Archlord

In the mainstream gaming world the MMORPG is a treacherous mistress, acting like a double edged blade which strikes mercilessly where she once healed a woe. Publishers often prioritize financial gains over the creation of sublime beauty and the fight for popularity raises a heavy toll; the scene quickly becomes saturated by numerous weak and unpolished releases. There is also a hint of hope, a prophecy of redemption to bring promise to the lost. Being developed by NHN Games studios, one of the biggest names in the Korean MMO scene, ArchLord set out to be a strong pretender to the throne of online role playing goodness. The title is free to download and free to play at the moment. Codemasters handles publishing and distribution rights for the western lands with a world wide release on August 17, 2006. ArchLord - false prophet or redeemer? Find out for yourselves in the following review.

Story

The history of the magical continent of Chantra is long and detailed, available for anyone to read on the official site. Tens of pages unfold the story of the land, way too much for anyone to grasp after just one reading session. Unfortunately the game sees only a small fraction implemented into its quests and NPCs rarely talk about game lore.

Gameplay

The number of characters you can sustain at any one given time on a single server is limited to three. Humans, orcs and Moon Elves fight for the title of ArchLord, with predetermined class and gender options. The eight archetypes are race specific incarnations of the warrior, the bowman and the spellcaster. Thus Humans can be male archers and knights, or female mages. Orcs are male berserkers and hunters or female sorceresses. The moon Elves are exclusively female to play, sharing their love for rangers and elementalists. As far as appearance customization is concerned, players can change the haircuts and faces of their avatars but nothing more. I found the whole process to be quite limiting in terms of freedom in role playing and class availability. Classes act pretty much on the same principle and no dedicated healers are in sight.

Fresh to the city of Golundo, this stranger set out to make a name for himself and Berserker Orcs everywhere. Surprisingly there are no quests to be had yet, something that only adds to the frustration that you can’t scroll through NPC text. I guess ArchLord is based on a highly intuitive interface where you have to guess both quests and storyline. I was a bit disappointed to learn that my first skills can be acquired at level 4, so off I went, trying to persuade unsuspecting critters to level me up. Stat-wise you have hit points and mana points, complimented by strength, agility, intelligence, wisdom, charisma and power. Unfortunately there are no tool-tips for any of them so my interpretation could be subjective at best. Skills are bought from trainers and feature different ranks that increase in power with level. Each skill costs mana so a warrior type would eventually take a hit in effectiveness due to the lack of a higher mana pool. There are potions to supplement this shortcoming. At least one out of three monsters will drop either a health of mana potion, being the game’s way of minimizing downtime.

Quests aren’t basically imply killing off a specific number of creatures bearing the same description or hunting drop able items via grinding. It bothers me that players need to place extra clicks to start, acknowledge, and finish quests. I find the “you’ve just accepted a quest” textbox to be highly useless, hinting that developers think quests to be something incredibly rare events that deserve 1000% of our attention. As I said, they are neither epic nor complex and the rewards are not worth the time involved in completing them. At least that’s the case for the first few levels of the game. Overall, ArchLord is the kind of game where you need to grind creatures for hours and hours in order to advance.

Funny enough, the text for adding a character to either your friend list or ignore list is the same. On occasion you won’t be able to tell the difference, especially when lag hits and that click might have gone either way, but you know what they say, love is just as strong as hate. Speaking of which, playing in a party will probably get you to express either of them. The main advantage of playing in groups is that buffs get automatically shared between characters. Since fighting monsters is usually a passive act that does not require a lot of micro and skill usage, buffs and equipment is what you’ll desire for quick boosts of power. Creeps are usually displaced over small areas, thus a party could successfully take over a spawning place and grind there for hours and hours. I always disliked the idea that I have to race the 10 other players in the vicinity for my next kill. This basically encourages people to camp spawning spots without switching areas and exploring the game world. I feel this takes away from the fun of playing a MMO, being a hit in gameplay.

