Darkfall Online

[Hellgawd]

Darkfall Online


Darkfall Online has been sitting in the folds of the internet for a while now, gathering dust... as well as attention. While some think of it as a WoW replacement, others believe it won't ever release. Whatever your angle, you should try your luck at getting entered into the beta.

Main Features

One of the key ideas surrounding Darkfall Online is that all of the lore advancement in the world will be based on what the players do. Considering that players can supposedly shape their world, by building cities and castles or making new factions - it could very well be true, and perhaps entirely based on a community.

Caption: Here is a screenshot, in-game realism, of a player-build city.
Author Speculation: Perhaps players will be able to form 'evil' factions as well, and players can create themselves into something to mimic the WoW 'end-game'?

Vastly Different HUD

One thing that has worried a lot of potential players is the idea that the HUD is so vastly contrasting to that of standard MMORPGs. Namely - World of Warcraft.
However, if you look at it a little more closely, you will notice the key details that Darkfall Online and World of Warcraft have in common. What do you think?

Caption: A glimpse of the Darkfall Online in-game HUD.

MMOwned's Contribution

With the vast promised scale of this game, there should be no end to the magic that MMOwned can conjure up for Darkfall Online. If this game hits the world like it says it will, and takes a huge chunk out of World of Warcraft's playerbase, it could very well have a home here at MMOwned for all of your botting, scamming, exploiting, and perhaps even model editing needs. That, however, would all depend on the popularity of the game. What do you think? Do you think it will overtake WoW, or sit and rot like some of the other competitors?

Gameplay in General

Gameplay has some key MMORPG features that is shared with World of Warcraft. However, they seem to have 'improved' on those basic ideas.

Caption: An example of a Darkfall Online mount.
In Darkfall Online, any beast can be trained to become your mount if you have enough skill. According to game representatives, even the most challenging beasts in the game world can be conquered and tamed - even dragons - with enough skill and practice.

Darkfall Online has a very wide range of races that are playable. Here they are:
The Alfar

Opinion: Undead or Night Elf comparison.

The Dwarves

Opinion: Dwarf comparison.

The Humans

Opinion: Human comparison.

The Mahirim

Opinion: Tauren comparison.

The Mirdain

Opinion: Blood Elf comparison.

The Orks

Opinion: Orc Comparison.

The Release Date
According to Darkfall Online, the fabled release date of DFOL is 'February 29th, 2009'
Are you ready to rumble?!

Here is a great resource for some leaked beta information:
Darkfall leaks

[BREAK=LEAKED VIDEOS]

Here are some leaked gameplay videos - Gastricpenguin

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GnsG-_CJnO0"]YouTube - Darkfall - Spellcasting + Wood chopping[/ame]

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14CrMGhRv1Y"]YouTube - Darkfall Beta - Mirdain Ranged and Melee Combat[/ame]

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQPLs34E81A"]YouTube - Darkfall Beta - Goblin Fight[/ame]

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BLEMMx0gcQ"]YouTube - Darkfall Beta - Mirdain Starting Village (Part 2)[/ame]

[Gripen2]

No gnomes?! >

[Bird Is The Word]

Awesome! I want to try this game actually. Great article.

[Ket]

On paper it sounds like an excellent game. Whether they can pull it off is another. It is mainly a mix between original Ultima Online and Shadowbane which was two of my favorites.

[mihaitza]

This game is, indeed, preety good and promising, but I still think that it will fail. No game will raise higher than WoW, that's my opinion....and if one will, then I hope I'll still be alive to see that happening.

[Dombo]

Let's hope the gameplay is going to be great, will you have to pay per month?

[Piersd]

dont think it will overtake wow, but i think it will be pretty popular

[andr3w_91]

Sorry to say this but you made this article seem that DF is just another WoW clone...

This is not the case.

There is no target lock, has a lot of FPS elements, is entirely skill based, and not level based, and offers a sandbox world, and not a theme-park mmo like WoW/War/AoC , etc


I find this article poorly written, sorry to say this... but you didnt get your facts right...

[~OddBall~]

Yes the only thing these two games have in common are that they are both MMORPG's, however Darkfall will be a TRUE RPG, if they pull it off like they said they would.

[Obama]

my computer prolly can't handle it haha.

[Wilkey]

Boo, it doesn't come out for mac

[Rofled]

I have to try this ^^. Though the "in-game" picture looks kinda sad/boring.

[Exiled1120]

DFOL is 'February 29th, 2009

Wrong, its the 25th of feb

[ViND_]

Lol... for those of you who say that WoW will never be beaten... well it seems you just think that because WoW is the best MMORPG right now, it CANNOT be beaten. Just because WoW has 15 million players, most of them that don't have 18, and most of them that are bored from Blizzard's set recoloring wizard DOES NOT mean that WoW is so awesome... actually WoW is getting REALLY boring... Seriously, even the new tier 7,8,9 sets are recolorings of tier 1,2,3... lol... Darkfall is going to **** WoW, it's going to make WoW die. All of you little brats that think WoW is so good, well it seems you don't know what you are talking about! Let's make a quick comparison, shall we? WoW - Target Selection, weapon speed, kiddy graphics, entirely GEAR-based... Darkfall - NO target selection, fast-paced attacks, awesome graphics (and if you think WoW has better ones then you haven't updated your graphics card so that you can play some of the new games with killer graphics, and see what is been talked about!) AND it's entirely SKILL-based. No, not spells and "HOLY LIGHT!", I'm talking about player skill. No classes, no levels, pure skill. You choose what spells to learn too! If you wanna be a rogue, there's no "Stealth" skill there. No lame stuff like that. Since Darkfall is in first person, which I think is good because I played Mirror's edge and it's totally awesome in first person, you need to sneak up BEHIND your victim and kill it. And then you can take the items. Seriously, if you think that's lame then you surely can't play games. Just go play WoW, it's actually really easy.

[Verye]

Here's some criticism of this article:

You compare the races to WoW races, you compare the HUD to the WoW HUD, and you only talk about if it can replace WoW.

Of course it can't replace WoW. It's a completely different game; it may even be a completely different genre. You didn't even touch upon the fact that the game is entirely based around PvP and world PvP, the fact that there's full looting, the fact that there's no targeting and all melee weapons projectiles (spells, arrows, etc.) have to be aimed with crosshairs...

You gave exactly one sentence explaining the sandbox features of the game. The only descriptive words you gave to it were "players can supposedly shape their world, by building cities and castles or making new factions." There was never a feature announced that had anything similar to "making new factions," and also, to my understanding, castles can't be built, only cities. Your speculation regarding all this, with absolutely nothing to back it up, only serves to misinform the people reading this.

Also, the beta leaks explain that you can't lay out your own cities. Cities are already pre-laid out. So you don't really build your own cities, you just throw money and resources at them until the buildings rise up in the spots the devs placed them to rise.

Source: City Building (Beta leak forum.)

You make the game seem extremely shallow and only touch upon its similarities and differences to WoW. You don't even mention that the company started working on it in 2001, and that people have been anticipating it since 2003.

You didn't seem to research anything for this article. You didn't look at any beta leak sites or forums (there are tons of them). You also don't seem to know that much about the game.

The article has 16 sentences, not counting fragments like "What do you think?" Each sentence is fairly short, too.

I'm very disappointed in this article, I'm afraid. I've been waiting for this game since 2004, and considering MMOwned boasts one of the biggest MMO communities on the web, Darkfall Online deserves more than this cursory mention.