Rating: 
Summary: AC 2 is a 1st Generation MMPORG, Nothing New Here
Review: First off, I have tested the Beta extensively and played DAOC, EQ, and AC 1. AC 2 is is NOTHING at all like AC 1. I would say it's more along the lines of EQ and DAOC, but with alot less features. Why Turbine took such a great game in AC 1 and made it a stripped down version of their competitors' games is beyond me. The developers themselves have apparently failed to learn a single lesson from all the time they spent on AC 1. They have reverted back to implementing tedium after tedium after spending years in AC 1 of removing it. Sure, it is still beta as of today (10/16/02) but there were some very poor decisions regarding the core of the game. Most notably the combat system is lacking in any sort of imagination. Gone are the days of feeling like a hero in AC 1, fighting mobs and mobs of critters. Expect most of your time in AC 2 barely being able to fight 1 creature then wait while you regen health and vigor (mana). I can live with limited quests, armor and weapons at first because I know full well that Turbine has a great track record of adding content each month. There is no doubt that AC 2 is the best looking game I have ever seen. But so much more is needed from an MMPORG where you are expected to live in a fantasy world. There is a total lack of immersion, tools that will enable you to play a part in an allegiance as well as nothing to help the player build a player economy (I.E. no trade chat channels, no player run vendors and no secure storage. The Developer's have already stated that there will not be player run vendors and secure storage for quite some time. Note that secure storage was added to the original AC two years after it was released). There are so many things fundamentally wrong about the game in it's present state and it has been stated by the Developers themselves that what we are playing now is pretty much the final build. Combat is relatively boring, although there are hundreds of skills, only a handful are useful, the UI is awful and not customizable, loot system is unimaginative and worthless, pets do not work properly, there are no distinct chat channels, in game map is clunky to work with, you have to keep too many windows open and the game play itself is way over-simplified. Character creation itself is very simple. You simply pick a race, gender and customize how you want to look from a limited selection of choices. You can untrain skills, which is good because there is absolutely no documentation about what each skill does. In a given skill tree, there are numerous Area of Effect skills, but you have no idea how much damage each one does, how much vigor they consume, etc. You also do not know at character creation what skills are available to you for your chosen race. Expect to re-roll until you find a race that has a skill set you like. There are melee users, missle users and mages. But, there are no "spells" they are all skills. Mages don't have to cast spells, they can just auto attack without using mana. In a simplified form, I can understand why Turbine (the developers) decided to institute the skill tree, because it would, theoretically, be much easier to balance game play. However, as of this time, there is NOTHING in the way of balance, with melee characters coming out on the bottom of the totem pole by far. Also, it doesn't matter which race you pick, as all will have the same attributes for their entire lifetime (strength, coordination, etc) and have the exact same health and vigor levels at each level (a Lugian Melee will have just as much health and vigor as a Human Mage of the same level). Player vs Player and Kingdom vs Kingdom combat have yet to go through an extensive test phase, so expect many months of balancing issues here. There is nothing revolutionary about this game at all. The game is nothing more than a pretty graphical engine. It is totally appalling that they are about to release this game in a few weeks time with such glaring issues at hand. AC2 is relatively stable for me however, so that is a good thing. Summary: Wait at least 6 months for people who are paying to play the game to do more "beta testing". Come back when the bugs are hopefully ironed out and the game is a bit more immersive.
Rating: 
Summary: Lost Adventurer
Review: This game seems to be that last piece of mudfish, at the bottom of a three day old gumbo. Developers plan to stir AC2, and hand carry waves of xp hunters across the ruins of dereth. Seems the only ones with some pleasure and excitement are the developers...I want a job doing that!!! No freedom for the flavor to lift from the pot and it draws no attention to the recipe. With a few hundred sheets of explanation, one might begin to explore the fine art of 'crafting' -woowee!!! If you want some low-pot gumbo, with shards of shredded meat-bits and by-products, please grab yourself a teaspoon of AC2. Otherwise, wait until someone cooks a fresh pot. Im going to give the beta/shelf/home/neighbor/friend/relative version of AC2 a big two toes down. Someone please tell the next devs that people want to interact with each other, in spite of the perils about...not the other way around. Anyhow...GOOD LUCK AC2!!
Rating: 
Summary: Better than Asheron's call 1?
Review: A lot of players coming from Asheron's call 1 will be disappointed with the changes in the game. There are no NPC's which means no shopping. No spell components, no fletching arrows. I myself missed many of the aspects of AC1. However, after a few full days of playing I've gotten used to the difference and come to terms with the fact that AC2 is a different game! and a darn good one!
New players will find AC2 very easy to get into and graduate from n00biehood. Best graphics of all the MMORPGS out and a great storyline are the strong points of this game.
Rating: 
Summary: Asheron2 Hit or miss?
Review: Being a EQ fan with a couple of level 60 toons, I was excited to check out the new AC2. The graphic textures are great. Be prepared to kill some rats and wasps to start leveling up. The animation when fighting is interesting. Looks like the rats have been practicing Kungfu since their days of EQ? Since I would rather go lance a boil than play the first AC, (yep, I hated it)I wanted to go into this review with a frest, clean taste in my mouth, placing my bias in a lockbox. Keep in mind this is beta, better than delta, but not alpha yet. If you like traveling the country side and enjoying the graphics of a game, this is enjoyable. If you like to kill and level up there is lots of blood to spill. If you looking for high social development that other massive online games are shooting for you may want to wait for their release. If you want to get away from Verant and Sony's Big Brother control, this may be the ticket. I am looking forward to see what refined and additions come with the retail version so I can give them one more star!
