Thursday, July 25, 2013

FairyLand 2 Online (Part Four)

Pets
Pets are an indispensable part of fighting in FairyLand 2 Online. By simply knowing what sort of pet to capture and how to use them, it will make your fights that much easier even when against a bucketload of enemies. As such, I will do my best to convey to you as much of what I know about them as possible.

Capturing a Pet
FairyLand 2 Online - Seal StoneFairyLand 2 Online - Capturing a Pet
With regards to the capturing of a pet, it is a pretty simple mechanism actually. The fundamental logic is to essentially weaken the target monster first and then use a "Seal Stone" to capture it. The higher your level is compared to the target monster's, the less HP it has left and the usage of a higher level seal stone will all contribute to increasing the rate of success in capturing the monster (from what I can deduce).

And while it may not be necessary to explain the capturing process (which is just select seal stone to use and click on target monster), I do wish to go on a little further regarding the seal stones.

Seal StoneCostInfo
Level 1200 Starring
(In-game money)
Can be obtained from Grocery Store Aunty.
Usable on level 40 and below monsters.
Usable on some baby monsters.
Level 2100 Coins
(Rarer form of In-game money)
Can be obtained from Coins Merchant.
Usable on level 60 and below monsters.
Usable on some baby monsters
(wider range than level 1 seal stone).
Level 32000 Coins
(Rarer form of In-game money)
Can be obtained from Coins Merchant.
Usable on level 80 and below monsters.
Usable on some baby monsters
(wider range than level 2 seal stone).
Level 4396 Fairy Points
(Item Mall Currency)
Can be obtained from Item Mall.
Usable on monsters of all levels.
Usable on all baby monsters.

Apart from this (which are all visible in the seal stones' descriptions), I have also come across some information that states that the level of seal stone used to capture a monster would have a vital effect upon its stats (growth rate) as a pet. But since I have yet to see any conclusive evidence that affirms to this info, you might have to take it with a pinch of salt.

Anyway, so long as you use the right seal stones upon the appropriate level of monsters, the seal stone wouldn't be "wasted" (in a sense) and thus whether this information is valid or not wouldn't matter much.

Finally, do not be afraid to use the seal stones as they will only be consumed upon a successful capture. In fact, I would pretty much encourage you to just go ahead and try to capture any and all monsters that catches your eye (though you must realize that there may be some monsters out there which are simply not programmed to be capturable).
FairyLand 2 Online - Rare Song Chicken Statue
Once successful, the captured monster will be found in the form of a pet statue in your inventory. All you have to do then is to right click to unseal it and make it your pet.

Pet Element
FairyLand 2 Online - Sesame MouseFairyLand 2 Online - Potato Rat
In FairyLand 2, each monster found in the game has to be associated with a certain element. And as far as this goes, the element that the monster is associated with is largely dependent upon its "Variety" rather than its "Specie". For instance, a "Sesame Mouse" is of the "Dark" element while a "Potato Rat" is of the "Earth" element but both of them are of the "Mouse" specie.

Anyway, according to what I've learnt, there are a total of eight types of element in the game.
FairyLand 2 Online - Gold Element Icon
Gold
Monsters of this element
- are weak against Fire (Attacks or Monsters).
- have high Agility (Dex).
FairyLand 2 Online - Wood Element Icon
Wood
Monsters of this element
- are weak against Gold (Attacks or Monsters).
- have high Constitution (Con).
FairyLand 2 Online - Water Element Icon
Water
Monsters of this element
- are weak against Earth (Attacks or Monsters).
- have high Wisdom (Int).
FairyLand 2 Online - Fire Element Icon
Fire
Monsters of this element
- are weak against Water (Attacks or Monsters).
- have high Strength (Str).
FairyLand 2 Online - Earth Element Icon
Earth
Monsters of this element
- are weak against Wood (Attacks or Monsters).
- have high Spirit (Spi).
FairyLand 2 Online - Light Element Icon
Light
Monsters of this element
- are weak against Dark (Attacks or Monsters).
- have balanced stats.
FairyLand 2 Online - Dark Element Icon
Dark
Monsters of this element
- are weak against Light (Attacks or Monsters).
- have balanced stats.
FairyLand 2 Online - Neutral Element Icon
Neutral
Monsters of this element
- have no elemental weakness.
- have balanced stats (but are much higher compared to other monsters).
Pet Stats
The screenshot below shows the stats of a typical pet that you may have obtained or caught during your journey in the game.
FairyLand 2 Online - Pet Stats
If you take a look at the "Pet Status" window, you should see a couple of interesting figures. Basically, these numbers represent how fast the stats of the pet would grow when leveled.

