Pagan Online is a massive isometric online ARPG in full Diablo style, aesthetically rendered with a pleasant vaguely comic art style halfway between Diablo 3 and the Warhammer universe. At the beginning, we will have the possibility to choose between three different heroes, a tank, a melee DPS and a melee / ranged hybrid with abilities able to vampirize enemies. Once we have chosen our alter ego, we will be immediately thrown into the dark and decadent setting of the title, which will see us fight to stem the darkness in a world ravaged by shadows.
Our character, after a few battles, will perish at the hands of a powerful demon, crossing the border between the real world and the afterlife. In this new dimension, linked to pagan myths and legends, we will discover that the divinities that once protected our world have definitively disappeared, leaving room for evil to maneuver. It will be up to us, fearless heroes, to discover the reason for the disappearance of the gods.
Having learned the initial narrative premises, the first thing we will notice will be of a more purely mechanical nature: in total counter-trend with the canons of the genre, Pagan Online it will allow us to move our character with the classic “WASD” key combination, instead of relying on the classic model of control with the mouse which, at the same time, will essentially be the center of our main class skills. This new mechanical interpretation, in addition to being quite comfortable and precise, is also perfectly “wearable” from a common pad, making the title potentially movable even on consoles. In general, the operation of the game will move on rather ordinary lines for the sector: we will have a central Hub in which to select new missions, access a series of vendors of various kinds and interact with other players.
From a more exquisitely playful point of view, Pagan Online will put on the plate a single-player campaign set on a series of maps divided in turn into micro-areas in which, from time to time, hordes fed of enemies with bad intentions will appear, assisted by a classic end-of-level boss, who will have special abilities listed below his personal health bar.
In addition to the canonical experience dictated by an all in all interesting story line that has its roots in the traditions of pre-Christian folklore, in Pagan Online we will be able to face two other game modes, single missions and assassinations, in which the formula will change only from a formal point of view: in fact, we will be called to complete different objectives, such as resisting a series of waves of enemies or defending a target from attack of merciless demons.
As far as it was possible to learn from the test, the general level design will be quite basic and not particularly intricate, with the maps that in general will be easily "interpretable" and not particularly tangled: exploring will make sense because, in addition to further possibilities to take down enemies and get new equipment, in the maps it will be possible to find chests containing special loot with a timer, which will force us to face a horde of enemies in a preset time and obtain. Exceeding the time limit will result in the final closure of the chest, which will become inaccessible.
As mentioned, we will have a central area that will act as the main Hub where you can accept missions, sell and forge objects, etc. Pagan Online, in addition to the classic trappings of the sector, it will propose some interesting news. For example, once the "Hero Forge“, We will find that we will be able to get other playable characters by accumulating Hero Shard, currency that we will earn as a reward from the missions: with the same coin, we will be able to buy new looks for our character, among a rather large series of possibilities.
The initial choice of the character will be substantially final, since we will be able to access the other characters only through the accumulation of the aforementioned Shards: Pagan Online will favor replayability thanks to the Legacy system, which will have its own specific rank and will go up as we unlock and use the available characters. The higher the rank, the more we will have the opportunity to use higher quality equipment and which will require a specific Legacy Rank. Given the above average difficulty level of the title, the need to have more and more powerful equipment will be essential to be able to face the most difficult missions.
Of course, mowing down hordes and hordes of enemies will give us new equipment and experience points, which will translate into Ability points that we can use to unlock and enhance new abilities of our alter ego, which will each have a specific tree with primary and secondary branches. that will enhance every single skill in various ways. A small variant compared to the canon is that the upgrades of the highest degree, will require the use not only of the aforementioned points but also of certain materials that we will collect as loot during the game sessions. In addition to the use just listed, we can also use the materials obtained in a special forge in order to build weapons, armor and tools useful in battles.
In order to forge anything, we will have to sacrifice a recipe, a predefined quantity of ingredients and a base item of an appropriate level: as we dedicate ourselves to building objects, our level in the sector will increase and, with it, object recipes will become accessible gradually more powerful. From a more strictly role-playing point of view, Pagan Online will work a bit like Diablo 3, or with characters with basic statistics on which we will not have the right to intervene directly, which at the same time will increase according to pre-set algorithms at each level up.
On a technical level, the game is already quite accurate and artistically valuable despite the "immature" state of programming. In the game, there were no significant bugs or anything so serious that it would affect the overall gaming experience, already being better than many productions at the official release. As already pointed out, from a mere artistic point of view the game will take on the connotations of a spiritual mediation between Diablo and Warhammer, while still being sufficiently personal and original.
An applause must also be made for the animations, fluid and plausible, and for the overall graphic quality, certainly of a high level and sufficiently detailed and dark, consistent with the events narrated. Although still at an early stage of development, the technical sector will already appear rather free of serious criticalities and substantially solid and fluid, therefore widely playable without the classic problems typical of alpha titles.
The only problem encountered is a certain slowness of the servers in "overwriting" the data in real time: for example, it will happen that for the sale of objects we will have to wait for the server to "register" the action for each individual item before being able to pass to the next object, or that sometimes the game itself does not "save" the progress made by the player in real time (I happened to have to recraft the same weapon twice, due to a "hasty" slog ed).
As regards the sound sector, the environmental effects and more exquisitely related to the clamor of the clashes will be well done and in line with medium / high productions while, in contrast, some items relating to the main characters of the campaign will be badly equalized, resulting at times distorted as if excessively high, and not particularly evocative in terms of acting. Obviously, we always talk about a game in an embryonic state, so the problems indicated here will most likely be solved in a short time.
Summing up, Pagan Online is an interesting ARPG with MMO elements that are certainly able to be interesting for the large passionate user base of the sector, perhaps no longer as excited as in the past by the area leaders. If you consider the experience and quality of the publisher, Wargaming, with the excellent support that the publisher has shown up to now for its post-launch titles, it is quite easy to foresee a substantial roadmap full of updates and new content. It should also be noted that the title, once released, will in effect be a Buy to Play, at least in theory averting all the critical issues that Free to Play games usually carry with them (gold seller, devastating micro-transactions , cheater as far as the eye can see, etc.). Pagan Online tries to establish itself as an excellent representative of the genre and, in some ways, the intention of Wargaming to offer a rather personal interpretation of the genre is all too visible, thanks to the game modes, the legacy system and the atypical but well integrated. We just have to wait and see how Wargaming will make its creature evolve!
