146676-do-you-enjoy-the-planet-nexus

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I want to start off by saying this is not a hate post
 
With that out of the way I have had an odd feeling come over me lately. I love wildstar, I've been around since beta. I have a level 50 and one more on the way. However I've run into one huge problem.
 
I don't enjoy nexus. I've stopped playing for a couple weeks and everytime I log in I only last 5 minutes before I log out again. Now I have a big history with Warcraft and I love that universe. I could log into wow just for theblore or because I feel the zones feel special. Nexus as a place seems hollow and just a host to gameplay mechanics as opposed to a real, enjoyable world. I think some of this has to do with zone design. The zones feel instanced and exploration seems a bit weak. 
 
So while I feel wildsrar is a great game and better than WoW I still find myself playing more wow simply because of world and setting of it all. Anyone else feel this way at all? Has anyone found some really cool spots of the world that would helpnchange my mind?
 
I'm just interested in seeing how others feel about this, cheers!	
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I want to start off by saying this is not a hate post
 
With that out of the way I have had an odd feeling come over me lately. I love wildstar, I've been around since beta. I have a level 50 and one more on the way. However I've run into one huge problem.
 
I don't enjoy nexus. I've stopped playing for a couple weeks and everytime I log in I only last 5 minutes before I log out again. Now I have a big history with Warcraft and I love that universe. I could log into wow just for theblore or because I feel the zones feel special. Nexus as a place seems hollow and just a host to gameplay mechanics as opposed to a real, enjoyable world. I think some of this has to do with zone design. The zones feel instanced and exploration seems a bit weak.
 
So while I feel wildsrar is a great game and better than WoW I still find myself playing more wow simply because of world and setting of it all. Anyone else feel this way at all? Has anyone found some really cool spots of the world that would helpnchange my mind?
 
I'm just interested in seeing how others feel about this, cheers!
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Well, Nexus and all the various zones in the game are visually beautiful for the most part, a real labour of love in terms of artwork. BUT .... when it comes to gameplay I tend to agree about the zone design being mostly to host gameplay and quest mechanics rather than create a genuinely believable living breathing world.
 
Most zones have a VERY cluttered layout and theme. I would call it "crowded themepark" design. I guess the intent was to keep players with constant quests to do and mobs to fight, but it's all so crowded together in most zones that it can get somewhat muddled and tiring to adventure. It's also very hard to suspend disbelief when there's so many storylines, mobs, npcs, camps and so on within a stones throw of each other. It makes storytelling awkward and rather irrelevant when everything is scrunched up like that. Of course WS isn't alone in this type of themepark design, but it does rather take things to the limit.
 
As such I've never found myself truly immersed in Nexus like I have in some other MMOs. The story isn't particularly strong and the zone design doesn't aid storytelling. Also, since few quests have much in the way of voice acting, the horribly small UI font (that can't be resized) makes reading quest text a chore, which again hampers the storytelling. Story isn't everything of course and the core gameplay / combat is fun. But we're talking here of zone design and I think if I needed to sum up Wildstar's zone design it would be "cluttered" (I'd use the same word for the UI too).	
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I will agree the music is absolutely amazing. As are the ambient sounds. Yeah the combat is my favorite part too, its what keeps me coming back. I also enjoy checking out other peoples houses.
 
But alas I find myself underwhelmed by the zones themselves. I feel there are very few special spots. Then there is the lore. Its not bad at all and I love data cubes but its also not great. Once again it seems like the lore exists so the game has some sort of story to structure content around. I don't see any passion in it. 
 