For example, with a growth value of 2.0 for its "Str", "Con", "Int", "Spi" and "Dex", the corresponding stats of this bunny actually increases by a value of 2 points per increase in level so by the time this bunny reaches level 11, it will have 30 Str, 29 Con, 29 Int, 29 Spi and 29 Dex.

As for the "Max HP" and "Max MP" growth rates, these are calculated with a slight discrepancy. With the same values of 2.0, the bunny actually gets a Max HP increase of 10 points per level while its Max MP only increases by 2 points per level. So this roughly translates to a ratio of 5 : 1 (Max HP vs Growth Rate) and 1 : 1 (Max MP vs Growth Rate).

While nice to know, I would need to once again state that the growth rates of a pet is random (though it is known to be within the range of 1 - 8). There is no way of knowing what sort of values it would have unless and until you capture it. However, what is certain is that each variety of monster should have a fixed range of growth rates (to generate from) for each of its specific stats. Furthermore, this range would most likely be modified by the element of the monster as well as the level of seal stone used in capturing it.

Pet Skills
Now just like how the growth rates and stats of a pet may differ, the same logic is actually applied to the skills that they come with as well.
FairyLand 2 Online - Violence Rabbit Statue 1FairyLand 2 Online - Violence Rabbit Statue 2
If you grab a bunch of level 1 seal stones, head out into the fields and capture 5 to 10 monsters of the same specie and variety, I am certain that you will find that some of the ones you have caught would have only one skill while some would have two. If you increase the numbers to 20 or more, then no doubt you will start to find some having as many as three skills (if your lucky).

But as far as these skills are concerned, the first skill would have to be a "default" skill that is known by any and all monsters of the same specie and variety. Only subsequent skills that the captured pet may know will be different. But even then, these skills do appear to be pulled (at random) from a "collective common pool" and thus you may find different species and varieties of pets (that you've caught) having the same subsequent skills.
FairyLand 2 Online - Book of Laser Beam
Anyway, that was just a simple example to show you the randomness in the skills of a pet that you catch but isn't of too much importance because any pets that you find lacking in skills may simply be supplemented by pet skill books (which can be obtained from monster loots, via pet exploration missions or simply purchased from the Item Mall for the rarer ones).


Previous: FairyLand 2 Online (Part Three)Next: FairyLand 2 Online (Part Five)

Thursday, July 18, 2013

FairyLand 2 Online (Part Three)

Skills
FairyLand 2 Online - Starting Mage Skills
Unlike the usual skilling system found in other games (which only gives out a fixed amount per level up), the one we have here in FairyLand 2 appears to be based upon gaining of skill experience points. And as far as they are concerned, these skill EXP can easily be acquired by fighting the monsters that you encounter during your journey into the fairy tales.

Upon getting enough skill EXP to fill up the blue bar (as shown in the screenshot), you will gain 1 skill point for use in leveling up your skills. However, this does not mean that you will have unlimited skill points to "max" all of your character's skills.

This is because there appears to be a skill point cap of about 100 points if I'm not wrong. Furthermore, you would also need to note that it becomes increasingly harder and harder to gain your next skill point as the amount of skill EXP needed scales.
FairyLand 2 Online - Job Advancement
Anyway, you will initially start out with just a couple of skills when your character is at level 1. Only upon completing the level 20 job advancement quest and choosing your next occupation (out of three choices) will you get more skills unlocked.

And once you do, all of the skills that your character has access to will essentially be divided into the two tabs as shown, "Basic" and "Advanced".
FairyLand 2 Online - Basic SkillsFairyLand 2 Online - Advance Skills
From what I can roughly tell, there appears to be some sort of hierarchy going on for the skills. They are first divided into two distinct paths (as represented by the differently-designed icons), which in my case is "God of Destruction" (golden) and "Death, Curse or Voodoo" (purple) according to the game's naming sense.

Next, all of the skills are arranged in such a way that skills found lower in the arrangement are higher-tiered and would require a minimum amount of skill points invested into those above it before they are unlocked (and those in the same row would have the same minimum requirements).

