world exploration

Hi! I just found out about this game today, and I did some research. Looks awesome!

I come from WoW (paladin) and the combat actually looks exciting!

I came home today and my roomate tried to burst my bubble. He played in beta (around christmas) and told me that you can't explore the world like you can in other mmos. He gave me an example of seeing a boat on the shoreline...you can't go check it out. You can only follow "paths" or something like that.

I'm curious now and I can't seem to find any info about it. Is this true? I've played AC, DAoC and WoW.

no i just played in last weekends beta and the world is very explorable with open maps that u can run around but somtimes when u go into a new area it has to load the map but it only takes a couple seconds once u have the files

I think I know what your talking about. It is possible that some of the imagery you see within the game is not 'explorable' but. By all means this should not deter you from this great masterpiece. I admit I am a GuildWars Fan but only because I've played it. I am not a dev or stockholder. hmmm stockholder .. Anyway- Not every object in this game is 'touchable' or 'deformable'. I am not sure what the technical gamey word for it is. But that should have no bearing on whether or not this game is awsome. Your friend simply did not play the game enough, or did not give it a chance.

~Darkmane

As far as i have seen there is no "path" really to follow, you could spend quite some time just wandering around the maps enjoying the beautiful scenery.

as for items, some things you can interact with, say treasure chests, dropped items, quest related activies and the like, but others say trees, NPCs, random (cant remember the name, for some reason i keep thinking do-dads) elements, (trees, non quest related items like carts, boats and stuff) are the usual, can look but not touch

I wish it was also an explorable game, "Open land"
But, hey, It still owns.

I like the fact that you don't sit in one spot camping mobs though. You're constantly travelling and killing. It isn't very linear, but there are some restriction as to where you can go.

Perhaps your friend speaks after experiencing missions. Missions tend to be more linear because they are trying to drive you to the next area. However, the open world is not linear at all. You could spend a few hours walking around the begining area, not to mention the entire world that will open up after that!

Thanks for all your replies! I'm not sure what my roomate meant. At first it sounded really linear, but that's why I came here.

Yeah, I'll definately be picking up this game.