by Amber “Aurael” Weldon

If we were meant to fly, we’d have been born with wings. Many of us heard this phrase at some point during our lives. Usually, this maxim came after a leap – off a tree house, out of a swing, or off a low roof. This innate yearning to escape the confines of gravity is the basis of Gala-Net’s free to play MMORPG Fly for Fun (or Flyff). In this game, players are invited to join others from around the world in order to do that which nature neglected to allow us to do—fly…for fun.

Flyff is a cute game that focuses mainly on combat and social interaction. While starting out can be tough, the game has many features that are enjoyable and even a bit fun at times. I’ve spent the last couple of weeks trying to absorb as much of the game as I could in order to bring you this full review of Flyff.

Getting Started

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Flying is fun!

Fly for Fun is relatively easy to get started. You simply register for a free account on the official website, hit the “Download Game” button and sit back and wait. It isn’t a long wait for the download. The patching process takes a bit of time, but that’s expected for a game that’s been out for any length of time.

Storyline

According to the official website, the story of Roika goes something like this. Five gods created the world and it was a utopia, with no struggles, hate or violence. They created the Goddess Rhisis to watch over the world, and then moved on to bigger and better things. Rhisis didn’t know anything about Roika and secretly resented being left behind to babysit the world, so she decided to go her own way. But first, she divided her essence into three beings so that Roika would not be left unwatched. The first, named Bubble, received her kindness and love. The second being, Iblis, was given her apathy and indifference and the third received her hate and feelings of rejection.

This third being, known as Shade, released these feelings of hate on the people of Roika. She divided the land, released horrible monsters known as Masquerpets and tried to destroy all life. Bubble came to the rescue; she divided the land further, causing the Masquerpets to scatter, giving humans a fighting chance against, not only the Masquerpets, but Shade herself.

It’s a Small World

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The world of Roika

The world of Roika has two main continents. Madrigal was broken into several smaller land masses by the goddess Bubble. You begin in the center of Flarine, a city on one of these landmasses. To get to other areas of the world, you must buy a blinkwing (an item used for teleporting) for the city that you wish to go to or you must wait until you are level 20 and fly there. Each blinkwing has a level requirement for its use. In addition to Madrigal, a continent named Azria is available for higher level characters.

Gameplay

So how do you get to a higher level? You play the game of course! This means gaining levels by combat and quests. In the beginning, you are given a brief once over on how to move and fight by your helpful little penguin guide. Movement is fairly easy in Flyff. You have the option of using your WASD keys to move (though there is no right/left strafe, sadly). You can also move by pointing and clicking. I found it easier to use the point and click way to travel over large distances and the WASD when moving in a small area, such as while killing mobs.

I covered combat briefly in my first impressions review, but I will add a few more points now. There are three hotbars at the bottom of your screen in which you can put skills, emotes, potions, pills, food and other usable items. The first bar holds icons that have to be clicked on to be used. The second holds icons that can be used by pressing the F1-F9 keys and the third is your combo bar.

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As you progress in levels, your attacks become bigger and brighter

As you progress your way through the skill tree, you will get a variety of skills that branch out from one starting skill. The icons for these will look a bit like puzzle pieces. These are your combo skills. With the exception of the starting skill, these combo skills can only be put into the combo hotbar (by connecting the puzzle pieces). While fighting, hitting “C” will set off the combo, releasing a flurry of these special skills against the enemy. You can only have one combo active at a time.

Other bars on your user interface include the status bars, which appear in your character portrait in the top left hand portion of the screen. After you receive your first job, you will only have to be concerned with two of the three status bars in your character portrait window. Your health bar and either your Mana Points (MP) bar or your Fatigue Points (FP) bar. If you are a spellcaster, like a magician or an assist you will be using the MP bar; if you are a mercenary or acrobat, you will want to watch your FP bar. Mana and Fatigue points are the cost for each of your skills.

As in most games, your health bar is your life line. The lower it gets, the closer you get to death. In case of accidental death, there are four types of resurrection. You can either be resurrected by another player, resurrect to a Lodestone (inside the nearest town), resurrect to a Lodelight (a nearby place not in a town, like a graveyard in other games) or use an item from the item shop (such as a resurrection scroll that resurrects you at your current location). Not all areas have a Lodelight resurrection, and I saw no negative effects from death.

NPCs and Quests

The majority of the helpful NPCs (non-player characters) reside inside towns. There are a few in the countryside, but they are either part of a quest or there because they enjoy the scenery. It is easy to distinguish whether or not you can receive a quest from a certain NPC because they will have a golden “!” in a chat bubble above their head. If you can complete a quest with an NPC, you will see a golden “?” in a chat bubble over them. If you just feel like chatting, all of the NPCs will give you a brief introduction of themselves (though some may tell you to go far, far away because they don’t think they like).

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The first questgiver in Flyff

Your first quest does not come until level 7. Until then, you just have to amuse yourself while the big kids play. You will get only a handful of quests in the lower levels; however, once you hit level 15, the number of quests available shoots up. Then at level 20, things really start to get fun because now you have more than one continent to play on and there are quests all over the place.

The quest types tend to lean more toward drop quests in the lower levels (drop quests are quests that require you to collect a certain number of items from looting mobs). The storyline quests (my personal favorite) don’t really start coming into play until about level 20.

Perhaps one of the most interesting aspects of questing in Flyff is the quest rewards. The majority of MMOGs offer experience as a reward for every quest. It is not listed as a reward, but given all the same. Flyff only gives experience as a quest reward if it is listed as a quest reward. While most of the quests do give experience as a reward, there are some that only reward with you with an item.

Jobs

You begin with the job title of Vagrant. At level 15, as has been mentioned, you’re slapped on the back and told it’s time for you to make your own way in the world. You have to get a real job. Each job begins with a chain of quests that you must complete before gaining access to the skills available for that job. These first quests are quite simple and are given so that you may “prove your worth”.

There are four job types available. The Mercenary is your standard sword and shield, melee, get-up-in-your-face-and-slash kind of guy (or gal). That is the class I chose. The Assist is the support system of a group with healing and buffing capabilities. Acrobats are the stand-back-and-shoot type and Magicians are standard spellcasters.

When you reach level 60, you will be able to further specialize your career. Mercenaries can pick from a Blade (a dual-wielding, high damage class) or a Knight (the tank). As an Acrobat, you can choose either a Jester (high damage ranged attack) or a Ranger (a ranged-based melee attack). Billposters (melee fighter with buffs) and Ringmasters (standard healer/buffer) come out of the Assist job class and Magician’s split into either Psykeepers (dark, demonic magic) or Elementors (elemental magic).