Originally posted by Stellus

Dated visuals? What computer are you running it on? Granted it is the Unreal 2.5 engine, they did a HELL of a job with the art style and lighting effects to make it look just as appealing as any other modern MMO out there.

This game is pretty. It has its flaws but graphics I would never think to be one of them. Just my two cents.

They are actually quite nice as you can see in the screenshots provided. Technically though, they are dated. Unreal, or even Unreal 2, is quite an old engine by todays standards.

Nice review, u took words out of my mouth. Personally i think this is good start, but need tweaking to be a good mmorpg. Fix pvp lag issues, made some more things to do other than questing and crafting. More group friendly things and most of all, make some daily events (more than demon chest).  I like this game very much after 1month paying and im gonna pay for other month too (lvl30 so far). Its fun to play what is important thing to me. I never had that feeling "o my, i paid for this mmorpg and now i HAVE to play" with this game. No, so far is have been only good time.

- Oldcshool player, newbie mmorpg player

Originally posted by MikeB

Originally posted by Stellus

Dated visuals? What computer are you running it on? Granted it is the Unreal 2.5 engine, they did a HELL of a job with the art style and lighting effects to make it look just as appealing as any other modern MMO out there.

This game is pretty. It has its flaws but graphics I would never think to be one of them. Just my two cents.

 

They are actually quite nice as you can see in the screenshots provided. Technically though, they are dated. Unreal, or even Unreal 2, is quite an old engine by todays standards.

The engine is the Unreal 2.5 engine that they have modified to fit their game. I hope you also realize there are only a handful of games if that which use an engine that is not dated by your standards. Although I agree with the score, I'd suggest fixing this so it doesn't seem like your information is misinformed.

Hit all the issues and bonuses right on and honestly.   Though it should def have a rating higher than 7.7 compared to what some of this sites other ratings, sure 7.7 is in tone with the writing but not with the ratings of other games(side effect of different reviewers i guess).

Originally posted by paulscott

Hit all the issues and bonuses right on and honestly.   Though it should def have a rating higher than 7.7 compared to what some of this sites other ratings, sure 7.7 is in tone with the writing but not with the ratings of other games(side effect of different reviewers i guess).

I don't really concern myself with the opinions of others in my ratings. I felt the game ultimately was a 7.7, so that's what it got. :) If I cared about what other reviewers scored games I wouldn't really be doing fair by you all, would I? I imagine you guys don't want us to just be an echo chamber.

Though, just to indulge you, the Metacritic rating for The Chronicles of Spellborn is 76. Well within the realm of what I scored it.

I played a couple of classes up to the f2p cap, but I just felt the game wasn't worth $15/month. If I want to spend time on lame quests where I'm gathering 10 boar meats from boars that have a 1 in 3 chance of having meat on them, there are a few decent f2p mmos out there with the same type of quest grind. The game does have some nice points and if they just had a competitive pricing structure I could see myself playing this a bit.

  I love the fluff reviews this site gives . No idea how they came up with such a high score with so many admitted CONS.

Originally posted by MikeB

Originally posted by paulscott

Hit all the issues and bonuses right on and honestly.   Though it should def have a rating higher than 7.7 compared to what some of this sites other ratings, sure 7.7 is in tone with the writing but not with the ratings of other games(side effect of different reviewers i guess).

 

I don't really concern myself with the opinions of others in my ratings. I felt the game ultimately was a 7.7, so that's what it got. :) If I cared about what other reviewers scored games I wouldn't really be doing fair by you all, would I? I imagine you guys don't want us to just be an echo chamber.

No, but it would be nice to know what this rating means as compared to other ratings on this site. From what you are saying it means little. Is that a new policy? It might mean that the rating means nothing. A better game might get a lower rating or vice versa. On the other hand, what is better? But still when this site lists games according to its ranking people are led to expect the rating means something for one game relative to other games.

Originally posted by Delanor

Originally posted by MikeB

Originally posted by paulscott

Hit all the issues and bonuses right on and honestly.   Though it should def have a rating higher than 7.7 compared to what some of this sites other ratings, sure 7.7 is in tone with the writing but not with the ratings of other games(side effect of different reviewers i guess).

 

I don't really concern myself with the opinions of others in my ratings. I felt the game ultimately was a 7.7, so that's what it got. :) If I cared about what other reviewers scored games I wouldn't really be doing fair by you all, would I? I imagine you guys don't want us to just be an echo chamber.

 

No, but it would be nice to know what this rating means as compared to other ratings on this site. From what you are saying it means little. Is that a new policy? It might mean that the rating means nothing. A better game might get a lower rating or vice versa. On the other hand, what is better? But still when this site lists games according to its ranking people are led to expect the rating means something for one game relative to other games.

