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Friday 8 February, 2008
GAMEPLAY
As expected, the game in fairly addicting. I find that hours of play does end to get monotonous for me, because of several high level characters, but there's always another self-proclaimed quest to take on to get away from the action of no-nonsense leveling and training. That can always wear a person out. If you do nothing but train, the game can easily loose it's interest, which is why I recommend getting a group or party together and go off on an adventure. Look for insanely hard monsters to fight, even if you know you'll die multiple times in the process. Or, go hunting for items that will increase your wealth or life or agility or anything. The point behind this game and other MMORPGs is interaction with other players, outside of the NPCs in a regular game. I for one, really enjoy talking to some people, who have a high leveled character and don't mind helping out in training or item seeking. Meeting people is always fun, and in RO it's not hard to find those who spent a lot of time on the game and reached level 99. They glow.
Sometimes the game tends to get a little boring, especially when the levels don't come as fast as they use to or if you are just wandering around by yourself. Some people enjoy the solitude, but I don't. Again, this game is interesting on its own with PLENTY of lands and dungeons to explore, the map is literally HUGE, but it's always funner in a group. War of Emperium, or the guild wars, is something I've never taken art in, but have heard many interesting things. I like the part in RO where Player vs. Player (PVP) is not allowed, meaning you can't go around killing other people. That is just rude, but there is a separate world, that can be reached through talking with the PVP sprite at every major city, that does allow PVP interaction. This world has a complete ranking system for who is in the lead and who has most kills. I personally haven't done a lot of PVP-in, but I know a good number of people who make character builds for the sole purpose of fighting other people.
Playing this game allows people to become experts at their own class. I know people who have written their own builds to get the traits they most want. Perfect dodge, or fast attack speeds. It takes a lot more work then you would believe to create a successful character. Also, it's important not to mess up on where you choose to put your stats points, because there is a stats wizard that allows you to redo all your stats, but the higher your level the more it costs to redo stats. My friend fell into this trap multiple times, it really does take good judgement and planning ahead.
DESIGN
RO is not much different from other massive multi-player online role-playing games. You have one character, who's class you can choose, and go around killing monsters. But the similarities stop there. Graphic-wise, it is not as advanced as say Oblivion or Lineage, but it is cute to look at with a wonderful soundtrack. The game gives off an over all good feel, that seems to suit all ages of players. It is cute..maybe too cute.
RO does not only carry the usual job classes like Knight, Mage, Archer, etc. It also has classes like Gunner, Ninja, Alchemist, Dancer, Assassin, and so many more. I think this is why this game is so interesting. It offers multiple character options. Not only that, but each job is exceedingly different from another. To start off you are a Novice, the beginning is very important because you get immediately start off with a number of stat points to put into your Novice. Each class that I previously mentioned has a specific characters build. I am most comfortable with an Assassin's build so I will use that as an example. To become a successful assassin the focus is on Dexterity, Agility, and Strength, but agility is he focus of all your stat points. To become an Assassin you must first become a thief, then you get to become an Assassin, were you'll stay till level 99.
You'd think that's where it stops, but no! Recently Gravity Co. Ltd. has launched a completely different set of classes, called Transcendent classes. After reaching level 99 the first time your character is reborn, and you become a Super Novice, then Super Thief, then an Assassin Cross. And there's a transcendent job for nearly every class. Sure, this might sound monotonous, and will be while you are leveling up, but the pay off is better skills and a cooler look. Isn't that most important.
Outside of such, Ragnarok really has no other purpose. There is no storyline that has to be completed, and I will that once you have all the money you need, all the items you want, and the job class you want there really isn't much else you can do. But you can always start over with a whole different class, or help other people, newbies especially because this is an online game and you meet a wide range of people from every corner of the globe. The original game is Korean, but has spread steadily into China, Japan, the UK, the Philippines, Brazil, and many other locales. Image the amount of friends you can make.
I'll say that RO is not a hard game to play. You point, click, and your character attacks. Simple as that. However, to make a powerful character there is a lot of other things to consider. I can not stress how important the distribution of stat and skill points are. You'd think it would be good to even out all the stats, that way your character would be good at everything. WRONG. A knight NEEDS a lot of vitality because they are slow and can not escape, but can take a beating. A wizard NEEDS a lot of Intelligence because their attacks are solely magic based and require a lot of SP or spell points to perform. Little things like these challenge the player to really think about their character, and I think it also helps bond the player to the character, because your character is truly of your creation, not a pre-made being like in most video games.
Level-wise, RO has a wide variety of dungeons and monsters. Settings include places a multitude of places like deserts and forests, and the games revolves around obvious Norse mytho themes. The city of Peyon, being the key starting point for all characters. Although the games has an open-ended plot, there are quest that keep the countless amount of players busy, by looking for limited or rare items, with an annual Christmas quest for the fun of things. I am surprised every time I get back into this game, it comes into phases, but there has to be something in the design that keeps me coming back for more.
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