Finally, if there is an arrow pointing downwards from Skill "A" to Skill "B", then this would mean that Skill "A" is a prerequisite of Skill "B". You would need to rank Skill "A" up to a certain level before Skill "B" will be unlocked.

And in case you were wondering about the reason for having the skills divided into two tabs...well basically, as all of the skills found in the "Basic" tab will have to be maxed before you can proceed to touching the ones in the "Advanced" tab, therefore to me, these skills kind of acts like a teaser that allows you to peek into the two paths open before your character.

From then onwards, you will need to decide upon how you wish to allocate your remaining skill points...whether to focus on one path or the other or to know a bit of both. But even then, you will need to realize that it may be impossible to fully max out any one of the paths.


Combat
The combat approach adopted in FairyLand 2 Online appears to be some kind of semi-active encounter system whereby areas found in the world of a fairy tale is first divided into "safe" and "hot" zones.

While being in a "safe" zone, the encounter system is dormant and the player need not worry about getting into a battle when running around. However, once the player steps into the "hot" zones, things change and you will start to encounter fights randomly when moving about.
FairyLand 2 Online - Monster FieldFairyLand 2 Online - Turn-based Combat
Though invisible to the naked eye, the best tell-tale sign that your in a "hot" zone is when you start to see monsters roaming in the field. And naturally, you may also initiate a battle voluntarily by approaching close to those monsters and right-clicking on them.

Anyway, upon initiating a fight, your character will enter into the turn-based combat screen as shown in the second screenshot. And like all turn-based combat, all enemies to kill are found on one side while all your allies (pets and party members) are found on the other. However, it is sad to say that the turn-based system found here is a very simple one wherein at the start of a battle, the system would randomly decide which of the sides would have the first strike (though more often than not, it is the player that gets it).

Once chosen, all of the members on that side have to complete their moves first before the other side gets their turn and so on and so forth. So with this kind of system, there is no such thing as a slower opponent getting less moves or a quicker opponent getting more turns. (Neither are there any stats that affect how quick you can attack.)

As for the controls, they are more or less just the usual. A left click on an enemy would signal your currently active character or pet to perform a normal melee attack. Pressing a hotkeyed skill or item before selecting a target would cause it to use the skill or item on the target (note that heals and buffs cannot be used on enemies nor can attacks be used on allies) while not assigning any action before the timer runs out (see top right of screenshot) would result in default melee attacks.

Other than that, you may also use the action bar on the right side of your combat screen to access commands, skills or items that are otherwise not found or hotkeyed, like for example, defending yourself, fleeing from the battle or using a capsule to capture a pet.
FairyLand 2 Online - Battle Positions
While all of what I've just mentioned may be intuitive to a veteran gamer, there is still one more thing that I wish to bring up (that might not be too obvious) and that is, battle positions.

This battle position window can be brought up by clicking on the squiggly arrow (blue) found on the side of your mini-map. And apparently, its function is to allow you to adjust the position of your character and pet in a battle formation. Just click on the portrait and then the spot which you wish to place it in.

Now basically, there are only three spots in which you or your pet can take up. (And just in case you were wondering...no they cannot both occupy the same spot.)
  • Front (+10% Atk, -10% Def)
    This position is usually more suitable for an attack/tank type character or pet. Needless to say, an attack type can leverage on the additional attack bonus while a tank type can withstand the defense penalty while improving its own attacking power.
  • Middle (No Bonus or Penalty)
    This position, in my opinion, is more versatile. It is suitable for almost any type of character or pet so long as it has a decent HP and is comfortable in taking damage.
  • Back (-10% Atk, +10% Def)
    This position is more or less ideal for a support type character or pet since they often have less HP. While benefiting from the bonus defense, it is important to note that they also incur a penalty when attacking so don't count on them to dish out damage. And as far as damage is concerned, it does appear to me that physical and spell-based attacks are affected by this penalty. However, I am not sure if assist-based attacks, heals and buffs are affected by this as well (but would be safe to assume that they are...at least for the attacking part).
FairyLand 2 Online - Nurse
And finally, before I forget, you would need to note that in this game, there is no such thing as regeneration while being outside of a combat so you would need to rely upon HP and MP potions (food) to replenish yourself and your pet or visit a nurse to heal up.
Previous: FairyLand 2 Online (Part Two)Next: FairyLand 2 Online (Part Four)

Wednesday, July 10, 2013

FairyLand 2 Online (Part Two)

Character Creation
From what I can tell, character creation in FairyLand 2 Online appears to be going for the cute-ish appeal. And while the customization options are few so as to speak, the selections for each of them are plenty and thus can offer quite a wide variety of looks by merely mixing the various hairstyles, hair colors, face and skin colors.

