Throne and Liberty Review: Very Much A Lineage Successor | MMORPG.com

System · October 7

Throne and Liberty Review: Very Much A Lineage Successor | MMORPG.com

NCSOFT's Throne & Liberty has the bones of the Lineage series but doesn't live up to its legacy. Here is our review.

Elidien_ga · October 7

I want to see where the game is at in 60-90 days. Being guild and PVP heavy, a healthy population is needed. They to games like this is when that population moves on.

Greatsword · October 7

Very much a Lineage Mobile successor.

Celcius · October 7

Elidien_ga said:

I want to see where the game is at in 60-90 days. Being guild and PVP heavy, a healthy population is needed. They to games like this is when that population moves on.

I don't expect it to last and PvP to become a ghost town most of the day.

Dattelis · October 7

Fair review. There's definitely going to be a lot of server merges within 3 months given how community driven some of the content is. Not just that but also a lot of things are on timers that are either sprinkled throughout the day or week which will end up leading to a lot of doing dailies and logging off. I guess the counter up-point to that is the p2w element wont really be noticed until a few months down the line since world boss loot will usually go to guilds and guilds probably wont sell stuff until members and their alts are fully geared.

mitech616 · October 7

Fantastic review! Good explanations and descriptions of the positive and negative aspects. Based on what I read, I doubt the game is for me. But luckily it's free to try and I'll give it a go regardless.

It seems difficult for eastern MMOs to do well in the western market.

ultimateduck · October 7

I'm finding it to me a mix of ArcheAge, New World and GW2. Fun enough to play for free but it hasn't grabbed me and made me want to play every free moment.

It will be interesting to see how it progresses, if I make it that far.

Groqstrong · October 7

I have to disagree with players progressing their character part. You can very much be BIS without a guild. You just will miss the biggest activies without one.

Neoyoshi · October 7

It's a NCsoft game, it'll be fine; even if people disagree with that fact.

It is a very Guild/community-heavy game though- if you are going into this thinking you can play it solo, think again. What will really make this game a lot of fun and brighten a players experience is joining a large community that plays.

That said, this is the type of game that cannot be scored by any metric-system, because it is so heavily tailored towards community much like Dark Ages of Camelot.

So take that into consideration when looking at that review score, it's a PURE old-school mmorpg experience, and to be far, i don't think any mmorpg can truly be rated properly- they are ever changing experiences that eb and flow based on community feedback.

xDrac · October 7

Ah man. It's alright. But I'm sad if I think about what it could have been if they went for a true Lineage MMORPG. This feels like they tried to cater to too many audiences and didn't master any of them.

Neoyoshi · October 7

xDrac said:

Ah man. It's alright. But I'm sad if I think about what it could have been if they went for a true Lineage MMORPG. This feels like they tried to cater to too many audiences and didn't master any of them.

Way too much happened between that period of 2005/2006 and 20011, NCsoft splintered into so many pieces and each piece kind of took a part of Lineage with it, so i don't think it was ever possible to create whatever that true vision was, and yes it is sad. L2 was my crack back in the day.

Homura235 · October 7

xDrac said:

Ah man. It's alright. But I'm sad if I think about what it could have been if they went for a true Lineage MMORPG. This feels like they tried to cater to too many audiences and didn't master any of them.

That seems to be what happens with most MMOs now...or they go the opposite and try to focus too heavily on one thing ( Wildstar) and end up sinking that way instead. We keep waiting for the "WoW killer" or the next great MMO but it still hasn't arrived (and probably never will)

Quizzical · October 7

Some Steam reviews complained that loot is proportional to damage dealt, so if you play a healer or tank to help a group with group content, you won't get much loot. Is that accurate?

Neoyoshi · October 7

Quizzical said:

Some Steam reviews complained that loot is proportional to damage dealt, so if you play a healer or tank to help a group with group content, you won't get much loot. Is that accurate?

It's not accurate at all if it's worded exactly in that way.

They may have meant to outline how World Boss drops work; in that regards the world drop distribution is believed to be based on damage to the boss, so whoever does the most has a better chance of getting the purple world drops; but it's still pure RNG. Everyone gets a chest they can open as long as they hit the world boss.

The instanced 6-man Dungeons has it's own loot distribution system, so you have these Abyss tokens, and you can spend your tokens towards whatever is in your personalized dungeon chest, or you can choose not to and save those tokens until you see something in your dungeon chest that you actually want/need.

Then there are open dungeons similar to what people saw in Lineage 2 and Knight Online, where you could farm 24/7 pretty much for gear drops, though some of these open dungeons have limits, like some are only open during the day.

