TERA Review
By
Kevin VanOrd, Senior Editor
Tera's fun combat has an immediacy that keeps you hooked for a good long while in spite of the game's bland questing.
The Good
- Terrific combat that connects you to the onscreen action
- Exciting encounters against big monsters
- Great instanced dungeons
- Diverse, attractive world invites you to explore it.
The Bad
- Bland, generic questing
- No player-versus-player battlegrounds
- Boring early hours.
In many ways, Tera is a whole lot like other massively multiplayer role-playing games. You team up with other players, fight monsters, level up, earn new gear, and so on. It is, in fact, a very traditional online fantasy adventure in most respects but one: its action. And that action is so smooth, so immediate, and so enjoyable that it's likely to keep you invested in Tera, even as you skip from one quest to the next, ferrying messages between characters standing 20 feet from each other. Generic questing aside, Tera is a well-executed game: it's easy on the eyes, smooth under the fingers, and remarkably stable.
So what is it about the combat that makes it so good? For one, you needn't worry about choosing your target before firing off the usual barrage of sword slashes and fireballs that automatically find their mark. Instead, you hover your targeting reticle over your target and swing, or stab, or cast. Sure, some attacks are homing attacks, but generally, if you miss, you don't do any damage. For example, should you release a slow-moving blastball and the big hulk in front of you lumbers away, you're out of luck. Tera feels more like a third-person action game than most MMOGs--you don't even need to hold a mouse button to engage mouselook.
As a result, you feel connected to the action: your key presses and mouse maneuvers translate almost immediately to the screen. Yes, there are ability cooldowns, and you have to wait for animations to complete. But there is a sense of agility to the combat that's rare in the genre. Big creatures bound around and exhale toxic fumes, while you and your adventuring party hammer on them when you aren't busy dodging, guarding, and getting into the most effective position. The biggest creatures are known as BAMs (that is, big-ass monsters), and facing one is a rush. One such monster is the ovolith, a giant spider creature that rolls across the landscape like a spinning top, bounds into the air and lands with a smash, and hammers the ground in the same way a data entry expert hammers on a keyboard. Facing one with three or four friends is a riot. You must aim your attacks and stay alert, and you receive an indication of damage done only when your ice blast meets flesh--not before. How wonderful it is, this rare feeling that you are performing daring battlefield feats, rather than simply inputting commands and watching them play out onscreen.
It's a shame that there is an hours-long lull before you see Tera at its best. The tutorial prologue is great, in part because it starts you at level 20, gives you a few interesting abilities, and pits you against a couple of towering ogres. But when it's over, you're off to the island of newcomers, where you start from scratch at level one with a paltry couple of skills. From here, you're sent on a series of quests that can politely be called "standard," though "monotonous" is a better term. Most RPGs have you going off to kill stuff, collect stuff, and pass on information to those who need it, of course. But varied pacing, strong mission dialogue, and other contextual elements can make for fun, diverse questing. Sadly, Tera's quests are as dry as its own Shara Desert. Every outpost is having some kind of problem with local creatures. Someone has always gone missing, and you have to go find them. Quest givers want you to take information to people standing within earshot. It's all so very tired.
There is a story tying all of it together, starting with a demon invasion and the search for a missing war hero. The writing isn't on Fallen Earth or Age of Conan levels of excellence, nor will you shape the story as you play in the style of Star Wars: The Old Republic. Yet developer BlueHole Studio tries to sweep you up in the process, punctuating certain story quests with excellent real-time cutscenes featuring your own character. Story arcs often culminate in instanced battles, with you and maybe your teammates fending off a sequence of attackers, or taking on a nasty boss demon. These sequences do a great job of keeping the mundane side quests from wearing on you.
Considering the blandness of the quests, Tera keeps you involved in the proceedings. Of course, much of this has to do with the combat. But the world design can take much of that credit. Granted, there's a certain inconsistency to the Tera universe. You can play as a horned, ferocious-looking Castanic, or as a hypercute foxgirl from the Elin race. The noble flesh mountains known as the Baraka cut impressive figures--particularly when standing next to a Popori, which looks like a portly panda. This bizarre and eclectic mix of fantasy figures comes across as disjointed at first, but it ultimately comes together. That's at least in part because the character diversity is matched by environmental diversity. The tropical landscapes at Cutthroat Harbor couldn't be more different from the enchanted city of Pora Elinu.
