Allods: Better than WoW and free?

[Breltar]

So I have been playing the heck out of Allods lately. To a lot of folks they look at the screens or a youtube video and just say 'wow clone' and click right by it.

I find this to be an error. In fact it copies gameplay components from several games (FF, WoW, even EQ). Yes the graphics are reminiscent of WoW, but I also find the character models to be more detailed and the weapons and armor looks to be a good fit with the lore and world.

Speaking of lore and world, I think this beats the WoW world hands down. Basically a catastrophe has rendered the world ripped apart and small floating islands of land (allods) are now floating about in an Astral plane. The astral can only be traversed by special ships (reminds me of spelljammer in a way) and several different allods are jumped across even early in the game.

The game also has PVP, pitting the League faction; which is a light side type force, against the Empire; more of a communist type state. Both sides have humans, but then each side also has two different other races league's being elves (which have wings) and Gibberlings (tiplet group of small ewok type critters). Empire's two alternates are the old standby of Orcs and an undead/cyborg race called the Awakened.

Being free to play most folks think it is crap, but I would pit this game against many subscription based 'AAA' games any day and would say that it holds its own. The cash shop is less intrusive than DDOs and does not hamper your ability to level to top level (40) nor does it hinder your abilities in playing the game as you wish. No quests are restricted and you can pvp to your hearts content.

Try it, you might like it.
http://allods.gpotato.com/


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[AgentPaper]

Hm, downloading it now, may as well give it a try. Definitely looks like a WoW clone, but that is in no way a bad thing. :smallwink:

I don't know about "better" than WoW though. Maybe it is compared to WoW as it is now, but Cataclysm at least would be hard to beat. (Cataclysm is essential WoW 2 as far as I'm concerned, much more than an expansion)

[Comet]

You can captain your own massive Astral Ships and go on grand space-adventures with your mates while fighting off mountain-sized Astral monsters and your fellow space pirates adventurers.

Too bad the ship-action is pretty late in the game. I really can't get through the beginning, mainly because I've grown to hate the classic MMO experience this game offers.
A shame. The Astral space looks amazingly pretty and piloting a ship with a whole bunch of other players seems like a lot of fun.

[Gruffard]

Now for the free to play? Is this a demo like Warhammer Online? Or more like D&D Online, where it is free but the "extra" stuff cost money here and there?

I can't check it out now but I am interested.

[Breltar]

Now for the free to play? Is this a demo like Warhammer Online? Or more like D&D Online, where it is free but the "extra" stuff cost money here and there?

I can't check it out now but I am interested.

This game is true free to play and will let you get all the way to 40 without paying. The cash shop is less intrusive than D&D Online (DDO) and the only annoyance I have found is grinding out reputation to be able to buy from certain merchants and the fact that you have to find bags in game to gain more inventory space (the cash shop offers bigger bags for real cash).

Honestly though the gameplay and world counter the annoyances.

[Gruffard]

Thanks for the info.

I currently pay to play WoW with RL friends, but want something else to play for a change of pace. Will try it out.

[Aidan305]

Looks pretty and I'd like to give it a try, but like most of these games it doesn't support macs.

It's one of the main reasons I play WoW.

[Breltar]

Looks pretty and I'd like to give it a try, but like most of these games it doesn't support macs.

It's one of the main reasons I play WoW.

Yeah, although steam has more mac games, the mainstream is not ready for mac as a gaming platform.

Still a good game and you might be able to run it through bootcamp or whatever that emulation deal is for macs.

[AgentPaper]

Actually, it's ONLY the mainstream games that are viable for mac versions. Them, and games that are rather small and relatively easy to convert to work with mac. Any other time it's just too small a market to be worth the time and money spent on it.

Honestly, if you're playing videogames a lot you should probably just switch to PC. The only good reason to use a Mac that I've heard is for the image editing programs, which is a tenuous argument at best.

[Desyth]

I played this game since closed beta, as well as the russian version for ahwile. It is 100% pay to play if you plan on doing end level raiding or serious pvp. The cash shop is mandatory if you are anything other than a casual player.

I LOVED the mechanics and lore of the game, however. For the casual player looking to bust out a few levels its a pretty good distraction however.