Ratings dont matter, even a completely average MMO gets a 7 on this site.

Originally posted by Delanor

Originally posted by MikeB

Originally posted by paulscott

Hit all the issues and bonuses right on and honestly.   Though it should def have a rating higher than 7.7 compared to what some of this sites other ratings, sure 7.7 is in tone with the writing but not with the ratings of other games(side effect of different reviewers i guess).

 

I don't really concern myself with the opinions of others in my ratings. I felt the game ultimately was a 7.7, so that's what it got. :) If I cared about what other reviewers scored games I wouldn't really be doing fair by you all, would I? I imagine you guys don't want us to just be an echo chamber.

 

No, but it would be nice to know what this rating means as compared to other ratings on this site. From what you are saying it means little. Is that a new policy? It might mean that the rating means nothing. A better game might get a lower rating or vice versa. On the other hand, what is better? But still when this site lists games according to its ranking people are led to expect the rating means something for one game relative to other games.

Sorry, I misread your post. I thought you were referring to other sites.

I cannot say anything in the review was innacurate ,but the OP perception of each detail is not one i agree with.

The hotbar is one that totally turned me off.It offers nothing more than a inconvenience,because yes you can preset  the hotbar to use it exactly the way you would a normal one,so why the fuss to make it more complicated than need be?Then you have to rearrange the whole thing when you get new abilities,lol again waste of time,oh well one opinion versus another,i just look at the facts.

I have no idea where the hitman thing comes into play,if you did not know the Hitman developer/artists,NOBODY would have a clue that they are anything alike,not even the sounds or music.Hitman was a console game designed for tight corridors and small view areas,to keep poly counts down.Even so on the note of music,the FFXi artists utilize orchestras and renowned ones at that,so again a console game beats out TCOS here.

The combat system is nothing unique really it offers some buffs debuffs,nothing special,it could never be compared to FFXI's combat system,but then again all other games take a back seat to FFXI's combat system.The mobs try to avoid taking their back in an unrealistic fashion,they look like automated mobs rather than anything that moves realistically.No rooting is a real step back in combat play,as pretty much every game offers it.

It has been quite awhile since i played TCOS,but i don't remember customization at all,and if it offered anything unique in that area,i would have remembered it for sure.The class selction seemed ho hum as well,nothing trhat screams out play me i am different or better.

I know many people at the time of beta tried to convey how amazing the game looked,i saw it as curvey buildings the same as WOW and all were static as F2P games do it,with NPC's standing out front.

IMO the game is decent but not a 7.7,i would rate it a 6 at best,just because there are a ton of games that do everytrhing the same or better.When you build a game to garner new clients,it has to offer something the other games don't or you will not get anyone to play the game.The ONLY thing this game offers really is the cumbersome hotbar,hardly an idea worth exiting your favourite game to play TCOS.I could give the game a 7.5-8 on graphics,but that would be the ONLY part of the game that garners a score higher than 6.However if i wanted just a better looking game,i would play AOC or Vanguard or several other games that utilize nice shader work.

A very well written, informative and fair review.

However I have to echo what other people have said........dated visuals? How did you reach that conclusion? Slightly cartoony with a touch of Tim Burton to offset potential performance issues does not = dated visuals. On my machine those "dated visuals" outshone anything else currently on the mmo market.

A well written review, tho judging from my ealier beta experiences I feel the verdict is a bit overrated. I would not give Spellborn more than 6/10 myself.

For once, I totally and fundamentally HATE kiting, and games having kiting as possibility, and Spellborn goes far beyond that, it encourages kiting. Actually kiting is the only real combat strategy. Forget your skills, just kite around. Usually that will get you along much more than anything else.

The other thing is, you'll love or hate the graphics. They were totally not my thing, which is of course subjective. As bored as I am, I am certainly going to skip that game.

The game has great combat, a nice story, an interesting enough world, some fresh ideas  - altogether, very worth checking out except it has no population whatsoever.

This review came too late. The game is already effectively dead. Unless they try a new marketing blitz, it's hard to believe it will ever have more than a few hundred players.

Its a shame, as i really liked this game. But dead MMO is dead MMO.

Originally posted by Airspell

  I love the fluff reviews this site gives . No idea how they came up with such a high score with so many admitted CONS.

Fluff reviews?  The guy writes a decent review and rates it appropriately according to how the other games are rated(high scores are the norm in this industry, get used to it) and that is all you can say?

Great review! I might give this game a try. Although, I'll wait a few months for them to work out the bugs.

Originally posted by Elikal

A well written review, tho judging from my ealier beta experiences I feel the verdict is a bit overrated. I would not give Spellborn more than 6/10 myself.

