RYL2: Path of the Emperor Review by Dave
For the last week or so I've managed to play RYL Closed Beta. I've played RYL the open beta since October time and I have mixed thoughts about this massive online RPG. I've seen many changes on the way of RYL with certain patches fixing bugs and certain quests. I've even seen them do a Christmas special. But everytime the RYL team has done a great job improving the game to make you still interested.
On the open beta I was a lvl 67 assassin, the problem with that version was if you didn't have a party you would never level. I didn't have a party for around 5 weeks and managed around 30%, and lost interest many times.
Also many bugs involving mouse mode, which would allow the enemy to keep a lock on you whilst you were invisible, made the class pointless.
RYL: Path of the Emperor CLOSED BETA Introduction
So on this RYL closed beta I chose a mage. So I could become an eNchanter as they are one of the best PVP characters.
As you can see here the scenery is beautiful and also the water. I had my settings all on high at this point with no lag, my ATI 9800 pro coped well at making this look great.
Now both Akkans and Humans spawn on the same island when the game begins. You cannot encounter them unless you are in guilds against each other, so if you're a renegade you will not fight them.
There are many differences in the way to lvl up and skills are used from previously. Skills jump in 10s now, so sometimes you have many spare skill points before you can increase your skills. To start you off there are a few quests around involving the pirates. You can see highlighted quests and names by pressing "V". Also before you want to get skills for your class you need to face a boss, an Ichemn King.
So straight away you are involved in a mini boss battle. I stopped my enchanter at lvl 20 as I found out that they are meant to be all int, so they can have powerful skills and also increase their skills, unlike in the open beta enchanters had same int and dex for there skills. So when you first start playing look in the shops to see what skills you need and how to approach them.
Second Character - Warrior or Defender?
I thought I would be a warrior after having a bad experience with my sin in open beta and decided I wanted to be the strongest. So I chose a warrior as last time they were a lot better at higher levels. On open beta once you got to a higher level warrior skills did more damage as they had tons of strength, and eventually got the same armour as defender.
This time however, armours go beyond the 165 con - warrior can't even reach, so a defender has a great advantage this time. Also axes, that did the most damage last time, defenders get to use as it is a con based weapon. Now on this version if you choose to become a warrior you will have to put some points into con to at least have some sort of armour instead of being pure strength. Also only defenders and clerics are allowed shields, so a warrior's weapon skill is to use duel wielding.
Meaning by using two one-handed swords at the same time.
I choose not to use duel wielding as early on I wanted to use a skill, that could do lots of damage and get me out of trouble.
Scenery
Even though this version is kinda similar to open beta it has some much better scenes involving snow, swamps, sea and mushroom land.
Ah my first party, as you can see both of us are not in guilds, so both Akkan's and Human's are able to party. So this nice gentleman helped me level faster, and I helped him as well.
Monsters
As you can see from a few pics above you could see a mini boss known as a Hydra, it was able to attack me with many spells like an enchanter, like entangle and vampire kiss (instead of being boring and hitting you or biting you), so I was dead very quickly.
The game is getting more advanced with each patch.
As you can see from here we have never seen snow before or these types of enemies. This one is Angry dwarf.
These I believe are kung-fu slappys or monks. Very strange form of monkey and looked mean.
Some really nice tigers. Well they look nice, but bite a lot.
This is an angry dwarf sharpshooter. Enemies can now fire weapons from a distance instead of them just hitting you from two feet away.
How is RYL Gonna Compare to other MMORPG's?
Ryl is more fantasy based, but still you get involved due to its realistic nature.
It's main competitors are obviously World of Warcraft and Everquest 2 - these two titles have had massive success so whether their games are good or not, a lot are going to buy them to try it out. RYL doesn't have the same advantage, but for me if RYL needs to succeed more it needs to add more depth in races.
As two races is very simple and not much change. There has been rumors about another race but nothing has been said officially.
My closing thoughts
RYL is on its way to being completed and I would say it's around 90% the way there. Each beta they offer you the game has got better and they have added more stuff. I dont know what else they have got in store for us.
It gets a 4/5 from me. The main problem for me is how is it gonna compete with the two other massive titles? It needs to add more quests, more events to keep people interested, also some form of creatures and more means of transport. A few other races would really interest other people also, as this game has some really stunning graphics and can offer a much more appealing side than other MMORPG's.
Check MTS_ALIEN review for other details
First Impression by TheBlacksmith
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