Staff Writer Patrick Do talks about his experiences in the Land of Chaos Online

LOCO: Evolution has done a lot over the last year to stand out in an increasingly crowded sea of lookalikes. The free-to-play Multiplayer Online Battle Arena game released by Alaplaya has recently undergone a series of changes, both cosmetic and functional. I’ve been playing the game for a week now; here is what happened to me in the Land of Chaos Online.

Upon booting up the game, I was instantly taken to the central city of Arhonnas. Arhonnas is a new addition to the game and will act as a hub for players to meet up and interact outside of battle. This is where you will find a plethora of MMO style quests and achievements.  I’ve logged into the city on five different occasions and each time the city has been pretty well populated with players of all levels.

There are a lot of things to do in Arhonnas, and an onscreen arrow is there help you find your way. It’s here that you’ll be able to upgrade and forge equipment at the Blacksmith’s, store your items at the bank, or even purchase a pet. Put plainly, the system works.  Alaplaya worked hard to streamline the entire process and reduce the barrier to entry that exists in many MOBA games.  There’s a completely revamped tutorial system that explains the frantic mechanics of the game quite nicely and I found it extremely simple to navigate the large city, find quests and interact with other players.

The bank feature is one that a lot of players will be thankful for, as the system works across your entire account rather than for just one character. Players will be able to move rare weapons and items between characters without relying on a second person to hold an item. Those of you old enough to remember the criminally underrated MMO Redmoon will know exactly how frustrating this system can be.

The lobby system that LOCO players may be accustomed to is still in use and can be brought up with a single stroke of the “L” key. Finding an open game was an easy enough task but finding a balanced game at level one was a bit of a pain. Players will frequently leave games if they see too many low level players, and high-level players will join games and throw the balance off. However, this is a problem symptomatic of the genre itself rather than LOCO, and it’s a problem that rectifies itself as you get better; but because Alaplaya made so many long strides toward making the game more accessible to new players, it would have been nice to see a slightly more elegant matchmaking system put in place.

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