Fallen Earth continues to chug along for me…and yes…I’m still having a great time with the game. Actually, Fallen Earth continues to take up the majority of my playing time. The crafting system is still managing to impress and is incredibly deep. For example…last night I created my first handgun. It was a revolver that involved making three other components: a barrel, an action and a handle. I had to make each of those elements separately and put them together with the revolver recipe. I know what you’re thinking…isn’t this the exact kind of component based crafting system that EQ2 use to have. Yes it is…kinda….except the difference here is that all of the components make sense and are easily understandable. Duuhhh….of course you need a barrel to make a gun 
. I’m expecting these recipes to get more intricate as time moves on and I’m hoping it doesn’t break under it’s own weight further down the line.
Content in Fallen Earth, so far, seems to be solid up to level 10…which is where I am. The quest system is nothing new but it does manage to keep you very busy. There is no shortage of quests up to now and I’m hoping that the game maintains this level of content all the way through. Recall that some games make the mistake of front-ending content, leaving the rest of the game a barren wasteland at the higher levels. No idea if that is the case in Fallen Earth…but I haven’t heard or read anything indicating that FE has fallen into the same trap.
The community of the game continues to be very considerate and “well behaved”. Asshat ratio is quite low. One thing I’ve noted is that there are plenty of players…so it looks like we’ve got a healthy game on our hands.
Last week, the devs managed to send out a “State of the Game” address, and it has some really great stuff in it:
We’re currently testing our first big patch 1.1.0 which includes one of our patented wall of patch notes. For those of you who have been tirelessly helping in New Player Chat, your job is about to get easier! We’re adding an extended training area into each starter town so folks can learn more about basics like crafting, harvesting, buying and using mounts, how to use mail and other essential skills. We also reorganized town events like the Embry Monster Hunt to have a better flow, although you may be too busy fighting off zombies in our Halloween event to notice our many pages of bug fixes and tweaks. Stay tuned for more details on that soon!
Following patch 1.1.0, we will work to resolve issues related to accessing promotional items cross-character on user accounts in addition to a few quick bug fixes. We’re also working on more content in the levels 32–35. You’ll also see upgrades to the updater, significantly cutting down on the “Collating Data” phase and helping with some of our European download rates.
The following patch, 1.2.0, will include an increased focus on group-oriented and social content, such as camps, that we’ve heard players want. Obviously there’s a lot of info to unpack in this patch but you’ll see more on that in the coming weeks and months.
I think it’s safe to give this game a very high recommendation to try out. So, if you haven’t, please do. It’s solid up to level 10 so far and everyone just needs to try out this crafting system.
D out.
Entries (RSS)
October 14th, 2009 at 3:07 pm
:Checks watch: 3 months until you quit?
On a serious note, I’m very curious to start reading about what happens later on in FE, the 40-45 level range and what will ultimately keep people playing without the ‘go plan an alt’ excuse. Maybe just the slow experience of getting to the cap will be the game. Shocking, I know.
October 14th, 2009 at 3:32 pm
The late game sounds like it will be a good time. Though I haven’t gotten enough of it to see the results, there is PvP experience called Death Toll, which is supposed to unlock PvP gear and such. Plus, factional fighting over towns, with quests and merchants only available to the controlling faction.
October 14th, 2009 at 6:56 pm
I have to say I concur with your summary. I have been playing Fallen Earth since a couple of days after launch. Admittedly I almost gave it away in the first couple of sessions…the difference in controls to other MMO’s was the primary issue, however I took a deep breath and decided to push through.
I am very glad I did…once I did some tweaking and got used to the concepts, I am thoroughly enjoying it! It does also seem to have a healthy community, I am Australian based and even at the times I get on there are always plenty of people around (a single server helps with that I guess).
I also have only reached level 10, but I hear good things about the levels up to 30, and they have said they are adding a lot of content to the 30’s which apparently is a bit of a gap at the moment. The crafting is superb, the classless/skill system is refreshing, and the world, lore and graphics are solid.
October 18th, 2009 at 6:56 am
[...] Darren re: Fallen Earth – “I think it’s safe to give this game a very high recommendation to try out.” [...]