NecroVisioN Reviews
This fast-paced, incoherent shooter asks, 'Is too much really enough?'
One of the most attractive aspects of the game industry is that it caters to so many different tastes, even within the narrow definitions of a single genre. For every Lord of the Rings Online, there's a Yohoho! Puzzle Pirates; for every Civilization IV, there's a DEFCON; for every SWAT 4, there's a Serious Sam. Farm 51's NecroVisioN is one of those shooters that focus more on instant action and relentless intensity, relying on sheer quantity of enemies and features to attract and engage gamers. Some gamers are bound to relish in the kitchen sink approach to game design, but for others, enough is enough already.The story is a pastiche of cliches with no real attempt to build consistency or embrace originality. You play an American enlisted in the British army during the First World War, which might be interesting if the setting didn't feel so generic and wasn't abandoned within the first few minutes of the game. Soon enough, you're venturing through hell on the trail of a mad scientist and fighting wave after wave of German soldiers, zombies, dragons, giant robots, and, yes, even wizards. If the story didn't insist on taking itself so seriously, having all these bizarre elements in the same cauldron might actually work, but as it is, the chaotic nature of it is just overwhelming.
The tone of the game is similarly confused. Much of the marketing material announces the Lovecraft influences in NecroVisioN, but that may just be based on the fact that the game is set in the 1910s and mixes the supernatural with the perversions of science. The bloody chaos that makes up most of NecroVisioN is worlds away from the looming dread and deliberate pacing that most people associate with H. P. Lovecraft. There's the added disconnect of having a hero who swings his way through dozens of zombie enemies, lopping off their heads with a shovel while shouting, "Suck it!" and the overwrought pathos found in the letters scattered throughout the level.
When you finally reach the point where someone exclaims "My god! They were experimenting on...people!" it's like, who even cares anymore? Am I supposed to feel sorry for these people or am I supposed to stab them in the face and then set them on fire? It's something that games like BioShock or the recent Cryostasis were able to do so much better by focusing more on the quality of the battles rather than the quantity.
Now, with that said, I fully expect that there are tons of potential fans for this game that won't care that the story is weak. For them, it's enough to know that there's a necromancer and that the Germans are to blame. My only answer to that is that the developers of NecroVisioN seem to want the story to matter but haven't made it coherent enough to keep it interesting.
If you can get past the story, the combat is genuinely entertaining with enough bloody dismemberments and explosions to fill an entire Sam Peckinpah marathon. The range of weapons is incredibly vast, almost too vast. At the beginning it can be a struggle to keep track of the melee attacks, underpowered WWI era firearms, thrown weapons and combat combos, but once you master the Shadowhand glove's combination of melee and magic powers in the underworld and pair it with a vampire flamethrower (yes, really), things tend to get a bit more manageable. Even with those items, you can still find yourself getting stuck in a lengthy combo. This is only a problem when you're facing lots of enemies at once, but that happens so often in NecroVisioN that your more powerful attacks can leave you vulnerable to mobs of enemies.
Fortunately, the game compensates for it's unusually high difficulty by slowing down time when you're near death, giving you one last chance to pull of whatever spectacular move is required to get you out of a tight spot. The game also allows you to slowly recover health during the rare lulls in the action, so you won't be scouring the level looking for health after every combat.
Still when you add in the slow motion moves, the combos, the wide range of melee attacks, and ranged weapons, (not to mention the rage meter and the ridiculous blurry vision that comes from scoring certain successful attacks), sometimes it's almost as if there's too much going on in the game. You can simplify, of course, by just focusing on the features and weapons that you like, but it seems as if the developers might have streamlined things a bit. The adrenaline system isn't nearly as important in the first half of the game, for instance, and once you get the vampire weapons, there's not much call for the trench guns or rifles.
The enemies are drawn across a wide range of types, from rank and file German solders to fiery flying mantas to hulking mechanical men. Toss in a few ogres, a couple of tanks, and some ghostly apparitions and you've got all the bases covered. The enemies here are tough and come at you in large numbers, and even the medium difficultly level is going to challenge most players. That's good because the artificial intelligence leaves them helpless to do anything other than to run straight at you, occasionally resulting in fights where you literally have a dozen enemies all right in your face. There's no shortage of targets in this environment but their repetitive attacks can get a bit tiresome. Even so, there are always a few laughs to be found in watching them bump up against the levels' invisible walls and get stuck in objects in the environment.
