Our team have recently tested the beta of Black Gold Online, the newest MMORPG from Snail Games USA, in which we can explore a world divided by science and magic, where the two factions are confronted by their ideology and for getting the powerful and mysterious mineral called Black Gold. The two major factions of the game are the Erlandir Union, a mystical and nature-loving people, and the Kingdom of Isenhorst, in which progress and technology are the pillars of their society. Although the game is still in beta, we already know that the game will adopt a Free-to-Play model.

The first thing we do in the game, is obviously create a character, although currently the game only have two races by faction, even though we know that soon it will be a race more by faction. We chose to play as a member the faction of the Kingdom of Isenhorst, because its steampunk theme caught our attention, and for our play test we turned to the Lokemean Dwarf, known for their skills as inventors and builders, who also are the main responsible in the advances in the steam driven technology. We were able to play both sexes, although female dwarfs resemble more to fairy girls insted of rude and hardened inventors; we can customize the appearance of our characters greatly, as we have at our disposal a large amount of options with which we can create a character with an unique look.

The game features a wide variety of classes, although some of them are limited to one faction or are gender locked, as for example the occultist who can only be women of the Isenhorst faction.

Upon entering the game for the first time we were greeted with a cinematic scene in which we see how Erlandir invaders were attacking the island where we were, so at the end of this introduction we were involved fully in the action, which was essentially a tutorial area, where as we progressed across the island fighting off few enemies and reaching waypoints that trigger new cut scenes. At this point the tutorial became particularly exciting as we got the chance to command a carrier (a huge vehicle or beast depending on the faction, which you can use in PvE and PvP as a personal tank), in this case an impressive combat Mech with which we fight against a huge magma boss.

Stepping into the main portion of the game it was readily apparent that this was an asian MMORPG, with a number of clickable icons to claim rewards for levelling up, logging in, staying in game, participating in events, etc. which is seen much more in the isometric top down point and click hero building type MMORPGs. Added to this was that each time we levelled up, acquiring item of piece of gear we suddenly increased our “Might” level, which in other asian MMORPGs are typically seen as being Battle Rating or something along those lines.

The game also offers the typical features of the traditional MMORPGs, like quests, action combats, nice graphics and intense gameplay. All this together makes the game a hybrid of both genres.
Already in the starter area we could do several different things, from face many different enemies, completing quests, exploring areas to enter into an instantiated instance to retrieve the belongings of a group of magicians. Also, a little later we could explore the dwarf capital, which shared many similarities with Ironforge, who many of you know as the World of Warcraft Dwarven capital. Yet the most remarkable during the first levels we were given access to our own mount; a steampunk style motorbike!

The game's story is revealed when you complete missions and talk to the NPCs throughout the world, to find out new bits of exposition with the war that was raging on and the conflicts that the Dwarves were facing at home, unfortunately the action and combat took a dramatic dip after the initial tutorial area and any combat that we did have was over in a matter of second with barely a scratch on those sort no challenge to it at all.

We had also explored the different features of the game, and the most promising were related to the PvP and the carriers, which you get from level 10 after completing a mission. The truth is that fight PvP battles mounted in a carrier may have much potential.

In conclusion: although the first impression we had of the game is that it is a bit dull and rough, we believe that it is worth to give it a chance since it seems that as the game advances gains in intensity, and that makes its at least promising.

RATING

• Pros: Battles between the carriers in the later game battlezones sounds interesting and would be a nice twist on PvP


• Cons: Controls and combat felt a little clunky, the game looks a little dated in comparison to other MMOs

• Graphics: 6.5


• Sound: 7


• Gameplay: 5

Overall: 6

And if you want to know more about this title, click on the "info" button below.

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 10th, 2014 at 11:14 am and is filed under MMO News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.