For about the space of a year, I was beholden to the MMORPG monster. I spent nearly all my free time grinding levels and not much else. I mostly enjoyed it, but came to the realization that in the space of an entire year I had only played two games, and the others that I wanted to play were just sitting around gathering dust. So last summer I decided to go ahead and shelve Final Fantasy XI and World of Warcraft for good.
Then I started having the cravings. I needed to slay some monsters, loot the corpses, and sell the loot so I could get better gear to kill stronger monsters.
I then remembered about Progress Quest
Progress Quest is an interesting MMORPG with all of the tedium abstracted out of it leaving you with the the meat of the MMO experience without the tedium of actually working for it.
Starting a new Progress Quest character is relatively straightforward: you select if you would like to play online (you then must choose your realm) or offline, you choose a name for your character (there’s even a random name generator included that generates fairly pronounceable names), select your race from 21 choices (including Half Man, Double Hobbit, Demicanadian, and Gyrognome), select one of 18 character classes, and then Roll your stats (Progress Quest even sports an “Unroll” feature should you change your mind and wish to go back to the previous set of stats). Once you are satisfied with your character you hit “Sold!” and embark on your quest.
This is where you sit back and let the game take over. The story is a bit cliché, but it gets the job done. Your character then heads off into the killing fields and begins murdering wildlife, looting the corpses, selling the loot and then getting better equipment. One of the best features of this game is that since it’s all automatic, you can still play and progress even if you have to leave your computer for any amount of time, or even while you’re playing something else.
The latest version of Progress Quest will minimize unobtrusively to your system tray so you can concentrate on other tasks while your character dutifully continues to make progress. You can at any time bring back up the main window which will show you everything you need to know about how your game is… um… progressing. There is a window that shows your character sheet, spells learned, inventory, equipment, plot development, what quest you’re currently doing, and what your character is doing at any given moment.
If you’re playing online, Progress Quest supports three kinds of guilds (evil, neutral, or good) that you can create and recruit people for. You also have access to the PQ Hall of Fame where you can see how your character measures up against the other players in your realm, who’s in your guild, and other exciting stats.
If I have to explain why Progress Quest is a great game, then you just won’t understand. But, trust me, it’s great.
See also