I had a chance to play Atlantica Online earlier this week in-between being sick and playing Warhammer: Online. For a game that is in beta, it seems to want to be treated as a game that has been already released, claiming in its advertisements: “Love it, or we’ll give cash for your character!” This caught my eye specifically and made me want to try the game, not because I wanted to love it; I figured I’d hate it, since I’m a bitter shell of a man, and could get some cash out of it. However, if you take a look at the details of the ‘offer’ it sounds more like they’re trying to get cheap power-leveling out of their players than actually convince you to play. Offers aside, we’re here to discuss my first impressions, so let’s get on with it!
Graphics/UI: 5/10 – ‘Meh’
The graphics are nothing innovative. They’re similar to most eastern games on the market. This game is particularly similar to Sword of the New World, a MMORTSRPG(?) I had the chance to try last year. I don’t normally review games at the login screen, but this one wants to be. I had never in all my years seen a login screen with so many, many random colors. I think it was depicting a large-scale battle, but to me it seemed like an orgy of fairies and daemons on a rainbow chessboard. Once I survived the seizure-inducing login screen, it was time to create my character. Character customization is very limited, not only at the character screen but in-game as well. I only had about five hairstyles to choose from, two outfit types, and a…weapon? Well, anyway, once in-game the graphics didn’t get that much better. After playing to about level 10(I think), I had gotten quite a few pieces of armor. Instead of evenly distributing them between myself and my mercenaries I figured I’d put them all on my “visible” character to upgrade his appearance. Where’s my helmet? Where are the new pants I got? The character looked exactly the same as it did before I equipped anything on him.
Now, let’s make something very clear. The game needs to have low system requirements in order to function properly, as battles will eventually become very, very large. This is not why the game’s graphics are ‘meh’. World of Warcraft and Warhammer: Online both had relatively low system requirements when released as compared to the available technology at the time. However, the way they depicted their characters, the landscapes, the spell effects, was very original, and relevant to the world they were basing the game on. Atlantica Online just seems to have copied and pasted a combination of Lineage 2 graphics, with Sword of the New World graphics, and other eastern games. That’s harsh, perhaps, but it seems to be the way the game wants to be treated. “Old MMOs not ‘WOW’ing you?” it proudly boasts in its advertisements, suggesting that they have something new and refreshing to offer. It certainly isn’t in the graphics department.
Gameplay/Chat/Community: 5/10 – ‘Who’s my special little boy?’
This section of my first impressions review will not focus on the combat aspect of the game. That’s a separate aspect altogether as they seem to want it to be. As soon as you start playing, the game will assume that you don’t know how to use your mouse or keyboard and will simply ‘lock’ you to the tutorial NPC. It will explain the world to you a little bit, and how to get started on completing your first quest. This is where the game also makes another assumption: it seems to believe that you’re too dumb to find battles on your own, so it will go find them for you. That’s right, there’s an ‘auto-move’ option that will automatically move you to your active quest’s objective. From there, all you have to do is either talk to NPC X or kill monster Y.
Perhaps an aspect that the tutorial should have expanded on was how to use the chat interface. I kept seeing only one person in my chat log, and they seemed to be talking to themselves. Not in the sense that there was no one else for them to talk to, but in the sense that they seemed to be answering questions and holding a conversation while there was no one else in the chatroom talking. Maybe I didn’t know how to use the chat, or maybe the game packs an auto-ignore feature that will ignore people it knows you won’t like automatically.
Now, one feature I sort of liked is the player’s ability to post in-game advertisements that are displayed at the top of your screen for goods and services players are interested in trading or selling(some services which I didn’t understand, such as ‘teaching pants’). This automatically made me think that goldsellers would be filling these advertising spaces with goldselling links. At the same time, though, it’s much less intrusive than those long whispers we get on other games, or the huge chunks of text in public chatrooms. If the feature were to be moderated, goldselling advertisements could be removed almost immediately.
Battle system/leveling system: 6/10
At last we come to Atlantica Online’s innovative feature. Okay, now that we’ve had a good laugh, it’s serious time. Let’s talk about how the battle system works:
- When you right click a mob to attack, a Final Fantasy-esque transition will take you to a battle sequence.
- You select the character you want to ‘move.’
- You then choose what you want your character to do. There’s attack, use item, use magic, all the standards.
- You will have a time limit, after which the enemy will make their move.
- You are now taking turns hitting each other with random things until one group is dead.
