Windows

RYL: Path of the Emperor

Risk Your Life: Path of the Emperor is about what gamers expect from a game. The interface is problematic, but the sounds make up for it. You won’t find a lot of dazzling graphics or brilliant innovations in the game, but sometimes gamers just want a game they can pick up and run with. Risk Your Life may be right for you, but if you have a low frustration threshold you might want to look elsewhere. The initial learning curve is steep.

If the worldwide aspect of RYL has you intrigued, check it out. Or, if you like hack-n-slash gameplay with no end in sight, this could well be your game. If you enjoy intriguing quests, however, and more to do than destroy every creature you meet, you might be better advised to hold on to your cash than Risk Your Life.

Obviously, I was less than impressed by this game on the whole. Its redeeming qualities are that it does have a story-driven mission system that seemed like it had a fairly interesting story and the world itself has an interesting history. The graphics are cool and exciting, which fits with the games fast-paced and PvP focused gameplay, which will definitely draw a more instant-gratification style audience.

Ach, wenn ich einmal reich wär’! Es hat schon seinen Grund, dass Ryl mich mit dem Versprechen auf eine Million Dollar ködern muss. Denn spielerisch hat der Titel ein Problem: Er ist überflüssig. World of WarCraft bietet mehr Atmosphäre, Guild Wars bessere PvPKämpfe und Dark Age of Camelot spannendere Belagerungen. Daher fehlen Ryl echte Höhepunkte, gute Ideen wie flotte Kämpfe und Gildenkriege motivieren nur ein paar Wochen lang. Danach landet Ryl in der Ecke. Denn mal ehrlich: Die Million hätte ich doch eh nicht gewonnen.

Risk Your Life: Path of the Emperor offers yet another MMORPG where you steadily level your way through enemies, alone and in groups, and where you participate in player-versus-player battles. Other than a million-dollar tournament, though, it's not really clear what RYL offers that other contemporary massively multiplayer games don't already deliver, and deliver better. If you're the sort of MMO ronin that can't help but wander from game to game hoping for a fresh distraction, the combat system may occupy your glance for a time. But unless you want to participate in monthly installments of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, you're better off skipping this game.

Altogether, what we have is a lackluster MMO that only does average in most cases, and poorly in most others. If you're the type lured in by the promises of free MMO or a million dollars, I say go right ahead. Likewise, if you're an MMORPG lover who's min-maxed every game you've played to death and need another game to pound on until the next Everquest expansion, you should feel right at home with Rise of the Emperor. Everyone else should know that Risk Your Life is at best a copycat game, riding on the coattails of the many other, more polished, far more successful massively multiplayer games out there.

There is very little to do in the game, and it’s the sort of game where I wonder what the developers were thinking when they made it. I mean, why bother making a game that has so little going for it? Even the $1 million tournament that is so prominently advertised on the game’s box got suspended because, apparently, too many people were cheating. The only good thing about RYL is that you can essentially play for free (you just have to take part in surveys from time to time), but I got two free months when I installed the game, and it’s difficult to imagine anyone wanting to play longer than that.

On a lighter note, there are other MMORPG's out there that you can play that are probably more fun. If you are a masochist, you can get this game AND pay twelve dollars a month. Being an avid World of Warcraft player, I can say that my money was much better spent on that. RYL seemed interesting in concept, but the execution is just really bad.

With its guilds, weapon upgrading, and large scale player versus player battles that I haven't gotten the chance to experience yet, RYL seems to have much to offer in terms of high end content. The problem is it's a long, hard road to get there, and sometimes the road less traveled isn't the more interesting one, especially with the number of potholes in the way. With a graphical facelift, less of a leveling grind, and additional early game content, RYL could really be an engaging experience at all levels. As it is now, however, it demands a degree of dedication that few causal players, and certainly no game reviewers, will ever be able to commit to it.

Poor design decisions and the dearth of anything interesting to do becomes more glaring when you add in RYL's frequent crashes and graphics glitches. What it boils down to is that Path of the Emperor offers very little you can't get from other, better games. Try Guild Wars if you want guild-versus-guild content, or Everquest II or World of Warcraft for a quest-driven MMORPG. Unless you're absolutely after that million-dollar prize, RYL is an easy pass.