Here's a recap of my play last night that I shared with my guild, so take it for what it is. Personally, I feel a bit more optimistic that other people posting here.
---
So I got to dive into this a little more last night. Had a lot of fun. Shook some serious tail for Pfloyd. But on that note, let me mention for those that might be turned off by that...there is a very wide range of customization on your toon, from fat to thin to muscular, to curvy or normal. You can make a very realistic looking body type for anyone if you want to...it's just that boob slider does get a bit out of control. Hilariously so.
Outfit-wise, too, there's a lot of customization. Some skimpy outfits, some with complete coverage, and everything in between. It looks like that's going to be a big part of the cash shop/monetization. And you can change your look on the fly.
Good. Now that the important stuff is out of the way, here's the highlights from about three hours of playing last night.
Overall it looks like a mashup between GW2, Neverwinter, Secret World, Wildstar, Path of Exile and Final Fantasy.
Combat - Very action oriented, but not necessarily a button masher. Think GW2 mixed with a healthy dose of Neverwinter. Early on, it's super easy. Mash mash mash to win. But later it seems you get rewarded for timing your moves and chaining together better combos. For example, in one solo dungeon last night, I got my butt kicked by a group of mobs. Didn't realize there was a healer in there dropping items that could be destroy, but if left untouched pulsed out an AOE heal that was more powerful than I could DPS. So next time in I locked on to the healer, leaped on it, did a quick LMB/RMB combo to stun it, whacked it with another four hit combo, then finished it off with my stun+big damage hit. After the healer was dead, the other two "striker" style mobs were pretty easy.
Taking a step back, combat is driven by two things. You can attacks mapped to the mouse buttons, which are "spamable", and then you have longer CD skills ranging from a few seconds to a minute. But you can chain together combinations of the LMB and RMB to produce different combos that have different effects.
The bosses also started to provide more robust challenges, with mechanics you could either try to just brute force through or use a little finesse. In that same solo dungeon, the last boss had the typical stay out of stupid big attacks, but at regular intervals he would go translucent, and six copies of him would appear. He'd then do a "shell game" style move, and all six would fan out and start zapping you. You then had to DPS down each of the images until you found the real boss. OR if you actually paid attention during the shell game, you could figure out which one was the real boss, then kill him more quickly. Otherwise it would've been very difficult to finish if you just tried to randomly guess. And the fact that you COULD figure it out (whereas most times I've seen this in a game, it's random) impressed me.
Questing - There's an overall story that's be driven, but it's more like "go to this area and quest". Seems like it plays out a little more in the dungeon content. But in the field, you basically pick up the zone-wide quest to start, which has a few different parts. You then run around in the field, and enter "quest zones" where you'll get your objective, and then you just complete it. Killing different monsters yields different progress, fighting harder monsters gets you more points towards completion, or you can whack groups of little monsters. There's stuff to pick up, and monsters drop items, too...but you don't really get these items in inventory...you just pick up the drop and get progress. It's very much like GW2's heart system, combined with Wildstar's pop up quests. And when you're done, there's no turn in. You hit F to collect your reward and move on.
When you "finish" a zone, you get a large reward for it, and in the first couple zones there was one "zone quest" but last night I was in at zone at about 1400 prestige that had 3 zone wide quests.
Character and Levels - So this is where the Final Fantasy part comes in. You can be any class you want, and you can switch on the fly. You start with three classes (support in the Lighbringer, tanking in the Paladin, and DPS in the Cyromancer). If you buy the packs, you get two other classes opened up early, both DPS (Gunner and Berserker). As you complete quests and content, you get different points to be spent in what's sort of like a Path of Exiles node of network. Each class has that builds out more abilities, and then you have a larger network that connects the classes together (with even more abilities linked in between). As you gain points, you can spend them in either network, and eventually branch out to connect to and unlock other class. I think there's a total of 13 right now.
You can then build out a character template with abilities gathered from the different nodes to create a somewhat unique character, sort of like Secret World...where obviously there were the "best" templates, but always room for a couple abilities you really liked. Or so it seems. There definitely seems to be cross-class abilities tucked in there.