This is supposed to be the best part about Atlantica Online. Strategic turn-based combat that makes you think carefully about what you’re going to use on your opponent for maximum efficiency. The timer was so short, however, that I found myself frantically clicking enemy monsters while hitting “q” over and over so that every now and then a magical ability would go off. I had 4 characters to move on a 15 second timer. It completely removed the ‘strategic’ part out of combat. Not to mention, it took me ten levels to figure out how to remove that annoying camera thing in battles where characters would take a ‘solo.’ A ‘solo’ is when your character decides he’s better than every other mercenary there and will take up the whole screen to show off his magical abilities in greater detail. Problem is: the timer is still running during this sequence, so if your guy decides to summon Knights of the Round or whatever, then by the time the sequence is over, so is your turn.
The combat system ended with me hitting two buttons over and over. I felt if I hooked up a Rock Band drum peripheral to my computer I could get through the battle easily by dropping some freestyle beats. My characters seemed to be a lot stronger than anything they encountered, so there was no need to think on anything. It’s a race to see how fast you can click enemy targets with a 15 second limit. Last thing, what’s up with the looting? When the mobs are dead, I have to loot them to claim my prize, but there’s usually 4-6 mobs to loot, and it uses up a character turn to loot a mob. So if all 4 of your mercenaries can move in a given turn you can loot 4 mobs, then you have to wait until the enemy corpses make a move before you can loot the remaining ones. What the hell?! Why even given corpses a turn?
The leveling system also had me a bit confused. I know each mercenary gains levels and they’re all displayed in the UI outside of combat. A lot of things required “level 20” and it made me wonder what exactly that meant, though. An average of the levels of all your mercenaries? The level of your main character? Another thing was the random number in brackets next to my name. I saw it on every new player I ran into. I figured it wasn’t my level since it said “18” and my character’s level at the bottom clearly said “Lv.1”. In the end, I decided it was my character’s age. A strapping young lad with a cannon on his back and a pocket full of dreams.
Overall: 5.5/10 – Nothing further, your honor.
Even though the game is still in beta, it seems to be advertising proudly things that it can’t really offer. If you hated the game, and want to take them up on their offer for cash, you have to get to level 50 first. “Old MMOs not ‘WOW’ing you” I see what you did there. Thanks, but I’d rather go back to World of Warcraft and endure the tedious scripted instances with several people who didn’t know a giant beam or orb was coming right at them, and that it wasn’t a good thing.
In the end, if you like these types of games, you know, the free, eastern, copy-paste-insert-item-mall-instant-cash games, then you might have some fun with this one. It’s a little bit different than other released MMOs, even if it’s not innovative in any way whatsoever.
This review is made by some incompetent freak with a weak PC that can play only WoW and obviously Warhammer.
The game surely has a high system requirements… for a free MMORPG. This however gives you the change to enjoy beautiful graphics.
“Well, anyway, once in-game the graphics didn’t get that much better. After playing to about level 10(I think)” – so we have a guy that writes a REVIEW when he had played about 1% of the game? Yeah, that’s neat.
“The character looked exactly the same as it did before I equipped anything on him.” – a fat lie. Every piece of equipment is displayed on your main character.
“This is where the game also makes another assumption: it seems to believe that you’re too dumb to find battles on your own, so it will go find them for you. That’s right, there’s an ‘auto-move’ option that will automatically move you to your active quest’s objective.” – obviously the gane does not thing you are dumb but gives you the oportunity to do some things automatically as for example the boring transition from one place to another. It actually keeps you cool as you are not obliged to click around 500 times on the ground while trying to reach an NPC that is only 100 meters away from you.
“I had 4 characters to move on a 15 second timer.” – another lie… The computer enemy has 15 seconds and you have 30 seconds to make your clicking… still I dunno what idiot you must be not to be able to thing where you are clicking 5 or 7 or 9 times, depending on the number of your characters, in 30 seconds…
“Not to mention, it took me ten levels to figure out how to remove that annoying camera thing in battles where characters would take a ‘solo.'” – So… you ignored all the tips and… oh, come on, you have to be either blind or dumb as hell to not see the camera with the arrow on it that is in the battle interface.
“The combat system ended with me hitting two buttons over and over. I felt if I hooked up a Rock Band drum peripheral to my computer I could get through the battle easily by dropping some freestyle beats.” – no comment. Well, the other battle systems surely demands you to just wait and do nothing after you clicked once… being able to actually make any decisions about who is hitting who in half a minute might really seem hard for you.
