Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
Haven & Hearth: Our Official Haven & Hearth Review
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
With the upcoming arrival of "Salem", a lot of attention has been turned to what is doubtless the basis of Salem's plot: Haven & Hearth. Haven & Hearth is a survival MMO and we've been putting it through its paces. See how well it did in our latest review.
Under a deceptive guise of java-rendered graphics and a momentary computer generated piece of music, lies a hardcore 'game' that tests our basic survival skills and instinct. Haven & Hearth is social survival simulation game produced by the minds who are now working on the up-and-coming, highly anticipated game “Salem”. This game is completely free (no micro-transactions, no subscriptions) and allows anyone to instantly jump into the world. Various issues arose while I was playing this, both technical and in-game, but there are plenty of positives and for the great price of free – I seem to have gotten my money's worth. Besides, I can make freshly baked bread in real life and H&H now, so I can eat bread while I eat bread (thumbs up if you get the reference).
Read more of Tyler Rowe's Haven & Hearth Review.
)
Comments
Some corrections:
Java is not an "Engine", it is a programming language.
This isn't the only survival MMORPG, take a look at Wurm Online.
Ender's Client is actually a "hack", the game itself has no plugin-system.
Writing a MMO in Java is ludicrous. Sure you can write small games in the language, but Java is an interpreted language, means it is compiling itself as it runs. Hence performance bottlenecks are common.
Just is an instant feeling for me to avoid any MMO this studio writes.
Ender's client is based on the open source of the original client, which the Haven & Hearth team released publically. So, how can it be a "hack"? It sounds like a modification of the original code for the client.
Or you could try one and Then express your opinion on it.Good and fair review I would say (and yes, I played Haven & Hearth for about half a year in 2011).
Only one slight correction: what you noticed about lag and connectivity issues has little to do with the server being based in Germany. I played the game from Germany and had the same issues, it's just so that the server hardware (and maybe the bandwidth) can't always cope with the load.
I maintain this List of Sandbox MMORPGs. Please post or send PM for corrections and suggestions.
Java hasn't been an exclusively interpreted language in years. I suggest you get up to date with how the Virtual Machine works, in particular the JIT-part. By your logic anything written in the .NET environment should be avoided as well.
how the hell do they rate social as a 9/10??? 90% of the time the very first person you run in to kills you and loots your noob junk.. there is no "world" chat of any kind.. so unless you are joining people you know already there is no socializing @_@... most people avoid others to get away from being PKed by people with higher stats or "aged" toons..
i dont think the reviewer spent enough time trying HnH.. iv been playing it for a few months and have died 3 times (1 to pk 1 to a bug killing me by a bear and 1 to a boar) the total socializing i have done has netted me 0 other then being killed by people.. and raided by others.. not exactly selling points for a game
while i try to not rage on it, the client suffers from alot making the use of Enders almost manditory (more so for the better minimap and area of effect of hostile monsters) as well its not the kinda of game anyone can really casually play, as casual playing tends to get you screwed over alot, not only do you risk getting raided while you are offline (if you dont invest the time to get a land claim and palisade wall up on day 1 of playing) but you will find doing alot of stuff really time consuming that casual play would be next to impossible (first palisade wall requires 24hr real life hours to set before you can make the wall, Ergo you have to dedicate almost 24-36hrs of solid game play to avoid having your wall greift by some D-bag who catches you offline and seals your wall.. making it useless.. and yes that does happen... alot...)
i find the overview of the game to be false.. as it like salam are hailed as a crafting mmo, when its more of a FFA PVP mmo with crafting.. though the worst thing out of everythign with HnH (dispite some of the less savoiry players) is the horrible server issues, the server has bad lag spikes and outright crashes at random at times its feels like you have a 900 ping and are rubber banding continusely (which can be painful if you are running from a bear or a boar.. or a nice player who wants to show you what your insides look like)
while the game CAN be fun.. for alot of people who get a spawn in a really bad spot or have no other players to join up with.. the game can and will be downright unbareable at times.. both with the annoying crafting system and the delightful players who kill you simply because you are there.
