Well, I was able to experience
the new video game The Matrix Online during the last weeks of
its beta-test and in the final week of its stress test. Since
I am almost 100% computer geek, and 300% fat-ass, I absolutely
loved the Matrix Trilogy. Sure, the movies didn’t end up
how I anticipated them, but nothing in life normally does. So,
when I heard they were going to create a video game universe around
my favorite movies...I was completely sold. Yes, I pre-ordered
the game months in advance so I could participate in the beta
test of the game and be there when it launched. Needless to say
my cholesterol laced heart was all a’flutter.
The Matrix Online takes off where the Trilogy
of films left off. Basically you are in the Matrix universe, with
its usual cast of characters, and eventually align yourself with
one of three factions trying to gain control of the Matrix. Neo’s
peace is brittle and could be very short lived as players from
around the world “jack-in” to try and sculpt the Matrix
to their liking.
How geeky am I? Well, I went out and purchased
a new Dell about 2 months prior to the games launch...I can’t
run the Matrix Online with the crappy TRS-80 that was recently
my computer. After I had the system up and running for a few months,
and as launch day approached, I decided I needed to upgrade the
system. I was running everything over their recommended specs,
but I thought I would go all out to get the most out of my gaming
experience.
I noticed when I was playing the beta the game
was extremely choppy and lagged out. It was so bad I was getting
motion sickness while playing it and that had never happened in
my life. It is hard to get motion sickness when the only time
you move is when you hobble into bed to fall asleep or make that
walk of despair to the refrigerator to see what you haven’t
consumed yet. I ended up purchasing a high-end video card and
a nice gig of RAM. Nothing is too expensive for my inner Neo.
I got everything installed in my machine for
the very last day of Beta testing. The game looked crisp and clean.
They had truly captured everything I would expect in the Matrix
movies to be in a video game, including sound. Their HUD, or graphic
interface, used to control your character in the game was different
than what I was used to, but I decided to give it a go even though
I wasn’t used to the odd layout of buttons before me. If
only they were edible buttons.
Everything in the game indeed captured the Matrix
feel. The bleak urban setting was filled with more gothic despair
than Robert Smith’s underwear. They incorporated some of
the classic pieces of original musical soundtrack while providing
enough ambient noise to really give the game some weight. Roves
of gangs roamed the streets in search of fights and to protect
their territory. Visually and audibly the game was quite stunning.
I felt for sure that I would soon abandon my real life and exist
completely in the Matrix Online. Could they even fit my girth
in the Matrix Online? Not even the Oracle could answer that question.
The people over at Monolith Productions allowed
people who pre-ordered the game to play a full 3 days before everyone
else. Since this amazing 3 day run started on my birthday I scheduled
everything around the game. Actually, I scheduled nothing, took
the phone off the hook, and had a list of delivery places I could
call to get some food when I woke up from my Matrix induced coma
that was about to occur. I planned on playing 3 full days, 72
hours, almost completely straight through. Sleep is for the weak
and those who can’t kick an exiles ass in bullet time. Plus,
how much energy can I seriously burn in one day of sitting at
my computer getting fatter?
I logged in 3 seconds after they officially
opened the servers. How do I know it was exactly 3 seconds? Because
I sat here pushing the connect button for 4 minutes straight,
every 3 seconds, until it connected. Before I knew it I was about
to see how far the rabbit hole went. It went a whole 4 feet underground
until I tripped over the corpses of the rabbits who could no longer
take the game and ended their lives with rat-poison stolen from
Alice’s cupboard.
After I created my character and loaded into
the game I had already crashed the program in the first 4 minutes.
No problem, I was sure some bugs were bound to show up as I played
for 3 days solid, so I pushed on. I pushed on another whole 15
minutes as I kept crashing the program. Sure, I was slightly irritated,
but nothing was going to stop my Neo-riffic Matrix fest. Well,
that is until the entire server crashed a few hours later. Yep,
barely 6 hours into my Matrix-a-thon and their server went down.