To be fair, it's not all about combat. There are a few straightforward puzzles here, mostly involving bypassing whatever barrier is blocking your forward progress. Sometimes this means blowing up a generator or finding a lever or grabbing a key, but the Medal of Honor-style compass at the top of the screen usually points you in the right direction, so you'll never have to think too hard about what to do next. There's still plenty of opportunity for exploration though, with tons of secret areas containing items to increase your power in combat. You can even unlock challenge levels that can be completed to gain access to permanent additions to your arsenal.
NecroVisioN's graphics are generally quite dark, both in terms of lighting and overall content. The enemies are fairly predictable but they fit the tone of the game very nicely. Yes, the zombies get a little tiresome and their polygon count leaves a bit to be desired, but their animation and overall appearance are unsettling enough that you don't need much encouragement to kill them. The big bosses are even more threatening. Your first confrontation with Dr. Zimmerman doesn't quite live up to the massive scale of the original Painkiller, but it's still a monster of an encounter. The lighting and many of the effects are very good overall, but the textures seem a bit muddy in places. We've seen a few people have problems with the overall performance, but we've been able to enjoy the game with a nice balance between the visuals and the framerate.
Sound is another matter altogether. While the weapon sounds and some of the ambient noises are okay, the voice acting is just terrible. The main character literally sounds like two different actors voiced him. In one sequence, he's a gruff Bruce Campbell type and in the very next scene he sounds like George W. Bush. The music is the predictable heavy rock soundtrack, which is at odds with the gravitas that some of the other elements in the game require.
Closing Comments
If the story had been a lot more coherent and decided whether it wanted to be tongue-in-cheek or tragic, then it would be a bit easier for me to get on board and enjoy the ride. Even so, having made the commitment to play through the game, I found myself appreciating the abundance (sometimes overabundance) of combat features and the hundreds of enemies waiting around each corner. The challenge is finding a set of combat options that work for you and not getting weary of the repetitive onslaught of enemies. If you're willing not to think too much about what's going on, it can be enjoyable but once you start paying attention to it all, the rougher spots in the design start to show.
©2009-05-20, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved
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DCS: Black Shark Reviews
From Russia with Love
Question: How often do we hear of the imminent demise of the PC as a gaming platform? Answer: Lots. Yet it's games like Eagle Dynamics' hyper-authentic, crazily detailed helicopter flight sim DCS: Black Shark that prove exactly why PC gaming must continue.
In Black Shark, you'll find stuff that simply does not exist outside the PC environment. Stuff like a flight model that truly reflects the painstaking minutia involved in piloting -- and even starting -- one of these mega-complex monsters. The campaign and mission builder offer so many options and so much customization that the game would score a ten on the replayability meter even if it wasn't set up for future plug-in modules featuring other bladed and fixed-wing aircraft or the involving, no-charge multiplayer component. You'll rarely, if ever, find this level of graphical detail, where the term "every nut and bolt" isn't an exaggeration, in a typical 360 or PS3 flying game.
Black Shark sounds great, from the whine of the engines to the whirr of the blades, the whoosh of outgoing missiles and the thunk of the cannon. Radio chatter is authentically compressed, and even the background and menu music suits the mood. No complaints here. Black Shark sounds great, from the whine of the engines to the whirr of the blades, the whoosh of outgoing missiles and the thunk of the cannon. Radio chatter is authentically compressed, and even the background and menu music suits the mood. No complaints here. Longevity and replayability is virtually assured. The mission editor is fully customizable, far past that of the vast majority of games and sims on the market. Granted, it's complex and time-consuming to learn how to customize, but you can ultimately control virtually every possible facet and add enough surprise elements to keep you on your toes throughout.
