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Auto Assault: MMORPG.com Review
Dana
Member Posts: 2,415
Andrew Cranston has been playing Auto Assault since launch and today files our MMORPG.com Review. He scores the game 6.9 out of a possible 10 points. Read on to find out why.
;) The game has virtually no user base yet. You may come across a user once every half hour of game play or so, depending on what part of the map youre on, and the further you advance the less likely you are to see players based on the fact that the user base is so small, there hasnt been enough users play the game to higher levels as of yet. That being said, the players you do meet are mostly available for trade or for chat (there is a global chat function where you can send messages to all users).
Because of this problem there is a fatal flaw in the game regarding classes. The game was designed to have convoys of users attempting missions, and therefore each character class would have something different to add to the convoy. Ive been playing the game mostly with the Human Bounty Hunter class, and have come to several situations where Im just not strong enough to survive certain altercations with particular enemies. The game is set up with a very strong single-player focus, and if you wanted to play the game as a single player with no interaction with other users, it could be achieved. My advice to you: play the Commando (fighter) class. The game is centered around the idea that youre out there, killing everything in sight, so you might as well have killing as your primary skill. |
You can read more here.
Dana Massey
Formerly of MMORPG.com
Currently Lead Designer for Bit Trap Studios
Comments
I think people don't wanna be "cars"... they wanna be people who drive cars...
I generally don't comment on reviews, since I find most to be highly subjective.
But there are a couple of objective points that I felt Had to be corrected in Andrew's review:
1. Of course there's a 'run' function while on foot.
I have my character set on auto-run (as I do in most games) and frequently use the toggle for walking whenever I feel like it. Whether it takes a long time to cross towns or not is a purely subjective topic, but the flat out wrongness of saying there is no running while on foot just floored me.
2. The other point is about INC. I admit that the death message in-game has a text error stating you'll be transported to the nearest repair station, but every other mention of INC since the game was in development has said "the last visited". Even the game features page discussing INC ( http://www.autoassault.com/gameinfo/feature_inc.html ) makes it rather plain:
The manual, in-game help, and INC airlift 'hint' pop-up all bear this out and give the same information -- last visited repair pad. So, while I understand from whence Andrew's confusion arose -- I am pretty disappointed that he let one text error vs a mountian of supplied information lead him astray.I would have been far more interested in seeing a comment that 'while INC will transport a wrecked player's car to their last visited repair pad, a text error in the pop-up message inclines one to think it will be the nearest pad.' Either an oversight on Andrew's part -- or pure laziness.
The one I can forgive, the other keeps from ever wanting to read another MMORPG.com review.
Tough call.
"Crafting seems to be the major fault of the game"
Endgame content is the major fault of the game, since there is none.
- It takes 2 weeks to level 80 if you're averagely fast and when you get there there is nothing to do but to farm the same crappy bosses over and over.
- There is no PvP system implemented which is weird since the devs have all been raving about PvP in AA for years and years. There is absolutely no point in killing another player except for the odd few quests that require you to kill someone to get exp.
- The game is sinking fast into the likes of WoW clones where items are everything and the focus is all about PvE. The PvE in AA is bad, you haven't seen much of anything different from when you killed a mob at level 1, a boss at level 20 or every single mob in the highest zone at 80.
Crafting is absolutely not the major fault here, a revamped and improved crafting system with the accompanying AH/mail-system will not hoist this one out of the grave.http://kompaniet.mine.nu :+: #kompaniet @ QuakeNet
While there are some flaws in this game, I have to disagree with a few points in the review.
Graphics - They ARE varied but it's more in terms of terrain and buildings than palette. I've mainly played the Biomek race but in their first large area you've got a snowy region that changes to a complete blizzard, an area on fire, lots of glowing green pools, parts of the road that have been changed and taken over by robots, shanty towns, dusty hills etc. You do see some elements used a bit too much but think how large the map is and how fast you move - it's always going to be difficult to finely scale them. I think the vehicle models are great, especially on high-rez when you zoom in.
Vehicles - The handling of each type of vehicle within a class is very different and there is the obvious playoff of choosing a light, fast car that won't be so good for ramming or a slow, heavy tank. The aesthetic mods "tricks and trims" are entirely supposed to not give bonuses. This is so everyone isn't driving around with the same spikes or paintjob.
Movement - Yes you run slower than a car moves in town but then the town is a bit smaller than the apocalyptic wasteland :P This is a total non-issue.
