to look for it) or it may be a case of different browsers.
Well, even if you aren't planning on doing the second part, thanks for giving us this part. Very well done, and extremely good for a first report. Thanks again for the effort. :) | | #7 micro[165089] | | cpe-71-64-152-211.woh.res.rr.com | i'm using ie7, and the black text starts at the gray table named "the stall" and keeps going until the gray table named "clustering."
i should probably stop using ie, but my firefox is being stupid. | | #8 BigD[165090] | | S0106000f1f1928f5.cg.shawcable.net | | I say a 10 just for the intro. Well done. | | #9 [165091] | | dblt-74-209-36-208.gtcom.net | | Ahh, I see micro. I'm using firefox and it shows up fine. Tough luck on the firefox issue. :( | | #10 lMagusl[165094] | | 69-160-7-35.bflony.adelphia.net | | Hahah im sorry but i loved the beginning of the report =]. now to read the rest of it :D | | #11 Decay[165095] | | 24-119-247-61.cpe.cableone.net | | Holy crap, that took forever, but I simply wasn't able to stop reading. The entire report was very engaging, and overall very well done. I enjoyed most of the seemingly forced humor as well. Definitely hoping to see more! | | #12 BigD[165096] | | S0106000f1f1928f5.cg.shawcable.net | | Rest of the report was nice, too. I remember playing that map one time as Gondor, and I seem to remember an invincible Sauron on it :/ | | #13 Hidden[165097] | | 49.150-244-81.adsl-dyn.isp.belgacom.be | This report as blown many a synapse in my brain ...
And I mean that in a good way ... Although my eyes have yet to stop bleeding.
So... Many ... Colors ... | | #14 Psyonic_Reaver[165098] | | 67-59-78-62.generic.webformix.com | | I loved it. Can I play? | | #15 Corpus[165099] | | 85.204.76.14 | | I must say I was rather entertained. Good work | | #16 Raider[165101] | | c-69-255-21-160.hsd1.va.comcast.net | | Holy shit--new report! Looks long as heck! Reading now. | | #17 Fangrim[165102] | | adsl-70-240-184-0.dsl.hstntx.swbell.net | Thanks for all the comments guys.
If it's possible, I'd like the game category to get changed from Starcraft to Other, or Warcraft, whichever you find more reasonable. I don't know why it got categorized incorrectly; guess I was just negligent.
And thanks for the 8 ^^ Woohoo.
The end of the school year is approaching, and with it lots of tests, and then finals. Maybe during the summer I'll have time to get interested in games some more, and I might even continue this report, as some of it was written already from last time, and I have plenty of screens. We'll see. | | #18 neoviper[165104] | | 66-214-84-8.dhcp.malb.ca.charter.com | That would be very nice if you completed it. I loved it the whole way through, even though I had to read it over the course of a few days due to interruptions. I'm not really a very good critic, but overall it was very good, held my attention the whole way through, and the pictures, while as other people have said not entirely necessary to the report, they help get a feel for the scale of the game for those like myself who have never played it before.
I'd agree with an 8 - 8.5, but I don't really know why, thats just the feeling I get out of this report. | | #19 Possumo[165105] | | 124-254-98-31-dsl.ispone.net.au | Agreed with all above, and pleasy please finish part two, i spent over an hour reading that rather than waste my time playing games, only too be left hanging! A testement too your report that i was that enthralled in it. Which hasn't really happened since Whogothelags reports.
The actual game itself sounds awesome, I'm really dissapointed i didn't get into it back in the day when i was playing Dota and Footy Frenzy etc, as I'm sure it would of been fun with all the hero management and the repercussions of hero deaths! Kind of like Diablo 2's hardcore mode, or Throne of Darkness.
Oh, and once again for emphasis, Plllleeeeasssseeee finish this report when you find the time, although having just started uni myself, i can understand the pressures it puts on you. Especially when you work in your spare time too :( | | #20 PeaceableGhost[165117] | | 207.75.229.32 | Other things I wanted to mention:
1) I read through the whole thing in one sitting the first time.
2) There used to be a UMS Starcraft map on essentially the same principles somewhere - I only played it once though, and it was massively imbalanced in favor of the good guys if only you survived the omgitsamassivelingarmyofdoom rush at the beginning. | | #21 Fangrim[165118] | | adsl-70-240-216-185.dsl.hstntx.swbell.net | 1) That's great :) I, of course, did not write the whole thing in one sitting. That would have been one loooong sitting, with a definitely sore behind.
2) Yeah, starcraft had a lot of LOTR UMS's, with a castle building mechanic and spawns, with mini-hero units. I believe those basic principles were indeed carried over to the Warcraft games. The starcraft games had a significantly less team aspect, but many of the same principles applied. | | #22 Honorary korean[165119] | | dhcp-227-212.tulane.edu | Nice report. I got black-texted too but highlighting served me fine. But man, the cliff-hanger? I think y'all picked the wrong sides, because honestly, what you just did there ... EVIL, pure evil.
and "we won't use, we won't use"
Shouldn't he have been playing Gandalf? I mean, talk about situational irony.
Anyway, 8.99 (points off for occasionally irrelevant pics and formatting; M44D PR0PZ for the wonderful intro. | | #23 wakiki[165125] | | 68-113-89-76.dhcp.leds.al.charter.com | This was really really great, and I would like for you to finish it.
I wish my computer was good enough to run the really huge WarIII custom maps. | | #24 Feanor[165129] | | p54837212.dip.t-dialin.net | | A very nice report. I liked it alot and would probably give the nine. It's nice to see to see a(nother) custom map in a report. I would love to see the second part... |
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