Rift Review!

Finally got some time till I have to clean the little crap out of my old place to write up a review.

Like i said in a previous post this game is basically what made a ton of ppl go out a preorder warhammer online. The game has delivered everything that it has promised to its players.  In the three different beta events I have been in the devs have improved the game by listening to all the feed back they have received.  I had to go back and lvl another character to see just ho much has changed.

Class wise there are 4 major classes which are warrior, cleric, rogue and mage.  With each class there are so far 7 different sub classes you can mix and match to go with it with others either hidden or unlocked from pvp.  For example my warrior is a champion(MS warrior from wow) Riftblade(thane from DAoC) and a voidknight (mage tank class).  The skills you gain with the 3 different combos depends on where you put your "talent" points.  As you put points up a tree you unlock skills depending on how many you put in said tree.  You can mix and match all of them to make some really unique character builds.  They also have the option for people to have different class set ups to change their class role when ever you want.  The build above i've been using for pvp, I have another soul set for tanking and dps.  So far no class is OP or UP.  I have saw everyone playing everything.

Rifts are now AWESOMEOMGOMGOMGOMGOMG.  I've said before that these will open up and start taking over the land and towns. These events are public quest from warhammer online but so much better.  Now players can call in reinforcements from their side to attack and take over towns of the other faction.  Invasions are now hella hard at times.  Leaving a rift open for so long will let more and more mobs pour into the area and they will attack!  There are a ton of different type of invasion mobs depending on the lvl area they spawn in.  Last night i fought in a group with 2 raid rift mobs.  Took 20 of us around 5-10 mins to kill both of these with the other faction trying to wipe us and take the mob for themselves.  Rewards from this is collectible items you turn in for quest, elemental currency you use for buying some decent items and elemental consumables they have come in handy so many times for me.

The instances so far have been great.  They start off being a little challenging for players until you get your 1st run over with and know the fights.  They all have great rewards and once you finish all the quest you can still earn end rewards in gold and exp.  Instance grinding got a ton better with this.  If you don't like instances you need to do it at least once because as you level you will return back to these and they will be different and bigger as you progress in the game.  At the end of each of the instances that are out you can see a ton of things unavailable to you.

Questing is the usual go kill x x times or collect x of x.  That always blows but its really hard to get away from this type of game play.  The good news with this is after the 1st beta they turned the spawn rates way up so if a area is way over populated with people you wont be sitting there fighting for mobs or collects forever.  Feels like they found a good balance with this.  You go in kill the mobs while not raging at people tagging from you and move to the next quest.  The spawns are not fast so that your swarmed with a ton of mobs going on you but you wont be waiting for 2-3+mins for a mob to pop.

Death in this game is fairly cool.  You die and have the option to either soul walk or res at a graveyard.  Every time you do either your soul vitality will drop and you will start to lose stat points till you recover them from a healer npc.  Of course there is still resurrection from your buddies.  No more OMG THIS LONGASSWALKISTAKINFOREVERSOMEONESHOOTME!!!!

"flight paths" are now teleporting to different major cities instead of riding a few mins as you go fix a drink or take a piss/shit.  They are not all over the place so you will still need to walk/ride there.

Crafting is cool. Right now its wowish with how you craft and collect resources. But as you level you can add in items you gain from doing rifts to boost stats in your crafted items.  If i remember right they have all the crafting classes from wow in game with some slight and big differences. No engineering but alchemy can make potion bombs which i freaking love to use.

Now for the newest thing i've been doing nonstop with my few available hours i have.  PVP!!!!  Finally it is in and love it so far.  With 2h sword in hand i have cleaved 50 guardians solo, the other 200ish have been in group pvp.  With no bgs in game yet there is nothing to do but good ol world pvp but unfortunately for me this means we have been camping their capital gates and try to lure them out.  With my guild we held the guardians down for hours on end as will fought invasions and reinforcements trying to get those cowardly guardians out of their capital.

Group pvp is as you would imagine for open world. 2 sides clash together and try to kill the others healers before they and their healers die.  After sitting and killing for a long time the guardians will eventually zerg up and rush us and use their graveyard next to the entrance to keep the zerg flowing.

So far its been really exciting and at other times boring trying to bait out groups to fight.  Once we had just a couple ppl out in the open as we flanked them after they got brave with a 20+ v 5 fight.

Graphic wise this game is beautiful.  Thanks to my crap vista soon to be w7 computer i haven't been able to play with high graphics but did play long enough to enjoy them.  Been hovering around low-mid atm but the game still looks great.

Sounds are great cept i'm tired of npcs clapping and cheering for the heroes.  As a side note i've noticed that all game have the sound maxed out all to hell.  You can't start a game anymore without taking a shot to the ears as the max sound settings rape you.

Story is cool. World is going to go into armageddon if you don't stop the big bad guy.  Guardians believe that the gods will help them fight back and the defiant believe that the world will only be saved with their technology. With me being low lvl there isn't really much to tell other then this. But who listens to story the 1st time playing when all you want to do is max lvl and pvp with your buddies.

This game is prolly the only thing that is keeping me interested the in MMO world.  I really think that this one is going to shine and not be a massive failure like so many new mmos are.

Well thats a general basic run down on the game so far.  I know i have left some things out but if anyone wants some more info or have questions about anything in the game leave a comment and i'll answer them in the next post.  I'll also keep this updated with info on rifts as more beta events come out.