Cabal Online Review: Too much action
By Kei Beneza (dividelife), OnRPG Journalist

Cabal Online is a fast paced, combat oriented 3D MMORPG developed by ESTsoft, a company in South Korea. Just as all of its trailers suggests, Cabal Online sports a superior combat system that gives players an action-packed Dragon Ball-ish fight never to be seen in other MMOs. You could say that they were right when they said this was The Revolution of Action. With big monsters, a whole lot of light effects in each skill, excellent PVP, and more moves, this game is a benchmark for combat systems. Cabal Online is a grindfest (just to clear it up), and the only thing you will probably do is KILL KILL KILL. Not that I mind the whole grinding thing as we’re probably used to it by now, especially since Cabal presents this outdated leveling feature with such style.

Let Me in on The Action!

The game has 6 classes all in all, each with their own unique playstyle.

Create a character

The Warrior: much as its generic name suggests, the Warrior is a hardcore melee character that uses brute force and crushing damage with his overgrown two-handed weapons. The Warrior can also be a promising tank as he has tons of HP to go around.

The Wizard: Wizards in Cabal are no different from their other MMO counterparts. They still have low HP (in fact, it’s the lowest in the game), a whole array of spells, and an awesome damage output, making them quite dangerous when engaged from a distance.

The Blader: Like Rogues, Bladers are dual wielding warriors who can also deliver a decent amount of damage through small but lightning fast styles while evading and effectively defending against the enemy.

The Force Archer: I’m not really sure why they had to put the Force part, but Force archers are much similar to your generic MMO Archer. They attack from a distance, add effects to their arrows, and are quite deadly when ignored. They also have a decent amount of HP, allowing them to survive close encounters that are fatal to mages.

The Force Shielder: The Force Shielder serves as the main tank in the game. They don’t necessarily provide the highest damage output, but greatly make up for it through their epic and immovable stature. They also have an array of magic that compliments their ‘tank and spank’ playstyle, allowing them to best anyone in cross counters.

The Force Blader: Force Bladers are technically just bladers who know a bit of hocus-pocus. They may not be as fast as regular Bladers, and have spells as deadly as that of Mages, but being a hybrid of both makes still makes him deadly on the battlefield.

Attack of the Clones – in different shapes, colors, and sizes

As far as character customization is concerned, Cabal Online lacks a lot options when it comes to customizing your character’sappearance. As far as I remember, I saw six clones upon logging in for the first time and a whole army of doppelgangers later on. The game also has a small line up of armor sets, which brings a feeling of uniformity among players. Some of the armor sets also look similar to one other with only the color (and some microscopic details) as its basis of inferiority or superiority (lame).

Grind grind grind

Grind! Yes! GRIND!

When it comes to grinding, I can say that Cabal Online should be at the very top of the list. Aside from the usual grind for leveling, the game also makes you grind twice as much to earn skill points (currency for purchasing new skills). Players can earn skill points by spamming their skills throughout the game, constantly performing tons of combos to at least remove the linearity of things. The stylish skills do compensate for the repetitive gameplay, but do know that the fun brought about by amazing light effects will lose its spark as you continue to execute it throughout the game.

So much for Exploration

What I really hate about Cabal is its limited and dull way of exploration. The maps in the game are small, making it quite hard to avoid high-level monsters when dealing with lowbie ones. It’s also quite easy to lure unwanted monsters, as there’s not enough space to separate you and your target from the rest of the spawning critters. It’s indeed troublesome, and can work to your disadvantage when unprepared. A few spaces between monsters would be nice, especially when you have tons of players logging in. As far as the map is concerned, I hate it.

Combo-tastic

Perhaps one of Cabal Online’s most commendable features is the Combo System. The Combo System allows players to link their spells by timing their execution with the time bar on the top portion of your screen, allowing them to gain extra damage and bone crunching numbers as they continue to grind their way to higher levels. This is definitely a nice way of presenting the grind factor, as it is both challenging and enjoyable when trying to land a perfect combo.

Combo moves in Cabal

Lights! Sounds! Revolution of ACTION!

If you were to ask me, Cabal Online’s graphic engine isn’t exactly the best one out there; however, they did manage to make the most out of everything, providing players with a well lit world filled with magical effects and lightning fast combat. I guess it’s a good example of the saying “It’s all about how you use your tools” lol. Cabal’s visuals are breathtaking, which compliments their combat system further. Like I said, style serves as an important medium in MMORPGs, and Cabal Online fails to disappoint.

Despite the awesome visuals and stunning light effects, Cabal’s music and soundeffects are really poor. First of all, the background music is completely annoying as it loops continuously throughout your journey. Each map has its own BG music, which is pretty catchy when you first hear it— until you realize that it was the same thing you’ve been hearing since level 1. The sound effects are dull and fail in presenting the full impact and crunchiness of the visual hit. Since Cabal Online IS the Revolution of Action, you’d probably expect the sound effects to be a bit more brutal; however, they give us TUKs and TAKs instead of BOOMs and BAMs.

Cute Pet in Cabal

The Verdict

Cabal Online isn’t really so bad. It still does have the right to call itself the Revolution of Action, but that’s a bit too much ACTION for an MMO don’t you think? It’s really fun at first (around level 1-50), until you realize that you’ve been doing the same thing over and over again. I guess the biggest problem with this game is its repetitiveness; however, I can say that this game is still worth playing.

The Good:
– Tons of skills
– Total NONSTOP action
– Great presentation of combat.

The bad:
– Super Grindfest
– Limited armor sets and customization
– Annoying music
– Small maps.