Allods Closed Beta Review

Review By: RM Long

Intro

Allods is a F2P MMORPG being developed by Gala-Net. It is a huge success in Russia and is now migrating to Europe and the US. It features some amazing visuals, great features, and a growing community of players. I got my hands on the first closed beta Allods had for the US as well as the three others they have released. I may not be the max level or even close, but I got a great look at this rising star in the MMO industry.

First Impressions

Allods is a very complex game, you create a character from one the the 2 factions, 6 races, 8 archetypes and 28 classes. This may seem a bit overwhelming, but actually it isn't, based on your race and class combination, it gives you various titles, so your warrior archetype can either be a Champion, a Brawler, a Vanquisher, or a Brute.

Now after tweaking your character's appearance and entering the game you are humbly greeted by a storyline driven tutorial. If you are on the League faction you start off fighting a rising demonic force that has attack your leader and destroyed your home or if you are part of the Empire, you must save a dieing ship from League invaders and a gigantic Astral beast.

Overall it is a great intro to an even greater game.

Gameplay

The gameplay, like most other MMO's, is centered around questing. But on the plus side, Allods features a wide variety of quests to give players a break from the boring kill X mobs quests (which they still do have a lot of). You will be repairing broken pipes, gathering bounties, and escorting the helpless in just the first 10 levels.

The combat can be somewhat repetitive at times since your character does not have many spells in their arsenal and party play can be a bit glitchy. Your character progresses through a small single tree of spells, unlike the popular US game World of Warcraft, which has 3x the spells. Plus grouping is not very well done. Every time an enemy drops an item being a piece of junk or a quest item, you have to roll for it, making it so that item you just had to fight for to acquire to complete that really hard quest... you have to do it once more for each party member so they all get the item. It seems like more of a chore than a help to players.

Graphics

Allods at first looks like just another rip-off of World of Warcraft's unique graphics style, but if you look past the textures and at the models, the game is actually a steam punk, fantasy/sci-fi masterpiece. The game features some amazing lighting and great attention to detail as well as a full day and night system with moving clouds. The water looks great too which is usually the downfall of most cartoon style games.

The other thing is that Allods features some of the best animation in a F2P MMO I have seen for a while. It is fully motion captured and every detail is taken into account. So your tons of emotes can be spammed in epic detail as you annoy your friends in the capital city.

Community

Like I've said before, Allods has only been in closed beta for a few months, but it's community of new and experienced players is amazing for a game that didn't really go mainstream in the US. I ask a question in game and am instantly given an answer by the hundreds of supportive players constantly talking in Zone Chat.

If this keeps up Allods could be just as much of a success in the US as it was in Europe. I just can't wait for the Open Beta and the rise of more players to quest and raid with.

Overall

8.5/10
Play It!
+F2P
+Amazing Graphics
+Expansive World
+Massive Community
-Buggy Party System
-Repetitive Combat System
*Only a Beta!

Check it out At: allods.gpotato.com

The New MMOverdose

MMOverdose was going to be an extremely active 2d Indie MMO Blog, but it really failed due to the lack of games coming out right now. So I'm thinking of returning to the site's original idea, rating any and all MMO's.

This will allow the site to have much more content as the MMO industry is booming and more and more epic online games are coming out. I will now be giving reviews on the top MMO's currently out, posting info on upcoming new MMO's, and having contests with prizes.

Here is a list of the current MMO's I am hoping to review soon:

• Aion: Tower of Eternity
• Allods
• Champions Online
• Global Agenda
• Fallen Earth
• Huxley
• Warhammer Online

Reviews coming soon, spread the news of the new MMOverdose!

Promising New Games

There are a lot of games in development out there that really deserve to be looked at, I really hope some of these can go all the way to a release and this post is dedicated to telling them they're doing an awesome job so far. Here's a list of games that may be receiving 9/10 or above here in the future:









Oh Punika, always trying something new, but keeping this nice, simple, and cute. Tales of Wonder is his latest game and probably the most promising. This traditional exploring, killing, and dungeon running MMO is just great and Punika confirms: "its not far away from open alpha."

You can check out it's progress at: TaleofWonder.WebMMORPG.net











Just cause I don't have a catchy banner for this game doesn't mean it's not original. Lostica is an amazing 2d side scrolling MMORPG with tons of great features. This is a really really great idea, for as I believe, this is the first game on Eclipse Engine has made this great breakthrough to side scrolling gameplay. The game is not ready yet, but beta is coming soon. Stay up to date on this game, because you can't miss that beta.

Check it out at: MrMiguu.110mb.com







Think of Arkland as the perfect example of a 10/10 2d MMORPG. This game has tons of great features including a custom built engine that allows jumping, awesome effects, and some great great graphics. The games art style is the best part I think. It looks like perfect a mix of realistic and cartoon graphics. I haven't got my hands on a release date for it yet, but I don't believe it will be any time soon due to the heavy development it is under.

This game doesn't have a website, but still check out it's topic on Eclipse at: TouchofDeathForums.com



All in all, check out these games and prepare for tests in the future. Also expect to see these reviewed on MMOverdose once they come out soon.

MMOverdose Is Here

MMOverdose (MMO Overdose) is a site dedicated to reviewing and rating games that we find "unique." We don't just find those big titles like WoW and Guild Wars, we track down the games the fall through the cracks and we help them out.

MMOverdose is dedicated to getting the small games known, and telling you which ones to play and which ones to pass.