Rift Collectors Edition

I have played World of Warcraft for over 5 years and after the last RIFT beta I was almost instantly won over!

Graphics: I use several different computers for gaming and even on my laptop the graphics are a noticeable upgrade from WoW. On true gaming computers this game looks truly amazing. I can honestly say that I did not anticipate an MMORPG to have this amazing of graphics anytime soon let alone now.

Customization: Unlike most MMORPG's you will not be needing do download risky independently made user interface modifications because everything you need is in game. Without any complexity you can move everything from where you bags open, to where your chat or quest window is, to how big your UI appears on screen. Some of this sounds really simply or trivial but trust me after years of playing with little things that just "don't feel right" I immediately fell in love with these features.

Playability: If you have played an MMORPG before than odds are that you'll be able to sink right into the gameplay. The setup if similar but still new enough that it is fun and interesting. A particular thing I can point out as far as gameplay is the Hunter class. Recently in WoW they converted Hunter's from a mana based class to a focus based class(this means you went from using a huge pool of energy to attack to using attacks to regen power to do other attacks). Both RIFT and WoW have a focus based hunter but just the way it is setup in RIFT feels like it was meant to be unlike in WoW where they kind of forced it and it doesn't really flow. Granted this is my opinion but I played a hunter all 5+years and when they were converted to focus I lost interest in it where as in RIFT I was pulled right back into the role of hunter.

Wonderful Implementations: Unlike in most games where you when you kill a bunch of NPC's you have to loot them one by one, in RIFT if you kill several NPC's in one close area it loots them all at once. If you haven't played an MMORPG before than just trust me, this feature is truly amazing!

Guilds: Unlike WoW guilds in this game can complete quests to help further progress the guild and gain more perks. Guild perks are also customizable in this game, for every level you get a guild perk point and your guild can choose what perk they like best, GREAT idea! Guild summoning is also something that should be a no-brainer when you think about it but this is the first I have seen from the start of a guild and it is just plain convenient.

Updating: From what I have seen in the last couple weeks is that once the developers find an issue in the game(which there are always going to be issues in games, none are perfect)they go right to work making a patch to fix said issue. I have been very impressed with how quickly they are working out issues and the effort they are putting forth to make the gameplay enjoyable!

Cons: Of course like every other game there are cons but I am happy to say they are quite trivial and updates are always in the works so I have no doubt these will be resolved in no time. There are no guild banks yet which is a bit of a downer but honestly this early in the launch people really don't have much worth holding onto. load time for a menu here and there might take a lil less than a second to load, very trivial gripe but I have to be honest about everything bad I found so I won't be called bias. However to my knowledge they are working all that out now.

Conclusion: There are many more things I like/love about this game but people in other 5star reviews said it all for me already. So to say that this is a game is the culmination of a ton of great ideas is the understatement of the century, if you enjoy MMO's, this is for you!!!!

Coming from someone who has been playing all type of MMORPG games from MUD to WoW and all that are in between. RIFT is a great game by its own rights. It's been a long time since the MMO community has a very successful launch. I'm not going to compare features between this game and that game, but here are the good and the bad from my playing experience.

Default UI is a great. Although many of the goodies are turned off by default, you can easily turn them on through the interface setting. No need to go to addon website to install extra stuff. Things like target of target, AoE auto loot, auto sell gray items, etc. The UI layout editor is very easy to use. I'm actually really happy with it out of the box. It's not perfect, but a great starting point.

Public groups. I thought it was dumb when I first saw it, but there's a plus sign above everyone's avatar. You can click this and invite yourself to create an auto-group with the person. This is great when you see someone doing the quest you're looking to do, you can just auto group and you both and help each other. When you're done, just leave and be on your way. You can turn this feature off if you don't like a random stranger joining you. This also works for Public Group when taking down world events, such as RIFTs and Invasions. If there are multiple public groups, it merges them in to one.

Warfronts. Essentially, it's instance battlegrounds. The queues are very quick since its cross-servers. You need to be at least level 10 to do your first Warfront. There are brackets from 10-19, 20-29, and so on. It's pretty much the same old same old here, so nothing exciting about it. The experience gain is enough that you could level from just playing the warfronts if you choose to. I don't recommend it though, it gets boring pretty fast if playing it back to back... to back. Plus, you'll be pretty weak because you can't get gear efficiently if this is all you're doing.