Nor is it recommended for anyone who isn't willing to put in a ton of research and an equal ton of practice. We're talking days or perhaps weeks here folks, just to stop yourself from flip-flopping about like a demented Frisbee. Granted, the game delivers distinct "Simulation" and "Game" modes, with the latter being much, much easier and much more forgiving than the former, but even in Game mode Black Shark is sober and thoughtful rather than wild and wooly.
More than that, playing in Game mode really defeats the purpose and the intent (and all that hard work) of the developer. Just check out the Pilot's Manual, which, at nearly 400 pages (even the Index is seven pages) is nothing short of massive. That it needs to be as massive as it is in order to thoroughly explain the intricacies of the game is testament to the incredible number of realistic variables Eagle Dynamics has modeled. That Eagle has taken such great pains to lay everything out so that a truly interested, obsessive pilot has virtually no guesswork makes the game feel more like an actual military trainer than a hunk of software for the home user.
We don't say this to scare away prospective players; we say it merely to stress that anyone who contemplates undertaking Black Shark fully understands what they're getting into. We may, however, want to scare or at least warn those who use either Windows Vista or a slower PC. As Eagle Dynamics says in the Quick Start Guide: "Because of the way Windows Vista handles memory, we strongly recommend not playing missions with large unit counts spread over a large area when using Vista. Windows XP however can handle such missions much better, but even Windows XP can crash if mission sizes are made too large." Consider yourself forewarned.
To its credit, Eagle offers an impressive number of Training sessions to better help acclimate newbies. And truly, these sessions deliver oodles of information. Moreover, they allow the student to take control of the chopper at any time. However, players would have been much better served had the Training component taken us by the hand and guided us through, confirming actions when they are correct and advising when they are incorrect.
Instead, the instructor speaks to the player rather than with him, continuing to offer information in exactly the same manner whether we've taken the controls or have simply opted to sit there and listen. We would have vastly preferred hands-on lessons that walk pilots through the various facets of the game, especially considering that it's one of the most difficult flight sims in quite some time.
So, what makes the Black Shark such an interesting case study? For starters, it's Russian, and we all know that Russian-built military vehicles hold a certain intrigue and mystery to us Westerners. Moreover, the Black Shark (more correctly known as the Kamov Ka-50) is one of few gunships designed for a single operator. Thusly, it makes a great subject for solo gaming.
But arguably the most important distinction between this and other attack choppers (or helicopters of any description) is its rotor configuration. The Ka-50 has no tail rotor. It instead features a contra-rotating co-axial rotor system wherein two sets of horizontal blades are mounted, one atop the other, on the main shaft. This allows the Ka-50 to perform some pretty impressive aerobatics such as barrel rolls and loops.
Graphically, Black Shark is stunning. Outside, the viewing distance is so huge that Eagle hasn't over-populated it for fear of frame rate hassles. Yet the aircraft and ground vehicles and ground installations are impressively detailed and go far, far beyond the basics. Indeed, each little truck and jeep and tank is adorned with little drivers, little headlights, little tires with little treads, and even little rear view mirrors. It's an awesome show to be sure, especially when you use your joystick's POV hat to do smooth-scrolling 360-degree sweeps of each of your enemies.
But the Ka-50 is the real star, and Eagle has pulled no punches to make sure we know it. The design job on the exterior of the aircraft is amazing, especially the jaw-dropping intricacy of the rotor system, and the special effects are to die for. The smoke of launching missiles and the translucent haze produced by engine heat are particularly noteworthy, as is the damage model.
This level of realism is only heightened inside the cockpit, where every button, every toggle, every switch, every switch cover, every lever, and every nameplate and display is perfectly rendered. Moreover, you can use your POV hat to scroll anywhere in the cockpit – something you'll need to do quite often considering many of the controls are mounted to your side and rear – and then use your mouse to activate and de-activate virtually everything. Ah, we love the smell of a fully interactive cockpit in the morning.
Sadly for those gamers with older PCs, Black Shark puts a serious strain on the system. Though it does offer numerous graphical de-tuning options, those who want to enjoy it in all its glory will need an uncluttered, power-packed machine. Otherwise, it's a trade-off between pretty images or smooth frame rates.
