Allods Online - My *Honest Review.

Divion

 

Greetings, So after a 3rd revisit to Allods i've decided i would finally put my stamp of judgment to the GP's viewing pleasure.

 

My first trip to Allods was during Open Beta, tried it again shortly after launch, tonight was my 3rd, and final visit to it's login screen.

 

Where to begin..

 

Well lets start off with the obvious, graphics - For a free  to play game,  the graphics are outstanding, but nothing impressive in the overall term as it pertains to MMORPGs, for the market standards they are sub-par for F2P standards they are sub-par, I say this with a hint of reserve, games such as SUN,  Vindictus, Requiem, among others show that this -cartoony- style of graphics are now outdated for the F2P Market, even big titles like LOTR, DDO, and EQ2 have gone to F2P models meaning by far the graphics from Allods are far from anything I would consider unique or awe inspiring.

As a matter of fact unique is exactly what they are not, a couple minutes in game and you will recognize Allods as an instant WoW Clone, more so then Runes of Magic.

 

Overall game play is somewhat stiff, but still more fluid then many F2Ps, giving some enjoyability to combat mechanics, the interface is fairly user-friendly, but still needs work.

 

While it may appear as if there is a great many classes to choose from you'll learn quickly that this is simply a facade, or even a misdirected trick to make the game appear to house more classes then they really do, most the "Archetypes" (Race specific twists to classes, Ex. Orc Paladin is a reaver) are very unattractive to play as an off shoot race - There is little difference so why not choose the warrior/race combo with the best stat bonus.

 

I found myself rolling several characters as nothing I tried really -felt- right to me, Rangers/Archers/ect. didn't really feel like agile stealthy ranged attackers, my healer didn't get his first heal til after level 5 - and either by some bug or by design his heal would heal for about 15HP (On a character with 700 max HP), even though the tooltip clearly stated "75hp".  I found the Warden classes to be the most enjoyable, but ran into issues with not enough control over my pet actions, and lack of pet skills, mind you i only played til level 10ish on all my characters.

 

The thing is, i couldn't bare to keep this game installed long then a few hours all 3 times i played it. The ONLY thing i truly seemed to enjoy was the Risen Race (Which appear to be a hardcore knock-off of the Warhammer Necron race.) The Risen are Undead who have been resurrected and combined with mechanical/cyborg parts, the animation for The Risen is nearly identical to WoW's Undead, the jumping animation is nearly 100% the same.

 

The game still appears to suffer from many major bugs (Falling through floors in instances, spells/abilities not working right), the XP Rate is pretty low, even at level 5 it could take an hour to level, meaning serious amount of time must be invested to even reach level 10, the quests do not reward a proper ratio of reward vrs work.

 

Overall this game just really feels off it looks promising but you'll quickly start to have déjà vu when you're playing, you would be better off going directly to the source, and playing WoW then this, I'm not quite sure what attracts people to this game, there is little attraction beyond simply testin the waters, and i for one didn't like it.

 

(Disclaimer, this is my HONEST opinion, I'm not a fanboy or troll, and i will not respond to any who are so reply with that on your mind.)

 

EDIT : Sorry about the poll it left out the last option of "No, and i disagree". 

Karesh

Hm, I don't recall it taking an hour to gain a level (at least not at first). It's pretty easy to get a lvl a day till max lvl (about a months time). Other than that, while I understand the game couldn't keep you interested, I wouldn't say 3 hours in game is enough to make a good review. But I guess it is only how you feel about the game, and not quite a full game review.  

Allods was probably the most enjoyable mmo experience I've had....oh well.

Divion

Originally posted by Karesh

Hm, I don't recall it taking an hour to gain a level (at least not at first). It's pretty easy to get a lvl a day till max lvl (about a months time). Other than that, while I understand the game couldn't keep you interested, I wouldn't say 3 hours in game is enough to make a good review. But I guess it is only how you feel about the game, and not quite a full game review.  

Allods was probably the most enjoyable mmo experience I've had....oh well.

I had -ALLOT- more than 3 hours of game-time.

 

And yes, i was experiencing 30-60 minute level times around level(s) 5-8, just questing with the starting quest hub.

 

I'd say overall maybe 15 hours of solid game time.

Karesh

Originally posted by Divion

Originally posted by Karesh

Hm, I don't recall it taking an hour to gain a level (at least not at first). It's pretty easy to get a lvl a day till max lvl (about a months time). Other than that, while I understand the game couldn't keep you interested, I wouldn't say 3 hours in game is enough to make a good review. But I guess it is only how you feel about the game, and not quite a full game review.  

Allods was probably the most enjoyable mmo experience I've had....oh well.

I had -ALLOT- more than 3 hours of game-time.

 

And yes, i was experiencing 30-60 minute level times around level(s) 5-8, just questing with the starting quest hub.

 

I'd say overall maybe 15 hours of solid game time.

Ah ok I must have interpreted it wrong. I also didn't mean to offend you if I did.

Stiggzz

Originally posted by Divion

Originally posted by Karesh

Hm, I don't recall it taking an hour to gain a level (at least not at first). It's pretty easy to get a lvl a day till max lvl (about a months time). Other than that, while I understand the game couldn't keep you interested, I wouldn't say 3 hours in game is enough to make a good review. But I guess it is only how you feel about the game, and not quite a full game review.  

Allods was probably the most enjoyable mmo experience I've had....oh well.

I had -ALLOT- more than 3 hours of game-time.

 

And yes, i was experiencing 30-60 minute level times around level(s) 5-8, just questing with the starting quest hub.

 

I'd say overall maybe 15 hours of solid game time.

Did you not use fatigue at all? It is essentially double XP. I am able to get from 1 to 8 in a matter of 2 hours tops.

Also, you never made it past 10 with 15 hours played? In my opinion, you haven't played the game nearly enough to give an "honest" review.

Tyrrhon

You are giving review of something that anyone can easily experience and express himself.

You are bashing the good or at minimum standard aspects of the game, never touching the real issues with Allods (forced cash shop, PvP implementation, steep level differences and gear dependency).

Even you voting is lacking, "No and I disagree" is missing.

Daedrick

I never played allod but this review is really not helpful as it only describe little flaws early in the game. Doesn't tell me anything at all about the rest nor any of the major issues. Well, the biggest one is the fact that its WoW made by russian, but what about the rest? If thats all there is against that game, than it must be more than decent. Once again, next time, get a deeper experience before ever sharing your opinion about a game. Unless the beguinning is truely awful, then the rest will follow the same path... most likely.

 

Meh