Merisa (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} merisa) wrote,@ 2007-10-07 21:51:00 |
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Tabula Rasa
I've been playing Tabula Rasa's semi-open beta recently and the game has caught me by surprise. I'll admit I hadn't paid it much attention. My first impressions were not favorable, either. The game plays a fair bit like Star Wars Galaxy's New Game Experience in that you have to aim at a target to select it, though once you've aimed, you can lock on with the tab key. That's not the best first impression to make. Once I got into the game, I found the gameplay to be slow, the graphics to be muddy, and the mechanics to be dull.
Then I gave it a few more levels. Tabula Rasa isn't a shooter and while it is definitely an MMORPG, approaching it the same way you would, say, WoW, will get you in trouble. A few hints for new players:
1) Crouching drastically increases the bead on most guns. Shooting a rifle from 40-60 meters while crouching will take out most enemies of your level in a few shots. Trying to run up and shoot them in the face with the same gun will likely needing to reload several times as your shots miss and do minimal damage. Which leads to...
2) If you find yourself in a melee confrontation... use the melee key, F. Most guns actually do a lot of damage melee and I can sometimes take out unsuspecting enemies in a few hits if I run up to them when they're not looking. You should never run out of ammo.
3) Use the right weapon for the right situation. Even if an enemy is not immune to a certain damage type, you'll fare a lot better to learn what he might be weak against.
4) In keeping, don't neglect your basic skills, particularly firearms. The more specialized weapons are, well, specialized and situational.
5) Special abilities are also situational. Unlike other MMOs where your primary damage comes from specials, in Tabula Rasa, specials are situational. Need to clear out the shields of a group of Bane? Toss out some lightning. Surrounded? Lay down shrapnel. Know you're up for a big fight? Start up Rage. You won't be able to spam them like in other games and that's ok. If you're using your weapons properly, you won't need to.
6) Also, higher pump levels for special abilities are not necessarily better. It is, again, situational. If a group of enemies is grouped around you, using a high pump Shrapnel is just wasting power.
Ok, so I gave tips, but I hope I also gave a bit of an impression about how the game isn't like your average MMORPG. Control point raids are a blast, missions are interesting, soloing is absolutely possible, even as you level, and levelling is quite fast, done primarily through missions with no real grinding. Oh, and did I mention the Clone system? Every time your character reaches a branch in the class tree, you gain a clone point. These points can be used to make a clone of the same level, allowing you to explore the various classes without having to start from scratch. You can also use this if you want to reroll your existing character (right now, I don't think you can clone in place, but I hope they let you just respec without making a new character using a clone point).
Ok, BUT... there are some nasty technical problems to be worked out, a lot of content is incomplete or buggy, and some systems are missing entirely. The game screams for PvP and it's just not there yet, other than dueling, there are no mounts and the high level content is simply not in the game. So is this Vanguard all over again? No... I don't think so, at least. The basic game is fun and playable, and content up to about level 30 or so is fine, though some missions are not itemized yet. If this week's update fixes some standing bugs and itemizes low level missions, they should be able to buy themselves enough time for a smooth launch.
If you're neck-deep in WoW or another MMO, there's probably nothing to draw you away, but if you're like me and like to hop around, TR offers action-oriented gameplay at a fast pace that can be soloed... nice if you don't want to lock yourself away just to play a game.
I've been playing Tabula Rasa's semi-open beta recently and the game has caught me by surprise. I'll admit I hadn't paid it much attention. My first impressions were not favorable, either. The game plays a fair bit like Star Wars Galaxy's New Game Experience in that you have to aim at a target to select it, though once you've aimed, you can lock on with the tab key. That's not the best first impression to make. Once I got into the game, I found the gameplay to be slow, the graphics to be muddy, and the mechanics to be dull.
Then I gave it a few more levels. Tabula Rasa isn't a shooter and while it is definitely an MMORPG, approaching it the same way you would, say, WoW, will get you in trouble. A few hints for new players:
1) Crouching drastically increases the bead on most guns. Shooting a rifle from 40-60 meters while crouching will take out most enemies of your level in a few shots. Trying to run up and shoot them in the face with the same gun will likely needing to reload several times as your shots miss and do minimal damage. Which leads to...
2) If you find yourself in a melee confrontation... use the melee key, F. Most guns actually do a lot of damage melee and I can sometimes take out unsuspecting enemies in a few hits if I run up to them when they're not looking. You should never run out of ammo.
3) Use the right weapon for the right situation. Even if an enemy is not immune to a certain damage type, you'll fare a lot better to learn what he might be weak against.
4) In keeping, don't neglect your basic skills, particularly firearms. The more specialized weapons are, well, specialized and situational.
5) Special abilities are also situational. Unlike other MMOs where your primary damage comes from specials, in Tabula Rasa, specials are situational. Need to clear out the shields of a group of Bane? Toss out some lightning. Surrounded? Lay down shrapnel. Know you're up for a big fight? Start up Rage. You won't be able to spam them like in other games and that's ok. If you're using your weapons properly, you won't need to.
6) Also, higher pump levels for special abilities are not necessarily better. It is, again, situational. If a group of enemies is grouped around you, using a high pump Shrapnel is just wasting power.
Ok, so I gave tips, but I hope I also gave a bit of an impression about how the game isn't like your average MMORPG. Control point raids are a blast, missions are interesting, soloing is absolutely possible, even as you level, and levelling is quite fast, done primarily through missions with no real grinding. Oh, and did I mention the Clone system? Every time your character reaches a branch in the class tree, you gain a clone point. These points can be used to make a clone of the same level, allowing you to explore the various classes without having to start from scratch. You can also use this if you want to reroll your existing character (right now, I don't think you can clone in place, but I hope they let you just respec without making a new character using a clone point).
Ok, BUT... there are some nasty technical problems to be worked out, a lot of content is incomplete or buggy, and some systems are missing entirely. The game screams for PvP and it's just not there yet, other than dueling, there are no mounts and the high level content is simply not in the game. So is this Vanguard all over again? No... I don't think so, at least. The basic game is fun and playable, and content up to about level 30 or so is fine, though some missions are not itemized yet. If this week's update fixes some standing bugs and itemizes low level missions, they should be able to buy themselves enough time for a smooth launch.
If you're neck-deep in WoW or another MMO, there's probably nothing to draw you away, but if you're like me and like to hop around, TR offers action-oriented gameplay at a fast pace that can be soloed... nice if you don't want to lock yourself away just to play a game.
