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AdventureQuest Worlds Review: AdventureQuest Worlds Review - Edit
7
Average
| Pros |
 
|
 Browser based – no client required Items purchased are permanent No item/sales spam |
| Cons |
 Lacks depth and immersion Quest progress not saved |
Visuals / Graphics & Audio
It's a flash based game and it looks as good as it can be. Animations are minimal. Facial animations? Forget-about-it. That said, there are some animated emotes including the always popular /dance and /wave and /point. The combat animations are actually much less lame than some truly spastic arm waving I've seen in other MMOs. I'm of the "Keep it Simple" school in that I believe having simple animation that works is better than complex animation that looks like someone dropped an earthworm down your character's armor.
Audio is limited to "swooshes" and "thuds" with no environmental music or background ambient sounds. This said, a recent event for Friday the 13th - To the Bottom of the Sea - included cutscenes, voice-overs and songs re-sung (much more family friendly than the original) by Voltaire for AdventureQuest Worlds which maxed and crashed servers. The re-play was available for two weeks and for a flash-based game, I was impressed at how lag-free it was, but the lag on launch day must have been incredible.
Bugs, bugs, bugs & Community
Being a flash based game, all player data is kept on Artix servers and players can log into any server that is up and available. There are two "Moglin" safe servers that children under the age of 13 are limited to. Only drop-down menu chat is available on these two servers. Several others are a mix of drop-down menu chat and free chat - if a paying subscriber, or verified paid up member of one of Artix's other games, yet several others are free chat as long as the email account is verified at registration, and one subscription server where subscribers get exclusive events and items.
;)
There are grouping and clan (guild) capabilities in game and a forum for players. The subscriber server seemed to be a little friendlier perhaps because no one had ever seen a level one noob there. However, zone into almost any level appropriate zone and you'll find players issuing you a group invite to do the boss. The forums are friendly if not super busy as are most players in game. One particular fun time was being invited at level 2 to do a level 12 boss and another at level 5 to do a level 25 boss with 50,000 hitpoints. A pity I didn't have the quest yet.
Although I was invited to join a few clans, I was not spammed with clan invites. The lack of trading and re-selling of player items also meant that there was no zone spamming of items and gold for sale.
What's an MMO without bugs? The communications from the developers are all tinged with humor. A recent release was titled "Let loose the dogs (bugs) of war" with one item crossed out later and replaced with "This broke BAD" One frequent issue I encountered was the game freezing on moving from one screen or area to the next. The only way to get out of that is to close the window and log-in again. This is particularly annoying if you are working on a quest as you have to restart them.
Business Model
AdventureQuest Worlds is free to play - unless you want to have a pet, buy exclusive fluff armors, get additional storage space and play on the single Paying Customer server for the exclusive events. There are several different subscription packages which come loaded with Adventure Coins (the paid for currency), beginning with a three month membership plus 1,000 Coins for $19.95. The Adventure Coins can also be purchased separate from membership.
All items can be previewed before purchase and range from a Werewolf Morph for 200 AC to the ferret pet for 900 AC to higher level weapons that go for 2,500 AC. To keep the game balanced, purchased weapons are level 1 and have to be enhanced when you level, or may only be equipped if you are of level.
The one big difference between AdventureQuest Worlds and many other free to play games is that the items you buy with Adventure Coins are permanent. Even when you stop paying the subscription, you will still be able to equip the armors and weapons, show-off your pet(s) and you will retain the additional bag slots and bank space purchased.
Reviewer's Opinion
;)
For a game that is pure hack and slash and item collection, AdventureQuest Worlds is a fun little casual MMO. It may lack depth, have no tradeskills or other career paths besides the adventure path and lack a certain amount of immersion, but that doesn't make it "un-fun" to play. A good community accounts for much in and MMO, and hanging out in the town during my lunch break, I watched the chatter. It was mostly about someone's cool armor or weapon, and where they got it from, and some chatter about quests and boss mobs.
