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Review of Astonia III
xoblivionxx
Member CommonPosts: 77
Firstly, i just want to say that never ever even consider playing this game, it is horrible. Read on to find out why.
I Just went through the list of the games a few days ago and saw a game that i have missed out, Astonia III. The rating 6.3 looked reasonable and I became excited as maybe this was a game that would not disappoint me. But when i clicked the link, i was already disgusted when i saw the banner on top. I was like ok lets go to their homepage. I went in and created an account. Browsing through the screenshots made me even more put-off than i already am. After downloading it, i tried the game out. The words were way to small for me, the graphics were terrible and overall, i felt like i was playing a 1970s game. The navigation was pathetic and the first quest i did was already boring. The idea of torches is seriously a useless idea. The idea of typing to initiate a trade is also just a waste of time. I just can't seem to find any pros about this game. Opinions of people who used to play this game would be appreciated.
Comments
and the cash shop selling asphalt..." - Mimzel on F2P/Cash Shops
See it seem's to me you were in 3.5 and not astonia 3 even though they are very close in graphic's 3.5 has a little bit more of a better graphic engine then 3.0. Even so it seem's you've only played for what maybe 15-20 minute's of the game? This game here is i think one a the best i've ever played i've played this for year's and just recently quit due to the lack of the community cause intnet just dont advertise to well. Play the game for a couple week's finish out the free trial get into a clan and go to the clan spawner's this is one of the high points in the game other then the whole pvp idea is just wonderfull. Dont burn a game down just cause you found it simple compaired to most mmo out that's what make's this game better.
i played this game when i was 14? till i was 18-19ish?
so thats 5ish somewhere years, this was a very decent fun game, lots of stuff to do and of course the grind. I spent the years building gear, and leveling characters for strict PVP battles, and got real far, along with many others who were just as competetive, and this is what kept the game going until, intent pulled the plug on it and decided to release 3.5, leaving behind many players who had been playing for years, no choice but to quit the game. 3.5 was not an update, it was a remake of the game, which is where this went wrong, as the community had built around V.3, for year, all to see it go to waste and have the plug pulled on it.
quite honestly, i spent alot of time playing this game, their were many great players/PVPers, and the PVP aspect of the game was superior, where you spawn for jewels to keep your clan alive, the batles were intense and crazy, this was the aspect of the game that kept people interested, not the graphics, some battles lasted well over hours, fighting non stop, intense fights between clans, and strategy. Although there was only 3 classes in this game, it made up by having the full ability to become a spec character. people made all sorts of builds and certain types of characters/toons/alts, what ever you want to call it, the battles for the jewel were based upon a team to hold the room, each clan would try to recruit players who had the most potiental in what they did. Some of the characters were made to survive the damage of casters, Some were made to survive fighters(tanks), some were even made to simply just stand at the ped till the jewel spawned, some were made to stop the fighters, this goes on and on, and you can see how diversed this game was.
i remember making the first War Cry Immunity Seyan, for 36 spawn, complete new build just because i wanted to see how it would work out, soon people were starting to build the same.
the clan system was complete trash though, you were sent into a dark room, and just wondered around for countless hours. No PVP, nothing just walking around, finding some keys, killing a few guards, it was complete failed. No one ever raided another clan because it was so dreadful to even try to raid, due to boredom.
this game was real fun, i put 5 years into it untill intent decided they wanted to split up the game, and release a different version, from there on the game has completely died out, and it survives on 5-10 players at any given time.
scale: 1-10
graphics> 4
gameplay> 7
Clan system> 2
spawn wars> 10
and thats it, review from me, too bad intent made a bad descion to let V.3 die.
Intent made the decision to let 3.0 die based on the fact that it was not fixable without a clean wipe. This would have angered many players. They left it up and moved to 3.5. 3.0 is still alive to this day, but 3.5 has more players due to being f2p.
Here's my review touching on some of the points previous posters have mentioned (tl;dr on bottom):
I joined this game years ago, before 3.5 was released. Sure, the graphics aren't current-gen, however I do not play games for graphics alone. I play games for the community, for the story behind it, and for ever changing PVP experiences. I played up to level 43, with the max being 200. 3.0 had a fairly poor clan system which forced you to create alts for certain level brackets. This allowed you to participate in "spawners" to win jewels to keep your clan alive. Had I not made alts, I could have easily been 100+.
Leveling:
Leveling in astonia is done through 2 major sources. Quests and Pentagrams. Quests exist throughout all levels, and they even have a public builder tool allowing players to create a full quest zone, present it to developers, and watch it get added to the game +- their tweaks. Pentagrams are the biggest part of the game. Penting is the only way to get equipment stones, which I will explain further later. In pents, there are pentagrams placed throughout the map. You touch these pentagrams, and they spawn a demon. The pentagrams turn either red, blue, or green once touched. The goal is to "solve" the pentagram which gives bonus exp, and resets all pentagrams to grey. There are random "lucky" pents in each solve that give bonus experience as well. Or you can get 5 pentagrams of the same color (by remembering which ones were that color from the previous solve) to get an exp bonus on the 6th pent you touch.
