+3 votes
5,011 views
by (4,918 points)
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I mean that moment when some friend see that you are playing a 2D game with low graphics and he is saying something like "How can you play a game like that?? it looks so bad". So im asking how do you explain what Tibia is and why is so a great and unique game.

by (11 points)
Hiho :)

Its seems so hard to recommend Tibia to another people on this days because people have another idea of videogames , they expect ultra graphics or dymanics but Tibia is different. Its an old game that has been evolving for many years but keeping it essence.
So I think like some guys already said I just say them to test it, I think is the only way to see what Tibia really is.
by (4,918 points)
+1
Hi dude , I think you made a mistake , this seems to be more an answer than a comment , if you want to answer you have to click  on the green button named answer.

15 Answers

+2 votes
by
Simple. There is no other game like Tibia. The graphics make this game for me, its the one thing that makes the game more nostalgic.

It's hectic, but peaceful. It's scary, but satisfying. Tibia punishes you if you die, and rightly so, it makes hunts that bit more exciting, when you drop to low health and your heart beat increases! You sweat! You panic! YOU HIT THE HEALH POTION KEY AND PRAY!

It's endless, really, its entirely up to you on what you do, where you go, who you intergrate with and what you hunt!

You can pick from 4 vocations, be a druid, knight, paladin or sorcerer. Wield mighty swords, axes or clubs to swing at foes, throw enchanted spears with pinpoint accuracy for incredible damage...or perhaps throw magic around like the very next Gandalf.

The. Choice. is. YOURS.

For me, Tibia could improve greatly with two things:

1) its initial starter game and explain a little more until level 30 or so. Getting someone to start is one thing, getting them to stay is another.

Just small hints such as:

"Great! You just reached level 14! Rumour has it that certain NPC's will offer you a spell to increase your speed temporarily, it could save your life, or just make those longer trips a little less bleak"

"Wow, level 20! Legend talks of an underground ritual in the dessert you may be interested with, perhaps there is a reward? Maybe a sacrifice? Speak to fellow veterans to hear their opinions on this dessert mystery!"

2) Have a more expansive outreach to attract more players, sure they tried greenlight on Steam, but i'd like to see more from them. If anything their attempts to attract players is lacking, it relies heavily on the "introduce a friend" or the "return to tibia" schemes. They need to advertise more themselves, spend some of that 11 million euro income from 17-18.

The majority of players now are old school, getting someone to start tibia can be tough, but if they can stick it out ~6 months, i can guarantee you - their hooked.

Peace!
by (5,687 points)
Worth mentioning comment on how Tibia could drastically improve the game:

I guess the problem detected by me would be related on how to recommend the game for Free Account players (which will be generally the account status of many newcomers). For example, your hint regarding level 14 would be useless to Free Accounts, since they currently have no way to improve their speed (extremely good spell all around) early on... Of course there are items that do that, but lacking basic spells necessary for exploration/quest/small hunting improvement/survival on PvP is a huge setback when I think about promoting the game. If not Haste, why not Levitate or Magic Rope at least for Free Accounts? I see only benefits if they came to apply it (I heard more than once of players that got stuck on a hole and never returned to the character).

-> Usually my way to help to Free Account is literally giving to them decent items early on and expecting that they will stay in the game. It is good to talk to them and explain basic quests, since they will need to know that they will have an extra hard time without many spells as a Free Account.


Also, Sorcerers and Druids suffer an extra setback without any real Strike Spell (Except for the one on Dawnport), but I guess it is debatable if they should receive at least some exoris, all basic exoris or no exori at all. However I believe that playing as a mage category on Free Status is very hard for new players (especially when talking about Druids, since they don't have Heal Friend or even a Strike to give to the player the reason on why this vocation exist).
+2 votes
by (45 points)
If the point of the people you recommend the game to is that the graphics are ugly, you might want to remind them some old games that they used to play and enjoy from years before - which also had bad graphics - and tell them that back in the days it didn't matter what it looks like and to at least give it a try :)
+2 votes
by (304 points)
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Best answer

I usually use a bit of reverse psychology with my friends. "Oh, you probably shouldn't try it, it's really old, you can count each pixel and it doesn't even have sound!"

