Brighter Shores First Impressions | New Player Experience 2024 | Early Access

[@WillEmmo]

Been checking out Brighter Shores since its early access release over the past few days and figured that i'd do a video covering my thoughts on it and what to expect at this early point in time. Expect this to be a bit of a one off type video on the channel, with me covering it mainly because its been made by some of the same guys who made the original Runescape (and i've played RS even longer than WoW)

[@naDalous]

I think Brighter Shores has a lot of potential. Right now, rather than adding new content, I think the game needs a lot of QOL updates. such as reducing the number of clicks to do activities, making the game slightly less grindy than it currently is, and updating the UI (As rn it looks like something from a 2010 Xbox Arcade game)

[@MysticStar_Blue_Swordsman]

This. I found it incredibly boring and tedious but it has potential

[@JSON_135]

The devs have been making small QoL updates. Today they even added the ability to navigate and move by the map

[@BloachismStrengthandFitness]

@@JSON_135 They added more qol and bug fixes today as well. Im expecting big things from the game in the future

[@leiferikson7052]

@@BloachismStrengthandFitness just added single click interaction today also so they been listening.

[@GoldRocketGamers]

Agree with you about the cooking, they need to make food useful in some way!!! Also yes left click drag to move camera annoys me Opacity slider for tiles is a super smart suggestion!

[@WingTzu343]

lmao when Willie was like "Imagine you step into outlands and you're level one and have to find new gear" - well okay, that's sorta how it was. You weren't level one per-se but relative to the boars and mobs you fought in hellfire, you essentially were. Unless you had crazy good epics from endgame raids, you largely replaced all your gear within the first zone, almost as if... you had to start all over again and find new gear. "Imagine your professions were back at level one". Again, they sorta were. At least in this example there WERE useful classic profession items early on into tbc, but again you had to level up the tbc-era professions anyway. I get what some people are saying about the choice, but honestly I don't think it's too far off from what most vertical-scaling MMOs have already done, just a slightly different coat of paint.

[@SimonRobeyns]

' Unless you had crazy good epics from endgame raids' which means you didn't. If you had decent end-gear you didn't need to replace it til far into TBC pre-heroic/raid

[@bcross15]

@@SimonRobeyns ^ exactly this. going into outland meant you kept your progression from vanilla. especially if you were in naxx gear. people are so quick to excuse brighter shores from making progression feel totally useless

[@Hightower-rc4fi]

I have no idea why he went with "lets go a different way than RS" when it was literally his game. Its like WillE says if it ain't broke don't fix. We need centralized banking, one-click for doing something, also while not mentioned too much the fact that every node is one-mat only is madness. I just want to chop trees while talking smack in chat and not have to focus click everything. You are very much correct, this game demands way too much attention for the type of game it actually is.

[@myerhq8307]

The socialization is this game is whats holding it back. It's stricted to the max 20 people in a room(if you or them don't walk/phase out because of it) and all social systems turned off by default. Weird design choices all around. Wasn't as skeptical as I am now but the mystery is driving me

[@TheCpadron19]

There's an area in episode 4 called the player's market. That's where trading is going to be.

[@mcfarvo]

Aka The Grand Exchange

[@Karalhovski1]

I agree with you about less clicks in skilling. But in combat, since you can't run from it and a miss click going through a zone can kill you, I think it's a good system as it is, maybe with some refinements. Especially if something negative comes with character dying. I think a good mechanic is to break the armour or something, especially because you lose it in another chapters. So it would make you get the best gear possible for that chapter again

[@sleepyz2z2]

The game seems okay for an early access release, but at the moment it's all just a grind for the sake of grinding or doing a handful of quests. At least in RS, your hard work led to accessing other more engaging activities like PKing, bossing, minigames and lots of cool quests.

[@ThisIsMyYouTubeAccount1]

I have faith in the creator. It would be sad to see him fail but I'll wait until more combat is added and see how he reacts to user feedback first.

[@sleepyz2z2]

@@ThisIsMyKZbinAccount1 The devs seem to be very consistent with how they're taking on feedback and pushing out updates. In keeping with the game only having recently entered early access, I'm sure that after a year the game will have addressed most of the concerns people have for it at present.

[@williammclaughlin412]

Cooking is a high profit activity, i earned 500 silver in about 3 hours and i was only level 30. Idk what it will eventually be useful for but right now it is at least useful for that.

