Sacred Souls: Genesis

Chapter 105: Chapter 104: Game Review

“‘Sanctum’ is a newly launched massive multiplayer online role-playing game on the Tian Gong gaming platform, a game you wouldn’t believe is still in closed beta testing.”

“Let’s start with the game graphics. ‘Sanctum’ has the most stunning graphics I’ve ever seen in all the VR MMORPGs I’ve played. Look at the movements of the hair strands—I think only a madman would go into such detail, but ‘Sanctum’ did it. The game’s details are constantly reminding players that this is a real world, yet some spectacular light and shadow effects remind us we’re in a game.”

“Next up is the game’s combat system. I used to think that ‘Conflict’ had pushed the combat gameplay of VR MMORPGs to the limit, but ‘Sanctum’ showed me another possibility. The game has found a perfect balance between gameplay and realism in its combat system. If you’re a sword user, facing off against another player swinging a sword at you, you have multiple options: blocking, deflecting, and dodging, to name a few.”

“Any method you can think of to deal with a sword-wielding enemy in reality can be used here. If a fight master were to play this game, it probably wouldn’t take long for them to get hooked—of course, I mean in beating up those newbie players.”

“But it’s not hard for regular players to master the combat and rhythm in Sanctum either. The game’s unique combat assistance system enables even those who are deskbound office workers to experience the thrill of becoming a Great Sword Master, Sharpshooter, or Great Mage. Look at how I swing my sword—can everyone keep up with my speed?”

Jiang Qiao watched the review video while he stuffed several pieces of grilled pork belly into Hai Lan’s bowl.

QGN is an international review agency, so Jiang Qiao was listening to English, but QGN’s official account in China comes with subtitles, and Jiang Qiao’s foreign language proficiency was quite decent.

Currently, ‘Sanctum’ testing qualifications are only available to domestic players, but for a major review agency like this, it’s normal to have editors dedicated to snagging accounts.

“Moving on to the narrative and character building in ‘Sanctum’. Game storylines and character development have always been areas where online games tend to skimp, but Sanctum, even at its closed beta stage, didn’t cut corners. Every NPC’s dialogue is so extensive that you can have a normal conversation with them, as if they were real people. This is something I’ve never seen in other games.”

When the QGN reviewer got to this point, he even specifically showed a clip of him having a lively discussion with a blacksmith selling equipment in Lionheart City.

Their conversation covered topics from this morning’s weather to the changing prices in Lionheart City, and even why the Black Dragon Princess in the Black Dragon Nest is so irritable.

Uh, this equipment-selling blacksmith is a Black Iron Dwarf.

After chatting for about five or six minutes, he even succeeded in receiving a hidden quest related to the Black Dragon Nest.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated on Ɲ0νǥօ.сο

“From the conversation above, we can see that most questions you ask can be answered by the NPCs, provided the questions are relevant to the NPC’s background. If not, NPCs might repeat some answers, and then maybe players would really think these are characters played by the game staff. Are you played by a staff member, Dwarf Blacksmith Furey?”

“Speaking of NPCs, we have to introduce the most popular NPC in ‘Sanctum,’ Guardian Spirit·Fureya.”

“The topic of Guardian Spirit·Fureya has already flooded various gaming forums. Yes, when you play Sanctum, you can get a character somewhere between a girlfriend and a wife. Fureya has the most programmed dialogue of all NPCs in Sanctum; you can even talk to her about real-world issues. ‘Oh! Fureya, do you think I might get a raise after I finish this review?'”

In the video, this editor was communicating with his Fureya in English. She slightly titled her head and then very decisively answered, ‘NO’.”

“Sanctum is full of surprises, and I can unreservedly praise it as one of the best MMORPGs of this century, but along with its excellence are some flaws. One that I directly felt during the playthrough is that part of the life skills system, specifically the crafting-related life skills system, is rather superfluous—for the best equipment and items, you need to acquire them from instances…”

“Also, while the game’s map exploration elements are rich, the map itself is not very large. Once you get a fast flying mount, you can quickly ride from one end of the game map to the other…”

“In conclusion, this is still a game in closed beta, and at this stage, the Sanctum playing qualifications are very precious—there are fewer than ten thousand players, and it’s only open to Chinese players. This is truly sad! However, we’re still very excited about the future growth of this game. The final score we give is 9.5 out of 10.”

“Not a perfect score, huh?” Hai Lan asked after swallowing the piece of streaky pork in her mouth.

“This is already a perfect score. Missing it by half a point is like randomly docking a point or two when grading an essay,” said Jiang Qiao.

“Essay?”

Jiang Qiao didn’t continue to explain to Hai Lan and continued to stuff pieces of streaky pork into her mouth, as he started contemplating the next update plan for Saint Spirit.

First would be the increase in level cap. Hai Lan had already collected a Divine Fragment, and Jiang Qiao could raise all players’ level cap to 55.

A new level cap would inevitably require opening new maps, with the Saint Spirit’s current map size being only 234 square kilometers. Factoring in the three Plane Fragments Jiang Qiao currently held, it could extend to 300 square kilometers.

“Still gotta stir things up in a new plane,” Jiang Qiao thought, falling into contemplation.

The Saint Spirit’s core map would always just be a novice village for the players, a village for leveling up, getting accustomed to the Saint Spirit system, and resting.

Jiang Qiao wasn’t raising players to fuss around in a novice village but to resist enemies from other worlds, or… to cause trouble in other worlds.

“Besides that, there’s the construction of the inner world,” Jiang Qiao thought, picking up Hai Lan’s lunchbox, which still retained the properties of the manor.

After assimilating the small plane invaded by the Eradication Legion and Queen Mei’s plane, Hai Lan had gained 40,000 points of Creation Energy, which, added to Jiang Qiao’s previous reserves, totaled 65,000 points.

Not much—these Creation Energy points were only enough to establish an inner world the size of Jiang City’s Food Street.

The inner world could gradually expand alongside the foreign world fragments attacked by the players. Jiang Qiao wasn’t in a rush about that, but he found it troublesome to consider where the players would get the resources for building in the inner world’s construction gameplay.

Building houses would always require things like stone minerals, and transporting them all from the world of Saint Spirit would also be a significant expense in terms of Creation Energy.

Moreover, players would need to use pickaxes in the world of Saint Spirit to dig up stones and transport them into the inner world… That was just too inconvenient.

“Jiang Qiao, some powerful guy has turned up at the Tower of Trial’s plane,” Hai Lan suddenly put down her bowl and chopsticks and said to Jiang Qiao.

“A powerful guy? What a coincidence, huh?”

Hearing Hai Lan’s words, Jiang Qiao felt like it was just like the moment when the main questline ends, and an NPC with an exclamation mark over their head forcefully runs out to thrust the next main quest upon you.

“The server is undergoing maintenance right now—perfect timing to ask the Tower Spirit if there are any rewards.”