Games Campus is currently offering up Scarlet Legacy for CBT. Their latest title is an attempt at bringing a visually stunning Eastern Style Martial-Arts MMO to the F2P market. The game offers stylish action-packed combat, quest based leveling, and an effortless character control system; bringing you to end game faster. Embark on an adventure to save Princess Scarlet from the poorly translated Evil Forces!
Scarlet Legacy for the most part does look great, and there are some really nice effects in the visuals. Many things in the world have had a great amount of attention paid towards the detail in the textures, but there have been many corners cut. It is hard to claim that the game is visually stunning, and from looking at the screenshots you might wonder why anyone could doubt it has great graphics. InterServ have cut many corners, and paid less attention to details they don't think matters.
I would like to hope that these are just "place holders" for future models/textures, and that they just weren't quite ready yet. It doesn't look this way though, and it degrades the visual experience as a whole. My first example is with the horse mounts, looking at them is painful and makes me feel as though I should be riding Epona with my trusty N64 controller in hand. This problem also lies in ground and building texturing, some areas will be bland and have very basic textures while other areas directly adjacent of the same textures look vibrant and full of detail.
Games don't always have to provide cutting-edge visuals to be a great success and find a solid playerbase. It is insulting however when you use an oversized NPC model as a statue,(Scarlet Legacy Gold) place it in front of realistic water, but surround it in once again N64 quality walls. This may be the result of nitpicking, but you can't sell a half complete painting.
Besides the imperfections, Scarlet Legacy does offer quite an authentic atmosphere that would please most gamers who enjoy an Eastern MMO. There is an atmosphere present that definitely brings back memories of a few Kung-Fu movies, and a fan of the genre might find some gratification here.