[xp194]

Well, I don't PvP much at all anyway

may give this a go.

[AgentPaper]

Hm, downloaded the game just fine, got an account set up, and now I can't log in. Username/Password work just fine for logging into the site, but don't work when I log in with the client. Got some troubleshooting from the CS team, but they couldn't figure it out either, told me to wait a day and see if it fixed itself.

Anyone run into any problems like this, and know any way around it?

[Hunter Noventa]

I'm downloading this myself. Undead Cyborgs, doesn't get much better than that.

[AgentPaper]

I'm downloading this myself. Undead Cyborgs, doesn't get much better than that.

Orc Paladins.

[xp194]

Could make a GitP Guild or something...

[Gorgondantess]

Orc Paladins.

I donno... I think undead cyborgs pretty much take the cake. The only thing I can see better than that is undead cyborg ninjas.:smalltongue:

[AgentPaper]

Could make a GitP Guild or something...

I dunno about that, but I'll happily join you if for some questing or dungeons or whatever. Once I can actually log in. Are there servers in this game? Or is it all just one big server? If there are servers, we'll need to figure out which one to all play on.

[Crispy Dave]

I'll download and try playing for a gitp guild.

[Hunter Noventa]

I was reading about this and a lot of the stuff that's been done to it and am bowing out. Mostly because the death debuff is horrible and costs real money to remove in any useful manner.

Unless that was changed, but I somehow doubt it.

[AgentPaper]

Apparently (http://allods-wiki.gpotato.com/index.php/Death) there isn't any debuff, or at least the wiki doesn't mention it in the death system. You just have to wait some time in the underworld before you can get back to whatever you were doing. Which is fairly similar to WoW's death system, so unless the time you have to wait there is really long, I don't think thats any problem. If nothing else, you can probably just log out and play another character while you wait. Annoying, but not "you gotta pay to play" level at least.

Still hoping to give it a try...if it would just LET ME IN ARGH.

[Desyth]

I was reading about this and a lot of the stuff that's been done to it and am bowing out. Mostly because the death debuff is horrible and costs real money to remove in any useful manner.

Unless that was changed, but I somehow doubt it.

Told ya.


I know it isn't mentioned in the patch notes, but its there, its unavoidable, and it makes PVP and PVE almost unplayable. Hell has been raised over this by the fanbase, and the devs claim it is working as intended.

[sol-decentguy]

Seems pretty interesting, i'm thinking about picking it up. The only problem is I a little worried about the game balance, are the mages overpowered in pvp?

[Tavar]

Told ya.


I know it isn't mentioned in the patch notes, but its there, its unavoidable, and it makes PVP and PVE almost unplayable. Hell has been raised over this by the fanbase, and the devs claim it is working as intended.
Can you tell us what the Death Debuff is?

[Eloel]

I donno... I think undead cyborgs pretty much take the cake. The only thing I can see better than that is undead cyborg ninjas.:smalltongue:

Try undead cyborg pirates. Beats ninjas everytime :smallbiggrin:

[Inhuman Bot]

Played it, and... It's not bad, but it doesn't have much charm to it, or any decent story, and those are the two main reasons I played WoW for.

But that's just me.

[Gorgondantess]

Played it, and... It's not bad, but it doesn't have much charm to it, or any decent story, and those are the two main reasons I played WoW for.

But that's just me.

How can it be possibly lacking charm when it has cyborg zombies????:smalleek:

[Knaight]

Actually, it's ONLY the mainstream games that are viable for mac versions. Them, and games that are rather small and relatively easy to convert to work with mac. Any other time it's just too small a market to be worth the time and money spent on it.

Bull. You should be working with Mac from the beginning, simply because no-one else does. Sure, the market is 10% of the size, but your competition is 10% of the size, so it works out. Plus, Mac users are more likely to be computer geeks, and thus more likely to play games, so you come out even further ahead. There's an article which explains this better than I can, I'll see about digging it up.

[AgentPaper]

Bull. You should be working with Mac from the beginning, simply because no-one else does. Sure, the market is 10% of the size, but your competition is 10% of the size, so it works out. Plus, Mac users are more likely to be computer geeks, and thus more likely to play games, so you come out even further ahead. There's an article which explains this better than I can, I'll see about digging it up.

