miles
New Member
A Review
I came to have look around, a little sooner than I planned and semi-unprepared. I was suspect of the hype, but also amused by the shock and outrage at the "horrible" launch. I expect every planet to experience major difficulties on day one, so I did wait a t least a few days.
Now I've spent several days exploring, trying some missions, hunting, and doing a tiny bit of mining and crafting. What I have found has been mostly quite good, and my impression has grown more favorable over time. I'd like to be able to run on the higher settings I usually use, but too many RAM crashes for that (It was a bit better yesterday). Still, the atmosphere is really good, the landscape polished, and mobs are varied and unique.
It's a small planet. but it has a beautiful ancient city, weird tribal compounds, and a variety of industrial ruins, all of which seem well realized. (If these ruins and the like are going to improve/grow/develop automatically based on player activity - that will be really cool.) The diversity and atmosphere are vastly superior to the sterile, optimized-to-death feeling I always get about 5 minutes after I reach Arkadia. I like Next Island, but the initial quality and attention to detail was not nearly this high. What I see is a planet that has been been very thoroughly planed and carefully developed - a good platform for growth.
Getting all of the TP's right off the bat is weird - exploring a planet is such a draw for me. I only came across one new TP (and maybe that was a bug) but teleporter gathering is a good introductory form of exploration and I question this.
I love my vehicles - the buggies best of all - and there are lots of good roads that are fun to drive on, and some crazy maze-like areas places on the southern island. I try to do as much exploring by foot or car before scouting from the air - it's more fun that way. Later today I should have my first Cyrene vehicle.
Many of the mobs are really cool, and really different. While nighttime is quite dark (which I like) most of the mobs emit light in one form or another, and some have interesting attack modes, the overall behavior is strange - like big lumbering mobs that rush around on their own, but then move like molasses once attacked. The superfast re-spawn rate is not something I'm sure I like. It's weird to sit and kill the same mob over and over again - and where more mobs are present, its almost impossible to clear an area - there is always another mob ready. This may not be a bad thing, but it is different. I think it negatively effects my sense of immersion, which is why it bothers me.
I'll spend a couple of days here before getting back to my current project, but I already look forward to returning. Once the real launch happens, I'll be eager to see all that is lying dormant now. I'll also need to check out the back story.
All in all, it looks to be another planet on my "like" list (joining Calypso and Next Island).
I'm interested in what others think about getting all the TP's and about mob/spawn behavior.
Finally, I have to say that the large range of smaller mobs and the limited amount of big mobs is good sign to me - it means that this really is meant to be a new planet for new players and not just an existing player-base cannibal.
Miles
I came to have look around, a little sooner than I planned and semi-unprepared. I was suspect of the hype, but also amused by the shock and outrage at the "horrible" launch. I expect every planet to experience major difficulties on day one, so I did wait a t least a few days.
Now I've spent several days exploring, trying some missions, hunting, and doing a tiny bit of mining and crafting. What I have found has been mostly quite good, and my impression has grown more favorable over time. I'd like to be able to run on the higher settings I usually use, but too many RAM crashes for that (It was a bit better yesterday). Still, the atmosphere is really good, the landscape polished, and mobs are varied and unique.
It's a small planet. but it has a beautiful ancient city, weird tribal compounds, and a variety of industrial ruins, all of which seem well realized. (If these ruins and the like are going to improve/grow/develop automatically based on player activity - that will be really cool.) The diversity and atmosphere are vastly superior to the sterile, optimized-to-death feeling I always get about 5 minutes after I reach Arkadia. I like Next Island, but the initial quality and attention to detail was not nearly this high. What I see is a planet that has been been very thoroughly planed and carefully developed - a good platform for growth.
Getting all of the TP's right off the bat is weird - exploring a planet is such a draw for me. I only came across one new TP (and maybe that was a bug) but teleporter gathering is a good introductory form of exploration and I question this.
I love my vehicles - the buggies best of all - and there are lots of good roads that are fun to drive on, and some crazy maze-like areas places on the southern island. I try to do as much exploring by foot or car before scouting from the air - it's more fun that way. Later today I should have my first Cyrene vehicle.
Many of the mobs are really cool, and really different. While nighttime is quite dark (which I like) most of the mobs emit light in one form or another, and some have interesting attack modes, the overall behavior is strange - like big lumbering mobs that rush around on their own, but then move like molasses once attacked. The superfast re-spawn rate is not something I'm sure I like. It's weird to sit and kill the same mob over and over again - and where more mobs are present, its almost impossible to clear an area - there is always another mob ready. This may not be a bad thing, but it is different. I think it negatively effects my sense of immersion, which is why it bothers me.
I'll spend a couple of days here before getting back to my current project, but I already look forward to returning. Once the real launch happens, I'll be eager to see all that is lying dormant now. I'll also need to check out the back story.
All in all, it looks to be another planet on my "like" list (joining Calypso and Next Island).
I'm interested in what others think about getting all the TP's and about mob/spawn behavior.
Finally, I have to say that the large range of smaller mobs and the limited amount of big mobs is good sign to me - it means that this really is meant to be a new planet for new players and not just an existing player-base cannibal.
Miles
And thank you for sharing this nice review. I'm glad to hear you like the planet so much, and hope you will like the upcoming updates too.