The Free MMO review and discussion Thread

[Ebonytears]

I've also been looking at BOI. It's been compaired to Diablo II type gameplay. I like the idea that your weapons and armour level up and the pet system looks quite detailed and interesting. I've been looking for an mmo style game that I can play on an extremely casual basis and I think I might give this one a try.

[LuSiD]

Hi all

Not quite sure why its not here, so I'll add it.....

Name: Everquest 2 Extended
Genre: Fantasy (NPC Gnomes add a touch of Steampunk)
Style: MMO RPG
Combat Style: Auto-attack mellee, but the casts do the damage. Icons on hotbar can have keys assigned to launch abilities - queue 1 deep.
Learning Curve: Complex start to crafting, then easy. Easy start to adventuring. Help tips and instructional quests get you going pretty quickly.
Crafting: Simple to start as you develop your first artisan. after basic crafting comes tinkering and adorning, making tools and add-ons to weapons and armour. This gets trickier - also because the materials are harder to source (often from transmuted loot)
PVP: PVP servers or Co-op servers - not sure if PVP is available on eq2x. However you can challenge other players to a duel with no ramifications or xp gain or loss. Also there are arenas where you can get your pvp on. So there is the option for PVP, but it is not in the general world, and I have not explored that yet.
Role-Playing: Voluntary - people tend not to, but also tend to be happy to play along with anyone into RP. Chat channel for lvl 1-9 tends to blow RP out of the water, but is hard to turn off as peeps advertise for groups in it too. (Other ways to form groups though)
Leveling style:Level based in 3 facets, Adventuring Level (auto skills upgrade), Tradeskill Level (opens up new crafting recipes), AA or alternative advancement (spend the points on various advancement trees to open up new skills)
Server Pop: heavy

Immersion: 10/10
Graphic Quality: 10/10 need uber boxxor
Sound Quality: 8/10
Content Quality: 10/10
Overall Rating: 10/10
but I am an addict........

Brief Description: Nothing brief about this game. My wife and I play together - it was great fun as noobs, and now it is great fun with higher toons. Soloing is kewl, but pickup groups are great fun. Skills (game experience and player professionality) can make a big difference to the success of a group, but similarly playing with tossers can equally be a laugh. Roles are acutely defined in groups, so breaking the typecast can really upset or amuse other players.

Great for gaming, but also great for socialising - can be treated like a chat room with a gui, or can be used for hardcore raiding.

Pros: Recently made free!!!! Toons at all levels and all experiences now. Depth and sophistication to the gameplay. Some questlines have great storylines. Create multiple accounts and 2box - easy if you have a PC and a laptop, with the "follow" function and the ability to target mobs through a group member

Flying mounts just introduced for high level toons - wow. I had a lvl 12 adventurer, 90 crafter, and now I am doing all the low level zones with a flying mount and loving it.

Cons:Sony are DOWN CRASHED at the moment LOL that's why I am here. To open up the world chat, a one off payment of $10 is a must. (Silver membership) At silver you cannot equip the best loot drops (but the best crafted is available to be used, and it is hard to find better than mastercrafted) Chat Channel for levels 1-9 (and above) can be feral, but Sony will boot people if they are reported, so usually it is within the realms of acceptable....just.

Other Comments: Get into a guild! Guild halls make great portals, and huge help with crafting stations and bot harvested materials. Also create and join the chat channel "TOG" - on EQ2X we don't have a guild, but we do have a secret society!!!!!

Voice chat is ingame, can be set to guild or group or a private channel.

Microtransactions using Sony stationcash are nasty - easy not to do, but then easy to do as well. For example, $7.50 for a fast mount is a worthwhile purchase, if you are used to the zones and want to level fast. For a new player with eyes wide open, not necessary at all. Try and keep my wife from purchasing new outfits on double station cash weekends!

Oh, the external EQ2 wiki is a great help (necessary for some quests) and you can make easy macro's in game with a gui to open browser windows in game to the wiki at set pages. Actually the macro system is a great help for reducing RSI

Also there are many GUI mods, "Profit" being one I used for a while. Ther best by far is the minor mod called EQ2Map which improves the in game map to include player created Points of Interest (searchable) and can nearly replace the need to consult the Wiki for complex quests.

Payment options: Various Tiers of Membership - Bronze is Free. Silver is one off $10, and a necessity after a while for the chat channels - but then all toons on that account are then silver. Gold and Plat aint free so no comment.

Download Size: Optional - 12 gig or the better option of a streaming DL - nearly instant play

EQ2 has its own forum here - live (not free) is lumped in with extended (free) and while it is monitored it is not overly active.
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[brohawk]

APB APB Reloaded - GamersFirst

Currently in closed beta, however if you had an account when it was Real Time Worlds, you can play.

Fun game in my opinion and I am not much of a PvP player, which APB is pretty much PvP with very limited PvE in the guise of stealing/impounding stolen goods depending on if you are a cop or a ganger. Mostly you get missions to do one of several things and they have multiple stages. So for instance you may have defend/hold/capture or kill the leader or hack/paint/steal something.

Equipment unlocks are based on rank and prestige with your contacts. Weapons, equipment, modifications, vehicles and clothing are available. Equipment is pretty useful since it reduces the amount of time required to do various missions. Mods are for your car and weapons, but only some of them have slots you can add the mods to.

The main part of the game is group PvP. You may start a mission as the only person on your team but you can call backup. Also, they do have quite a bit of achievements in game that also open up gear for you to attain. The game has built-in voice, so once you are in a group, you can talk. The comms are pretty good too. Teamwork is key to winning as well.

Personally, I suck at PvP and die about 10 times for every kill, but it is still fun.

[Sloffe]

Just received an email today from the fallen earth team. Looks like there's been a change of ownership and they'll be introducing a f2p model in the coming months.

[naboo]

I occasionally jump into Dead Frontier. Very simple isometric zombie shooter(though it claims to be 3d you can't change the camera angle). You run it in the browser with unity.

Basically you wander around collecting loot and shooting zombies in a massive post-apocolyptic city. There are lots of different weapons and possible character builds.

Nice trading system, but the mission/quest system is new and is still a bit clunky.

It is in open beta but works nicely, i've hardly ever seen it bug out.

Good one to just jump into and wander around for a while, although I would like to try it with a group, see how that goes.

I recommend it if you like zombies.