The Lord of the Rings Online Book 7 Interview
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MMORPG.com: Can you tell us exactly what the quest radar is and what it's going to look like in-game?
Turbine: The Quest Guide is set of features designed to make navigating through Middle-Earth more intuitive. For quests that you choose to track, the radar mini-map on the UI will display an arrow guiding you to the focused (or closest) quest objective that is available. On the main map, you will also have different indicators for objectives available over a wide area, individual quest targets such as NPCs, and quests that would lead you into an instance space. You can expect to see a developer diary with more detail (and screenshots!) soon.
MMORPG.com: There is a school of thought amongst some players that making quests too easy to track down via systems like the quest radar makes games too easy and removes a layer of challenge. Can you speak to this?
Turbine: A primary goal of any game is to have fun, and as you would expect different players have fun in different ways. For players who are new to MMOs or prefer to have a helpful hand finding quest objectives, the Quest Guide provides added features to enhance their gameplay. For players who prefer to explore the world without a guide, we recommend that they disable the Quest Guide through the Options menu (Options>UI>Enable Quest Guide).
If you have run through the winding passages of Moria I believe you'd agree that a marker on the map does not necessarily make the challenge easier; much of the challenge of Moria is simply figuring out how to travel from "A" to "B". We have also taken steps to remove the Quest Guide from situations that were not appropriate, such as quests based on riddles. Ultimately this is a feature that our players have asked for, and we believe will enhance the experience of many players.
