Evony – Free Forever?
Evony is a popular online game that is marketed under the slogan “Free Forever”. Formerly known as “Civony”, it is a medieval fantasy game in an enduring world. The game plays in a similar fashion to Sid Meier’s “Civilization” PC game, but supports micro-transactions if players want to speed things up or get other in game boosts and power ups. Although often described as an RPG game, it is probably better to describe Evony as an MMO RTS game. Real time strategy (RTS) is a more important gameplay aspect than any roleplaying element, although it is possible to outfit heroes in the game with personal equipment and perhaps for this reason some describe it as an RPG. Whatever the classification used, Evony is a cool game that is fun to play and best of all, it is free.
Evony is a Cool Game
At time of writing this Evony has over 18 million players in 167 countries. This is phenomenal growth by anyones standards and is a credit to both the games designers and their marketers. At times the marketing efforts of Evony have attracted criticism for the style of adverts used, but this takes nothing away from the game.
The advertising campaign has at times forced parents to ask ask “Is Evony safe for children?” and my answer is “Yes, providing you are OK with your child playing a fighting game”. There is no nudity or animated violence in Evony that I have seen and I have been playing some months now. This is in sharp contrast to many other free online games out there. What the game does provide is fun and lots of it.
Learning to Play Evony is Easy
When you first learn to play any online game the number of options can be daunting, but Evony is quite simple to understand. You can only build one building at a time per city and so in the early stages it is merely a choice about what is most important right now. As the game progresses and you have more cities to look after the complexity goes up, but of course by then you have a lot more experience and so it is far easier to understand. There is also an Evony guide built into the game, sort of. The game offers quests and if you complete the initial quests it will take you through everything you need to know and learn. Completing these basic Evony quests is highly recommended as they speed up the development of a new player as well as instructing them in how to play.
Is Evony Really Free Forever?
Evony has changed much since its launch in 2009 and no doubt this will continue, however at the time of writing; the game remains 100% free to play. There is no restricted version, or features only available to subscribers or other nonsense. What does cost money in Evony is a system of micro-transactions that allow you to buy various in game powerups or other enhancements. These micro-transactions are in no way necessary and merely speed up some aspects of game play. I personally play Evony for free and have done so for some time now.
What Makes Evony a Fun Game?
Everyone will enjoy different things and of this there is no doubt, so here I can only offer my personal opinion. Two things really make Evony a fun game; firstly it is easy to play in an extremely casual manner. As it is a browser game I can set building orders and then go and do something else while those orders are processed – the game continues to play in the browser window in real time even if I am not watching it. This allows me to work or do other things around the house and just check in now and again.
The other thing that I really like about Evony is the people. Games like Evony are made or broken by the people that you meet. So far the people I have met through my alliance have been helpful, casual and easygoing. We chat while waiting for stuff to finish building and help each other where we can. If you are new to Evony then I would recommend joining an alliance as soon as you can, as a good one will make all the difference to the amount of fun you have in the game.