[@fo-ef8qo]

potions stack, and you can equip healing potions, but not exp potions. dunno about offense potions yet

[@qrowing]

str pots stack and can be equipped as well

[@alexgmello]

one small change that I think it would help with all of the clicking would be to have the first menu option appear right under the mouse, instead of slightly to the side, this way you could just mash the mouse 1 and do the action

[@leiferikson7052]

they added single click today interactions and also you can move 2 map areas at a time now. using mini map to move.

[@alexgmello]

@@leiferikson7052 nice

[@marcinsarniak]

At the point in my life where I don't care about big raids and fights, this game looks just chill enough. ClickRPGs needed a new entry.

[@KingDennisJensen]

Definitely lots of potential. The offline xp grind is such an amazing feature tbh. Still Early Access, I can see this game being quite good in the future since its a passion project of the guy who made Runescape.

[@chadwickhjones]

I played UO, SWG and WoW at launch. Never heard of Runescape until 2024.

[@kAzinGaming]

I love the game, as you progress you get more synergies between episode skills. Some of the issues are surely being worked on, we already had multiple UI patches in a few days, let Gower cook.

[@whiteblaze34]

What the hell is with all the bots in this comment section?

[@Rathial]

I don't see any did WillE delete the comments?

[@alihorda]

welcome to youtube, they are in every single video

[@WillEmmo]

Happens on every video nowdays, KZbin usually purges them after a bit - can't see them this morning!

[@blakesimmons9655]

Dead internet theory

[@Xyoni_htklv]

They added the option do one-click actions.

[@GenghisKhanBruseySkyz]

I love it its a great game. Andrew Gower is a genius.

[@RollinDaBones]

This was a great video, thanks for putting it out there! Your criticisms are valid, and yes this game does have an audience! I'm excited to see its future, but actually find myself enjoying every piece of the game. Similar to your experience, I have just been going along for the ride, and trusting the process! I did find that a lot of the gripes I had with the controls and clicking through many menus has faded since the start of my journey. It's an interesting rythym when performing an action and being ready to perform the next by clicking the right button in the correct window at the right time. All things said, I would love to see you do some more content focused around OSRS! Looking forward to more fun videos. :)

[@MrXhukari]

I've jumped onto Brighter Shores as well, and similar to you, RS2 was the first MMO I played. I do like how this game is trying some new things out, and yeah some things don't have much point right now; like the Cooking you mentioned. But the talent involved here is the Gower brothers, I feel they deserve our trust for now, and hey, its an early access of an MMO. Things will be far from perfect!

[@lukienman]

Unfortunately they have broken a lot of trust just releasing the game in this state. Unfortunately it's just not fun, Andrew has done very little to address criticism outside of QoL, and their original plan has been to fully release in the next 6 months. Unless they can step back and admit that the game is as wide and shallow as an inflatable kiddie pool, its going to die. Its literally an par with a mobile game someone made by themselves, but you can't even play it on mobile. Hopefully they seriously address the issues and have an honest announcement or by the time leagues 5 rolls around the only people left playing it will be idling, but again there's no mobile capability. Its an embarrassment.

[@MrXhukari]

@@lukienman Are you aware of what an Early Access is? This is quite the norm for an Early Access game. And deadlines getting pushed back in the gaming industry is so very common.

[@Tolseren]

@@lukienman speak for yourself, you probably did not even play it for an extended period.

[@johnnobon]

This is a good review. I'm enjoying the game overall, but there are things that annoy me about it. However, seeing how lightning fast the team has been with receiving feedback and implementing fixes has been great to see and gives me a lot of optimism for it. I don't know if I will ever be into it compared to how I am/was into Runescape, but I am going to keep playing and see how it goes

[@daviddickson4936]

Hey just leaving a comment that an update was released today making many of the actions one click instead of multiclick including combat.

[@SimonRobeyns]

It doesn't really feel like an open world more like a board game with very few people around on each puzzle piece not sure why they would choose to go with this route is there even any PVP or any need for other players? Even in non-iron man mode there's little need to do anything with other people in OSRS, which is the thing i hate the most. It's the most single player mmo ever, everything you do is mostly on your own.

[@jensv874]

Playertrading will come as noted in the early game notes.

[@taylorsimounet5645]

I and so many others are just playing because we want to give Andrew a chance, and keep Wonder when it gets better. I can see this game dying pretty easily with how fast people move on, this wasn't ready for open early access.