Not all of the servers, mind you, just mine. So I got to go out
and watch reruns of Hogan’s Heros until they decided to
reboot my server so I could continue playing. Around 5:45am I
decided to call it quits for the night and get some rest for the
next leg of my marathon on Saturday.
I got up around seven, got outta bed around
nine and I don't worry about nothin' no 'cause worrin's a waste
of my... time. And by seven I really mean around 4pm, and I am
not Axle Rose but I can eat his weight in food in 24 hours if
given the opportunity. So, it was on to day 2 and it was nice
to see they finally got the server working. I really wanted to
gain levels as quickly as possible so I could be really cool when
everyone else started playing in over 48 hours, but my dreams
were quickly crushed as I saw people running around almost double
my current level....damn my need for sleep!!
So day 2 was pretty good. I was getting annoyed
with the combat system, which the Matrix Online calls “Interlock”,
because the stupid thing didn’t really know what the hell
it was doing or how to function properly. I swear I could have
grabbed a drunk midget, thrown him in the dryer for 2 hours, had
him inhale some Nitros, and he could have functioned better at
building the Statue of Liberty in 1/6 scale out of Legos than
this stupid feature of the game. Now I was starting to get frustrated.
I had updated my PC, I had purchased the game months in advance,
I had watched a server crash, and now this essential piece of
game play functionality was really nothing but a big piece of
horse shit. My dreams were now crushed, but I still played on
while getting my ass handed to me right and left because the stupid
game play mechanics were screwed.
I made my character this hot little red head.
Yes, she was sexy and I was fast falling in love with her, until
I found out she liked to dose up on pain medication before she
went running around the Matrix universe. The controls to move
my vixen around were poor indeed. Everything seemed to be lagged
by a few milliseconds, so if you wanted to run to the roof’s
edge to peer over and look down at the ground 15 stories below
you…you would normally fling yourself off the roof like
a defrosted Butterball turkey juiced up on Uncle Larry’s
Cough Medicine. Running, jumping, walking, standing, sitting,
dancing….it was all lagged and was getting on my nerves…but
nothing was going to stop me damn it!
I played the rest of that second day, taking breaks often, because
the interface and game mechanics were just plain getting on my
nerves and because the missions were really repetitive. Sure,
this game had just launched and I expected to be bugs and some
repetitiveness as they worked on more content behind the scenes,
but how many times can you run into a building, run into an elevator,
go to the 13th floor, kill 3 gang members and retrieve Trinity’s
dildo before it gets old? Oh, I would say about 342 to be exact,
because that is ALL I did the entire time on the second day. I
actually had to take a break and dose up on migraine medication
because this game was pissing me off so much. How dare they ruin
my Matrix-a-thon on my goddamn birthday?!
On the third day there was the Matrix and all
was bad. I got up on the third day and “jacked-in”.
I decided to run around the world for awhile to go sight seeing.
Yeah, that was pretty much a big mistake since everything looks
the exact same no matter where you go. Don’t get me wrong,
it is gritty and looks good, but not even Frank Lloyd Wright makes
every damn building look exactly the same on the inside. So, after
about a half hour I become bored and decide to head back to doing
some more missions searching for Trinity’s golden dildo
of power. Bad idea.
I get a 3 part quest from my operator. I am
supposed to get some information, kill the person who stole it,
and then rescue 3 operatives that are being held by one of the
factions. Sounds easy enough right? Well, that is where you are
wrong…dead wrong, so fucking wrong your third grade cousin
can see you are a complete dip-shit and just pissed on your pillow
to prove it. I get the info, kill the thieving bastard who stole
it, and then try to rescue these sad pieces of shit before they
decide to walk the whole 20ft they are away from the door to escape
with no one watching them. You know what happens? None of them
will follow me, so I can’t complete my mission. Imagine
that…it appears there is yet another glitch in the Matrix.
I then try to log a complaint in the game to
one of the GM’s or Game Masters. These people receive complaints
and then will fix the problem you are having or give you a possible
work around. They are kind of like gods in online games. After
filling out my complaint form and clicking send I get yet another
bug, the in-game complaint form is also bugged and it won’t
work. I think I tried to send the thing 1,400 times, but it would
never go through and I would get an error. Disappointed, disillusioned,
and dismayed I decided to disconnect before I disintegrated in
disbelief at this diabolically dumb waste of money.
