City of Steam

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City of Steam

Preview

The steampunk MMO you always wanted?

Learning The Ropes


With a party established we then pursued the usual procedure of learning our way around the city with the airships flying overhead and the sun gleaming down upon our frail armour. The first few levels came very easy, we simply talked to a couple of merchants and were rewarded for the task - no peril was involved at all, though some of those merchants do have a sharp tongue. The greatest thing at this early stage of our playing of the game was meeting other people, being amazed at their hefty armour they had gained after just a few hours inside. We later learned that we would never look quite as impressive as some as our Gunner class didn't allow it - sad faces ensued.

Of course, we soon entered daringly into the game's dungeons, the first of which was a sewer, the second a crypt and the third a gang-run town. The level variation was not too bad, nor the enemies, but it didn't quite feel steampunk enough. This became a recurring thing throughout the game. The game uses steam rather than magic, but it's basically the same thing and so is ever so slightly disappointing. The enemies weren't steam-fueled robots as you might imagine, but skeletons, dogs and slugs (amongst many others). Their names were at times of the steampunk legacy, but nothing ever really felt that steampunk apart from the city itself. Some may care, some may not and for all I know this could all be added in later. The feeling of it being a fairly normal RPG never went away in this very early preview build though, so I hope some more visually obvious steampunk elements will come around later.

More Of The Same


With a few hours now behind us, I was able to confidently remark on my satisfaction of the most important part of the game; the gameplay. Taking a little party through the multi-layered dungeons was great fun, especially when being challenged later on and coming out with barely a scratch once we found a good battle formation. Some enemies later on, the larger ones mostly, demanded that certain types of steam magic be used. This was an exciting variation every time this type of new challenge was introduced.

Did the game feel a bit grinding at times? Of course it did, it's an MMO and that is almost inherent to the type. You'll face the same enemies in the same places and go back through the same areas with similar objectives, all in the name of levelling up. Not just that, but you may stumble across some new armour or a better weapon, or maybe you're saving up for that cool looking shield. Which reminds me - in battle there are 3 different stances: shield and weapon, dual weapons or a more powerful double-handed weapon. You'll try them all out before settling just on one of these and relying on your magic for the upperhand, but it's worth noting that there is some option to the battle tactics. For me, I was a gunner with a double musket and simply wore the shield as decoration - I needed something to stand out as my friend and I had accidentally acquired the same armour and were already the same class.

Towards A More Steampunk Future


Initial impressions of City of Steam are good. I don't really have any gripes with the game at this point in the development period aside from the slightly repetitive gameplay, which comes standard for MMO's anyway. It is fun if you are used to this though, and let's be fair, it's playing with your friends that makes the MMO experience so inviting. Luckily, the partying up mechanics are as simple as can be, matching the rest of the user interface.

In future updates I would hope to see more steampunk injected into the game, to really give it a unique sense of character. Just relying on names of things to give off that steampunk vibe isn't quite enough - you want some eccentricity to your steam punk MMO, we've fought skeletons and imps enough already! I can't say anything about the game's story at this point either as it is not been woven into the game yet. Regardless, City of Steam is definitely well on its way to the MMO Hall of Greats and is well deserved too, what with such humble roots.