7. An Engaging Story
To be fair, storylines in the vast majority of MMORPGs aren't that great, and it's because most people just skip through them anyway, after becoming obsessed with dispassionately grinding their way to the next level. This isn't to say that A Realm Reborn is massively different - it's still a pretty garden-variety good vs. bad epic adventure yarn -
but it makes a better effort than most similar titles, and pulls you in with the punchy writing that defines some of the stronger titles in the series. There might not be any classic characters here to contend with the more memorable offerings of the best games, but they still make a firm impact with their characteristic looks, even if it's a little disappointing that only some of the characters have voice-over actors (it feels like Guild Wars 2 did a far better job, frankly).