Neither does the game load or unload quickly. We spent upwards of a minute on several occasions waiting for a given mission or component to load, at times feeling the game had crashed. It never, ever did, but the waiting game was often a hard one to play.
On a more positive note, those of us lucky enough to have two or three monitors hanging about will want to avail themselves of the game's multiple monitor setup, wherein each screen may be used for a unique perspective.
In the battlefield, the game, when played in Sim mode, is as difficult as they come. Missions range from patrols to all-out attacks to payback to all things in between, but it's the Ka-50 itself that's perhaps your most prominent foe. There's just so much to remember, and then so much more work involved in putting it all into practice inside an environment where death seemingly lurks around every tree.
Curiously, Black Shark won't allow you to crash into a tree, but it leaves just about everything else open to your interpretation. And as if you needed one more reason not to die, remember that the game won't allow you to jump into your wingman's chopper when you do.
Longevity and replayability is virtually assured. The mission editor is fully customizable, far past that of the vast majority of games and sims on the market. Granted, it's complex and time-consuming to learn how to customize, but you can ultimately control virtually every possible facet and add enough surprise elements to keep you on your toes throughout.
Our online forays were brief because we seemed to hit the servers when they weren't exactly busy, but we found few glitches or frame rate issues to mar our experience. The options are many when playing Black Shark over the Internet, and we expect the diehard flight sim community will flock here, making multiplayer an interesting place to be for quite some time.
Closing Comments
If your idea of gaming doesn't involve study, if it doesn't involve reading and learning and the challenge of working hard to accomplish goals, do not buy this game. If quick reflex action is your thing, do not buy this game. And if you use Vista, do not buy this game (unless you don't mind leaving some of its potential behind). But if you're willing to log the necessary hours, train like a real pilot, and memorize the daunting complexities of one of the most difficult war machines every concocted, the rewards are many and the sense of authenticity will blow you away.
Neither does the game load or unload quickly. We spent upwards of a minute on several occasions waiting for a given mission or component to load, at times feeling the game had crashed. It never, ever did, but the waiting game was often a hard one to play.
On a more positive note, those of us lucky enough to have two or three monitors hanging about will want to avail themselves of the game's multiple monitor setup, wherein each screen may be used for a unique perspective.
In the battlefield, the game, when played in Sim mode, is as difficult as they come. Missions range from patrols to all-out attacks to payback to all things in between, but it's the Ka-50 itself that's perhaps your most prominent foe. There's just so much to remember, and then so much more work involved in putting it all into practice inside an environment where death seemingly lurks around every tree.
Curiously, Black Shark won't allow you to crash into a tree, but it leaves just about everything else open to your interpretation. And as if you needed one more reason not to die, remember that the game won't allow you to jump into your wingman's chopper when you do.
Our online forays were brief because we seemed to hit the servers when they weren't exactly busy, but we found few glitches or frame rate issues to mar our experience. The options are many when playing Black Shark over the Internet, and we expect the diehard flight sim community will flock here, making multiplayer an interesting place to be for quite some time. 
©2009-05-13, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All Rights Reserved
Velvet Assassin
Not the way to win World War II.
Although the mountain of games, which are produced by seemingly every week, you believe otherwise, the Second World War was not entirely on massive battles between armies, Hitler's halt search occult objects or by sending a One-man Wrecking Crew win the war alone. It was a lot of secret agents, resistance fighters and soldiers, have contributed to lowering the Third Reich. Consider, for example, Violette Szabo, a British secret agent's decorated service during the war. Replay Studios and SouthPeak Games, inspired by her story, created Velvet Assassin is a stealth action title that places players deep behind enemy lines to cause havoc in the German army. Unfortunately, the weak story and a very inconsistent stealth elements seriously hamper the game.Velvet Assassin is a story told from the perspective of retrospective and introduces players to Violette Summer, a British secret agent, which is often sent behind enemy lines. Unfortunately for her, the game begins with the tragic turn of events: Violette was seriously injured and is trying to restore the remote French hospital. As she lies in a coma, remembers many of his previous missions, which could be sent to the destruction of key facilities or assassinate German officers. For the most part, the story sequences are scruffy - briefings on the mission are shown through several photos, which explains how to animate, what must be done. But these are very short, lasting about thirty seconds each. There is very little information about why it's in the hospital, or why it believes it is necessary to explain or tell her adventure. It's only in the last mission will be completed on certain elements of the backstory, but this is too little too late. As a result, the story does not really make any sense, and that would be told, usually without flashbacks, moving from one mission to another. Even if the mechanic to change the morphine (which I will receive later), it would be much more meaningful than the crowded story, as it currently exists.
