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Why I'm Not Applying To Isengard

Monday, May 18, 2009

I genuinely thought about it. Really hard. I had a blast beta testing LOTRO before release. I met awesome friends, I got sucked into an awesome game. For the first time ever I spent 200 dollars on a video game (total now is a little over 300 counting my lifetime sub and the two boxes). LOTRO for me has been an event of a lifetime. That sounds melodramatic, and maybe a bit nerdy when referring to a video game, but it's true. My gaming habits changed, I started this blog, I met a bunch of people I'd still talk to (try to anyway) even if I weren't playing.

There's a difference between now and then. Recapturing a romanticized nostalgia is futile. I already have those friends and they're not testing (not that I'm aware of), and I'd feel compelled, obligated, responsible to and for beta testing on Isengard. As it stands, I don't log in on a regular basis anyway. Adding a testing regimen would probably be a bad idea in the middle of mild burnout.

Then there's the fact that I couldn't talk about any of that here on this blog. While I highly doubt I'd break the NDA because of the temptation this blog offers, the Adventurer exists to chronicle my LOTRO journey and thoughts. Having a hole in that journey because of an NDA wouldn't feel right.

However, I'm greatly excited about the prospect of this testing and wish all the testers the best of luck on Isengard. I hope Turbine can get the data they need from this and build that much better a game.

1 Responses:

unwize Says:

I'd be tempted, but I want to experience the content for the first time in as polished a state as possible.

I'm sure there are plenty of excellent testers signing up to give the new content a once over. I just hope they spend some time checking that the new changes haven't broken the old content, which seems to be what usually happens.