However one look at the screenshots and I'm pretty sure you would have realized that the two more important tasks to do at this stage would be choosing your character's race and occupation, so let us go into a little more detail on just these two then...
FairyLand 2 Online - Character Creation PriestFairyLand 2 Online - Character Creation Mage
Up until this point in time, there are a total of three occupations (jobs) and three races that you can choose for your character. And although you are free to match your job with whichever race that you prefer, there is still something that you ought to know about them.

First of all, regarding the three occupations (Mage, Priest, Warrior), a Mage needs to have high Intelligence in order for its magic to hurt, a Priest is recommended to have high Spirit while a Warrior would want to have a high Strength stat.

And because of this stat requirement (or rather bias), the race that you ought to pick for a particular occupation is thereby "restricted" (in a sense) due to their differences in starting attributes and also possibly the rate at which those attributes would grow (base part).

For example, if you take a look at the two previous screenshots and compared their starting stats, you would ought to notice that being an Elf would give you a higher starting Intelligence while a Human would give you a higher starting Spirit.

So if you wish to be a Mage, then your better off being an Elf rather than a Human. Conversely, if you wish to be a Human, it would be much better if you make your profession a Priest. (Oh and in case you were wondering about the Warrior? Well...they can choose to be a Dwarf, which have high starting Strength.)

Stats
The below screenshot shows my character's stats window in FairyLand 2 Online (which can be accessed by pressing "C").
FairyLand 2 Online - Character Stats Window
Basically upon inspection, you should note that there are two types of stats visible in this stats window.
  • Primary Stats
    These are the main stats from which all others are dependent upon. And as far as I can tell, there are seven of them, namely HP, MP, Strength, Constitution, Intelligence, Spirit and Dexterity.

    The source of their increase generally comes from two places, a base part that you receive automatically upon leveling up and a free part that comes in the form of bonus points which you can freely allocate (also received upon gaining a level).

    Other than that, these attributes may also be increased when you equip items that provide such a bonus.
  • Secondary Stats
    These stats are essentially derived or calculated from the primary stats. However, they can also be affected/improved by other means such as from equipments or pets. (Do note that while some of them can be seen on the character's stats window, others cannot be seen but are nonetheless still known to exist via inference. For example, "Hit Rate" and "Evade", both of which are unknown to us but can be found on the weapons, armors, rings and necklaces that you equip.)

    Anyway, one peculiar thing to note is that in FairyLand 2, there exists three forms of attacks at the very least (if I'm not wrong). And apparently, each of these three forms seem to have their own "attack power", "defense", "hit rate" and "evade" secondary stats.
    PhysicalSpellAssist
    FairyLand 2 Online - Physical Secondary StatsFairyLand 2 Online - Spell Secondary StatsFairyLand 2 Online - Assist Secondary Stats
    The first form of attack is what you would normally call "Physical" attacks. This form of attack is primarily done by Warriors but would most probably also include melee attacks performed by a Mage or a Priest. The second form is "Spell-based" attacks. These are usually associated with the magic spells cast by a Mage. The third and final form is "Assist-based" attacks. And if you still have not guessed it, these form the basis of a Priest's offensive and defensive skills.

    In any case, the thing to bring away from here would be the need to focus upon increasing your occupation's "Attack Power" and "Hit Rate" secondary stats (since your own skills would depend on them for their accuracy and damage potential) but yet not forget about improving the "Defense" and "Evade" of the other two forms so as to avoid or withstand attacks based upon them.


Previous: FairyLand 2 Online (Part One)Next: FairyLand 2 Online (Part Three)

Friday, July 5, 2013

FairyLand 2 Online (Part One)

FairyLand 2 Online
The game that I'm going to introduce to you today is called FairyLand 2 Online. If I remember correctly, I only came to know the existence of this game due to a newsletter that I received from IAHGames, advertising about this new release of theirs. And since I was just about to finish up on Star Trek Online, I decided to give this game a check.