Story potholes Party, the main objective of this game is about a stealth attempt to infiltrate into the enemy bases and installations. To assist you in achieving this goal, colored silhouette is located at the bottom left of the screen. If the silhouette is shown in purple, Violet is completely obscured from view, which enables the movement quietly from place to place and prepare to strike with inconspicuous cover the attack of the shadow. As Violette sneaks for the intended target screen slowly turns red, giving you an indication of when is best time to strike. If you manage to pull off the move without you saw someone, and killing blow animation will play in response, so you can see the division of a neck, slicing a tendon or repeatedly plunging the blade into her enemies, including brutal strikes.
It is clear that leaving the body lying around will alert any guard that comes across his way, even if it can be used as a tactic to isolate and eliminate the other soldiers. Violette can also perform several other stealthy maneuvers to confusion, such as breaking fuse boxes on the part of the area, in the dark, or whistling to get someone's attention. You will have to be careful, of course, because the enemy will try their best to detect any of the ordinary, such as shattered glass on the corridor floor. They'll also search the groups and, consequently, the flashlights to peer into the shadows. Totally blow your cover, and you'll have to either fight or flee as the guards call for backup and shoot at each other. This often means disappear into the shadows and standing still hiding in lockers or cabinets, or leaving the area to record the position of the drops.
You will be expected with such a high focus on the hidden maneuvers that sneaking mechanics would be very strong. However, stealth is completely at odds with performance. When it works, it's nice, but when it fails, it fails on a large scale. This is reflected in many issues. The first is that the game often requires you to be exactly in a position to start the kill animation. Management down to the tiniest part of a soldier by the hair and you will not only fail attempt to get a burst of gunfire but for your efforts. A second question arises in that the shadows are not always conceal you. During one mission, I turned all the lights in the room and sat quietly in the corner and waiting to see who could walk before me. A guard, which was probably fifteen feet looked in the dark (no flashlight, mind you) and raised the alarm. I reloaded the control and magically, he worked in the shadows the way they were it. This was not an isolated incident, in fact, it happened more often than not and forced me to reload several times, as I worked in every mission. A third question, which might some consider a minor, is that the stealth action is very linear, which may reduce some of the exploration and creativity, how to get through each of these areas. Unlike other stealth games, where you can potentially penetrate the area for more ways that you have some flexibility in how you advance, there is only one route to Violet. Taking no-violent approach, or even sneaking past a guard without enemies is not really an option because you will often find that doors are locked and the key guard on their bodies, forcing you to give up on stealth killing guards. This can be somewhat frustrating, because at the beginning of each mission, Violet often leaving everything behind except the knife, forcing you to procure weapons on the ground. Instead of picking up weapons from fallen enemies, you can only get a pistol, rifle and shotgun from the box of weapons that are conservatively scattered throughout the map, which have limited ammo. Although it is not primarily armor-plated, many of these guards will take at least two or three bullets into the body, than go down, which can quickly exhaust your supply and get attributed to the serious danger in the firefights. Getting Headshot is crucial, but it's not nearly as simple as it seems, if you are close.
The only guaranteed way to eliminate rivals in the fight is on your morphine power, which provocatively places Violette her negligee, and she is running around while enemies are stunned, and slows down, allowing it to kill enemies before it regardless of the damage. In addition, clear admission on the supposed retrospective premise for the story, there is no explanation as to why Violette used morphine in addition to mild titillation, which is shaky at best. This is particularly true because after the killing starts in animatic shows Violette independently, is in "normal time" instead of the drug haze of morphine. In addition, there is a ton of morphine needles lying around the sections, so it is possible to run through the fields and slaughter of guards, then run away, to get more corrections, and do it again. Moreover, if there is a need game bullet time, it could have been carried out according to number of stealth kills Violette undertakes to place drugs she shoots you in the heart because it sticks like a sore thumb.
Another problem is that Violette is extremely slow in terms of its insidious. In many ways, this lifts the balancing system, which is a game that allows you to increase your statistics collection items that are scattered around, as well as the fulfillment of the secret objectives. Every thousand points, you will obtain permits to expand your statistics, which will increase the length of your shots of morphine, increase the amount of damage you take before dying, or increase your speed when you are sneaking around. However, even with the support of some significant speed Violette guards will just go faster than the creep, so some stealthy takedowns very difficult. At one point it was actually running better, regardless of the noise of the Violette, because I could close the distance between me and my aim, and pound on the kill button still the removal of guards. The success rate was about the same as before, and yet I could move much faster with this method.
Finally, how quickly a party, what is happening in fact destroys the purpose of disguising themselves? At various places in the game, players have the opportunity to dress as SS officer, which will allow you to pass between the guards without immediately attracts attention, or how to shoot. There are two problems with the mask, however. The first is that you are not able to sneak around because you wear shoes that noise. The second is that if you run into random near the cover, or do anything from your current cover is blown. After a while you begin to realize that it's sometimes easier to try to close the guard with your standard methods than walking between them, because at least this way you will be able to move quietly, if you need.
While Violette animates relatively well as she moves and sneaks around, not much to the fluidity of movement. In fact, most natural movement of the character model exhibits seems to be running in the cutscenes. Nazi soldiers that they also tend to move rather robotically. At least the PC version manages to inject some variety to face soldiers with at least four different faces of the soldiers to kill Violette. That certainly helps considering how anemic selection was for 360 version. Then again, that game does not feature fourteenth individual resolution settings, as well as four separate settings for the texture, shadow, anti-aliasing and shader quality. This will help you select a range of information that should not be seen, as well as possible to make some of your environment as a pop sneak through the levels. I will throw to include a warning if: Your mileage may vary as fine-tune these settings, and you may be somewhat surprised, you have to do to get a stable running environment. With an Intel Core 2 Quad processor running at 2.4GHz, 4 concerts RAM and Nvidia GeForce 8800 GTX, turn everything on high or very high causing the game to stutter and browse only on every step that he took Violette. These specifications are recommended over multi-core settings, so that was surprising.
However, even fine-tune the settings, you are still running at more than a slowdown on the console, especially when you swing the camera around to check what's around you, as well as sequences during cutscenes. The screen tearing and some of that teleporting before it happened, is not nearly as widespread, but still you can see here and there as you travel the game. The same can be said of the soldiers get stuck to the environment. Violette also encounter some items, and the camera itself will have some difficulty tracking where you are. For example, there are times when the camera goes off Wednesday, if you have the secret objective, which is a little difficult to see where your target is in motion. At least the sound is good, and Violette, together with a German accent spoken in the game sounds pretty decent. Although the question of some words used by the Nazis to speak (the lad actually say or bum bum? This seems to be more British than German), it seems that just as there are good supply lines. Additional increases of music during the detection experiments and the key moments also works well.
Closing Comments
Velvet Assassin could be an interesting take on World War II, which focuses on the aspect of the conflict, it is rarely covered by the play. Although it into a secret agent angle, but also brings to the story, that's fine and completely unsupported. Worse, Assassin malfunction stealth action elements that can ruin the game when they go awry, and just point to the random nature of the drive, if you work well. If you need a stealth action experience, you may wish to look elsewhere.
© 2009-05-07, IGN Entertainment, Inc. All rights reservedFree Realms
A very enjoyable and varied experience, although lacking the depth some other children's MMOs have.
Sony Online Entertainment quietly launched its free children's play MMORPG Free Realms last week. World is colorfully populated with fairies, humans and various bizarre creatures. It is a mix of RPG combat, mini-games fashioned after the popular casual games on the market, trading card game and various other tasks that require the player to explore and apply analytical thinking to solve. There is also a car racing and demolition derby style jobs available.There is enough to at any given time in the game, but players who want to focus on one aspect of the game strongly, but quickly find themselves worn thin on what is available. It is very easy to level to 20 in one job and one maxed out, grinding out other than for activities that have a player there, there is what to do. However, for those who want to carry out all the activities, the game can offer, there is a lot of fun to be had.
