Juggernaut Review

Juggernaut has a presentation style that reminds me of a favorite early online service game from back in the pre-Internet era (read: old-school Prodigy/AOL-type online services) in several different ways and means, but with a MMORPG twist. You start by setting up your avatar (thus setting up your account with it), then you have to read through a series of prompts and select your responses to a series of point-and-click questions. Only when you reach your first battle (which also includes a degree of point-and-click to select your intended target) does the game begin in earnest, at which point you can select the Unity plugin or a standalone client (read: playing in your browser or a traditional client app). This is one of the more unique aspects of Juggernaut -- you don’t actually have to play the game from within Chrome, Firefox or any other browser if you don’t wish to do so. You’ll also have to going back to your point-and-click NPC conversations every now and then, albeit only when you query another NPC for the next available quest series, or upon reporting in from a completed objective (which also comes with some automatic notifications when you’re work is due for you to report in on).

 

 

If you choose to play using the browser plugin, you’ll only be using it during battle; otherwise, you’ll be dealing with a standardized Flash-based monster selection screen or a HTML-based NPC conversation, which keeps the game requirements to a lower level of prerequisite overhead in relation to necessary plugin requirements. Once you have selected your desired target and have entered battle, you’ll have to deal with that one enemy which has shown up on your computer screen, usually by yourself at the beginning of the fight. That being said, it is possible for other players to help you out at any time by clicking an enemy that has crossed swords next to it, as can you if you wish to intervene in a fight -- which, by the way, is a very good way to return the favor to someone who gave you an intervention during one of your battles.

 

 

The catch is that it becomes quite necessary to intervene for someone else who is lower-leveled than you are, since any one of your hunting targets -- even so far as to challenge them during your training quests -- can be especially difficult to kill at lower levels, and may end up leaving you at the mercy of total defeat. Even when it comes to those excruciatingly difficult, nails-thick Hisser snakes that you have to fight at very low levels, you’ll be up for a serious fight; and that’s even when you’re challenging a level two monster, for all that’s worth!

 

Just make sure that you’re prepared for some lost in translation moments, however; Juggernaut, for all practicality, is entirely and completely independent from the majority of your typical jurisdictional limitations. Needless to say, the end result is what you’d expect from such an inherent lack of restrictions: one minute you’re battle description may be written in plain English, the next you’ll literally be reading that same description off in German! This is yet another part of Juggernaut that you simply cannot find in every single MMO game out there, and one which can literally bring the world’s population of MMO fanatics directly into the same online environment that you’re logged into.

 

 

 

Playing Juggernaut using the client option follows a similar approach to playing within your web browser,

partly due to its use of the Firefox browser engine to provide its game presentation services. There is one major difference, however; as with other MMO client apps, Juggernaut gets its rendering files, graphics and other core necessities (including periodic client updates) straight from the Juggernaut website as usual before dropping them straight onto your hard drive in advance of starting the game itself. Theoretically speaking, playing Juggernaut while using this method should up the pacing of your game sessions; however, your actual performance will more than likely be fast enough already with the latest PC systems -- though you just might get a slight advantage during battle, since enemies take a few seconds to load up in the battle sequence plugin upon your first battle against that particular foe when logging in and playing through your web browser.

 

 

The client does take quite a long time in downloading the latest available content, however -- and that counts double upon your first launch of the client app to begin with -- so it’s definitely worth keeping that in mind when opting for the standalone client. In fact, the download process for your initial playthrough can easily take well over the bare minimum of a full hour and then some -- especially if you’re using a laptop PC connected to a 3G Ev-DO network connection or similar (as tested over Verizon Wireless data services via mobile hotspot functionality). The obvious end result is that you can very easily run into a few billing surprises if you only pay for the minimum level of data allowances (even if you have the faster LTE services in your area). I definitely recommend that whenever possible, you should connect to your DSL/Cable services over a direct Ethernet or Wi-Fi router connection; or even make a periodic connection to a nearby public Wi-Fi network, any one of which can easily be located in virtually any place that you can possibly think of -- including your nearest public library, Starbucks, McDonald’s, etc.

 

 

I did occasionally run into a few other surprises during my playtests, however. For one thing, I had an occasional (and rather problematic) delay in the appearance of a monster within the battle sequences -- an issue that occasionally left me with a “battle has ended” message popping up before even having an opportunity to fight the monster itself, resulting in both a necessary page reload and one excessively cheap death (or three). However, the issue did clear up after my Internet connection had been active for a while, and roved to be little more than a surprisingly rare glitch at that. Another surprise that I wasn’t expecting is that you don’t have the option to use any purchased weaponry from the store located in the game’s starter village until you’ve gained a few levels, which itself feels like an unnecessary limitation since it forces you to use kicks and punches to fight until you’ve trained enough levels in order to meet the requisite qualifications. Additionally, the only variety in attack methods that I saw was a choice between attacking the enemy on the left or right side, or directly in the front -- with all of it being melee strikes only. That being said, one notable place where Juggernaut doesn’t skimp out is with the inclusion of a clan factions system -- meaning that you can organize your personal allies into a coordinated group, much as with guild functionality in other MMO games.

 

 

All things considered -- including all of these surprising elements, whether good or bad -- I was pleasantly and greatly impressed with Juggernaut. The level of attention that has been given to every single detail is of quite an inherently top-notch level of quality, and the presentation is just as pleasing in retrospective means. Despite some of the more oddball situations that may occur (including the excessively occasional instances of untranslated text, which thankfully only shows up when entering a battle intervention) the game plays exceptionally well, and holds up to all of the important MMORPG standards, even with its unconventional form and function. I would highly recommend Juggernaut to anyone who would be interested in something outside of the ordinarily typical, same as usual MMORPG format.