Modern day Action Arcade MMOs always seem to have these three constant things in common with themselves that always seems to (more or less) ruin them:
1) Gender Locked Classes
2)Lack of A Story
-and-
3) A reason to kill that always seems to be for a purpose much much higher than it should be.
Lately I’ve been playing the Action MMO Vindictus, and while it unfortunately has the first problem, problems 2 and 3 are blown clean out of the park. Vindictus has an amazing story that wraps around humanities desperate struggle for survival. There’s no IMMEDIATE reason to kill besides simple knowledge that it’s “kill or be killed.” The land of Vindictus is actually the same land as the popular MMO Mobinogi. It tells a tale of the dark horrific times before the ‘peaceful’ times of Mobinogi, back when humans were more masculine and blood wasn’t frowned upon.
Both the story and the graphics are absolutely wonderful however there is absolutely no immersion.
Nexon made the mistake of giving each character an entire back story as well as dictating their personalities. This takes away any creativity of the game and makes me feel like I’m simply controlling a character and not playing as myself. Vindictus seems like it’s going out of its way to be single player and honestly it’s not like other MMO arcade games where you have no problem finding groups and hanging out online. Vindictus is better played either by yourself or with friends that are actually in the same room as you because finding a group is impossible.
That aside the combat in this game is the best I’ve ever seen in ANY action MMO. The maps are littered with debris and as you fight with your enemy the world around you seemingly crumbles. Almost anything you find can be used as a weapon, ranging from pots and pans to the enemies corpses. Realistically depending on what character you choose you can pick up certain things. The agility soldier can only pick up light things and a few heavy things that will constantly drain his stamina till he berids of them, while the tank can practically pick up trees and beat people with them. The combat is actually quite realistic for an Action fighter and the use of environmental weapons furthers the sense of hopeless desperation the humans have in their fights. When you’ve beaten your way past endless hordes of enemies only to get to the boss, your character covered in blood and all his/her armor broken and his/her weapon(s) chipped and dulled, it’s comforting to know that for the crafty and the cunning a weapon is always right around the corner.
It’s got a nice weapon and armor creation system and unlike most other games it actually makes since. While you can buy the most vital parts of weapons and armor from shops like the Iron Ore, you get everything else from your enemies. Normally that translates to grinding, but it really only takes one or two runs through a dungeon to find the materials you need. If a replay is needed, you'll have no problem doing it as each map you play on is unique and has its own replay value. Unlike other games where you're sent to collect items for weapons and armor simply because the craftsman is to lazy to do so himself, the human race’s resources are extremely scarce, thus the need to collect items off of monsters (IE the "Farming" aspect of the game) is sewn right into the plot. I mean yeah there’s a marketplace but that’s just no fun, and from personal experience it will sometimes screw you as you can only equip certain equipment before becoming encumbered reducing your speed and effectiveness in battle.
I recommend Vindictus to anyone looking to get some friends together for an afternoon of non-stop action and violence; the likes of which no one will ever be able to surpass...Well at least not until Guild Wars 2 comes out. No offense to Nexon, but ANET just did a better job with the concept.
Regardless Vindictus still scores a 7 out of 10. It has hardly any bugs and there are little problems short of the gender-locked classes and it’s a hell of a lot of fun.