After a visit to their official website, it seems that FairyLand 2 is somewhat a 3D MMORPG based upon a fantasy world revolving around popular bedtime stories like "Jack and the Beanstalk", "Alice in Wonderland", "Pinocchio" and "Little Red Riding Hood", which...frankly speaking, ought to be fairy tales that we were often exposed to when we were young but grew up and left forgotten (not sure if that's still the case with youngins nowadays though). And perhaps partly due to nostalgia or maybe just homage to these fairy tales that had kept us entertained, I proceeded with downloading the 1 GB game client.

But skipping the character creation intro for the time being, let us just proceed with the general feel of the game and its content for now...
FairyLand 2 Online - Little Red Riding Hood Animated SceneFairyLand 2 Online - Big Bad Wolf
Upon loading into the game for the first time, you as the character somehow find yourself inside the storybook setting of "Little Red Riding Hood" and an animated scene kicks in where the Big Bad Wolf is just about to attack Little Red Riding Hood.

After saving her and completing a few other minor tasks (some of which are classics while others are just twists), you or rather Little Red Riding Hood finds that her grandmother is missing and sets off to find her together with you.
FairyLand 2 Online - Fairytale LibraryFairyLand 2 Online - Fairytale Characters Escaping
Using some magical crystal or spell, both of you get warped outside of the storybook and into a Fairytale Library which is "surprisingly" (or not) managed by "Hans Christian Andersen".

Anyway, shortly after your encounter, a yeti escapes from some storybook, gets turned evil by some sort of wicked witch, got defeated by you and then some sort of fairytale exodus happens.

Now with all the storybook plots wrecked and jumbled up, the task of setting things straight got pushed upon you and so the journey begins...with you trying to put things right and Little Red Riding Hood trying to find her grandmother.

Albeit a bit cliche, I still kind of feel that the storyline might not be too bad and ought to keep people interested in how it would develop.


Gameplay-wise, your whole endeavor practically revolves around this "fairytale library" situated within a mystical village called "Jean's Village" (not sure why its called that though and I vaguely remember some references calling it Rainbow Village instead).
FairyLand 2 Online - Jean's VillageFairyLand 2 Online - Alice in Wonderland Portal
Anyway, the village itself is more or less acting like some sort of hub where you would be doing all sorts of the mundane stuff known to playing an MMORPG, i.e. crafting, trading, repairing or upgrading stuff etc. The library, on the other hand, functions like a terminal or interchange with portals warping you into the various storybooks or fairy tales (with their accompanying difficulty in levels).

Pretty typical of an MMORPG's gameplay style I'ld say, but nonetheless still okay to me. However, what really puts me off about the game is its lack of a proper translation with regards to the information present within the game. And if I'm not wrong about it, its probably a game made in chinese or something (initially) that got translated into English to cater to English-based customers.
FairyLand 2 Online - Typical Quest DialogueFairyLand 2 Online - Typical Skill Info
To help you understand what I meant, let us take a look at the two screenshots above. One shows a typical quest dialogue while the other shows one of my skill's information window.

For the quest dialogue, while it is still readable, it is clearly not presentable as the sentences seem broken and weird. Furthermore, I find it terribly wrong that we weren't given any way to check what the instructions were (in our quest logs) after leaving the quest giver (apart from running back to it). Which, in this particular case, was especially important since the sequence of inputs was vital.

As for the skill information window, the state it is in is even worse. For a skill's description, whose primary purpose is to inform the players about what the skill does and whether they should spend precious points into learning it, the ones found in this game totally fails in this aspect.
FairyLand 2 Online - Shinigami Burst
Players of FairyLand 2 Online are left on their own to guess what a particular skill does, how much and what sort of damage it causes, whether its AoE or single target and the stats that affect the skill (all based upon what little unreadable content is shown on the description). And what's more, since the same particular description is used for all levels of the same skill, its useless to even try and guess what upgrading the skill does.

Mind you that with just these two and its already portraying badly for the game so even if the plot is slightly interesting, most wouldn't even be bothered to try exploring too far in the game. Moreover, I kind of find that some of the features present within FairyLand 2 Online seems awfully similar to that found in another game that I've introduced earlier before, called Magic Campus if I'm not wrong. So overall, the game kind of feels like its made from an overused template that keeps popping up once in a while, over and over again...or at least that's how I felt when playing.

But for the sake of those who are planning to give this game a try nonetheless, I will be going over some of the basics of this game, quickly and over the next few articles, to help you get around the game at the very least.
Next: FairyLand 2 Online (Part Two)