The underlying UI is intuitive enough but it lacks the subtlety of most modern MMOs on the user experience front that said, the game does fit into the MMORPG model for windows, UI elements, and such so the learning curve for getting into the game is quite easy to overcome. As a result, I first thought I needed to double-click NPCs to interact.
Talking to NPCs can be a little bit weird because it require clicking them once to select them and then clicking them again to activate dialogue. The movement system is click-to-move (and no option appears to exist for WASD controls) combined with a hold mouse-button to move camera. Gameplay: Click-to-move, click-to-attack, but Kung Fu and a bit of swiftly running around In fact, I’m not sure if the music is on a loop, if it comes and goes, or if it’s triggered by particular interactions with NPCs. The music is Chinese-sounding, mostly lilting flutes…but I’ve barely noticed it while playing. The UI has some effects that sound metallic. The fighting aniamations are amusing enough and seem to borrow a lot from Chinese martial arts movies and wuxia (as expected.) I rather like watching my character swing, swirl, and hammer with her staff as she sends splashes of light from a struck enemy, shouting, and hollering until she beats him into a quickly-vanishing-corpse. As a result, to most Westerners it will have a sort of exotic theme, and in a way the art-style helps fixate that.Ĭhatting with NPCs places them large on one side of the screen with a tall scroll with text on the other for mission briefings and other information. The game is supposed to be set in the mythic history of ancient China and that’s also where much of the game gets its skill jargon from Kung Fu to the names of various clans and even the names of NPCs. The character models themselves feel low poly, and also look like fabric paintings to an extent-but what sets them apart is their costuming. The vegetation in particular looks slightly off when compared to the models for the people and buildings although I did enjoy the speedy clouds whisking by in the skybox overhead. The graphics for this game have this sort of muddy watercolor effect even at the highest quality settings, as if I’m looking at a 3D painting in low polycount. Not exactly the most customizable experience, with a fairly simple-looking avatar, but what it lacked in fine detail, it made up for in textured detail with interesting clothing, Chinese-appearance hairstyles, and a good fit for expectations of someone who doesn’t know too much about ancient China (the setting of the game.) Graphics and Sound: Although simple in graphics, there’s an obvious art style going on hereĬharacter generation was extremely simple, a few hair styles, colors, faces…choose a gender, and viola: out pops a smartly dressed vagabond ready to do Kung Fu in 9 Dragons.
#Gamescampus tflying password#
Not only must I use my usual username/password (to which most gamers are quite accustomed) but the game defaults to requiring me to use the on-screen keyboard to enter the last 3 characters of my password and then requires that I recall a special 4 digit PIN chosen at account creation. The security measures cooked into the game client can be a little bit overwhelming, if not obstructive. Overall, it’s a game with some rough edges, but it has a nostalgic feel and a sense of art and style that might make it interesting-but for Western audiences or people who’ve gotten to particular MMO UI styles it might rub them the wrong way. I spent a little while in game to see how it plays and bring back my experience so you can decide if you want to try it out. However, that doesn’t mean that I ran into nobody playing-and add in the Chinese historical motif it has some interesting elements going for it. The community has dwindled somewhat and there’s not many from the Western audience still remaining in the game. According to Wikipedia, the original In-game story for the Korean version was written by wuxia novelist Jwa Baek and it was localized for Western audiences when Acclaim hired Steven-Elliot Altman to rewrite the game in its entirety.Īs 9 Dragons has been on the marketplace since 2010, the graphics will feel a bit outdated to many as will the UI. Set in China during the Ming Dynasty, it includes actual Chinese geography and historical features such as the Great Wall of China and the famous Shaolin Monastery. The game is published by GamesCampus and developed by Joonwong Games (a Korean studio)–and it’s been with us a few years, but remains a little bit popular with its following fans. Enter into the ancient age of feudal lords, warring states, and a lot of nifty wuxia Kung Fu-weapons flying, aerial battles, and people snaring at each other-it’s GamesCampus’s 3D free-to-play Chinese-history MMORPG 9 Dragons.