Mac users are more likely to be computer geeks? No, they're more likely to be art majors and people who value their computer for it's looks and as a status symbol. Your main market for games knows that macs aren't where you go for gaming, so most people who do own a mac either have another computer to play games on, or don't play games very often. The amount of people who have only a mac and play game extensively is pretty small. And yes, your competition is much more limited, but the competition you do have is gaming behemoths like WoW and Half-Life, so no it does not even out.

[xp194]

So, did we ever decide on a server that we're playing on?

Waiting to make a character.

[Breltar]

Can you tell us what the Death Debuff is?

I don't know what he is talking about either unless it only happens at end game. There is a timer on death that seems to increase as you gain levels, but no debuff in game once you were out of purgatory.

I had heard the death system had been changed since beta though as well as lots of other things. It may be that the beta was vastly different but I haven't had to buy anything nor have I had some massive debuff on me at death.

If you are talking about endgame I could care less as I usually don't get there or take so long another game gets my attention anyway.

[Breltar]

Still hoping to give it a try...if it would just LET ME IN ARGH.

The servers were down for maintenance last night so it might be involved with that or something. I also noticed that my sign in for the game was different than my sign on for the forums, one is a name in the forums the other is your 'account name'.

[Breltar]

Told ya.


I know it isn't mentioned in the patch notes, but its there, its unavoidable, and it makes PVP and PVE almost unplayable. Hell has been raised over this by the fanbase, and the devs claim it is working as intended.

Have you played since it was out of beta? I died several times so far and there is a minor wait but nothing that I need to buy from the store to have to get out of purgatory (death zone). It also does nothing to me besides make me invuln for about a minute after I get back into the world of the living, no debuff applied or anything.

[xp194]

Okay...

I'm going to take the initiative here and play on the Tensess server, unless anyone already has characters on Nezeb. Sound good?

[Felyndiira]

Death debuff: following a certain level (Lv. 15 I think), after you respawn following death, you will earn a debuff that greatly decreases your character's stats (in case if you didn't know, stats in Allods stack like WoW, so if your stats are low enough you will miss a ton of things) and prevent you from being effective at, well, anything. Resurrection doesn't help since rezzing will result in the same debuff, which means that every time you die - PvE, PvP, or in a raid - you cannot play for a number of minutes equal to your level. Incenses from the cash shop migitate this debuff and eventually take it away.

The complaints about Allods being essentially more expensive than WoW stems mainly from this. It differentiates itself from other free to play MMOs in that instead of CS selling experience/convenience items or equipment, it sells what amounts to gameplay.

And no, I do not believe Allods is more expansive, story-wise, than WoW is. WoW's lore spans continents and years of continuous development from all of its predecessors, while Allods is still fresh in the scene; it won't be that long before you exhaust all of the storyline and get stuck in the grinding/collecting chests 1/day for money loop again.

[Murdim]

I donno... I think undead cyborgs pretty much take the cake. The only thing I can see better than that is undead cyborg ninjas.:smalltongue:
Put your undead cyborg ninja in an rogue Astral Ship, and you've reached the Nerdvana (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/NinjaPirateZombieRobot)

EDIT : Now that I think about it... that's not just a Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot. This is a Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot... IN SPACE ! (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ptitlekt6mtovm4vne?from=Main.RecycledInSpace)

[Desyth]

Have you played since it was out of beta? I died several times so far and there is a minor wait but nothing that I need to buy from the store to have to get out of purgatory (death zone). It also does nothing to me besides make me invuln for about a minute after I get back into the world of the living, no debuff applied or anything.

@Breltar. I've logged in a few times since cb, yeah. I think its still in open beta now though? The death debuff starts at level 15. What's your level and class?

[SlyGuyMcFly]

The possibility of playing a cyborg zombie has convinced me to try this game.


I'm going to take the initiative here and play on the Tensess server, unless anyone already has characters on Nezeb. Sound good?

I'll go ahead and make a toon on Tensess when I finish downloading then. Unless you're playing as Alliance scum League scum.

Edit: Oh, and they're getting rid of the current death penalty system. A different one is being implemented though.