Rifts and Invasions are pretty cool at first. After awhile it's just a zerg fest. I don't mind doing this, but again, in moderation. The blue and purple tokens you get from it are zone specific, so spend those to get yourself stronger. Not a lot of experience from invasions, so you can't level off of it like you can from warfronts. If you farm the invasion currencies you can buy items to make yourself stronger.

Quests are pretty much a straight shot. What is great about them is that you get pretty decent gears from following quests line. It will continually upgrade your gear as you go along. So this is the most effective way to get decent gear if you're playing by yourself or with a friend.
Dungeons are also pretty much like other games, but a lot prettier! It's hard to describe in words. The first instance is the Realm of the Fae, and the winter top mountain is pretty amazing, a must see! I won't spoil it.

This brings me to another point. The graphic and game effects in this game look very nice. Warrior's cleave bring up dust from the ground looks amazing. If your computer can handle ultra setting, the game is very pretty. I enjoy the graphic a lot. The last game I play that I thought was pretty was LotRO, this beats it.

Sound effects is pretty good, nothing that stands out. The script events and voice over is a nice touch, but nothing special. I turn music off when playing so I can't comment on that.

The loot is pretty also straight forward. The nice touch here is that all souls in the class use the same stat no matter what you're doing. For example, all clerics will use WIS gear. So I won't have to haul STR/DEX gear when tanking, WIS when healing, and INT/DEX when trying to DPS. All cleric uses WIS as the main attribute and that gets converted depending on the souls. If I'm tanking as Cleric Justica my WIS converts to STR for tanking. All I have to worry about is if I want to tank with 2H weapon or 1H and shield. Pretty awesome!

The Classes and Souls system is also nice, because it's very flexible. You can also purchase new roles to swap out from Tank to Healer on the fly. Since you're using pretty much the same gear from one role to another, it's painless.

In my opinion, this game doesn't bring anything new or innovative. It takes all the things other games done well and implement them in a nice package. There are a lot of improvements to be made. Like I said, it's not perfect, but it's a great start.

NOTE: If you want to save some money, I recommend getting the Digital Collector's edition for $60. You a mount right off the bat (no level restriction) for all new characters that you make. The cheapest mount you can get is about 2.5 plat. I didn't get 2.5 plat until about level 20 from a normal play. I created 3 characters to level 20, and it's pretty much the same pace. Having the mount as soon as you can get to the mailbox is awesome. I'm not sure if the extra $20 for mouse pad and CDs are worth the price... but the mount was definitely worth it.

I picked up my Digital Download of Rift last night and played for a few hours. To begin, the download itself was 8.32GB. This seemed daunting at the outset but their servers allowed my ISP to pull it in at my maximum rate of 1.5 MB/s. The stability and speed were certainly a good start to the experience.

Upon entering the game, you are presented with a nifty little scene that gives you a general idea of the two opposing factions and what "rifts" are. The character creation screen is very thorough and customizable. Color choices include: eyes, skin, hair, makeup, and "tattoos". You can customize the shape of the head, nose, and eyes. You can choose from 10+ different: lips, tattoo styles, makeup styles, hair styles, and eyebrows. It'd be nice to see more tattoo options, as they are all on the face and some are just plain odd, but to even have a tattoo option is nice. You can choose from the following callings: warrior, cleric, rogue, or mage.

After creating your character, you are given another cut scene explaining what recently happened and how you got to where you are. After a simple quest, you get your first Soul. Around level 6 or so, you will have three Souls, all are rewarded from quests. A quick word about the quests, they do not feel as "grindy" as many other games. Quests with kill objectives require only a small number of kills and the travel time between quest hubs, objectives, and turn-ins is short.

The UI should be familiar to anybody that has played an MMO before. Action bars are at the bottom, chat box next to them on the left, minimap in the upper-right with quest objectives (and more optional action bars) on the right side, with your unit frames in the upper left. The UI is, admittedly, a bit cluttered @ 1680x1050, but you are able to completely customize your interface. In the Escape menu, there is an option called Edit Layout; which, upon clicking, turns every UI element (including those that are hidden, such as raid frames when not in a raid) into a box with the name of the element on it. You can then drag them around the screen and place them as you please. When close to another element, the boxes will "snap" together, creating a clean, aligned interface.