By
Kevin VanOrd, Senior Editor
Kevin VanOrd is a lifelong RPG lover and violin player. When he isn't busy building PCs and composing symphonies, he watches American Dad reruns with his fat cat, Ollie.
I can understand now why the most mmorpgs sucks..the reason is because most players sucks...this place is full of jerks exactly like the mmorpgs games .They will never do a good game cuz they dont need ...they just have to make a cheap dumb game to u guys waste your mothers money and promote this fanboyism...sad but true... :(
Honestly, if you are going to make a review of an MMO, you should at least be critical about it and reach the level cap, a "favorable" critic is not a critic at all, just a fan-boy.
Not to mention the fact the game is broken in just about every aspect: the crafting system is useless until lv 60, the pvp system is nonexistant (you can gank someone half your level right outside of town and the guards do nothing, this high level ganking happens often on any pvp server), ranged classes have such an advantage of melee it is a joke, it has horrible performance problems, mainly when streaming in new data, and did I forget to mention the game has absolutely no content aside from a bunch of who-gives-a-crap repetitive quests?
fattslice
>the crafting system is useless until lv 60
That doesn't mean it is "broken". Many games have better items at crafting later on. Also, what is your definition of "useless"?
>(you can gank someone half your level right outside of town and the guards do nothing, this high level ganking happens often on any pvp server)
This was discussed many times on the forums. People decided that guards not influencing on open world PvP was the better.
>ranged classes have such an advantage of melee it is a joke
Really? And I play as both melee and ranged.
>it has horrible performance problems
Maybe on really crowded areas. Models tend to take a bit to load.
> did I forget to mention the game has absolutely no content aside from a bunch of who-gives-a-crap repetitive quests?
Aside from a shitload of dungeons and hard-mode dungeons, Nexus and battlegrounds that'll be implemented later on. Yeah, only who-gives-a-crap repetitive quests.
This Kevin VanOrd is a fail , every single review he does is just awful
suplax Well I suppose everyone is entitled to their opinion.
A mmorpg with a single faction and without Battleground or Arena??? Plz stop fanboys just stop. 7.5 rating that much.
Why! just tell me why the PvP, of all the new mmorpg, is so bad? Aion, Rift, Stor, and now Tera. Fail Fail Fail Fail. How hard is to make a competitive pvp system? all these mmorpg, have something in common a very bad pvp
opinion. just because you get spanked doesn't mean its the game's fault
erozeuz PvP in Rift is bad? is it not just you beeing bad at PvP in Rift? i have played a lot of PvP in rift and i tell you, it's a billion times more fun then boring WoW's battlegrounds. world PvP in WoW, what world pvp? all people do is gang up and gank low lvl's and call it pvp. Rift? team up with you'r guild, get a pvp rift lure and have fun. 7 out of 10 times we ended up with a raid vs raid battlefield. Like Crimson_Erskine said: just because you get spanked doesn't mean its the game's fault
erozeuz Oh yeah, forgot to mention, PvP is the only reason you play a game? if pvp matters so much why don't you go and play pvp games instead?
erozeuz cause WoW's arena is the biggest rush I've ever had and I've never found it's equal in any game. Ever.That being said I quit wow almost a year ago, screw you activision
cephas90 Lol, why the hell do you hate Activision for? They don't own Blizzard, their parent company does. Just like how Bethesda doesn't have a say in what ID software does, because it's their parent company ZeniMax that owns them.
I didn't like that this review knocked Tera for what it's not. NO It's not a PvP style game. It does have PvP, but that's not what the game is about. If you MUST have PvP go somewhere else.
scottwilkins Are you sure you're playing the right game? Tera is all about PvP, it's just not fully running yet. Koreans hate raiding, they are way too competitive, they like to play against each other. I can almost guarantee you play on a PvE server...
Rat_King We must remember this game is brought to you by a Western publisher that promises to adapt the game to the Western audiences, not by a Korean publisher trying to fit Korean standards on a Western audience.
scottwilkins What, an unbiased review that GASP looks at pros AND cons?! Unthinkable! He should have just praised every single aspect of the game that's wonderful and IGNORED all that's wrong!
You sir, must be liberal
PVP battlegrounds will be out soon.
Standard edition is currently $25 on Amazon. People shouldnt be surprised with this review, you could clearly see this game's shortcomings.
smoman5000 People shouldn't be surprised when others think they're wrong for judging a game's shortcomings from a single review, pictures and a sale on Amazon.
smoman5000 You can only remake the same thing so many times before people get tired of it. The combat is the only real draw in a pool of MMOs where most do things better.
I played beta guys and it is GOOOD.Some major stuff are missing from the ORIGINAL KOREAN CLIENT!! so sorry GS but i cannot support this review since you havent even checked the missing things.Anyway Guys WoW is the MMO tha kept me for very long.I played since its its release until Cata (and sorry i stopped because cata killed the game).So i have to say that Not every game next to wow is a clone or a copy or this or that.ITS AN MMORPG.So based on common LOGIC every mmorpg CAN and WILL have common features or CAN and WILL have similar graphics engine depending on its country(korea,japan,uk).Even wow took the good parts of AoC,Anarchy Online, Everquest.Jesus.Its called evolving.So stop whining about copies.
BTW What is this a new political movement or something about turning all the mmos from P2P to F2P?Sorry guys but development companies didnot create games for us just to play them and be happy.ITS CALLED PROFIT.Just because you can not play it for subscription reasons doesnt mean that the company has to cancel the p2p mode and change it to f2p.Example @Rift all the people think that is has a problem but its development team stated that they are more than happy with their current subscribers and they will keep it that way.SO NO P2P.
Btw i am not saying that f2p games arent good.On the contrary there are f2p games that are way better than swtor.At least on their content and gameplay.
To conclude Tera is a very good game and fun.I dont know about GW2 since i havent been able to play it but i think it will be a very good and fun game also.Choose the game you want to play and stop crying about the low cost subscriptions.
maotinanai "you havent even checked the missing things." seriously???Do you realize what you're saying? Just the fact that the game launched with missing content is a huge minus.Makes the company look bad and the game launched as beta.If you go to a store and get 1/2 of a product while others get whole product you'll be at the manager next second,and whine everywhere.
abadgirl84 I agree with what you say but most of the games this gen are halved products with DLC and ULC that contain the other half.
I dont mind this game but it's not open world like WoW is. In wow you can literally go anywhere and I love that about that game. Tera isnt like that. It seems to be trails you follow along and kill things on either side of it. There no running though the trees to get some place else or climbing over mountains to find short cuts or to just look around. You follow the path and that's that for the most part. The mounts are beyond aggravating. The horse mount snorts and neighs every second non stop. I don't use it anymore because it's so annoying. The colors are pretty in the game though. Could use more ground clutter. Shame about the linear aspect of following the trails around. The game is also very fantasy and child like if you ask me. All the giggling from npc's is annoying as well. I will continue to play it but it just doesnt have that visceral feel to it like wow has. It's almost like it's too polished if that makes any sense. I have fond memories of playing wow going back years (none lately though) and I'm not certain I will look back on this game with the same fondness.
jojocoolio That is a very good observation, I hate the "invisible wall" that cuts me off from real immersion.
This game looks great, i have to say and i'm definitely interested. However i refuse to pay a monthly subscription for a game that cannot be bothered to include PvP battlegrounds at the start. Hopefully they're added sooner rather than later because i think this game could be the one to get me back into MMORPGs...
Gamespot reviews are so rediculous these days... Gues EM didn't pay enough to get a good score like Blizzard scores their games.
Meteor7 Actually looking at the aggregate reviewer scores shows that Gamespot's review isn't that far off of the margin. The user score is also close to Gamespot's review score. Doesn't seem ridiculous to me.
Meteor7 I played TERA and everything he says in this review is true. The questing SUCKS and every part of the game except combat is generic. 7.5 is actually a pretty generous score.
I've been a member of GS for 7 years now. I've seen it all. The one thing I've learned from GS reviews in the past 5 years is......to never trust GS reviews. They are too inconsistent, hint so strongly at bias, and often are written by old gamers who have no real connection to this generation.
However, GS has some of the best news articles and preview features of most other sites. Not all, but most. Take this for what you will...