There is a bit more to do at level 50 in terms of gear progression, and we don't have everything Korea has, we are very much behind Korea progression-wise.

Terazon · October 8

One of the things I like is the world feels alive. Not just because players are everywhere (which they are) but the mobs, the animals, the wind blows, the grass moves and sways.
Very cozy.
I love the weather.
Great implementation of weather in the world and it has an affect. It is not just visual.

The game has some issues for sure but for me, it has more pros than cons.

Many do not like the little pets but I like them because it reminds me of VRising when you could send your minions out on expeditions for crafting supplies. Same thing with the pets in this game. The longer you send them out the more supplies they bring back.

I also love exploring the world and discovering the book fragments. Collect them all and complete the set.

S tier character creator
A tier graphics
S tier music and sound (music is awesome)
B tier combat
B tier leveling system
C tier crafting system
B tier fishing

Overall, for me, it is a low A tier - high B tier game.

Neoyoshi · October 8

Terazon said:

One of the things I like is the world feels alive. Not just because players are everywhere (which they are) but the mobs, the animals, the wind blows, the grass moves and sways.
Very cozy.
I love the weather.
Great implementation of weather in the world and it has an affect. It is not just visual.

The game has some issues for sure but for me, it has more pros than cons.

Many do not like the little pets but I like them because it reminds me of VRising when you could send your minions out on expeditions for crafting supplies. Same thing with the pets in this game. The longer you send them out the more supplies they bring back.

I also love exploring the world and discovering the book fragments. Collect them all and complete the set.

S tier character creator
A tier graphics
S tier music and sound (music is awesome)
B tier combat
B tier leveling system
C tier crafting system
B tier fishing

Overall, for me, it is a low A tier - high B tier game.

The weather i think needs to be talked about more, they really kind of went a bit nuts with the weather system in this game.

Weather affects so many things in this game, from how strong certain monsters are, to drop rates and drop types, to whether or not a certain fishing spot will be there or dried up due to lack of rain.... the list goes on.

I found out recently that depending on which direction the wind is blowing, it can affect a players gliding strength when they are in flight-morph.

Sovrath · October 8

xDrac said:

Ah man. It's alright. But I'm sad if I think about what it could have been if they went for a true Lineage MMORPG. This feels like they tried to cater to too many audiences and didn't master any of them.

I would have loved that but truth be told, Lineage 2's game play would just not wash today. Well, and have the large numbers these games seem to need.

Scot · October 8

"Reliance on active guilds will prevent players from making any real significant progress in the end game"

"The game will live or die by its community due to its reliance on PvP"

Are these really Cons?

Have we reached the point where a player in a MMORPGs should never have a reason to actually need a guild or a community is only important if a game has 'too much' PvP?

This is solo mentality up to the hilt, presumably a rubbish community is fine in a PvE MMO? As long as it is completely 'soloable' that is all that matters. Dire.

Ginaz · October 8

Scot said:

"Reliance on active guilds will prevent players from making any real significant progress in the end game"

"The game will live or die by its community due to its reliance on PvP"

Are these really Cons?

Have we reached the point where a player in a MMORPGs should never have a reason to actually need a guild or a community is only important if a game has 'too much' PvP?

This is solo mentality up to the hilt, presumably a rubbish community is fine in a PvE MMO? As long as it is completely 'soloable' that is all that matters. Dire.

Name me a pvp or forced grouping MMO that is even remotely successful these days. The only one that comes to mind is EVE and even there I believe most people spend their time in High Sec space. Maybe BDO, too, but you can do a lot there without having to pvp or join a guild.

Sovrath · October 8

Ginaz said:

Scot said:

"Reliance on active guilds will prevent players from making any real significant progress in the end game"

"The game will live or die by its community due to its reliance on PvP"

Are these really Cons?

Have we reached the point where a player in a MMORPGs should never have a reason to actually need a guild or a community is only important if a game has 'too much' PvP?

This is solo mentality up to the hilt, presumably a rubbish community is fine in a PvE MMO? As long as it is completely 'soloable' that is all that matters. Dire.

Name me a pvp or forced grouping MMO that is even remotely successful these days. The only one that comes to mind is EVE and even there I believe most people spend their time in High Sec space. Maybe BDO, too, but you can do a lot there without having to pvp or join a guild.

Are there really a lot of quality games that had decent money put into them and that were released with polish or at least were able to survive and gain that polish over time?

Clearly There is an audience for them.

Black Desert, Albion and Eve are the only current games that come To mind and they’re good. I think that points to these types of games being successful if they have quality.

aleos · October 8

My guild of F2P players, all 3 of us, just looted a sword from a world boss worth around 200 to 300 USD. All while 80 other people were attacking the thing. World bosses alternate from PVP to Peace to give PvE players a chance to participate.

