While waiting on WAR patch 1.2 and being burnt out from Wotlk raiding, i decided to try out out this F2P MMO.

Review
Pros

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• Has in depth crafting system (you can craft every piece of gear) suprising lot of Pve content. (Sad to say F2P MMO has more Pve content than WAR )
• Lot of strat when it comes to combat since it is turn based game (Keep in mind if you enjoy turn based JRPG you will like this).
• Mature and helpful player base. The game encourages player to help lowbies plus the turn based system turns away most of the young-lings
• Guild owned cities and Pvp .
• PvP ladder matches.

Cons

• Pop ups announcing players acquiring gears etc
• WTF items like mercury mount which looks out of place in this historical mmo.
• Poor character customization.
• Better help system (granted the starting quest explains game mechanics).

Poor dialogue.
Limited amount of skills (granted you have 9 different mercs under your command).

Overall
8/10

The game is certainly fun and intresting. The leveling can get grindish but has lot of content and zones to explores. Some of the content does seem outlandish the historical npcs, certain mounts. It is good MMO to try out if you are into old school JRPG turn based combat or simply want to kill time while awaiting on Darkfall .

Yup. I agree most Atlantica players are generally helpful and kind with newbies. I personally experience this since most of them are willing to give some sort of beginning items to me so I can level-up more easily. hehe.
 

yeah your right... speaking about being generous my partymates yesterday gave me quest items and teleport licenses... for free! i wish that there would be more players like them

My review:

PROS:

- Game has enough depth and has a well thought out storyline.
- Their system isn't really true turn based RPG, it's more like final fantasy's ATB (Active Turn Based) system where there's a countdown (20 seconds) timer for each side to make their move. So you gotta think fast on your feet.
- Each mercenary character are well rendered and designed. They're pretty to look at.
- World is huge. You have several theathers to fight in. North America, Europe and Asia (including China/Korea/Most of Southeast Asia).
- Game is free and supported by a (very expensive) cash shop. You don't really need the cash shop to play.
- Guilds can conquer town, levy taxes (which goes to the guild) and has interesting PvP (arena) where people can even bet on the winner.
- Interesting dungeons to explore and instanced boss battles.
- Community are very nice so far. Lotsa help from the playerbase.

CONS:

- Lack of customization for your avatar and for which mercenary to recruit (at the start). <- minor thing really since this is more of a strategy game it doesn't really matter.
- Annoying popups that go up at random times announcing what rare items people get (mounts, gear, etc.)... I wish you can disable them but you can't.
- Most quest are like gofer quest, collecting this, kill that, talk to, etc..
- Instanced boss battles that can be a curse. Some quest requires you to fight bosses that can only be defeated with the right build of mercenary and if you don't have the right build its almost impossible to defeat them and some quest requires you to do it alone or you can't level up past certain stages.
- Lack of in-game help from the game. And it is possible to screw up your build. And if you screw up you cannot complete certain missions which requires you to start over.
- Menus are archaic which reminds me of games from the early 1990s. Seriously .. too many pull down menus = FTL.
- One thing that galled me was that to be successful your stable of mercenary MUST be of certain builds (usually 3 tanks (to cover all the front ranks), 1-2 healers, 1-2 ranged fighter (archers/cannoneers/gunners) and AOE casters). If you deviate from that you cannot win especially in later battles when there are a lot of enemies (2-3 groups). In the end (especially at high levels) pretty everyone have the same builds which pretty much kills the strategy part of the game and makes everyone a clone of each other.

"One thing that galled me was that to be successful your stable of mercenary MUST be of certain builds (usually 3 tanks (to cover all the front ranks), 1-2 healers, 1-2 ranged fighter (archers/cannoneers/gunners) and AOE casters). If you deviate from that you cannot win especially in later battles when there are a lot of enemies (2-3 groups). In the end (especially at high levels) pretty everyone have the same builds which pretty much kills the strategy part of the game and makes everyone a clone of each other."

What level are you? I have noticed game videos and there are seems to wide variety of builds. One of the 90s seemed to use all melee. I use one ax (main), 2 shaman and 3 ranged deciding what to get for my lv 30 merc slot.

well said reviews guys. its been a while since i last posted in this forum. i was caught up with somethings but still make it a point that i get to play every once in a while. its really hard not to DETOXIFY whil;e you are being stressed out in your own personal outside world. the games helps me unwind and forget my problems for a while. i saw that  during these past few days, atlantica has lots of problem both in-game and out but sooner or later, it would an all out gaming frenzy for us once they have fixed all of the problems that we encounter. :D