Trion was gracious enough to grant me access to the alpha test phase of ArcheAge. I’ve had access for two days now and put in somewhere around 5 hours of play.  I’m still -very- early in the game and haven’t even gained access to most of the features I’d like to try the most (ships, housing).

I want to start sharing my impressions, though, because there’s going to be a lot to say about ArcheAge.  Let’s discuss the first few hours of play.

Visuals, Presentation, et al.

ArcheAge is quite beautiful.  You can glean that from watching most videos.  The engine runs well on my computer at maxed out settings with only the slightest hint of slowdown around what I think could be a shadow issue.  From a complete technical novice like myself, the game ‘feels’ well put together and as the end-user I have no technical complaints yet.

Some of the game is still in a language I do not understand — Korean?  Other than language, ArcheAge feels Eastern to me.  Character models all look feminine and ‘pretty’.  Back to how the game ‘feels’, I can ‘feel’ the Eastern influence in the controls and the gameplay.  Playing MMOs for almost 20 years gives one that sense to pick up on these things.  Keep in mind that’s not yet a negative thing by itself. (more…)