[Gorgondantess]

Soon as I can, I'm downloading this and playing a robot zombie. I always wanted to play a robot zombie. Then I'll play a ninja class... then I'll get an astral ship and raid other ships!:smallbiggrin:

[Flickerdart]

I've had an account for a while, and managed to get lost in the starting Empire city. Playing an Orc Rogue - the bow in the preview is such a lie. You get a tiny little plinker! :smallmad:

[Eon]

Sounds interesting.... I might give it a shot. Maybe I should go and be alliance league scum and fail at killing you :smalltongue:

[xp194]

Playing on Tensess as an Elven Paladin/Templar going by the name of Silthra. Rather confused, and trying to work out where a particular monster is

Oh, and you can fall off the edges of the world. I learnt that the hard way.

[chiasaur11]

Huh.

Rock Paper Shotgun reviewed this a while back.

Didn't seem terribly fond. (http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2010/04/15/wot-i-think-allods-online/)

[Breltar]

@Breltar. I've logged in a few times since cb, yeah. I think its still in open beta now though? The death debuff starts at level 15. What's your level and class?

Seems it starts at level 15, which I was unaware of.

BUT! The new upcoming patch changes the death penalty as reported by massively....

http://www.massively.com/2010/06/24/allods-online-will-replace-harsh-death-penalty/


Allods Online will replace harsh death penalty with Patch 1.1

by Dan O'Halloran Jun 24th 2010 at 1:30PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Game mechanics, Patches, Free-to-play, Allods Online
Since launch, the free-to-play Allods Online has had a very unpopular death mechanic. When a player is killed in the game, Fear of Death is applied to their character. This debuff is a 25% hit to offensive stats for a duration based on level up to 51 minutes. And it stacks, so if the player dies again, they get a 50% debuff. Players must use a special item (incense) to remove the effect early. They can buy incense using the cash shop or in the auction house from other players who have already paid for it with real money.

With the launch of Patch 1.1: Revelations of Gipat on July 7th, Fear of Death will be going away, replaced instead with a different kind of penalty. But will it be what players have been asking for all along?

When a character dies in-game after Patch 1.1, there is a small chance that a curse may land on one of their inventory slots. If it does, and the item equipped is Rare or above (i.e. Rare, Epic or Legendary only), then that item will have its stats inverted. This curse is permanent until the player removes it with a Purification Scroll. Like incense, this scroll can be purchased from the cash shop or off the in-game auction house if another player has bought it and placed it there.

If players don't want to risk getting any of their item slots cursed, they may also purchase special Holy Charms from the cash shop. Every time they die, one Holy Charm will be consumed to protect the player from any possible curse landing. The charms will stack up to 1000 and can also be bought from other players who have purchased them from the cash shop.

For players with stacks of incense, that item will take on a new function not yet announced. Also, bosses will have a chance to drop cursed items requiring purification.

It remains to see how this new death mechanic will go over with the player base. They'll be happy that the stackable debuff is gone, but may not be so happy that the new curse mechanic requires a cash shop item to remove or prevent. As in the past, the answer probably lies in how much players will be charged for these essential items and how the game developer responds to their concerns.

Different to say the least. In essence it is a chance to have some of your equipment be nullified until you purchase something. The less you die the less chance of having to buy one of these items.

The rock/paper/shotgun article author didn't seem like he played the game much since he didn't get into the additional talent tree system that is similar similar to one of the Final Fantasy games I have played.

There are no true free to play MMOs that I know of that don't have some sort of cash shop or draw to pay for something, even DDO does. I think the micro transaction model puts off folks because they think they will have to shell out huge amounts of money, this isn't true at all. You do shell out huge amounts of money for sub games, even if you don't play those games for weeks on end.

Personally I would rather pay when I play or get to a certain level and know I enjoy a game rather than have to pay for a box, then a sub if I want to play more than a month.

Let me know where you guys are gonna play and I will be there.:smallsmile:

[Eon]

I think the problem I see is bosses dropping cursed items...

[Breltar]

I think the problem I see is bosses dropping cursed items...

Depends on the chances of the item being cursed. It always seems like I get the items I don't need in every MMO I have tried.