Dying - Auto Assualt pretty much the softest penalty there is. Just wait to be picked up, then repair (all at no cost). All of your skill timers are reset and you lose nothing. You can even drive from one pad to the next if you don't want to wait 2 secs for this one to restore the next 10% of your HP. Being returned to the last station is more useful IMO. When out travelling, just make sure to drive over a repair pad so it remembers and returns you there rather than some other random pad you happened to be closer to.
Conclusions - It's not that difficult to raise crafting if you know what you are doing. You can buy broken items from junk vendors, get broken items as mission rewards instead of fixed ones (your choice) or reverse engineer a fixed item. You ideally want a new item every 5 levels of crafting otherwise when you craft something too easy you're less likely to get a level-up.
I agree with the rest of the review. The small community can be a problem but everyone is pretty friendly. What wasn't mentioned is that once you hit level 60 (out of a cap of 80) then there's a mission gap so for the first time in the game you have to do what you do in the first minute of other games and grind mobs for xp. Or you can start a new character and wait for the content update coming soon which will have some lower level missions which you'll get the same XP for. Which is what I'm doing.
A note on the value score - they recently reduced the price, even for the collector's edition so it might even be worth buying it and playing it for a month or two then quitting if you run out of things to do. So I'd give it more value.
All in all it's a great fun up to level 40. 40-60 the novelty of driving around destroying everything starts to wear off but it's still a good laugh. 60+ the endgame starts with a central PVP zone but that seems ultimately pointless. 7/10 :P
Graphics - Cant complain realy, looks good.
Vehicles - Need a little work, should be way more costumizible, and paint should be free. Shouldnt have to use up the little cargo area you have for something like paint. That has always been an issues that should have been resolved by retail. Not just the looks, but the physics with the terrain needs alot of work. Driving off a heal pad to do a front flip off a 2" drop is not cool. Ever car/truck/van should be able to hit 100mph easly, being its the future, with nuclear power engines, also given that a Geo Metro can out run most cars in the game is very sad.
Movement - Nerfed in beta, it was fine, but they though people were leveling to fast.
Crafting - Oh my, where to start. There was a few great and origianl crafting plans setup, but were thrown out for the current one. Bad mistake. Roll back. You can get most of everythign to 100 pretty easy in the first set, and even the 2nd. The 3rd is still bugged and the last is non existant.
I had very high hopes for the game, and did not end up buying. Me and my clan mates won the 1st IGN Tourny through total domination, the devs were the prize to kill, actually were the easiest. We all won free signed copies, and yet to recieve them, though I have been re-assured that they are being sent now. Not really angry about that, and shouldnt be until the gaem is in a good playible state.
I am a proud member of my Clan. We have been there for AA from the beganing and are still there. I hope the dev team just gets there butts in gear and fixes the obvious isssues that make this MMO under par from the other selections out there.
It still is a great game. One day I will return to the wastelands and smear those humans over the land as before.
Lt.Colonel Retratserif
1st Mechanized Infantry
Are you 1?JOIN THE FIGHT!!!
Classes:
In all honostly you can easly solo with any class, though you may run into some trouble, you learn to find ways around it. You can also put points into skills wherever you want, so if you are dead set on playing a class, you can turn it into a highbread as you go along and take new skills and put your skill points into the right stats.
Commander class (pet class): I played one for several levels, and they are very easly another great choice besides commando. You have to learn how to utilize the Speed/Defence/Offince switches as well as the class specific switches. When you need to sit back and heal up, switch over to defensive or defensive/speed mix AND switch to the pet mode that increases your pets offinsive abilities by a lot, but turns off your ability to fire weaponry. This way while you're running out of harm your pets are tearing em up. Over all this is a great class, enough fighting power to face up against many enemies, and having pets to do a lot of extra damage is very nice.
Test Server: Currently they are testing a LOT of changes. NCSoft likes to compile all it's patches into one big release, like they do with CoV and CoH (although in this situation I feel they should have been gradualy releasing fixe). A lot of loot will be balanced out and the game shall become a lot more playable!
Top Ten Most Misused Words/Phrases in MMO Industry...
As for crafting meh, gave up after got chassis to 100 with no player base and a lot of stuff needed from low level area im not about to farm thousands of mobs to get grease
Game has potential, but im sitting with 2 lvl 80 chars waiting for the patch to see if that changes anything, coz there's not a lot else to do.
Andrew -- A couple of things I, as an 8th wave beta tester and current player enjoying the game a lot, just have to point out.
