Fantasy Earth Zero - In Depth Game Guide

This is the new game (USA) Fantasy Earth Zero. It was known as Fantasy Earth: Ring of Dominion in Japan 3 years ago. Developed by Fenix Soft and published by Square-Enix (best known of course for their Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest franchise).

The game lacked demand on Japan and was canceled by Square-Enix, it was later then absorbed by Gamepot which had better success. One main reason why Fantasy Earth Zero was better off with Gamepot is because it was turned into a Free to Play MMORPG instead of Pay to Play by Square-Enix. Being a Free to Play MMORPG has its ups and downs, but this game is offering a 50v50 PvP feature and players will be spending most of their time on the battle ground. Naturally, you need a LOT of players, so having Fantasy Earth Zero as a Free to Play MMORPG was a great idea to add a lot of players.

Features of FEZero (Fantasy Earth Zero) are

Controls: Uses WASD controls and has no automatic aim. yey! Excellent! I'm sure a lot of people are happy about this, including me. This is what I look for first in every MMORPG. It's skill based and is NOT a click to move game.

Grinding: Since it's a Japanese Game, most people would ask if it's a hardcore grinding MMO. From what I could gather, it depends. You can either go on PvE and Quest/Grind your way to level 40 cap or you can keep on doing Kingdom VS Kingdom Battles which of course gains you EXP and points for newer and better items.

Hyper-Active Battle System: Like what was said earlier. Players will be spending 85% of their time on battle fields (territories) defending or doing sieges. Fantasy Earth Zero offers an action-strategy based battle system where players will not just fight against each other but also fight against enemy Archer Towers, destroying Castles, building Warcrafts (a kind of outpost) and much more.

Wait... is that a Scythe?! Yes, this game has scythe weapons...

The NPCs that you will see on the battle field are the buildings. Knights (anti-siege/fast units), Giants (siege tanks), Wraiths (anti-unit/player), Chimera (heavy-siege/super unit), Dragon (same as Chimera) - are all individual player controlled, you turn yourself into them. These are called summons. Of course, everyone want's to be Wraiths but killing players isn't the only method of winning. Also, you need Crystals and a certain building to meet the requirements to make a Summon.


Territorial War: The game map is huge. It is composed of 5 Kingdoms which is of course ruled by 5 different Rulers.

The Kingdom of Netzawar

• Ruled by: Lion King Huenkel
• Bio: Turned into Human-Lion form by a witch. Rules the whole Victorian Continent. Kind and compassionate, but turns opposite on the battle field, ruthless and ferocious.
• Just for Fun: I call this the land of the Narnia Fans. lol

The United Kingdom of Cesedria

• Ruled by: The Elf Queen Tiffarith
• Bio: A pacifist and thinks that war is unnecessary and think only of it as the last option. She has a loyal guardian called Win-Bane.
• Just for Fun: kek, an Elf Kingdom. If you like Legolas or Elves in general, then this Kingdom is for you. The name Tiffarith... Tifa Lockheart - Aerith Gainsborough combination? hrmmm you Square-Enix you...

The Gevrandian Empire

• Ruled by: Emperor Lyle Geburand
• Bio: Ruler of the whole Stricor continent, forged from hundreds of wars. Brash and confident(prick). However, contrary to his *Evil Looks, he wants to bring true equality. Just like Chen Daoming of China in Hero (epic Jet Li movie), he wants to conquer all the land and unite the people.
• Just for Fun: *Long white hair with a "generic anime villain" looks like Sephiroth, Virgil (Devil May Cry), Griffith (Berserk), Sesshomaru (Inu Yasha) etc

The Kingdom of Yelsord

• Ruled by: King Niass "Duke of Yelsord"
• Bio: Knowledge is Power. Ruler of the land of mages and scholars. His rule brought about balance and power on the Pedestal Continent. Those that are under him wants to expand the Kingdom's domain; King Niass watches the plans for expansion and is eager to spread knowledge to the world.
• Just for Fun: More like Albus Dumbledore, Harry Potter Fans might want to go here.

The Kingdom of Hordaine

• Ruled by: The charismatic Queen Wadritte Belkstein Hordaine (what a long name)
• Bio: Hot tempered, charismatic and young. Controls the whole Oreole continent. She unites and calms the local residents and inspires them to help her fight and conquer the lands around their Kingdom.
• Just for Fun: Is that pure bewbs or just padding? Well, I know for sure that the anime art is hot. Maybe that's why she's "charismatic". Reminds me of Clare (Claymore) or Joan of Arc.

Character Customization
Unlike S.U.N (Soul of the Ultimate Nation, a very promising MMORPG but fatally lacks character customization), Fantasy Earth Zero provides more options to customize your character. You can choose the type of hair, face, eyes and even height.

Classes
It only has Three Classes. Bummer right? However, the classes are customizable in which you can choose which will be your specialty. Later, Cestus and Fencer classes will be available.

• Warrior - The meat-shield and powerhouse of the party. You can either be Two-handed wielder or a Sword and Shield Warrior. Two-handed warriors deal massive damage and good AoE attacks and Sword-Shield Warriors deals stuns and has of course heavy defense.

• Scout - The sly and annoying class. PKer's will mostly go for this class or will be over populated with it as in most MMORPGs do. (Damned Ninja Influence!) You can either be a Bow Scout or a Dagger Type. Scouts can hide and deal poison damage and other inflictions.

• Mage - The equally annoying class along with Scouts. Deals massive damage and is the bane of Warriors, like in most MMORPGs anyway. Has a variety of Elemental Spells which can either be Lightning, Fire or Ice.

Take note: Fantasy Earth Zero has "true" Paper Rock Scissor PvP mechanics. It has Damage Modifiers which goes like this: Warriors > Scouts > Mages > Warriors
Scouts will always deal small damage to Warriors and will always deal super damage to Mages. There is no OP class, which is good news.

Graphics
It's not that good. It's quite blocky, more like PSX/PS2 kind of graphics. If you're expecting an Aion-like or WoW-like graphics because of the minimum (exaggerated) System Requirements, then you'd be disappointed. However, if you're like me, uber-graphics isn't everything, but it shouldn't be left out too. Gameplay is more important. The exaggerated minimum requirements was for the smoothness and fluidity of the game once you get into a massive 50v50 Kingdom Battle.