“My characters seemed to be a lot stronger than anything they encountered, so there was no need to think on anything.” – well, the guy played up to lvl 10… that is about 30 minutes of gameplay and he wants to be challenged… last time I played another MMO I was hunting damn boars and wolves till lvl 10… it wasn’t very challenging either. Still just about lvl 10 you start to battle the boss monsters for the encounter of the big boss monster that is the finish of the first “arc” of your journey in Atlantica and it is not exactly the weakest thing around. And later the things tend to become more challenging. But still, let’s not forget, this is a review made by a guy that had played almost 2 percent of the game.
“The leveling system also had me a bit confused. I know each mercenary gains levels and they’re all displayed in the UI outside of combat. A lot of things required “level 20�� and it made me wonder what exactly that meant, though. An average of the levels of all your mercenaries? The level of your main character?” – Um… so you have an armor that requires lvl 20… so… can your mercenary wears it if it is lvl 10 and your main character is lvl 20? I.e. think a little Sherlock!
“Another thing was the random number in brackets next to my name. I saw it on every new player I ran into. I figured it wasn’t my level since it said “18�� and my character’s level at the bottom clearly said “Lv.1��. In the end, I decided it was my character’s age. A strapping young lad with a cannon on his back and a pocket full of dreams.” And another wrong assumption for our reviewer! If only had he played for an hour more or read one of the hunded tips that jump everywhere then he would have known that the number next to your character’s name is the PVP league you are in. There are 18 pvp leagues and you start in the last one.
Overall this review of the review is completed by me really wondering “How a 10-year-old birdbrain is given money to review games that he had barely played?”.
What a lame “review”. You’re basically showing everyone how you didnt have enough intelligence to learn how to play.
Anyway, if you wanna know what people think of your first impressions take a look here: http://news.mmosite.com/content/2008-10-19/20081019201550808,1.shtml
Hi,
This is a “first impressions” review on the game. There is absolutely no need for me to reach level 100,000 to write a review for any game. Based on my first impressions(which I again remind you is what the article is about), the game was absolutely horrible. Other games I have played, not necessarily popular ones such as World of Warcraft or Warhammer have had much more intuitive ways to hook players right from the beginning so that they become curious to learn what comes after the first ten levels of the game. This game did not do that. The horrible grindfest that was Lineage 2 still made me play it to level 6x, in the same way Priston Tale did and RuneScape to 8x.
Sorry to tell you again, but the game’s graphics are absolutely horrible. I found the “video” settings, and cranked it up to 5, and the game still ran like Ragnarok Online. I appreciate all the kind comments on mmosite. The truth is, I didn’t expect to get positive feedback on this article, since the only people that bother to read about it are people who actually play the game; the rest of the world doesn’t even acknowledge its existence.
You know the review is going to be a bit slanted when the reviewer starts off by saying that he didn’t want to love it and figured he’d hate it. It’s sad how some people can get such tunnel vision after too much WoW that anything outside of that mold is automatically viewed in a harsh light.
I give this reviewer a 5.5/10 on his review skills ;)
Malcom, just ignore the idiots that can’t see pass Atlantica’s oblivious shell…The game is a mess even in a Open Beta State…Should have mentioned its completely badly translated state as well. Having as much grammatical errors as it does in Open Beta Phase is a sign of bad management, and no passion in localization. Translations should be done by the end of the Closed Beta Phases, not by Version 24.00.
Just so these people understand, First Impressions mean the most in every game and if a game can not deliver early on, it shows they will not or actually never will engage the Average gamer at any stage of the game. And they usually are based on the early levels of the game and clearly Atlantica is one hell of a grindfest lv1-20.
My First Impression of Atlantica was “nothing but a typical Asian MMO, with a shell that only fools the fools”
Just to point out:
RTS = Real Time Strategy
AO is Turn Based Strategy.
Did you play the game or just put the first that come to you mind looking an screenshot of the game?
I stumbled upon this game while bored @ work. As far as a free game goes..yeah its 1/2 fun. I do love how people get hung up on graphics. It’s a game…Would you never play monopoly because the money doesn’t look real enough? On the whole, most of the next gen games don’t hold a candle to to the older games. But everyone has their own likes/dislikes. I still dig the basic nature of a strategy game…
This game has tried something a little different, and accolades for that. Everything these days wants to be a WoW killer or clone. Yuck. Breaking new grounds, and going away from mainstream is a good thing.
