Review by Pietro Gualano
Proposing an innovative MMORPG capable of carrying on the genre is not an easy challenge, quite the contrary. The market offers several titles (many mediocre, some really good) and over the years we have seen the rapid decline of some once extremely popular games. The developers of Black Desert Online, therefore, found themselves having to face a very difficult task and today, after having tried the title in its final version, we can give you our opinion.
A world at war
Black Desert Online is an MMORPG with a fantasy setting, the player finds himself in a world where there are two conflicting nations: Valencia and Calpheon. But what prompted these realms to clash? The Black Stones, special magical stones present in the Black Desert, a place that is sometimes also referred to as the Red Desert due to the bitter battle it hosts. In all this international intrigue we take on the role of the chosen one of the Black Spirit, a “very nice” entity that accompanies us in the course of our adventure.
We do not intend to reveal the real purpose of this black sprite, he is a cruel and evil travel companion with whom you will have to deal and represents a real point of reference for the main quests. It is immortal, visible only to us and we can recall it immediately with the press of a simple button, it is he who guides us in the course of the various missions and it is always he who, every now and then, also offers us some suggestions on how to deal with the game.
The plot proposed by Black Desert Online is not obvious, it is quite engaging and pushes the player to continue to discover the conclusion. We are not facing an exceptional story, but we are still on good levels considering the average of MMORPGs.
The developers have also done a good job in creating the game world (a fundamental aspect in such a title): Black Desert Online offers vast and varied territories to explore, with beautiful landscapes to look at and well cared for. Basically, we are in a large map divided into several regions that we can visit after gaining some experience, the variety proposed in terms of settings has impressed us positively. The game does not offer a real fast travel system, so you have to move between the various settings in the old way: on foot, on a mount or through special means of transport (boats for example). The choice not to allow the player to "teleport" from one point to another on the map is certainly interesting, it can be annoying after several hours of play but initially pushes us to explore the various places we encounter on our path. Often we start to go from point A to point B and end up doing something else but, as mentioned, it is a mechanism that can become rather boring in the long run. Black Desert Online, however, offers a respectable mount system and allows you to use steeds of various levels to move around the world. It is also possible to mate the mounts in your possession to get new steeds, even our four-legged friends acquire skills over time and it is easy to become attached.
Character creation and classes
Developer Pearl Abyss did an excellent job with character creation in Black Desert Online. The player has the ability to adjust many parameters and, with a little patience and dedication, can create a character that can meet his expectations one hundred percent. The system is not complex to use and also allows us to determine the personality traits of our protagonist. Of course it takes some time to create a truly original and beautiful character, but it's totally worth it. It is rare to find such a neat protagonist creation tool in an MMORPG and Black Desert Online has pleasantly surprised us from this point of view.
Before creating the character, however, you need to choose your own class. Here are the alternatives we have available:
Tamer: skilled in hand-to-hand, armed with a short sword; she has tremendous mobility and can rely on magical abilities and her inseparable companion: the "Black Beast".
Valkyrie: class equipped with sword and shield, more suitable for those who like to be a support than others.
Warrior: classic tank with sword and shield, if used well it is also excellent in the offensive phase.
Sorceress: Skilled in melee and magic, she has great mobility and can be adapted to many different situations.
Ranger: class specialized in the use of the bow, excellent for ranged combat; they are endowed with great mobility
Berseker: slow but very strong class, allows you to use two axes and is perfect for those who love to play with power.
Wizard (female Witch): class specialized in magic, excellent for area attacks and for ranged combat.
The classes, unfortunately, are linked to the gender and race of the character and therefore, for example, it is not possible to create a warrior who is not man and human. This limitation leaves a bitter taste in the mouth and we hope it can be removed in the future, it is not a huge problem of course but it is still a limit to the player's freedom. Some classes (wizard for example) also require an older character while others require a younger character.
It is time to fight
Now let's move on to a fundamental element for Black Desert Online: the combat phase. The guys at Pearl Abyss have created a system characterized by strong action components in which you do not just wait for the cooldown times of individual skills, but you must be able to understand how to move on the field and when to land a certain number of shots. . The battles are often spectacular, with lighting effects, sparks, explosions, magic that help to make the battles memorable and compelling. The combat system is based on the pressing of certain keys in sequence, to activate the skills many times it is necessary to press two keys at the same time and it is evident that Black Desert Online is meant to be faced with a mouse and keyboard.
