Echo of Soul vol. 2

More EOS!

By now I've gotten more accustomed to the game, Echo of Soul. I'm now a level 38 archer (last time lvl 17 ;-) ) and I'm starting to enjoy the game more and more. Here are some of my thoughts about the game so far.

 Some of the prettiest places in the game so far.

I've been leveling up pretty fast and one of the reasons is PvP battles. First I wasn't too sure if I'd even like PvP but after playing a few battles I'm absolutely hooked. I don't have any screenshots of my own but an explanation should be enough. The battle ground where the 30 players fight against one another in teams is selected in random. I don't know if there are other versions but so far I've played in two different battle grounds, where the maps are a bit different. In the first area the map is circular with 5 pillars surrounding it. Your goal is to activate these pillars and of course, kill as many enemies as possible. The other battle area is more oval-like, with five different paths crossing it. Every path has a crystal where you can collect resources. Again, try to collect as many resources for your team as possible. While in the first area the pillars are there the whole time, but the crystals in the second area disappear once someone has obtained them. Whichever team wins will get better prices but so far I've been plenty happy while losing as well - I get a ton of experience points compared to random quests in the main game. (Around 10,000 exp from a quest, ~60,000 from a PvP battle)

 I've also found a guild! Or actually I think they found me and invited me to join, so I did. Once I joined, the guild was probably pretty new and they had a peaceful status. The next day I logged in they were already hostile! I did some reading and it seems that guilds can fight each other, so that's where the hostility comes from. Only today I understood what it meant in practice. I came to an area and I wanted to purify souls with an other player. (You collect so called chaos souls from monsters and purify them into different buffs. Purifying them with friends is more effective (takes only one soul per buff) than by yourself (takes two). So I went next to this other player, about to request purification with them, when my character attacked them! I was so shocked that I could barely do anything next so obviously I was killed by this other person. What I realized is that the character was probably from a rival/hostile guild and I automatically attacked them when attacking. I've played for over 30 hours now but I felt like an absolute noob when I didn't know about the fact that other players in RED are also your enemies. Stupid me.

 I had to take this screenshot because I was cracking up so badly while fighting this miniboss! (Juha is also my father's name)

 I still haven't used any real world money in the game but every once in a while I'm tempted. But what I do like about the game is that you get these magic eggs from here and there, and you may use them to get certain credit items. So far I've used them all to purchase magic lamps. Magic lamps give you a variety of items which are supposedly of higher value. Also, every lamp (I think?) gives you this little silver coin. When I received the first one I noticed that the coin had a description talking about summoning a ghost tiger. I thought instantly: "HELL YEAH!!! Lucky me!". It wasn't that simple since summoning this godly mount requires 2,500 coins of the same type. And I know no other way of getting them than purchasing magic lamps. One lamp costs 86 magic eggs, in other words you need *takes out calculator* 215,000 eggs in order to get this fuc**** tiger. The most I've had is around 300 at a time. If magic lamps are the only way to get this tiger, I'm out!

 This is my character visiting the first town after some time and look, I have a party member! One of my friends was kind enough to try the game so that I'd have someone to play with. Unfortunately it wasn't to his liking so I'll be going solo for now. I wish the community was more open and my apologies if it is and I just haven't noticed it but, there isn't much integrity within the players I think. I don't know about the guilds, but the one I'm playing in isn't putting much effort in playing together. I do have one experience which required me to play together with someone and hey, it made me feel all fuzzy inside. This level 14 character wanted to go against this level 15 co-op quest bear and my level 19 character was just randomly passing by. This person kindly asked me to help and I did. Once the bear was dead they thanked me and we parted ways but it made me soooo happy! This is what the game should be like. I still have co-op quests I haven't done because there haven't been anyone helping me (even though I've asked!). Players unite, now!

 I'm really looking forward to leveling up to 40. In the screenshot you can see my pet Anto who kindly collects all my loot. To be honest I couldn't live without him anymore. He will unfortunately expire in 3 days (I've used an hourglass to lengthen his lifespan). So I think, if I'm correct, I'll receive a new pet on level 40!  It's too bad that otherwise you need to use store credits to buy new pets but I hope that you'll get them by random every once in a while. I'm a bit sad to go separate ways with Anto, though. He is such a sweet heart.

  There are also different events in the game every now and then. I took this screenshot today before logging out. There was a fashion competition in the main town. Even though I didn't participate I kept getting these event gifts like they were raining on me! So, that bunch right there is gathered around a mailbox, opening their gifts (I think). It's fun because when I was playing Dragon Nest every main town was filled with people like that! I'm afraid the game is dying out slowly since all the servers are uncrowded all the time and that is actually the most people I've seen in one place during this week.

Today will be my 7th day of logging in and it'll also be my 7th day playing this game. 38 levels, 32 hours and 7 days. I think I'll receive a new mount tomorrow! A horse, which is must faster than my current llama (even though I received a new riding permit on level 35, which makes my llama faster.)