Here's some of what you get for filling in nodes at the top level, and where some of the shared stuff is tucked away (I think):
There are no levels. It's Prestige. Every time you add points to your network, get better gear or somehow improve your character, you gain Prestige, and stuff is gated by Prestige. And there's probably more to it, but haven't gotten too deep into the game.
Guilds - As far as what guilds can do? Looks like a shit-ton. There's suppose to be end-game raids, invasion style events and up to 50v50 PvE AND PvP stuff...and you can build out a guild base (it's just for bonuses, you can't actually walk around it). How's that work? I have no idea yet so here's a picture.
Oh, realized a screen shot of the world map would be cool, too. You go to a place called the Observatory where you bring up the world map and then are given lots of different locations. Some are group, some are PvP, some area regions where you adventure. And as far as the dungeons go, you can go into the solo, or in three man groups. At some point I think there's five man content as well, but it's cool that you're not held back on progress in some areas if you don't want to group up. Stuff is repeatable, and you have different objectives in each that you can complete for bonus rewards.
And concerns? Yeah. As always.
Top is monetization. F2P has such a wide range of models here, who knows? It could suck.
Grind. Could also turn out to be pretty grinding, in conjunction with the F2P stuff. Any time you have a game that allows you to purchase every skill, class and ability, that turns into a mountain of fun points, and who knows how easy those are going to get later in the game.
End game. No idea. I assume there's "max prestige" content out there.
Bugs and reliability of the developer. Apart from two CTDs, didn't have any perceived problems last night. But who knows what shit is going to break when the gates open up, or I get deeper in the game.
And lastly, open beta is STILL beta. Yeah, they're taking money...but again, it's a big unknown. It was fun for me last night. How endearing is that fun? I don't know...soloing is soloing, but it'd be awesome to get down on some more of the group content to see how robust that is.
But overall, it was extremely robust and fun, especially considering there's no box to buy or subscription to pay. There could be some meat here.
Ultimately, it really does boil down to how they chose to monetize stuff.
Have they indicated any way they might offer a demo?
I'm figuring I'll drop cash on this either way if I end up playing, if only for the subscription/premium time. But I'd like to actually try it first. It looks like it's mostly a shiny, build skills game, but... I've sort of been hankering for a shiny build skills game.
Also, for some reason it makes me really miss Global Agenda.
It looks like it's mostly a shiny, build skills game, but... I've sort of been hankering for a shiny build skills game.
Pretty much. Like I said in my write up, I'm only a few hours in, but I thing the "guts" of the game are good. It also is very pretty.
However, my interests can sometimes be fickle, and we'll see how well it holds up once whatever end game there is starts to open up. For the most part, most MMOs feel pretty cool in the first few hours of play.
EDIT: Also, as far as a demo, it's free sometime next week. The early access part of the open beta that you need to buy a package for is only 7-days. But if you really want some of those extras in the packages, they supposedly go away when the "free" open beta starts.
I'm sort of wondering if I couldn't just drop $20 post launch and get the same degree of value. Buy a month subscription and a class of choice or whatever.
The bosses also started to provide more robust challenges, with mechanics you could either try to just brute force through or use a little finesse. In that same solo dungeon, the last boss had the typical stay out of stupid big attacks, but at regular intervals he would go translucent, and six copies of him would appear. He'd then do a "shell game" style move, and all six would fan out and start zapping you. You then had to DPS down each of the images until you found the real boss. OR if you actually paid attention during the shell game, you could figure out which one was the real boss, then kill him more quickly. Otherwise it would've been very difficult to finish if you just tried to randomly guess. And the fact that you COULD figure it out (whereas most times I've seen this in a game, it's random) impressed me.
I remember this boss fight from CBT2 and am working towards getting there again today. This is what has me optimistic about what this game could bring as the boss fights, for the most part, are really well designed.
