Cryptic's D&D-based MMO officially launches today after months of beta. Ragar brings us his opinion on the state of the game.

Conclusion

Despite my issues with some of the 5-man design and the tanking model Neverwinter uses, I do recommend people at the very least try the game. I had a blast leveling up to this point and I will continue chipping away toward 60 whenever I find time to do so. The questing and story are enjoyable and the combat is interesting enough that I never felt like I was grinding away levels while running around with my friends. Gateway in particularly impressed me with how well it worked with their crafting system and it's nice that I can chip away at my Platesmithing, Leadership, as well as my actual character's level (pretty sure at least four of those 47 levels came from Leadership) while I'm away from the game with only my iPhone.

Neverwinter is in a good position at the moment: it’s a fun F2P fantasy MMO with good combat and established lore to draw upon for questing and encounter design. Neverwinter also benefits from the fact that it hasn’t had any real direct competitors come out in the month between Open Beta and launch. Defiance is going after a different market with its TV tie-in and FPS combat, and Marvel Heroes is there for players looking for an unofficial sequel to Marvel Ultimate Alliance or a superhero modded version of Diablo. The problem for Neverwinter is that open window of opportunity is closing. The delay of The Elder Scrolls Online to next year certainly helps, but WildStar is still slated for release this year and both games are going to provide some stiff competition for Neverwinter regardless of whether or not those two games also go F2P. If Neverwinter wants to succeed, we need to see the game grow and we need to see it fast. New classes for purchase or for free, new instances/skirmishes/PvP instances, new zones and quest storylines - the faster you get all of those extra D&D hooks into the game, the more momentum you have built up to keep your players around once the competition starts rearing its head.

Michael "Ragar" Branham