Hello everybody! :)

Like many others, I got the chance to check and test this game out as also to send in two bug/issue reports.

Techinical Issues

So everything started with me trying to login but getting thrown out when I tried to create a character (screen didn't loaded and it told me that the server disconnected even it was at a medium load).

So after I managed to enter and was excited to create a character for the dragon faction I saw that only templars were available. Well it's a beta so such limitations are normal.

I created my character, typed the name and the storytelling began.

Unfortunately after the introduction happened, I stuck on a the loading screen again for 10 minutes while the music was playing and the mouse was reacting (I could also minimize and maximize the game again so it wasn't my pc) till I got disconnected again.

In the third try I managed to go further and start the tutorial that lead me to another disconnection after it ended which lead me to shut down the game and go to bed.

So I tried again at sunday and played a bit through the story which I found entertaining, got to visit the training hall and test all weapons available there before I went for a elementalist with pistols as second weapon.

All in all the game run smoothly at sunday and I had to end the game only once.

These were the only technical issues I had in overall which were a bit surprising since the server were only on medium load but it is a beta after all so it gives the devs a chance to improve things for the next one.

Story/Design/Graphics

I found the atmosphere/environment to be great for such a type of game.

It gave me a resident evil feeling that I liked a lot.

The animated NPCs saying the story and explaining what happened or what they need was a big plus for me and I enjoyed it a lot.

The graphics were good and added to the overall feeling.

The only thing that really bugged me was that while the NPCs felt so alive, the own character only stood there listening what everyone has to say without EVER opening it's mouth or even making a other move except of repeating the idle animation.

This part needs definately improvement, animations on our own character and talking to the npc would make the whole thing more alive and will add a lot at the same time.

Another thing I disliked a bit were the limitation of the character editor cause no matter what I used for my female character her face structure would barely change at all. Since it's a beta thought I didn't minded too much cause it could be the case (and I really hope it will be), that more options will be available in the release.

Gameplay/Systems

As I already stated above, I loved the environment cause it added a lot to the atmosphere.

The GUI system is very good and doesn't take a lot of space out of the screen which is always a big plus.

The character stats, inventory and skills learning were good and the possibility to go anyway you want with your class and mix it up to what you wanna be able to do (some presets were there as guidance aswell) is a very nice touch that adds a lot in my opinion.

What I missed animationwise was the ability to dodge or at least jump effectively.

The jump animation didn't look right and needs a lot of improvement and the movement looked partially as one would be a turtle in a world filled by "rabbit zombies" cause when you hit one out of a group they run down to you THAT fast, that it was as if they had a immediate "red bull" boost or something.

What bothered me the most was the combat when it comes to this.

The zombie run to you and as long as they have life points they are like "glued" on your body no matter if you try to strafe or move to any direction.

This is a major point that needs lots of work in my opinion cause it destroys the atmosphere and feeling the environment, theme and skills are giving to the game

Some quests needs improvement aswell.

I had a quest I needed to find the pieces of a report and the pieces were always outside of the radius they were supposed to be in (marked as circles) which made it unnesecary extra difficult to find them at times.

Also the solo instance with the booby traps said "try to avoid" the booby traps but there were no options given to do so in the instance which is a bad thing in my opinion. So I went through 2 of them (since the enemy was out of range to be attacked and pulled to my direction) and waited till I had full health again.

Then went to the room and heard the countdown so I run to the switch, I flipped it to deactivate the traps and after the deactivation (which obviously were none), the room exploded and I was dead.

Rinse and repeat without having a chance since you had to move through the traps after all (tried to find items or to jump over but nothing worked).

Maybe there was some kind of trick to overcome this but the way it was made was once again unessecary difficult and illogical.

There should be at least a hint or two spread around for the player to find so they can help themselves or at least a update in the quest log after one entered and the cutscene with the npc has played instead of only writing "find a way to overcome the booby traps".