The controls are cold stiff. Movement is based upon the W-S-A-D cross that controls forward and backward movement along with turning around. Although you can customize the keyboard mapping, the lack of strafing is notable. Be advised that you can zoom in and out with the mouse wheel, yet you can’t mouse-look and it’s of the utmost importance. The camera often enough changes the point of view into disturbing angles when turning and or running up a hill. Further camera view adjustments are made by using the arrow keys. Up to now you need three free hands to operate the 8 keys and the mouse at the same time, in order to properly guide your character on the adventure map. Avatars frequently change direction for no apparent reason and stop for a second in doing so, thus movement feels mechanical, somewhat as if you were experiencing lags. Although characters can fall small distances, from higher ground, they can’t jump and you’ll soon enough find yourself stuck in a rather insignificant obstacle like a wooden fence, or behind a house and the nearby hill. I can’t help but wonder how such horrible pathing will affect the seemingly fast and furious world of PvP. I can’t imagine how extensive PvP will be carried out as long as you can’t dodge, close in for the kill or run away for a strategic advantage.

Concept

ArchLord aims to impress through one fundamental difference that will shape both PvP and the in-game social structure of guilds. NHN developers have a great plot twist in mind. One player will be able to control the ArchLord, a supreme being able to directly influence through power the social workings of the land. Not only does he receive a full set of impressive new armor, he also has a giant arsenal of unique weapons at his disposal. Throw in the mix a fire breathing dragon for a flying mount and you pretty much have the cool factor covered, with major bragging rights. In addition, he can use all of his new found powers to impose a specific vision over the lands, including a tax rate over each player. It’s quite a responsibility; therefore developers prepared a special event in order to choose the most suitable characters for such a task, a continuous power struggle that gathers the six most influential guilds each month and pairs them in a game mode similar to castle siege.

In a timed battle, defenders are enclosed in a heavily fortified stronghold, while attackers have various siege engines at their disposal. Should the gates fall, the attackers must secure three out of the five objectives in order to take control of the castle. Only three guilds will remain, having to battle it out in a last-man-standing scenario. Each guild has an appointed ArchLord candidate who will eventually take charge of this destiny should his mates win the confrontation. Of course, losing guilds may very well challenge the power of the ArchLord head on in all-out war, but this may be harder than anticipated, considering the extensive list of powers available to the ruler. The ArchLord can summon up to 20 monsters or three powerful knights to aid him in battle, can change the weather and has access to very powerful spells.

Sound and Video

The music was recorded with help from the godly London Symphony Orchestra. I am not qualified to test such a claim, yet I can tell you that regarding musical composition, tracks lack the details and finesse compelling developers to use such finely attuned music weavers. None the less, music fits great with the environment, saving face in front of other various shortcomings. Voices are not that impressive though, as they see limited use and lack the undeniable immersion qualities of extensive professional voice acting.

For a next generation MMORPG ArchLord has quite outdated graphics. The poor geometry of the landscape design leads to a lot of rough edges, visible even on full detail and higher resolution settings. I’m not saying there are no complex buildings and special places that look good; I’m just observing that starting cities and the surrounding areas have a simple look about them. Trees are so far apart that one can’t be sure it we deal with a hill, plain, mountain or forest. Grass and tree branches both receive the same unnatural feel.

Multiplayer

Fighting for the ArchLord title has the potential to bind players together in a cooperative effort, or break alliances through into competitive skirmishes in grand acts of betrayal. I can’t say team PvP is frantic, even though NHN wishes to stage monthly worldwide events where players can bash themselves out in a controlled environment. Incentives to take battles out in the open lie solely within self motivation, because the game system punishes you for non-consensual PvP. Heavy healing potion usage is common, as PvP dominance follows the better geared characters when uncanny critical hits rank above human skill and timing. You can attack other players anytime after level 6 if you so desire. Throughout the world special creatures are to be encountered, whereas PvE cooperation is required. Characters can band together in parties and eliminate such powerful foes, for greater loot and experience rewards. I can’t say ArchLord is that massive in terms of player interaction; you will trade others for rare item drops, but that’s as far as player interaction goes.

Conclusion

The overall feeling of the game seems to be lacking, due to the poor implementation of otherwise generous concepts. For instance, emotes aren’t that bombastic in terms of character animation and speech is often enough childish. Coupled with repetitive gameplay, difficult control scheme and average graphics, I can’t help wondering what happened to the great PvP hype during beta testing. Starting January 4, 2007 Codemasters removed the standard monthly charge, turning ArchLord into a free to play enterprise, with in-game buffs available for real money. You can see for yourselves and experience ArchLord along with its first expansion Season of Siege now, through the official website.

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