Rat_KingM8 GS is just writing a review.Its the author's and GS'S opinion about a game not the holy bible.Jesus Christ.If you want to have the best opinion for yourself just play the game.
maotinanai I'm fairly sure the whole point of a game review is for the consumer to read it to help form an idea of a game before going out and spending $60. So obviously it's not the holy bible, but I think it's pretty logical to read reviews to help influence a decision on if this game is right for you or not. A good review should consist of a technical overview defining any unique, well done, or failed features of a game, with a VERY SLIGHT bias one way or the other. However, you're right. GS "reviews" are just editorials of the author on what they thought of the game. Also, these editorials often times leave out some of the most defining features of a game. For instance, this article has little to no mention of channels, world pvp, politics, glyphs, crystals etc. The bulk of this is about failed questing and good combat, both of which are incredibly subjective.
Moral of the story is a review IS supposed to influence my decision, however when you can't trust those who write the reviews, then you'll always be disappointed in games you buy or miss out on games you'll love. Go ahead, be a GS member for years and read review after review, you'll see what I mean...
Rat_King Interesting. I usually (19 out of 20 times) trust GS's reviews. In fact, it's one of the reasons I check this site. Usually they seem to review harsher than most sites ie, IGN, but that's just my opinion.
"nor will you shape the story as you play in the style of Star Wars: The Old Republic"
In all fairness, you don't really shape your own story in SWTOR. The devs have pre shaped your story, and your choices have no impact on the direction the game takes.
I wonder how much Blizzard pay Gamespot to make reviews such as this one.
It dead obvious that this review is biased and thats all there is to it.
roarboarz I completely agree. Everyone that has played the beta for TERA and D3 will tell you TERA is by far the better game. Yet the review for TERA, being a non-blizzard game will be low, while D3 will end up with at least 9.0 or higher. Completely ridiculous.
roarboarz as much and EA or Bioware does.
roarboarzD3 will recieve a higher score the funny part, It was unplayable at launch has lots of glitches and bugs still. It will receive a higher score i bet. lol
roarboarz totally conspiracy, couldn't be honest, right? get over yourselves. Reviewer nailed it dead on with 7.5
Crimson_Erskine
Basic marketing is now a conspiracy??
Its good to see what kind of players the blizzard fanboy community consists of.
roarboarz Have any of you actually played TERA? Or is this the pathetic new game fanboy defense? it's a GENERIC MMO!! The only draw is the combat and that alone won't net TERA a 9.0. Geez, grow some brains kiddies.
Runock Shhhh.... don't let reason and facts get in the way of mindless fanboy rage towards the latest popular game. Though I admit this is the first time I've ever seen it turned into a conspiracy theory.
I agree, SWTOR really? worst game in history got a higher score than Tera? Obviously 7.5 is an inaccurate rating. The innovating combat alone and successfully inputing into an MMO (which by the way no other has) should not be over looked. Yes sure they have the same typical quest lines as every other MMO that was released but that should not ruin a great game like Tera. Come on!! I have not felt more satisfaction killin a monster!! even the AI and attacks on the monsters are amazing!!!
Innovative combat was given to us, and all we can say is BAH... questing is the same? So if they removed the combat and kept target combat (I hit ok your turn) it would be better? looool Funny!!!
Cozm1kaos This combat isn't new, just look at vindictus. And a monthly payment, service oriented business model can't be focused solely around innovation of a single aspect in a market where there are DOZENS of high quality, graphically similar competitors. This genre has been out for years, higher scores require higher effort.
cephas90 Firstly, Rift and SWTOR have just been recently released. Having said that, both are target hit, both got better reviews. This is why I cannot believe why a beautiful graphic game such as Tera got this score? I mean lets be real here, the graphics are really nice, the sound is great, the gameplay is great!! the combat is great!! major 3 points to look in a game are pretty much covered. People fail to realize that live updates and huge patches will come out!! after all it is an MMO =)
WAIT A second not sound biased or anything how did this game receive a 7.5 if the only thing bad he pointed out was the repetitive Questing like all other mmos have.
On a serious Note if the only thing you can point out is boring quests and you gave this game a 7.5. I find this to be atrocious biased review. I am by no means a tera fanboi for that matter but a MMO player who has played all the big MMO's in recent years. I have beta tested this game and played live like all the others and find this one to be one of the better ones...
SWTOR- was a straight copy and paste gameplay+ Abilities from wow, But way worse.. the only good thing is obviously sw lore Received a 8 from GS. Even tho it had launch problems compared to tera. Dont forget the decline in sub fees..