I wake up the next day and see that my complaint
actually went through the GM’s had responded to me. I gave
them loads of detailed information and this was the answer I received:
Response
---------------------------------------------------------------
Your incident status has been changed to Pending Resolution.
What this means: At this time we are not able to
resolve the incident you filed, nor do we have a definite resolution
timeframe. Once a resolution has been made, the status of this
incident may change.
Great. This is just perfect. Why? Because if
I cannot complete the mission I cannot get ‘experience’
which means that I can’t level, which means my character
cannot advance and I am stuck at a stupid level 8 until they decide
to fix the problem. Needless to say I am pissed. I login to the
game and give the misson 3 more tries…I desperately want
to play this game and to be happy, but the whole thing is leaving
a sour taste in my mouth, much like when you spray some Lemon
Scented Pledge on the coffee table and wonder if it tastes as
good as it smells. It doesn’t…trust me.
After trying to complete the mission the next
three times I find that they did in fact fix the ‘won’t
follow’ bug and replaced it with a new ‘operatives
will die when you enter their building' bug. Yeah, I have had
it. I am pissed now. This was my last day of pre-order game play,
which means the game is being released tomorrow and I can go to
the store and pick-up my pre-purchased piece of shit that still
needs another 6 months of development before it is consumer ready.
I decided to write Monolith Productions, the creator of the game,
a nice letter:
Dear Monolith Productions,
I am an avid video game player and try to play as many games as
I can so I can experience all that the digital world has to offer.
Needless to say I was EXTREMELY excited to hear you would be putting
out a MMOG based in the Matrix universe. I read about the project
for a year while it was under production and couldn't wait to
get my hands on it ASAP. I finally got into the beta/stress tests
about 2 weeks before the game was set to go live. That is when
I started noticing odd things about the game.
Your minimum requirements wouldn't run the game even on a DSL
connection. The only thing that I had that was bare minimum was
my RAM and I was running 512 @ 400Mhz of DDR2. The video was extremely
choppy and lag filled, enough to make me motion sick and I have
never been motion sick.
After the stress test was over we got a 3 day wait while the you
wiped the beta characters and got everything ready for the 3-day
pre-order extravaganza. I could hardly contain myself because
I finally got 1.23gb of RAM and the video was finally running
smooth on the last day of beta.
I log in that first day and get crashed to my desktop 5 times
in the first hour because of a Beta Hyper-jump bug. After that
I am running around trying to complete missions, but am constantly
frustrated because the "interlock" combat aspect of
the game freaks out every 3 seconds and doesn't know whether it
is engaged or if it is idle. I swear it is like my character in
the Matrix is some sort of a drunk circus seal high on meth.
I try to ignore it over the following days, but everything is
more and more bugged the "further down the rabbit hole"
I go. The HUD is clunky and is awkward to control, interlock is
about as good as a mongoloid midget, the chat interface is absolutely
pathetic, to complete missions you would have to be Neo himself
because exiles are all grouped together and like to shoot at you
while their buddy gets his ass kicked...even on EASY, most of
the "abilities" I have learnt are completely worthless
like Multi-foe fighting, you can't buy crap from vendors except
weak weapons, you can't complete missions because they are bugged
and the NPC's will either not follow your orders or immediately
die the second you enter the room, and the "crew" structure
is absolutely horrid. These are only things I have noticed that
really cause me concern over this game....there are plenty more.
You have taken one of my favorite movie series and have turned
it into a joke. I can actually no longer stand the Matrix or anything
that deals with it. I know you don't care because you have enough
slacked jawed retards willing to plop down $15 every month while
you try to make this piece of crap game function, but it is worthless.
Hell, I can't even get the damn petitions to work in-game and
when they do the support staff says, "there is nothing they
can do" while I am stuck as a level 8 character because a
retarded Zion mission won't let me complete it.
To sum it up I feel cheated, taken advantage of, and used. As
soon as I email this off I am going to my local EB Games and I
am canceling my pre-order because I refuse to pay money for a
game that is half built. Will you care if I don't buy the game?
