Saga of Ryzom (SoR), is the MMORPG from French developer Nevrax. I found it to be one of the most innovative contenders on the market. Set on the living world of Atys, SoR allows players to take on the role of any of 4 subspecies of Homonids, as they try to reclaim an area of the planet devastated by an army of giant insects. Doesn't sound like anything you've seen before, does it?
The first thing that will strike you about the game is how jaw-dropping gorgeous it is. All the load screens and production art are amazing, and the in-game visuals are just as good. The animation is really solid as well; from the spinning attacks of the dual dagger user and massive swings of the two handed sword wielder to the sublime dancing look of a caster bringing up a spell - this is a game with style.
In keeping with its innovative approach, there are no classes in SoR. Starting characters choose three emphases (magic, combat, gathering, crafting) to start with, but by the time you are ready to leave the newbie area you can completely change what you started out with by learning cross skills and practicing them. Then there are the skills themselves - called Stanzas. Each skill can be edited, allowing the player to change the execute time, cost, and add effects to it however they choose. Needless to say, the amount of freedom and customizability takes some getting used too.
The sound work in the game, though solid, does leaves something to be desired. The intro music is excellent (which is nice since it is the only music in the game), and many of the character sounds are good, but once you get out and explore you will be struck by how uneven the environment sound is. Some of the animal sounds and ambients are spot on and provide a strong sense of place, and others are jarringly badly recorded. The developers have made it clear that a full soundtrack and polish for the existing sounds is in the works, so this aspect of the game may improve. In the mean time you may find yourself making extensive use of the ingame mp3 player.
The interface was very complicated and hard to acclimate to. There are a lot of screens to navigate, and the documentation is less than complete, so you are left feeling quite lost starting out. Once you get a feel for things it starts to get easier, but a better manual would have gone a long way toward smoothing out the beginning jitters.
This brings us to the weakest part of SoR, the story. The intro and background story for the game are unique and interesting (how many games have you play an alien humanoid on a planet that is a gigantic organism?), but once you get started you rarely ever hear about it again. The quests are all flat, obtained from generic NPCs, and are all hunting missions of one sort or another. The developers have begun in-game events to spice things up, so perhaps more improvements are in the works.
My overall impression of Saga of Ryzom was a good one. They certainly have a wealth of unique and interesting features to bring to the world of MMORPGs. I do wish they had waited to release until after they had tuned the game to be more immersive and really involve players in this fabulous world. All indications are that they are diligently working towards that goal though, so there is reason to believe it will get much better. I would say the SoR is a good game now, but by the time they release the first expansion it has the potential to be a great one.
(Post Script: If you are like me SoR will really bring back memories of a line of toys from the 80's called Sectaurs (http://www.x-entertainment.com/messages/323.html) That is - if you remember them at all.)
I am an IT manager and sometimes artist who has been playing games since his first ATARI. I generally enjoy playing RPG and Strategy games, and lately have been playing quite a few MMORPGs. I generally enjoy games which are both fun and visually pleasing, and I tend to play games until there is nothing left to do in them.
