Recently I saw "Western Storm" being discussed in the selfie dating section. As an old reviewer who has been involved in MMOs all year round, I came to join in the fun. To be honest, I really paid attention to this game for a while when it first came out. After all, the brand name "Yiyi Chunqiu" still has some weight in the era of domestic PC games, but the mobile version... emmm, how to put it, it was popular, but it cooled down faster, which even made me feel that it was not unjustly cool.
Let's talk about the graphics first. Just looking at the promotional pictures, it is indeed a Western-style desert, ancient city, and camel caravan, and the atmosphere is full. But after actually entering the game, you will find that the precision of character modeling is probably at the level of web games in 2016, and the skill special effects are very "cool", with light pollution all over the screen, which makes your eyes suffer after watching it for a long time😅. But I'm not a graphic person, so I can tolerate this. After all, the core of MMO is gameplay.
In terms of gameplay, it is actually very "greedy". The three professions of sword, shield, bow and arrow, and knife, and the three types of qigong of ice, fire, and thunder, can be freely matched. It sounds like the freedom is MAX, right? However, the actual experience is: you can indeed select skills at will, but the numerical balance is sparse. In the later stage, you can basically only select skills according to the mainstream Build, and you are free and lonely😑. The most gimmicky three-party confrontation setting of "businessmen, bodyguards, and righteous men" could have created a deep PVP ecology, but the gameplay depth was not enough. In the end, it turned into a brainless camp fighting each other, and running business was reduced to a daily task. The "caravan game" flavor was completely lost.
Let's talk about krypton gold. Although it is marked as free, there are more things in the mall than there is sand in the desert. Equipment strengthening, gem inlaying, mount upgrading... everything costs money. And if you want to play comfortably, a monthly card plus a first recharge is almost necessary. What's even more outrageous is that the BOSS in the wild map will be defeated by kryptonians in seconds, and civilian players will not even have a chance to touch it. This confrontation has directly turned into a "money-power confrontation"💰. It's no wonder that the retention rate plummeted in the later period. Who wants to experience the game of being a kryptonian?
The social aspect is pretty good, the gang, sworn, and marriage systems are complete, and the chat channel is quite lively - but unfortunately it's all just as lively as the beginning. Because the game content is consumed so quickly, almost a month after the server was launched, all that is left in daily life is to hang up and grind monsters and stand in a daze on the street. No matter how rich the social network is, it can't save the embarrassment of having nothing to do. I saw with my own eyes that several gangs chatting enthusiastically turned into a zombie group of "checking in and clocking in" within a few days, which was quite sad.
Finally, let's summarize why it failed: there was insufficient innovation in the core gameplay, the numerical guidance was too much, the free development was not worthy of the name, and the camp confrontation was superficial. It wanted to capture the appetite of all players, but as a result, the chef's skills could not keep up, and the dishes served looked fancy, tasted bland, and were extremely expensive. In addition, there are many more mature MMO competing products in the same period, and players naturally vote with their feet.
Give "Western Storm" a score:
Picture: 6/10 (stacked special effects, rough details)
Gameplay: 5/10 (freedom is a gimmick, balance is a flaw)
Krypton gold: 3/10 (It's hard to play without krypton, and it's hard to play with krypton)
Social: 6/10 (The system is complete, but it can't retain people)
Overall rating: 5.5/10. Emotional players can give it a try. Others recommend saving time and wallet. I hope that the next work of Youyi Chunqiu can really incorporate "freedom" into the bones, instead of just writing it in the promotional copy. 📝