So I've put a few hours into this now and honestly the game isn't bad. I've pretty recently opened up the full atlas and got to mess around with the other classes in the training room. It feels like they put a lot of effort into making them all feel different. There's a lot to the game and I feel like I've hardly scratched the surface. It also looks like you can just buy their f2p currency with ingame credits, so you can buy premium time that way too. In general I'm enjoying myself.
Of course there's some cons, the voice acting is terrible, some animations look a bit janky, it takes a pretty considerable time investment to unlock the other classes, and I'm not a big fan of how visual equipment works. It's all costumes but it's full body and my weapons at 1k prestige look exactly the same as they did when I started. Also the beginning stuff felt pretty boring but it doesn't take too long to start getting enough abilities to flesh out the classes.
If you can get a key I'd definitely recommend giving it a shot, or I guess wait until "official launch". Feel free to add me on the NA servers: Kyanilis Targath
Voice acting is fine. It's what I'd expect for an MMO.
I'm actually a huge fan of the way they did the cosmetics. It's awesome to keep your character look separate from your gear, in my opinion. Look how you want, and not have to worry that the next gear drop is going to make you look like a demented clown. But cosmetics can be a powerful avenue for revenue in the F2P sphere, so it is nice to see the exploring this option. Sadly, this is a huge piece Neverwinter never monetized, instead choosing to do some pretty ridiculous stuff.
However, I'm at 2k prestige and my weapon still looks the same. Maybe different appearances come with dungeon drops, or later on...but given my comment above it would be nice to see some progression on the weapon.
It's also nice (in my opinion, but this is probably going to be controversial) to see they throttled the rate at which you can progress. There's a weekly cap of what's essentially skill points, so you can only get so far ahead (or probably pay to get there faster) each week. Once you hit the cap, you get alternate currencies that can be used to buy stuff like costumes, or resources for your followers.
The broad game play feels a bit like Guild Wars 2, though not quite. The class system feels sort of like Rifts. There's something that reminds me of city of heroes, but I couldn't tell you what. There's also a taste of The Secret World, maybe in the costumes?
I spent awhile doing the training dojo stuff to unlock new costumes and playing dress up. I didn't get to the part where you get worshippers yet.
The broad game play feels a bit like Guild Wars 2, though not quite. The class system feels sort of like Rifts. There's something that reminds me of city of heroes, but I couldn't tell you what. There's also a taste of The Secret World, maybe in the costumes?
I spent awhile doing the training dojo stuff to unlock new costumes and playing dress up. I didn't get to the part where you get worshippers yet.
That's at 2050 prestige. Or about six to eight hours solo casual playtime. Hardcore could probably get there quicker if it's grouping for harder content/faster clearing.
Also, follower missions are like Neverwinter crafting. You send your followers on missions that have completion time measured in IRL time that runs even if you're logged off.
One of my main complaints right now is groups. I wish there was a way to tell which events had queues popping or people in them. As is, I just queue for what I want to do for a minute, then usually cancel and solo instead.
It's not groundbreaking so far, but it's pretty neat the big question is how they straddle p2w concerns. It's already been a pretty big blow up in the community. I'm fine with it if, say, a subscription is pretty much necessary to really progress, but they've got one weapon in the $70 preorder that is apparently pretty game breaking right now.
Just based on the fact that you can convert ingame money to argents (the pay currency), there's nothing really unattainable for a free player. Including premium, which gives you a huge boost to things earned and speeds up progression by quite a bit, but again, you can technically just pay your way with credits.
The legendary weapon included in the $70 pack IS super strong for "starter gear", probably intentionally, however it's still a starter weapon so it'll be replaced regardless by the time you start hitting the later content (probably before the first 5-man, but I don't know what stats it has to begin with). I'll also note that there's not really anything with stats in the f2p shop ingame. Mostly, people who pay just get a big time advantage on progression. Which is pretty standard for f2p games.
So far I don't see any real p2w aspects, and you can easily just play the game casually if you're not worried about "rushing" to the end.
The legendary weapon includes a 100% buff to nukes which, stacked with the right gear, provides a pvp strategystrategy that absolutely dominates all the way to end game. It's a pretty big complaint right now.
