http://massively.joystiq.com/2011/05/31/massively-exclusive-the-sweet-and-sour-of-archeages-third-clos/

Quite indepth article with screenshots and impressions from someone who actually got past the 15 level tutorial(unlike mmorpg.com preview) and it lists some interesting bits you do not get to hear

for example:
- Characters adjust their footing accordingly when standing near the slopes, so no sort of "one feet hanging in the air" stuff.

Very nice! But I am also on the 'fence' for ArcheAge. I mean, at some point, Sandbox Vs Themepark in the same game... I think Sandbox will take over at one point and after a year or less, all the servers will belong to guilds and new players looking for a fun game will hit a major wall in the newb zones.

> Economy

> Exploration

> Housing

Everything will have been warped by the older players.

Edit: And not sure you guys can see Youku.com but here: http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XMjcwNDU5OTY0.html

14 minutes of character create. I'm sure it's on YouTube somewhere as well.

Great article, it points out the uniqueness of the game along with valid concerns. It will be very interesting to see the direction they take and if they can make it work at all.

Pretty good summary, and hopefully the author will keep doing great previews like this. So far nothing he wrote about is making me not want to try the game.

Yep good article. I hope he will do anotherone like that for the next testing phase. I'm still on the fence because of the PVP FFA.

Chances are im gonna try it reguardless but the majority of my friends will shy away from it because of it.

Originally posted by SabbathSMC

Yep good article. I hope he will do anotherone like that for the next testing phase. I'm still on the fence because of the PVP FFA.

Chances are im gonna try it reguardless but the majority of my friends will shy away from it because of it.

I hope they address this issue aswell, they could potentially alienate a lot of players because of it.

On a more positive note, nice to see someone actually do something more with mounts rather than just for getting from A to B a little quicker.

This was a good article. The one at AAPortal is fairly well detailed as well.

"Mechanically, the newbie levels will feel familiar to you if you've played a themepark game at some point in the past. Kill this, deliver that -- we've all been there ad nauseam, and the language problem was no problem at all for these familiar trappings."

Great.......

Originally posted by jpnole

"Mechanically, the newbie levels will feel familiar to you if you've played a themepark game at some point in the past. Kill this, deliver that -- we've all been there ad nauseam, and the language problem was no problem at all for these familiar trappings."

Great.......

 newbie levels are newbie levels, nothing to get too stressed about. 

Reading the review Im hearing ok so far, obvious big question is will it be sandbox with themebox elements or an attempt to merge 2 types of game play.  Going by articles by Jake Song, I think that his vision does seem in tune with what we hope it will deliver, so thats as good as we can hope at this time.

Seems like every site cept this one could be arsed to log on more then once and get to L5 before writing their piece... Not MMORPG.com's finest moment tbh

Originally posted by SabbathSMC

Yep good article. I hope he will do anotherone like that for the next testing phase. I'm still on the fence because of the PVP FFA.

Chances are im gonna try it reguardless but the majority of my friends will shy away from it because of it.

WoW has FFA PvP and it did Ok.

Point being, we have to wait and see how they work out the rules.

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Originally posted by charlionfire

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Originally posted by SabbathSMC
Yep good article. I hope he will do anotherone like that for the next testing phase. I'm still on the fence because of the PVP FFA.
Chances are im gonna try it reguardless but the majority of my friends will shy away from it because of it.

---

WoW has FFA PvP and it did Ok.
 
Point being, we have to wait and see how they work out the rules.

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WoW has FvF pvp.

FFA is...think stuff like Lineage2, Ultima Online, Darkfall, EVE.

WOW does not have FFA pvp.  FFA pvp means no factions, a game could have factions and FFA, to compare it to WOW Alliance would be able to kill Alliance

This is good. In my opinion Jef Reahard carries nearly the same point of view of MMOs a Garrett Fuller. This is the kind of review I wanted to see of where the game is at and where it's going. Thanks OP for posting link! Time to dive in!

Edit:

Now that is what I would have expected from someone who has a passion for old school sandbox games and realizes that honestly that type of game is missing (with really only EvE as the only other modern day serious effort). Here's to hoping Jake Song and crew continue to make it more "sand" than "park".