Introduction
Basic information
Developer Name: Galahad Creative
Full Name: SimpleMMO
Release Date: February 2, 2018
Released on: Android, iOS and web/desktop
Cross Play: Yes, players share the same online MMO world across the different versions
Initial thoughts
This was actually our second time playing SimpleMMO, so we already knew exactly what awaited us.
Step.
Step.
Step.
And then step another ten thousand times.
I stopped playing considerably earlier, while Simone continued and reached an absolutely insane level. We took the screenshots for this revamped review a little later than when she actually stopped playing regularly, but they still show just how much time she poured into the game. This was not a game she poked at for two evenings and forgot about; SimpleMMO stuck around for a very long time.
The game has also changed quite a bit since our original experience. New events, pets, systems, professions, Abyss content and quality-of-life improvements have continued to arrive, yet the wonderfully stupid core remains almost untouched: press a button, take a step, see what happens.
It is even a game we featured in one of our old Daily Quests, which probably says enough about how long it remained part of our gaming lives.
Story and setting
Plot overview
There is no traditional main campaign where you must defeat one ultimate villain and roll the credits. Your own progression effectively becomes the story.
Take steps, level up, complete quests, improve equipment, collect pets, join events, participate in guild activities and keep watching increasingly ridiculous numbers go upward.
The random travel events help because every step has the possibility of producing a little encounter, item, enemy, or strange bit of text. It means the Step button is repetitive mechanically without every result being completely identical.
World building and immersion
The world is mostly delivered through text and small pieces of pixel artwork. There are different areas, monsters, NPCs, events and enormous numbers of collectible items rather than giant animated environments.
Surprisingly, it works.
You slowly become familiar with places, event areas, the market, guild systems and other players. The community arguably becomes more important to the world building than any scripted kingdom. When you recognise usernames, compete with people and see enormous player levels, the MMO portion starts carrying the simple presentation.
The problem is that PvP can remind you very quickly how small you are. Getting murdered by somebody vastly above your level does not exactly create the heroic fantasy of an evenly matched duel.
Character development
Your character development is extremely literal. Your level rises, equipment improves, stats increase, pets become stronger and your account slowly accumulates ridiculous amounts of stuff.
There is no complex protagonist arc, but your profile eventually becomes a history of how much time you have invested into the game.
Simone’s account is probably the perfect example. By the time she stopped playing seriously, her character had become absurdly stronger than when we returned to the game. The later screenshots still make that commitment very obvious.
Emotional impact
Most of the emotional impact comes from progression.
Watching your level increase, finding something valuable, getting a rare pet, completing an event or suddenly earning an absurd amount of experience gives SimpleMMO its addictive quality. It is the satisfaction of making a number bigger, except that number can keep getting bigger for years.
There is also the emotional experience of being destroyed in PvP by somebody whose account apparently existed before the invention of electricity.
That is less satisfying.
Rating for story and setting
I have visited multiple aspects of the story, and after some thought and objective thinking, I rated the story and setting with a 6.
Gameplay and mechanics
Core gameplay mechanics
Stepping is still the foundation. It is basically an incremental RPG disguised as an MMO.
Energy and quest points limit certain activities, while equipment, pets and stat progression determine how powerful you become. Loot can be used, collected, traded or sold, and the player economy becomes increasingly important once you start understanding what things are worth.
Pets have also become a significant progression element. New ones keep being introduced, and naturally the newer or rarer options can become stronger and more desirable.
There is always something slightly better to chase.
Difficulty and balance
PvE itself generally becomes a matter of progression. If something is too powerful, improve your character, equipment, or stats and come back stronger.
PvP is a different story.
You can encounter players vastly beyond your power and get absolutely flattened. Long running MMOs naturally develop massive gaps between newer players and veterans, but SimpleMMO can make that difference particularly visible because levels can climb so ridiculously high.
The monetization also affects how fair that progression feels. Players willing to spend real money can acquire premium currency and gain advantages that ultimately help them progress faster.
