Wizard 101 Game Review

What would it look like if Harry Potter walked into the world of Pokemon? Well, Wizard 101 is great way to get an idea of what it would be like. The game is chalked full of magic cards that you will use in battle against the evils in the world. This is turn-based RPG that has a beautiful graphic battle scene for every move. Although, after a few battles you will become tired of the scenes that take up some precious questing time. To refill your energy and mana you have to walk into these little orbs everywhere which can also be a grueling task to take on if you are extremely low on either of these. Quests are done just like any other MMORPG out there... find a person with a mark over their head talk to them and go on about your day. One fine thing about the questing aspect is that the creators were nice enough to give us an arrow to lead us on our way so that we don't get lost trying to find the quest area. It does get a little confusing though when the quest is in a building because it will seem as though the area is on the opposite side of the building. The community is really pretty young, but they are all helpful except the few kids that just want to talk smack to everyone. This game can be enjoyed by all in the family, because of the chat filter that is pretty darned picky. There are a lot of regular non-profanity words that it will not allow due to them being used with other words to create the bad ones.

Ratings (1-5):
Game Play: 4
Community: 4
Graphics: 4
Overall: 4

 

Magic World Online : Game Review

If you liked Diablo or Cronous then you would probably like the Magic World Online. This game is fast paced from the get-go with plenty of monsters to kill, npc’s to talk to, and quests to complete. Leveling up is fairly easy and quick. (Tip: When you are doing the quests look at the name of the person to look for and check the map. Then you can scroll over the dots to find where they are and click there to make you auto walk to them.) The map is not very user friendly with only using co-ordinates, but it does come in handy. It would have been better to configure your own stats when you level up instead of it doing it for you. Community is pretty slim too. There is more around when you gain levels and move out of the newbie area. The community does not try to help you that very much either. So, don’t plan on asking questions and getting answers from people. The graphics are good although you will be irate at times when the monsters are crowding around you all the time. This was a huge complaint of mine. The monsters should be scattered more instead of a hundred of them standing on top of you, causing you to click on things you don’t want to. The areas/cities are very small with not that much area to run around and explore. This was a turn off for me to not have a vast amount of grounds to examine and dominate.

Game Ratings (1-10):
Game Graphics: 7.5
Game Community: 3.5
Game Play: 6.5
Game Controls: 8

Dragon Oath

I have been playing the new closed beta version of Dragon Oath that was just recently opened up for public to play. This game has an awesome feel to the world, although there is a lot walking from here to there and everywhere. The auto function to bring you to the next area will be a life saver for your mouse or pad. Dragon Oath is a 2D view with camera angling. I find that the camera angling is easy to use, but not very necessary. The quest system can be confusing at first until you figure it all out. And, the available quest functions are the best for helping you decide what area or quest to venture off to next. The team playing is fun and easy to use. The community will help you out and it is pretty easy to find people to join teams with you. You will be pissed off several times when you are fighting a boss, get close to killing them, then someone runs up kills them and steals that kill right out from under you. Make sure that you appraise and identify all items before you sell them in order to get the maximum amount of gold from them. Buffing your skills can make or break you in this game too. Make sure to stay on top of that. Dragon Oath is def. a need to try game.

Game Review: Grand Fantasia (in closed beta)

I got an email to join in on the closed beta for Grand Fantasia by Aeria Games. And, for a free game this blew me away. The graphics are pretty nice. Not what you would have expected, although it looks slightly childish, but really isn't when you get down into the nitty gritty of the game. Leveling is fun and easy to do. There is some confusion about where to go at times to find the best level monster since there is not notification of their levels. There is a color difference in their names such as yellow for equal to you and red is higher. The spirits are annoying little monsters that will make you want to pull your eyeballs out of the sockets. The darn critters keep crying on you if you do anything remotely wrong. Such as not spending time with them, getting them to work too hard, or just plain being mean :) The spirits are like your little assistants. You set them to go out and collect materials and build things for you such as armor and weapons. Community is small of course, but as I was playing there was no shortage of other members to play with and talk to. It's going to be worth the time to play!

Game Review of The Nightfall beta

Do you like to sit down and figure out puzzles, search mysterious haunted towns, and play "find" and seek? Well, you might be in luck soon enough. The Nightfall Mysteries: Curse of the Opera is in beta, but you can play the first chapter of the game. Nightfall is like playing Davinci Code in a way. The graphics are pretty decent. There is no community interaction seeing that it is not a multiplayer game. But, puzzles are great when you don't want to deal with people at all. The game starts out like a book using "Chapters" as your marking spots of where you are at in game process. Game is pretty dark and spooky even though it is in a 2d and non moving environment. It reminds me of the older versions of Myst in a way. The game of choice for the developers seems to be what I call "Find" and seek. It's the games where you see a picture that has hidden items all over the room and your objective is to find all the items in their list to get the special object to continue playing. You are able to click on people and listen to them talk. The characters have voices that speak, but I find myself turning the sound off and just reading since the voices can be very irritating and don't fit the character the way you would think of them talking. (ie... the opera singer sounds like a german and it freaked me out since she was obviously italian)

Get bored with Bored.com

Well, if you like to play some browser games to take up some of your time when you have nothing else to do in your life. Then Bored.com is the place for you to go. They have games, videos, quizes, and weird information out of the wazzoo to keep your mind from falling asleep on you. It's my favorite place specifically for the tons of games and the humor section.  Definately recommend anyone that needs something to do to head on over there.

Xfire Update

There was recently an update to Xfire on November 9th, 2009. With this upday they fixed some bugs with live and capture video. The most exciting part is the additional games that have been put on their huge list of games that it works with. Here's the list:

Return to Mysterious Island 2
FATE - The Traitor Soul
NosTale
Tiny Tanks Demo
Red War: Edem's Curse
Tropico 3
Celtic Kings
Parabellum
Pro Evolution Soccer 2010 Demo
Pro Evolution Soccer 2010
Lucidity
Borderlands
World of Zoo
Heroes of Gaia
FarmVille
Left 4 Dead 2 Demo
Torchlight
CSI: Deadly Intent
Saw
MDK
MDK 2
Football Manager 2010
4 Elements
FIFA Manager 10
Painkiller: Resurrection
Dragon Age: Origins