Maybe its just the zones im in right now but im definitely starting to notice a huge lack of exploration. The zones are set up so oddly. Anyway, I appreciate your response	
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			Well you're right, you've hid the nail on the head. There is no great journey or expedition in wildstar. You are merely following the breadcrumbs from point a to point b. I can remember traveling across the barrens in wow and that felt special, as if I was discovering a beautiful world. I have not had that experience in wildstar	
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i agree with you but since i am in dungeons/raids/capital/housing/bgs for 95%+ of my playtime (pretty sure most players are at max levels) it does not matter how the world looks like. at least to me.
WS cant compete with the lore of Warcraft, its unfair to compare a grown universe/lore over multiple games/years/expensions to a new game.	
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i agree with you but since i am in dungeons/raids/capital/housing/bgs for 95%+ of my playtime (pretty sure most players are at max levels) it does not matter how the world looks like. at least to me.
WS cant compete with the lore of Warcraft, its unfair to compare a grown universe/lore over multiple games/years/expensions to a new game.
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I feel that my complaint carries through to dungeons too, does anyone really care about who they are killing or why? i know this isnt that important but it does help. While you're right its unfair to compare warcraft to WS i would say that even if compared vanilla WoW to modern day WS, WoW was still a much better world to inhabit.
 
The lore of WS seems lazy and generic. its almost like a soap opera, we will never find out any real answers, they will just keep dangling it in front of us.
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I will post a reply to this since I feel the same way.  There are way too many enemies to make exploration fun.  I also play GW2, Elder Scrolls Online and SWTOR.  SWTOR and Wildstar have the same problem.  There isn't exploration because you have to kill so many enemies within a close proximity to each other.  Go five steps...kill....go five more steps...kill more.  GW2 and ESO lend themselves to exploration and enjoying the worlds that are created.  It's just in how the games are made.  Each has it's place.  SWTOR has a fantastic story and lore.  GW2 and ESO have exploration and beauty in the world that just makes you want to climb high and look out over the horizon.  Wildstar has the best housing I've seen in any game. 
 
I think in Wildstar, you're eyes are drawn to the enemies instead of the terrain.  Kill or be killed.  There is just no time to see beyond that.	
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There are some incredible areas that "off the map" that you can get to which really do show the beauty of this game off in a lot of ways.
 
That said, I do agree with you on the idea the leveling areas within zones are way too much "this is here because you should level!" and not because, "This is here because it should be here". Of course, given the nature of many gamers these days, they just wouldn't put up with huge areas that take forever to get through and explore. MMOs just don't work that way as they all want to get to level cap. Sure, there are exceptions to that rule, but overall most players don't want to take forever getting places. Personally, I'd love it to take me actual time to get places, make the trip worth it and interesting rather than "Get here! Go there! Kill that! YAY!" it's draining at times.
 
I would love to see the maps expanded on and other things being able to be discovered and explored. As much as I do love the world, and some of the zones, it seems far less like a planet and more like a collection of small regions at times.	
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I wish Carbine would have rather gone for a theme like "wonderful mysterious alien world to explore" instead of a "crazy arcade planet on steroids".
 
Nexus is too much in my face at times. Some days i just want to play to relax like i did in other mmorpgs.
 	
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			Hmmm while I feel like the mob density is too high in some places, overall I really like the feel of Nexus. Having a fully open world with minimal invisible walls was also such a breath of fresh air after playing FFXIV. My husband and I have spent a lot of time exploring the coastline and the mountains between zones. Overall, I've had a fairly positive exploratory experience in WildStar.	
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I'm ok with zones and mobs. For me the planet seems just right. ( kinda lazy to copy paste old maps for dailies lol, but it's ok XD ) The only problem I have with WildStar is the casual content, rather than its looks. Not existing that is.
 
After dailies and gear runs (Dungeons, Exp., Adv., you name it) I find myself with nothing to do on a more, as said, casual pow. For example, in WoW, I used to spend a lot of my time fishing XD, Training/Selling/Capture/Battle Pets, Trasmog Hunts ( I tried Costume Hunts, but this game is too young for that. Often you get the same damn aesthetic disguised in a different name ), Searching for silly items ( Like the trinket that forces people to dance lol, I loved it. WildStar too has few toys, not enough tho) and stuff like this 
 
I'm enjoying Housing and trying to find cool decors is really a lot of fun, but I start to feel the lack of side activities diversity
 
(yeah, my path is maxed along my profession XD)
 
