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[Review] Mortal Online: Free to Play, But Not Bug-Free
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
Mortal Online recently began offering a free-to-play option for interested players. We wanted to see how the F2P version stacked up. See what we discovered and then let us know what you think in the comments.
Mortal Online has been gorgeously crafted, with every inch of detail taken care of. As expected the Unreal Engine provides great scope for Star Vault to do what they wish. Vast expanses and huge cities are all well-crafted, resembling medieval townships or capital cities, as they should. The use of lighting in MO is something that caught my attention with the aesthetics of the game. Light blooms, refracts and reflects beautifully off of appropriate objects and buildings, adding atmosphere and immersion to the experience. But this isn't without its flaws.
Read more of George Dimmock's Mortal Online: Free to Play, But Not Bug-Free.
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Comments
Great article. Star Vault should have hit gold with this, but instead stalled short of bronze. The idea on paper when I first heard and saw videos on this years ago blew me away. After playing the beta I was still blown, but the bugs were something that concerned me.
IMO, a publisher and some developers need to take this project over OR make a seperate IP with this exact idea and expand on it, polish it, and make it truely great!
S.C.I.F.I
<Sights, Clouded, In, False, Illusions>
This ship has long since sailed... its time to look to the promising next generation of fantasy sandbox MMOs.
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
However, the truth is that even with the bugs, MO is still the best damn sandbox MMORPG since SWG.
Edit: the author also failed to apparently notice the "lore" button associated with each race, cannot count to 5, and does not know how to optimise his rig.
Playing this game on Ultra settings, on a mid-range PC with smooth framerates.
It really sounds like the "reviewer" hurriedly rolled a character, muched about in Tindrem Garden for 30 minutes, and then wrote this innacurate slop. Typical MMORPG.com trash.
Should always add "in my opinion" with a statement like that in regards to games like MO because most would disagree.
This is MMORPG.com, where "most" wouldn't know a good game if it hit them in the face.
Seems pretty fair if you ask me. The bugs has always been MOs achilles heel. But to me, there is nothing like it out there. I sure would have loved to see MO/SV get backed up by a bigger company, so they could hire more peeps and fix the game at a faster pace. I think they are 4 devs working on it now. And for being such a small crew they are doing amazing things. But one keeps thinking of exactly how good it could have been if it had the funding to hire a bigger staff etc. But I still back SV for what they are trying to do. We need more companies that dare to do what SV have done.
I look forward to see what Pathfinder has in stall, but that one is 2-3 years away as it seems. Next would be The Repopulation for me when it comes to sandboxes. Since DF:UW also seems to fail. But I will give AV another shot as well. But it´s looking bleak... And if MO fixes things, I will stick to it 4evva and ever...
LOL the reviewer was actually pretty much spot on from what I have heard from the few people I know who were day 1 players who went back when it went f2p.
Oh, and what cup are you drinking out of, MO is the best MMORPG since SWG? I only want to know so I dont drink it. I like living in reality.
So much crap, so little quality.
-Awesome Idea (a 3d UO) TERRIBLE implementation.
I have enjoyed reading all the "drama" and stuff for the past few years but honestly thought that much of it had to be unwarranted (but was stil funny) so when it went F2P I finally got my chance to seee for myself without risking my hard earned (...hmmmm, I really do not work very hard lol) Money.
Man, it was bad. Bugs everywhere, my stuff getting "lost" , basic systems not working, rude or uncaring GMs, server constantly down (which is really funnt too since they delete the server status thread almost daily so it doesnt look so bad on them- Like, you cannot see how much its been down in the last month because its always 'reset' after everytime the server blows up)
-I have tried off again, on again for the past Month or so...Its bad. I would be so pissed off had I spent a dime on this game, but found it rather sad even though it was free.
Why have a F2P when the server and basic systems dont work.? Another new guy and myself sat around talking and laughing and I made an Online friend to "game hop with" (which is really cool , and I did get SOMETHING out of it) but the state of the game has turned more people away than it has kept even as free players from what I have seen.
-How the hell has this been released 2 and a half years ago? Really? I am baffled.
If this was a beta would be sticking with it since the idea is so cool. But it is not. Plus I now believe all the stuff I have read that the TC control doesnt matter, economy and gold doesnt matter, etc,etc, which is not much of a sandbox nor like UO. Again, I never got that far but based on what I did see- I believe.
This review is very flawed imo. Seems like a fair score, but please explaine how SWtor gets 8/10 innovation and this game gets 6/10?
Did you even craft in this game, or join a guild? I have to seirously wonder how far you got into the game? After reading the review, it doesn't seem like you did much of anything. Anyone could have gathered what you were saying in less than an hour of gameplay.
You didn't comment on territory control, the unique minin/extracting stystem, thieving/lockpicking, player housing, sieging, dominating, any of the on-going world events...