I've yet to encounter a real game breaking block, paywall, or any difficulty that cant be overcome by simply playing the game.

I typically crawl dungeons alone and collect loot, the world is master crafted and have yet to come across repetitive world textures. Clothing physics are spot on, spells, attacks, look great, and bosses have their own modern mechanics needed to defeat them.

Hell a giant whale spawns out of the sky for you to mine minerals off its back to free up the monotony of whatever grind you're doing and the server typically participates.

Seeing what the game looks like in 30 to 90 days will be interesting however because it sounds like no one knows how to play the game or claim "mobile game" which couldn't be further from the truth.

For a genre thats so overly saturated with complete garbage after 15 years, this is a breath of fresh air that genuinely blends f2p and p2w mechanics and they hit the nail on the head for the time being imo.

Germzypie · October 8

The PvP combat is pretty awful really. Not much else to say about that.

When i first logged in and seen that huge map, i was excited about all the content only to realize after i hit lvl 50 that most of it was locked. Already running out of things to do, as a casual player. Game was fun for about a week.

Scot · October 8

Ginaz said:

Name me a pvp or forced grouping MMO that is even remotely successful these days. The only one that comes to mind is EVE and even there I believe most people spend their time in High Sec space. Maybe BDO, too, but you can do a lot there without having to pvp or join a guild.

Did I say PvP "forced grouping" were all amazingly successful? There have not been enough games on any of the variations from the WoW template to be sure how well any of their differing gameplay would fly. And Besides, what we are talking about is grouping as high end content, I suppose you want to remove raids as well? There is no such thing as forced grouping by the way, do you complain about co-op games?

Kyleran · October 8

aleos said:

My guild of F2P players, all 3 of us, just looted a sword from a world boss worth around 200 to 300 USD. All while 80 other people were attacking the thing. World bosses alternate from PVP to Peace to give PvE players a chance to participate.

I've yet to encounter a real game breaking block, paywall, or any difficulty that cant be overcome by simply playing the game.

I typically crawl dungeons alone and collect loot, the world is master crafted and have yet to come across repetitive world textures. Clothing physics are spot on, spells, attacks, look great, and bosses have their own modern mechanics needed to defeat them.

Hell a giant whale spawns out of the sky for you to mine minerals off its back to free up the monotony of whatever grind you're doing and the server typically participates.

Seeing what the game looks like in 30 to 90 days will be interesting however because it sounds like no one knows how to play the game or claim "mobile game" which couldn't be further from the truth.

For a genre thats so overly saturated with complete garbage after 15 years, this is a breath of fresh air that genuinely blends f2p and p2w mechanics and they hit the nail on the head for the time being imo.

Good story but it's a bit disconcerting that you are able to quote the USD value of the sword you looted.

Still sounds as if there's a pretty strong P2W component to this game even if you have decided to ignore it.

Elidien_ga · October 8

Kyleran said:

aleos said:

My guild of F2P players, all 3 of us, just looted a sword from a world boss worth around 200 to 300 USD. All while 80 other people were attacking the thing. World bosses alternate from PVP to Peace to give PvE players a chance to participate.

I've yet to encounter a real game breaking block, paywall, or any difficulty that cant be overcome by simply playing the game.

I typically crawl dungeons alone and collect loot, the world is master crafted and have yet to come across repetitive world textures. Clothing physics are spot on, spells, attacks, look great, and bosses have their own modern mechanics needed to defeat them.

Hell a giant whale spawns out of the sky for you to mine minerals off its back to free up the monotony of whatever grind you're doing and the server typically participates.

Seeing what the game looks like in 30 to 90 days will be interesting however because it sounds like no one knows how to play the game or claim "mobile game" which couldn't be further from the truth.

For a genre thats so overly saturated with complete garbage after 15 years, this is a breath of fresh air that genuinely blends f2p and p2w mechanics and they hit the nail on the head for the time being imo.

Good story but it's a bit disconcerting that you are able to quote the USD value of the sword you looted.

Still sounds as if there's a pretty strong P2W component to this game even if you have decided to ignore it.

Agree 110%. Not only the value but its sellable? So it is pay to win then?

Xoph · October 8

You did not play Lineage or Lineage 2 if you think Throne is a successor to Lineage.

And this is coming from someone who has been playing Lineage since 1998.

It was renamed to Throne for a reason, and a very good reason: It's not Lineage.

There's not a single game system in Throne that is like Lineage. Throne is Throne.

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Throne and Liberty Review: Very Much A Lineage Successor | MMORPG.com

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Throne and Liberty Review: Very Much A Lineage Successor | MMORPG.com

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Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV