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General Review for Entropia
jihashi
Member Posts: 136
Hello everyone, for those that follow me from game to game, then you know who I am. For those that don't. Just know that I will make this as painless (or painful if you prefere) as possible. This is a general breakdown of Entropia Universe. All opinions and observations are my own, feel free to disagree. But a word of warning. Do not troll this thread, or you will find yourself on the recieving end. So, without further ado, here we go.
-graphics/gameplay, The graphics in Entropia are fairly decent for a game/community. Far better than most chat platforms out there. But to call this an MMO is far off the mark as far as game play goes. After a tedious, and all to laggy character customization routine, your dumped right into game with no direction, an ugly orange jumpsuit looking thing on your body, and a cheesy 60's sci-fi looking thing. Which, after painstakeingly trying to find out, is some sort of "sweat" gatherer. They do have billboards that give you generalized advice, but nothing that will constitute how to survive should you find yourself under attack. The all to brief descriptions don't tell you much, and there are no popups to help you realize you just got some advice. They say there are quests you can undertake, but after four hours of wandering around aimlessly trying to find an NPC or a player to talk to, I found nothing at all.
-UI and movement, Possibly the worst setup I have ever seen. The UI is far from entuitive, and takes a good fifteen minutes or so to go through and try to understand. Most of the options you have to setup on your own, there isn't even a tutorial hint to help you figure this out. While your able to gather items from enemies, the game fails to inform you on how it is your supposed to get it from a corpse, to your inventory. Even right clicking on the object doesn't give you any sort of hints. Drag and drop maybe? Well, if that is the case, you better gather it fast if you got it from a creature. Otherwise, you will lose it the instant your killed. Movement is with the WASD keys, which is fairly standard for foreign produced games. But there seems to be no way to change that to something your more comfortable with. The click to move is the worst yet. Try to mouse look while you have that option set, and you find yourself running in whatever direction you were facing. Even if you didn't click on a spot for a destination.
-economy, From what I have seen, the world runs off of a currency called PED. Which, if I read correctly, can be bought and or sold with and for real world currency. When you start out, it's not an easy commodity to come by. With no other gear to start off with other than a sweat gatherer, expect alot of frustration, because your going to die time and again just trying to get a few drops of sweat to sell. As far as the tag saying that the game is free to play, as it turns out, it isn't really free, and ends up costing you more in real world currency just to get going, than any other game out there.
-community, I spoke to very few people in world, as at the time I was online, there was nobody around to talk to. So all in all, not very many people can be seen, if any. The few that you do see are spamming the chat over and over again with adds trying to sell goods, or recruit you into whatever clan/guild/faction/cult or whatever they call it.
Overall, this is something that should be avoided, unless you like being frustrated on a minute by minute basis. If your looking for an alternative to Second Life, just keep looking as this isn't it. If your looking for something that is newbie friendly, easy to start, and zero to little frustration on getting started. Again, this isn't it. If I graded on a star scale, this would get a zero out of five stars.
Well, that concludes my review, short, but not nessarilly painless. Bear in mind a review is an individual opinion, nor does it reflect the opionions of any one community. Until next time!!
Comments
Great review!
The economy is controlled by Mindark and their employess "personal avatars" that play the game. Most of the older players have left the game. {Mod Edit}
Read the forums for more information before you deposit
http://www.planetcalypsoforum.com/forums/
{Mod Edit}
Entropia has always been and will always be a Scam disguised as a 3D Game.
I like the idea of a FPS MMO, but I really hate the real world currency system. Stick to F2P or Sub system, none of this real currency crap :-/
This game could have been pretty decent if it was hosted right.
Stay far far far away from this game unless you have very deep pockets (lot's of real money to burn). $20 will buy you about 5 hours of "Hope" that the game could be fun. Then your left with nothin'.
If this game... I say "game" because I'm afraid to even utter it's name anymore..... But if this game changed it's money in and gave players the "real" tools to have real fun, then it might stand a chance. I'm apalled that Michael Jackson's legacy and even Rock and Roll for that matter has anything to do with this game as it's business practices are as unfair to the player as it get's.
Godspeed my fellow gamer
This.
I tried the game 3 times during the last 5 years, thinking i was missing something. But its not even a game, the most common basics of game design and mmo design were thrown out of the window years ago. MMORPG.com shoudnt even list this POS.
Stay away ! Even DF is with his poor animations, ui and clumsy mmo system is like 100x better than this. I really dont how they get players to actually play that "game" for weeks and months, even pay for it lol
Found out later that most of them have no ideea about the games. The ideea of paying for stuff, and harsh dead conditions is great, but is so poorly executed and misleading here, that is not even worth any atention.
Hmm.. i wouldnt compare this game to DF, as DF is an 'honest' game, not that im a fan of DF though, but i do agree that Entropia is, to all intents and purposes the MMO definition of a ponzi scheme.. i think mmorpg.com would be doing everyone a favour by de-listing this game.. though i guess the fact you really can play this game for free - though who can possibly have fun gathering 'sweat' i have no idea.. probably means that the game squeaks through.. still.. i really think it should come with a warning...
I have a buddy who stoped smoking... guess what that money he saves from being a non-smoker goes... yeah, into this game. He has tried couple of times getting me to play it, but I have a hard time seeing myself putting money into a game that I could put on something else... I rather pay NCSoft or Blizzard or whatever 13€/month than spending hundreds of euro per month in this game just to progress...
To be bloody honest, you can get pretty far in this game for the normal 14-15 (what ever curremcy your contry uses) that most MMO's cost. Sure the amount of knowledge needed gaind before entering the game is higher than your average MMO and you should not drop in top this without being prepared.
the UI is horrid... but used to be worse and you get used to it after a while, and while the game is alot more shiney these days animations are still about as smooth as concrete. Questing... if you like to call it that is a very recent addition to the game and is player generated... so quality can be iffy at best.
This is in all aspects a sandbox game... You can be anything at any time... But as some less then balanced individuals have noted you can sink about as much money in to this game as the NATO defence budget and still come up short, so this is not anything i would recommend. I usualy tell people to not invest more then they would in a normal MMO and start out small to make those PED's go as far as they can.
And while you theoreticaly can make money form this game, at this late stage in games liffe you are very unlikley to find enough of a market to make up for the cost of getting your crafting up to speed.
So while it is not all that much of a scam as most people in here claim... It takes a lot more throught and research to get started.
But... We know the "hard-core" gamers like it that way. None of this holding your hand.... No you get a set of clothes and then you have to figure the rest out... Heck the sweat-gatherer is iceing on the cake. back in the days you did not even get that.
This have been a good conversation
Even the chinese goldminers don't wanna play EU because you can't get anything from the game.
EU could be a great game if they overhauled the economy, but I don't see it happening. I was playing another game and someone recognized me from EU and said they wanted to trade items in this game for items I had in EU, and it kinda freaked me out so I went and checked on my EU accounts to make sure everything was alright, and found someone who was actually buying sweat. Which is weird because the last time I was playin' there really wasn't anything to use sweat for in large amounts.
But yeah, if they made it just a little... actually alot easier to have fun and actually be able to do things, then I might spend more "time" in there, but um, I just don't see it happening.
Again, unless you got lot's and lot's and lot's of money to burn "Stay far far away".
Godspeed my fellow gamer
i would love to play a polished versioon of a game like this and with a decent game design and level design. Entropia lacks on both. I m having a blast in Darkfall lately which it doesnt even have a powerfull epic engine as Crysis2, but at least they played some mmos.
So yeah there is huge potential but besides adding a very poor tutorial, keeping the same old bad stuff from 5 years ago including the interface LOL, is still a very poor game with nice graphics. That doesnt mean that if u enjoy it, its bad, good for you, have fun.
jihashi, a few questions:
How much time in game do you spend on average for one of these reviews?
Which destination in Entropia Universe did you visit? Currently there are three seperate games running under this banner: Planet Calypso, Rocktropia, and Next Island. Each is managed by a seperate planet partner company and run on the Entropia platform.
I can't speak much to Rocktropia or Next Island, as the robot-killin' sci-fi environs of Planet Calypso are the kind of fun I love best. I will ask the following on the chance you were reviewing Planet Calypso as opposed to the two other games.
Did you ever leave the newcomer arrival island and visit Port Atlantis? Players cannot travel back to the island once they leave, so if you didn't teleport, your opportunity to socialize with more experienced players was nil.
The UI is complex, I'll grant you that. The key mappings are indeed configurable, so you can make it more WOW-like, or whatever, should you choose. Funny thing about standards, there are so many to choose from! LOL That mouse-look thing you mention, go into options and turn off "move to selected target" to stop this behavior.
I ain't flaming here, but the comment about losing loot the instant you die is totally false. Creatures you kill stay in place for a long time after their demise. It is possible to return to the site if you happen to die before you can loot a creature. Only the person doing greater than 50% of the damage to a creature can loot it, so others cannot pick the corpse while you're running back from revive. Even if you die, you can go get that loot. Press "P" before you teleport to get the coordinates of the location you've died. That way you know where to go from the revive to get your loot.
Should you find yourself on the losing end of a battle with a creature, don't worry too much. All your stuff stays with you, and you wind up at the closest revival terminal. There are exceptions to the "all your stuff" statement, but should you find the edge of a lootable PvP area, you will recieve a warning that you risk losing your stackable items therein.
I'd be interested in hearing what equipment you purchased when you're discussing this being an expensive game. A decent newcomer kit with armor, weapon and ammo can be had for less than 10 bucks US. I believe this is less than the average monthly payment for subscription based games.
As for the community... if you never left the newcomer area, you really didn't get a chance to experience the community. I'd recommend taking a peek over a weekend and checking out Port Atantis during peak hours. I think you'll find a completely different experience from the one you describe. You can also utilize the two most popular forums for entropia and get answers to questions like "how do I reconfig my keyboard", "where are the NPC's I need to visit for the missions?" and meet players that aren't online when you are. It's a global community, and many members are awake when you sleep, and vice versa. http://planetcalypsoforum.com and http://entropiaplanets.com are where many Entropia players hang out when not on-planet.
Thanks for taking a look at Entropia, and thanks in advance for answering my questions!
Cheers,
AG
Alpha AG Geek
Founder- Manticore Society
I tried this game about 2 years ago and bought $20 worth of AMMO. It was gone within 5 min of hunting with no good loot to re-imburce the purchase of more ammo. This game is a money sink like most have said. It sort of sounds like you are an entropia official the way you try to defend it -_-. In all Honesty, this game is amazing, however the economy choice is not. If this were built as a sub plan MMO where you pay per month and not worry about buying ammo with real money every 10 min, but actually has a in-game economy, then this game would have been very successful with more people. Especially with the new cryengine graphics.
Sadly, a real world economy game is just too hard to get started in for the masses. Gathering sweat was very frusterating and people tried to rip noobs off constantly because the currency system is hard to understand. People buy and sell in percentages 130% 200%... no noob would get this. So noobs are ripped off... at a certain level they can no longer gather sweat and have no choice but to spend real money.
The real money buys you about 5 min of hunting. Sorry, but this is what they call a scam in game form. I would expect $20 to last much longer than a day. Not even the money hungry Nexon is this bad.
Yet we have botters, or at least their were last time I played with any great length
Sick of playing Entropia Universe? Want to quit, but don't want your hard earned money to vanish? Give your items to ME :-)
LOL What gun did you use as an unskilled noob that consumed 200 PED of ammo in 5 minutes? It couldn't have been an opalo or other gun that's tailored for the lack of skill levels that all newcomers have. Sounds like you tried to just grab the biggest gun you could find, which would certainly be less efficient due to low fire rate due to lack of weapons handling skill, missed shots due to lack or aim skill, etc, etc, etc.. Unless you actually grabbed one of the anti-materiel rifles which is the hardest hitting firearm in game and has one of the highest decay rates, I doubt the time factor you cite.
Players must carefully match the weapons they use to the skills their avatar has, otherwise you will lose peds.
This isn't the instant-uber shoot 'em up that many uninformed people seem to expect.
Alpha AG Geek
Founder- Manticore Society
Yeah... i used to level with the old "newbie" gun called outbacko... And it took a hell of a lot more time than 5 min to drain the ammo out of that one.
Sure the big game rifels and big game hunting can set you back a lot... But it can also reward you a lot. But as a newcommer to this game. stick with the newbie guns and don't bother with a armor until you get a good enough skillset that you don't need it to hunt the things you hunt.
This have been a good conversation
Disclaimer: I am a huge fan of the game. (hopefully I wont be crusified here)
There are some missconseptions that people have when they start, and it looks like most of the posters here have those same ideas.
Let me try and share some insite into those while hopefully not stepping on any toes.
