Darkfall Preview

Even though the game is technically released in Europe, IGN's Vault Network has just finished posting a hands-on preview of Aventurine's Darkfall.
Darkfall does not hold your hand. You have to seek out the quests. No glowing '?' either. The direction you take your character in Darkfall is entirely up to you. But the quest givers are fairly obvious and this shouldn't cause any frustration. On the other hand, actually getting the opportunity to buy a Darkfall account causes ulcers. I was fortunate to actually be home the week of launch and after three days won the 'F5' lottery to buy an account. However, perhaps tens of thousands of people have tried and while their friends and guilds are happy in their new home, many are frustrated and cursing Aventurine's handling of the situation. I suspect another server or two will be opened up over the next month as I believe 'Euro 1' has 10,000 active accounts on it now. The server remains perfectly stable, and downtime has been minimal. Lag has not been an issue, even with a screen full of players. I do look forward to North American servers, as the ping time will drop and I suspect my performance both technically and in game will improve. I know I've missed a gold stack or two due to my high ping times.

I'm not going to proclaim Darkfall is the BEST MMO EVAR! There are some negatives as with any MMORPG at launch. There have been well documented reports of exploits. People are very frustrated with the inability to buy the game. And some have bought the game but have had account authorization problems which prevent them from playing the game. These problems are only compounded by what seems to be insufficient staff to cover customer service needs. As seems to be the norm with MMORPGs lately, Darkfall launched missing a little polish here and there. As beautiful as the game world is, there is a lack of random fauna which makes the game world feel empty at times. But Darkfall is a level above what I expected it to be. I can only imagine what this team could produce with more resources. If sandbox PvP MMO is your thing, I would say Darkfall is a must try. I also see a huge potential for Role Players in this game. Agon is a new and original world just ripe for roleplaying.