CBT 1 is over, and with it comes a insane desire to continue playing. Unfortunately this is not possible, and it leaves plenty of time to look over the last 3 days and point out a basic idea of what I like and what I dislike about TERA.
Likes:
Skill Based Gameplay - Tera is a game that requires skill. Long it has been since I could come away from a MMORPG and say, “I need to get betterâ€. After extensive dueling in the arena, and a number of runs in the level 20+ instance, it is clear that Tera will punish players for not being able to play competitively. It becomes immediately obvious if a player is unable to play their class properly, and Tera does not look like it will cater to players that can’t perform.
Graphics – Graphically Tera is one of the best looking PC games on the market. If I had not known that we were not using the HighRes textures, I would still be very satisfied. It just shows that the Unreal Engine is still the beast that it always has been. And the female character models are nice too
A “Complete†Experience - Tera has the features that every MMO should have on launch; Summoning, LFG, Properly functioning Auction House, Guilds, Guild Ranks, /random 100, and many more. Needless to say, after playing SWTOR, it is a breath of fresh air to see that these will be in on launch.
Lack of Bugs – Besides the issue with the login queue causing the client to crash (I never encountered this), Tera is in a VERY good state. I did not encounter any bugs which stopped me from enjoying the game or progressing through it. It is true that Tera has been out in Korea for some time now, but that has only made the US experience better.
Leveling Speed – It looks like EME did exactly what they said they would do, copy WoW’s progression system for levels. Leveling is fast, sometimes a little too fast, but never comes off as a grind. As a game toting itself to be a “westernized†korean MMO, it is sure doing a good job.
Dislikes:
Loot System – Tera has a loot system that displays generic item icons for loot that drops. It becomes rather difficult to identify items that you can actually use and easily clutter your inventory with junk. The group loot system also needs a boost due to the intrusive roll system and lack of ability for group leaders to set master loot.
Shoot where they were, not where they are – I have noticed something very interesting after playing a Archer for the first beta. It seems that when an enemy performs an animation (ie. dodge), if you fire a projectile at the same time they move, the projectile will only hit if you aim where their character WAS. Normally I would think that you would have to aim where they are going or hit them in transit, but this was not the case.
Tera will punish noobs – I listed above that I liked that tera presented a significant challenge, but this is also a drawback when it comes to being able to find competent players for dungeons and PVP. This is especially the case for when bad players take on key roles in a group. If a healer can’t target the tank for a heal, the tank will die and the group will wipe. This becomes a serious problem during the course of forming PUGs. Tera will highly encourge players to do Guild Only runs. When a MMO has bad attrition rate, it suffers in the long term.
Instances - Tera has a instancing system which allows players to be populated across a number of “cloned†zones. This is great for distributing a large population across a number of servers, but is a huge drawback if used on an open PVP server. It allows players to dodge gankers and gank groups by just changing the instance they are in. Hopefully EME will not implement instances for higher level zones.
Questing – Questing in Tera is very bland. It is much like MMOs in the past where you grab the quest, find out what you are suppose to do, and kill 10 monsters. I hope that the latter quests involve more cutscenes or something to stirr up excitement, but right now, they are used only to level. That being said, the repeatable quests track past the number of kills required for the quest, thus allowing you to stay out in the world killing and turn the quest in multiple times later.
Overview:
Tera CBT 1 was a great experience. A large number of players had issues getting in on Friday during peak, but once you were in, everything went great. From running dungeons, to grouping for boss monsters, Tera felt like it was ready to launch. I am looking forward to the next CBT, and hope everyone else is as well.
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