This is not an MMO like any other. It can't be played like others. The reality is that it is a very complex economics simulator wraped up in a pretty package to look like an MMO.
Play this game like an MMO and you can loose alot of money fairly quickly.
Play this game like a complex graphics simulator and you can not only have fun, but also be able to afford the MMO experience as well.
This game is not a quick game. It requires dedication and long term commitement to be worth playing. I have been playing 2+hours a day for the last 3 years and am just reaching lower "mid-level" and still learning new aspects to the game all the time.
Because this game is based on real money it is EXTREAMLY compettitive. It is still possible to play casualy, but you need to understand that casual gaming will never give you the competitive edge needed with such feirce competition.
Because it is a "Free to Play" game, the developers will take their cut from normal activities. Only an idiot would think they can win against the house.
Because of point #6, you need to understand 1,2,3,4 & 5 and be able to tie them together to use the economy to pay your ingame expenses.
There is a really steep learning curve since you need to know and understand stuff that is not common in other games. To overcome this you really need two things. 1. A strong ingame support group(usually a good new player society) and 2. A strong desire to study, research and crunch numbers.
The Harsh Reality:
You can loose money in this game.
A lot of people posting in this thread made stupid rookie mistakes and were not willing to actually understand what they were trying to attempt and are now bitter about it.
The Good/Fun:
It truely is free to play at low levels if you want to and play intelegently.
It truely is free to play even at high levels if you work hard and play intelegently.
With investments of money and or time and some luck, it is possible to make money in this game. (I dont think you should expect it, but it is possible, I withdrew 3,300usd a couple months ago from a part of what i received selling a lucky loot i got. NOT TO BE EXPECTED THOUGH)
Because of the maturity and intelegence level required to do well in this game, there are some really great people in it with potential for some great conversation and friendships.
It would appear to me that the "reviewer" did not understand some or all of these points, and so had a bad experience. It would be interesting to see what his experience would have been if he had done the necessary research before and during his trial period. (one issue of "reviewing" this game though is that the reviewer has no commitment or intent to really play the game, and this game requires that to really play well, so by its nature a "review" will be negative.)
For people interested in trying it out, understand the risks, and are willing to do the research necessary, here are some starting points to read up on.
entropiaplanets.com (an independent forum dedicated to all the planets in the universe)
planetcalypsoforum.com (the Calyspo forum, Calypso is the oldest and most established planet)
neverdie.com/rocktropia (the Rocktropia forum, Rocktropia is a new planet still somewhat in Beta and all systems are not implemented yet)
nextislandlife.com (the Next Island forum, Next Island is the newest planet, still somewhat in beta and hopefully with most systems in place in the comming month)
entropedia.info (independent wiki with information on almost every item in the game and the statistics)
http://www.entropedia.info/weaponcompare.aspx (a chart for comparing the economical and dmg statistics of weapons, this is something that I think most of the posters here do not understand but is EXTREAMLY important to playing well)
narfi-willem.blogspot.com (A blog I started about my activities in the game recently, not necessairly that educational but hopefully still an interesting read)
The truth is it all boils down to what do we want to do. We play games for fun, and we play games for competition. Some games are so mindless a 3 yr old could play them, and others like this are more complex and chalanging. There is a huge range of games inbetween, and we each strive for that perfect fit for our own personality and definition of fun.
Hopefully the FanBoys won't stress too much over your dislike of a game we love, and at the same time I hope that you don't get high blood pressure over trying to convince people how awful it is. The truth is it is a great game for those that enjoy it, and a bad game for those that dont. To be fair to both sides though, it is good to present the full story, and to give it an honest chance.
gl and have fun
narfi
Playing with Real Money: Colonizing Virtual Worlds
There's a middle of the road player too Narf and all kinds of players in between, you know that. I really like the game itself, but the economy and the economy in the game is all messed up. That's why y'all can't hang on to players and when a new player arrives sure everything is gonna be hunky dory for awhile, it's new to them and exciting "looking" and they might bring more money. Money that is desperately needed.
Personally I don't want to spend a month sweating for a day of hunting, that's just insane. I don't want to spend 2 hours staring at the side of a creature gathering it's sweat, then another half a day if I'm "Lucky" to sell that sweat just to afford a tiny little bit of ammo just to go hunting for about 2 hrs.
And everything is like that... It should be the other way around, where you sweat for and hour or so then can afford to hunt "All day".....
