Rival Saga Alpha Review

I have to admit that there are times when I should be working, and I instead find myself wasting hours away playing games. We all do this to some extent, as it is the nature of the beast that is the gamer. We can be the ultimate procrastinators, "Just one more level and I will study/sleep/go to work!"  Browser based games do not help this situation out at all. Easy to play, no install needed, and can be played anywhere you have an internet connection.

  At first glance Rival Saga was just this, another browser based game to entice me away from my "to-do" list for the day. Being an avid player of Adventurequest and Mechquest, I thought I would apply for the Alpha test and see how this game panned out so far. I am glad I did, as my initial opinion about Rival Saga was changed as soon as I logged in and started playing.

 

This was the screen that greeted me on login. The animation was good, and the rendering and art was as expected, well done and basic. It was a little less cartoony than other games, and this was a bit refreshing.  NPCs have the yellow exclamation mark above their heads, and the UI should not be a problem for anyone to figure out.

  I chose the Knight class, and I am glad I did. He is actually closer to a Paladin, as you start with a lightning strike spell and a heal spell, as well as a suit of armor and a sword, some potions and the ever present Apples to keep your health up between battles.
   At first glance, I thought this game would be similar in combat style to the other flash/browser games, but i was happily surprised! You have to have a sense of resource management for RS, as I learned painfully wiping twice in the beginner dungeon. You have to conserve your mana, and cast appropriately, otherwise you will end up as worm food.

   Questing will look familiar to anyone who as played any sort of RPG. Simple choices and commands will help the players to get familiar with the game, and for established gamers it might get a bit boring, but we can hope the text is spiced up for the Beta/final release. Below is a screenshot of a beginner quest.



Pretty cut and dry, so I headed to the dungeon under Hilsh to vanquish some greenskins and save the maiden. Not too hard once you realize you can't spam the attack  button, and you get your groove down on casting/attacking/healing.

This is a shot of Halfbad laying the mighty Knight/Pally/Emperor Palpatine force-lightning/ smackdown on a greenskin who thought he was better than me. Teaches him.



     The game is still in early release, and I can see some promising things in it so far. I would urge you to give it a try if you are a fan of browser games, and are looking for something new. The admins of this game have been quick to respond to any bugs or suggestions/comments, and that is refreshing as you know your time testing it out isn't wasted.

  It seems in the future they will go for a item mall/or paid upgrade like in AQ. If they keep improving the game the way they have been, I will sign up gladly. 

The only improvements I would like to see so far is a hotbar of sorts for potions and food, and the perhaps to speed up the character movement on the overworld map, as it is a bit choppy and very puppet-like. I am sure these will get ironed out in the end product.

So in closing, there is much potential here, and I can't wait to see what the final release will bring us. This game has started out fresh, in what could of been a played out clone of AQ, it is more than initially meets the eye.

Now if you will excuse me, I will go back to work (killing greenskins and rescuing maidens).