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Tabula Rasa


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Tabula Rasa - hands-on

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Words: Kieron Gillen, PC Gamer UK
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You’ll need such tactical flexibility to survive in this world. Tabula Rasa offers the first genuine step forward in terms of a convincing and atmospheric MMO world since City of Heroes decided that, actually, enemies standing aimlessly in a field waiting for players to hit them isn’t enough any more. Yet while CoH was happy creating idle animations for us to disturb (robbing innocents, etc), Tabula Rasa’s hostiles are a little more proactive. In the starting areas, Bane soldiers engage in firefights with your fellow AI-controlled members of the Allied Free Sentients, while various forms of wildlife engage one another - as opposed to implausibly joining forces against you. Pass the defenses of your town, and more often than not, there’ll be a skirmish for you to skirt around or engage.

But even this pales before another of the game's freeform centerpieces. Rather than having a static world, the battle zones are dynamic: AFS bases come under regular attack from the Bane. While the AI troops will defend, they'll need the help of passing players to be sure of victory. Lose a base, and all its facilities - from shops to quest-givers - will be unavailable until a group of players reclaimed. Equally, there are Bane bases that players can attempt to storm. Succeed, and computer-controlled allies drop in to secure the area, opening up new quests as long as the base can be held against the now seriously pissed-off Bane. It's a game about a war and does a lot to maintain that impression. Foes don't spawn: Bane dropships fly to the battlefield to deposit attack squads.


 
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Tabula Rasa
Tabula Rasa

Genre: Role Playing
Release date: Nov 2, 2007
Published by: NCSoft
Developed by: Destination Games
Designer: Richard Garriott
Min system requirements: 2.5 GHz Pentium 4, 512MB RAM, ATI Radeon 9600/NVIDIA GeForce FX5700 w/128MB of VRAM, broadband
Recommended system: 3.5 GHz Pentium 4 or equivalent, 2GB RAM, ATI Radeon x1800 or NVIDIA GeForce 7800 series video card
Multiplayer Modes:
Online
MMO player MMO
1000s player MMO
8 GREAT
Read the review
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