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TERA: The Disgruntled Pony: TERA 7-Day Trial First Impressions
MikeB
Community ManagerAdministrator RarePosts: 6,555
DarkPony is back with a new entry to The Disgruntled Pony blog here at MMORPG.com! In his latest update, DarkPony offers his first impressions on TERA's 7-day free trial.
Tera has been on and off my radar in its past years of development and porting work. Some aspects looked appealing, others not so much: it was to be another quest based themepark and it had some very obvious anime roots and "AZN" design choices in some of its playable races. Even though its real time aiming and tactical combat managed to interest me, I never really got truly hyped for the game so I very consciously skipped on preordering or jumping in at launch. I reckon that's a stance shared by many in our community.
Anyway, to cut the intro short: I'm very grateful for this opportunity for skeptical fence sitters like me because this game has managed to positively surprised me in more than a few aspects so far and I will tell you why;
Read more of DarkPony's The Disgruntled Pony: Tera: Hitchhiking the 7 Day Trial Train: 1st Impression.
Comments
Pros:
"Action" Combat. You movements and attacks actually matter now.
Unreal Engine. A "more bang for your buck" graphics engine. The game looks superb and isn't very demanding on your PC. My PC can easily run this at maximum settings.
Cons
Lackluster musical score. Sometimes, I think this game doesn't have music to begin with.
Over the top character models. Males, except the High Elf are all cosuins of The Hulk. Females are completely and totally over sexualized.
"Action" Combat, while a Pro, it is also a con since one must stand still to actually do anything offensive. The better term would be "Reaction" combat. You attack, and then respond to the encountered mob accordingly.
Unreal Engine, another Pro and Con. The graphics engine doesn't appeal to everyone and has the tendency to make things look... off. I.e. absurdly shiny trees.
Attack Animations. Some attacks lack impact. Penetrating Shot for the Archer is a perfect early example. You charge the shot, fire and watch enemies health meters diminish. The shot has no impact animation on the target, making it difficult to tell if you even hit the enemy with it. Also, this is no Dragon Nest. Attacks are quick and to the point. Nothing really over the top...attack-wise.
Camera angle. I have no clue why an action game would choose to have such a limited camera system. The angles you can choose seem very... weird, and pointlessly weird. If it's not broken... and all that.
Pay to Play that Feels like a Free to Play. This was the over all vibe I got from the trial. This game really feels like a F2P game, or even a B2P. I cannot see myself ever buying this game at retail price and then paying for it monthly. Not a chance. The starting area felt so generic. I felt like I was playing something from Aeria Games.
It's sad, I was hoping this game could change things. Put P2P games back at the front of MMOs, but... I don't see that happening. I wish them the best though. It's terrible to see an MMO crumble.
Just my two cents...
I can't get past the over-the-top "style" as a poster above says of the female models "oversexualized" - that's a understatement, I'd call it whorey-chic (except without the "chic"). Frankly don't care for the style of combay either, the way it's implemented....
I have to disagree with you on the musical score and the character models. But then again I suppose those are more about opinion.
Personally I think the music is exceptionally well done. Unlike some games, it doesn't insuinuate itself in such as way as to appear intrusive. It actually does what I suspect it's supposed to do, which is to be a part of the tapestry of the game without calling too much attention to itself. But if one wants one cam pay more attention to the score and realize the orchestrations are really beautiful as well as the motives. It's a quality job and the composers and orchestrator deserve kudos.
The characters are exceptionallyh well done with a lot of detail on each model. As far as aesthetics I'm not too thrilled of the male castanics lounge look but the entire time I play I can't help wishing that turbine took this amount of detail with their avatars which in my opinion are an abomination. Someone is going to say "not fair, LOTRO is an older game" and to that I would say "yes, I acknowledge that" but look at older games like Lineage 2 with that level of detail and you can see what I mean. Asian games just care more about the detail of their characters. Which is sort of funny because even though they have a lot of detail they are usually known for their clone faces.
The action combat is like other action games. Anyting you need to do you need to you need to stop running. Which makes sense in a quasi game/realism way. I applaud this part of the game play. Had the game allowed constant moving while attacking I would be less inclined to like the game.
I have no idea what you are talking about regarding the camera system and the angles "you choose". I wonder if you could eleborate on that? I have heard that because the game world is so "big" that it's a shame that camer is positioned where it is because one might not realize what is going on above them unless they actively look. I think there is some truth to that.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
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My brand new bloggity blog.
TERA is a prime example game for me that shows how combat alone cant save a game. I had very positive initial feelings about TERA, and killing BAMs is very fun, but it gets old quite quickly. At lvl30 I already started to feel the burden of grind and repeating the same thing over and over. Repeat is not a problem as I expect it to be in MMORPGS, but it's a problem when you need to do the exact same thing only and there's no variation or change in it.
It's so damn frustrating, all these new MMORPGs coming out that does only one or two things well or right, but the rest of the game keeps you from logging in after a couple of days. I want a MMORPG that feels immersive and where I can do many things, instead of these games where I get to do one thing while progressing in a narrow pipe, and when I grow bored of that I can only log out because there's nothing else to do or I'm wrong level for some other area or activity.
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What the.......pony-fanboys? WAH!
who would have thought a my little pony brony would be writing MMO preview articles
Thanks for all the support guys
I know the way he pointed it out was kind of a bad one. And you are right, screw him. But I do hate it more when I make a glaring mistake in a "serious" write up and read over it a bunch of times and somehow didn't see it.
My brand new bloggity blog.
2 things I hate about tera
1) only 1 tank, lancer cause warriors cant tank well not to mention they made lancers op to get more people to play them
2) no reward for pk'ing i pk'ed almost 100 people ( i pk ppl my own lvl dont rage ) i get no cool rewards for pvping :[ it feels so empty
I am in agreement with several of the comments above.
Tera does seem like the type of game that would be hosted by Aeria Games. The overall design of the game would easily fit their payment model.
I also agree with the general feeling that I feel trapped into the grind of these types of games with little else to do until I have reached max level or tread water until I take a break. A few years ago I could grind endlessly through the mindnumbing content and somehow deal with it, now days I just can't bring myself to do it. The boredom sets in too quickly for me.
Usually I balance the quest/level grind with pvp, however the pvp in Tera is just an unstructured open world "gank" style that has no real purpose or reward involved. Most people are just waiting for you to be engaged with the mobs before attacking. This type of pvp is not fulfilling for me. Players a couple of levels higher than you and a bit better gear will most often win the encounter.
I only played the trial version prior to release but concluded then that I could not purchase the client and justify a monthly sub for this game. The combat is entertaining and challenging for sure, but the game is just another grind to the end game, enchant and farm gear time and money sink.
I know that the issues lie with me and not the game. I envy those players that are still new to the genre, or have only played a few games. I think the luster of a new world takes longer to rub off for them.
i bet server getting spam from goldsellers now bc oft he free trail