Tutorial doing their job, which means that it will introduce players to the fundamentals of combat, mini-games and interaction with the gaming world. Interaction itself is simplified. Everything can be controlled using the mouse, but movement and keys are mapped to the keyboard as well. There are still a few quirks with the interface, such as opening up jobs and facilities will not allow players to move the menu on the other hand, work as a menu page includes over selectors. Open only offers jobs with J address. The same is true in the collections of quests as well, there's no way to display multiple pages on screen collections, and we were unable to find a solution for this.
There are fifteen current jobs at stake, but it's quite clear SOE plans to add more in the future. Current work includes the fight against six working positions, three tradeskill job, two car job, and four other jobs as adventurer (players receiving first class) Pet Trainer, Postman and Duelist Cards. Four of the fight employment are a member, which means players must pay 5 dollars a month for the membership subscription (which also allows access to various other content in the game). These two free classes, brawler and Ninja will fight to keep people looking RPG in the game pretty busy, but four members of class are definitely fun. They are a guide (our favorite), archer, warrior, and medic. Combat jobs are pretty self explanatory.
Combat itself forward. Click on the monster hit or made an initial step in Hotkey. New moves are learned, as players level up and can be activated by clicking on the road or a combination of press-related. These movements are cool timer, so must be used strategically. Medical students to learn how to heal, wizards are more powerful magic and melee combat martial classes get moves that will do more damage or more damage to enemies.
The combat is totally instanced and voluntary. This is the danger of the game, but it also allows casual players to enjoy the majority of Free Realms in their spare time. There are relatively few 'pit' style, and some areas are very large and more fun to complete the group. However, the association is not really necessary, although some cases will surely need a higher level of combat to complete the work if done alone. The cases are different from land combat zone handful crowds full of underground caves and dungeons with dozens of crowds. There are often multiple goals in the pit, which will earn bonuses, including any search tasks received outside. It's a lot of fun to try to complete all objectives, although after finishing them once, especially in larger cellars, getting a little boring to repeat. A repetition is often required to complement the various quests.
Two of the three tradeskill positions are available non-customers if they are to cook and miners. United with the miners' members-only blacksmith profession. These jobs take the form of casual mini-games. Harvest is part of the kitchen and mini-games for this, together with mining, sorting mail for the postman game archeology dig and play three matches style. Players match up to some baubles in order to remove the plates. Each style of game has its own unique twist. When harvesting the game, which aims to collect varieties produce corresponding to production and gathering enough to create a full barrel. The mining industry is to get ores and gems at the bottom of the plate to go, the corresponding bubbles below them. Although there is good variety to the game, if players are not a fan of match three style casual game, it will quickly wear thin. Cooking and smithery involve a different type of casual game like Cooking Mama. Players have to complete certain objectives with the use of basic skills, such as smashing, casting and moving the mouse quickly. For example, to turn the ore into bars, the first player to break the ore into bits, then pour the liquid into the jug, then use the bottle to get the fire really hot, then pour the melted ore into a form. Once again, for fans of this type of game, it will give hours and hours of fun, new recipes as you can learn or buy. However, cooking or smithery game quickly gets boring for people who want more variety to their play.
The balancing aspect of this game is very simple. Players earn Stardust aspects of completing a work search. Stardust level to work and any active combat earns sappiness in the fight against any player will work in. balancing is also often reward players with new items, or knowledge. Chef recipes and learn most of the classes of clothing and equipment rewards. It's exciting to get a new hat or shirt and see how it looks. In fact, the clothing aspect of Free Realms from the salaries of clothing for clothing, which can be bought with coins from the manufacturers or from the market, it is very pleasant for anyone who likes to mix and match clothes.
There are many quests in the game that have nothing to do with the specific task, so you will not be granted Stardust, but instead will have other rewards, especially coins (which can be used to purchase goods from sellers) and treasure tickets, which can be used in the Cave bridge at Sanctuary (center of the region on the map). Purchase these tickets will have players random items on a specific level range. It is a fun little activity, and tickets are easily earned.