[@Tolseren]

its 15-17k on steamcharts consistently. people did not just quit instantly like you are suggesting.

[@ashleyjrwatson]

great honest review

[@PeterPanbe]

Grinder Shores.

[@vicenine7689]

lot of potential but alot to invest into this game without knowing what will be added

[@bigswigs3659]

I predict this game will last about as long as new world

[@GoldRocketGamers]

Yeah they need to add 1 click actions, I'm sure it will come. Personally I'd love left click as default action (maybe customisable) and right click opens interaction menu.

[@djstikman991]

This reminds me very much of Neverwinter Nights 1

[@MeatTheGamer]

It is a worse experience. If you compare the two games. Might be able to compare it to runescape classic.

[@Dr_McKay]

Lobbies for 250GP?! STOP UNDERCUTTING ME

[@superleipoman]

sell rare black lobster

[@Yarsig]

"Brighter Shores could very well be a single player RPG with other people sharing the world." You sold me.

[@ToGoBox69]

So glad you made at least one video on this game. It has a lot of work to do but I’m loving it so far.

[@snackgames13]

click map to run

[@ashrasmun1]

To me, combat that involves completely no involvement and it's just watching numbers appear above two characters' heads is almost the most boring combat system one could ever implement in a modern game. I understand it's a thing of the past and people are nostalgic for something like that, but in 2024? Ugh... This looks like a mobile game.

[@xakiri4577]

why do people get so angry over a new game release

[@Tale_swapper]

It's in an odd space right now of very obviously missing content but still having 1000's of hours of skill grinding... But I don't know what I'm grinding for yet.... Hopes and dreams

[@AdventurousTherapy]

Thumbs down. Tried to skip ahead a bit and was slammed with an ad every time I clicked. 13 ads in a 17 minute video is ridiculous.

[@drackaris_]

Really enjoying the game! Been a nice distraction and a great chill game to play on my steam deck on the couch.

[@Hjortur95]

i think there's a huge space in gaming for "shared experience" games.

[@TitusCanatella]

people are reviewing this game WAY to early You have NO idea how these things play into the game as a whole it all fits in

[@KrackahLack]

I really miss the days where games just released in their finished state without a prolonged "Early Access" phase

[@garycannon2887]

At least the early access games are honest that they aren’t ready for full release yet.

[@fuxxxie]

Better than releasing in a unfinished state like games did between 2010 and now lol. Early access is still better than a fully released broken game, also, more games release full than there are early access games so idk where that even comes from. There are so many games that I'm begging to do a EA but are choosing to just release in the future.

[@Blackread]

I recently went through the vanilla wow major patch notes for fun, and I gotta say, the whole of vanilla was pretty much a prolonged early access. So many features we take for granted even in classic were missing for the majority of the game's existence. 😂 I don't think games have changed too much, but expectations certainly have.

[@ArmaHipHopTV]

No MMORPG ever released in their finished state lol.

[@pumpkiiin]

Loving the game so far. Super chill experience, can’t wait for all the future updates

[@GoldRocketGamers]

Also, I guess you know now but afk training is just unlocked at lvl 20 in any profession, you don't have to complete episode 1. You also don't have to log out to do them, you can literally stand there and let it afk like you said, but the exp / HR is rly low

[@GoldRocketGamers]

Are you sure the rooms are limited to 20 people? The room cap changes for each room and I think they said the markets for example will have very high caps Also coop skilling is a thing (and PvP and trading obviously will involve other players)

[@DardyGamer]

Brighter shores is basically an indian version of runescape

[@superhetoric]

wat

[@TheBlackHeart1903]

indians are incompetent they cant even make a game like this

[@nootnoot8287]

🤣🤣🤣

[@beardedrake9983]

they will add mouse options update ASAP they said

[@zavos5659]

Brighter Shores has a horrible first impression, that smooths over as you get used to how the world works. We've gotten some vary early updates and a dev blog about some of the community's main problems, hopefully we'll get a lot of further refinement and fine-tuning during early access. At this point, I'm honestly expecting a "1 left click action" update any time now, simply due to the precedent of early quality of life update.

