Rift Going Free

[Gimlion]

It would seem that, according to their FB page, Rift will be free to play starting June 12.

http://www.riftgame.com/en/promo/freetoplay.php

Facebook Post

Heard the news and figured some of you may be interested.

[Rhyela]

I always liked Rift, but my PC couldn't handle it at the time. Then, with other games grabbing my attention, both on PC and console, I kinda just forgot about it. But then I got the email that they're going F2P and well.....I just downloaded all the patches and messed around with character creation last night. I think when we're done with SWTOR, my husband and I will hop back over to Rift. A lot's been added since we last played, so it'll be like learning a new game all over again. We'll probably sub it though, that's just our preference.

[Slapperfish]

(deleted)

[Rhyela]

Bahaha, that's awesome!!!

[Rhyela]

So, my husband, brother and I have been playing RIFT again. I really, really love it! I am way more into it now than I was before. I never disliked it to begin with, but I think my expectations of MMOs were a bit different back then. My expectations and desires have changed, so now I'm enjoying a greater variety of MMOs. What helps is that they've added a lot of things to improve the game since I played it. I think that goes for most MMOs, but I digress.

I love the rifts and invasions to give you a break from questing, plus you get some very nice rewards and random drops from them (I got an awesome fiery beetle pet as a random drop!). The crafting is more or less like other MMOs, which for me is a good thing because it's familiar. I love the environments because so far they are rich and colorful. I like that higher-level mobs and even same or lower-level elites are actually a challenge. I even like the RIFT store. It's like any other store, you buy credits with RL money and yadda yadda, but they offer a larger variety of things than I've seen in other games.

For those of you who may not be familiar with the game, the main thing that sets them apart and probably the biggest thing they've advertised is their "soul" system. You start out as one of four base classes - warrior, rogue, mage and cleric - but how you build them is entirely up to you. I'm a rogue, and for example, there is no "ranged spec" or "melee spec". There are souls that focus primarily on one or the other, yes, but you can mix and match however you please. You get a combination of three souls per "role", and you can re-spec at a trainer if you change your mind. It looks like you're not locked into a soul until you put points in it though. Until you put points in a soul, you can switch it out for another one at any time you like.

They do have recommended combinations called "Purposes", which are great for beginners, but you are by no means forced to go with any of them. My rogue is built Bladedancer/Marksman/Assassin right now. My main soul (meaning the one I choose to plunk the most points into right now) is the Bladedancer, which is a melee toe-to-toe rogue, but I also picked Marksman as my second soul so that when I'm at range, I'm not gimped. I fight better in melee range, but I'm not totally screwed if I'm at range.

Before, I had picked a Nightblade as my second soul, which focuses on Death and Fire magic damage (which in itself is awesome - a magic rogue!), with Marksman as my third. But the problem was that when I was out of melee range, I was weak, and I didn't have anything to quickly get into melee range. So, I scrapped the Nightblade, picked up Marksman as my secondary instead of tertiary, and took Assassin as tertiary for poison. It wasn't a "recommended" combination, but it's what I wanted to do, and that's the beauty of it.

Also, each base class's souls are quite varied. They have warrior souls that focus on ranged magic damage, mage souls that focus on melee (like a spell warrior), and rogue souls that focus on tanking or support. Clerics seem kinda neat in that they can do most anything; however, more of their souls are focused on healing than the other base classes. I guess that's the thing to keep in mind: warriors have a couple of magic souls but the larger part is on tanking and physical/melee damage. Mages have souls for melee and healing but most are focused on various types of ranged magic. Rogues have a support and a tanking soul but most are focused on physical ranged or melee damage. Clerics have tanking, magic and melee souls but most are focused on healing. But you're still not herded into any one role or another, the choice is entirely up to you. Woot! I think my two favorite classes right now are the rogue and mage. I had a really hard time deciding between the two.

I LOVE the new "dimensions" thing they added though, I think it's my favorite addition yet. A dimension is basically an instance that you own. There are keys you can buy (and you also get one as a quest reward in the beginning) for different dimensions. Simply put, it's a home that you can decorate as you see fit. They are quite varied in how they look (they have jungles, deserts, plazas, necropolises, etc.), and some are more expensive than others.

You can buy different things to put in them, of course. Dimensions have different limits on the amount of items you can put inside. The starter dimension you get from a quest at low level can only hold 50 items, and it can be upgraded with "credits" (RL money) and I think even in-game money to a maximum of a couple hundred items. But other dimensions can start out holding almost 200 items, and can be upgraded to probably like 400 or 500. The more expensive the dimension, the more it can hold.

The items you can put inside are obvious things like furniture, but also landscaping items (plants, trees, rocks, etc.), lighting, and even building/construction items like tiles, bricks, walls, doors, windows, etc.. I haven't played with those yet, but I'm assuming you can actually build your own house. That would make sense, since two or three of the dimensions are just land with no building already inside. There are plenty of "flavor" or decorative things like idols, totems, rugs.....for example, I bought a beehive because I thought it was neat. Anyway, decorating and building in a dimension can be VERY addicting. I've already spent hours messing around with my piddly little starter dimension. Oh, and the items can be rotated, scaled, etc. So far, most of them you can't interact with (like sitting in a chair or laying in a bed), but they're still a neat thing because you can make your own home within the game.

You can also allow friends and even strangers to come inside if you want (or not allow anyone besides yourself if that is your wish). They have permissions you can set up too, to even let people move things around in your dimension.

But to give you an idea of how creative you can be, I went in some random person's dimension (whose dimension had received the highest rating so far) to see why they were ranked so high. They had a spaceship set up kind of like a museum inside (I haven't even SEEN some of that stuff in the store - must have cost a fortune!), and then outside the ship there were ramps going up and up and up into the sky. It was a long climb. At the very top, they had a platform with a hole in the center. I looked down, and it was a slide with tons of twists and turns! So, I hopped into the slide (more like several chutes), and took it all the way down to the bottom. It was pretty awesome! So yeah, tons of creative freedom with dimensions.

Anyway, overall I am totally into this game. It's a truly free-to-play game. Unlike SWTOR, there are no restrictions for non-subscribers (or "Patrons", as subscribers are called). Everyone has the same access to everything. However, subscribing does have its benefits. You get Patron buffs (optional, which I love because I don't like out-leveling zones) for more experience, more notoriety (rep), more money, a banker, etc. You also get priority status if there's a queue on your server. With the massive influx of people since going F2P, that priority queue has really come in handy, lol. Instead of having to wait for who knows how long, I've been bumped up so I only had to wait a few seconds. VERY nice.

I suppose my only complaint is that the races aren't very varied, and aside from hair and markings/makeup, people's characters tend to look a bit alike. I do think my high elf stands apart from what most people make, but that's because I didn't go with colorful hair and flowers and "pretty" makeup. My character is a bit darker in appearance, so she is different from other elves I've seen. But if that's my only complaint so far, that's saying a lot for the game, I think.

It's free to download and free to play, so I highly recommend it to anyone looking for a break from something else, or anyone who's wanting to play something new. It's a very good quality game and it costs you nothing, so what are you waiting for? Go forth and be Ascended! ^.^

[Vephriel]

Yay!

Now I can finally use that Spider Hat voucher ticket I've had sitting in my TF2 backpack all these years.

For those of you unaware, it's this fine piece of freakish headgear:

I would wear this every day.

[Myrrmi]

So... with lack of new content in wow and having some time off I've decided to give it a try

What server are you playing on, if you're still playing, so I have some familiar faces to join if I decide I want to stay for a while longer?