All in all I'm really enjoying this game! I keep looking forward to meeting new people, leveling up and discovering new things about the game. It's not the best MMORPG, but the best I'm currently playing. I was looking forward to the Tree of Savior which will probably be out on the 10th, but I think I'm too busy playing EOS that I'll skip it. Thanks for reading and if you're at all interested in trying out the game, I'm here to help the best I can. I'd love to get new friends to play with!

Echo of Soul

Hello!

I can't say I'm a huge fan of MMORPGS but I have played quite a few of them. My first experience of Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (what a word monster!) was back in middle school when I stumbled upon the world of Maple Story. What most MMORPGS I've played hold in common is that they're either cute or visually beautiful. I think the next game falls under both categories.

 I only have a single screenshot of my own to show here. Mainly because I was stumbling with the keyboard and accidentally took one... 

Anyways Echo of Soul is a relatively new game published by Aeria Games. It was out in 2013 but on Steam it has only been up for about a year.

 I didn't know much about the play mechanics of EOS before I started playing. The main reason I picked this game was 1) It looked nice and 2) it was available on Steam. The reason why I prefer downloading online games through Steam is that I'm not required to create separate credentials for every single game that I play. There are of course exceptions, such as Dragon Nest.

EOS looks fantastic in my opinion. I had lots of fun creating my character - the character creation isn't as developed as in Skyforge for instance, but it was still so diverse that I had a hard time picking my char's hair, face and tattoos. If you're a fan of pixelated beauty like I am, you would soon notice having small crushes on your fellow players' characters. They are just that good looking.

 The game has six different classes to choose from. The class I picked, archer (like usual...) is quite balanced and easy to play with. That is, if you choose to become a huntress, instead of a bard. The bard gameplay is apparently much harder than playing a huntress. I chose huntress since I will probably be playing most of my playtime solo, while bards are ideal for party-playing. The other classes are warrior, rogue, guardian, sorceress and finally warlock, which is the most difficult class to play. My level 17 archer looks pretty bad ass I think, despite her mismatched armor. Speaking of which, that top does NOT look like it could provide +8 defense. The equivalent would be me, running in a forest with my bow only wearing undies. But yeah, that's how it works in a fantasy world.

 The distances to travel are quite long in EOS so I was extremely happy that you receive a free mount after finishing the first two main quests. In other words you receive an insanely adorable llama that grants you +33% movement. How awesome is that? I've seen pictures of other available mounts in the game that are quite incredible as well - giant dogs, dragons, tigers etc. What you also receive in the beginning of the game is a little companion to pick up your loot. Mine is a small anteater called 'Anto'. It's only valid for 7 days but I believe you'll get other pets further in the game.

What I hate about all MMORPG's is microtransactions. In other words you pay real money in exchange for ingame credits. I was happy to go back in to one of the first towns, once I hit level 10, to notice I had a new quest available - and my level reached the requirements, hooray! But, this 'Monica' bastard who gave me the quest wants me to get her a magic lamp repair kit that is only available in the credit store. What? How is that fair? You give me a free game and one of the quests tells me to use real money anyways. I admit having used $5 in an online game called 'Gems of War' recently, but I will not pay to get a freaking repair kit for some Monica. Go get it yourself or turn yourself into one!

 Once you level up enough your class can pick a further class to specialize in. On top of that there are professions and hobbies to choose from. You can specialize in jewelcrafting, alchemy and resource collecting. I picked the latter one but it bugs me that I keep getting resources, but have no means of using them. The resources are used by jewel crafters and alchemists, but us resource collectors have nothing else but to sell them? Kinda sad. There are also two hobbies - soul experting and cooking. A soul expert sounded somewhat lame so I decided to go for cooking. It's pretty fun actually! The only problem is that so far I haven't picked a single resource from an enemy that could be used in cooking. So to increase my cooking level, I have to buy the ingredients from a chef. There seems to be a bit of polishing around to do before the game is perfect, but I don't let the minor details bother me.

I play solo since none of my Steam friends are playing the game. I did ask for play buddies in the discussion section so let's see how that turns out... Anyways, what saddens me is that there are quite a few party-only quests, meaning that if it's a level 10 quest, I can probably do it solo when I'm level 20. And by that time the experience points and loot I get from that quest are close to nothing. So if you start playing EOS, consider having friends to play it with!

I don't know if it was the wisest thing to do but I quit the 'Newbie'-guild immediately when I started playing. Through the guild I may have found friends to play with but, oh well... The difference between EOS and other MMORPGs I've played is that you may enter a guild only through invitation, which sucks. I've seen some German shout outs about guilds but how the heck am I going to find the perfect guild unless they advertise themselves? For instance in Dragon Nest I found a guild for Finnish people just by looking it up, and I got right in. In EOS it's a bit more difficult than that.

Anyways, I have forgotten to eat since I've only been gaming. The plan for Friday night: Eat, and then play. Thanks for reading and I'll return to you with a new game soon in the future!