should add to make anything in HnH, you have to get the LP to learn the skill then have enough points to discover all the item's crafting parts (to make a water flask you have to learn leather working and then create leather, from tanned hides you get from killing animels.. before you can craft a low quality water flask... making a brick wall (best in game) you have to unlock stonesmithy or something like that, discover clay, build a kiln, smelt clay in to bricks "discover brick" then mine iron and make bars to get the crafting recipe for a brick wall... very time consuming and annoying if you "borrow" any parts of the recipe you still cant make it without "discovering it"
Hehe, ichmen, keep calm.
What you wrote about getting killed by players can happen, but it doesn't happen always, and not even very frequently. Yes, there are many bad apples that play H&H to make life for their fellow players as ugly as they can - but they're not the majority.
You even write that you played a few months and got killed by a player exactly once. For a FFA PvP game that's nothing. Granted, the permadeath feature makes every death of a developed character a big pain, but then the inheritance gives you a little headstart with your new character - you inherit the claim and all items on the claim. Granted again, everything you had on your character that got killed is likely lost.
Personally, I think the social rating of the reviewer is in order, not necessarily because of the sheer number of social contacts in the game but because of the intensity. I played as hermit with my own claim and it took me a few weeks (RL time) to get a small network of neighbours for support and trade - and I felt pretty safe. Later I joined a village but kept living on my personal claim.
I played for about half a year (world 5 and 6 I think) and got killed twice while I killed one other player. Both my deaths were caused by me taking a risk - and I knew perfectly well that what I was doing was risky.
I maintain this List of Sandbox MMORPGs. Please post or send PM for corrections and suggestions.
I was never actually able to log into this game...It seemed to have alot of issues, at least it gave that appearance...If it's FFA PVP then I wouldnt have had any interest anyway......Same goes for Salem...It sounds great on paper, but not interested in being killed and having to start all over again...There are just too many idiots that thrive on ruining other players game experience for this to be a good environment.
Just wondering how this game only get 7/10 for innovation. It's one of the most innovated games I have EVER played. It has so many little features that just arnt in ANY other MMOs.
Also 9/10 for value? Really? It is bloodly free and has NO cash shop. What does it need to pay to you to play for it to get a 10 value?
As for the FFA PVP. IMO it actually works as the game maps are so big compared to the number of players that if you don't want to meet another player you can just hide, addtionally you can lock doors and gates so that they couldn't get to you anyways. On top of all of that the game rewards players for hunting down PKs.
I will not play a game with a cash shop ever again. A dev job should be to make the game better not make me pay so it sucks less.
Some good points from you, Drax, some not so good ones.
I would also say that the game should have a 10/10 for innovation. After all there's no other game with the same feature set. Likewise for value, one can't beat a totally free game.
I disagree with your opinion about FFA PvP however. I can't understand how you could come to the opinion that H&H rewards players for hunting down PKs though. There is no such thing.
I maintain this List of Sandbox MMORPGs. Please post or send PM for corrections and suggestions.
i only got pked once, do to me moving to the middle of nowhare after. the majority of villages around me now are dead instead of the more active area i spawned in to. but i still do not feel the social ranting is valid at 9/10. as there is 0 socializing, iv talked to people while raiding 100% dead villages and towns for junk. the forums are full of flame wars and baiting so unless you are rating the forums 9/10 id rate the social aspect a 5/10 simply because you do some times run across friendly non-hostile people, but a majority of the time you see another person you run the other way.. as most will kill you more so if you are in the north west areas of the game map.
I've just really tried it, but the clunky point-and-click interface screwed it for me: your character gets stuck in the scenery, doesn't go around it, and lag kept him from reaching the oh-so-close screen border. Seemed interesting, though.
My blog: