Update: as several commenters mentioned, this review is very old, I'm told the game improved a lot. So give a try it might be not as bad as it was 5 years ago ;)

The game should be renamed: Clickers and Heroes
or Grinding Heroes

At first glance the game is fairly cute and suitable for children. This is true and a positive thing.

But the core gameplay is a brutal GrindAndClickFest with agressive Pay to play concept: even the training missions are about craft 50 items... what means: you sit in the front of the monitor and click in every 3 seconds 50 times.
Also, this game is about epic grinding. Really, there are no challenges in the game, the loot and the resources are easy to reach BUT: you have to spend long minutes and hours just to click and click and click on the same spot to have the necessary resources.

All the gameplay is about just clicking and waiting, clicking and waiting, clicking and waiting.... while there are mechanics to reduce this tedioum, everything points to the shop.

Honesntly, if there would be a reasonable priced monthly fee to eliminate this click fest concept I would gladly pay for it (because I like the world and the relatively simple gameplay, and again the relatively non violent MMO concept). But at it's current state, the game really tries to enforce me to pay with the nasty "I will make your clicker finger suffer if you dont pay" method. What I really don't like and I won't bend. Instead of that, I quit game.

People keep saying that the controls feel like a facebook type game and the like. Well, this game WAS actually on facebook a long time ago. I played this game a few years back and when I log into facebook, I can still see this game on my list. While it has improved from it's facebook days somewhat, it's still not up to par. It is creative in it's own right (Bughunting as a profession!?) and it does offer player housing and growing stuff in your garden and caring for animals. I do like having some form of simulation aspects in my games.

But it is really clunky, and it has a lot of 'seen that, did it in another mmo!' type of vibe. It's also not graphically appealing and for the most part I kept the sound off.

It's playable and you might get some entertainment out of it, but there is definitely better out there.

While this is not the worst MMO out there, it certainly isn't one of the best.

Here's a Quick Look video of my tragic adventure in this game. All of what I descibed below is in there, though some parts edited for your sanity and bugs in the game. Even though it's long, I'll still call it a quick look since it's an MMO. Feel free to skip around if you want a general idea, or just read the short and dirty summary below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-bUgaTg8yc&list=UUsGKrLHOxr2113efbnkp5MA

I'll start off with saying that the first thing you do in this game is get plopped down in a tiny starter area and get asked to kill wolves. Pretty typical right? Well as I went to fight the most docile wolves apparently terrorizing the town, I got introduced to the combat system. You have to stay perfectly still and click buttons, and I STRESS perfectly still. If you move, you cancel your auto-attack. If you turn slightly, you also cancel your attack. Heck, even if you press the attack again, it cancels the attack and you have to wait for the ability to go off cooldown. If that's what the game is like right from the beginning, I can only dread what it's like late game.

But combat really isn't the main focus of this. Crafting and socializing is. So I excused the dated and poor combat system and continued my journey. What I found out was that you can infinitely gather from nodes that require no effort to get to. It didn't even encourage exploration. Not that there was much to explore. You play in linear zones that push you along a path. But hey, maybe the crafting was where this game shined...

Boy, was I wrong. It was as basic as the gathering. You click on the recipe, and let the game take care of the rest for you. There wasn't even some sort of minigame to make it more engaging. It was just a droll experience of clicking buttons and farting around.

Alright, well perhaps the social part was the point of this. I wanted to try chatting to some peeps, but I rarely encountered another person. And when I did, they were doing the same boring stuff I was doing. But regardless, counting on the community to make your boring game more enjoyable isn't what developers should be hoping for. So it fell flat for me again. Even more when I discovered there wasn't a /dance command. C'mon now? No dancing?

But I dredged on. And I found several bugs along the way. Sure, I understand most MMO's have them. The games are so big, it's kind of expected. But I don't think you should be encountering so many in the starting zone, probably the most tested place of them all. Why did my character leap into the water and flop like a fish when I asked him just to fish? Why are there strange black squares following me on the ground everywhere I go? Why is a fenced area full of hens called a sheep plot? Heck, I even had a game breaking bug that kicked me out of the game and corrupted my video footage. But even after all that, I suffered through this game some more to give a better review.

Most of the quests. if not all, where simple fetch quests. All you had to do was go to a place sometimes a few feet away to complete them. It's like the quest givers themselves couldn't be arsed to play their own game. The animations are terrible too. Sure, some of the attacks look flashy, but rarely do they actually connect to what you're supposed to be attacking. Walking sideways is the most laughable thing in this game. It was so bad, I actually enjoyed doing it. I even fell off a cliff and my guy was as stiff as a board all the way down. It's just not polished at all.

And when I finally reached the last boss of the tutorial, Grimbad the Deadly or something rediculous like that, I just walked right up to him and stared at him. He didn't even attack me. The big bad boss just aimelessly wandered around, looking for a way to escape his cruel fate.

That just broke me. There is just no immersion in this game. I couldn't get a feel for it, and the point of MMO's is to lose you in their world, which this game failed miserably at.

