This town has no walls, unless you want to call some cobblestone sticking out from the ground a wall, then there is a really tiny wall. The closer I get to the town, the sparser it looks. The buildings aren’t very close to each other, and they all look shabby. The general impression I get from this town is that it doesn’t offer much to the world besides being the closest settlement to the spawn temple, but I guess there isn’t anything wrong about that.

This is practically just a big village! The “Holy Temple” which is where everyone seems to start out from in this game, doesn’t even look like it’s a well-maintained richly decorated building. Instead, it is half a ruin. However, it certainly is a lot more majestic looking compared to this little town. Again, the contrast between the town and the temple is crazy to me. In front of me is a normal medieval looking cobblestone village you’d probably see just about anywhere in this world. And just behind me is a massive temple! A temple which I would say is at least six stories tall, like the height of my apartment building which I’m in right now.

While entering this village, I’m still not sure if I can see any NPC characters or not. Since there are so many Players here, who are crowding around almost every building and object they find interesting, I can't see much of what's in front of me. All these Players seem to be either chatting to NPCs or just testing everything we can do in this game so far.

I’m starting to feel like this game has a critical flaw, from a new player’s perspective. This flaw could be especially problematic for people who rely on objectives to have fun in games. So... what’s there to do so far besides walk around? I’m sure that of the many Players are drawn into this game for the cool features this game promises, such as "governments!" and "economy!". But there are also many people, like me, who aren’t primarily interested in this game just for those things. I’m simply excited to play this amazing looking and performing game. But what would another person, who isn't interested very interested in certain features or the "feel" of the game, do here besides walk around, and continue exploring? I guess the question answers itself. I currently see many players following the main road into this little town, but I’ve also seen many others instantly wander away towards random directions into the grassy distance. Hopefully, the exploration aspects of this game live up to the expectations I and the community have. Since it seems that the key feature for this game which might be holding everything together, is the exploration and adventure opportunities Divine Mortality offers. Yet, from seeing and experiencing to what I have so far, I'm confident enough to say that this game will succeed in offering what it promises. At least for now.

Anyways, as I’ve entered this town, it looks like there are a lot more NPC characters around than I had expected. But most of them appear to be distanced away on the other side of a small river which this town sits next to. There is a stone bridge covering the crossing, so it should be easy to walk across but it doesn’t seem like the NPC characters are doing that. I can tell who an NPC character is and who isn’t since the NPCs are standing around more formally in one place. And when they are moving, their animation is gentler compared to how we player characters move around. Plus, they have different clothing on. Every player I’ve seen so far has been wearing either rags, a rob, or just a large t-shirt on them. I’ve been wearing a dark gray colored rob, it looks pretty heavy and itchy, so I’m glad that I can’t feel it myself. But the NPCs are wearing special villager clothing or some sort of light armor with crests and symbols on them.

In terms of what this town has to offer, I see a little blacksmith area and a couple granary buildings here. A couple general good shops, but nothing more. Yet unusually, there is a lengthy training field with dummies and targets for practice. This is established at the center of the town, and it extends all the way to the far end of this settlement. It seems like that place is a combat tutorial area. I’ll go there before crossing the river so that I can get the hang of the combat in this game.

There are many players at this training field who are practicing the combat mechanics in this game just like I’m planning to right now. It actually looks pretty cool seeing them move around and attack with their weapons, even though I’m just looking at them from a distance. I think the reason why it looks so cool is because those players must also be using VR controllers like I am. And so, they are actively physically moving their arms in real life and maybe because of that, their character’s body animation looks fluid since every attack is probably never the same exact animation. You can actually tell who is using VR controllers and who is not, because there is a difference in the fluidity of their model’s animation being displayed. I already know there are different levels of weight to each part of my character’s body. When I see only my character’s hands move, it looks like their hands are lighter than when my character walks or runs because their entire body’s weight is account for. So, I assume you could also feel the weight difference when swinging a weapon. Not in real life of course. This isn’t even unique to Divine Mortality since last decade some games had already implemented advanced physics like this one to their gameplay.

But when it comes to the way the combat system works in Divine Mortality, I’ve read that it’s solely unique to this game alone. It is a combination of VR gameplay and (I think this part is interesting) old school RPG dice rolls mechanics. I didn’t really understand why at first, but I think I just figured it out. After talking with Fate-Fan, she told me that they (the developers) wanted to widely integrate Divine Mortality with other devices, like popular consoles and the PC. So that more people are able to buy and player the game, instead of limiting it to only for those using VR controllers. I think what the developers have done is try to balance this game’s combat mechanics somehow. I’ll be fighting in this game eventually, so I’ll test out how the combat works right now.

I don’t see any weapon nearby, perhaps I could find one somewhere inside this training field.

Weapons Master: “Oi you! Are you trying to cross over the fence? Well, don’t do it. Even if you are a Divine Spirit.”

A raspy voice suddenly pointed at me.

I didn’t realize there was a dwarf man laying down on the ground beside a moderate sized round tent. I think this is an NPC. I probably could simply ignore him by turning around or moving ahead, because there is nothing stopping me from doing it. But I obviously should wait and listen to what he has to say, it is after all my first time talking to an NPC besides the AI version of Fate.

