[Register now] I am really impressed by Age of Wushu thus far, with content after content patches for the China server. Launching on 10th April for the North America server, Age of Wushu is a level-less MMORPG, where characters are not decked out in crazy armors to stay true to the wuxia settings.
The main upcoming content is the introduction of factions. These are not similar as the schools such as Shaolin or Wudang, but players can still join them. For clan-less players, they can immediately join these factions. For players attached to a school, there are 3 ways to join the new factions.
1. School betrayal – No introduction needed, a series of quests to GTFO from your current school, with all previous school skills wiped out.
2. Wanderer – Apply for permission to go wander about while still attached to the school, with many more and longer quests to complete. According to the final results at the end of joining a faction, the player’s school skills may be affected.
3. Facial surgery disguise- Known as “仪容术”, which means changing one’s look, a common feature in wuxia movies. This will cause all school skills to be locked, not wiped.
There are 4 factions revealed thus far, and only 2 of them have details at this stage. Introducing 无根门 (Rootless Clan) and 移花宫 (Palace of Moving Flowers).
无根门 (Rootless Clan) – According to the official teaser, this faction only accepts ball-less characters. Yes, castrated, eccentric male characters. The description says that there is a unique skill, where 5 of the faction’s players can unleash a skill to “control” another player… I am not sure if females can join, so stay tuned.
移花宫 (Palace of Moving Flowers) – This faction only accepts pretty female characters who have never wed before. What is considered as “pretty” then? During character creation, there is some gauge to measure the “prettiness” level, from height of nose to position of eye brows. It is not stated if this gauge is visible to players.
Age of Wushu will also see a vastly upgraded weather, seasons and time system in the upcoming updates. There will be small rains, big rains, thunderstorms, sandstorms and more. For time wise, 1 month in the actual real world will be equivalent to a year in Age of Wushu.
Day system – Dawn, morning, noon, dusk, night (there is eclipse as well!)
Seasons and weather will affect other features as well, such as the type of plants growing in the wild, the growth rate of plants (slower in winter or none at all) and even cause fire skills to deal lesser damage during winter and other related skills to increase in damage.
There is more! With this active environment upgrade, powerful NPCs will make their appearances, sandstorms will reveal previously-hidden ancient ruins. These ruins are explorable! With all these unpredictable changes, a player might be the lucky one to obtain a miracle quest, learning some unique and awesome skills.
Dating system – This is different from in-game wedding. Online players can choose an offline player he or she likes, and through several quests to build a relationship. Both online and offline players will get massive bonuses, with a feature to battle together. Players can choose to continue building upon this relationship before logging off.
Other features in discussions include cross-server guild vs guild, a good and evil karma system, managing an actual shop and more. Of course, all these might change when entering development phase, but don’t they all sound awesome?
