iPhone Games: CozyQuest Review
As an RPG gamer for 20 years, I naturally gravitated to MMO’s when they first hit the scene. If you name the MMO, I’ve probably played it, at least for a short play test. Eventually I took my leave of the genre for numerous reasons, the main one being that MMO’s are far too time consuming, and I found when I got away from them that I simply enjoyed playing single-player games more (a fact that isn’t always easy to realize when you’re immersed in them believe it or not, as you’re driven on by factors other than the simple enjoyability factor of the game, which doesn’t cloud your judgement when playing other games).
This of course segues into the fact that I’m reviewing an MMORPG, so I’ve clearly broken my avowed back-turning on the genre. Admittedly I was intrigued by the concept of an MMO on the iPhone, and as I knew the game would not have nearly the amount of content as seen in PC MMO’s, there was no fear of being sucked into a game that could take months to beat.
CozyQuest has a decent amount of quests and content for an iPhone game, but of course comes nowhere near the amount seen in a PC MMO. The game contains about 10 hours of content at present, with fairly regular updates coming from the developer.
CozyQuest is not structured like a typical MMORPG, instead functioning more like any of the numerous text-based MMO’s found online. In this sense it’s more like an RPG with online features as opposed to a persistent world game that the term MMO would typically refer to. Being largely text-based, the writing is of major importance, and the developers have done a good job of presenting well written text for players to read.
You begin by creating and customizing your character from a number of different races and classes. You can further customize your character in game with stat boosts, professions, and equipment. You develop your character by taking on quests, throughout which you’ll fight numerous enemies in a traditional turn-based text fashion. You’ll find you need to perform the same quests multiple times to reach a point where you can move up and take on new tasks, which can grow tiresome, but as mentioned there’s a fair amount of content at present to satisfy players. Besides questing, players can participate in lotteries and auctions, chat with fellow gamers at the tavern, or develop their skills.
One of CozyQuest’s better features is that it doesn’t feature any sort of money sink in the form of purchasable items or points that need to be bought and used in-game, something that has plagued not only the majority of iPhone’s early MMO’s, but the majority of major PC MMO’s coming out of Asia in recent years. You simply pay your one-time fee for the game and that’s it, you have access to all of the game’s content without having to worry about other players having better gear than you because they spent more money for additional items, or having an easier time of it because they used purchased points to level their character quicker.
Giving a verdict on CozyQuest is difficult. While the price is fair for a moderately sized iPhone game, the other side of the coin is that there are dozens of free to play MMO’s available on PC, which makes recommending this game for a $5 purchase more difficult. If you’re intrigued by the concept like I was, by all means give it a shot. Everyone else should likely steer clear.
Pros
- No money sink
- Well-written (though fairly generic)
- Nice artwork
Cons
- Not enough content to make reaching the current ‘endgame’ smooth
- Slow loading at times
- Gameplay will only appeal to a small collection of gamers
Score: 6.5/10
Price: $4.99