RPGDot - the fastest news from other worlds

The Saga of Ryzom takes place in the future and begins on the living planet of Atys, which grows and evolves on its own, sending tendrils into the sky and covering the lands with new life. The world has lots of secrets, which many will be unlocked during the game.
While I was at the Games Convention I got an opportunity to take a look at the game, right before the beta kicked off. This article sums up what I was shown.

During character creation you can select between the four homins that inhabit Atys. Each homin civilization has its own weaknesses and strengths.
The Fyros are warriors from the deserts and make for an excellent fighter.
The Matis live in the woods and are experts in genetic manipulations.
The Tryker are denizens of the idyllic lakelands, have a high agility and are explorers by nature.
The Zorai are feared mystics from the dark and hidden and they wear masks that are genetically a part of their face.
For every race there is a choice of a male or female avatar. Furthermore, the body of the character can be changed: the height, torso, arms and legs can each be made bigger or smaller. After that the face of the created character can be altered, by selecting the hair, color, tattoos, type of nose, chin, mouth and eyes.
This should result in a large variety of character avatars and offer some form of uniqueness in the game.

This large variety is not available during the selection of the skills. It is only possible to select a mix between fighting, magic and crafting or to focus on just one or two of them, depending on the type of character the player envisions. This choice can be changed later in the game, so even if your choice now is to create a full-fledged fighter, it is possible to turn the character into a magician later on, making the character a fighter with magic skills.

Characters have 5 basic skills: fighting, magic, defense, crafting and harvesting. In the beginning of the game a player can advance in any or all of these skills. When reaching level 20, each of the skills gets specialization paths and branches in which the character can advance further. There is no real class system in Ryzom - you can become whatever you want in the game by choosing the actions and skills that you want to learn.

After character creation a map is shown, showing the starting locations. For each race there is a different map, with different starting locations so not everybody has to start in the same city. After the starting city is selected, a tutorial can be started. This tutorial offers an interface, which allows selecting the parts of the game you want to learn more about, making it possible to learn only those parts you are interested in ,instead of having to go through a complete tutorial. It is of course also possible to skip the tutorial all together.

The world to explore has four regions occupied by the four races; deserts, forests, lakelands and jungles. Besides those four regions there are also the prime roots, a cool and damp place, where the most ancient and strange artifacts can be found. The map is fully scalable and allows zooming in on any location on the map - even those places you are not currently in. Also, for every city you visit a spawn point marker will be set on the map automatically. Whenever you die, you can respawn in one of those cities.

The game also has seasons, which not only result in different weather effects, but also in the materials that can be found in the game. Some are only available in certain seasons or weather conditions, making them harder to find.

Combat
Fighting in melee is straightforward and is performed by using a basic attack, which can be changed by selecting one of the special attacks the character has mastered. These special attacks cost an extra amount of stamina in most cases, so when you run out of stamina, you will have to wait until special attacks can be used again. Each weapon can have its own individual set of special moves that are only available for that type of weapon. As opponents have different resistances and thus also need different weapons to kill them, a real warrior needs to develop skills in a range of weapons to be successful. The game gives feedback on how successful the weapon is by indicating the damage it could do and the damage that is actually done.

Combat is a balance between attack and defense strategies. The defense strategies can be set automatically for certain parts of the body - some creatures always attack a certain area of the body, so using a defense strategy for that area gives the best results. The damage inflicted is always localized, which means that when you hit the legs of an opponent it will slow it down when it does not have enough armor on its legs.

The buff system in Ryzom adds special abilities, which are called 'auras'. When you have developed a skill up to a certain level, an aura ability can be gained for that as well. When using it all friendly players in the range of the aura receive a bonus for that ability. Using an aura is time restricted and there is a long delay before being able to use the aura again.

Player versus Player combat is only possible in designated arenas and in the outposts. When you die in a PvP fight, you loose stat points and experience points for a certain duration of time. After this time has expired you get those points back again.