[Knaight]

Mac users are more likely to be computer geeks? No, they're more likely to be art majors and people who value their computer for it's looks and as a status symbol. Your main market for games knows that macs aren't where you go for gaming, so most people who do own a mac either have another computer to play games on, or don't play games very often. The amount of people who have only a mac and play game extensively is pretty small. And yes, your competition is much more limited, but the competition you do have is gaming behemoths like WoW and Half-Life, so no it does not even out.

Sure, you have more art majors and people who have the computers as a status symbols. But when you look at, say, elderly relatives who want to get in on this "email" and "computer typing" phenomena, they are almost all going to be on windows machines. Probably running something multiple operating systems behind the current one as well, and almost definitely not playing any games that don't involve cards.

Sure, you have to deal with WoW, Half-Life, really Blizzard and Valve in general, and those can hurt if you are another mainstream company. But my position was that games outside the mainstream are viable on a Mac, and those aren't really competing with WoW or Half-Life to any real extent, more with eachother, due to differing target audiences. Sure, Blizzard and Valve will butt in occasionally, but it isn't huge.

As for the aforementioned article (http://blog.wolfire.com/2010/05/The-state-of-Mac-and-Linux-gaming), we see Mac and Linux working way better. Given that you can design cross platform code on the beginning, and for the smaller games the Mac is at 1/5 to 1/4 the market being looked at, its worth it.

[xp194]

Depends on the chances of the item being cursed. It always seems like I get the items I don't need in every MMO I have tried.

Like I said, I'm in Tesness server. On the Allod after the tutorial. Finished recently trying to kill crabs for food. Pretty fun atm, I think.

[Gorgondantess]

...Okay, actually, played it a bit, total WoW clone. Slightly different story, but the gameplay is almost identical. And the Arisen are just slightly different (yes, cooler) egyptian-flavoured Forsaken.

[AgentPaper]

Sure, you have more art majors and people who have the computers as a status symbols. But when you look at, say, elderly relatives who want to get in on this "email" and "computer typing" phenomena, they are almost all going to be on windows machines. Probably running something multiple operating systems behind the current one as well, and almost definitely not playing any games that don't involve cards.

Yes, a lot of people who use PCs don't play games. But you're not targeting people who have computers, you're targeting people who play video games. And most gamers either have a PC as their main computer, or have a PC in addition to their mac that they use to play games. So you still end up with about 8-10% of your target market being on the mac.


Sure, you have to deal with WoW, Half-Life, really Blizzard and Valve in general, and those can hurt if you are another mainstream company. But my position was that games outside the mainstream are viable on a Mac, and those aren't really competing with WoW or Half-Life to any real extent, more with eachother, due to differing target audiences. Sure, Blizzard and Valve will butt in occasionally, but it isn't huge.

Exactly. There are less niche games, but there are also less niche gamers, so you'll end up with about the same percentage of the mac market that you would the windows market. You can't magically appeal to more niche markets if you make your game for the mac, and niche games don't really compete with each other, since people who buy niche games tend to buy all of them, since they're generally cheap, short-lived, and few in number in the first place.


As for the aforementioned article (http://blog.wolfire.com/2010/05/The-state-of-Mac-and-Linux-gaming), we see Mac and Linux working way better. Given that you can design cross platform code on the beginning, and for the smaller games the Mac is at 1/5 to 1/4 the market being looked at, its worth it.

That article seems to take some rather profound leaps of logic. Mac users buy twice as many electronics, so they buy twice as many games? The percent of people who play flash games on a mac is bigger than the mac market share, so more mac gamers play games? :smallconfused:

[SlyGuyMcFly]

Finished downloading. Psyberpunk the Arisen Psionicist (un)lives on Tesness. So far it looks nice. The art is pretty neat.

[Crispy Dave]

What server are you people playing on?

[AgentPaper]

What server are you people playing on?

Tesness, it seems.

Still no clue what's wrong with my account, so I just made another one. Not like it costs anything anyways. At any rate, I'll be on as Sopor, the Xadaganian Paladin and possbily Karkat, the Orc Scout. I've also got Kafa, a Gibberling Warrior, on the other side of the fence, just because I want to try out playing as 3 of the tiny little guys at once. (which sounds awesome)

[Crispy Dave]

Tesness, it seems.

