I've gotten up to level 16 with my archer so far in this game. Been playing with my brother.
I have to say, though, this is one of the worst starts I've ever had in a game, period. My first character was a berserker, and it was an unmitigated disaster. I couldn't even get through the prologue! It starts off with the usual "a 5-year old could do it" difficulty, then pits you against a super demon. This demon kicked my berserker's ass six ways to one. I would resurrect and start hitting him again, but he'd just kill me. I'd get him down to something like 90%, and then he'd reset because it was taking so long to kill him. Apparently, death or combat had made my character "fatigued," crippling his fighting abilities. The interface told me I needed to rest, but I couldn't figure out how. No campfires, no nothing. I even tried running far away, but he followed me! Rez, die, rez, die...I was ready to rage quit. My attacks were literally doing .1% per hit. And, yes, I had my weapons equipped and was using the "super" attacks whenever possible. This was agony!
My brother, however, convinced me to re-roll as something else, since he didn't have any issues getting through with his warrior. So I tried an archer. Not my first pick, but figured it'd be something different. As he said, I rolled through the prologue and the demon this time with no issues.
WTF?
Initial impressions after the disaster:
Very WOW like. That's probably unavoidable, really, but it's really easy to forget that you're not playing WOW, and that's not necessarily a bad thing here. The realms I've explored so far are lovely to look at and the music is good, so it's relatively easy to get immersed.
There are lots of small deviations from The Secret Sauce that are interesting, though I'm not sure if I'll ultimately like them better. For instance, gathering is something anyone can do; you don't need to train for it and can harvest herbs, ores, or energy as you see fit. I think they overdid it a bit, though, because in some zones there is so much ore you could literally just run from node to node all day.
Anyone can also craft anything, though that gets expensive. You need to purchase reagents and designs to make anything, and I just didn't have the money at the start to do much. You can also "extract" metal and herbs from items, though this only worked at the start. After that, it started saying my extraction was too low to work with the items I was collecting, so I guess that's a dud. What, am I supposed to run around the low level areas grinding to get cheap items to raise it? Now that's getting WOW-like in a bad way. ;)
One big difference is the ridiculous amount of T&A in this. This is a pervert's wet dream in MMO form. You literally have "little girl" characters running around in negligees--with bunny ears and tails to boot! Pedophiles delight! Everywhere you look, some babe's boobs or butt is about to pop out of her...hm. "Clothes" seems too much..Cloth? There are times I get very uncomfortable with this game, I'm not gonna lie. I mean, is this a game, or porn?
I'm wondering why they didn't just say "$R@ it" and have full-on nudity and sex. Perhaps that's later in the game?
I saw some women in the general chat complaining about it, but I figure the huge boobs on the box cover give a pretty clear indication of what to expect. If you're not a horny guy, gay, or a lesbian, I can't see ya getting very far into this. I throw in "gay" because some of the male characters are, well, I don't want to be prejudiced, but if that ain't gay, I don't know what is. The only thing I didn't see were "normal" female characters, though I suppose anyone can play one of the animals.
I was most worried that this game would be too anime. I never liked that art style. Thankfully, this is not the case at all. The style here is more realistic than in WOW! Instead of that vaguely cartoony, "super deformed" look, you get mostly realistic graphics comparable to something like Amular. That said, anime rears its ugly head from time to time, with silly stuff like ridiculously oversized weapons and disgustingly "cutesy" critters. Like I said, this kinda nonsense has been minimal so far, but I worry that soon every quest will be given to my a cuddly raccoon.
It's like Game of Thrones...Imagine Ned Stark just got his head chopped off, and there in the crowd is Mickey Mouse and Daffy Duck.
Okay, so maybe it's not that bad, but be warned. ;)
As for combat, I don't notice much difference, at least as an archer. Sure, I'm not hitting tab to target enemies, but otherwise it's the same. I'm actually a bit disappointed I have to be so close with my archer to deal damage. Otherwise, I could hang back and pretend I was playing an FPS. Things get a little more interesting when they get close, but the feeling (to me, at least) is not substantially different than what I'm used to.