Community -- The community is growing. Our guild is now around 100 strong and, even with alts and a few folks who didn't make it past the trial, there are 10-20 people online at peak hours and I've found folks on at all hours from 3 AM thru until the evening's peak. This complaint about no community is self-fulfilling and needs to be ratcheted back a bit, or new folks will stay away. There IS a community and it IS growing. The problem is that it doesn't appear to be because the General Chat is usually pretty silent. The reason, of course, is twofold. First, most folks join guilds right away. Yes, we actively recruit for Warriors of the Changed, but I've even gotten PMs on the site asking about joining up. But most importantly, the game moves so fast, the mobs are so numerous and respawn so quickly that, unless you're in town just hanging, you CAN'T chat. You need your hands to drive and fight, not type!
Now, you haven't seen anybody "in the field"? Well, the areas are bigger than you think, and that 100 mph you don't THINK is moving very fast is actually covering some ground. Also, there's a ton of Movement in this game. You're never stationary. But, really, you seem to feel more comfortable if an area is just teeming with folks all going after your mobs, KSing like crazy? Yikes!
Roleplaying/Storyline -- You're playing the Human faction, Andrew. This is the fastest levelling faction, but also has the least involving storyline. Give yourself a challenge and try the mutant faction. It's the slowest levelling but has a storyline that rivals a good old-school single-player RPG. And the Biomek faction is in the middle. Each faction is different in both levelling speed and storyline. You can't make a general statement about Story from just playing the Human faction.
As for roleplaying...c'mon now. Aside from a few folks who really take the time to roleplay, just how much of it do you find in most MMOs? Oh, you got a whole lot of folks shouting "Scorbu!" or "Watchawannakill?" in WoW? I don't think so. Roleplaying is always hammered in all these reviews of any of the games and it's time to give it a rest. I've seen great roleplayers in SWG or UO or Horizons, but they're few and far between. And, having a degree in English with emphasis on Middle English, most folks who even attempt the "Thees and Thous" don't know the actual grammar and usage and it gets painful to hear. If you take the time to READ the quest text, you'll find the characters don't speak all that differently from us, and have a wide range of styles from heavily stylized to everyday to downright humorous, thus allowing you to "roleplay" however you are most comfortable. (I love the crazy Biomek in the first tier area who collects old world recordings! And Theo the Scav and his wife Alice!)
Graphics -- I assume here you mean the landscapes, which ARE quite spartan, though can also be quite lovely. Again, you're playing the Human faction. The Fetid Bayou of the mutants has all the oppression and flavor of a swamp and is nicely done. Presumably, a professional reviewer has a rig strong enough to turn on the fog effects. I do. You should too. But it's a post-apoc world. The place has been nuked to within an inch of it's life. Aliens are terraforming it with green gunk! This isn't a fairyland elven forest here. It's a blown to snot, nuked world. Just how much "color and variety" are you expecting to find in that kind of world? Ever seen Damnation Alley? It's a desert, Man, from coast to coast!
The characters in town are stylized graphics rather than realistic. They remind me a lot of my beloved, lost-but-not-forgotten EnB. The cars, where the real action is, are very nicely detailed, down to the greenish smoke coming out of the mutant tailpipes, and all the weapons have their own look when mounted on the vehicles.
Crafting -- You're level 30 and only got to 20 in crafting? Then you haven't been looking anywhere but in Upside and you haven't Reengineered anything you've looted or gained as mission rewards. Go back to the official site and read up on the basic crafting guide. That's just sad for a professional reviewer. You haven't even tried.
And if you're a level 30 and getting killed travelling from town to town, you're doing something fundamentally wrong. We've had level 2s that have made it all the way to Ground Zero as far as just travelling is concerned. (Though it definitely wasn't easy! lol)
This is NOT to say the game is without issues. We're desperately waiting for the first big patch to address some of the problems. But as a review, this one is shallow at best. I hope you're not on salary, because you've spent a weekend with the game as the easiest faction and are putting up a review that many folks will read and upon which they'll base their decision. Or, if you really HAVE been playing since launch, then you haven't understood how to play the game at all!
I'd give your review a 2.5.
-- Xix
"I know what you're thinking: 'Why, oh WHY, didn't I take the BLUE pill?'"
- The population appears to be decreasing.
