In almost twenty years of online gaming I've encountered extremely few men who actually pretend to be women. In my experience most guys playing female characters make no effort to hide that fact. Given that I don't actually believe that the Troll or Iksar I see in my group is *actually* a Troll or Iksar, either (given that they don't exist), I've never given any weight to immersion complaints with respect to voice chat.

Annoyance is a different matter entirely. As I recall, I started using voice comms in late 1998 and started using them in most games I played about a year later. As the tech gained broader appeal more and more folks I didn't care to listen to started using it. I don't think I've used voice comms to any great degree since about 2008. As I age I have less and less patience for listening to teenagers or college kids blather about crap I don't care about.

I don't think most P1999 guilds are as insistent as they say they are, regardless of the rules they post. The player base is small enough that the majority of second- and third-tier guilds have to take what they can get.

Danth

Sorry thats no excuse. True Manginas bent on nerd deception can just use this line "my mic doesnt work" if that fails then fall back on "I dont own a mic" but remember never use the "my cat ate the cord to my mic" line because then everyone just thinks your a crazy cat lady and starts to withdraw. Those first 2 lines have worked over 4 games or more for some people. Just remember if you 'dont have a mic' never accidently key it up or talk in vent because your voice will give you away.


It can be fun to sit in vent and listen to the idiots who really think to impress or who have mental defects that prevent them from interacting with society effectively outside of a video game.

How is just listening to people instead of reading chat the lazier route again?

IE: Book on tape vs actually reading

More the point you should be after, that added difficulty to the game is client stability. If you engaged Yelinak with 70 people (let's just say), do you realize how many would just straight up crash on engage? Or have a total slide show? This is more what makes the game "easier" on P99 than anything else. However, like I say about item recharging and other FLAWS (not content FEATURES removed or introduced later otherwse) its a good thing that this is no longer a problem.

I sound like Jim Gaffigan when I'm trying to be quiet on Vent :(

"Hot Pockets...."

Cool to see this thread - I agree completely. I said a long time ago when i transferred to WoW that vent was killing the mmo scene.

I don't mind it so much now, to be honest. But things seemed so much more... organized.... when I played EQ -raid/guild had to be clear during instructions, etc. In WoW I implemented a system 'don't talk in raid' - so they made chat channels for 'BSing' in. And then vent destroyed any semblance of organization

I still liked both games, and nowadays I don't mind hopping in and talking to people.

Most guilds probably don't require you to speak in vent, but at least listen. There are plenty of people who have a "broken" mic and just listen to instructions and type in /guild when responding

I've always avoided Ventrilo raid guilds, always will
For all the reasons mentioned in this thread

smh

voice chat is awesome, you people are all insane

flash drives not classic either