Will I keep playing? I don't see quitting anytime soon, at least until the free month is over. I'd like to try some of the different classes, perhaps give a melee class another shot. It sucks that they allowed the prologue to get into an unwinnable state, though; I imagine that's going to turn off a lot of people. "Well, they suck and shouldn't play anyway." Meh, whatever, I never liked that kinda attitude. We're all here to have fun.
The community so far (observed in gen chat) is mostly WOW people. I see endless comparisons there to WOW. AT least for now, people seem to like this better. Some claim "WOW is for 11-14 year olds; Tera is a grown up game." Uhm, I think that's silly. I also saw "Tera actually requires skill; WOW you just stand there." Again, I don't know if this is just wishful thinking or pure ignorance. Granted, I'm only up to level 16 or so, but, if anything, WOW is more complicated, with a lot more clicking and cooldowns and such to manage. Hell, you can even play Tera with a controller, for God's sake.
In short, if I were new to the genre and had the choice between Tera and WOW, I'd go WOW, no question. Unfortunately, I'm so burned out and disgusted with WOW right now that I'm very happy playing something different. Besides that, I (along with lots of others I've talked to) are convinced that the upcoming "Panda" WOW expansion will bring the flood of 11-14 year olds to the game, ruining it for everyone else. So if Tera can be a haven for mature players--really mature, not "hey look at the tits on that one!" "mature"--then I'll be playing for a long time.
I did get a brush of rudeness already from the Tera community though. I noticed that you could deposit money in the banks and wondered--why? Can you draw interest on it? What's the purpose? So I asked in general chat if you could earn interest in the banks. The responses were something like: "lol, nub" and "pffft! idiot." Finally someone said "No." So I asked why the option existed, and the response was "So you can share gold and items with your other characters, durp."
Okay, sure, asshats will abound on any mmo. But this was a really bad introduction to the Tera community! I guess it's typical, though. If you don't like dealing with asshats, just stick to Skyrim. Uh, wait, let me rephrase that. Stick to Grimrock!
I've gotten up to level 16 with my archer so far in this game. Been playing with my brother.
I have to say, though, this is one of the worst starts I've ever had in a game, period. My first character was a berserker, and it was an unmitigated disaster. I couldn't even get through the prologue! It starts off with the usual "a 5-year old could do it" difficulty, then pits you against a super demon. This demon kicked my berserker's ass six ways to one. I would resurrect and start hitting him again, but he'd just kill me. I'd get him down to something like 90%, and then he'd reset because it was taking so long to kill him. Apparently, death or combat had made my character "fatigued," crippling his fighting abilities. The interface told me I needed to rest, but I couldn't figure out how. No campfires, no nothing. I even tried running far away, but he followed me! Rez, die, rez, die...I was ready to rage quit. My attacks were literally doing .1% per hit. And, yes, I had my weapons equipped and was using the "super" attacks whenever possible. This was agony!
My brother, however, convinced me to re-roll as something else, since he didn't have any issues getting through with his warrior. So I tried an archer. Not my first pick, but figured it'd be something different. As he said, I rolled through the prologue and the demon this time with no issues.
WTF?
Initial impressions after the disaster:
Very WOW like. That's probably unavoidable, really, but it's really easy to forget that you're not playing WOW, and that's not necessarily a bad thing here. The realms I've explored so far are lovely to look at and the music is good, so it's relatively easy to get immersed.
There are lots of small deviations from The Secret Sauce that are interesting, though I'm not sure if I'll ultimately like them better. For instance, gathering is something anyone can do; you don't need to train for it and can harvest herbs, ores, or energy as you see fit. I think they overdid it a bit, though, because in some zones there is so much ore you could literally just run from node to node all day.