In fact, you don't seem to take in consideration anything that the game offers. Even commenting that which race you pick is irrelevant. This leads me to believe you didn't do much of anything except the tutorial than leave. Now that i think about it, ALL of your screenshots come from the tindrem garden tutorial area...
If you're going to review a game you should at least play it to it's fullest for a reasonable amount of time by joining a guild and trying out the different mechanics the game has to offer before you offer blanket generalities that dont review anything about the game besides for it's graphics and polish.
-I agree witht he "Innovation" comment.
But does all the other things you listed work and/or matter? (serious question)
I too never really got far past the noob area- But I had seen enough. Why does Housing matter , why does TC matter? Everything I have read/heard says there is no point to either and you cannot even decorate or otherwise make your house unique (plus you can be attacked through walls and spawns can be in your Home)
Those features sound cool - If there is a point to any of it... Like in UO there was alot to do with housing and was one of my favorite things (Hell, I played EQ2 forever because of the fun I had decorating my House and running a shop)
I saw quite of few people (and talked t them) who played for a very short amount of time since if the Bugs were this bad (and server this unstable) in the noob area- What can we expect in the rest of the game?
I am asking these things Honestly. If there is a point to any of that stuff you listed- Cool. But if its just cobbled together and bugged out features mainly listed to say "we have this, this, this and this you can do"- Its kind of pointless.
EDIT- I also really wanted to like this game. I am dying for an updated UO sandbox type game. There is nothing out there that captures the freedom of UO- But the "sandbox" games I have played in the last few years have essentially been deathmatch games with pointless and broken features.
This is quite the ridiculous comment. How can you write a review and expect to to be taken seriously if you haven't even tried the features the game has to offer -- that you also happen to be reviewing.
Houses don't have much usage besides for actual productivity in gathering, hunting, nd of course roleplay through the use of player made villages. For example, you can build a house in a resource rich area then work out of your house, as people do quite often. With a butchery table, or mining and extracting, or regearing fighters for example. There's even a guild in the game that lives entirely out of a player village(not including keeps and palisade that add an entirely different dnyamic) that they built themselves using housing. You could build a keep, freely place towers to a town, take control over it and tax all the property under you control. No, you can't decorate them, and they could have more functionality, but how can you write a review without even taking something like this into consideration.
Like i said, this review is flawed. It minus well be a review of the tutorial.
-Thats what I took it as. A review of the Tutorial.
I see your point. This was not a review of the entire game since they didnt discuss housing/TC/wars and such. I would love to see them do the game as a whole.
Againthough, I was looking at this as a review of the tutorial and begining of the game.
A fair score. I would have given it a much lower score but that was at launch. I am sure it has improved a lot since then but to still hear about so many bugs and glitches is shameful. Several years since release and they still havent managed to fix these?
No. If you want an indy sandbox title then wait for DF re-release or upcoming Repopulation. MO has had its chance and has been found lacking.
My gaming blog
How can this buggy mess be a good game? You can't f2p it, as the sub players have huge advantages since it is pvp everywhere. So you have to pay a sub for a game that is barely in beta stage and pay for all the bugs. I don't think so.
You are trying to hard, game is shit from the char creation to the desynched movement and crappy animations.
Some of these Nextgen games have real development teams working on them!
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
ah, so you're basing your opinion off from what you've "heard" eh? See, I am basing mine off from actual experience with the game.
Come back when you know what you're talking about.
gotta love this site. bunch of people jumping on the bash bandwagon, talking shit about a game they have never played, in response to a "review" of the tutorial area.
And how long does it typically take to gather the materials, tools, required skills and various other sundries to build even a modest house? Now how long would it take a NEWBIE player to do it? Its a review jackass, they arent going to play the game for 6 months to get enough stuff to build a house just to add it in the review.
Broken shit is broken shit. Im sick and tired of you MO fanbois praising this game and suckering people into spending money on BROKEN FUCKING SHIT. This game is trash and all SV has done is bullshit customers out of money for the last 2 1/2 years.
Take a look around these boards. There is a REASON there is a TON of bad press about this game and the development studio behind it. They both suck.
I played way back in alpha beta and a total of 4 reactivates over the last 2 years. I talk shit because I have first hand experience with how BAD this product, and its fanbois', are.
Hows that AI coming along? Did'nt they promise that 3 YEARS ago? ROFL!!!!
Did they ever get around to coding their own patcher, or are they still using the one that was written and donated by a player because Starvault was too inept to code one themselves?? LOL!
P.S. You might have a little more credibility if your account was more than a month old. Just sayin'
How is it a joke? On scale WoW to Minecraft it seems to be fair to rate it somewhere in the middle. Only because you are doing something different or more complex (crafting) does not mean you innovate, MO still falls under the medieval fantasy genre with typical features to it, even if done in a different way.
A trully innovative title (chosing from available) would be a game like minecraft, LOVE, Otherland, Endless Forest, Puzzlepirates, EvE, UO. Those are titles that stand out from the generic fantasy wow formula.