The combat in this game is pretty dry. It’s basic and it works. The one sore spot I have is the UI. Much to be desired there. It is very clumsy. The camera can be annoying, and lack of open space to wander is kind of a let down.
1st impressions – interesting and worth checking out. Could be worse – Anyone still playing Age of Conan? Graphics….pshaw…
In my honest opinion, someone who starts out their review with something to the effect of ‘I figured I would hate the game’ should not be allowed to review that game… It’s just silly to have them do the review, when they have so obviously already made up their mind about it. Get someone else who can be slightly objective…you know, at least a little bit.. But I suppose that is too much to ask.
With that said, I can see what the reviewer is talking about in places… Honestly, the only reason I looked at the game, much less started playing it was because I saw the offer to buy my character if I didn’t like the game… Then I got into it because of the Final Fantasy-style combat that I love…
It did take me about 15 levels before I bothered to figure out how to turn off that solo camera thing–not because of how hard to figure out that it was, but because it just didn’t bother me badly enough to make me care. The interface is not that difficult to figure out if you have played other games online and are familiar with the general concept that they are all designed around.
Personally, I have a love-hate relationship with the auto-move feature… I love it because it takes a lot of the tedium out of running back and forth around the world, but I hate it because it makes your character follow the weirdest paths some times… It is really nice, though, because most of the quests I’ve seen don’t really tell you exactly where to go to get to where you need to be, and I tend to get lost fairly easily.
I just tried this game and played it for 2 hours, wow im level 20
doesn’t seem like a grind fest to me
one quest after another, the quests is rather short and simple, also the auto walk feature takes you to the quest destination
no way is this game a grind fest, i dont see how your complaining its so hard to get to level 20.
Like with every game, you are required to have a brain to understand the features, and not skip the hints and assume you can figure it out. because obviously, you didn’t
did you even try the pvp system in this game
pvp with a strategy turn based combat system is awesome
people who assume they can try the game for 30 minutes and understand everything about the game (i.e. judging if its crap or good) are just dumb. Developers put hard time and effort into developing every aspect/feature/characteristic of the game and you expect to decide if the game sucks or not by playing so less?
and seriously wtf, u put on armor and your character stayed the same? you must be blind seriously…
Just because you level quickly doesn’t mean it isn’t a grindfest..
WoW is a monster grindfest and u hit double digit levels rather quickly too..
also, I still have yet to find a point…um, quest, quest, quest, quest…(all kill x this or get y that too)…
tHIS REVIEW rocks! it is so funny!
TOP QUALITY EXCERCYCLE FOR SALE
hahahaha
Ok this game is not even good I played TBS many times. But Atlantica blows! There is no 30 seconds, and half the time the characters don’t even respond, they just “Let Me Handle it!”……. they say and they waste 10 seconds standing.
Yeah there is tougher monsters. but who cares?
This game blows. This review rocks bigtime! I love the screenshot malcom is so funny!
I love the fact that it is a known issue that the game will hold up indeifently in the login screen “Logging On”
Sorry, but anything which advertises “Still not WoWing are you?” is obviously tending toward the failboat.
World of Warcraft was a huge MMO hit and it set the trend for the MMO market. This is just another one of those games which tend to follow in it’s footsteps by offering a much lower standard of game, and then has the cheek to claim it’s something more powerful and exciting than World of Warcraft.
There’s other ways to advertise, but Atlantica just went straight for the retarded choice.
I don’t really care about the advertisements, the gfx, etc. The gameplay is the only thing that matters about a game. I hate hte people who think Crysis was good when it really, really wasn’t. The amazing gfx are just a way of making you think you’ve had fun, when really, the AI is shoddy, and the controls are irritating.
AO is a great game. I haven’t played a MMO as good as it. It does have its flaws, but everything does. Especially Crysis!
Based on first impressions mean nothing. You’re missing the bulk of the game. And im sorry, from your understanding of atlantica’s basic mechanics, its wrong in many ways, many are based on your assumptions and not a fact.
People have different views at stuff, you dont like it its your opinion. But you dissed the whole game as if its a pure garbage game with zero positive comments as i have seen. Why dont you just give a 1 / 10, that fits your review
This review contains nothing but small assumptions that don’t hold any meaning if someone with half a level of patience would play beyond 10 levels and not cry about it at the start.
The game holds many things to do and attain as you level and grow, and also holds a strategic twist to is whether in PvE or PvP. However, going by this “reviewer”, it isn’t shown, but what do you expect when his “facts” are beyond overexaggerated and he doesn’t bother to delve further into what is offered.
