Decent graphics but very lacking in other areas.

User Rating: 4.5 | Shaiya: Light and Darkness PC
For basic mmo pve play Shaiya is better than the other free mmo's available. The graphics exceed the other free ones certainly though the landscape itself is rather bare.

One issue with the game is a insufferable lack of itemization. Example...priests and mages are paired for the armor sets they can use...at each 'level range' you switch to the next set...what it boils down too is though there are six classes there are only 3 armor sets so you have a game filled with people who all look alike. Another problem with itemization is regular npc's u find in the open world itself drop nothing but vendor junk and regular (no stats or bonus) armor/weapons. Which makes the very long hours of grinding very unrewarding.

The PvP is the worst of any online game I have seen yet. Its extremely limited and after level 30 you pretty much won't see any pvp at all anymore except an occasional encounter in what they call the 1-60 pvp zone ( there is no active pvp here but are dungeons people use so if u hunt around long enough eventually you might find an enemy to kill). The PvP itself is unrewarding as all you can earn is 'rank', there are no skills to strive for or pvp reward items...just a rank symbol by your name.

Another HUGE downside to the pvp is that like other free mmo's this game has a cash shop where players can use real life money to buy AP (Aeria Points) which they can use to buy special items. The problem is, unlike other free mmo's with cash shops, Aeria Games allow players to buy things that imbalance gameplay which creates alot of complaints in Trade chat (the only global chat in game) as there are some players who spend money regularly and bugg up with NOS potions which makes them almost invincible in pvp (seriously, you will see 10 players tryin to kill 1 guy who is NOS'd and fail miserably).

The PvE aspect of the game (lack of itemization aside) is actually kind of fun for a while but the tedious grind for xp (especially once you leave normal mode into hard mode) will bore you very quickly.