This one is for all my fellow MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game) fans out there. There’s a brand, spanking new - so new it's in open beta testing - MMO out there that's not only FREE TO PLAY, but allows you to create characters of two races as large and in charge hairy, muscle bears!  The game is called Allods Online, created by a Russian company, and brought to the USA via F2P (free-to-play) by the video game company gPotato.  All free-to-play online games have a store where you can purchase either items for your characters or game enhancements such as extra experience points, or even extra characters…all for REAL money of course.

Now, I know most of you guys are familiar with WoW (World of Warcraft). You will find a very familiar set-up in this game, from the two warring factions to choose from (Orcs and Undead cheerfully included), the controls of the game and even the quests (Go kill X number of monsters, or collect X number of items for me).  But what sets this WoW near-clone apart is the setting and the promise of more goodies to come at higher levels. The setting has a distinctively modern feel, with a city that feels like it belongs in the 1920's, with brick apartment buildings, sewage plants, and eclectic factories, as well as electric street lamps.  Yet there is still a sense of medieval warfare, considering players fight with swords, bows, and magic.   Allods Online even provides “Space” exploration via what looks much like flying pirate ships from the 1600's in a modern technology mash-up.  With these ships you can fly through what they call the Astral to explore space “Islands” called Allods (hence the game’s title).  While doing this of course, enemy player ships can attack you, so you’ll need a crew of friends to man the cannons and repair the ship while in combat.

The story line actually falls in line with a previous RTS RPG (Real Time Strategy Role Playing Game) hybrid from 1998 called Rage of the Mages in the US and  Allods: Sealed Mystery in Russia.  The game was heavily inspired by Warcraft 2 but set itself apart by giving you one main character to control that you would level up through exp (experience points) and gain new skills and abilities.  One might even say Warcraft 3 might have been inspired by this game which in turn was inspired by their previous title!  The story goes something like this:  A great war broke out between different factions and races on the planet of Sarnaut, and the world was broken into thousands of pieces; islands or Allods floating in space.  Now two main factions remain, the League and the Empire, both with multiple races joining the cause in a quest to claim and conquer as many Allods they can find.

The character classes and races arise from what the game refers to as archetype's.  For example, an imperial orc and human can both be paladins; the orcs version is called a reaver with the imperial human models called avengers.  The game’s archetypes are as follows: warrior, paladin, scout (ranger, mostly bow attacks), healer, warden (they get pets who fight on command), mage, summoner (who can summon multiple temporary pets), and psinoicist who are more like mages who use mental powers. Within the two factions there are five races to choose from.  Both factions offer stock humans.  On the league's side you can also choose elves (with decidedly less-than-butch fairy wings), as well as a race of adorable, little creatures called giberlings that come in sets of three. They’re played in what is called a trupple (a sort of three-way couple) relationship because you end up controlling three creatures at once.  Giberlings pretty much look like a cross between a gnome and a werewolf, but a lot cuter!  On the imperial side you get to choose from undead cyborgs with mechanical arms and legs, as well as super-ridiculously hot orcs.  It’s rather unfortunate for dwarf lovers out there. At least at this stage of beta release there are no dwarves in sight.

Characters take on professions that are supposed provide have mini games for the creation of items.  The company also promises a sports arena for a game called goblinball. At this early stage I get the idea that it’s a sort of a pvp (player versus player) game that works like a competition sport.  They also promise pvp grounds and areas as well as the very enticing space ship battles.   

The graphics in this game seem cartoonish with a look much like World of Warcraft.  The animation is beautiful and very eye-catching – fresher and more current than the six year old WoW.  The humans on the league side can be customized into stocky muscle cubs, and you can even give them body hair!  The orcs are the same on the imperial side, with the added ability to make them chubby, hairy and ripped with muscles. I admit I have a bit of a chubby orc fetish, so I spent an extra long time in the character creation room admiring half-naked orcs in all their glory. 

Now lets talk about the flaws of the game.  Once again, this game is currently in beta, so elements are bound to change. One snag that you will notice instantly is the lag (slow game play). There are currently only two servers to choose from, so its understandable. I doubt this will be much a problem once the game goes live.  Another early problem is the lack of decent menu items and quick commands.  Currently you have to type ‘/invite *friends name*’ to be able to invite them to your party rather than right-clicking the mouse. Your starting city is located in the imperial territory (I have yet to play the league...hello, hot hairy chubby orcs!?  Yes please). Though the city is a bit on the huge side, its design is a bit awkward and currently doesn’t allow easy travel between districts.  For you WoW players, imagine combining all the major horde or alliance (not both at the same time) cities into one large metropolis. Each WoW city would be about the size of a district. Yeah, that’s pretty big.  I’ve only reached about the eighth level, and so far all the quests and monsters I’ve battled are in the city, so you get the size thing.

My last two gripes about the game are the largest; questing and leveling-up time is slow.  Too slow, as a matter of fact.  Most mmorpgs before WoW came along were very slow, but WoW pulled it all together and streamlined fighting to accommodate fast fights and quicker leveling-up. More skills and abilities got a dose of speed as well.  Unfortunately for Allods Online, this may not be the case.  Each level you gain is much stronger than, say a single level in WoW. But at the same time, it takes you that much longer to acquire new skills.  The number of available skills is smaller, and the only way to learn them is through talent points which are earned with each level.  The problem with this is that a first level skill costs one talent point to learn. But if you want to bring that same skill to level two, you need two points to learn it…basically two levels worth of fighting.  My last gripe is with the quests themselves.  It’s no longer fun to find lazy npc's (non playable characters controlled by the computer) asking you to retrieve items that they could easily acquire themselves, like dirt and rocks (yes, there is a quest for that from some miners). Being asked to go out and kill a prescribed number of monsters no longer thrills me.  While there’s nothing wrong with those types of quests, there are just too many of them in the game. Boasting over 10,000 quests is nothing to cheer about when most of them request the same task over and over.  I would like to see a game present fewer, more meaningful quests than a ton of boring ones. 

All in all, Allods online has great potential. They hit the ground running with a game that’s both familiar yet fresh, with an updated concept (space pirates in the 1950's!!). In it’s current incarnation Allods needs more work - not just in the core programming (additional user friendly menus), but with some of its core concepts as well (skills, leveling up, quests). The game is, and will remain completely free.  So if you’re looking for some decent online gaming with handsome graphics, a brand new world and some cool space exploration, give it a try. At its heart Allods lives in the fantasy genre. But with hot, hairy muscle bears waiting for you to dress them up…look no further than Allods Online! 

Alex is a North Carolina Fan Bear with a passion for gaming, Furry art and hunky orcs! Can ya tell from the picture? Alex is our go-to man for fighting games. And if you've ever seen him work out his martial arts skills...you'd understand that he knows his stuff! Welcome aboard, Alex!