finalark
SNORLAX
Link to original post: [drupal=1275]Review: Mabinogi[/drupal]
Buddha, does it feel like a bad time to be me a both a gamer and an armature game critic! Up until yesterday (that's when I picked up this awesome game called Okami) all the games I owned I was either bored with, have beating a million times, or was suck on with no chance of getting past what ever part I was stuck on. And there are no recent releases that I want... let's see, Street Fighter IV. I played it, and I'll admit that it was fun (even though the guy I was playing against kicked my ***) but there's no way I'm blowing sixty bucks on it. Killzone 2, while I was impressed with the demo I'm down right sick of first person shooters so that's off my list for a while. And Resident Evil 5... if I wanted to snap my controller in two out of pure frustration because I'm fighting baddies who have skin made out of iron and skeletons made out of titanium (except between the eyes, that's made out of cake) I would play an NES game. So eventually I was driven to try a free MMO called Mabinogi.
Mabinogi is a free to play MMO with an anime style. So I fired up the game after making an account. I got to choose from three races, Human, Elf or Giant. I choose a human and started messing with the face and hair styles. Oh, and it doesn't matter what combination you choose because if you choose to play a male character you're either going to end up looking like a very manly girl or a very girly man. So after making my character I was dropped into a big white void (purgatory?). Suddenly, a bouncy, large-busted chick in a black dress drops in and tells me that I'm apparently a pure soul and deserve to go to this super special awesome world where death doesn't exist and everyone is happy and crap like that. And there's no indication of how you got to the big white void but I'm guessing your dead.
Okay, now onto game play. Okay, here's what I want you to do. If you own a PS3 or 360 go and play Eternal Sonata for a few hours. Don't worry, I'll wait. Done? Okay, now fire up Never Winter Nights (or Fate if you're cheep). I now want you to slightly unfocus your eyes and imagine the game to have the bright color, anime style and general cuteness of Eternal Sonata. There you go, you've (more or less) played Mabinogi.
There's a lot in Mabinogi that sounds good in theory but doesn't work so well in action. In the game you can develop relationships with the NPCs and become their friends. But all you really get is a small discount on their shop and a title. And why would you want to make friends with an NPC? That's like making friends with a rock. And you can also get part-time jobs from the NPCs to make some quick gold. Good idea in theory, but they didn't execute it very well in action. Like once I got a job from a healer where I had to go deliver a potion to a guy named.... Oragan or something like that. First, all she gave me was a name, second, she didn't even give me directions on where to find him. And another time I got a job from a Priestess and she asked me to go harvest some wheat for her using a scythe. Okay... but she didn't tell me where to go the scythe nor did she tell me where I was supposed to farm for the wheat. Oh, and asking the community is like talking to a wall. They're all dead silent and if you try to talk to any of them they won't say a thing back. You're better off hanging out with your NPC friends than you are with the community.
Lets face it, in MMORPGs whenever your doing quests for someone your becoming their *****. And while I'm fine with that, Mabinogi doesn't do a good job at giving you good quests. The thing that I liked about games like World of Warcraft or The Lord of the Rings Online is that while you may become someone's *****, you're someone important's *****. And while yeah, kill X amount of monsters may be a bit annoying but when you think about it, while it may not be reflected in the story at least you're killing them because they've become a danger to Y faction. But in Mabinogi... it's almost embarrassing who's ***** you become. There's hardly any "kill X creatures" quests in the game. Good change of pace, but the quests they give you instead are ridiculous. Rather than go kill stuff you're asked to go do chores that the NPCs are too lazy to do themselves. There was one quest where I had to sheer sheep because a farm boy was to lazy to do it himself. And he made me go out and buy my own knife too!
If you want to be a mage I hope you know some good spots to grind. I wanted to be part warrior and part mage, so I went to the local school to learn some magic. Okay, what's wrong with "hand over X gold to get spell?" No, they made me pay 4000 gold in order to get one spell. And what I had to do was go back to that school three in game days straight in order to get more annoying trivia on their magic system which they make sound super deep and complex but in actuality it's little more than "click on spell you want to cast, then click on thing you want dead." So after spending 4000 gold so I could participate in a trivia game and get a spell, it turns out at the spell kind of sucks. Hell, I was doing more damage with my sword than with that piece of crap.
The game also has this habit of making itself sound really deep and complex when it's actually not. After the the black-dress chick sent me into the world I had to listen to a fairy go on for a few hours about every aspect of the game. And the combat took forever to explain. They made the combat system sound unique and original when it's really, "click on what you want dead a lot, then if you want to hurt it more click on one your abilities. And don't forget to use your defend ability once in a while."
Regardless of how bad I'm making the game sound, up until around level 10 when repetition started setting in and regardless of how hard I tried I couldn't get back into it, I was actually having fun. I enjoyed playing through the dungeons, even though they're all way to easy. And I'll admit that the game overall was fun. So what I'm trying to give you is some sort of recommendation I guess. It's not the best free MMORPG I've ever played but it's fun while it lasts. So if you like anime and thought that Never Winter Nights needed to be more complex than necessary then go for it, this is the game for you. But if you're like me and MMOs don't hold your attention for very long (or the sight of disgustingly cute anime characters fill you with indescribable rage) then you can try the game, but I can just about guarantee that you'll find something much better to play in a few days.
