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Review: Runes of Magic
Runes of Magic - Review
Written by Andrew Donnell   
Tuesday, 08 December 2009 08:54


Story

The RoM story is set in the world of Taborea. The world was created by a God known as Ayvenas, who wrote a book in which he 'captured the shape of the world and recorded the origin of life' naturally the book became known as Taborea. At the time there was a balance among the elements but ofcourse that did not last and the world went into chaos as it usually does in these sort of stories. The world has a huge history which is split into different 'Ages' and for players that are interested in it there is a section on the main website that lets you read it all in full. In the beginning humans were just at the beginning of a journey that would see the world destroyed, at peace and then in peril once again. Humans over time had begun to gain more knowledge and started deadly machines and started to challenge the world, they even became deluded enough to challenge the Gods. Throughout the world there was Dragons and Guardians created by the Gods which the humans tried to enslave and trap for their own deeds.

A great war broke out that lasted a century long and eventually the powerful entities of the world destroyed everything humans had created before leaving for another world. The humans realising what they had done begun to rebuild their world and started to co-exist peacefully with the other races of Taborea. They built machines once more to help explore the vast unreachable places of the world, but with each new place discovered a new secret was revealed. From discovering long lost machinery to barbaric civilizations, the world will be peaceful no longer and players must venture into Taborea to help restore the balance to an unstable world.

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Gameplay

The download of the client (including Chapter II) comes in at a respectable 5GB considering how much there is to the game, from expanse lands to handfuls of crafting. As it is also an F2P game the client is completely free of charge, the only thing that requires you to pay for is the RMT store that we spoke of earlier but which is completely a players choice to indulge into.

The game has a few nice features which you rarely see, or don't see at all in other MMOs. The first of these is the Dual Class System which opens up at level 10 and when achieved the player can select a secondary class and switch in and out of it by speaking to a trainer or a 'House Fairy', which resembles a sexy french maid..... no I kid you not. Another thing that you find in the game is the Personal Housing aspect, this allows players to have their own living space and invite friends around for a gathering to talk about their next raid or event. Amusingly enough the 'Personal House' is where you also find your sexy maid..... I mean..... House Fairy.

Players can create characters of 2 different races, Humans or Elves and a selection of 8 different classes: Warrior, Scout, Rogue, Mage, Priest, Knight, Druid and Warden

The Dual Class System is quite interesting in the game, unlike other games that use a DCS where you can only match up certain classes with each other, RoM will let you match any class with each other to make formidable characters. What is unique about it is the way you can switch between talents, let me explain. If you are Warrior and a Scout as your secondary, that means that you can use a bow and thus some ranged attacks. If you are a Cleric with a melee class you can find yourself running around with axes on your Cleric, but, that's not the unique part. Each class will use a certain element of power for their abilities ie. Mana, Energy, Rage etc. Now, if you are a Mage that uses mana for abilities and you find yourself low on mana, but you happen to have Rogue as your secondary class, then you can switch to using your rogue abilities in an instant and as they don't use Mana but rather Energy you can continue dishing out the damage. This opens up a huge range of posibilities since there is 30 different combinations of classes, but the one thing a player needs to be careful of, if you play Cleric with a Mage secondary, both use mana and you can find yourself dry of abilities and unable to use either when your Mana runs out, so be careful when thinking what you will match together.

For an F2P game, the world of RoM has an incredibly large world, 50 levels to power through and not to mention the vast amount of crafting that can be done. The game boasts 2000 quests for the player to do so you are not going to run out of things to do anytime soon. The PvP element has the usual open battle policy, however, players will need to achieve level 15 and also complete a set of quests in order to activate their PvP 'Flag' which will allow them to participate in battles against other players. There is also a Cross-server PvP element which allows players to enter multiple battlegrounds and go head-to-head with players on other servers. Ofcourse this means that it is EUvsEU and USvsUS, unforunately there is no EUvsUS cross-server battlegrounds for those of you that wish to do battle against your friends across the atlantic.

In PvE there is a vast array of dungeons for the players to jump into, ranging from large PvPvE open world dungeons, dungeons for a small group of 6 players and then the bigger dungeons that require 36 players to participate. Guilds can build castles which are similar to that of the Personal Housing, where they can hang out in the main room or have smaller parties in any of the side rooms that can be built. The Guild Castle can only be achieved through members working together to gather materials and money before it is erected for them, once it has been the guild can decide wether they will leave it open to visitors or wether they will keep their ways under wraps by keeping their castle locked. There has been talk that in future there will be an aspect that will allow you to try and bring down a guild castle of the rival factions but no word as of yet.