Pet Trainers train animals to do tricks. There is more than teaching Spot, how to sit down and talk, though. Pets must be cared for. There are mini-games for the cleaning of the animal, which requires, shampoo, conditioner and brush to be purchased in-game. It must be fed, which requires bowls, food and vitamins, all purchased in-game. Once aspect of care is taken, then the coaches can 'play' with their pets in teaching them all sorts of tricks. This is another kind of mini-games, pet tricks gestures, as each trick is connected with the movement of the mouse on the screen. The faster and more precise movement is, the better will teach pet trick. Players may only pet tricks to learn in specific areas for training. PET coach work could be completed without ever buying a pet through the test of domestic animals (pets borrowed from the teachers for short periods), but most people will want to own your own animal. Pets can be purchased from the market by means of Cash Station, ranging from 250 points to 400 points. A pet is not with the membership, either way, if players want to name and have their own pets to monitor the surroundings in the game, they will have to fork out any additional money. Not really, but whereas each point of the same coin, as well as the most pet gets only $ 4 a player it forever. Pets are limited at this time for cats and dogs, but we have time for more types of pets may be added to the game.
Jobs, we found that most have been pleasant and Postman Card Duelist employment. The Postman, it seems silly on the surface of the work, but we actually thought it was one of the most well thought out aspects of the game. For some reason finding the right address and throwing mail into mailboxes in different cities was incredibly convenient. Of course, some are not so simple as the other and knocked the stupid dog was annoying and made the task more fun. One player even turned repel dogs go bad guys! It's very nice.
Card Duelist is nice for a completely different reason. Supporters Magic The Gathering, Pokmon, or any other type of business card games will be like. After the card Duelist set of jobs will earn a lot of players from the card and a decent set can be compiled without ever purchasing any package. You can be on-line to play against other players. Packing fees are game, though, and, of course, will allow players to seek a greater diversity of decks, so have a value for those who have online TCGs. If Free Realms not in any field, it's where a Toontown Online Guide 101 succeed, and that is depth. Although all three of these games target kids, Toontown, and guides to the level of depth that keeps adults interested in the game long after the novelty wears off. However, in free Realms, what you see is what you get. Reach a level of 20 in each job will take a very long time, even though there is plenty of activities to participate in outside jobs, in the case of longevity in the game may come from, but we hope that you will find more depth to employment in the near future.
Another complaint we have, it seems that some unnecessary grinding. Often, we encounter a business trip and said, we need to get to level 10 or 15 and have no other tasks before us to help us get there. It is true that the fight with less work, because there are many activities in the gaming world, which we will ask you to engage in a fight and we will do to raise the level of those in employment but tradeskill and postman job, this is not the case. Once we hit those places where we have a certain level to the next trip to business trip, you must return to the old, and churn out, regardless of the level of remaining there. Usually, this involves only the level but it is annoying and we would have liked to have seen SOE make sure that they were enough activities in the way of employment (or other activities by NPC to ask us to do), so we really feel that we were just doing the task to get level.
The last thing we would like to see in the future relates to tower defense and Chess and Checkers games. We would like to recall more goals for playing these games. Right now there is a few quests in the game where the NPC to send players to beat several levels of the tower defense game, or beat an NPC in chess or checkers, but it's the extent of interaction with these games. Advanced Tower Defense games are just a membership, so you will have plans for down the track. We sure hope so, as a variety (penguin and Bixio only name a few) of these styles of games are completely fine.
Closing Comments
With a nearly flawless run under their belts and several updates have made games for the repair of minor bugs with the game, Free Realms behind really solid start. Even with its shortcomings, it's a lot of fun and so is the fact that even if one of balancing the current ceiling of 20 may not take a long time, balancing all of them and goes through all the finding in the content world, as well as enjoying a trading card game tower defense games, the many dozens of hours playing. It's worth checking for any fan of casual games, RPG games, trading card games, tower defense games (yes these games are so good that fans of the genre should look to it!) Or five training games, whether you are 5 or 50 .
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