Even for the higher-level characters there is something to do with specially designed areas for characters above level 120. In addition, the GMs of Ryzom can start scripts to launch a massive attack, allowing for an extra dimension where large groups of people have to work together to overcome the attack.

Even when you are a low-level crafter you can already create items with stat increases. The bonus they can add to items improves with the experience of the crafter, not just with the amount of bonuses but also in the type of bonuses. Items can only be crafted with the appropriate materials, which can be taken from killed animals (as long as there is something left after the kill) or by harvesting them, if the appropriate skill has been learned.

A variety of combinations is possible when crafting and these items can also be sold to others, making it possible to become a wealthy person. As this requires a lot of stock, which might be more than you can carry, you can purchase a �mule' (the Ryzom version of a mule) that will be able to carry a lot more than you can. The �mule' can also be given simple orders, so that it doesn't walk away while you are in the middle of a fight.

When leveling up, character stats can be increased in addition to weapon abilities and upgrades and also spells and spell upgrades can be acquired or improved. Players can create their own spells or attacks and the higher the level of the player the more options are available. However, even at low levels players can already use this capability. Besides creating individual attacks or spells it is also possible to create a combo of them, resulting in even more powerful, but stamina expensive, blows.

As usual the noise on the stand was too much to hear much of the game but I was told that as you live on a tree the footsteps of your character make noises that should reflect that, including the sounds that branches make when they bend under your weight and other related sounds. In one of the add-ons it will even be possible for those who have taken up the profession of a musician to make their own music off-line and play it for others in the game.

Players that have a certain level of fame and skill they can find a Guild Clerk on the mainland. With the right amount of money it is possible to start your own guild, even if you are the only member. The guild can be given a name, description and a guild crest from a variety of available graphics.

A guild needs a Guild Hall, which can be found in one of the many cities and rented out to you. The Guild Hall can be used to store items for later usage and can be expanded to the likings of the guild. Guilds can also hire NPCs to do some of the work for them. Guilds can also create unique spells, attacks and other actions that are only available for that guild, and which can be used to complete the guild mission - quests that are a lot larger and more difficult than the individual missions.

Besides being in a guild it is also possible to form a group. These groups cannot be larger than 9 people but make it possible to take on stronger opponents. As a group member you have to participate in the fights as the experience gained is divided over the group members, depending on how much effort they have put into the fight.

In Ryzom you really have to play the game -- there are no scripts that can be run, leaving your character to fight creatures while you do something else offline and come back later to see your character has leveled up.

Outside of the major cities, there are outposts that lie on the border of a land, with each land having 32 of these outposts. The outposts form a line of defense against invasions from the outside and are mostly also placed in the neighborhood of valuable materials. An outpost can be owned by an individual, a group or a guild.

The outposts can be attacked, either by the creatures inhabiting the world or other players and guilds. When doing so, a guild can also form an alliance with another guild to assist them in the attack. This alliance lasts only for a fixed duration of 2 game hours, after which you are on your own again.

The items planned for add-ons that have already been mentioned are by no means a complete list.
In the current version houses can be bought in the city but in the future it is also possible to buy land and build a house in other locations than the city. Currently players have to run or walk to locations but future versions will have teleport systems and mounts, allowing faster and more convenient travel.

The developers of Ryzom claim to have made the game accessible to both the casual and the power gamer. As most of the abilities of the game are available at very early levels or even at the very beginning of the game, this might be very true. It remains to be seen if this is balanced for both of course. After all, someone who really spends a better part of his or her days in the game needs to be rewarded appropriately.

With a price 49.90 Euro with one month for free when purchasing the game and a monthly fee of 12.90 Euro, the game places itself in what currently is seen as being �normal'. The release is worldwide, with servers based in the USA and Europe and the release date is set to the second half of September.

Ryzom is said to have a storyline of 8 years, which means that the game is scheduled to span 8 years from release onwards. The story is supposed to be �written' by the actions of the players - whether this is true or not remains to be seen, but from what I have seen, the game could have the potential to last for a long while.