BoneDancer-SIN on Betaforums:

Got the permission to do a brief hype post/video on Darkfall and have released a in game video of a small skirmish. I'm sure alot of you vets will find the combat rather newbie as it was our first week in game and really our first fight. That said I think it is a good show and tell of the chaos that is group warfare. You can find brief basic review and the movie on our site.

I encourage one of you elder guilds running the empire thing to try and do the same. This game needs help from us the community to overcome some of the bad rep it has.

Thanks to Ren for his awesome job (as usual) at fraps and editing especially editing out the part where I almost died!
 

Divx:

www.afraidyet.net/

Youtube Hi- Quality:

www.youtube.com/watch

"I've always considered myself a competitive gamer, and I tend to keep my eyes on the beta horizon. For sometime now Sinister has been active beta testers and live subscribers to any game who catered to PVP. Since Ultima Online, where this guild formed, we've tried Everquest, Asheron's Call, EVE, Lineage 2, Shadowbane, World of Warcraft, Asheron's Call 2, Age of Conan, and most recently Warhammer Online. In each game we played on 'hard mode' taking the PVP rule set and usually picking the toughest server with the most competition at release. When Darkfall was announced some five years ago it was greeted with much fan fair from the PVP community and inside the Sinister core; at last a game for us. Fast forward the five years of development and many people have simply written the game off as Vapor Ware. I'm hear to tell you the game is for real and has a punchers chance to be really good fun if you like the genre. A game based upon PVP has to have a combat engine that is engaging and Darkfall delivers on this promise.

- Combat that matters. You fight for territory you want. You fight for loot from the players; that's right boys full looting.
- FPS targetting required for any action; there inst even a target frame in the game. Watch for Ren's target tooltip to popup when he's facing targets.
- Everything in the game costs stamina; when your hit, when you swing, when you cast, sprint, or shot your bow.
- Most damage appears to be splash damage. Translation: coordinating your attacks and your defense needs to take into account the other players positioning. On more then one ocassion Ren hits his own guys and I think even scores a TK at one point. I'm glad the camera wasnt on me ;p

So the skill in this game comes from coordinating your individual / group efforts, taking into account the terrain, your enemys movements, your teams positoning, and your classes skills. Gear and items play a VERY marginal role in your damage. The result of all these 'skill' friendly design decisions is already beeing seen on the beta forums where you can frequently find chest-bumping threads about small groups beating big groups outnumbered. Our first week in game we really didnt know any of this shit, and this video isnt by any means us saying we PWNFACES, but it will give you a really good impression of combat in the game. The fight shown in this video happened cause we PK'd some dude, took his loot, and his guild came for revenge. We were Dwarves and they were Dwarves so targetting was additionally complex. After the first battle where both teams were dodging the Alignment system (think UO's Karma system) they declared WAR on us and the shit was on. Final note, two days later their guild capitulated and they petitioned us in game for peace. You can guess how well that went ;p

Will Darkfall last? Will it be another in a long string of short lived jumps of entertainment? I really don't have the answers, but at least for me, it far exceeded expectation. Don't get me wrong, you wont find Ragnaros styled content in this game and you will likely find bugs and imbalances. However, if your a PVP fan, or are looking for a game with consquence, then this game is made for you. Oh, and one final note this game has NO client stability issues . You wont find sb.exe or goofy ass polygons-of-doom among in Darkfall. Througout the fight I managed to keep 80-110 FPS and I'm optimistic the client can support medium-large scale combat. Come to think of it, the only time I've ever crashed inthe beta is when they've brought down the servers."

Hehe we posted at the same time! Ill get mine deleted as yours is better.

that just looked terrible my god

Originally posted by Raizeen

that just looked terrible my god

I am sorry you feel that way, perhaps you will find another game, such as AoC or Warhammer more to your liking!

Good Luck!

That looked fun! Graphics are always secondary to gameplay. At least that is the way it should be for any serious gamer.

Originally posted by Raizeen

that just looked terrible my god

It does. Personly I have never expected otherwise though. I would have no problem with it if the rest makes up for it.

I cant wait to play this.

Lol "Who knocked me in the water" "What dipshit hit me down here?"

That proves its real pvp--- No FF. Use your brain, and skill...

yeah, it looks pre-EQ

EDIT: Sorry, at launch

Game looks awsome.  Dwarfs look sick! Massive little guys.

Sad that trolls have to resort to calling the graphics shit.....when that is most definatly not one of the problems this game has.  Ah well guess release will be quite fun on these boards.