Not new enough for two. Here is the break down
Graphics 4.7 stars ****.
Gameplay 3 ***
New stuff **
Addictive rating ***
Would I buy retail. Yes
Recommend others to try download. Yes
How much does my wife like it *
how much does my wife think I should like it -***** (yeah, minus)
Do I wake up grouchy? NO! I let her sleep in.
thx laterz
Rating:
Summary: Camelot Redux
Review: Playing the Beta..
Its the same thing over and over again. Since UO and EQ nothing new has been added to the MMORPG. The true poverty of the online gaming world is not in the graphics engines or the power of the hardware. The poverty resides in the game writers total lack of imagination.
This one is EQ/Camelot warmed over.. no new stuff here.
Rating:
Summary: Nice looking graphics, but ...
Review: I have been a beta tester for quite a while and so far AC2 did not meet the expectations of most beta players (check out AC2 beta forums). I would recommend checking it out before you place your order. If you are looking for depth of play similiar to AC this might be the wrong game for you. Here are some pros and cons. Pros:
-great graphics
-nice looking seemless dungeons (mostly without portal)
-good monster AI
-easy to learn Cons:
-no NPCs!!!!!! Just to be clear on that. It means NO stores, NO in-game NPS help or communication of whatsoever.
-no economic system except player economy (I guess that means if you are a casual gamer you will be stuck with looted weapons and armor that suck); loot can be converted in backpack to gold that, since there aren't any stores, is useless
-simplified skill system (kind of like Diablo, but far away from AC1's detailed skill system)
-no role playing because you will be stuck with hunting monsters since there is nothing else to do... -all combat types play the same (magic/hand weapons/missile weapons). None of them needs any supplies (no arrows, no ingredients, ...). Basically you aquire a bow and it comes with unlimited ammunition...
-small game world; don't get mislead by endlessly curving valleys leading you around in circles... Don't get me wrong. It is still quite big and very detailed, but relatively small compared to similar titles. Unfortunately it appears that AC2 will become just another great looking MMPORG without much content. It will surely have some nice and cool looking events, but there is a lot of substance missing. Looking at the game itself and noticing that it has cities with houses that can't be entered it almost appears that Turbine tried to cut some corners (no NPC economy, no transportation or housing, ...) to be out first with a good looking next generation MMPORG. Unfortunately this came with a price that hurts the longterm play value which is quite important in this game category. I can only recommend to check it out before you buy and be sure that monster killing is all you are looking for... This had a great potential, but it didn't get used for some reason... :(
Rating: 
Summary: Shut up fools
Review: I think whoever is knockig the game before they play the complete version are fools. I personally think this game when complete will be much better than AC 1 and ive been playing AC1 for more than 2 years myself. I also dont think it will be like Dark Age as much as people think, this game is pretty original through and through.
Rating:
Summary: Very disappointed.
Review: This truly is a shame. The game looks beautiful but thats the only thing going for it (and you can't even take advantage of that unless you have a decent Vid Card). There is no sense of adventure, no sense of comradeeship. The A.I. is appaling and sporadic at best. 1 third of the character types (namely Melee) is entirely useless. The loot drop is buggered beyond belief with no sharing capability and works strictly on a whoever killed it can loot it basis; thats even in groups (or fellowships as their known in AC2). There are no 'channels' to speak of to communicate within the game if you want to talk to someone in your fellowship you have to type the slash command /f first... every time. And, of course, ITS BORING. A previous reviewer called it a dumbed down version of Diablo, thats it exactly. Imagine Diablo in a 3d world and you have Asherons call. If you do not create a character who either uses a Bow or Magic, then you will get NO where. So resign yourself to standing at a distance and pinging away with your arrows/spells... it gets tedious very quickly. Another reviewer who jumped to the defence of this game (even though he's never played it) mentioned that its still in Beta. True .. however the version of the client we are usining at the moment is the version being shipped to stores (or so we were informed at the last patch). This does not bode well. Its really very sad. This game is truly beautiful in appearance, but with no sense of community (it is a multi-player, guild based game after all), and a class that is entirely useless and superfluous, bugs galore, constant crashes and a play style thats just plain old BORING! I do not see this game making any inroads into the genre. If your looking for a more substantive game ... take a look at Dark Age of Camelot. AC2 is just a shabby pretender to the crown.
Rating:
Summary: Nice graphics.... BUT.....
Review: I played this on a friends desktop and despite the load they were putting on it in beta, it seemed to handle well. One thing they don't tell you about on the pre-order page, however, is that it currently only works with GEForce series cards. I would be pretty upset if I pre-ordered this game and found that out the hard way.
Rating:
Summary: Whats up with this game??
Review: I can see so many areas this needs to be improved halve the monsters i fought yesterday didnt attack back. The graphics are great!, but the lag has been lasting forever.
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