What is Perfect World? Game Overview.

Perfect World – a Chinese MMORPG set in a world styled after national mythology. Thanks to Nival Online, the game has learned the Russian language. However, the transfer of such a specific project was not without its challenges. A vast world… a monumental field of hieroglyphs. The localizers struggled for a long time to translate it; PW even set a record for the longest beta test, yet the release finally took place. I had the opportunity to see the project back in its early stages when the 'Orion' server was just beginning to frighten with queues to enter the game, while 'Vega' was empty and lifeless. Almost nine months have passed – a quite respectable time. Has the world become perfect?

Welcome Back

The first thing that catches the eye (or rather, the ear) is the music. Previously, it did not match the game at all. Traditional melodies are good, but not at the expense of immersion. Imagine battling a strong monster, health is low, it’s challenging and dangerous, while soothing sounds of some string instrument play from the speakers. Now, the adventurer is greeted by a very dynamic, lively main theme that, nonetheless, does not break the color palette – the basis of the motif is played on flutes.

We enter the game, the screen dims for a moment, and then explodes with color. We are in a beautiful green glade, where someone has scattered bright flowers, as if from a large basket. Just behind us stands a house. It's clear that refined seed descendants live here – they are evidently distant relatives of elves, as their architectural creations resemble those we have seen in Middle-earth (and even in Azeroth) – as graceful and slender as their masters. The graphics engine has clearly improved. The textures of the houses are no longer a blurry nightmare, the shaders gently fill the world with light, and the water – is simply a sight to behold.

We looked around and took a couple of tentative steps. What’s this button? Ah, yes! These are wings, I had forgotten that the delicate seeds have feathers not only on their ears but also on their backs from birth. Flying is a wonderful thing. Burning Crusade and its dragon-like prices for 'mounts' come to mind like a nightmare. The player does not have to wait long to soar over blooming meadows, dense forests, and endless seas. Just press the button, and the character will soar into the sky. All worldly things remain below, and only clear sky lies ahead. But what’s this? Some flying cuttlefish, and their level is indecently higher than mine. Perhaps, I will avoid them and return later – at higher levels. I land successfully – it’s never any other way here. In 'Perfect World,' they don’t know about accidents, so you can fall from any height headfirst.

Choose, We Have Plenty of Work!

The rookie is immediately put to work – the local NPCs are helpless as children, and thus they ask for help in various ways to retrieve money and experience from them. There are plenty of quests, and almost every NPC has some urgent need. Mostly, of course, they involve simple mail-killing quests. Go, talk, kill ten enemies, bring back 15 wolf heads, and so on.

There are interesting tiered adventures as well, but they don’t quite compare to those in, for instance, World of Warcraft. The issue is not even in the gameplay itself, but in immersion – the texts of quests and NPC dialogues do not impress, so even the most interesting ones simply pass by unnoticed. Otherwise, Perfect World resembles many other online entertainment – in almost every MMORPG, one must kill, collect, and go from one character to another. Only here, the scale is a bit different. The East is a delicate matter; to complete a complex quest, you will have to kill so many monsters that you can adorn yourself with teeth, claws, and other trophies in three layers.

The quests are predominantly simple. We slay monsters and collect ingredients (which often drop after killing the same beasts) – one mouse button, one skill, no symphonies required on the keyboard. The ease of gameplay is a kind of hook: complete one quest, and here’s another five piled on, and all are completed quickly and without issues. You won’t even have time to turn around before getting fully immersed in the game.

Inhabitants of Myths and Legends

'Perfect World' is rooted in Chinese mythology. For example, one of the races – zoanthropes – comes directly from legends. Half human, half animal, they are very close to nature and derive their powers from it. Men can turn into tigers, while women focus on sorcery and prefer to fight using a hand-held beast. In Chinese folklore, the fox shapeshifter is a well-known character.

The second race – humans. Like in many other games, they are strong middlemen. Good at everything, they have no critical weaknesses, but also no remarkable features. Human warriors are rightly considered one of the simplest classes, as they can deftly dismember creatures, but they themselves fall easily with just a couple of blows. Mages, on the other hand, are a very complex class – they have little health and must rely on spells, which require mana.

Winged seeds are the third and most controversial race. Their connection with mythology is, to put it mildly, weak. However, the winged ears immediately reveal their prototype – elves. One of the classes is the archer. The ears and wings stick out, an elegant hand draws a strong bowstring – does this remind you of anything? The priests of the seeds are classic 'healers': they boost their allies, resurrect the dead, and heal the still living.

