Due to popular request, I'll log my activities in Wildstar for some days. Day one started badly, at the time where the head start officially started there was no way of getting into the game. Carbine says they were targeted by a DDOS, but you could say that every MMORPG launch is a DDOS, so I'm not sure what really happened. Anyway, it took me an hour and a half to log into Wildstar.

I am trying to hook up with my guild, but my chat isn't working. The pre-order bonuses and boom boxes aren't working either. That remains an ongoing theme for the day: The rewards appear at some point, only to disappear again later. Disappearing items in my inventory make me nervous. As there is nothing else to do, I play through the first 3 tutorial levels, which takes me a bit over half an hour. Then it takes me an hour and a half to go through the second tutorial zone and up to level 7.

So now my draken warrior is in Deradune. Which makes for a striking similarity to my troll warrior in the Barrens nine years ago, same class, similar look, similar landscape. I log out for lunch, which of course is a mistake. First I can't get back in at all, some network error. Then I'm in a queue, at low priority, because the game mistakenly believes that I have a guest account.

The levels just fly by. At 4 hours /played I'm level 9 and decide to take a break from questing and leveling. Instead I take a taxi to Illium the capital, and do the guided tour quest there which rewards me with a daily teleport to Illium spell. I have a look at the auction house, but there isn't much happening there yet. As most players only go to the capital at level 14 and there aren't many that high yet, I have the city for myself. So for a change I can do challenges in the city and succeed, while all day long other players in Deradune cause me to fail most challenges. Worst feature ever, making you hate your fellow players. I don't go straight back, but first visit the other level 7-14 zone, Ellevar, to tag the flight path to there. Then I hearth back to Deradune.

At level 10 I learn mining and weaponsmithing. That allows me to directly make a better sword for my warrior, plus another one in reserve for level 12. Big improvement over crafting in World of Warcraft. I make it to level 12 by evening, and notice that my 10-slot bag pre-order bonus has disappeared, together with all other pre-order bonuses and boom boxes. Part of my inventory is now inaccessible, although I can still see the healing potions I have in there through the special healing item hotkey menu. I decide to not fiddle with my inventory while it is broken and call it a night.