 

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The gathering and crafting element of the game has enough to keep you occupied for weeks, let alone hours. There is gathering, production, processing and planting, each with its own sub categories (except planting). The gathering as you guessed it sees you sweeping the world in search for mining, woodcutting or herbalism. Production is split into 6 sub categories; Alchemy, Armor crafting, Blacksmithing, Cooking, Tailoring and Carpentry. The only one you may not recognise in all of those is Carpentry, this proffession deals in making weapons... that's right... weapons. So what does Blacksmithing do you ask!? Blacksmithing also deals in weapons, each of these crafts specialise in different types of weapons. Blacksmithing is for swords, clubs and other metallic/melee type weapons, whereas Carpentry creates wooden style weapons like bows, crossbows and staves. The other proffessions you can pretty much figure out, armor, potions, food etc etc. There is plenty here for everyone to get stuck into and it will keep you occupied for some time of the game.

The planting is another somewhat unique aspect of the game, you plant flowers (no kidding). What's different about this planting method is that you can achieve items for crafting through them, basically, you get a pot, put a seed in it, water and feed it and after the 36 hour growing period you get items. Sounds simple, no. When you start the planting there is a few pieces of information that you should be aware of. The seeds that you plant have a  'chance' of giving you different items, but it all depends on how well you care for them to increase your chances of better items. It's not only if you water and feed it enough either that makes a difference, each seed requires a certain pot to grow in and if you plant the seed in another pot your chances of success are cut by 33%. It's these little things that make the planting proccess really fun and addictive, ofcourse, once you grow and harvest your plant, you start all over again. It is the sort of thing you would think would be boring but once you start planting you can't stop yourself.

As the game is a Free2Play game it survives by what the world has come to know as Real Money Transactions. These RMT basically let the player buy in-game goods through an online store using real money. RoM uses a currency known as Diamonds for this online store, Diamonds can be purchased in several different amounts ranging from 20 Diamonds to thousands. For 100 Diamonds you will pay roughly 5Euro right up to 3000 Diamonds for 100Euro, obviously the more Diamonds you buy the more discount off the price. The sort of things you can buy on the RMT store range from novelty items for your character to mounts. Why buy mounts? you say, well in the game you can use mounts, but they are only rentable, 300g will see you renting a mount for 15minutes. Obviously there is more lengths of time that you can rent the mount for, however, the mounts that you can buy on RMT store can last considerably longer if not last forever. A mount from the store will see you dishing out roughly 15Euro for one. It is these sort of things that encourage players to buy the items from the store and is how the game is able to survive as an F2P game.


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Graphics, Sound and UI

The main UI of the game most people will say that it is almost identical to that of WoW, the action bar is in a somewhat same format, the parties on the top left of the screen design and even the mini map on the UI, but that being said the UI is nicely done and works quite well. When you start opening menus the real problem starts to show, they can be a bit cluttered and fiddly to begin with and possibly could have been a little more simplified, but it's not something that should throw you off the game. There has been a good deal of effort put into the UI in order to make it easy for the player to access all the important tools and abilities of the game.

For an F2P game it has to be said that the graphics are quite well done, nicely rounded and definitaly more depth to them than you usually find in F2P games. Although in the character creation the player does not have much options for the character but they will be welcomed by an expanse world, although alot of it is not original the areas are still nicely designed. For those players out there that actually listen to the music of the game, you will be able to enjoy a beautifully orchestrated soundtrack to the game for when your riding through the forests or bashing the brains of a monster in. The only problem with the sound is that at times it seems to stop dead and there is also a few missing sound effects, nothing major but still something we hope that the developer will fix in the near future.

Value

Since the game is a F2P game it is definitaly not an issue of value for money, but is it good enough to actually download and play?! simply put, yes. As stated the game has some of the nicer aspects of an MMO that you don't usually find in other F2P games and there is enough in the game to do and explore that will keep you entertained alot longer than most games these days. We have already seen the first expansion coming in the form of Chapter II; The Elven Prophecies and there is without question plenty more room for new Chapters and content to be added in, when we will see them I'm not sure but you can sure bet that they will come. The value of the RMT store is respectable and for those that will be putting alot of hours into the game there is alot of nice items that they will surely enjoy if they decide to purchase any of them. There is some glitches as mentioned with the sound and menus but it's something that can hopefully be fixed in a soon to come patch.

Conclusion

Overall it is a nicely designed game, with plenty to do for all types of RPG players, wether hardcore or casual. Apart from having to use real money in order to buy bonuses for your character this is a completely enjoyable game and possibly one of the best F2P games you will find around at the moment. If your looking for a fantasy MMO thats along the lines of WoW, LOTRO and such but you don't want to fork out the money to buy the games, expansions and then a monthly fee...... this is the game for you.


83/100

 
Last Updated on Tuesday, 08 December 2009 09:09
 
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