But after being so negative, I'll list a few positives. I like the jumping flips. You go so damn high when you get a boost from some boots. I like that the game's quest helper tells you exactly what to do, even if it does hold your hand too much by saying where you can get stuff. And, umm, some of the bugs were kind of funny? Eh, I guess that counts as something.

So all in all, even if this game is free, I can't recommend it. There are plenty of better MMO's out there, some free as well. Don't waste your time here.

This is a nice game, with funhy cartoon-like graphics and a sence of humor. As many others have already commented, it is a next-gen Runescape. So if you are in to Runescape, go ahead and try it.
If you don't like Runescape or don't even know what it is, then DON'T try this!

Unfortunately, in my opinion, the game is heavily Pay to Play!!
From the 35 hours I have on record, the 30 or so were consumed on clicking on trees, mineral nodes and anvils in order to level up crafting skills..And I managed to get them to level 15...I can't imagine how much time it would take me to get to 50...Of course, you can speed up the process by using harvesters, but you have to pay real money to get them! ;)

Travel pads (the way to teleport between areas) require travel stones. You get 1 free for every travel pad you discover (I got 7). If you are 3 areas away from the main city, you have to either travel on foot or use teleport..After 4-5 freebies, you HAVE to pay to get Travel Stones..

It also has a farmville simulation! Plant. water, collect crops in order to level up your villager skills. At least crops deliver some good in-game cash...

There are lots of other examples of situations that you have to pay in order to avoid the EXTREMELY OUTRAGEOUS LONG and TEDIOUS grinding you need to do.

You will grind. A lot.

You will die. A lot.

At about level 19, you will essentially hit the paywall. At that point, you will find it hard to progress unless you start buying things with real money.

When I started this game, I was hoping for an MMO, that makes a civil option just as viable as a fighting one, somewhat like UO, leading to players playing the roles of the titular villagers and heroes. This is not this game. Instead, the village options are of strictly supporting purpose to aquire equipment and items for adventuring.
As far as free MMO-RPGs go, this one is pretty standard. Paying is for comfort options only, so no part of the game is completely locked out for free players (unless for example you count mounts, which offer only a speed advantage), but the difference in grinding pace can be felt strongly. Graphics and maps are kind of okay, if you don't mind mid-sized single maps instead of an open world, questing is not overly repetitive. Still, there's some signs of lazyness, like the tendency to use standard icons for various unique quest items, quests themselves mostly leaving no change at all (until recently, the biggest visible effect was to remove a fog from a small area, the latest addition to the main quest at least made some NPC build a hut), or my favourite, child NPCs being adult avatars shrinked to 50%.
An aspect, that I would say, could need some improvement, is the fact, that there is few reason to specialize. Players are able and expected to maximize all the civilian skills over time, there are enough points at the highest level to max about half of the fighting skills, and even as a character skilled towards group play, it is possible to solo through most of the game. A bit less omnipotence to strenghten the need of cooperation wouldn't hurt.

So far, I'd say, it's meh, doesn't hurt to play, won't make your day either. Why do I still give a negative review? That would be my reaction to the handling of the new update. In early May, there was an announcement, that a major update is on the way, about which an announcement would be made in early June. A pre-trailer, in film terms. The date came, an internet page was opened, which still did not contain informations, but required "community tasks" to be completed to unlock hints about the update step by step. Those tasks were to make a screenshot of a large group of players (okay), writing short stories and painting fanart (okay...?) and as the latest but certainly not last task to post screenshots on Facebook. Not okay.
Maybe this sort of pseudo-viral campaigning is normal to todays kids, but a game, that pushes me to advertise it, just to get access to a glorified newsletter, deserves a negative vote in my eyes.

P.S.: If anyone is wondering, why I keep playing nonetheless; the player community is a suprisingly pleasant one on the server, I use, especially for MMO-game standards.

While the game is cute to a point. It is boring. The game is grindy. It is Cash Shop Greedy and much of the game to make it fun is Cash Shop dependent. I play EOS, spend money in EOS. Because EOS does not sell stuff that the game depends on. This game is a click fest also. I came back to it and found it no better and my houses gone (You have to pay rent). I bought a dlc and it seems a one time use. Delete a character and it is gone.

Too Cash Shop greedy and dependent
Click fest.
Grindy
And for me simply one of the worst MMOs I have played (I have played other F2Ps).

WARNING: while other android mmorpgs support cross-save with steam, this one does not.
If you want cross-play/save, get the game on their website instead

Pros:

• Lots of crafting to do
  
• You can find all the materials you need in the world
  
• Lack of Vim or energy system (removed in past patch. I saw this was a major reason for negative reviews in the past)

Cons

• Gets boring as you go further in
  
• Lack of motivation to continue with lack-luster storyline
  
• Auction House is empty, I would never be able to make money off of how the player economy is in its current state
  
• Empty feeling community
  
• Many bugs

I have to say, I had some hopes for this game. I've always loved mmos that carry a heavy focus on PVE rather than PVP. When I saw this had a dynamic crafting system, I was quite pleased. I've played Runescape and several other rpg mmos that mimicked the style of Runescape over the years, I figured I would give this one a shot and see how it hold up. And it did not.

