Another game, still lurking around in a beta, has made the rounds to GameOgre.com, the upcoming free-to-play game by Square-Enix, Wakfu, has gotten a first impressions treatment by Kyt Dotson. While most of the game is 3/4ths view and looks like it’s been dollhoused; it has some interesting implications for persistent world gameplay using an social-ecological take on gaming universes.
It presents persistent worlds where the character’s decisions can affect the ecology of areas, social dynamics that include citizenship of various towns and regions.
The first thing I noticed about the game is that everything is a little bit tiny. The characters look a lot like dolls, or miniatures, standing in a cartoonish Fantasy world that seems to be floating in space. The graphics are geared more towards the cute than the realistic with enemies like wabbits, gobbals, little plumed birds, etc. Heck, the first item I received from a fight happens to be a hat with ears on it.
The world is displayed in a 3/4ths view and mouse-guided, click-to-move and you progress square-to-square. This is because when combat is initiated and turn-based combat begins, the squares will become important as they’re featured in both determining how far you can move in a turn, line-of-sight for attacks, and positioning for enemies and allies.
[ad#Helvetica Left-align]For the full review, you’ll have to hit up the article itself. However, as the game progresses and the community develops, you might want to also jump into the game itself. The peeps over at Squenix are really working hard on something that will catch the attention of players who want to grief entire regions (although, doing so causes a reduction in citizenship and major penalties to game play.)
It’s hard to say quite where this one is going yet, as it’s still in beta stages; but Wakfu has all the hallmarks of a strong tactical-based JMMO that will probably be sticking around.
Link, via GameOgre.
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