On the Subject of Vanguard: Saga of Heroes

Aria Giovanni

It's no secret that Vanguard has had it's share of drama in it's relatively short life. Wildly optimistic pre-launch claims from head-in-the-clouds supremo Brad McQuaid did little to endear Sigil to players once the game was realeased, "6 months" too early, in a state that was barely recognisable as a game. Loyal players stuck with it in the hope that some of the formidable potential would eventually be realised.
Sadly, very little of any consequence has actually changed since release. There have been sporadic and much-needed performance improvements. There's the usual round of class nerfing every so often (a subject to which I suspect I will return in the future).
Vanguard had a lot going for it. The epic sense of freedom and scale is unmatched. Despite a breathtakingly shoddy engine there are some awe-inspiring environments.
I say "had" because with every passing day it seems increasingly unlikely that SOE will be able to pull Vanguard back from the looming abyss. In fact it seems increasingly unlikely that SOE are interested in even trying. Another round of staff cuts and a relocation are currently doing little to inspire confidence in the future.
There were things I loved about Vanguard, and things I loathed. The often stunning scenery vs. the horrendously poor interface. The sense that, for once, the game world wasn't surrounded by strategically-placed, impassable mountains forcing you to take a specific path vs. some of the buggiest, grind-iest, most tedious quests I've ever had the misfortune to undertake.
To my mind the core of Vanguard's struggle was the piss-poor engine. It's one thing to have astronomical hardware requirements, and the game's artwork does often manage to shine, but awful texture filtering, lack of anti-aliasing and the worst water shading I've seen in a game in many years make you wonder what all the horsepower is being used for. While competing MMOs like LotRO were releasing sizable expansions soon after launch, Vanguard's developers are still struggling with fundamental memory issues that have existed since beta, and which have put the brakes on any serious content development. Player after player hits the level cap, and is faced with no compelling end-game content. That's what will finally kill the game. That, and the staggeringly bad reputation the game has managed to achieve.
It's sad, because the core "feel" of the game hints at something special. It's frustrating because you know under more positive circumstances (and with software devs who actually knew what the hell they were doing) it could have been the connoisseur's choice of MMO. Bad tech and misplaced, old-fashioned mechanics will prohibit Vanguard from achieving any sort of "next-gen" status.
The tragedy is, while Vanguard attempted to be different it's potential failure will only serve to fuel development of cheap and cheerful WoW clones. I'm sure Conan's extended release delay is being used to make the game as casual-friendly as possible in an attempt to avoid Vanguard's fate.