For those of you worrying about graphics the movie was made in very low graphical settings, with Fraps.

the game in full graphics looks MUCH MUCH BETTER, better than War & WOW, almost as good as AoC

you dont have to believe me, the videos will come out this week and see for yourselves

Looks to me like a game for the people who like to PvP and that's that. Not because there is nothing else, but because that is the main focus and by its nature as FFA PvP with Full Loot, it will drive people with other focus away.

I'm still not seeing any ways/solutions to the concerns I've voiced over the past year, but I am not expecting any by now. Lag Issues, LOS exploits, Dual-Character to avoid penalties etc etc. None of that has been adressed by Aventurine or the Fanbois, so I'll wait to see the results.

As far as graphics/animations go, yeah, the game looks somewhat dated, but that is not really a main selling point, is it? Although, the other leak I heard about, the one about the sieges, the guy said that you go down to 20-something FPS in battles involving 80 people on the screen....on a GF9800. Which is a far shot off from the earlier claims of medium machines handling hundreds of players at 60 FPS without problems.

Anyway. 7 more days eh. I'm gonna miss these forums. *pat pat the forums and sniff*

hehehe....I hope you DF fans enjoy this game despite it shortcoming in many areas. And what the hell is with that choice of music, it sounds like porn music or something, very distracting.

I enjoyed the video, im still debating if i want to play this game or not but it looks pretty enjoyable from watching this video.

Originally posted by dark-merlin

For those of you worrying about graphics the movie was made in very low graphical settings, with Fraps.

 

the game in full graphics looks MUCH MUCH BETTER, better than War & WOW, almost as good as AoC

 

you dont have to believe me, the videos will come out this week and see for yourselves

Aye they wont belive you, but release will set them straight.

You have got to be kidding me. This is what all the hype is all about ? To each their own but damn that was awful.

 I do hope that they have a beta that lets everyone try it out.

Originally posted by dark-merlin

For those of you worrying about graphics the movie was made in very low graphical settings, with Fraps.

 

the game in full graphics looks MUCH MUCH BETTER, better than War & WOW, almost as good as AoC

 

you dont have to believe me, the videos will come out this week and see for yourselves

don't even try man.

let these guys go on there little crusade... if it makes them happy.

we have all seen how well mmorpgs  with awesome graphics work.

Originally posted by Martie

 

For ffa to even be uselfull with full loot, the game has to be centred around armour and weapons, so anyone that says this is a skill game is talking out their asses.  For all the people crapping on wow being an item game.  You do reliase ther eis no point to ffa looting game if the items arnt worth it, what are u gona loot gry items that says "shirt".

Why exactly are you preaching to the choir? I still haven't figured out how Aventurine wants to handle the delicate balance between items being a deciding factor vs. all skill based in an environment that is supposedly about the "consequence" of PvP. *shrug*

I'm just saying what I see in the video.

Not bad it really reminds me of morrowind for some wierd reason.  Prob the only thing i didnt like was the useage of tower tactics. I can understand using the land and all to shift things to your favor. But the usage of guard towers to tip things to your favor.? sadly this will become a popular tactic. however at anytime the devs can  change a few things with their karma system so it wont be exploited.

Well it sounds like the guys from Sinister were having fun,but watching it looked very uninspiring.The over the shoulder view looks awful,and the constant one animation swing of the battle hammer got real boring to watch.There just seems to be a real lack of abilities/animations and strategy.

I would get bored of that combat system in one day,sorry but PVP fails again as usual.There is NTHING here that i could get above playing UT99,witch i can play for free,so no reason to play a lesser combat system in DF.It was at least the first video i have seen where the players were having fun,all other videos i watched the players seemed as bored as i was watching it.

2girls1cup was had more entertainment value than this video. Was also easier on the eyes.

Hey, if the game is fun I will play it for sure. But, I have to say that it does look completely horrible even for Beta.

Originally posted by Wizardry

Well it sounds like the guys from Sinister were having fun,but watching it looked very uninspiring.The over the shoulder view looks awful,and the constant one animation swing of the battle hammer got real boring to watch.There just seems to be a real lack of abilities/animations and strategy.

I would get bored of that combat system in one day,sorry but PVP fails again as usual.There is NTHING here that i could get above playing UT99,witch i can play for free,so no reason to play a lesser combat system in DF.It was at least the first video i have seen where the players were having fun,all other videos i watched the players seemed as bored as i was watching it.

well they all had just the basic 3 attacks: the basic melee attack, basic mana missile (there's hundreds of spells in the game) and basic archery, its the basic noob fight

I dont think in UT u can have cities built, siege machines, mounts and mounted combat, trade/economy, ship building & combat,  looting, questing, hundreds of monsters and much much more

Take that as you wish...

Originally posted by dark-merlin

For those of you worrying about graphics the movie was made in very low graphical settings, with Fraps.

If this is true, I hope you do realize you've done a huge disservice to this game.