This usually makes them curious enough to ask for more information, or even just install the game to try it. When they do ask more quesitons, I usually tell them one or more of the following:


Goal of the game

Tibia has no actual goal - there is no end to the game. What it does offer is endless possibilities for setting your own goals:

  • No level cap, so you can keep leveling forever
  • Tons of achievements, some easy, some hard
  • A great social system (more on that below)
  • Both daily and one-time quests of varying difficulty
  • Extensive lore and possibilities for roleplaying
  • Outfits and mounts to collect
  • Extremely rare items to try and loot and show off

Premium system

Tibia is free to play, so you can try it as long as you like before deciding whether or not you'd like to buy premium time. While the experience is limited, it still provides enough content for weeks or months of playing, and there is no time limit to it. Premium time can be earned through ingame currency (spending tibia gold on tibia coins), although it's not easy to earn enough to pay for premium every month.

Map and updates

  • Tibia has a huge map and many areas to explore - it takes years of playing to get to know all of them
  • Tibia is still updated regularly, despite having been online since 1997, so there's always new things to experience and to explore.

Social

  • In the Tibia client, the chat windows are prominent and extremely easy to use. This allows for easy communication with both your friends and anyone else playing the server you're on.
  • You can own your own, physical house on a server. This isn't done the way it is in other games where 10 players can own the same house but they're just in different "instances" - you really own that particular house, and everyone can see you own it. You can decorate it, invite people over, show off your wealth - it's all possible.
  • You can form your own guilds, and rent your own guildhall, which has the same advantages as the housing system above. It also has an effect on PvP (for more about PvP, see below)
  • Hunting with a team is possible and even encouraged through specific bonuses for playing together. 
  • While bonuses for hunting together are capped, there are no limits to which areas you can hunt in, so you can always go help your friends, no matter what their level is
  • Thanks to this social system, Tibia has a very strong international community. It's hard NOT to make any friends whlie you play, sometimes even leading to lasting real life friendships.

Hunting

  • You can make hunting as exciting or relaxing as you like - because you can hunt in any area, you can pick your own difficulty. If you want to hunt rats (one of the easiest creatures in Tibia) until you're level 600, you can, even if it will likely take you more than a lifetime.
  • Various vocations (classes) have different hunting styles, and you can pick one that suits your needs
  • You can hunt solo or in a party (for party hunting, see "social")
  • You can choose to grind levels if you just want to hunt mindlessly, or you can follow questlines and do daily missions to get your experience

PvP

  • There are servers with various PvP types, so you can pick one that suits you best
  • On PvP servers, there is no limitation to who can kill who or when. You can kill anyone, high level or low level. Death penalty is adjusted according to the level difference and the number of attackers.
  • Guilds can team up and wage war against each other, either via an official war system or without. This means that there is often heavy competition between guilds on servers to "own" a server.
  • Attacking others leaves you vulnerable to be killed by others through a special skull system, so while PvP is possible, you need to be smart about it.

Death

Death in Tibia is punishing. This sounds bad, but is actually a good thing. It means that you actually have something to lose. Nearly dying is exciting! Everyone who plays still has some stories of a stupid or glorious death, and even though recouperating your losses can be a pain, it makes death count.


Of course, there is much, much more to tell people about Tibia, but I find that this list usually caters to most different playing styles. I just pick the ones that appeal to the person the most :)

by (4,918 points)
+1
Nice answer bro !  thanks so much for your effort writting this complete answer
by (304 points)
+1
My pleasure! Even after 15 years of playing the game still draws me back every time, so it's nice to write down some reasons why :)
by (4,918 points)
Thanks! remember to upvote the question if you like it
by (5,687 points)
+2
One interesting thing to add: Tibia nowadays is notably more rewarding for casual players. Even if you a Free Account, you may have your experience of gameplay enhanced a lot if you just use a few Tibia Coins during your session.