[@animedreamnetwork245]

Even if they can explain it right that in it self does not make it right. It’s very bad design given how limited each episode is. I feel like the system was made up to keep costs down of the game and only for that reason. It adds nothing to the gameplay. The game is not ready but early access is a good thing in this case because it forces Andrew think about his choices and yes Andrew you will have to accept your game being compared to runescape and you need to accept that fact and not to add in pointless and meaningless systems into the game just so you can say “See we are not runescape” general public may be dumb but they are not that dumb. Since we are choosing to use up are free time to play your game. Which could be spent doing something else so we are going to think about it.

[@SammyBoyy300]

Looks lame, ill stick to OSRS

[@Tnscla]

It has a long way to go, i hope they can expand on it, im not going in now, maybe in a few weeks/months?

[@lukienman]

Andrew has said they planned to fully release within 6 months of EA launch. there's no more cooking, just QoL improvements to try and cover up how horrible of a game it is.

[@Tolseren]

@@lukienman lmfao you are hating so much in these comments. get a grip, even if you don't like it others do.

[@Rathial]

Oh small tip but with combat you can use the type advantages and safe spotting to kill stuff like 20 levels higher than you. If you do that you get insanely better xp rates lol

[@MiloLexau]

Did not expect you to cover this, albeit even as a one of but positively surprised. This type of game has never really been my thing, and i could never get truly hooked on OSRS (I am still nostalgic about the music though) but something about this game just clicked for me. Despite its rugged appearance, it is quite addictive and cozy. Music is amazing and sound design is good, I've had multiple chuckles in my near 20hours through quest dialogue, but like you, i do have a few points of critique. I will add though, Andrew has come out and made a long post explaining his reasons about per-episode related proffesions and since reading that, my worries about the "proffesions being wiped when entering a new zone" has almost dissipated. I actually think i like the vision he has, they do however come with a few concerns namely: 1. Re-skinned gameplay loop, sure your proffesions increase in levels but there is no difference in feel of foraging kelp at lvl 4, vs foraging [insert random color or prefix name] kelp at higher levels. The kelp is still in the same zone, same spot. 2. Combat proffesions and class archetypes: To make the feel of having your combat proffesion "wiped" sting less, Andrew should make it so that fighting as a Guard feels different to fighting as a Scout. Give each combat proffession some flair, this should be possible. I know there are going to be special attacks but I believe those are reserved for different weapons, so im left wondering, what the point of classes are if they feel no different from one another. 3. Grinding for the sake of grinding: Grinding cooking for the sake of levelling your cooking and or total level gets kinda old quite fast, as you touched on yourself, the cooking proffesion serve no purpose outside of this and there are quite a few proffesions that suffer that aswell. Id love to see more relevancy for each proffesion in the practical gameplay loop This game is good & chill fun but very grindy. This is a marathon not a sprint, if nothing else, i would really recommend to give it a chance just to experience the music and quests. (PS. any insider news on a TBC fresh? wink wink, i remember doing a Karazhan run with you back in TBC classic ptr, was good fun, so... yeah, about time we get tbc again^^)

[@hyruler036]

Ah crap, here this guy goes releasing videos again and trying to support himself.

[@harryc8433]

its fucked up and not okay

[@Ellismista]

???

[@0Wayland]

They could chill with the ads.

[@conorf8091]

I’m confused… he is a KZbinr…surely that is the point of it all, to make bread

[@Rathial]

Personally the game play is waaaay more like classic than 3 the game feels pretty slow and barebones rn but I'm going to assume that is mostly the early access aspect. @4:10 ehhhh isn't that pretty much what going from classic to tbh was like? you had full bis from classic and it got replaced by blues in every new expansion? I feel like the game will be min maxed to hell once people figure everything out and make guides. Wil have the whole profession guide thing with level 1-5 do this x times 5-10 this x times repeat etc. As for the classes its just combat triangle again but this time its blue beats green beats yellow beats blue. I'm assuming they will have a way to use multiple classes or switch between them in the future since being stuck to this version of either melee range mage seems clunky The Card System(getting bonus xp the first time you do a new training method), Loot System(Diablo style), Knowledge System(bonus xp lamps or gp when actively training), Afk Training System(getting xp while logged out albeit EXTREMELY slow), and Episode System are neat At this point though I'm only in episode 3 of the 4 and I feel like Its at that wait for the game to be fleshed out more mode. The entire game rn feels like just a very very very long tutorial island

[@Baalium]

Plays like a single player, I wonder why this is an MMO.

