When I first hopped into the beta for Wangyuan Shengtang & Aurogon’s MMORPG Swords of Legends Online, I have to admit that I was a bit overwhelmed and found the controls a bit confusing. I couldn’t figure out if playing with a mouse and keyboard, my preferred, would be best or if I should use a controller. I spent time playing with both during my hours into this game. There was a lot to figure out and the story was just as complex as the controls themselves. So, basically what I am saying to preface this impression is that this Gameforge title has a lot going on, but it pays out in the end once you get it all down.
Gameplay
Before getting into the game, I want to share with you my thoughts on the controls along with some tips. I strongly recommend sticking to the mouse and keyboard due to the controller only able to offer partial support. I don’t know if they will be able to give full support honestly because of how the game is set up, so just be prepared to use the standard PC gamer setup. When you first start playing, the game doesn’t focus too much on explaining the parts of the controls that affect your combat and general interactions with the world, so I am just going to go over that stuff.
For one, my biggest complaint was going to be that the character doesn’t turn when you turn the camera. You already have to hold the LMB (left mouse button) to turn the camera and the default option won’t have the character turn with it. Instead, you will have to use the RMB (right mouse button) to turn your character and the camera. I thought that wasn’t much better, and then I found out that there is a control swap option by press the Ctrl key! Basically, the difference between the two controls is whether you want an on-screen arrow to click on icons, quest HUD’s for details, and other various HUD’s and menu options, or if you want to just be battle-ready without the on-screen arrow. When the arrow is turned off, the character turns with the camera and the LMB and RMB become your main two attack options. This leaves your slots for attacking open to a wider range of skills!
As you level up, you get more skills that fit your character’s class. These skills can go into a slot system on the bottom of your screen that will be triggered by buttons E, Q, R, and so on. You can edit how many of these there are and I suggest you do since after the first four it becomes options like Alt+X and such. On a controller, these make more sense, but on the keyboard they are a bit rough when fighting. They don’t let you edit the controls to your own key bindings, yet, so until then you just have to work with it. Personally, I would have my extra skills just be the number buttons (1, 2, 3, etc) since they are right there while I am playing.
Regular skills aren’t the only things you will obtain that go in quick use slots though. There is a dedicated bar for convenient and helpful aspects to use outside of battle. For instance, one of the first things you will get is a flying sword that you can use to get around more freely in the world. You can hop on and hop off this sword anytime outside of combat by pressing F1. You will get more things, like other transportation options and meditation, as you progress.
When it comes to the game progression, you are basically going to be doing back-to-back quests that follow the storyline. Sometimes you will come across a side quest that you can trigger and complete, but they honestly don’t feel much different than some of the quests. You are welcome to hang out in areas and just fight the enemies in them as long as you want of course, but due to how the traveling is when you are doing the quests, you will have to complete a couple of hours of the game in order to be able to travel yourself between different areas, since you unlock a portal-like skill. Until then, you are kind of stuck in whatever region your current quest is in.
Before you start anything, you will get to customize your character though. Picking a fighting style, outfit, and many of the details that make them look how you want them to. There are more character customization options unlocked and able to be purchased later in the game too. Player customization is always a major plus, so that’s good to have plenty of. Plus, eventually, you will even be able to maintain and customize your own personal island.
Expectations
It seems they are adding English voice acting to the game, which is definitely a bonus to their player base since English is one of the most widely spoken languages. However, I would say that this whole aspect needs work and to be checked on. I came across multiple lines that were said with a very bland voice, with just no emotion behind it, and found it pretty frustrating that the game just randomly had characters speaking English and others not, even within the same scene. Just wait until you have the whole cutscene finished and dubbed before changing the language for the scene.
Please, add a tutorial tip regarding the option to press Ctrl and switch been the on-screen mouse and off-screen mouse control style. It was a literal game-changer and felt like a breath of fresh air when I realized the controls being difficult was just because I didn’t know to press a button that most games don’t have a function for. Without a Controls menu in your options, there was no way for me to know this until I was trying to figure out my controls randomly changed every now and again. Fun fact: I push shift a bit heavy sometimes and hit ctrl, so that’s how I found it accidentally.
It doesn’t really feel like the MMO aspect isn’t being utilized in the game either. There is plenty of RPG elements and quests to accomplish, but there is no reward for playing with others and I failed to get anybody to use the chat with me no matter how many times I tried to connect with someone. It doesn’t help that the World chat option is locked until you progress far enough into the game too. Make a party system where players can share exp, complete quests together, and stuff like that. I got up to the StudentPlains section of the game and never saw this option anywhere and it would really give purpose to the MMO part of the game.
Conclusion
Swords of Legends Online is one seriously complex MMORPG, but once you get everything worked out, it is a lot of fun! Hell, it was even fun when I was having trouble with the controls a bit. While I look forward to where the story is going and what scenarios I’ll be put in soon, there is some work still to be done for the game. Still, it is a very promising title and I highly recommend it to fans of RPG’s with heavy lore and a good amount of combat action.