Also, I'm not saying the game is p2w, I'm saying that's the greatest threat to it that I see right now.
The legendary weapon includes a 100% buff to nukes which, stacked with the right gear, provides a pvp strategystrategy that absolutely dominates all the way to end game. It's a pretty big complaint right now.
Also, I'm not saying the game is p2w, I'm saying that's the greatest threat to it that I see right now.
Oh, I did not know that. Yeah that seems pretty extreme, I'll agree
So i have to play like 3 clusters of classes to get to the one I want and spend tons of time grinding to get there...well thats dumb. Also my first five minutes into the game and 90% of what I see is "BR BR BR BR HUEHUEHUEHUE" So clearly the game is off to a good start.
I'm playing with my gaming community, and we have about 25-30 people active right now.
It's a lot of fun. I'm really loving the "bite sized" portions this game serves up. As I said before, I think there's a lot of good stuff here.
But there's also a ton of cynicism in the MMO space, so I can understand the lack of interest in giving yet another "flavor of the week" game a shot. But then again, I don't feel like there's anything blockbuster on the horizon that isn't pretty much vapor at this point, too.
It is a bit grindy but nothing completely horrible by f2p standards. The combat is smooth and responsive. World is beautiful. The story is kind of bland but that is no biggie for me.
Interesting game. Played for a few hours tonight as a Lightbringer. Did shit for damage (which is expected), but ended up pretty much soloing a boss dude after the other two in my group locked up and died. 8 damage a hit on a boss with 70k life was... fun.
Posts
---
So I got to dive into this a little more last night. Had a lot of fun. Shook some serious tail for Pfloyd. But on that note, let me mention for those that might be turned off by that...there is a very wide range of customization on your toon, from fat to thin to muscular, to curvy or normal. You can make a very realistic looking body type for anyone if you want to...it's just that boob slider does get a bit out of control. Hilariously so.
Outfit-wise, too, there's a lot of customization. Some skimpy outfits, some with complete coverage, and everything in between. It looks like that's going to be a big part of the cash shop/monetization. And you can change your look on the fly.
Good. Now that the important stuff is out of the way, here's the highlights from about three hours of playing last night.
Overall it looks like a mashup between GW2, Neverwinter, Secret World, Wildstar, Path of Exile and Final Fantasy.
Combat - Very action oriented, but not necessarily a button masher. Think GW2 mixed with a healthy dose of Neverwinter. Early on, it's super easy. Mash mash mash to win. But later it seems you get rewarded for timing your moves and chaining together better combos. For example, in one solo dungeon last night, I got my butt kicked by a group of mobs. Didn't realize there was a healer in there dropping items that could be destroy, but if left untouched pulsed out an AOE heal that was more powerful than I could DPS. So next time in I locked on to the healer, leaped on it, did a quick LMB/RMB combo to stun it, whacked it with another four hit combo, then finished it off with my stun+big damage hit. After the healer was dead, the other two "striker" style mobs were pretty easy.
Taking a step back, combat is driven by two things. You can attacks mapped to the mouse buttons, which are "spamable", and then you have longer CD skills ranging from a few seconds to a minute. But you can chain together combinations of the LMB and RMB to produce different combos that have different effects.
The bosses also started to provide more robust challenges, with mechanics you could either try to just brute force through or use a little finesse. In that same solo dungeon, the last boss had the typical stay out of stupid big attacks, but at regular intervals he would go translucent, and six copies of him would appear. He'd then do a "shell game" style move, and all six would fan out and start zapping you. You then had to DPS down each of the images until you found the real boss. OR if you actually paid attention during the shell game, you could figure out which one was the real boss, then kill him more quickly. Otherwise it would've been very difficult to finish if you just tried to randomly guess. And the fact that you COULD figure it out (whereas most times I've seen this in a game, it's random) impressed me.
