Thinking of Vanguard? Don't bother

[Agram]

Been avoiding the new batch of MMORPG's due to the life absorbing nature of them, but got this one very cheap. Vanguard: Saga of Heroes

Should of known it was a bad sign when the developers can't be bothered providing any useful information about the game apart from technical support. And well-established sites like Allakhazam don't support it.

Anyway, all the servers listed have population status of low, except Galenia that's at medium. Have tried one of the low population servers (as a friend had a character on it) and I've not seen any other players. Tried several races/classes to visit most of the newbie area's. Have left the newbie area's and it's still disserted. So unless you have a friend to duo with, you're left grinding away in an empty area bored out of head. And due to the fast respawns, you can easily get over run.

I foresee and merging of servers fairly soon, if the game doesn't go belly up.

[Harrison]

Is is always sad when games that rely on community based populations don't thrive or just start to die. Apart from the lack of other people populating the game what is the actual game like compared to other MMOs?

[Agram]

Visually the game is very nice, and that's with a 7800GT. So it probably looks stunning with a newer card and more options enabled.

The free-roaming nature isn't entirely true as my PC does chug once you hit a loading zone. You can still carry on moving, but it's like a stop motion and jerky movement. Would probably die if fleeing combat at the time.

Not been able to explore any internal area's due to them being classed as dungeons, as there are no instances. So trying to get in solo isn't that easy due to slow clearing and fast respawns.

You can flee combat, but you have to run a long distance before the mob breaks pursuit. Also had issues where the mob has stopped chasing, but I've remained in combat for several minutes (have kept running on to towns) so regeneration is greatly reduced.

Still going to see how high a level I can get before trial ends. Just incase the game ever picks up in the future.


Still got to try the trade skill part, but diplomacy looks interesting if you've experienced trading card games. But I just ended up speeding through conversations instead of playing it like a genuine sub-game.

I brought the game for £5 as a friend had a spare version. And feel it was a waste of money due to it being like an off-line game.

Still going to play and get as high a level as possible before trial expires. Just incase the game picks up in the future.