New F2P Title on Steam: Rusty Hearts

Rusty Hearts appeared on Steam today, adding another Free to Play title to Steam's range.
The game just opened its Beta phase to everyone and is still in development.

Rusty Hearts is a multiplayer online game with fast-paced and highly-stylized brawling combat combined with a solo or team-based dungeon exploration experience. In this gothic inspired world of vampires, half-vampires, and humans, players will be able to unleash devastating combo attacks, engage in a wide variety of epic monster battles, collect valuable loot, and become a unique hero.

Sounds not too bad, huh? Let's take a closer look!


I quite enjoyed the character selection screen, felt somehow nice and atmospheric. However, my character of choice isn't done yet, meaning I can't pick gunslinger Natasha yet. Disappointing, but can't help that. I'd rather have the developers steadily add content to a free to play title than throwing out all there is from the start and leaving it to die.

After a slight disappointment that my character of choice is not ready yet, I started out with Angela Strraugend, who seems to be a witch apprentice and focusses on close combat and magic.
The tutorial felt quite enjoyable, albeit short. The video sequences were fun, the character interaction interesting and atmospheric.
Graphics-wise I have seen better, but Rusty Hearts seems true to its unique style and that counts more than the polygon count after all.

The gameplay seems captivating enough to make me want to explore the game more. I'll make sure to use my DualShock2 for Rusty Hearts, though, since I can't help but think it was intended that way.
Slaying monsters, picking up items, earning experience and completing the tutorial after watching a really intriguing cutscene and the promise of getting even more stuff like that with coop buddies made me drag Alkaid into the game as well. She has not started yet, but I'm sure she'll have more fun than with Spiral Knights.

The character creation might seem dull to some, due to being limited to only 3 characters as of now, which all have their set rolls in the plot, but don't be mistaken - there's a lot of room for customization in the game.
Either paying cash for fashion or helpful things from the store or finding materials to craft these nice shoes you've seen somebody wearing, you'll be able to modify your appearance a lot.

Sadly, the cash shop seems a bit expensive, but it's gotten cheaper overall throughout the game's development. Costumes are now permanent purchases rather than overpriced stuff you could rent for a month, due to heavy protests from players. This surely gives an impression of how feedback is being handled.

The developers' presence on the Steam Forum is also quite encouraging, especially with the comments they're making - these guys got humor!

Sadly, regional restrictions might hit you, and your characters are bound to the server you start them on, alongside your cash-purchases, which quite honestly sucks. Let's hope they'll rethink that and open your lockers to all servers after having paid once.


Of course, these are only the initial impressions I got from playing the game's first 30 minutes and looking around (mostly checking outfits...), combined with things I came across reading the official and steam forums, but it's a start.

Alkaid and I will take a look under the surface asap, slaying monsters side by side.
We'll keep you updated, sharing our thoughts on Rusty Hearts and will in time hopefully be able to present a real "review" of our experience.

For more information or diving right into the game, please check out the Rusty Hearts Website and the Steam Storepage.
Please take note that aside from Steam, you'll need a separate "Perfect World" account. That account can be used for other F2P games by Perfect World Entertainment as well, so even if Rusty Hearts might not satisfy you, it won't be completely useless.
Steam is not necessary, but surely beneficial and also awards you with promotional items if you choose to start this week.