The decay on items I can deal with, the lengthy process to level up I can deal with. But when someone drops money into your game, you should give them something in return, something that doesn't disappear. And I'm not talking about a useless candy cane and a pair of slippers. You know what I mean.
All I can say is to those who aren't sure about whether or not to play this "game" if that's what you call it, is don't judge a book by it's cover. Get in there give it a try and get burned yourself, then decide.
It won't take long, maybe two months.
In the end, it's a really really really expensive social game
Godspeed my fellow gamer
You have to remember that you dont just put money in the game and buy items. The idea is that you can freely and legally widthdraw money from the game at any time. They cant just let you kill creatures and get tonnes of money other wise everyone would win and take the money out of game which will stuff up the economy.
I view the game as more of a casino where you gamble your real world money but instead of looking at chips and a dealer you are looking at a crytek2 engine. You can increase the odds by buying expensive gear but statistically you are unlikely to make money in this game from hunting alone.
Some people would say casinos are stupid. I suppose there not good but they are fun and provided you are mature about it and dont play all the time then you will have fun and not spend much money. On the other hand if you play 12 hours a day like the average WOWer who trys to get to level 80 in one day then ofcourse you will loose lots of money quickly.
One other point, People say its 'too hard' as a noob and not enough 'pop-ups'. Well ill ask you this. when you were born did you have a tutorial? No, part of what makes the game so interesting is that you have to work things out for yourself by talking to people and trial and error.
As far as the community goes, as a noob you start in one city with not many people. The major hangout is twin peaks across the other side of the map. I wonder why its all the way over there?? :P so one day your exploring the map and u stumble across a bustleing town that no tutorial system as pointed you towards.
I think its funny that there is no top level. Why do you want to play a game where you stop at level 80 or whatever?
once again ill say if something is easy at the begging its boring quickly (like a girl) if you have to work in the beggining its worth it in the end.
well i dont know the guy your taling about but 'I' would defend this game. As one might buy shares in a company I have invested money in this game and therefore will defend it. Im sure when shares were first invented they were ridiculed (especially by the socialists) :P but u know what they say "without risk theres no reward"
{Edit}
Regardless of what your personal experiences were (and I do beleive that you have an agenda from the way you post) this game is good enough that players have spent hours a day for 2,3, 5, 7+ years non stop playing it. It is a lifestyle, it is an obsession, it is an addiction, it IS that good.
Maybe its not the game for you, but when you attack it, it is the same as any of those questions I asked you, and so yes anyone who has truely played the game would defend it with conviction!
gl and have fun
narfi
ps: sorry i dont know how the quote tags work on this forum, but you get the idea
Playing with Real Money: Colonizing Virtual Worlds
Its almost like the people fighting this game are fighting the political advantage of the creators - obvisously no idea of what the game is about. Its like being an american indian and saying that american capitalism is 'unfair' well your sob stories are pathetic. Either play it and be successful and enjoy or leave and play WOW like the average human being that cant hack the perils of a true MMORPG with a real cash economy.
I find it amusing that none of the questions regarding gameplay issues, etc I asked have been clarified by those making complaints. If you're looking to figure the game out, then let's have some dialog.
AG- not employed by Mindark or any of the planet partners as one person seems to think.
Alpha AG Geek
Founder- Manticore Society
One thing I never understood about the game is this. The money flow between the game, Mindark, and the players(who pay).
Is the money players deposit into the game collected into a big "POT" like a lottery where everyone has a chance to dip into it with globals and buying/seling things? Does Mindark infuse money into the economy with the random globals or are all globals a result of how much money has been deposited into the game?
If every person playing stops depositing with globals go down?
I always had a feeling that the regular depositors were the ones who are technically supporting the game.
Don't be terrorized! You're more likely to die of a car accident, drowning, fire, or murder! More people die every year from prescription drugs than terrorism LOL!
Since this is a "Entropia Universe" Review, I thought I might add "my own salt" and point to a thread I've just started about their so-called Support:
http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/31/view/forums/thread/304656
I've said... Many things about things about this game in the 4 years I've been playing it.
But it saddens me to see that some people still haven't learned to be VERY careful in a virtual world backed by a real world economy...
Sick of playing Entropia Universe? Want to quit, but don't want your hard earned money to vanish? Give your items to ME :-)