I haven't done game reviews since Raptr removed their reviews feature. I did manage to download them all before the feature was removed, but dunno if I'll repost them elsewhere. For now I'll just repost my Ragnarok game reviews here at the very least.
In no particular order, here are my reviews for some of the Ragnarok games.
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Game Title: Ragnarok Online
Review: It has a unique job class system and customizable stat attributes so players have total control over their characters' overall performance in the game; unlike any other MMORPG in the market. The world in the game is fun to explore and the upcoming episodes to come will make it even better.
Not to say it's a good, solid MMORPG, though. It's still your typical Asian MMORPG at its heart. Quests are hard to find and a few take a very long time to complete. Success rates plague a lot of crafting activities in the game so if you're hoping to do some fishing, cooking, or crafting in here, you're going to be sadly disappointed. There are many parts of the user interface that has been left unfinished or unimplemented entirely so you'll find that there's a lot of good stuff that never really made it into the game. Only viable leveling option is straight out grinding since quests offer very little in terms of EXP and an even smaller number actually award gear items.
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Game Title: Ragnarok Online II (Legend of the Second version)
Review: RO2 has potential to draw in the World of Warcraft crowd, but the developers don't seem interested in making it as good as it could be. It tries to be WoW with an RO skin, but fails even at that. Players are forced into a linear progression from town to town, a vast departure from RO's open world design. Instead of vanity pets, RO2 has a pseudo Homunculus "pet" system that requires players to grind for DNA pieces that have very low drop rates. Mounts come in temporary and permanent versions and the permanent versions are nigh inaccessible with the cash shop system in place.
Raid dungeons and the Khara System were the main saving grace of RO2. Unfortunately, raids were modified to the point of not fun or challenging and the Khara System hasn't received much love and care since launch. The original plan to have the max level be raised from 50 to 99 was scrapped in favor of a Master Level System, which is just RO2's version of RO's Rebirth System. It's such a shame how far the game diverted from the developers' original ideas and plans for it in favor of being cash shop-reliant.
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Game Title: Ragnarok DS
Review: The game utilizes the touchscreen of the DS pretty well. It was rather refreshing to see the protagonist of the game be the tutorial teacher rather than some random NPC teaching the protagonist. Story is okay and each character has interesting-enough quirks that they actually add to the story. Good luck finding other players to tackle Mirage Tower, as that requires you to find three other DS owners that all have their own copies of Ragnarok DS.
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Game Title: Ragnarok: Valkyrie Uprising (AKA Ragnarok: Path of Heroes, AKA Ragnarok: War of Gods, AKA Ragnarok Classic MMORPG)
Review: First Ragnarok mobile game I played after getting my first smartphone. Not a fan of the transparent gamepad UI as it got in the way a lot and didn't really make optimal use of smartphone touchscreens to translate the RO experience to mobile. Game just feels like a clunky mess.
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Game Title: Ragnarok: Ash Vacuum (AKA Ragnarok Empire)
Review: When I saw the game had the Schwarzwald crest displayed upside down, I just knew I was in for yet another bad mobile game. Adding to that hilarious mistake, Gravity Interactive's launch of the game has the [Help] button in the game LINKING TO THIS VERY WIKI instead of their own wiki. Wow, way to send your customers to a fansite instead of your own website.
Other than that, the RTS aspects of the game were okay, not really innovative in that regard.
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Game Title: Ragnarok Online: Prequel (AKA Ragnarok Web, AKA Ragnarok Journey)
Review: First time I saw gameplay videos for this, I thought "wow, this looks like a generic Chinese MMORPG." Still thought that way even after the game was launched in my region as Ragnarok Journey and I wasn't too far off. Game looks like an RO rip with the RO2 UI slapped on it. There's an automation option, which has your characters running around doing quests all by itself, allowing you to just sit back and watch it work. Not much to explore as the maps feel smaller than their original RO versions. Rather just play RO since ROP just feels like RO being adapted to work on a potato.
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Game Title: Ragnarok: Renaissance (AKA Ragnarok R, AKA Ragnarok Revival, AKA Ragnarok RUSH)
Review: Oh my goodness, where to start.
First off, the artwork looks like it was done by the artist(s) who did the initial version of Ragnarok Online: Prequel. Not horrible, but nothing eye-catching either. Similar to ROP, Renaissance has an automation feature, but it's only when you're in fields and dungeons. You can move around in towns, but the only purpose that serves is to collect quests and there's not much of it anyhow.
Story-wise, it feels like a bad RO fanfiction. Kiel Hyre is the big bad who works with Rekenber Corporation to experiment on the general populace and your character teams up with the biolabs characters to take them down with the help of random monsters. Dialogue is cringey and there's actual voice-acting in the game. (Feels like a waste of their talents to work on such a bad mobile game.)
I've played my fair share of flashy games, but Renaissance really takes the cake with its super flashy combat. When the lights flash brighter even when I'm playing the game in broad daylight, you know you done messed-up. I've never uninstalled a mobile game as fast as I did with Renaissance and it wasn't because of the gameplay. I literally could not continue playing the game with how badly it affected my health.
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Game Title: Smack Poring (AKA Poring Adventure, AKA Idle Poring)
Review: If the point of the game was to smack Porings around, I actually would enjoy that. Unfortunately, the name is super misleading as it's just an automated game where you just log in to collect rewards. Even PVP is automated, which is rather absurd. Can't even customize your characters outside of hats. Its only saving grace is that it utilizes the same graphics as Ragnarok Mobile: Eternal Guardians of Love, which can only amuse you for so long.
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Game Title: Ragnarok Clicker
Review: My very first clicker game and it was everything I'd thought it'd be: mindless.
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Never got to play the original Ragnarok Mobile since I didn't have Internet on my mobile phones back then and I didn't get my first smartphone until 2015. Then there's several games that never got released outside of Asia, so no way I could try those out to review them. I have yet to play Ragnarok Battle Offline and don't know if I'll find time to play it between all my projects and managing this wiki.
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