Sunday, July 17, 2011

New Worlds Ateraan

New Worlds Ateraan (NWA) is a slightly smaller MUD than other's I have reviewed so far, but still has a very large player-base. At any point in time about 100 or more players will be online.

NWA is known as a TORG. As described on the NWA website, "a GORG or MMORPG is like a movie with all the digital sound, SFX, and CGI, and a TORG is like a book with all the detailed description, indepth character involvement, and imaginative prose that allows you to be creative in your selection of imagery." TORGs are different than a normal MUD in that they have rules that both enforce and support role-play.

The fighting system is quite different from Avalon or Achaea. In NWA you start a battle by attacking, which will begin you auto-attack with your weapon. Once in battle you may use powers dictated by your profession. Your auto-attack damage is dictated by your weapon, and you defense is dictated by your armor. Gear is very important for fighting, unlike many MUDs.

Nearly every aspect of NWA involves role-play. Whether you are fighting monsters (hunting), socializing in the bar, defending your city from an invasion, or doing your tasks to join a guild, everything supports and even enhances your role-play experience.

There are many rules within in NWA, most of which are in place to facilitate a heavy role--play environment. Keep in mind some rules are meant to be broken, though in NWA I have yet to break any, either purposefully or by chance; They're not too over-bearing. The use of triggers, speed-walking with client maps <such as double-clicking locations with zMUD maps>, and chain-command aliases ***my parenthesis key just broke so brackets will do*** <putting multiple commands into one alias> is prohibited. You may also only have up to 2 characters.

Ateraan has been a great experience for me. On my first character, Ayrian, I was a Waylumi priest <the goodie goodie huggy wuggy kind> and  he was a bit of a neurotic nymph. Well I developed him over a few days and wanted to see how hard it would be to change guilds. APPARENTLY it is VERY HARD!!! Ayrian turned his back on his faith and was struck down publicly for it... FOREVER. Yes! Permadeath! This sounds bad, but is reversible, though rare. Generally it is reserved for those characters that have backed themselves in a corner through role-play and permadeath is the only way out. Anyways, that's just one of my characters. My other character was a slave in the south. He gained his freedom and was doing tasks to become a Shaman... Sadly he was denied after completing his second or third task. Getting into a guild is no easy feat, your character must convince the guild that they want in.

NWA is free-to-play, but allows you to "donate" money for in-game rewards such as coins or experience. The total amount donated is placed in tiers <copper, bronze, silver, gold, etc> the higher tier you are in, the better the passive awards are.

Overall I give New Worlds Ateraan a 7 out of 10. A great game for the social MUDder.

Find out more at http://www.ateraan.com.

1 comment:

  1. It is an okay game, it has good times and bads from from the staff approving and disapproving stuff at the whim of one of their friends. Do not forget heavy favoritism the staff shows to their friends in the game. Part from that the player base is good and you can pay for perks from the ingame black market.

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