Of course, there are not only basic shots to chain and dodge: we can use a large number of unlockable skills thanks to the accumulated experience and, level after level, we can create our ideal build. The possibilities offered by Black Desert Online in terms of managing the growth of the protagonist are certainly sufficient, some "special talents" are really fun to use and the player really has a large number of skills to choose from. In addition, many abilities are divided into several ranks and can be further upgraded during the game.
The character growth system is based on levels (it is necessary to have reached a certain rank to have access to certain talents) and skill points, which can be obtained by completing missions. Unfortunately, the tasks that are assigned to us in Black Desert Online do not shine for variety and very often our quests consist simply in killing a certain number of enemies of a certain type to gather resources, in producing certain goods or in exploring certain areas . It is really a pity that there are not many missions that are really different from each other, in the long run the game can get tired due to a certain repetition and, unfortunately, we believe that this aspect will negatively affect the experience of many users (the grinding is very present ). The missions, while quite repetitive, are still fun thanks to a working combat system and an adequate level of challenge. Black Desert Online is not a simple game, it will not take you by the hand accompanying you from start to finish and you will have to understand the basic mechanics as soon as possible to avoid bad defeats. We are dealing with a rather complex MMORPG, spamming random moves is useful only in the very first fights and, after a while, it practically means certain death. We appreciated the level of challenge proposed in Black Desert Online, sometimes the game can be frustrating but it is thanks to its difficulty that it often manages to give great satisfaction.
A game full of things to do
Black Desert Online is not a simple game where you face enemies and experience a story, it is much, much more. As the hours go by, we realize that BDO is a huge game, full of things to do and discover day after day.
The title offers a large number of professions: we can specialize in alchemy, cooking, fishing, hunting, trading (the developers have created a truly intriguing system to be discovered), collecting and more. We can also take advantage of the materials collected thanks to clashes and missions and throw ourselves into the crafting system, to which the management system of the buildings we own is connected in turn in which to place and use the crafting stations. We can even delegate the collection of the necessary materials by hiring workers and over time we have the opportunity to specialize more and more in the professions we value most. It takes several hours to figure out how to take advantage of certain game mechanics, but pursuing professions is extremely useful and brings great long-term benefits. Initially, you are surprised but don't be scared: with time and patience you will understand how to move at best.
The game, as a good MMORPG, also offers a complex system of relationships between players. Developer Pearl Abyss has created a real bounty market with which players can take revenge or hit a certain user. How to do? Simple, just put a bounty on his head.
There is also a Karma system that divides players based on their in-game behavior, the developers have evidently thought of it to discourage attacks against interesting users mainly in PvE and automatic PvP activation is provided for more players. "Bad". Attacking a player with positive karma (after activating PvP by him, of course) will lose karma points, while attacking users with strongly negative karma (divided into Rogue and Outlaw) will suffer very minor harmful consequences.
It is also possible to face PvP battles (single or group) without suffering any kind of negative consequence thanks to the Arenas, places designed specifically for players who like to face other human opponents.
Of course, you can also join a guild, get special quests and engage in battles against players from opposing guilds.
The level cap is theoretically set at 50 but it is still possible to continue to enhance your character and increase the level even if the required times become progressively longer and longer.
A feast for the eyes
Black Desert Online has fully met our expectations from a technical point of view. The game is really beautiful to look at and is graphically one of the best MMORPGs on the market. The game world is alive, the cities are well cared for, the day / night cycle and the weather system work offering pleasant views, and the lighting effects in combat are more than convincing. The only thing we didn't like is the rendering of the characters, who rarely appear one hundred percent faithful to the model created in the early game editor.
All this beauty, however, has a price: the game struggles a lot on medium-low configurations and just any PC is not enough to run everything at ultra. Unfortunately, it's not even possible to play around with the settings to find a compromise since they aren't particularly detailed.
As for the stability of the servers, however, during our test we did not encounter any particular problems.
Moving on to the soundtrack we are average, the music and audio effects of the game are not particularly memorable but they do not tire for several hours and this is certainly a positive aspect. In conclusion, we point out that the game is not present in español and a good knowledge of English, German or French is required to enjoy it one hundred percent.
Conclusion
Black Desert Online is a MMORPG worthy of attention, a technically very good product that, we are sure, will captivate many players for a large number of hours. Unfortunately, the proposed missions are not particularly diversified and this in the long run can lead the player to get bored. However, we are faced with a title full of things to do that, in our opinion, manages to give its best in PvP and not in PvE. If Pearl Abyss will support it adequately then this game will give great satisfaction to many users, if you have someone to play it with, we definitely recommend the purchase (the title is buy-to-play).
