TERA review

When it comes to MMORPGs, TERA makes the competition look like TERA-ble. Originally released for PC in 2012, TERA excels at innovation and makes the entire genre look like new.

At first, TERA appears to be a World of Warcraft clone. After all, she has a fantasy setting, tanks, healers, DPS, mission donors with punctuation over their heads, etc. But once the game starts correctly, the differences become crystal clear.

Fight

TERA is an action MMORPG, action is the key to the fun of the game. Combat takes center stage, ditching WoW’s slow aim and spell system for a dynamic third-person camera with an aiming reticle. To attack, simply point and click in the direction of the nearest red health bar.

However, to maximize damage, skill chaining must be mastered. Some skills have specific chains in other skills that you unlock as you level up which can lead to devastating combos.

The Ranger, for example, can back away from enemies as soon as at level one, but once the Piercing Arrow is unlocked, any dodge can be followed by a hit that pierces multiple targets. The downside to Piercing Arrow comes from the long final delay of the move as the Ranger recovers from the powerful shot. But another ability, Sequential Fire, can be chained immediately after Penetrating Arrow and can nullify slow end lag.

With skill chaining, a Ranger can dodge circles around enemies and line up large damage hits that can be negated for even more damage. Each class uses different chains, so experiment with enemies to learn the optimal path to chain skills.

Mob

It doesn’t matter how fun the combat is if the other party doesn’t react, but thankfully TERA takes a different approach to mobs and bosses than other MMOs. RPG combat often feels like a slap in the face as both sides sit around and automatically attack each other, slowly chipping at each other to death. But in TERA, the enemies react.

There is no guaranteed blockable damage when enemies attack. Instead, when a monster attacks, it gets up and swings. If the player character touches the attack, he is hit. When you take damage, it never feels unfair as there is always a window to dodge. Some of the larger enemies (referred to as Big A ** Monsters or BAM) play more like Monster Hunter than RPG, requiring perfectly timed dodges and counter attacks to take down the huge beasts.

The way TERA implements mob pull makes traversing the open world convenient, as only the monsters the player must kill for a mission will focus on the player and attack. As soon as you kill 10 Sporewalkers or Devan Warriors or whatever you have, that type of enemy won’t automatically become aggressive when you get close to within 10 miles like other open world MMOs. They will still focus the player if touched or attacked, but will not seek and destroy from a distant football field.

This helps in missions because the areas are generally dense with monsters and enemies regenerate frequently. Having to fight them all would be a nightmare. But if one or two other players share your current mission, there is no downtime waiting for a mob to respawn.