However yeah, map design, music, mob models etc, I think they're great
			
				
	Edited November 10, 2015 by DorianTail	
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Hmmm while I feel like the mob density is too high in some places, overall I really like the feel of Nexus. Having a fully open world with minimal invisible walls was also such a breath of fresh air after playing FFXIV. My husband and I have spent a lot of time exploring the coastline and the mountains between zones. Overall, I've had a fairly positive exploratory experience in WildStar.
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			I really nee fishing for 100% enjoyment for me. otherwise I love nexus and I love my floating house over it.	
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I have personal preferences for zones. Those personal preferences seem to be, for whatever reason, "lots of flat ground with very few trees", because my favorite zones so far have been Algoroc and Farside.
 
I don't know why, but I just do not like the forested, jungle areas of the game. A wild west desert? Sign me up. A barren moon? I'm always a slut for space. But- ugh- jungles? Jungles? Get out of here, jungles.	
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I enjoyed questing through most of the zones.
 
But personally, I prefer a balance of quest hubs and wilderness. A lot the zones have densely packed quest hubs and npc settlements. In my opinion, it would be nice from an atmosphere perspective if quest hubs and "developed" areas were a bit more sparse.
 
No buildings, crashsites, ruined bases, and few eldan ruins. Just open, untouched wilderness with some caves and caverns, and only one major hub. Ellevar, Grimvault, Farside and Northern Wastes have some of this feeling.	
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I had the exact opposite experience. That said, My first toon I took my time leveling and actually picked up the lore and most of the quests as I went. It was literally incredible (especially discovering all the cubes as I went. Every new zone was a breath of fresh air and got closer and closer to the mystery of what drew us all to Nexus. If you do all the quests in each zone before moving on it really helps, Ellevar with Toric and his brother was IN-cupcaking-CREDIBLE, then tack on Corrigan doon and the Ikthians (and some nasty Mordesh alchemists trying to kill the whole place with poison for good measure).... The soft green and gold glow of a new exolab was tantalizing. There was and is so much depth and a lot of care put into the quests and stories in each zone, even my least favorite zones blew me away.
 
And then there were places that just literally were beyond words. Farside the first time? The planetary canon and the Ikthians? Arm-a-Geddon :D Playing Alien with the Silo, The shiphands too, all of them.... I still remember hunting down EVERY caretaker info-panel in every exo-lab to put the pieces of the mystery of the Drusentity together before it was dropped; and following the narration of the Eldan in the cubes along with the remnants of their stories on the planet was remarkable...
 
I disagree with people who suggest exploration is some how hard with mobs; aggro ranges are not that huge here and you can avoid combat entirely by dodging aggro, or just boarding through it. I have spent a whole lot of time exploring, but the great thing is you don't even have to. Look at the places you spend all your time in from a different angle, you'll notice things you never did. Shameless plug of my old "Look Up" topic ( But really, you should!). 	
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Nexus as a place seems hollow...
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			Yes, I think Nexus is great. Oddly, I stopped doing world/zone PVE around lvl14 and got hooked on PVP and housing instead- but that has much more to do with me as a player than it does the PVE/eploration content....in fact it means that when I need a break from PVP later I still have vast swaths of Nexus to explore at my leisure.	
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Yes I love nexus.
 
I love the lore, i love the feeling of each zone, and how the sub-zones tie in with everything.
 
I ADORE just wandering around and looking at things.  Exploring is very much rewarded in the game - and you can see some really cool things.
 
After over a year of playing things are starting to feel a bit... dull, but I've been exposed to it for so long that it's to be expected (thats how I feel about WoW atm lol)	
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It's okay.
 
To be honest, I don't see much in Wildstar I haven't seen anywhere else before. The questing is standard MMO fare and the combat is similar to most action MMO's. The only difference here is the telegraphs. 
 
The one thing Wildstar does better than any other MMO, not including dedicated building games like Landmark, is housing. 
 
I can't say it's the best MMO i've ever played, it's not even close, but it's the first MMO since DAoC that i've played with my wife and that's been fun. Although i've now got to split my time between this and Fallout 4.	
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