Still no clue what's wrong with my account, so I just made another one. Not like it costs anything anyways. At any rate, I'll be on as Sopor, the Xadaganian Paladin and possbily Karkat, the Orc Scout. I've also got Kafa, a Gibberling Warrior, on the other side of the fence, just because I want to try out playing as 3 of the tiny little guys at once. (which sounds awesome)

alright cool I'll see about getting the game downloaded. No guarantees I'll actually play with me getting a job.

[Knaight]

Niche games don't really compete with each other, since people who buy niche games tend to buy all of them, since they're generally cheap, short-lived, and few in number in the first place.

What are you talking about? There are way too many of them to buy all of them.

[Eon]

I'll probably download sometime tomorrow, still unsure about my evil... wait... good plan to be on the other faction and fail to fight you in PvP. If you see some noob running after you and clearly failing... It might be me. Might being the key word. Just wait for my Forum Post about me playing....

[Jokasti]

That does look like a WoW clone, but free you say? I shall investigate...

[AgentPaper]

Hm, my main problem with it so far is that the controls seem kinda sketchy. It's at least partly me being new to it and not being using to them compared to say WoW or WAR or something, but still. Other than that, it seems average for a pay-to-play MMO, which means it's excellent for a free-to-play MMO. Of course this is just my impression from just a few quests out of the tutorial, so don't take it as gospel or anything.

[The Glyphstone]

So they're removing the temporary death penalty and replacing it with a permanent item-wrecking penalty? And they think this is a good idea why?

[Murdim]

So they're removing the temporary death penalty and replacing it with a permanent item-wrecking penalty? And they think this is a good idea why?
Because it is not something that can be countered by (mainly casual) players by Alt+Tabbing out of the game and waiting for the debuff to expire while doing something else ?

[factotum]

Well, yes, that obviously makes it good for the game company, but it's not so good for the PLAYERS--they can only get round this by spending money. To be honest it all sounds like legitimised gold farming to me--if a player spends real-world cash and then puts that item in the Auction House you're going to have to spend a lot of in-game gold to get it.

Don't think I'll be playing this--I used to die a LOT playing WoW, so that's the whole concept of a "free" MMO out the window to start with as far as I'm concerned. I might as well just go back to playing WoW, where at least I know exactly how much I'm spending every month rather than my monthly spend depending how often I die!

[AgentPaper]

You can also replace the item, so at least for leveling it shouldn't be that bad.

Still, I've decided to not keep playing Allods. There's just nothing in it that WoW doesn't do better, except for maybe the art, and even that is a bit shaky when you compare it to the newer stuff in WoW.

[Breltar]

You can also replace the item, so at least for leveling it shouldn't be that bad.

Still, I've decided to not keep playing Allods. There's just nothing in it that WoW doesn't do better, except for maybe the art, and even that is a bit shaky when you compare it to the newer stuff in WoW.

Yeah but I'm not going to pay a monthly sub to a game whose graphics to me are dated and way more 'cartoonish', I forced myself to play WoW once because 'everyone' was there. Evidently 'everyone' has a way different opinion than me on some things.

I'm going to keep toughing it out and see what the next patch offers. If nothing else it will tide me over till Lord of the Rings Online goes free to play this fall.

[Inhuman Bot]

Yeah but I'm not going to pay a monthly sub to a game whose graphics to me are dated and way more 'cartoonish', I forced myself to play WoW once because 'everyone' was there. Evidently 'everyone' has a way different opinion than me on some things.

I'm going to keep toughing it out and see what the next patch offers. If nothing else it will tide me over till Lord of the Rings Online goes free to play this fall.

Well... Suit yourself?


Because it is not something that can be countered by (mainly casual) players by Alt+Tabbing out of the game and waiting for the debuff to expire while doing something else ?


So basically, it's a terrible idea for that very reason. If most players are casual, why try to force them to jump through hoops to fix their gear, if they can? It's not like they're paying a monthly fee.

[factotum]

It's not like they're paying a monthly fee.

As I said earlier, that's the main reason why this is a GOOD idea from the game developer's perspective. A casual player who never spends money in the shop is just a drain on their bandwidth--they need people to spend money in there to keep this whole thing going.