Conquest Online II review: a brief but passionate affair

I had a lot of things to do today but that all went out the window when I started playing Conquer Online II (CO2) from NetDragon. CO2 is a hack and slash MMORPG for iOS set in a distinctly Chinese-style fantasy world full of winged snakes, green-skinned bandits, Taoist sorcerers and other interesting beasts. The plot is fairly standard hero rising stuff and some of it is a little confusing due to some dodgy translations, but please don’t be put off by this.

A pleasant surprise.

Now let me start by saying that I do not like MMORPGs, and when I agreed to review this I was expecting to loathe it. I had played MMORPGs like WoW, Warhammer and City of Heroes and had always found them to be incredibly mundane, tedious ordeals that reminded me more of shopping than gaming. My initial expectation was that an iOS MMORPG could only be more of the same but watered down into even less substance. Boy, was I wrong. Thirty seconds into CO2, I was hooked. The first quest given to me was to kill some overly aggressive pheasants that were terrorizing the local population. That’s right, pheasants! The second quest was to kill turtledoves, and the third was to kill robins. The first thing I learnt in this game is that someone at NetDragon has a serious issues with birds!

This is some of the greatest text in gaming history.

The game plays totally seriously, but the dialogue in the game is weird to say the least. At one point I was delivering a letter found on a corpse to a grieving wife, sad but standard stuff; the next, I was massacring bandits so a girl wouldn’t have to end her game of hide-and-seek. There is something genuinely magical about this game because it is translated, but not localised. The jokes are Chinese jokes, the quests appeal to Chinese motives, the love stories are very much Chinese love stories. It’s impossible to explain this completely within this review, so all I can do is urge you to play and find out for yourself.

Hack and slash and swipe!

In terms of gameplay, CO2 is simple and pleasurable. Press a finger on an enemy and your character will slash until it drops dead. Skills can be activated from a taskbar at the bottom and utilised through various gestures, making certain skills feel much more dynamic than simply pressing buttons, yet still keeping them simple and easy to use. For example, performing a Cyclone Strike has you swiping across your character. Certain attacks require you to swipe the enemy or other similar actions. While this is hardly revolutionary, it works really well and keeps the player absorbed in the combat. Now the combat is fun because it revolves around killing lots of monsters very quickly, and the game gives you all the tools to do just that; attacks have huge areas of effect and enemies are plentiful and rarely difficult providing you stay within your own level. The end result is carnage, and everyone loves carnage.

The combat is the highlight of Conquest Online II

Why I won’t be going back

However it is not all golden for this little game, and I do have some gripes. CO2 is way too overwhelming: the tutorial is long winded, and seems to contain precisely none of the information necessary to get into the game. This led to my bumbling around for thirty minutes before I really figured out what I was doing. In my opinion, a mobile MMORPG should make sure that the player is very comfortable with the game and its surroundings before throwing them into the deep end, as hardcore PC MMORPGers are unlikely to be interested in such a small title and n00bs, like myself, need all the help we can get! The other thing I didn’t like is the movement. The game employs something called pathfinder, which is basically autopilot for bouncing heroes, and allows them to hop across fields of enemies unscathed. I like that the game provides this feature, but I would like to be able to control my characters movement more easily. There is a reason why people don’t jump everywhere, it’s bloody awkward, and it looks weird.

Jumping over the heads of witless enemies is great fun for about ten minutes…..

Finally CO2 is just too easy. In fact, it is shockingly easy. I was expecting a long grind to the tenth level and found myself at level forty within two hours! I enjoyed being able to use all the skills and murder at will, but I did feel that an MMORPG without grinding is somehow empty. I guess the final nail in Conquer Online II’s coffin is that I don’t feel the need to pick it up again. I enjoyed my time with it today, but feel no need to go back. For an MMORPG, this is an unforgivable crime. The whole genre is based around creating a sense of purpose within the game, driving the player to improve their character’s armour, weapons, haircut and house, if any. While CO2 had all of these features in abundance, I simply felt no connection to them because they were all too easily obtained. I guess my final words should be give this game a try. At the very least you’ll have a memorable experience playing with an unfamiliar type of game. Perhaps you might even find the spark that I missed, the one which drives you on in the game. Conquest Online II: Infinite Battle is certainly a good game but it needs some fine tuning before it can be great!