I am the Call of Duty 4 leader for Team Dignitas, a pro gaming team sponsored by Dell. When Dell asked me to write a review for Warhammer Online, I thought that there could be worse jobs in the world! So here we are….
When you first load up Warhammer Online and get past the character creation a lot of people will think hmm this looks a lot like WoW, and yes the interface is quite similar but isn’t that the same in every MMO? It’s not like they can come up with some magical way of casting spells without having your bars. The one great thing about the Warhammer Online interface is definitely the ability to customize it. You can change everything, from the size of your bars to where you want your party bar to be and it’s all so easy to do as you can just drag them around the screen.
After you have familiarised yourself with the interface it’s time to get to killing! Another great thing about WAR (short for Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning) is the quests. When you pick them up and then look on your map the general area will be circled with a red ring making them really easy to find, but for single items you still have to do a little bit of looking around. The rewards are also a great thing as when you complete quests in other MMOs you may get items that are completely useless to you. But in WAR every item you get from a quest will be for your class so you are always improving on your gear so everyone will have similar levels of gear making it an even playing field in PvP.
One of the first things you will come across in this game which is a huge feature is the public quest system. It is exactly what it says; you can just run into an area and participate in a quest with anyone who wants to join in. They are a really good way of gaining experience and items as when you finish the public quest a chest will drop and everyone will roll for the loot inside it. How many people are there will determine the loot , so when more people are present more bags of loot will drop so everyone is happy. The public quests themselves consist of three parts. The first is often killing x amount of mobs or gathering x amount of materials which is often pretty easy to do solo but can take some time. The second part will often include champion mobs which are a lot tougher than others so you will need your friends to help you. In the third part there will be a hero, really difficult if you don’t have the right people with you.
Now the main part of this game is the player vs. player, or rather realm vs. realm as all the scenarios you win, keeps you control, and even the quests you complete all contribute to the realm control;when you control one area of the world you will gain bonuses such as more experience. This game makes it so
easy to compete against other players as you can just click on a button near your mini map and you will be entered into a queue for a scenario. Scenarios are basically battlegrounds where you will be playing the same amount of the other side over a small area. There are various types, including game types like capture the flag and domination with various other types. Even though scenarios are great the world PvP gets even better. Gather your battering rams and catapults as you prepare to take the enemy’s keeps and eventually capital city. Yes, you can ransack the enemy’s capital city and kill their king to claim your rewards which will be the best items you can receive. However before you can kill the king you have to push the enemy back to their capital. This is not as easy as it sounds. You will have to battle through three different zones with castles that you need to take before you can move on to the next. The battles for these keeps can be epic with hundreds of people all fighting to keep control.
So far I have enjoyed WAR immensely and can’t stop playing it. It just draws you in with the awesome public quests and PvP from the word go.