The fantasy future setting is ruined by awful gameplay and bugs
RF Online is a Korean styled MMO, which generally favors old school grinding as opposed to innovation. This certainly appeals to the Asian continent, on which this game is proclaimed a virtual king, but the reception in the US has been chilled with due cause. It's not that other games don't have a harsh grind, but the process is so pronounced in RF Online that it consumes all that is good.
The setting is fantastic, with a war against machines, magicians, and elves that use robots and magic over the rights to mine precious resources. The gameplay is geared towards the player becoming high level enough to fight for the right...to paaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrty. The only thing standing between you and the pvp element is the Antichrist of grinds, armed to the teeth with constant slowdowns in your journey.
Normally, when a game crashes, I brush it off and restart. When it's happening every half hour to a hour, and freezing your computer, then I start to take notice. Like the squid that lives in your BMW, it's always in the back of your mind, no matter how much you want to ignore it. In addition, I experienced an odd bug, a random switch of keybinds from one thing to another. It only happened for a few functions, but since the game doesn't give you the option of looking at the keyboard functions and figuring what goes where.
The graphics are pretty utilitarian, with the bright point being the robot designs. They look and are animated exquisitley, which is fantastic, but it also unintentionally highlights the poor job done with other models. The backgrounds, landscapes, and architecture are pretty mediocre as well.
The sound does an adequate job of rendering bleeps and bloops of a futuristic war, though there isn't anything partiuclarly exceptional. The music is by far the outstanding element, with a score that can excite, create tension, or mystify.
There is no adequate way to quantify the irritation with this game considering how much I wanted to enjoy it, but since Codemasters is offering a 10-day trial currently, you have a no risk assessment of whether or not you want to fork out 50 bucks with 15 a month for a game that is pretty run of the mill.