So all in all I think the following:

What's good:

- Environment and overall feeling

- Storytelling

- Skill/Class system, Inventory, GUI, Attribute systems

- Outfits

- Graphics

- Partially the Quest System (many different types of quests and sub-quests with various tasks for lots of fun)

What needs improvement:

- Character creation

- Character animations (cutscene animations to breathe some life into the own character and jumping too)

- Combat System (needs more action, tab targetting is ok but staying in the middle of zombies shooting with them being glued to you is not)

- Partially Quest system (some quests needs to be adjusted to prevent illogical difficulty and reduce the frustrating factor they provide)

- Server Stability (a server that drops people out when its on medium load, will have from heavy to impossible problems when it comes to a high load so they really need to look into that and improve it)

Potential

The game has its own great design which can benefit from and most of all from which it can stand out a bit from all the fantasy and sci fi stuff we are usually getting.

The story quests are a bit stale overtime and very linear but through the sub-quests people getting the chance to explore more of the world and have additional fun tasks to take on.

IF the developers improve the combat system, take care of the server issues, improve the quest system and give the own character some very much needed animations and speech, the game could go very well and stay active for years to come in my opinion.

Did you happen to try and log in sat night? They had a few issues then that sounds like the issues you had, did not take them long to sort out.

Also the beta weekend was just for the templars yes and we where told this quite some time ago, there will be other open beta weekends that test the other faction starting areas.

Character editor was limited, Funcom have said there will be a lot more opitons at launch :)

Not a bad overview :) I must say other than the sat evening for about an hour i never had any server issues. Infact I had the zone i was in go down and i had a message asking if i wanted to move to a different one of log my character out. Thought that was pretty cool.

Originally posted by zevni78

You avoid the booby traps by moving outside the vision of the cameras; there is a path, search in the time it takes for the countdown to finish.

 

Spoiler

 

You hug the walls in the case of the first room, pretty much for the second too, though you can jump over to the panel on the wall, which may be unintentional.

 

I agree with the review, though I don't think your character needs to talk, for rp reasons, its about the npcs, not you.

Thanks for the spoiler. ^_^

I tried to jump over the loader(don't know how to word the vehicle otherwise sorry) on the first trap but ti still went off, tried the walls too but it still went off so when I entered the room after I had regained my health and saw the switch, I thought it would turn off the traps. Well... it didn't. :p

Anyway, what I meant with the character being more active wasn't for rp lovers only.

It was more about the character being a active part of the world when interacting with these npcs instead of the npcs talking their monologue while the own character has sealed lips and only watches without any reaction at all.

In my opinion and for my taste it takes away a lot from the character that one controls.

As example: when you go to Andy the deputy why not let the own character say something like:

"I finally found you!"

Andy: "who are you and why were you looking for me?"

You "the sherriff told me you would be up here", "I'm coming from..." blablabla and so on giving continuity, interaction and a more "living" character.

I mean, even the zombies say something right? ;)

Originally posted by Caldrin

Did you happen to try and log in sat night? They had a few issues then that sounds like the issues you had, did not take them long to sort out.

Also the beta weekend was just for the templars yes and we where told this quite some time ago, there will be other open beta weekends that test the other faction starting areas.

Character editor was limited, Funcom have said there will be a lot more opitons at launch :)

 

Not a bad overview :) I must say other than the sat evening for about an hour i never had any server issues. Infact I had the zone i was in go down and i had a message asking if i wanted to move to a different one of log my character out. Thought that was pretty cool.

 

 

Yes! I was unfortunately ill so I missed friday evening (GMT+1 here so evening my time) and only logged in saturday evening in which I had the issues.

Good writeup, thanks!

Originally posted by Raekon

Originally posted by Caldrin

Did you happen to try and log in sat night? They had a few issues then that sounds like the issues you had, did not take them long to sort out.

Also the beta weekend was just for the templars yes and we where told this quite some time ago, there will be other open beta weekends that test the other faction starting areas.

Character editor was limited, Funcom have said there will be a lot more opitons at launch :)

 

Not a bad overview :) I must say other than the sat evening for about an hour i never had any server issues. Infact I had the zone i was in go down and i had a message asking if i wanted to move to a different one of log my character out. Thought that was pretty cool.

 

 

Yes! I was unfortunately ill so I missed friday evening (GMT+1 here so evening my time) and only logged in saturday evening in which I had the issues.

ah that explains it then :)

Originally posted by FC-Famine

Good writeup, thanks!

It was a good write up and I am impressed you are over here posting.  It pleases me greatly that funcom are looking for opinions from many different sources.  Keep up the good work.