Online, Offline, What's The Difference? A Quick Look At The Spire Horizon Online Demo

Today's Next Fest demo is an MMORPG called Spire Horizon Online. Note that "Online". It's important.

I just had to re-write my whole opening monologue because it was a riff on how, surely, we don't need to add "Online" to the names of games any more because pretty much all of them are, only to discover there are in fact two versions of this, one of which is not.

There's an open-world RPG called Spire Horizon that's already available on Steam and then there's this one, which is an MMORPG version of the same game, due to launch in December. I now realize I have been conflating the two since I first heard about the demo. I apologize for any confusion - not that anyone's picked me up on it yet.

The original is the game that one reviewer on Steam claimed was a now-abandoned student project from a single developer. The same reviewer also added, snidely, that the project must have received a failing grade. That seemed credible at the time. If true, it certainly wouldn't be the only student project on Steam. I've played a couple.

As soon as I logged into the game, though, it began to seem extremely unlikely. So I checked and the single developer part is true, which is both surprising and impressive when you see what they've achieved, but I find it very hard to imagine it was done for a student project.

The demo opens with an impressive four and a half minute long movie that would look entirely in place fronting an AA game. AA games don't exist any more, apparently, and I'm not sure I know exactly what they were they did but if they were anything like I imagine then this would have been just the sort of movie they'd have opened with.

Don't take my word for it. Here it is. It's well worth a watch even if you have no intention of playing the game.

It's lucky it's on YouTube because in the demo it glitched and jumped all over the place and I missed a lot. I could tell it was good from the bits I did see but it wasn't until I watched it on YouTube that I realised just how good. 

It wasn't the best of beginnings, technically speaking. I don't know if the juddering and skipping was down to the only available server being in "Asia" or some issue with my own internet connection, which hasn't been at it's best of late, but it made me expect the worst going into the game itself.

And things certainly weren't perfect. There were quite a few more problems. Some might have been bugs - there's a card at the start warning that the demo is "unfinished" and may contain "various bugs or issues". Most of the issues I encountered, though, like quest widows not closing properly or certain buttons not responding, could have been caused by connection issues or lag. 

Whatever the cause, there was nothing to make the demo unplayable or even to stop it being fun, which it was. I played for an hour and would happily play more if I'd had the time. There's a lot of promise here and no small amount of pleasure to be had in what's already there, although I think there's a deal of work to be done yet if the game is going to meet its proposed December 2024 launch date. 

I have wishlisted it anyway, not that that means I'll buy it. It definitely has potential. Plus it's really weird in the right kinds of ways and that's something I always like to encourage.

Here are some things that I found unsurprising about it

• It's a medieval fantasy world, all castles and keeps and greensward everywhere.
• It has lots of Kill quests and not just Kill Tens either. More like Kill 15 of three different mobs.
• It has levels and classes you gain XP by doing quests and killing stuff.
• The classes include Fighter, Priest, Sorceror and Assassin
• There are mounts including some that fly.
• There's gear and upgrades and loot.
• It plays like an MMORPG from maybe fifteen years ago, one of the lesser-known ones like Argo or even NeoSteam.

Here are some that I wouldn't necessarily have expected

• The player character is a skeleton. Hair optional.
  
• You never really get to wear any clothes. Or have a face.
• The plot revolves around your character's search for his lost friend.
• The friend is a capybara.
• Classes include MuayThai, Boxer and Musketeer.
• You get a mount and wings for free, almost at the start.

Graphically, it's lovely to look at it. The colors are rich and vibrant, the scenery is attractive and for once everything is bright and cheerful. The UI is well designed and pleasant both to look at and to use. I particularly like the font used and the borders are elgant and stylish. It's one of the more tasteful yet friendly-looking UIs I've seen in a while.

The whole game feels a bit like that -tasteful and friendly - or I should say the demo does. I imagine things get a little less cozy later on. It's explained in one of the quests that there's a protective barrier around the area keeping the really bad monsters out, so the local monsters are fairly tame. All told, it feels like a nice place. You wouldn't turn down a weekend break there, if you won one in a raffle.

Gameplay is exactly what you'd expect. Speak to an NPC, do something for them, get referred to the next, ad infinitum. Combat felt more like an ARPG than an MMORPG, with mobs coming in large numbers and respawning almost instantly. Button mashing worked for me. 

Most of the time, anyway. It is quite possible to get out of your depth, esspecially if you run out of healing potions. Of course, that's just in the starting zone. I imagine everything gets a lot tougher later on. 

The writing is... I want to say decent. It's better than functional, anyway. The NPCs have some flavor and the prose style doesn't jar. The translation is solid, assuming it has been translated. I'm basing that assumption on the location of the server. I have no knowledge of where the developer, Mendoka, is from.

I did very much like the central conceit of what I guess we're calling the Main Story Quest these days. Playing a character whose one and only motivation is to search the world for his lost friend seems like something that hasn't been done to death in the genre and it makes a refreshing change from Only You Can Save The World or I Just Woke Up And I Don't Know Who I Am. That said friend is the world's largest rodent just adds to the fun.

I don't have an awful lot more to say about this one except that I'm not entirely sure why it needs to be an MMO. I didn't see much in the short time I played to indicate what potential for grouping or raiding or even trading there might be although I did see quite a lot of other players running around. Then again, you wouldn't really expect to see much in the way of co-operative activity in the starting zones of any MMO these days so maybe that all comes later.

I suspect I might prefer to play the RPG, anyway. It's very cheap, it has good reviews and it's right there, right now if you want it.

 I'll be keeping an eye on the MMORPG all the same. As I said, I feel it has potential. It certainly felt at least as well-constructed as some I've played, games that have had far more attention, naming no names. (Okay, Palia springs immediately to mind. Crowfall, even. I'm not entirely sure either of those felt orders of magnitude more polished, let alone finished but they certainly received orders of magnitude more column inches.)

File under very much worth a look if you like this kind of thing.