Classes and Progression:
There are 3 playable classes. Mage, Warrior, and Seyan. 2 of these are pickable at level 1, the mage and the warrior. Around level 30, you can choose to either arch or seyan. Arching gives you a cape, and a couple extra spells. Seyaning restarts you at level 2 with a "hybrid" class. They get the best of mages and warriors, without being overpowered. Seyans can still get a cape when arching, they just don't get a new skill as they already have a lot. Progression in this game is one of the main reasons I play. You get 7 stats, and roughly 10-15 skills depending on the class. As you get experience you can allocate that experience to whatever stats or skills you wish. Stats raise the ability of all your skills, and skills raise the ability of just that skill. Until you arch, the max base you can have on a stat is 50, and the mod (it's actual ability) can be double that. You increase the mod by either gear, or increasing stats.
Death:
In 3.0, you lost all gear and inventory and had to make it back to your body in 30 minutes to get that stuff back. In 3.5, you only lose your inventory and have 30 min to retrieve it. You get a "save" every time you level, capping at 3. This save prevents you from losing your inventory and experience. Without a save, you lose both. If you have used up all the experience you have on your stats, you get "negs" from dying that take a bit to work off before you start getting experience again.
Variety of Play:
There are tons of things you can do in this game. Some are forced, some are by choice. Here's a short list of these things..
Questing, Pentagrams, Mining for silver/gold which fixes equipment that has been degraded through use, Random Dungeons which are mazes that give bonus experience and other random effects by touching "shrines", Ice Army Caves which is a mini strategy game that has ~30 levels, Clan raiding, spawners (for clans), and various dev hosted quest events. There are professions in the game, but they are different than what you are used to. Enhancer is the most common, which gives you better quality and strength on the stones you use to upgrade equipment. There is alchemist, which makes the potions you make stronger, miner which gives you more silver/gold when mining, and mercenary which gives you more exp on pentagram missions.
I'm sure I am missing lots of things from the game, but I've never made it to the cap so I can't enlighten you on that part of the game.
Equipment:
There are tons of stats to choose from, and equipment will add to either 1, 2 or 3 of these stats. You will never be able to max all stat mods, so choose wisely. Equipment is upgraded from +1 to +20 by stones gathered from pentagrams. Monsters in the game will randomly drop gear that will be single, double, or triple stat +1. You have to gather stones from a map called Pents to upgrade your gear. You upgrade +1 at a time, and triple stat gears require triple the amount of stones to upgrade to +2. Equipment and Stat progression are a part of what keeps this game unique. You get to fully choose what path you want to take and it offers a lot of variety between other players.
Clans and PVP:
Clans in Astonia are kept alive by clan jewels. These can be obtained by spawning, or by raiding. Spawners are broken down into many level brackets and happen every 6-10 hours for each bracket. This means that the PVP events are NOT set at a certain time of each day or week, and everyone gets to participate regardless of schedule. Spawners usually have 20-30 characters in them all around your level fighting for a single jewel that spawns on a pedestal. The only way to get the jewel is if you are the only one near it. Raiding can be done at any time. One clan will raid another clan's vault and have to destroy their tower. Upon destroying the tower, you steal their clan jewels and they get placed in your vault. Alliances are allowed to help, other clans can interfere, and whichever clan gets the last hit on the tower gets the jewel. There is also a sand arena, which allows for 1v1 or team dueling to practice your abilities.
What 3.5 brings to the table:
Upon releasing 3.5 intent decided to make the game f2p so that older players would move over to the new game. They gave an option of a subscription to allow for better gear and more inventory space. Usually this would create a problem in my mind, due to imbalance between payers and non-payers, but the equipment upgrading system they've introduced counters that. They completely reworked the clan system and the new system brings in some amazing PVP as I recently stated. Leveling is slightly harder than 3.0, but the cap is 100 instead of 200. 3.5 also brings tons new quests from many different minds due to the new public builder tool they released.
Community:
Since this game is not mainstream, and appeals to the older gamers in the market the community in this game is absolutely astounding. They are always willing to help, and everyone knows everyone. I'm so sick of the games coming out these days where players that aren't doing good whine and complain about their teammates, make excuses, and never blame themselves. It goes on both ends too. Players that do good in games get this elitist additude and do not help or care about anyone else. They even take is as far as cussing out the player they just beat, saying they suck. That turns more people away from games than people realize, and it is not a problem in astonia. Sometimes things get heated during clan wars, but it's all in good fun and no one directs a personalized attack at another.
Summary/tl;dr:
Astonia 3.5 is an old-gen graphical game that offers a different style of game than we are used to. There are loads of things to keep you busy, and an amazing community of 3+ year players to guide you through the game. There is a great and unique PVP and clan system that I've never seen in another game, and I definately recommend trying the game out (for longer than 15 minutes...). The only thing this game is missing is a large playerbase, as it sports on average 50-75 people online, but all you have to do to fix that is join!
Graphics: 3/10
Gameplay: 8/10
Community: 9/10
Storyline: 6/10
Clans/PVP: 8/10
Link to join: urd.astonia.com
mmorpg hasn't been updated with 3.5