Questing - There's an overall story that's be driven, but it's more like "go to this area and quest". Seems like it plays out a little more in the dungeon content. But in the field, you basically pick up the zone-wide quest to start, which has a few different parts. You then run around in the field, and enter "quest zones" where you'll get your objective, and then you just complete it. Killing different monsters yields different progress, fighting harder monsters gets you more points towards completion, or you can whack groups of little monsters. There's stuff to pick up, and monsters drop items, too...but you don't really get these items in inventory...you just pick up the drop and get progress. It's very much like GW2's heart system, combined with Wildstar's pop up quests. And when you're done, there's no turn in. You hit F to collect your reward and move on.
When you "finish" a zone, you get a large reward for it, and in the first couple zones there was one "zone quest" but last night I was in at zone at about 1400 prestige that had 3 zone wide quests.
Character and Levels - So this is where the Final Fantasy part comes in. You can be any class you want, and you can switch on the fly. You start with three classes (support in the Lighbringer, tanking in the Paladin, and DPS in the Cyromancer). If you buy the packs, you get two other classes opened up early, both DPS (Gunner and Berserker). As you complete quests and content, you get different points to be spent in what's sort of like a Path of Exiles node of network. Each class has that builds out more abilities, and then you have a larger network that connects the classes together (with even more abilities linked in between). As you gain points, you can spend them in either network, and eventually branch out to connect to and unlock other class. I think there's a total of 13 right now.
You can then build out a character template with abilities gathered from the different nodes to create a somewhat unique character, sort of like Secret World...where obviously there were the "best" templates, but always room for a couple abilities you really liked. Or so it seems. There definitely seems to be cross-class abilities tucked in there.
Here's some of what you get for filling in nodes at the top level, and where some of the shared stuff is tucked away (I think):
There are no levels. It's Prestige. Every time you add points to your network, get better gear or somehow improve your character, you gain Prestige, and stuff is gated by Prestige. And there's probably more to it, but haven't gotten too deep into the game.
Guilds - As far as what guilds can do? Looks like a shit-ton. There's suppose to be end-game raids, invasion style events and up to 50v50 PvE AND PvP stuff...and you can build out a guild base (it's just for bonuses, you can't actually walk around it). How's that work? I have no idea yet so here's a picture.
Oh, realized a screen shot of the world map would be cool, too. You go to a place called the Observatory where you bring up the world map and then are given lots of different locations. Some are group, some are PvP, some area regions where you adventure. And as far as the dungeons go, you can go into the solo, or in three man groups. At some point I think there's five man content as well, but it's cool that you're not held back on progress in some areas if you don't want to group up. Stuff is repeatable, and you have different objectives in each that you can complete for bonus rewards.
And concerns? Yeah. As always.
Top is monetization. F2P has such a wide range of models here, who knows? It could suck.
Grind. Could also turn out to be pretty grinding, in conjunction with the F2P stuff. Any time you have a game that allows you to purchase every skill, class and ability, that turns into a mountain of fun points, and who knows how easy those are going to get later in the game.
End game. No idea. I assume there's "max prestige" content out there.
Bugs and reliability of the developer. Apart from two CTDs, didn't have any perceived problems last night. But who knows what shit is going to break when the gates open up, or I get deeper in the game.
And lastly, open beta is STILL beta. Yeah, they're taking money...but again, it's a big unknown. It was fun for me last night. How endearing is that fun? I don't know...soloing is soloing, but it'd be awesome to get down on some more of the group content to see how robust that is.
But overall, it was extremely robust and fun, especially considering there's no box to buy or subscription to pay. There could be some meat here.
Ultimately, it really does boil down to how they chose to monetize stuff.
I also coincidentally had some corrupted file sectors immediately after installing and had to recover.
I'd still like to try this, however. I'm going to keep an eye out for those keys.
I'm figuring I'll drop cash on this either way if I end up playing, if only for the subscription/premium time. But I'd like to actually try it first. It looks like it's mostly a shiny, build skills game, but... I've sort of been hankering for a shiny build skills game.
Also, for some reason it makes me really miss Global Agenda.
Pretty much. Like I said in my write up, I'm only a few hours in, but I thing the "guts" of the game are good. It also is very pretty.