Of course not. But I will always remember who produced this game
and how they took care of their loyal fans and customers. It is
an insult that a horrid piece of coding like this can even have
a price tag attached to it.
Go ahead and trash this letter, I am sure you have gotten a thousand
more than just mine and I don't expect a faceless corporation
to actually apologize to one person because they put out a faulty
product. Hell, if you apologized then it would be like you are
admitting to putting half complete projects on store shelves,
but Mommy and Daddy will still buy crap like this for their kids
because they whine for it. Congratulations, you pissed me off
enough to have me actually write an email. I would advance you
to level 9, but first you have to lead some dead Zion operatives
out of a building and to a hardline.
LaVarious
I guess Monolith didn’t want to respond
to my email, so they forwarded it to the technical support lackeys.
These poor support bastards must be having a hard time and are
tired of endless stream of hatemail they get. Here is their reply,
which I didn’t even expect to get:
Actually, we haven't gotten that many complaints.
Most people aren't having any problems playing the game with supported
hardware. Of course, you haven't bothered to submit a tech support
petition to get help with the problems you are having running
the game, so it is no surprise you can't get any help with the
issue. (This answer is great because I submitted
countless petitions with all of my hardware information and they
still couldn’t solve the problem)
Looking on the mission issue
you reported, it is one we are working on, and, like the other
users experiencing it, you may have to wait until the mission
is fixed before you can complete it. (And
by “wait” they mean pay $15/month +$50 for the game
that is not yet ready to be released to consumers)
However, since you've already decided to trash the game without
bothering to get your hardware/drivers problems fixed, this information
probably isn't useful to you. (These
problems should have been non-existent by the time I got the game
in my hands. So, sure I will trash something if I purchase it
and it is a complete rip-off)
In the future, please submit your feedback in the feedback queue,
as emails are for registration issues only. This insures that
your feedback gets to the appropriate people.
(I didn’t submit this email to them, Monolith forwarded
it to them because they were too chicken-shit to actually admit
they were wrong and are basically retarded)
mxo.nun - The Matrix Online
Support Team
http://support.warnerbros.com
Please include previous email in your reply
So, as promised, after I sent off my letter I hopped on the motorcycle
and headed for EB Games. Once I got there I told them I was unhappy
with the game and that it shouldn’t even be released for
another 6 months. I explained the situation and told them I wanted
my money back, which they gave me.
Here is my final review for the Matrix online (MxO):
The game is graphically amazing. The world has great detail, but
you will need to run over 512mb of RAM to actually see it in any
sort of detail without lag. The audio is pretty good, but does
become repetitive at times, but over all the ambience is good
with the wind and what not, but the foot-step sounds you create
when you are running don’t really sync up with your character,
which was disappointing. The game mechanics are absolutely horrible
and I would rather jog 2 miles that try to maneuver my character
in game, and I detest any form of physical exercise…just
ask jesus. Their “Interlock” fighting system is the
biggest piece of shit I have ever seen. It doesn’t function
correctly and completely bugs out if you are being attacked by
more than 1 person. I also noticed many of the abilities I purchased
and uploaded into my character were basically worthless and didn’t
do crap, besides taking up valuable memory space. The content
in the game is really bleak. I was only able to select 1 mission
at a time from my operator and then I couldn’t complete
some of those and got stuck. All of the missions repeat themselves
and become uninteresting after the first hour of game play. The
chat interface in-game is horrid and you might as well try to
communicate with a yeti by humping a dead penguin slathered in
Crisco than actually try to communicate anything to anyone in
game. The HUD (heads up display) in-game is clunky and bulky,
much like me, but unlike me it cannot talk about humping dead
penguins. Overall I would give the game a “burn in hell”
rating. Maybe in 1 year they might have the bugs worked out and
have some actual content and missions in the game, but right now
it is just a waste of $50 and your time, which you could spend
eating lots and lots of twinkies.
The Matrix Online get 4 Mr. Yuckys for sucking!!
-LaVarious
04-08-05