For once, I totally and fundamentally HATE kiting, and games having kiting as possibility, and Spellborn goes far beyond that, it encourages kiting. Actually kiting is the only real combat strategy. Forget your skills, just kite around. Usually that will get you along much more than anything else.

The other thing is, you'll love or hate the graphics. They were totally not my thing, which is of course subjective. As bored as I am, I am certainly going to skip that game.

I didn't mind the graphics so much, technically, they could of been better, but artistically and the style, they were great. 

But you nailed the Kiting thing right on. Kind of makes that nifty skilldeck everyone claims is a god-send to combat a mute point. Regardless, tho, the combat system wasn't bad. Ranged attacks are far too common in terms of how much they are used in general throughout your career in killing stuff and really killed the combat system for me. 

I just wish the leveling would of been more than delivery and kill quests. And that the XP rates for quests made more sense, the rates for rewards don't match up at all with the risk involved in half of them. Some of the hardest quests in Ringfell gave virtually no experience compared to one where you just run across the bridges on the trees to the other side of the map to deliver something. I wish it would of been less theme park, more opened ended, but I guess that was just the dev's vision.

It's worth trying out, but the lack of subscriptions isn't just because of the advertising. They lost many, many people who subscribed and played from the beta already. There's no lasting appeal past max level, no replay value. But it's worth checking out, if only to play through it once.

Some minor mistakes made by the reviewer corrected:

This storyline eventually sends you to the Mount of Heroes where you participate in a set of instanced challenges called The Vault trials.

The Vault of Trials is located on a separate shard called Atheneum.

By level cap you will have five slots per deck, and five decks total.

The total number of decks at level cap is six.

Other areas, like the Mount of Heroes, simply float within the Deadspell Storm itself, which appears as beautiful vortex of light.

Atheneum, Exarchyon and Rawhead Landing just float in the Deadspell Storm like that. Mount of Heroes does not. But the author probably never got as far as Mount of Heroes. I doubt he even got beyond Quarterstone and the first two trials in the Atheneum, but then that was probably not his job.

The review was informative but in a factual, boring sort of way. I give it a 6.5.

Originally posted by Delanor

Some minor mistakes made by the reviewer corrected:

This storyline eventually sends you to the Mount of Heroes where you participate in a set of instanced challenges called The Vault trials.

The Vault of Trials is located on a separate shard called Atheneum.

By level cap you will have five slots per deck, and five decks total.

The total number of decks at level cap is six.

Other areas, like the Mount of Heroes, simply float within the Deadspell Storm itself, which appears as beautiful vortex of light.

Atheneum, Exarchyon and Rawhead Landing just float in the Deadspell Storm like that. Mount of Heroes does not. But the author probably never got as far as Mount of Heroes. I doubt he even got beyond Quarterstone and the first two trials in the Atheneum, but then that was probably not his job.

The review was informative but in a factual, boring sort of way. I give it a 6.5.

 

Whoops, sorry about that, I'll have those bits corrected. Got the names confused.

Originally posted by Delanor

But the author probably never got as far as Mount of Heroes. I doubt he even got beyond Quarterstone and the first two trials in the Atheneum, but then that was probably not his job. 

Just out of curiosity, how many reviewers make it even half way to end game content in an initial review?  From my experience they are given a deadline to have the review written (often within a few weeks).  I don't know where any of those places you list fit in the overall game world as I haven't played it.   Overall, you'll be pretty hard pressed to find an initial review out there that covers from starting spot to end game content.  Often follow-ups are added or second looks are done to include new data, if anything is done.

I've tried the game, but couldn't last for more than 1 hour. Feels unfinished and to be honest just doesn't feel like an MMORPG. It feels like my friend made it on the weekend and gave me a chance to try it out...

This is a pretty good review. stunning game both in originality and graphics, but not worth paying for

Hmm, LOTRO is stunning with DirectX 10 on max graphics, Sacred 2 is quite stunning on max, Dawn of War 2 I'd say is quite stunning on Ultra High... Spellborn has 'decent' graphics I 'd say. But when you take in account everything else that decency kinda diminishes.

Am I blind, or did the Spellborn forum get deleted? I'm pretty sure there used to be one. I was going to check it out after reading the review....

Edit: Nevermind, I'm blind. The forum is in the "T" section ("THE Chronicles of the Spellborne").

Originally posted by El_Lion

It's indeed a good game, your pro' and cons are also what I think.

It's sad the servers are so empty ... and with empty I mean empty, I met no-one ...

denial is a river in egypt

I would never suggest that popularity = quality, or Britany Spears would be Mozart.

But in this case, the numbers do indeed....... speak for the product.