So here is my feedback for the devs on the off chance they read this and find it helpful. I am going to avoid talking about the bugs and latency issues, though the game was plagued with fps drops, imbalanced CPU/GPU usage and server lag; these were all mentioned by myself or others in the bug forums. Hopefully those things will be solved come launch.
Graphics, the game looks very good. Dark and gritty with a good amount of detail. Transmogs seem to show a decent range of variation and have some beautiful design. Character customisation could do with some expansion, I’d also like to see us be able to alter hairstyle and not just things like tattoo’s at the Wardrobe after creation. Spells and abilities all felt impactful, satisfying and well animated.
Sound, the music seemed to capture the mood wonderfully, sound effects fit seamlessly. There were a few times where the voices of npcs were a little quiet, drowned out by other things in the world but overall the voice acting was excellent. I was very disappointed by the fact it sounded as though we only had one male and one female voice actor for the player character(if each class was supposed to have a different voice actor then it was clearly bugged for me). I would have hoped for a different one for each class, to allow for more fitting characterisation. The voice actors did a good job overall, but there were definitely times where the performance didn’t feel like it match up to the player character because of the fact they were generic voices(particularly for classes like Necromancer). I would also have liked to see the player character talk a bit more frequently, they often felt like they were being talked at, rather than having a conversation.
Gameplay, here is where the wheels start to come off a little for me. Overall it’s good but certain classes definitely felt in need of some love. I had the time to level Druid, Necromancer and Sorceress all to level 20+ and the experience varied wildly.
Necromancer felt powerful, satisfying and definitely felt like a hero in the making though it’s initial spells were a bit underwhelming. That initial sets of skills feel like they could do with some tweaking, whilst thematically they seemed interesting the gameplay of them was a bit meh.
Sorceress was very much a glass canon as expected, it had a very satisfying damage throughput; though the gameplay loop did suffer at times from a lack of mana regeneration(depending which element you focused on, Frost had no mana issues, but Fire and Lightning both suffered). There were definitely moments on boss fights where I found myself struggling for mana as I ran around waiting for it to regen; not a satisfying experience. But the class was still overall in a good state.
Druid was, frankly, in a poor state. Luckily it was the first class I played, so I didn’t realise quite how bad it was until I played Necro and Sorc, otherwise I may have given up on it in the first few levels. Sub level 10 you often felt simultaneously very squishy and like you were slapping the enemy with a stick of wet celery. I died more times(to bosses and some of the tougher events) as a Druid leveling 1-10 than I did on Necro and Sorc combined going 1-20. Around about level 12-14 the situation improved as some synergies started to let me get some reasonable recovery and some good throughput. This didn’t last long though because by the time I was 17/18 I was back to feeling like a wet noodle. I could survive against bosses, by spending what felt like more time running and dodging than fighting, but it took me so long to kill them that several times when I was slow working out the boss dodge patterns I ran out of health potion uses and inevitably died. Whilst I know end game balance is ultimately what matters, the early game Druid experience is a sorry one and I can see it putting off a lot of people from leveling it.
The whole open world design and free form choosing your own path structure to the game is something I’m not entirely sold on. Whilst I appreciate the freedom there were times where it felt more like aimless wandering rather than meaningful exploration. This brings me on to the final section of my feedback.
Story, this for me is the most important part of the game, it’s what is most likely to keep me coming back over the longer term(if you add more). I didn’t have enough time to play to complete the entire of act 1 during this open weekend, but what I did play felt enjoyable, delightfully dark and macabre. I do feel that the game’s aimless exploration design however does negatively impact on the immersion of the main story. Because of the way side quests(which in themselves were great and added to the depth and feel of Sanctuary) were designed and positioned they would frequently send me off in a totally different direction to where my next main story step is. When you combine that with the random events diverting you, dungeons appearing to lore you in etc, it seemed very easy to get distracted to the extent that you would be diverted from the main story for significant amounts of time.
Because of the nature of a time constrained beta weekend, this applied a level of artificial focus and vision which might not ordinarily be present when playing the game where time is not such an issue. During the beta weekend there were several times that I was diverted from the story, due to the direction the side quests sent me in and distractions along the way, for several hours and when I returned to it had a few moments sitting there thinking to myself “Who am I talking to and why again?”. Because of such a short gap it only took a brief thought, but I could easily see people with RL interruptions being away several days and losing interest in the story because of this slightly disjointed nature of the game’s design.
It is inevitably too late to do much about this for the base game’s story, but might be something to keep in mind should you add future story expansions. Consider small things like designing side quests to send us in the direction of the next main story step, encouraging us to proceed with it in a timely manner, thus maintaining focus and momentum rather than risk too many distractions.
So overall a good game with good potential, overall I’d give it a solid 7/10 so far. But that is assuming the later and end game continues at a good level and the performance issues/bugs are sorted.
The only thing I really need to see from the game now is what the “end game” will look like. So far I haven’t seen anything from the game that would keep me playing on a daily/weekly basis once the story is complete, definitely not enough to make me want to invest in a season pass. Hopefully we will hear more of that in the coming months.