New Ideas, No Levels, Lots of Fun!!
I will say that I have been playing TSW since May. I got into closed beta then.
This game has progressed a lot up until the launch day. I'm sure even before I started playing closed beta too.
One thing I will say if you are thinking of playing this game:
Give it a chance! Don't play this game and expect to be wowed in the first hour of play. You just might be wowed... but not everyone is. This game is very different from the MMO's you are used to. After I got through my first few skills and a few missions I was hooked!
The no level system is awesome! Many will tell you that there are indeed levels... yes and no. If you mean that they rank your gear compared to your opponent to decide how difficult they are, then yes that is a level of difficulty.
The cool thing is that you can start over any weapon skill that you want. What I mean is that if you start playing with Blades and then decide you don't really like it...
Start with another weapon. Then you can go back to earlier zones and level up that weapon. So replayability is there!
YOU decide how you want to play. The game will not tell you to play this way or that. That is the part that I think many folks won't grasp at first. We are so used to being spoonfed quests, gear, lore... blah... this game doesn't do that. It encourages you to just go out and explore. If you go in to an area and try to do all the missions there at once, you are missing the point. The missions simply give you story to go explore more of.
Yes, story, this game has plenty of it! Lot's of cutscenes and things to read about. Hell, they even have websites that were designed for the game to give you clues in missions!!
Also, if you like puzzle type quests that make you think, look no further!
Ok, enough rambling. You can read all this anywhere on a forum to know. So I'll break down my review score and end this review:
Graphics - 9.5
I love the graphics in this game. 10 is hard to earn in my book.
Sound - 10!!!!
Sound is awesome in this game!
Gameplay (hardness) - 9
I would say a 10 but some will find it a bit hard to understand at first.
Animations - 8
These do need work as many will say. They are by no means terrible! So don't let that fool you. Just some of the voiceovers and things need to match up better which Funcom is working on in a later patch.
Endgame - ??
Not too sure yet but from what I have heard, its great!
OVERALL - 9
Just play it already!!