The first thing that caught my attention had to be the lack of ambition this game gave me. In games like Runescape, I was always working towards a specific, achievable goal. I saw all the cool things you could do with construction downt he line, so my goal was to level construction. I saw all of the sick skill capes people earned through their hard work, I figured I could maybe try for one as well! In Villagers and Heroes.... Not so much. I mean even RPGMO had some interesting skills that made you wanted to level and achieve even with the old-school graphics and lack of aniamtions. Villagers and Heroes led me on a wild goose chase throughout the internet to find out what I could do with say, smithing or mining? Is mining a good source of income on the player market? Do I get cool capes or titles or SOMETHING from achieving the highest level? Why should I sit here and grind all day if nothing will come of it?

The second thing that caught my attention was the stale and empty "Auction House". This is supposed to operate much like any other player market in any standard mmo. For example in the Grand Exchange in Runescape, the economy was always bustling. The demand of the market flowed naturally in a way I was able to take advantage of and profit from. It was fullfilling to find out new ways of making money. In Villagers and Heroes, however, there were several things on the market one could purchase, but rarely anything people were willin to buy. I found it fairly difficult to find demand fro any of the materials I had wanted to sell.

Lastly, the community seems pretty dead. There are only a few people on at a time it seems. The villages seems pretty empty, which is a shame because I though that player owned villages was a cool a neat Idea. I wanted to join one, but could find none that were active! I think a lot of this game's woes stems from this huge problem, but I can't say I blame people for wanting to stay away from the game. This game has a Vim or energy system in the past, that made it so that players could only do so many gathering actions a day (correct me if I am wrong). After something like that is implemented, I could imagine many people moving on to better organized mmos! I just feel that after the beginning fiasco of this game, it will be hard for it to recover.

I also wanted to mention the amount of bugs I experienced over the first hour of gameplay. I had a few visual bugs that I blamed on my own system. But then I started getting bugs that compeltely strained gamelay for me. For instance, I would go to talk to an NPC, only to have to wait a minute for the bubble to pop up. Sometimes quests would not be fullfilled even after I turned them in, and I would have to do them all over again. This happened specifically with the tailoring master during the first crafting quest. this really bogged down my gameplay.

Overall, I had a pretty "meh" experience. It left me wanting something more from it, it made me miss Runescape more than anything because of how unsatisfied I was. the community is slow to grow, if anything at all, and it severely impacts things like player economy, villages, guilds, and other aspects of the game. It doesn't seem like people are going to go back to this game for a while after some decisions made by the developers in the past that pushed a lot of people away. If it does recover and become and interesting game to play, I will most certainly change my review. However, in its current state, I cannot recommend it over other veteran games that have conquered the PVE style for decades like World of Warcraft or Runescape[//i].

You'd think indie developers ever learned anything good from years and years of MMORPG players feedback and complaints against idiotic game-design decisions ? Well, you'd be wrong ! Villagers & Heroes is the living proof :-)


a.) The entire in-game economy of this game is a sad, sad joke.

b.) 99.99% of the quests are "fetch" quests.

c.) The story is not long. It just takes very long to reach the countless NPCs involved, to the point where travelling becomes painfully annoying and boring.

d.) The stupid stone-age old monetizing trick with minuscule inventory and bank space which fills up with "necessary stuff" is absolutely pathetic and a very, very strong "STAY AWAY !" warning against this game. The developers intentionally keep flooding the player's very limited inventory with tons of "fragments of various items" (as in "Combine <N> of these to receive <something>"), multiple types of "zogs" (exchange 5 of the same type for <something>), multiple types of "medallions" (exchange "N" of the same type for <some key>), multiple types of "keys" which grant access to otherwise locked areas on the map. Absolutely insane !

e.) Daily login "gotcha rewards" and "locked treasure chests" which occasionally drop from mobs. The keys for these chests can only be bought from the Shop.


f.) You got some (free) house in some village ? God forbid you get ill or have some accident in real life and end up in a hospital for longer than two weeks because this indie game will simply delete your house, your house assets, your plants and animals. (Not to mention they're already famous for losing player's data !!!)


g.) Speaking of animals (raising animals) and useless necessary items: "Ranching" requires some "tools". Lute, flute ... musical instruments, because animals love music. And a grooming brush. Ok, nice, but these tools are ... consumable items. I'd love to hear Damon Slye or Sarah Skibinski explain how can a flute ever be a consumable (?!?).


h.) Meanwhile the same game gives you an "imaginary endless shovel" (which, surprisingly, is simply a mouse cursor shape, not an item in your inventory like the lute, flute and brush ...) to pick up your crops :-) Anyway, "Farming" (crops) DOES NOT work hand in hand with "Ranching". Sheep, your most basic animals crave for "yellow squash" or "tomatoes" ... which are literally nowhere to be found. There are no "yellow squash" or "tomatoes gathering nodes" on the map, no NPCs to buy from and no players ever listed a single tomato at the auction while I played this game. As a low level farmer you are not even allowed to buy yellow squash or tomato seeds (minimum level required is 11 for squash and 16 for tomatoes. But "Shaun" does not care about these ... details).


... the list is longer. Much longer. This (above) is just a "teaser". STAY AWAY !