Permanent buys mean that gamers can pay for a short subscription and coins, buy the items he/she wanted such as that neat little ferret pet or additional inventory slots or flaming sword, then go back to playing for free - and who can argue with that as value for money?
I find this review very accurate, if you take the game for what it is, which is a casual MMO made for kids and teenagers, or even older people who just want a break and dont feel like downloading something.
The draw of this game for me was that it's entirely web based (no download/instalation), and it doesn't limit the amount of time you can play with regen "energy".
However, it can get a bit boring after you are through with the first chapter of the story, because it would seem like there's very little for you to do without upgrading to member; aka member only area or member only items.
I am very glad to learn that whatever items you purchase while you are a member you get to keep forever... hmm, maybe I'll finally get that pet that's been just sitting in my bag slot ;-)
I think the fact that it is a casual MMO is the draw to the game.even though my draw to the game was the chance to get a founder title one one of the artix entertainment games, im upgraded in 4 of the 5 games including a mem in AQW)
I beleive Artix's Games have hit a homerun with this one. The quirky jokes, to the hilarious weapons and hairstyles. In a overall review i believe this is the one, I'm not much to putting much effort but I give This Review a [5 out of 5] and the game a overall score little higher than most but a [4 out of 5 (8/10)]
Congratulations Artix
AE are money hungry bastards. This is supposed to be a free browser based game, but all their releases are 90% member only. They also selling a pet which you have to buy for 70 dollars to get a certain ingame pet. If paying members is not enough, they also have to buy certain items and bagspace for AC which cost even more money. The review is wrong in the aspect that once your membership runs out, you cant equip the member items anymore unless you upgrade again.
I like AE games. I reckon their games are pretty good.
I don't think AE is money - hungry. In fact, they made new equips for free players that at first glance, may look like only for those that are members only. But they are not. Well problem is most of them may be hard to obtain, but some are usually not. I guess they are doing so for the sake of the free players who support AQW but couldn't buy or just can't be bothered. Anyway important thing here is that it's free, play it, like it or not, that's just the way it is. The developers needed to earn anyway for their hard work on the games they make. It's worth it.
this game has an "awful awful" community.. kids as you might have imagined..
just a word of advice if anyone wants to begin playing.."never use the chat to ask something in public" "don't try to talk unless you really need to" unless you want to hear some foul language.
yes..even asking for direction will most likely get you no answer..or an answer that you'll never want to hear.
Decent game, but certainly not the best that you can find from Artix Entertainment. Games like AdventureQuest and MechQuest have a more mature feel to it, but are single player. Even if single player, the community makes up for that, as the forums are (or maybe were) some of the most highly populated, active, and fun you can use. You can easily get in touch with the very friendly and cooperative staff, as even the lead programmers take much of their time to hear directly from the fans. Take it from me, I used to be a moderator for EpicDuel, their newly adopted game, but left to pursue creation of a new Flash RPG title. By the way, this is their first attempt at a MMO environment, as DragonFable is solely single player as well.
I played it for a day, and here's what I observed:
They restrict most things to members, or .. What did they refer to it as again? DragonKings?
Most weps are 'virtually' expensive, thus making the virtual money thing more of a con. (10K FOR A LV 4 WEP?!?!)
Limited skills. I only unlocked 2 (out of 4) skills and got bored.
Corny jokes, sort of like the Leisure Suit Larry reference in AQ. "Lounge. No lizards allowed".
It's more of an at schol game, because post people are the kind that talk "wike diz"
Ae is one of the greatest companies ever. They provide games with weekly update, cool quest, items, monster, bosses, storyline and features. They have more connection with their players than other browser games companies. They give equally to their free players and members.
Your a douche. I have gotten max level cool armor and weps. And guess what? i am a non-mem i may have upgraded once, but they do give u ur moneys worth, and this company is not money grubbing. Once the creater of the game was gonna get a lot of money for putting ad in the game, that said "free" in it when it wasnt and he just said he would not put it. Explain that if he was money grubbing........douche.
And P.S
they is WAY more non mem content then mem content