Combat is familiar. The aggro range of monsters is well tuned. Mobs below your level do not aggro from a large distance, whereas mobs above your level do. Mining and foraging do not aggro nearby mobs if you weren't already in their aggro radius. An especially nice feature is the AoE looting option, which allows you to loot EVERYTHING in one window that is nearby. If you are the tanking type that likes to grab a bunch of enemies and end with a pile of sparkling corpses at your feet, this will save you tons of time. The de-aggro range is well tuned. Mobs do not follow you very far nor do they continue to pursue if you are healing as you run -- I'm not sure if you can kite them, I didn't try.

This brings us to the name of the game: Rifts. Initially, Rifts are very fun. The locations of rifts are located on the world map as green circles. When you are in the proximity of one (which is relatively small and unobtrusive), you are given the option to join a public group. Lasting through the onslaught of enemies spawning from the rift and finally sealing the rift, you are rewarded with loot. A benefit of participating in rift events is being rewarded with a currency that can be used to purchase higher level gear (blue). You can get enough of this currency to purchase gear in 2 or 3 invasion events. Some might be wondering how challenging the events are. Naturally, I'm only in the first zone and can only comment on the initial events, but they are certainly challenging (depending on how many people are joining you in fighting). At level 8, my biggest hitter (a 3 second cast) does ~80 damage. The final boss in the event has around 8000 health and as a cleric, I am not able to tank it. Our tanks health was pretty steady with only a couple healers on him, so don't expect it to be an epic battle of life and death...at the same time, it isn't a cakewalk. If the group is dumb, the boss could kill all of you.

Now, this brings us to the Souls. After obtaining all 3 souls and choosing your specializations, you can start putting points in them every level you obtain (until around level 6 you get 2 points per level). I'll use my cleric as an example. My first selection was Inquisitor (which deals damage), my second was Warden (endurance healer), and the third choice was Purifier (healing by fire...). Each calling (the 4 stated earlier) has 8 classes in it, visit the Rift website for the list. Each class has synergy with 2 other classes, which are recommended in the tooltip. For example, I deal damage, heal slow and steady for a long period of time, and can stop big damage on a single person. This allows me to heal a tank very effectively as I can prevent large damage while providing a constant stream of heals for the incoming damage.

There is a twist to the Souls (which are effectively the talent trees) and a very nifty twist, at that. As you progress up a tree, placing talents into whatever benefit you feel is best at the time, you gain new spells below the tree. For example, upon putting 2 points into the Inquisiter class, I gain Sanction Heretic, which is an instant-cast, damaging spell with a DoT (damage-over-time) on the back-end. The more points you put into a class, the stronger and better abilities you get that are tuned to that class (a damaging class won't give you healing spells). You can get more Souls as you progress so that you can swap them in and out as your role dictates.

Quest objectives are shown on the minimap. Areas where you will find monsters are shown in shaded circles, quest turn-in NPCs are shown with a blue circle and a white check mark, and travel locations are shown with a glowing star. If you are confused or an objective isn't shown, you can open your quest log and click Map to be shown exactly where you need to go; however, the quest text is generally sufficient to figure out what to do. The enemy tooltip shows quest progress if that enemy is an objective. For example, if you are to kill 10 firefly's, when mousing over firefly's, 2/10 is shown at the bottom of the tooltip to indicate you've killed 2 of the required 10.

The guild system seems awfully mature for a launch. Guild Perks can be obtained as the guild gains experience from guild quests. Guild quests are quests that are automatically shared to all guild members (by the Guild Master, I believe) which should be completed with multiple guildies. Completing them gives you guild experience and the guild more experience to purchase Perks. An example of a Perk is the ability to place a guild flag which allows guild members to teleport instantly to the flags location. There is no guild bank, yet, which is somewhat disappointing.

For an initial launch, this game is polished. Trion has released a very good game that is worth a look. There is no trial option yet so it's not possible to try-before-you-buy. This may be due to an already heavy load on the servers. On the weekend of 3/5 & 6, the population on many servers saw an explosion; it is expected that once the surge dies down, a trial option will be introduced, but that is yet to be confirmed. There are certainly some short-comings but the overall game is extremely fun and will undoubtedly waste plenty of your free time.

I don't have any experience in PvP or instances, yet. I'll try to update this review once I do.

› Go to Amazon.com to see all 64 reviews  4.1 out of 5 stars