Buddha, does it feel like a bad time to be me a both a gamer and an armature game critic! Up until yesterday (that's when I picked up this awesome game called Okami) all the games I owned I was either bored with, have beating a million times, or was suck on with no chance of getting past what ever part I was stuck on. And there are no recent releases that I want... let's see, Street Fighter IV. I played it, and I'll admit that it was fun (even though the guy I was playing against kicked my ***) but there's no way I'm blowing sixty bucks on it. Killzone 2, while I was impressed with the demo I'm down right sick of first person shooters so that's off my list for a while. And Resident Evil 5... if I wanted to snap my controller in two out of pure frustration because I'm fighting baddies who have skin made out of iron and skeletons made out of titanium (except between the eyes, that's made out of cake) I would play an NES game. So eventually I was driven to try a free MMO called Mabinogi.
Mabinogi is a free to play MMO with an anime style. So I fired up the game after making an account. I got to choose from three races, Human, Elf or Giant. I choose a human and started messing with the face and hair styles. Oh, and it doesn't matter what combination you choose because if you choose to play a male character you're either going to end up looking like a very manly girl or a very girly man. So after making my character I was dropped into a big white void (purgatory?). Suddenly, a bouncy, large-busted chick in a black dress drops in and tells me that I'm apparently a pure soul and deserve to go to this super special awesome world where death doesn't exist and everyone is happy and crap like that. And there's no indication of how you got to the big white void but I'm guessing your dead.
Okay, now onto game play. Okay, here's what I want you to do. If you own a PS3 or 360 go and play Eternal Sonata for a few hours. Don't worry, I'll wait. Done? Okay, now fire up Never Winter Nights (or Fate if you're cheep). I now want you to slightly unfocus your eyes and imagine the game to have the bright color, anime style and general cuteness of Eternal Sonata. There you go, you've (more or less) played Mabinogi.
There's a lot in Mabinogi that sounds good in theory but doesn't work so well in action. In the game you can develop relationships with the NPCs and become their friends. But all you really get is a small discount on their shop and a title. And why would you want to make friends with an NPC? That's like making friends with a rock. And you can also get part-time jobs from the NPCs to make some quick gold. Good idea in theory, but they didn't execute it very well in action. Like once I got a job from a healer where I had to go deliver a potion to a guy named.... Oragan or something like that. First, all she gave me was a name, second, she didn't even give me directions on where to find him. And another time I got a job from a Priestess and she asked me to go harvest some wheat for her using a scythe. Okay... but she didn't tell me where to go the scythe nor did she tell me where I was supposed to farm for the wheat. Oh, and asking the community is like talking to a wall. They're all dead silent and if you try to talk to any of them they won't say a thing back. You're better off hanging out with your NPC friends than you are with the community.
Lets face it, in MMORPGs whenever your doing quests for someone your becoming their *****. And while I'm fine with that, Mabinogi doesn't do a good job at giving you good quests. The thing that I liked about games like World of Warcraft or The Lord of the Rings Online is that while you may become someone's *****, you're someone important's *****. And while yeah, kill X amount of monsters may be a bit annoying but when you think about it, while it may not be reflected in the story at least you're killing them because they've become a danger to Y faction. But in Mabinogi... it's almost embarrassing who's ***** you become. There's hardly any "kill X creatures" quests in the game. Good change of pace, but the quests they give you instead are ridiculous. Rather than go kill stuff you're asked to go do chores that the NPCs are too lazy to do themselves. There was one quest where I had to sheer sheep because a farm boy was to lazy to do it himself. And he made me go out and buy my own knife too!
If you want to be a mage I hope you know some good spots to grind. I wanted to be part warrior and part mage, so I went to the local school to learn some magic. Okay, what's wrong with "hand over X gold to get spell?" No, they made me pay 4000 gold in order to get one spell. And what I had to do was go back to that school three in game days straight in order to get more annoying trivia on their magic system which they make sound super deep and complex but in actuality it's little more than "click on spell you want to cast, then click on thing you want dead." So after spending 4000 gold so I could participate in a trivia game and get a spell, it turns out at the spell kind of sucks. Hell, I was doing more damage with my sword than with that piece of crap.
The game also has this habit of making itself sound really deep and complex when it's actually not. After the the black-dress chick sent me into the world I had to listen to a fairy go on for a few hours about every aspect of the game. And the combat took forever to explain. They made the combat system sound unique and original when it's really, "click on what you want dead a lot, then if you want to hurt it more click on one your abilities. And don't forget to use your defend ability once in a while."
Regardless of how bad I'm making the game sound, up until around level 10 when repetition started setting in and regardless of how hard I tried I couldn't get back into it, I was actually having fun. I enjoyed playing through the dungeons, even though they're all way to easy. And I'll admit that the game overall was fun. So what I'm trying to give you is some sort of recommendation I guess. It's not the best free MMORPG I've ever played but it's fun while it lasts. So if you like anime and thought that Never Winter Nights needed to be more complex than necessary then go for it, this is the game for you. But if you're like me and MMOs don't hold your attention for very long (or the sight of disgustingly cute anime characters fill you with indescribable rage) then you can try the game, but I can just about guarantee that you'll find something much better to play in a few days.
