Remnant Knights Closed Beta Review

Written by Craig Will Monday, 21 February 2011 15:00

MMOs, for the most part, are all the same. They've got their schtick that they stick to: talk to NPC 'A' who sends you on a fetch quest for Item 'X', which is either near or being held by monster 'Z'. There's a story in there somewhere, something about the world being in danger of being overrun by this evil or that evil and you need to find a way to stop it. Character classes include rogues, knights, mages, etc. and if you can't figure out where to go then you haven't been reading what the NPCs are telling you. GameSamba hopes to shake things up with Remnant Knights.

Anybody that has played any sort of RPG is familiar with character creation. If you're anything like me then you also look forward to any game that changes the standard classes and eschews the traditional setup. Remnant Knights tries to do things things a little different. The first step to character creation is choosing your school. Literally. School. Dragon school focuses on strength and combat while Owl school believes in wisdom and learning. So it's a little like choosing your starting faction or home world. But they've tied it into the overall feel and story of the game really well and it gives a little bit of a fresh face to the arguably stale genre controlled by WoW. After enrolling at your school of choice, the next step is the standard creation guide screen where you pick: your name, your class, gender, and physical appearance. Class is another area Remnant Knights attempts something a little unique. Instead of the usual rogue, knight, etc. you pick your circle (gun, magic, or fight), which dictates your weapon choice -- gun circle uses guns, magic uses magic, and fight uses melee. After picking your circle you need to select your Advanced Class. There are two advanced classes for each circle and they provide the gameplay style you're looking for. For example, magic circle students can select between Elementalist, for long-range fighting, or Priest, for healing.

My average PC has no problem running this game as long as it is in windowed mode. Fullscreen causes stuttering and lag but I generally prefer windows to fullscreen anyway. Visually, the game looks like an anime-cartoon hybrid. Characters sport classic anime hairstyles and clothing but without being over exaggerated and the environments are super bright and colorful and look Disney-esque, like that Toon Town game. Disclaimer: I never played Toon Town and the previous statement was based off of advertisements.

No matter how fresh a developer makes the character creation or how refreshing the art style is, an MMO, or any RPG, is only as good as the system the characters live in. Remnant Knights makes everything as simple and accessible as possible while still engaging and fun. Tutorials are given through picture pop-ups (though they sometimes don't close on their own) and quests are given one step at a time. The greatest tool used however, is the implementation of the quest trail. Similar to Fable II or Dead Space's guiding lights, there is a dotted line leading you from your current location to the current quest. There is no getting frustrated when a quest giver is too vague about where to go or trying to remember key NPC names in case you need to talk to them at some point in the future.

Quests are standard fare and possibly the one thing I wish was done differently in order to set this game apart from other MMOs. After talking to NPCs with exclamation points floating over their head you receive a quest to A) talk to another NPC, B) go collect item 'X', C) kill monster 'Z', or D) all of the above. But hey, it works for other games why not for this one? At least the "questing line" as I've come to call it is being utilized for ease of direction, and when viewing quests you can see a breakdown of how many more steps are needed until quest completion.

Combat is also largely the same as other games, selecting enemies (tab is a handy shortcut) and selecting abilities and skills by clicking their corresponding menu bar slot or number on the number pad. Enemies drop items, experience, and health and mana orbs. Healing outside of combat is as easy as finding a chair or bench to sit on.

What's an RPG without leveling? Upon gaining a new level you acquire skill points to spend on new skills. Any experienced RPG or MMO player will be familiar with the skill trees. There are active and passive skills, cooldown timers, and MP costs. An interesting note is that while you may get 10 skill points for a level up you may only be able to get one or two new skills because each skill has a level requirement as well as a certain cost of skill points. Oh, and once you reach a certain level (5) you get to hop aboard a little hover scooter to make traveling that much faster.

While Remnant Knights does a lot of (needed) refreshing of the MMORPG genre it doesn't stray too far off of the beaten path and isn't without faults. For one thing the English translation is a little off sometimes, notable quotes include - "Rest, sitting on chair and chat secretly with friends…" and, "Where did you get all these furnitures?" I also would have liked to see a new mechanic for the tired old (yet, tried and true) combat system. Also, when is an MMO going to offer branching dialogue and story quests?

Overall, this is looking to be a solid game, especially for those new to MMOs, those looking for something different than WoW, or those that want to get their younger ones into an easy, accessible MMO so they don't have to feel bad while they play WoW.

*Review based on product in Beta phase and does not necessarily reflect quality of final product.