Lets remake this review fast.
Malcom’s Review – 0/10 due to incompetence.
AO the game actual rating – 9/10. Not perfect obviously, but it has it’s good ups and actually gameplay if you actually play it that will keep you trying to beat everyone you can in competition and even dungeons.
What I consider to be unprofessional about your review is that you wish to complement the forum ticker feature but note your concerns about the possibility of it being hijacked by gold sellers. You then proceed to mark it down because it could be abused by gold sellers because it is not moderated, even though you cite no evidence of it having ever been abused for such purposes and your screenshot is devoid of any abuse. As it turns out, I have never witnessed a gold seller advert on the forum ticker, so next time consider checking your prejudices in at the door and basing your review only on facts before you discredit yourself entirely.
I can understand that there’s such thing as “first impression” review. However, this is not to be confused as “game review”. You might score the game 5/10 based on your first impression, but if you go beyond the first impression bit, you might actually find the game to score a different number.
Things you didn’t consider at all include:
+ Craft system
+ PvP
+ Events
+ Raids
+ Mercenary recruitment
+ Enchant/Enhance system
+ Skill sytem
+ and many more because you didn’t go beyond “first impression”
Fair enough that you feel that Atlantica Online didn’t hook you straight away from level 1-10. But I think even you would agree that it’s a rather stupid way to write a review without even trying to play the game more than .5% of what it has to offer.
And even for first impression, it was quite awful to make a very basic mistake of saying that wearing new gear didn’t change the look. If that’s the case, then every other player would also be wearing the same thing as your player. But in fact, they weren’t.
Lol, this review have to be nominated to “the lame review of the year” =))
As a lot of people has stated, everything in your “review” is in fact “assumptions”! And all of your assumptions are simply WRONG!
You played a game to lvl10 and you don’t like it? Then shut it! What’s the point of going around badmouthing about things that you don’t know?
Writing “first impression”!:)) Why don’t you just say what you think when you see the name of the game? That’s the first impression, all the others… none of them is first=))
You said auto move = the game says we’re dumb? Don’t you know what’s an option is? It’s there, you can use it if you are lazy to click, but if you want to run and find, no one asks you not to! You obviously just use the thing and then think to yourself that you’re dumb!
Also, the quests aren’t t just kill mob x and get thing y but also have a variety of demands. And if you think they’re not good enough, plz name some game that give you variety of quest that are not just hack and find!
Hi Malcolm,
Thanks for your review. I also was VERY put off by Atlantica when I first started playing, and indeed almost quit entirely after my 2nd and 3rd logins. Thankfully, my brother convinced me to stick with it and I am glad I did.
I find this is one of Atlantica’s biggest faults – the turn-off to new players is huge. Not only all of the things you mentioned, but the sheer weirdness of everything seems to be a real turn off especially to a Western audience. This game really starts to shine once you get past all of the “newbie” stuff and start getting multiple quests and seeing the rest of what the game has to offer. I have since quit all the other pay-to-play MMOs I was involved in and now play Atlantica exclusively, and I love it.
Although your points were off base in a few instances as pointed out by other comments, it rings true that the new player/first impressions of Atlantica are shoddy at best, and I hope this is addressed so that the game can reach a wider audience.
I grew up on the turn based system, and final square soft games where my favorite, from final fantasy and secret of mana, to earth bound and illusion of gaia. But after final fantasy 7 and ff tactics, I really quit playing video games, except for ff 10. So anyway, about a 2 months ago or so, I found out that there were free rpg’s online, and so I was excited, thinking it would be like the good old days. But one after another, from the 2D maple story, to sword of the new world, I noticed that liked that essential element that pulled me into the game; story. So upon hearing of atlantica online, I thought I had found the real deal, until I went through the tutorial,(which was a pre-cursor to the epic fail) and found that my first quest was to kill this number of this, and go see this person. I thought this was going to be some ground brake shit from all the advertisements, but it worser off the super ninentindo rpgs. Maybe it’s just that the rpger’s of my day(I’m 26) are just different from the grind and quest oriented rpger’s of today. I can’t stand any of these games after awhile because they have no story, or no great villians to defeat. If there is a boss that you are fighting, you don’t know the story behind that boss. Their are cut scenes, as to show progress among perodic intervals in the game. This game blows. No strategy other than what you soon find to be pratical.
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