Skaiano review #1 : Asda Story (Deleted)

Skaiano

Unfortunately. Or fortunately... I have quit this review and will probably not be making any other reviews any time soon. Please enjoy the other reviews made by more experienced users. Thank you.

Trucidation

Not bad for a first effort, but you need to get away from using "official style" formatting kind of reviews.

Many of us here have played more than several MMOs. What we need from a review of one we haven't played yet is Relevant Details. You yourself say you've tried a bunch of games, and you name them. Which strikes me as odd how your review is pretty devoid of actual content about the game itself. Which can lead to the assumption that you're the type who dabbles for about a week and 10 levels in a game, and then bails out to try another. If you're not, sorry, but that's how your review comes across as. It's too superfical, there's basically nothing in it.

For example, in your own "Interface" section you say "basic stuff". So what are you trying to tell us if you haven't got anything to say? You should point out instead if it has any unique features, or does something differently from how other MMOs of this type do it. If you don't have anything to add, just sum it up quick in the summary or something.

Things like graphics, design, sound effects, music... they can all be lumped under "Presentation". While many of us like pretty graphics, we've also grown more or less numb to all the hype over the years that the next game will be the best thing since sliced bread... but it turns out to be just another clone. Also, how a game looks/sounds is NOT important to how it plays. You don't need to devote multiple sections to describing all that. Seriously. Many of us even substitute our own music while playing games. Graphics/music just aren't a big deal. There are way too many shitty games that look nice but play like crap.

Finally, playing the actual game itself, or as you put it, "concept". HERE is where you should devote most of a game's review. What makes this game different from other games of the same genre? What does it do well, what does it botch up? Class balance (pvm, pvp), skills, quest-vs-level distribution, grinding factor, noncombat options. Social aspect, guilds, events, GM availability, ease of finding help of the type you need when you need it, is questing better done solo or with party, exp distribution and plvling, pvp/pk, is it infested with gold spammers, is it stable or does the server go down every other day, how many servers/channels are there, server load, lag, are item mall items tradable/unbalancing, etc etc. You know? All the meaty stuff.

You hardly even mention anything about all this. I could cut and paste your review onto a different MMO and it'd still fit. Wtf? That shouldn't be the case.

Just compare your review to Aciddragon's. He mentions stuff like Titles, the soulmate system, how there are 3 job classes, how soloing is only viable up to a certain point, etc. THAT is the kind of thing we need to know.

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You're not writing a fluff piece for a magazine. You're writing for people who already know most of the basics of playing an MMO. What we want to read in a user review is what makes this game stand out from the others. List all the details.

Skaiano

So it IS crap eh? Oki doki.... I'll fix it up.