It has been a few months since we had our last Game of the Month. Actually, this was exactly the reason we changed from "average counting" to "monthly counts".

This month, Avalon is the convincing winner, topping the rankings with a few 100 votes more than the number 2 in the list.

So, what makes this game so special? We signed up to have a look. Signin up was pretty straight-forward, without any bumps, so we were inside the game within a few seconds, receiving a piece of clothing, a stick and some starter items. Cool! Freebies!

The forums, always the first place we go, are nicely visited. But they are not as busy as those in other games we've seen. In some subforums, the latest post was made a few days ago. Of course, this says nothing about the game, but we believe that an active community is what makes a "good" game a "great" game!

The game has everything you'd expect: a training grounds. Contrary to most games, you need to think before you train in Avalon. Training once costs 15 energy. Training twice or 4 times costs 35 energy. 5 or more: 50 energy. 

So training 4 times means getting most out of your energy. I do have to admit though, that I am not entirely sure where the "training points" come from, and how they relate to the energy. I suspect that this system is designed to promote attacking. If you use all your energy on training in one go, you will be left with energy you cannot use, except in attacks. 

Next, it's time for an adventure. And adventurous as I am, I go out to steal some coins, filling my wallet. Don't expect any difficult quests here, an adventure is just a matter of selecting one, clicking the link and you are done. Much like crimes in competing games.

Well, what do we do now? We've trained, we've robbed... let's go out and attack someone, getting ourselves killed. I grab my sharp pointy stick, and rush at the first random person in my neighbourhood.

Marraman dodged your attack!
Marraman hit you with His Iron Blade doing 10,156 damage!
You were defeated by Marraman

 That went exactly like I'd expected. Battle is based on the combat statistics of attacker and defender. But what I did not expect is that losing a battle actually makes you LOSE experience. This makes me wonder whether it is actually possible to level-down in this game. If so...then this builds some excellent strategical possibilities for punchbags and levelholders.

All in all, I have to say, I like what I've seen. With one year of public availability, Avalon is young, has a small active community, and holds everything it would need to grow in the future. Being a small game at this time, gives the newcomer a fair chance of -in the future- becoming stronger than many. It offers perspective for newcomers, the lack of which is usually a common complaint with newbies in other, bigger and older games. It encourages combat, which is always a good source of fun.

You definately might wanna try this one!