Recent reviews by Lash

This game is quite fun to faff about in, and of course with survival sandboxes, it can be like that. Looking forward to heading onto the PvP server and having my stuff destroyed :D Seriously though it could be fun to work together with strangers and build things, even if it gets destroyed. Social dynamics are fun like that. If you want to try something like Don't Starve but a bit more sandbox MMO-like, this one is worth keeping an eye on.

The Exiled is an Early Access, social, open PvP, partial loot, sandbox MMORPG. It’s in active development, and has been on Steam Early Access for a little over 1 month, with 2 updates so far. There are EU, US and Brazilian servers. I recommend you give it a try yourself if you're interested, since it’s only a 500 MB download. Note that most of the events with high rewards occurs at 7pm-11pm server time, so that is when the people log on and fight over things with each other.

In terms of actual gameplay as it exists now, the combat is quite fun (WASD movement + mouse aiming for skills). It has full friendly fire, everything is a skill shot, in isometric combat (like League of Legends without any auto-targetting or auto-attacks). There are multiple social tools such as clans, parties etc. to aid you in coordinating groups or doing some active diplomacy.

You can establish bases, lay siege to settled bases, and in general do whatever you feel like. All equipment is player crafted, which includes weapons and armour. The weapon type and armour type define what sort of skills your character can use, which can be changed at any time. There are 5 weapons and 4 armour types at the moment, with more to come. Skills can be leveled, with the max level of skills defined by character level.

Character level has a catch up mode which gives you a bonus to get closer towards the max level on the server faster. Grinding levels has significant diminishing returns, so that people always have a chance to compete without having to always grind levels. The diminishing returns on XP is reset every day, so that the max character levels on the server gradually increase as the season progresses. Seasons at the moment last 28 days, but the devs say that there are plans for all kinds of different game modes and rules in the future. There are no safe zones so they can’t be exploited, even in the beginner zones. People compete over high score related to how well they control resources and convert their surplus to score.

At the moment, the main conflicts occur during peak time (7-11pm local time) over resource control points, which give a lot of resources if you control them. The game doesn’t force you directly to group, so if you want to go at it solo you’ll have to deal with the consequences of that, good and bad. You could act as a mercenary, for example. I started the game without knowing anyone, and made friends and enemies through shifting alliances in the game, sometimes there are agreements on terms of battle, sometimes not. I’ve been playing for over a month now, and there are monthly resets of the game world to keep it fresh and for the developers to try different experiments.

They have recently (April 20) done a third update after 2 months of release, which adds more tools to join clans, and various bug fixes. They look like they will do monthly updates which coincide with the monthly reset.

New player advice for this season:

* Check out the very quick and straightforward guide to the basics of the game here: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=857190477
* Join a clan ASAP or make your own (even if it is just yourself, since some activities need you to be in a clan). Being social in an MMO!? Crazy talk. You can do some things solo, but I personally had a lot of fun being in clans and doing things together. I didn’t know anyone when I started as well. But you can try playing solo too, the game doesn't force you directly to do so, but you have to accept the consequences of that, for good and bad.
* The easiest way to get resources is to log on during prime time (7pm-11pm server time) and take a resource control point. You might have to fight for it, but it gives in excess of 1600 materials by controlling it and looting the nearby crate afterwards, which completely eliminates any grind.

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Below, the developer responded to a previous version of this review, regarding a complaint I had with lag. So they were actively trying to find the bug. They fixed it in 4 days.

For those thinking of trying this game, here are a few experiences I have seen regarding people getting into this game:

1) You have a friend who plays this game, and convinces you to try it, the tutorial didn't work on your PC for some reason, your friend doesn't help you play the game, you try playing with your friend against people but get dominated and have no fun since he pulls you up towards his skill level with the matchmaking, uninstall, politely refuse to play Dota 2 in the future.

2) You see that this is the most played game on steam, and decide to try it out. You play the tutorial, and like getting a high kill/death ratio against the easy bots, while getting triple kills and rampages. The medium bots are quite tough, especially that stupid Viper, but it is a challenge. You give yourself the goal of trying to always beat the medium bots, while trying some different heroes, before trying to play against people, but you like that you can just quit the game whenever you feel like it if life interrupts you. You decide to try playing against people occasionally if you definitely have the time, and most of the time you lose, but you're slowly getting better. Your teammates and enemies can be quite rude sometimes, but most of the time people are quite friendly, I even added a few to my steam friends so we can play together in the future!

3) You have a few friends who play together, so you decide to try it. You play the tutorial and practice against bots since you don't want to let your friends/team down. You enter the game with your friends, you lose a lot to begin with, but it is fun since you are playing with friends anyways, but then you finally win as a team!

4) You have a very insistent friend who wants you to play. You finally cave, and you try the game out. Your friend realizes that he doesn't want to scare you away from the game, so he doesn't play with you straight away since that would bring you up to his skill level with matchmaking and make the game very difficult, but also wants to actively help you play it, so he parties with you and coaches you in the coach mode instead of playing directly with you, or he plays bots with you, while giving you instructions and direction on what to do beyond the tutorial. With his help you win a few games against real people!

Once you start playing, you can decide to be a nasty person and start fights with your teammates, or find friendly people to play with. There are a lot of Discord servers these days to help find nice people to play with and pre-screen them, while developing rapport, and don't forget to add nice people as steam friends as you encounter them in-game.

As a game, it is limitless and:
* develops tactical and strategic thinking,
* allows creativity with the variety of tools at your disposal,
* promotes social interaction and coordination (in a somewhat stressful environment)

If the above appeals to you, you will definitely have fun.