Warhammer another copy and paste wow lets not even go their received 8.5
Age of conan was unplayable at one point with random glitches received and somewhat fun combat with no endgame content got a 8.5
All this games are fail but yet receive a higher score. Than you have tera a game that has changed mmo combat and had a cleaner launch than all this other mmos and actually has some endgame with pvp incoming in later patches WTF! are you serious. Just lost respect to gs reviews
Bottom Line stop being biased
PS. Im waiting for gw2 and maybe will play this game when im not playing the other
GameCrazy22r God,how much i hate ppl with arguments "wow copy"/"wow killer",if you start a point with that ..sir,your argument is invalid.Dont know when you were born but gaming world didnt started with Wow.And..is not even that original,it "copy pasted" from other games too..- (although i prefer inspired,not to be rude at their work),just probably you all fan boys werent born when those launched.Sorry if i am mean to you,but even if i am not a big mmo player,the ones i've been in,even betas,you barely log/game started,ppl didnt even pas 1st npc and all you can see in chat is Wow wow ...and more Wow.And am sick of that.Makes me think your moms dont give you her credit card to pay the sub and all u can do is whine in other games and play free betas.
Curse me or whatever,but ..try next time to think outside the wow box and if u find a Senior Editor's review bad,find proper arguments.Like the fact he didnt got max lvl to see whole content to make a proper review.
And is a fair score,for a game that released in beta.Rant as much as u want but for a game that is what..1 -2 years old in Asia to launch with 1/2 content missing (am talking about pvp),that is a money-hungry company to me.
abadgirl84 FYI I dont even play WoW... as a matter fact i stopped giving blizzard money years ago.My point is valid if you dont think all this games have failed because of some other reasons Except for the fact that they mimic Hot key based game play from warcraft with the exception of AoC than your points are invalid.Look at this link i bring up valid Points
http://technorati.com/entertainment/gaming/article/how-and-why-star-wars-the1/page-2/
Im talking from experience i have been looking for the next non fail mmo and I hate wow as much as you do. But Tera combat sets it miles apart from all this fail mmo's it at least tried to do 1 THING different which in my book is much more innovation than SWTOR has done in their game. Questing is part of any Mmo weather people like it or not.
Im looking forward to playing gw2 having played the beta it has more innovation than any of the ones i listed including tera....
SO yea not a fan boi
GameCrazy22r "mimic Hot key based game play from warcraft" ..looking at the link you gave,i dont see your point (except you linked me SWTOR which i hate :) ) Those skills arent just in WOW,are in every single RPG out there..stun,reduce armor,and so on.Look at Baldur's gate for ex (am giving u an example before WOW):Smite -With the Smite ability, the warrior gains the ability to strike a mighty blow, knocking an opponent back for a considerable distance and stunning the opponent for 1 round. Difference then were rounds.But same idea.What do you want them to do a flip ,walk on tip toes and pinch your nose?You're crying same as those after Tera's quest system just because you get to kill 10 pigs everywhere.
Each game has something new and rest made on current trend pattern.You didnt get my point at all,u cant say you hate Wow but compare everything you played with it.
On other hand ..you argue with phantasms ..i got my idea where GS loyalty lies years ago.Look at the scores for every game(i talk rpg only,since just those i follow) from Bioware ,not to say the reviews..or when one launches,how much promotions gets.Morrowind and NwN launched same year.Nwn according to GS "turned you in a rpg player if u werent one" Morrowind - not a game for everyone..HA HA!Nwn:fail copy of Baldur's gate.Moar plague please we didnt have enough,not even in DA.You'll open some random indie game and in similar games you'll see a Dragon age or whatever.. :)) (fan girl rant over)
Just the fact that last screen of the review is of a lvl28 char should say you enough.Probably even i played more then them on beta..and I personally dont like Tera.But that's just me.Anyway is wrote a novel here -.- so ..cya in GW2 :p
GameCrazy22r I agree with everything you said. Except, Star Wars wins because it is STAR WARS. Nuff said. You don't want none from my Chiss James Bond.
Great review and dead on. Combat is outstanding and where all the value of the game truly lies. Environment and game are also excellent. However, it is definitely hampered by the quest system and still feels grindy.
I think this game will be more successful outside of a subscription model, though that should not be taken to mean it is a terrible game. It just isn't worth a sub, IMO.
Game Emblems
The Good
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TERA
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- Publisher(s): En Masse Entertainment
- Developer(s): Bluehole Studio
- Genre: Role-Playing
- Release: May 1, 2012 (US) »
- ESRB: M