[@badgerb]

playing mmo's for 25 years and i can openly say this looks like absolute Trash, like an indie game you'd find on steam and give a go to realize the mechanics are trash and delete after mins, Total Flop. there was hundreds of B grade games exactly like this in the 00's and 10's they all miserably failed due to no one liking these mechanics and game play style, gower has been smoking , and it will succeed slightly simply because of his name, its no better than any average one developer no budget indie game.

[@thatonedudelive7260]

So… RuneScape 4. Got it.

[@Colancio]

Not gonna lie, I'm starving from a fresh MMORPG, but this is an annoying version of Runescape with Runescapeish 3 graphics. Overall it's a lower product than a game with 25+ years older.

[@Got_Gud]

lifelong enjoyer of video games and 22 year rs vet opinion: this game looks utterly terrible...sorry but it's a no for me on all fronts.

[@TrueSaint916]

This game looks awful. It also looks boring. I'm not sure why people would play this, but nostalgia is a strong drug.

[@nx47]

MMO’s like this are a goal orientated person’s wet dream. It’s oddly satisfying for these people to see xp slowly rise overtime hitting goals, not to mention games like this have HEAVY rpg elements. It’s hard for modern rpg addicts to find a game like early dragon quest or early final fantasy in a sea of easy “hold your hand fast tracked” rpgs of today. Yes, I’m that person that this game appeals to 😂

[@lumpylumpyloo]

Nostalgia for a game that just came out?

[@1OnlyOneOnlyOne1]

idk man. no i think.

[@bcross15]

it looks and feels too much like a mobile game and the world feels like its being constricted with how "rooms" operate.

[@bigswigs3659]

The game is dogwater

[@pate7816]

the acts that seperate all the content is very strange to me and i dunno how anyone can overcome that

[@mranderson4001]

we already got ppl lvl 800. it is no problem to us grinders

[@pate7816]

@@mranderson4001 just dont see the reason behind it thats all

[@pumpkiiin]

By playing the game lol

[@mranderson4001]

@@pate7816 i think they don't want new players feeling seperated from the "end game." In a way each zone has an end game. Andrew Gower is on record of saying he made a mistake calling them "episodes." I still go back in between each zones. 80 hours in lvl 300, just got into zone 4 and going for the cape with the dragon on it. im simple

[@messy3371]

@@mranderson4001 80 hours what how thats 20 hours a day lol

[@zaetayo]

I've been having a chill time grinding, but man.. some things are super tedious.

[@DarkRequiemFilms]

That logo is from Old School RuneScape, not RuneScape.

[@Setta-p2d]

Is or is not paid video review/impression?

[@clintmcbride7830]

Pretty sure he would legally have to say if it was a paid promotion. Sure, technically he could still have gotten paid. But he is already a very established content creator so i doubt he would risk that for a few bucks.

[@BloachismStrengthandFitness]

@@clintmcbride7830 there is not requirement to state if a review is paid or not on KZbin. There is no legality involved

[@NostraDavid2]

​@@BloachismStrengthandFitnessif the review is paid for, then this is an ad, which means he should announce it, no? Not a lawyer, but that's my basic understanding of the law.

[@WillEmmo]

You legally have to disclose if its paid - there will be a popup in the top left corner if it is at the start of the video. (this video is not)

[@SpicySharp]

an surprise to be sure, but a welcome one

[@ryuno2097]

Hmmm.. early access mmorpg... I'll wait until the game goes 1.0 then I'll try it out. 😊

[@Cloud_Fluff]

I won’t lie, please don’t make games like this where I can’t move with WASD

[@SoliiD]

So, a modded RS3 =/

[@williamlampke8083]

Its animations are a exact rip lol

[@alchemyty]

It makes me think of a down graded rs3.

[@Rathial]

more runescape classic than rs3

[@lukienman]

Try a downgraded RS3 to be mobile friendly except you can't play on mobile.

[@TheVirvar]

No

[@sora8711]

"I've yet to come across anything that actually stacks" Bro never did Alchemy....

[@beardedrake9983]

the skills are for certain areas only right now. it doesnt reset anything except your gear and combat levels for that region

[@strady0]

I'm a simple man, I see Andrew Gower and I click. In all honesty though, for a team that never went above eight devs this is quite the achievement for this genre of game, and yeah it isn't close to the greatness of OSRS but it's alright. Andrew is still the same, taking feedback seriously, chatting with the community and getting to work - can't go wrong with that type of devs.