Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning

Past level 30, the skills can become something of a mish-mash, and there are limited specialisation options - the Mastery talent trees are basic, although equippable Tactics make up for this a little. But it's probably more important that each class is well-defined and functional, both solo and in a group, and that much is certainly true. The broad range of adaptable and fun-to-play healers who can handle themselves in combat is particularly welcome, and they seem popular with players so far - a definite plus on the battlefield.

The feel of Warhammer Online's combat worried us when we first played it early this year, and although it's made some strides since then, it still falls short of perfection. Skills now have plenty of punch, but the timing is off, especially in the laborious animations. It's easy to trigger skills too early or too late, and it does make the combat feel stodgier than it actually is. The Morale system, however - which rewards constant fighting with increasingly powerful super-skills - brings a terrific guts-or-glory savagery to prolonged battles, especially in large groups.

With so many classes to cater for, you'd think Mythic would make itemisation as flexible as possible - but no. Weapons and equipment are allotted on a purely per-career basis. It means each career has a very iconic look, but it does lead to a sameiness in appearance which is only partly remedied by the ability to equip trophies and dye your armour sets. This is not a game for individualists - you could argue that WAR's greatest pleasure lies in feeling like part of an army, rather than feeling like a great hero.

Although loot drops are pretty frequent and generous, you'll mostly be getting your new gear from Renown and Influence rewards. The former relates to your contribution to fighting other players in RVR, the latter to your contribution to Public Quests. They provide a satisfyingly steady stream of new equipment - almost too much so. You don't really lust after loot in Warhammer Online, when incremental upgrades are never more than an hour or two's play away.

This has implications for the game's economy - it's hard to imagine player trading being a major part of Warhammer Online. That impression is reinforced by the game's perfunctory crafting professions, essentially a bunch of simple refine-and-combine mini-games that make consumables and trinkets and little else.

Tick feature box, make it as quick and painless as possible, move on. Warhammer Online has everything you expect from a modern MMO, but anything that might distract you from Mythic's mighty war effort, or from rapidly levelling your character, has been streamlined and curtailed and smoothed away.

This is by no means a bad thing - there's little downtime or fuss in WAR, and the game has a fast, linear, well-crafted and densely-packed flow that makes it highly compelling, and unusually rewarding if you have limited time to play. However, it does raise a question mark over Mythic's aim to make the ultimate, all-consuming hobby experience. While there's plenty going on, the variety, the silliness, the lazy luxury of wasting your time in a world you love, isn't really there.

Case in point: the linear structure of tiered zones, divided with systematic neatness into questing chapters and RVR war camps, leads you smartly through the levels without punishing travel times or backtracking. But with trainers and merchants in every encampment, and rally masters throwing new gear at you faster than you can equip it, why take time to visit the game's two extravagantly well-appointed capital cities, Altdorf and the Inevitable City? They're often quiet (at least in the early stages of a server's life; how they'll develop once city sieges kick in is an unknown at present). WAR lacks genuine social hubs; places you'll call home, hang out in, grow attached to.

Not that WAR's world isn't well-realised. The races have strong characterisation and the architecture, in particular, is stunning, almost every landscape having been littered with rampant Gothic constructions of staggering detail and size. Natural landscapes are a little less graphically impressive and more clichéd in style, with some puzzlingly complex layouts that make the route from A to B something that requires detours through J and Q. Zones are large and there are a respectable 27 of them, but their division into three separate lines - High Elves versus Dark Elves, Dwarfs versus Greenskins, Empire versus Chaos - dents the cohesion of the world somewhat.

But we're forgetting ourselves; we're forgetting those three letters, scribbled repetitively in blood on every loading screens. We're forgetting the WAR. Every barrier, every curtailment, everything that seems to limit your freedom and immersion is there for a very good reason: to relentlessly channel and focus players on the deadly serious business of beating each other, and everything else, to a pulp.