"Move over Monopoly, Richman Online is here!"

Yes, the first thing you will undoubtedly notice when you start playing Richman Online is that it is incredibly similar to Monopoly, well; it would be if Monopoly had landmines and nuclear warfare.

After logging in and listening to some of the catchiest tunes in any MMO to date, you'll first be asked to complete the tutorial. Fortunately its brilliant, covering a vast majority of the game without boring you to tears. They've taken the 'learn by doing' approach, setting up a game with the rules specific to what they were trying to teach you, and then letting you battle it out with an NPC under those conditions. By the end of it you always have a full understanding of what they were trying to teach.

After completing the tutorial you should be level 4, and able to join the main room, allowing you to play against other people. I found that after sitting in the lobby for only a few seconds I was invited to my first game…it didn't go so well. I honestly had no idea of the rules outside of the tutorial, so naturally when my first turn came along and I saw 3 other players all neatly lined up next to each other I went with my instincts, threw down a few landmines and dropped a nuke on their heads. I won't go into detail on the comments that followed because I'm trying to keep this review PG13, but I will say that from that point forward I knew that we were all on a team and friendly fire was enabled. Soon after I learned that our objective was to kill a boss, a baby in a devils costume to be more precise, and after 15 minutes and a large assortment of things that go 'boom' we had all found a new understanding of the word 'pawned'. 

I will say though, nuking a baby has never been so much fun. I occasionally let out a sinister giggle as I ashed my cigarette and clicked my boom button, but don't judge me…you will soon know what I'm talking about, and you'll be enjoying it too.

So for all point and purpose, Richman Online is a room based MMO somewhere in between Monopoly and Mario Party, and is jam packed with characters, maps, game modes, and item cards for your playing pleasure. There's also a premium content store that sells different looks for your character alongside some new vehicles that allow for extra dice rolls, and special item cards that have various effects. Let's take a look in some more detail.

Game Modes: 

Regular Play: This is your Monopoly version of the game. Buy Land, Stock and Cards, and pray to whichever god you worship that your opponent lands on your hotels. Landing on an empty piece of land gives you the option to buy, landing on it again gives you the option to upgrade. Having 2 or more pieces of land in a row increases your intake when somebody lands on one of them. There are many cards and mascots floating around to add a twist to the game, some of which are explained below. This is your standard mode, and in my opinion easily the most enjoyable.


Competitive Play: Unlike in regular play, where the main focus is building property and buying shares to eliminate your opponent, Competitive Play will have you using all manner on boom's and blau's known to man to trap and ultimately destroy your opponents instead. This may as well be an entire new game all together, and it's loads of fun.



Boss Play: As the name suggests, the main focus of Boss Play is working as a team to defeat a boss with massive health. It uses a combination of the above two play styles with altered settings. You Can't build houses and hotels, but you can build structures like Pyramids and Research Facility's that have various effects on the game. As you would expect, all weapons are enabled, and the enemy will be making full use of them…




Power-ups:

Cards: Cards act in the same way as items do in most other games. There's a truckload of different types, and when used correctly all of them have the power to me devastating. Listing them all would take days, but I've included a small list of some of the common ones below.

Construction Card: As the name suggests, this card is used to add a level to your property. If you have no house on your land, this will give you one, if you have a 2 star hotel, this will make it a 3. This card can only be used on the space you are standing on.
Remote Control Dice: Using this card will allow you to choose how many spaces you want to move ahead next time, but only using 1 die. Used properly this card could give you the most valuable piece pf land, or avoid you from losing the game entirely. A common, but extremely valuable card.
Road Block: Putting up a Road Block will naturally force any player that passes it to come to a complete stop. Wether your placing it out the front of your own hotel for a suspecting victim, or using it against yourself to grab some extra property this card can certainly turn tables.
Landmine: -Effect changed with game type- Landmines are used to inflict massive damage against your opponents. Placing one wont do much unless someone lands on it, causing a 3space boom in every direction. Fortunately, nukes and missiles can trigger these landmines, making for some life ending combinations. These can be placed anywhere in your field of vision.
Missiles: -Competitive/Boss Play Only- Missiles are very self explanatory, they drop a missile on someone's head, and can be used from anywhere in your line of vision. Alone, they really aren't all that great, combined with several landmines and 3 other players…mucho boomage.

Spaces: Spaces, as in the spaces you land on when moving around the board, have several different power-ups of their own. Using cards and spaces together is really the key to success in Richman Online.

Shop: Shop spaces, as you may have already guessed allow you to purchase different cards using points that can be obtained by landing on point spaces. Good players will take advantage of these spaces as much as possible, knowing full well that cards hold the key to success.
Points: Point spaces simply give you points equal to the number displayed on the space itself. These points can be used to buy cards at Shop spaces, and to resurrect fallen team mates when the game type allows it.
News: From what I could gather, news spaces seem to give out a random effect when you land on them. Sometimes you could gain money or cards, other times you could wind up in Jail.
Bank: Unlike other spaces in which you have to land on the space to activate it, the bank space will open every time you pass it. It's only function is to switch money from your capital to your deposit. Money in your Capital can be spent on  building and upgrading, whilst money deposited gains interest over time. 

Mascots: Mascots randomly appear on the board and activate when you land on them. They all offer various different effects, both good and bad.

God of Happiness: Bestows a random 'good' effect on your character, increasing wealth gained, protecting you from paying out, or adding levels to buildings you land on.
God of Mishap: Almost the exact opposite to the God of Happiness. You do not want to get this Mascot…it last for 5 turns and it can lose you a game very fast.
Guard Dog: Usually found outside land that you would otherwise be looking to buy, a Guard Dog will beat you up, and send you off to hospital for 2 days. Another one you want to be avoiding.
God of Poverty: Basically steals a random amount of your money. I really don't like him at all. I've really only listed the bad ones, because they are the ones you seem to remember the most. But rest assure, there are plenty of good mascots too.



Everything else:

In all honesty, gameplay is where Richman Online is at. The Graphics aren't great, but they don't need to be, they are exactly what is required in a game of this type. Sound is the same, it's catchy, uplifting and brings the game together nicely. Really, the only things that I can complain about are the Text Style, which is painfully hard to read and glitches from time to time, and the character selection which is something that should have been a primary focus in a game such as this. The Character choices aren't bad, they just aren't really that good either, except of course for the Iraqi looking character…who occasionally yells out "For Allah!" when he drops a nuke on someone. It's so wrong it's almost right.


All in all, I can honestly say that Richman Online is a fantastic game. It has everything you would expect in a game of this type, and so much more. From the building construction and attack cards to the game modes and friendly community, it truly offers everything a Monopoly lover is ever going to need. Sadly, that may be the only problem with Richman Online, while it does do everything it possibly can to succeed above the rest, it's really only going to attract gamers that enjoy this play style, and while that is in no way a bad thing, I can't help but get feeling that the core gamer base isn't going to be happy with spending much time playing a souped-up Monopoly Online for very long.

For the mean time, it's in Closed Beta, and mmosite.com are giving away free keys to all forum members that meet the requirements. So what are you waiting for? Get in there and give it a go, you've got nothing to lose and everything to gain…until you get nuked in the name of Allah that is.