Addictive, or I Just Alchemized Crystal Meth
posted by IllogicalJ (BROOKLYN, NY) Oct 8, 2010
Member since May 2005
5
out of
10
gamers (50%) found this review helpful
For all the obsessive-compulsive people out there, or anyone who enjoys forging/synthesizing/item-creating in MMORPGs, your drug of choice has just appeared. There's a light-at-heart, character-driven narrative that takes place over the three-year story, and rather than fighting an evil villain, you play Rorona, an apprentice alchemist who is tasked with keeping her workshop afloat.
Gameplay breaks down neatly into two categories: Alchemy and Adventure. You'll Adventure to go out into the field, fighting monsters and harvesting goods from their corpses and from the colorful dungeons. You'll then Alchemy those components into new items, items that can then create other items, be forged into armor/weapons, or be used to complete assignments from your party members and, most importantly, from the king. All of these actions eat up days, and the flow of the game is broken up by 80-90 day deadlines, at the end of which you must have submitted enough of the king's requests to satisfy him. If not . . . game over.
The trick is time-management, which would be fine if the game didn't force you to memorize character locations and then run about every few days to check in with them for new requests, and if it weren't so frustrating to organize and deliver those items. But to the game's credit, each month brings a new twist to the system: new shops open, new characters join, and eventually, you are given the ability to store up to ten items in each shop--allowing you to buy them in the future, rather than eating up days on end to make them again. Moreover, you're also given a Mystery Bag that eases management--but like I said, if you're not into that, it won't matter.
The good news is that the game is fairly easy to breeze through; the bad news is that if you want the good ending, then you'll be grinding elixirs like there's no tomorrow. The dialogue is whimsical enough to keep you going, and there's always something new in store, but unless you like repetition, stay away.
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