Anyone can also craft anything, though that gets expensive. You need to purchase reagents and designs to make anything, and I just didn't have the money at the start to do much. You can also "extract" metal and herbs from items, though this only worked at the start. After that, it started saying my extraction was too low to work with the items I was collecting, so I guess that's a dud. What, am I supposed to run around the low level areas grinding to get cheap items to raise it? Now that's getting WOW-like in a bad way. ;)
One big difference is the ridiculous amount of T&A in this. This is a pervert's wet dream in MMO form. You literally have "little girl" characters running around in negligees--with bunny ears and tails to boot! Pedophiles delight! Everywhere you look, some babe's boobs or butt is about to pop out of her...hm. "Clothes" seems too much..Cloth? There are times I get very uncomfortable with this game, I'm not gonna lie. I mean, is this a game, or porn?
I'm wondering why they didn't just say "$R@ it" and have full-on nudity and sex. Perhaps that's later in the game?
I saw some women in the general chat complaining about it, but I figure the huge boobs on the box cover give a pretty clear indication of what to expect. If you're not a horny guy, gay, or a lesbian, I can't see ya getting very far into this. I throw in "gay" because some of the male characters are, well, I don't want to be prejudiced, but if that ain't gay, I don't know what is. The only thing I didn't see were "normal" female characters, though I suppose anyone can play one of the animals.
I was most worried that this game would be too anime. I never liked that art style. Thankfully, this is not the case at all. The style here is more realistic than in WOW! Instead of that vaguely cartoony, "super deformed" look, you get mostly realistic graphics comparable to something like Amular. That said, anime rears its ugly head from time to time, with silly stuff like ridiculously oversized weapons and disgustingly "cutesy" critters. Like I said, this kinda nonsense has been minimal so far, but I worry that soon every quest will be given to my a cuddly raccoon.
It's like Game of Thrones...Imagine Ned Stark just got his head chopped off, and there in the crowd is Mickey Mouse and Daffy Duck.
Okay, so maybe it's not that bad, but be warned. ;)
As for combat, I don't notice much difference, at least as an archer. Sure, I'm not hitting tab to target enemies, but otherwise it's the same. I'm actually a bit disappointed I have to be so close with my archer to deal damage. Otherwise, I could hang back and pretend I was playing an FPS. Things get a little more interesting when they get close, but the feeling (to me, at least) is not substantially different than what I'm used to.
Will I keep playing? I don't see quitting anytime soon, at least until the free month is over. I'd like to try some of the different classes, perhaps give a melee class another shot. It sucks that they allowed the prologue to get into an unwinnable state, though; I imagine that's going to turn off a lot of people. "Well, they suck and shouldn't play anyway." Meh, whatever, I never liked that kinda attitude. We're all here to have fun.
The community so far (observed in gen chat) is mostly WOW people. I see endless comparisons there to WOW. AT least for now, people seem to like this better. Some claim "WOW is for 11-14 year olds; Tera is a grown up game." Uhm, I think that's silly. I also saw "Tera actually requires skill; WOW you just stand there." Again, I don't know if this is just wishful thinking or pure ignorance. Granted, I'm only up to level 16 or so, but, if anything, WOW is more complicated, with a lot more clicking and cooldowns and such to manage. Hell, you can even play Tera with a controller, for God's sake.
In short, if I were new to the genre and had the choice between Tera and WOW, I'd go WOW, no question. Unfortunately, I'm so burned out and disgusted with WOW right now that I'm very happy playing something different. Besides that, I (along with lots of others I've talked to) are convinced that the upcoming "Panda" WOW expansion will bring the flood of 11-14 year olds to the game, ruining it for everyone else. So if Tera can be a haven for mature players--really mature, not "hey look at the tits on that one!" "mature"--then I'll be playing for a long time.
I did get a brush of rudeness already from the Tera community though. I noticed that you could deposit money in the banks and wondered--why? Can you draw interest on it? What's the purpose? So I asked in general chat if you could earn interest in the banks. The responses were something like: "lol, nub" and "pffft! idiot." Finally someone said "No." So I asked why the option existed, and the response was "So you can share gold and items with your other characters, durp."
Okay, sure, asshats will abound on any mmo. But this was a really bad introduction to the Tera community! I guess it's typical, though. If you don't like dealing with asshats, just stick to Skyrim. Uh, wait, let me rephrase that. Stick to Grimrock!