Xhodon Review: You Get Yourself a Palace for Free
By Vincent Haoson (Vincenthaoson), OnRPG Journalist
Xhodon is a browser-based MMOG that puts you in the shoes of a magician who has been provided a palace to rule, which is believed to come from a forgotten kingdom. The game is the usual browser strategy resource building game set in a mythical world.
First Impressions
Upon starting my Xhodon experience. The game starts off in the usual MMOG manner, providing you the tutorial, which teaches you the game basics. You are introduced to a world that has shifted in your favor after a dragon provides you with its egg, which transforms into a palace that belongs to you.
After getting your bearings, you are then tasked to establish your own rule through the tree of life that the dragon egg provides you. You are given the beginning armies to serve at your beck and call and from there you are then left to your owndevices.
Establishing Your Rule
In Xhodon, the way you build your structures is by conjuring them into the tree of life. For a certain amount of time you are given newbie protection where you are safe from harm from other magicians. Hopefully during the time frame you establish yourself enough that you can protect yourself from invaders.
Xhodon has all the things you need in a game like this. It has a diplomacy tab, which is Xhodon’s Guild system and provides you information on guilds that you can join. Through this tab you can create your own guild if you have enough resources. As usual you can collect resources either through invading or enhancing your resource gathering structures, which then earn you resources in every tick, which is Xhodon’s version of time. Each tick corresponds to five minutes of our time and each act is connected to it.
Heroes
Being the magician that rules your realm, you don’t go out into battle so you have heroes to go out and beat the stuffing out of creatures or other magicians around your land. Your heroes can level up and you can even allocate points to their stats and enhance their racial bonuses to make them more effective in battle.
The one thing Xhodon doesn’t let you dofor your heroes is equip them with items. All the equipment your heroe may gather during attacks is only useful to your magician. In fact if you look into the connection between your magician and your heroes I can say that it is quite similar to the connection between Saruman and his Orcs in Lord of the Rings (Movie and Novel). The units rely on their innate strength and numbers while the magician provides remote boosts that enhance their battle prowess.
The heroes you choose in Xhodon are more like “captain” units that lead your creatures. These units can be named and depending on which race you choose is either a defensive or offensive unit. I like how Xhodon keeps the hero stats simple so that you don’t have to think hard on which kind of hero you need to pick out. The game provides you with enough hero types that youhave no problem which hero to choose to fit your game strategy.
Battles
With Xhodon being a browser-based MMOG, it is already a given that battles are more text-based and static compared to flash-based MMOGs. Creature battles also don’t happen instantaneously and are really dull if you don’t have anything else to do.
I can say that while Xhodon’s battles are not that innovative or genre defining, it can be an MMOG to tide you over during the boring hours at work. With the game being text-based you can play it easily on any PC because as it’s not so resource expensive for computers. The game also doesn’t require you to pay close attention every minute, especially if your structures are in the higher tiers of the structure tree.
Socialization
Xhodon is not all battles and wars however, the game promotes socializing between players. There’s a pretty obvious chat box that appears whenever you log into the game and it allows you to talk real time to players and even some game staff.
While it is a pretty nifty game feature it’s also obstructive especially if you want to concentrate on your game for the time being. The game does allow you to change the height of the chat box or even close it so that it won’t be much of an eyesore.
Liking the chat box is an acquired taste really and even after seeing it there for quite some time it still makes me want to close it every time I log in. However during the boring moments of waiting for my attacks to happen or the moments where I’m waiting for the structure improvements to be finalized the chat box was my companion and made the game more engaging for a short while.
Conclusion
All in all, Xhodon is not an impressive browser-based MMOG. However, it does provide a good alternative to spend the boring hours at work. The game does provide decent enough game play so you never really care about the lack of innovations. Of course I’ve set the standards high for this game because there have been a lot of MMOGs in the same genre which are pretty engaging.
Xhodon, is more of an MMOG which requires time before it becomes good enough to make you want to log on and play for the rest of the day. The problem with that is that most people don’t like these types of games and prefer games that engage you from the start. Players are used to browser games that you can join and leave in a heartbeat and Xhodon isn’t like that. If you are the type who is patient enough and doesn’t mind dull moments then Xhodon is the game for you.