However, my interests can sometimes be fickle, and we'll see how well it holds up once whatever end game there is starts to open up. For the most part, most MMOs feel pretty cool in the first few hours of play.
EDIT: Also, as far as a demo, it's free sometime next week. The early access part of the open beta that you need to buy a package for is only 7-days. But if you really want some of those extras in the packages, they supposedly go away when the "free" open beta starts.
Also, I got the name Space Jesus, Can't believe it wasn't taken.
I remember this boss fight from CBT2 and am working towards getting there again today. This is what has me optimistic about what this game could bring as the boss fights, for the most part, are really well designed.
FFXIV - Milliardo Beoulve/Sargatanas
"...only mights and maybes."
Worked just fine on my US account.
Worked for me too.
Of course there's some cons, the voice acting is terrible, some animations look a bit janky, it takes a pretty considerable time investment to unlock the other classes, and I'm not a big fan of how visual equipment works. It's all costumes but it's full body and my weapons at 1k prestige look exactly the same as they did when I started. Also the beginning stuff felt pretty boring but it doesn't take too long to start getting enough abilities to flesh out the classes.
If you can get a key I'd definitely recommend giving it a shot, or I guess wait until "official launch". Feel free to add me on the NA servers: Kyanilis Targath
I'm actually a huge fan of the way they did the cosmetics. It's awesome to keep your character look separate from your gear, in my opinion. Look how you want, and not have to worry that the next gear drop is going to make you look like a demented clown. But cosmetics can be a powerful avenue for revenue in the F2P sphere, so it is nice to see the exploring this option. Sadly, this is a huge piece Neverwinter never monetized, instead choosing to do some pretty ridiculous stuff.
However, I'm at 2k prestige and my weapon still looks the same. Maybe different appearances come with dungeon drops, or later on...but given my comment above it would be nice to see some progression on the weapon.
It's also nice (in my opinion, but this is probably going to be controversial) to see they throttled the rate at which you can progress. There's a weekly cap of what's essentially skill points, so you can only get so far ahead (or probably pay to get there faster) each week. Once you hit the cap, you get alternate currencies that can be used to buy stuff like costumes, or resources for your followers.
I spent awhile doing the training dojo stuff to unlock new costumes and playing dress up. I didn't get to the part where you get worshippers yet.
That's at 2050 prestige. Or about six to eight hours solo casual playtime. Hardcore could probably get there quicker if it's grouping for harder content/faster clearing.
Also, follower missions are like Neverwinter crafting. You send your followers on missions that have completion time measured in IRL time that runs even if you're logged off.
FFXIV - Milliardo Beoulve/Sargatanas
I finally reached order rank 2, have 4 provinces, 2 with chapels.
Im sitting at about 3700 and i have hit my sparks cap.
I'll have to fire this up for the weekend and see if it's any good. What I am seeing makes it look interesting.
XBL:Phenyhelm - 3DS:Phenyhelm
The legendary weapon included in the $70 pack IS super strong for "starter gear", probably intentionally, however it's still a starter weapon so it'll be replaced regardless by the time you start hitting the later content (probably before the first 5-man, but I don't know what stats it has to begin with). I'll also note that there's not really anything with stats in the f2p shop ingame. Mostly, people who pay just get a big time advantage on progression. Which is pretty standard for f2p games.
So far I don't see any real p2w aspects, and you can easily just play the game casually if you're not worried about "rushing" to the end.
Also, I'm not saying the game is p2w, I'm saying that's the greatest threat to it that I see right now.
Oh, I did not know that. Yeah that seems pretty extreme, I'll agree
It's a lot of fun. I'm really loving the "bite sized" portions this game serves up. As I said before, I think there's a lot of good stuff here.
But there's also a ton of cynicism in the MMO space, so I can understand the lack of interest in giving yet another "flavor of the week" game a shot. But then again, I don't feel like there's anything blockbuster on the horizon that isn't pretty much vapor at this point, too.
Hey, it's me, Teldra! Did someone say "greatsword"? [Eternity]