He points towards the field.

Weapons Master: “If you want to use the training field in the back, then first you’d need a practice weapon to use, right? Otherwise, I won’t have anyone, even a Divine Spirit, be punching the training dummies with just their fists like a fool.”

Ah, a dialogue box opened. There are only two response options available for me to choose. Either I “agree to his demands” or “disagree with his demands”, well…I don’t see why I would disagree unless I didn’t want to use the training field. So, I agree.

Weapons Master: “Very good then, tell me what would you like to use? A Light: beard axe, common spear, or a short bow? Looks like you’re a Dwelf, but at least you have some dwarf in ye, so I recommend the beard axe for you.”

I haven’t thought much about the skills and classes yet! I wanted to be a wizard ever since I created my character. But there doesn’t seem to be any magic related weapon for me to select…so. Sure, I guess I’ll go with the one-handed axe since it seems like a simple and effective weapon.

I pressed the “Beard Axe [ One Handed]” option.

Weapons Master: “Right you are, hold on a moment.”

He marches into the tent behind him and quickly marches out with the axe. I thought the tent was merely a prop design, but it seems to have an actual use in the world.

Weapons Master: “Here you are, now start training!”

A quiet ding sound was made as soon as I was given the “beard axe”. At the bottom left of my screen, near the “friends” button, there is the inventory button. It started to slowly glow after I received the weapon from that dwarf. Since I don’t have the axe in my hands right now, then it must be in my inventory- yup it’s here.

Ah! There is also that necklace from before. When I tap once at either of the two items in my inventory, it displays their uses and item description. The amulet is simply called “A Goddess’s Amulet”, which provides +1 luck. It says that this item was “imbued with the hopes of a goddess”. Though I have no idea what the +1 luck does. I don’t think the sources I’ve read online previously ever mentioned this attribute.

On the bottom right of my screen, near the health bar, there is another button which shows my character’s status and other detailed information. I’m looking at all the attributes and possible skills displayed right now…but there doesn’t seem to be any descriptive information about the concept of “luck” in this status window. Besides it existing. I wonder what luck increases, just the amount of loot gained? Or it influences some other factor in this game?

Whatever! Let’s just start swinging this axe. So, tapping once at the item in my inventor just displays its information, but then tapping twice on it offers me the option of equipping it either on my left or right hand. Right hand! And there it is, I can see that my character is holding an axe in their right hand. Moving my arm around, it now looks like my right hand is slightly heavier than before. Normally in many other VR games, stuff like this looks clunky. The weapon could be held at an odd angle or there could be a spazzy connection between the player’s controls and the item being held. But to me, it looks like I’m perfectly running a single player first person game on the computer. Meaning that, this game is continuing to impress me (as expected!) with the way it integrates everything together neatly.

To the left and right of me, I see other players swinging or shooting their weapons. There are even more people appearing at this area just like I did earlier. At least it’s slightly quieter and less densely crowded at this location compared to at the temple or nearby. I’m planning to leave this town as soon as possible because I feel like my ears will get too irritated surprisingly before my eyes do. Earlier while I was standing in the fountain just after descending into the Overworld, I did try to change my audio settings. But if I put it too low then everyone is too quiet, I want to be able to hear other people’s voices. So of course, I raised the volume up a bit higher but then it just somehow became even more annoying because everyone sounded like they were rapidly whispering. So, I decided to raise the volume for voice chat up even higher, and now it’s back to normal…meaning it’s still loud. No wonder some people quickly wandered away from the spawn temple in all directions instead of continuing to walk towards this town.

Ahhh… I’m too overwhelmed with emotions and thoughts that it feels like I won’t ever be able to simply play this game and enjoy it! Come on, let’s get a move on Amulet Pond!

Here goes nothing, watch out a crazy old Dwelf is ferociously swinging his beard axe!

-20…-25…-17…-16…-19…-23…-25…-26…-24

Yup, so that’s my damage output.

If I swing the axe from a top angle, then it deals the most possible damage I could produce right now.

If I swing the axe from the side, then it deals generally an average amount of damage.

If I swing the axe from below or thrust it, it deals the least amount of damage.

However, even if I try to swing the axe in a powerful motion or if I try to swing the axe while barely trying to deal any damage, then the damage range doesn’t really decrease or increase from before.

So, like I realized earlier, there seems to be a combination of both advanced VR physics and linear RPG dice-roll mechanics for the combat system in this game.

The game clearly acknowledges that dealing slashing/chopping damage from the top deals the most amount of damage, on average at least while using this beard axe. But the damage doesn’t change depending on what kind of animation is performed. As long as the axe touches the target from the top, it can constantly deal the same level of top angled damage. While, as long as the axe touches the target from a bottom angled direction, then it constantly does bottom level damage on average.

I guess this is the sort of balancing the developers introduced to Divine Mortality, where players from either the traditional PC mouse and keyboard or the specially designed VR control scheme, are both able to play the game more or less in a fair manner. But I’m pretty sure there are still certain advantages and disadvantages. Perhaps in VR it is faster to perform the attack animations and causing other types of effects rather than it is on a PC where the player has less control over the body motions of their character.

I do still want to be a wizard in this game, casting magic and stuff…but I do admit swinging this axe is really fun!