patriccatani's Full Review: Yu Gi Oh: Poc Yugi The Destiny for WIN 98SE, W2K, ...
Until they offered a free trial I didn't think I would be interested in this game. However, in the few short days of playing I realized what the hype was all about.
This is a massive world with tons of characters, monsters and ever changing scenery. The graphics are kind of cartoonish to fit with the previous Warcraft games, but they must've spent over 50% of their time creating the world. You won't see a lot of copy and pasting here, pretty much every square inch is unique. The real excitement comes with seeing how each realm lives: the humans, the dwarfs, and the elves. Ironforge is a massive city and my jaw drops everytime I see The Great Forge. The characters are pretty unique themselves. You start out looking like everyone else, but every piece of armor and weaponry you equip changes your appearance. Soon enough you'll feel like your own character.
Apart from the appearance you can customize your character even more by choosing from a wide selection of class skills. You can even spend points towards improving those skills and gaining bonuses to use them. Another thing that can set you apart from a fellow warrior or rogue is the trade skills: jewelcrafting, skinning, tailoring, cooking, enchanting, etc. They're not all easy to practice but they're probably all just as useful. Some of these trades can benefit you greatly depending on your race and class, but some trades can gain you great wealth by selling your goods and services. You can only know two primary trades at one time, but at the auction houses you can buy and sell almost anything.
The gameplay itself is usually very addictive as some have said. Once you start a quest it's hard not to finish it. These quests usually aren't simple hack and slash fests. Usually you'll need to read further to understand your objectives and where to go. This might be annoying to some people, but forcing you to read the story of each quest draws you into it. It makes each quest feel different and unique. Furthermore, it makes you feel like you're actually doing something real and not just going through the motions because everyone else has done the quest too. Some quests take you to different areas which can be good and bad.
In the game you're pretty much free to go anywhere you want to, but some places aren't as easy to survive. You'll do alright if you go where your quests lead you, but sometimes they lead you to dangerous grounds. In those cases you need to run around killing random things to get stronger for the quests. In this period, where you aren't strong enough to complete your quests, things get really dull. I'm glad to say that's not a common occurrence though. I've actually had too many quests at one point. You can have up to 25 quests at once, but I don't recommend taking on that many. My quests have been spread across three maps and I was very confused.
Speaking of running around, I hope you have plenty of Snickers available. Sometimes you have to run far, I mean really far to get to your next quest. You'll spend maybe 40% of your time running between places. You don't run very fast either. If you get lucky your character will have a skill to increase your running speed. Even then it can still take a long time to get anywhere. The aerial transports (gryphons, wyverns, bats, hippogryphs) are much faster and you'll do well to use them whenever possible. They cost money to ride each time, but you should always have enough to spare. Eventually you will get an epic mount to ride, but I've seen them run by me and they're still no replacement for aerial transportation.
I've played other online RPGs and in my opinion the sense of community isn't very good here. Sure, people usually help you out when you ask, but finding a team for a specific quest is hard. If someone does decide to help you and they don't have the same quest then they don't get the experience for it. I don't blame people for not wanting to help out. In some cases you can't complete a mission as long as you're on a team. This could be the result of teaming with people much higher than you but I couldn't say for sure.
From a programming standpoint I think this is a well developed game, you never see loading screens aside from instances (dungeons, battlegrounds). The initial loading time is super fast too. The update system could use work though. When there's a client update you'll be notified and it will download automatically. The updates can download extremely slow sometimes (we're talking 8 hours slow), but I won't say that's typical. Also, if you're a few updates behind they won't download and install in a batch. You'll have to download and install them one at a time.
Speaking of waiting, I added this little bit because I've recently been frustrated with their maintenance schedule. I don't plan my day around World of Warcraft, but I like to find a few hours to squeeze it in. It's a lot harder when I plan on playing and the servers are down. Usually they do it in the mornings (when activity should be low) but sometimes I like to wake up and play for a few hours. They do give a 24-hour notice, but I might not login for 24 hours to see it. If I knew every Tuesday was maintenance day I'd either find something else to do or sleep longer. The 8 hour downtime is pretty excessive too. It wouldn't be so bad if they only updated a few servers at a time.
One special thing I want to mention is "cat traps". I'm sure someone has coined that phrase before me but "cat traps" are places in the game that lure in curious players. You think there's something over the hill or at the bottom of the waterfall, but it's only YOUR DEATH! If you fall from a very great height and die DO NOT TRY TO REACH YOUR BODY! Trust me. I've wasted 2 hours trying to reach my lifeless corpse at the bottom of a cliff and then was forced to be resurrected by a spirit healer.
Now I recommend this game to people who enjoy adventure and character development. This is not a game for action junkies.
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