Welcome back!
It finally comes time to enter the world! First, the loading screen. The bar at the bottom reveals more images as you load. Final Fantasy XI just has a "Now Loading.." in the corner of a black screen. Score one for Ryzom. The world shown here is Atys, a living world full of giant tree vines. Because of the movement of these, the weather is particularly unpredictable.


When you first join the game, you find yourself near a "Welcomer" - this NPC gives you a basic starter quest so you can get started quickly.


The first thing you might notice is that there's a LOT of windows. There's windows for everything, and there's even a multiple desktop manager to keep track of them all. You might accidentally try to use WASD to move but most of the keyboard (including those keys) are toggle-window buttons. So, arrow keys and we're off. Another thing is that it's raining right now. The occasional lightning blast distrubs the dark sky. It's worth noting that I turned up the brightness on these pictures so they aren't as dark (like any game it's taking screenshots of the frame buffer before gamma correction of my monitor/drivers - it doesn't look nearly as dark when you play)


The welcomer gives you a quest that first brings you to all the trainers in the main building (for these guys it's a big tree)...


Each one will point you to the next one. Eventually you're introduced to some other NPCs and you're sent back to the welcomer to gain a new part of the quest- this one depends on what category you choose to update.


The mission for "fight" he gives fighters is to kill a single suckling yubo. A defenceless herbavore, but still very dangerous. We set out to find one and.. wait, is that one?


Nope. Close though. Note: these guys killed me once.


While searching for a Suckling Yubo the rain cleared up, and I found the edge of the island. Don't worry, game version of me, I won't make you jump off. And, wait, what is that?


AHA!


Taste cold steel!


Or maybe you'd prefer a little acid?


Mission complete, I headed back to the greeter. On the way back, I notice one of Atys's vines far in the sky. Well, enough sightseeing, let's see how impressed Trigio Ciodi is with our fine job.


Well you didn't have to rub it in. He then gives you a quest to see a trainer and learn a new Action.


Namely, this one. It's an attack which deals more damage then the regular attacks but has drawbacks as well. After learning it, and accepting the next quest, I feel that's enough for today's session.


Well, that's it for today. I hope you enjoyed reading these first two parts of my journey into the Saga of Ryzom. Tommorow we'll cover one of the most unique aspects of Saga of Ryzom - the stanza-based ability system. See you then!