Not to mention that even the Free Account Area of the game received huge additions nowadays, making you able to amass gold for Tibia Coins without the need to spend money :)
+1 vote
by (16 points)
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Tibia is not only an online rpg game, Tibia is much more than a 2d game, it is about friendship. We know people from all over the world and make really good friends. In my guild we have players from Brazil, Canada, Egypt, Germany, Japan, Mexico, Norway, Poland, Spain, Sweden, UK, USA, Ukraine and Venezuela, even though it is in an european server. This is just a sample! I hope you enjoy it! See you in Tibia ❤

+1 vote
by (74 points)
I mostly recommend it to my firends who I know used to play Tibia before because I assume it would be difficult to interest someone with game with retro graphic in age of super hyper graphics and dynamic gameplay.

And what I do is usually before or after update message them and tell about how fun it is and how fun it would be to play together again :) Sometimes I will offer to create a new char myself so that we can actually play together instead of me have hundred levels above them.
+1 vote
by (5,687 points)
view edits | edited by

Having a small talk and detecting if the friend that you are recommending the game identifies himself with the usual RPG/MMORPGS setting is a good way to go. Even a somewhat casual experience can be attracting to players nowadays, so I guess it is more important to explain on how Tibia can be extremely time consuming if you get really into powergaming, but can also have a lot of Quests/Mysteries/Hunts to do occasionally or frequently, so the game can adjust according to your time and objectives there.

I guess that after they get the "Tibia MMORPG style" they might be more inclined to stay in the game and advance. The retro style in my opinion is more an appealing detail to be mentioned rather than a setback. Tibia Mainland is indeed great to explore.

Oh, and nowadays is way less stressful to play on Open-PvP, but if you see that your friend is more into quests and killing mobs peacefully, it could be good for him to start right of on a Optional-PvP (Although I would always literally tell my friend to come to the server where my main is located and I would give to him good items... But that's because I can protect him against abusers or random player killers, so it depends about you that part :) )

Blocking to low levels and inviting them to a more interesting hunt can be great to make the game more interesting, since the early game on Tibia is somewhat boring, but it gets better as soon you advance in game. Everyone should give a try!

0 votes
by (4,918 points)
My personal answer is that I have been playing videogames for more than 15 years , I played Counter Strike , League of legends , WoW, Diablo ..etc But I have never found a game like this , this community, this history and this unique graphics. This game gave me very nice friends, so many hours of enjoy and so many funny moments. So how I recommend this game? I just say it a thousand of times , you will never find what Tibia is until you play it. You cant see the whole game and enjoy the experience until you play it for some time, this game have something that makes it so different from the other games, because after more than 15 years playing Tibia I still enjoy it like the first time, so I hope someday other people find out how great Tibia is.
0 votes
by (60 points)
What to say, Tibia is more than a simply game, Tibia is where i've found my best friends. I cant explain that feelings 15 years ago while we were doing our first hunt at Orc Castle in Carlin, facing the Dragon, still remember that moment.

This game is not about graphics, this game is about feelings and one of the best communitys in MMORPG Games ever.
0 votes
by
I love Tibia, I've started playing from 7.6 and I only can say please give a chance to Tibia and maybe u will leave the other games xD

I've meet the best friends that actually I have and I've spent a lot of time of pure entertainment hunting da solo and th with my friends...

Tibia is rlly magic
0 votes
by (12 points)
Tibia is Tibia , its a game where you can spend hours and hours for getting a lvl which you can lose easily if you die, that things make it so hard sometime and so intensive, mini heart attacks ! haha
Tibia is the emotion of killing your first Demon , making your first important quest , making friends that last forever and treating your character as part of ur life. Thats a little resume of what you can find on Tibia.
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