A sip of Silkroad and we're godsmacked with the atmosphere of ancient China, with the clashes of halberds and swords.
After a lengthy download to this game, you start of with the basics. Creating your own character (firstly you are required to choose the gender); however you cannot customize the face, hair, body, etc. But you choose from a wide range of characters that all look unique and have different animations. E.G. A red haired demon, a young warrior with an eye patch, most interesting a monk who resembles solid snake, etc.
At the character creation screen, you are required to choose your weapons each type has two categories magic or physical. For example; Magic is the spear, while physical is the glaive. These choices depend on how you'll like to play the game. Secondly you choose your amour; Physical defense, balanced defense, magical defense. Which all very different.
Now I can get to the interesting part! The gameplay. Silkroad has a very deep system, when you level up you gain points to spend on strength or magic. But also you gain skill points depending on how many enemies you have killed which adds a layer of depth, and more original gameplay.
The Game really boosts of when you get to lvl 20. Where you choose either to be a Thief, Hunter or a Trader. All with different motives, the thieves attack traders to steal their cargo; the hunters kill the law breaking thieves and the traders transport cargo where they gain profit. This 3 class system really is original and gives the gameplay a sling that over typical MMORPGs.
One of the great things about this game is the ability to buy transports e.g. horses, camels, etc. These transports have different health therefore when attacked damage is applied to them before hurting yourself.
In this game you can join guilds where you can socialize and co operate with fellow members to complete quests, etc.
The quests themselves can be quite stale they are obtained via NPCs who give quests via text (which is a bit tedious as some translations are done badly). Normally a quest will consist of; kill 20 of these, kill 50 of these or collect 20 of these, etc. But doing these missions with friends make this experience much more fun. As the main zest of this game is with the thief, hunter, and trader system.
The inventory is easy to access and you can store items into a large storage foe a price. The skills you obtain are all very special and can be entertaining to look at. You can choose a few different classes of magic; fire, thunder, ice, force (all with different advantages). And with physical skills you get; spear, sword and bow.
The graphics for this game is fairly average, but definitely creates an Asian/china atmosphere. All surroundings reflect the Asian theme, and can even be fun to travel. The animations are generally ok, and there seems to be different animations for every character!
But Silkroad has its number of flaws even with its list of servers; lag is present nearly always, which can be extremely frustrating. The draw distance is annoying as some enemies can be next to you but you cannot see them.
Overall silkroad is an enjoyable experience and worth taking a look at if you’re an MMORPG fan. Besides it free!