Game has potential and is fun but bad management, too early a release, low population and the EU server SUCKING made me leave. The EU, US segregation reaqlly annoyed me. Bad bad business decision. Apparently ncsoft europe and ncsoft (america?) are seperate business entitysand thats why we have no access to american forums and patches etc. How dumb is that?. They should just have english speaking servers.In order for me to spend hours a day for months or years playing a game I have to have a relateable character, and I just could not relate to being a car.
In this fundamental aspect, I think the game is flawed.
Bad reviewer, bad. Very poor quality "review". He obviously did not play much and could not be arsed to get enough info for the real review.
He haven't even tried to create Mutant or Biomek char for this "review". Because if he tried he would see that the starting area and areas that follow as you lvl up look totaly different for each race and change every 10-20 levels (lakes, desert, swamp, snow, mountains, alien infested greenish etc.), weather is different, architecture and remains of the industries are different, wildlife is different, color palete is different. What the hell more do you want?
If you want roleplay and story, play Mutant. I haven't seen good story arches like those offered by AA in a MMO for ages.
And the part about vehicles is simply wrong. NO, new cars aren't necessarily better than even your starting car. Cars are very different and their weight, handling and other parameters may or may not help you - depends a lot on your style of gameplay.
And to somebody in this thread claiming there is no PvP... get your car to the final zone - switch to PvP map and go blast other races to ashes in fast battles over control of artifacts and outposts.
And there is always the possibility to play against other players in the arena or join tournaments even at starting levels.
P.S.
I don't play the game currently. I'm waiting for fixes of bugs and addition of some needed features. If they manage that and work on high level content AA will definitely be a game worth playing.
I have not had the chance to play AA yet, but just from looking at the screen shots that have been posted, I'm sorry but I have to say- The graphics look pretty lame. Dissagree all you want fanbois but it looks like old school Sim graphics to me.
Ew.
Doesn't anyone want to leap to the reviewer's defense? No? Me either. Most people playing the two-week free trial reach the level 20 cap, and several manage to reach it with multiple characters. This guy plays a Bounty Hunter to level 31 and jumps in to write a review?
I look to this site for guidance, not first impressions.
This game has potential to be excellent, if all the pieces are placed correctly. With implemention of a AH/MAIL system will help it out, its still not the answer, but it will be an improvement.
I dont entirely agree with the reviewer neither, you really dont get the feel for the game at level 31. First impressions I'll admit are important, but this game has more than meets the eye if you just take your time to enjoy it and not speed thru the levels asap.
The game still needs some work, but when all is said and done, you may just have a winner in this category of a mmo.
I see Unreal Tournament has a Mod now to transform their game into something similiar to AA. So AA may be a trendsetter.
Only time will tell if this game will be successful and catch on. But at least I am still having fun at it...
Well some people think Lineage 2 has uber graphics so w/e but my system is very good and AA cannot be touched except maybe by EQ2 and then only barely.
In screens you can't see the flying debris and volumetrics smoke and fog and epxlosions and and and. The curls of sand stirred up on the ground from the rotors of an apache helicopter or the smoke drifting upward and the heat shimer from it's engines. Yes there are helicopters in AA.
In screens you can't see the flying debris and volumetrics smoke and fog and epxlosions and and and. The curls of sand stirred up on the ground from the rotors of an apache helicopter or the smoke drifting upward and the heat shimer from it's engines. Yes there are helicopters in AA.
I think the review was fair - there are some fun bits but I found it became an almost completely boring kill-all-you-can game (actually, it made me think it was a futuristic car version of Horizons
)
I was hoping for something like Mad Max but ended up so disappointed I removed it from my PC.
Heh, I have this game, and I barely ever play, but when I do play I enjoy it immensely. This is a truly great game for me.... that and I just love post-apoc games in general. I still play Fallout, for god's sake! Anyway, on the topic of the actual review, he is right about a few things. The graphics aren't great. But, he's wrong that it has a dismal user community. It actually has quite a large user community considering how buggy the game is, and the fact that most people say it's like an open beta you have to pay for doesn't help, but most of the people are just on at different times. I find I'm one of the lucky players who is on at the same time as all the nice people.
Sometimes, the gameplay does get a bit repetitive. The missions aren't really very original, and that bug where little ledges can flip you is annoying. The most fun thing I find in this entire game is melee combat. Sometimes, if I want a REAL change of pace, I'll unequip my turret weapon and ram enemy vehicles until they explode. It takes time, it's hard, but it's a lot more fun than just keeping your front weapon aligned while having them hard-targeted.
I give the game 8/10, and the review a 7.
Cheers!