ok folks.

yesterday downloaded the game after purchasing it(round 17 bucks).  the download had one mess up but only took 2 and a half hours.  i read about how character creation was and developed my character accordingly.  at this point i feel i should say something about the graphics so far.  really reminds me of the old windows 3.1 to even cammadore 64 days.  but a true MMo'r doesn't base a game soly on graphics.

Anyhoo got into the game and here my character is standing in front of some field and what looks to be outside of a town and i am in boxer shorts, and nothing else.  the landscape and overall realm is 3d, but the controls are Real Buggy and "ancient".  But i was lucky to have another player take me under his wing and show me the beginning quest line.  This character "Cararacturus" was very helpful on telling me the keyboard commands and what not.  This game is Not windows friendly(IE point and click) you have to know the keyboard commands also while i was doing my missions there were many times the game glitched on me and whatnot, one of the strangest things to see your char fall like 15 feet all of a sudden and to stop walking, but your feet and hands continue onward, or another part of your body.  So anyhoo I do like 3 "deliver the scroll to this guy" missions in which case i get some shoes, a slaves little toga and a jar in order to carry water.

Here where the game nosedives on the 4th mission i gotta make a woodpile.  doesn't sound hard, does it.  Basically you go to where there is a wooded area(bout a 5 minute walk from starting point) and then you begin to gather up firewood, now the gathering up part isn't so Hard(just hit F6 and watch your staminia not drop totally) the next part SUCKS!  you have to place each inventory slot of firewood or stick into the firewood, the process takes roughly 20+ seconds.  you have to repeat this process 125 times.  so take 20 seconds and times it by 125. . . OUCH  here is the actual excerpt from the Romawiki: To complete a firewood pile, you will need to add 125 pieces of firewood. Type /project while in the construction site to find out how much more firewood is left until you can finish the project. When you have 100% of the required firewood added, type /projectfinish. If you hurry with the gathering and adding building at the edge of the forest, you will be able to finish in 40 minutes.

don't believe me?    www.roma-victor.com/community/live/wiki/index.php/AttendingTasks

now, we all have done quests that take a while, but this was Matononous and Mind numbing.  i had to wait 20+ seconds in order to add another stick of firewood to the pile, your average inventory has over 35 inventory slots.  so it's not like your running back and fourth, your sittin in your chair and clicking 2 things every 20+seconds and nothing else.

About this time I was gettin very turned off by this.  I asked my mentor friend Cararacturus if this was the longest part of the begginer quests, he then pointed me to the wiki.  i am now going to post another excerpt from the Wiki, and after i read this I was ready to quit.  it goes: Make a Clay pile:  Find clay. Go back to the river where you filled your amphora. You can gather clay by using /gather (F6). Get a player to teach you pottery first. This will take about 3 hours if you make it from scratch with 0 foraging and the projectsite just by the side of the riverbed.

3 Hours!!! Are you kidding me.  At this time I asked my mentor frined to talk to me about the usual operation on how the game is played.  He said most things in game take a bit.  I asked him, lets say i have the approiate skills and i have the Ore in my inventory and other materials i need in order to make an average longsword, how long would it take me to make one from start to finish.  He thought about it a moment and said he wasn't a blacksmith but he had some frineds who are, and for them to make an average sword from start to finish(provided they have all the materials, and all the blacksmithing equipment is with them in that area) would take over 3 hours.  At this point i apologized to him and then logged off the game.

My conclusion:

poor graphics.  poor UI.  Low server population.  Basic materials and crafting takes an Unheard of amount of time.

At this point it's not worth it.  I would suggest finding something else.

But then again I oly played on this game for 2 and a half hours(and most of that was making a bloody Woodpile)

Hope you liked my review.

Any questions or anything?  pls reply.

Well, it's a game meant to simulate life in roman times. But as for you, this was rather boring to me as well. To get a decent population they have to popularize the experience a little and make it more of a game and less a roman time simulator. So I would say your review is pretty much spot on. Besides, there are no excuses for a poor UI.

I agree. There should be other ways to simulate the time and effort involved in realistic crafting.

Also, with t he low graphics you would think the game would run much faster and effecient, but the performance is terrible and the UI could be so much better.

About the graphics and UI....

www.youtube.com/watch

They will change Q1 next year hopefully

www.roma-victor.com/community/live/development.php

 Please stay on topic.

Apologies, attending is poor. The devs are working on Rv2 alot right now. More screenshots today. Check em out. Attending has been a massively complained about feature. You can skip it by a simple forum post to the magistrate for deattending.  RV2 has a whole different system.

P.S:The guy who spam posts about this game Marker. Has been crucified for a range of activities believed to range from hacking to griefing.

Joojoo, when given the chance, I always advise new players to give the game a week.  Your very short time spent in game, mostly building a firewood pile, means you saw almost nothing of what RV has to offer.  I question why you are posting a review.

There is no question the attending tasks for beginner players have never been anything but something to scare people away.  They are boring and mostly pointless and will hopefully be gone when RV2 comes out.  Most players ask the Magistrate to deattend them so they do not have to finish the tasks.  You may not have known that option was available.

If you had spent more time in game, you would have learned that firewood piles can be built using handcarts and hired laborers.  Instead of one built in two hours, you can build 6 or 7 an hour that way.  All cooking, baking, and blacksmithing requires firewood so they are a necesary evil to the crafting ladder.

There are 900 boards in Roma Victor.  You spent all of your short time in game on the one board that has the most lag and the most frequent crashes.  Improvements over the years have made that board very livable though compared to how it was at game launch. 

IF you have access or have already made a charcoal pile and tools and have 11 or more forges and furnaces...  It will take 365 real life minutes to make a longsword from scratch without labour aid.   This breaks down to 6 hours 5 minutes PER sword.

If your good you can multi-task and do several things at once.    I think I can crank out if I put full effort to it, 5 longswords in that time.   

But in game there is the ability to hire labourers/slaves which are NPCs that help cut times on alot of projects drasticly.   If you are making a firewood pile you can just use a cart and a labourer and cut the time down by half.     The slow deliberate pace of construction, and crafting is nice, it lets you truely take pride in completing something, expecially something big like a Arena,  Workshop, or a Horrea.     These things are true accomplishments, and in real life were never attempted by one person.   This game team work is pretty much a must.   Cant just be a loner and hope to rule the world.   This aint WoW.

joojoo1975, not only could you have requested de-attending and skip all the tasks with a quick request, but you could have also borrowed a pile from someone or bought one and completed the task in a matter of minutes.

But that requires actual player interaction - something which many spoon-fed gamers of single player MMOs like WoW know nothing about.

Oh wait you are 33 years old? WTF?

Originally posted by Smartwhois

joojoo1975, not only could you have requested de-attending and skip all the tasks with a quick request, but you could have also borrowed a pile from someone or bought one and completed the task in a matter of minutes.

But that requires actual player interaction - something which many spoon-fed gamers of single player MMOs like WoW know nothing about.

 

Oh wait you are 33 years old? WTF?

I guess i don't see the point on pure negativity.  You did recall the fact I had a Real Life Person helping me and telling me stuff.  I mean since you have played this game you can tell me that there is a massive server population?  And can we please Drop the hate on WoW.  Sheesh.

WoW is WoW and RV is RV.  I didn't compare them, why should you?

Sorry, was just trying to say you can either interact with players or waste time;

1) beat your head against the door all day doing the attending tasks or;

2) turn the door knob and open the door by skipping them.

Maybe the Master should tell you this up front so you don't  have to find out from other players.