In Perfect World, the sides do not fight against each other, so there’s no special balance. The design of the game implies that players will unite in parties, considering the weak and strong sides of different classes. The idea is good, but it is not surprising that the official forum occasionally erupts with 'flame wars' over topics like 'archers are OP' and 'druids are cheating.' In nearly a year of testing, the situation has changed little – archers are still considered the strongest, while druids continue to thrive as they always have.

And There’s No Limit to Perfection… or Is There?

We have settled into the world, and now we are growing and developing rapidly. A standard bow gives way to a magical crossbow, and instead of rags on our chest, we wear impenetrable armor. The inventory is packed with various items, and pockets are bursting with money. There are plenty of quests – try to keep up with them all. Levels are gained very quickly – complete a few tasks, and you are on the next tier. The world truly seems perfect, as everything is just so wonderful; live and enjoy, but… around the thirtieth level (sometimes a bit more), a great copper basin named 'Korean model' (or Asian, which is the same) unexpectedly creeps up on the player. The vessel encompasses everything around – capital, it turns out, is trivial; the crossbow is fit only for hunting mosquitoes, and the impenetrable armor has disintegrated like fake clothing. It appears that you had to not only run after quests but also simply kill monsters; otherwise, the reward experience would be lacking. Roughly, the formula looks like this: at level 10, you need to complete X quests and kill Y monsters, while at level 30, it’s already 2X and 5Y. The coefficients only increase from there. If you skip the 'game keys,' they will eventually catch up with you, and they will do so harshly – to ensure an adequate level of gear, you’ll need to spend hours farming money from weak creatures.

However, balancing quests and extermination still won’t work. Diverse (and, importantly, in large quantities) quests at higher levels suddenly disappear. NPCs fall silent and do not want to give orders even under threat of torture. The world, the story, the tiered quests, and dialogues are gone forever. A hero at level 60 and higher finds themselves alone with endless hordes of hostile beings. From this point, the mountain of 'Maximum Level 150' seems extraordinarily high and insurmountable. The convenient quest tiers unexpectedly end, with only sharp cliffs ahead, and in places, smooth walls. No one has ever seen the peak of this mountain – it's somewhere out of reach, in space.

In fact, only a few have made it even to level 100. Some say that there simply isn’t enough experience for such levels in the game. Others believe that 150 is just a myth. However, it can be confidently stated that no one has reached the pedestal yet, even though the game has existed for almost a year...

Where to Go, What to Do, What to Wear?

Sooner or later, the monotonous process of gaining experience becomes tedious (well, of course it does), and then the population remembers about PvP and the social system. In general, Asian games are known for these components. WAR or WoW seem laughable compared to the epicness and depth of intrigues and wars in, for example, Lineage 2. Perfect World follows the beaten path, only there are more castles than in the prototype.

The entire world map is divided into patches-sectors. Controlling territory promises serious profits, so there are always contenders for the gold. Even the scale of the battle (80 versus 80 people) doesn’t deter anyone – there are plenty of willing participants.

There are numerous places to fight – there are 44 sectors in total in the game. Turmoil happens continuously: clans quarrel, form alliances, declare wars, betray one another, while others are simultaneously gaining strength and striving for power. All this is interesting and grand, but in the long run, the surplus of money among a few strong clans will lead to hyperinflation and economic collapse. However, this is also in the realm of the cosmos – somewhere near the peak of the 'level mountain.'

At other times, the population entertains themselves with quite peaceful activities – holding weddings, dressing up in regular clothes, and buying mounts. Everything is almost like real life, even better – for in the 'Perfect World,' everyone is so beautiful, charming, and overall…

Why Play This?

What is it about this MMORPG? Why do not just thousands but millions play it? The answer is, in fact, on the surface. Perfect World is a gaming reflection of social networks. Fighting monsters and completing quests is secondary. Even the world itself is secondary. What is primary are its inhabitants. They construct their characters, spending hours selecting eye colors and nose shapes. They earn long weeks just to buy ordinary (not armor) clothing and show it off to others. They try to stand out, cutting through the area on an expensive riding deer. Conflicts and wars ignite here as they do in life, because of the whims of beautiful women, and alliances fall apart for the same reasons – misunderstanding and greed.

It is no wonder that Asian games take pride in their strong social models; oh, it’s not in vain – Perfect World is yet another proof of that.

Pros: social system; graphics; PvP mode.

Cons: long leveling up.

Game Rating:

4.0/5

The review was taken from StopGame.ru

written by me, kosher copy-paste.