Ten Ton Hammer - Taking MMO Gamers to the Next Level!

In my first impressions of YNK's Rohan: Blood Feud, I told Ten Ton Hammer readers that Rohan sports quality graphics, great music and some unique features. I've had Rohan in my Top Ten Free-to-Play Games pretty much since I was in the beta back in June 2008. As my character's levels started to climb, my relationship with Rohan has turned into something more like David and Maddie from Moonlighting: there's a genuine spark, but maybe we're simply not right for each other.

Once Upon a Time...
The early levels (say, until 25 or so) feature a world rife with more political intrigue than the British royal family, interesting quests, and a solid tutorial. The beginning exopsition does a good job of fleshing out the differences between the races, and it helps the player get a sense of the scope of the events happening all around the starting area. Then rocks fall, and the plot dies. Ok, not quite so tragically, but the story does taper off as players are funneled toward PvP and Township battles (think of the RvR maps in Warhammer Online).

Rohan's tutorial does an outstanding job of briefly revealing all of the depth to the game much along the lines of the "onion principle." The tutorial lets you know at once that Rohan is deeper than most F2P offerings, but it doesn't overwhelm you by trying to teach you every intricate detail at once. It's just the right touch to make you want to keep playing and test out each the gameplay systems thoroughly.

Opening quests vary from the normal kill and fetch quests to early dungeons. The variety and pacing seems just about right to keep players from getting bored. The dialog is translated well, so you won't need to wear your All Your Base t-shirt to get in the mood to play the game.

Feed Me, Seymour!
Just as Audrey II, the man-eating plant in Little Shop of Horrors, had an insatiable desire for fresh blood, Rohan will eat your memory. That is not to say the game is unstable or even that it performs poorly. The game pushes high-quality graphics and numerous lighting effects, and it will gladly use everything your graphics card can give, and it'll borrow your RAM, too. If you have only the 512MB RAM specified as the minimum requirement, you'll be disappointed. Have at least 2GB and it will perform like a race car most of the time.

You Sure Got a Pretty Mouth
The graphics in Rohan are one of its strongest traits. Landscapes look very nice, especially when viewed from a distance. Up closer, some of the textures look rushed, and a few polygons need some smoothing. The worst part of the robust graphics may be the sparse vegetation. The UI is clean and simple, and the mini-map is useful. In general, Rohan just copies the standard layout since it works well enough. Character models seem accurately proportioned, and the move better than the marionettes we often find in other games. Put simply, if you were looking to score at a bar, you'd definitely chat up Rohan and leave other F2P games to your win man.

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