Tarisland Closed Beta Impressions: A Bumpy Start With Red Flags

25.11.2023 - 00:27 / mmorpg.com

Tarisland had a lot of hype surrounding it, and we had to give the Closed Beta Test a try. The beta kicked off on November 15, and content unlocked across seven days of testing. I had the chance to jump into most of the content that is available right now and I have to say that there is some promise to the core gameplay. However, the monetization and Vigor (stamina) system has major red flags that need to be addressed before it gets my approval. 

As always, these are impressions of Tarisland’s very early stages of development, and things are subject to change. My experience with the game was primarily with the Phantom Necromancer, and I delved into both Normal and Elite dungeons and raids that are available in the CBT. 

The beta was a fairly relaxed experience, thanks to the server cap. The server capped player levels, and some light questing and dungeons were more than enough to stay at the level cap. A stamina system called Vigor limits how much you can craft. This is something that a lot of mobile games have adopted to make players log into the game regularly instead of burning through content and quitting after a few days. You need to spend your Vigor regularly, and if you are overcapped you will lose out on things you can craft.

I am not fond of this system, and I have a gripe with this system in every game it is implemented in. It is an indirect timegate that hinders player progression. If you have free time only on the weekends, you should be able to go through the entire week’s content in one go. 

Tarisland has quite a few classes in development including Barbarian, Ranger, Necromancer, Mage, and the other standard classes that you would find in most games. None of the classes stood out in particular. 

After the initial few days of playing, Elite difficulty content opened up, and aside from higher HP pools, not much changed. By the end of the closed beta, I was reasonably happy with the core gameplay but it didn’t hook me enough to recommend it in its current state. Of course, the game is still in its closed beta testing phases, and there are likely to be changes to the gameplay systems that could make it more enjoyable.  

Tarisland has in-game guides that go over the raid mechanics so if you are stuck you can always check the official guides out. The raids themselves seem a little too simplistic. Your basic attacks are automated and there is very little micromanagement involved which makes the fights a lot less engaging than what I’d like them to be. During the beta, here are the endgame activities that were available: 

The Ancash raid is what I spent most of my time in. It starts off with a mini-boss and leads up to some trash mob clearing and ends with a final boss. Players can clear the