That does not make free progression impossible, but it absolutely makes the playing field less even.
Pacing of the game
The pacing depends almost entirely on the player.
Want to press Step five times while sitting on the toilet? Sure.
Want to spend hours grinding quests, fighting, trading and optimising progression? Apparently also sure.
That flexibility is one of the game’s biggest strengths. Simone was able to keep playing for a ridiculously long time because SimpleMMO can become a routine rather than something you specifically sit down to finish.
Events also break up the normal progression loop. They give players temporary goals, unique collectibles and often special pets or rewards.
Innovation and uniqueness
The brilliant part is how much MMO structure has been attached to such a stupidly simple concept.
Most MMORPGs ask you to move through huge 3D worlds, learn twenty abilities and memorise complicated rotations. SimpleMMO basically says:
Press Step.
Congratulations, adventure happened.
Yet underneath that is an economy, PvP, guilds, collecting, quests, professions, events and long term progression. That contrast is what makes the game memorable.
Controls and user interface
The controls could hardly be simpler. Most actions are buttons and menus, making the game extremely easy to play on a phone.
The interface has been changed and improved repeatedly over the years, and the current version contains substantially more systems than the game we originally started playing.
Naturally, adding so many features has made it less simple than it once was, but it remains considerably easier to understand than most MMORPG interfaces.
Microtransactions
This is where I have one of my bigger problems with SimpleMMO.
Diamonds can be purchased using real money, and there is also a paid membership system. Diamonds feed into an economy where players can effectively turn spending into progression advantages, while premium resources can also help with things such as energy and quest activity.
That makes the system feel too close to pay to win for me.
You can absolutely play without spending money, we did, but somebody willing to throw real money at the game can accelerate parts of progression considerably.
For a competitive MMO with PvP and leaderboards, that advantage matters.
Rating
After combing through many of the mechanics, the pacing, and other factors of this game, I rated the gameplay and mechanics with an 7.5.
Graphics and art style
Quality of graphics and art direction
Graphically, SimpleMMO is extremely simplistic.
And that works.
Pixel artwork represents monsters, pets, items, avatars and environments without trying to turn the game into something visually spectacular. The presentation exists to support the menus and progression rather than become the main attraction.
Technical performances
Because the game is mostly text, menus and relatively small pieces of artwork, it generally runs well on practically anything suitable for accessing it.
It also works nicely as a mobile game because there is no complex 3D world consuming battery and demanding perfect controls. You can open it, perform some actions and close it again without much hassle.
Over the years there have obviously been bugs, recent patch notes still contain regular fixes, but the developers continue updating the web and app versions frequently.
For something designed to be checked repeatedly throughout the day, that lightweight technical design is a major advantage.
Environment and design uniqueness
Locations are mainly differentiated through artwork, names, enemies and possible encounters rather than huge explorable maps.
That means the game relies heavily on imagination. You are technically travelling enormous distances, but visually you are pressing the same Step button.
Special events help by adding themed areas and unique artwork. Pets, avatars and collectible items also bring much more visual personality than the environments themselves.
Rating
It took me some time to give the graphics and art style an objective rating. There are many things to consider, but ultimately, I rated this section with a 6.5.
Sound and music
Music score and how it contributed to the game
I am not even entirely sure SimpleMMO has audio now, and I don’t really want to know.
That probably says enough.
This is the kind of game we played while doing other things, and sound never became an important part of the experience.
Sound effects quality
There are basic audio effects around certain actions and combat, but nothing that defines the game.
It works, but you could play SimpleMMO silently for hundreds of hours and lose very little.
Voice Acting
There is no meaningful voice acting.
Considering how much text and how many random encounters exist, attempting to voice everything would probably be completely unnecessary and impossible anyway.
Rating
After a lot of consideration, I rated the sound and music section with a 4.5.
Replayability
Game Length and content volume
Technically unlimited.
You could play SimpleMMO casually for a few weeks and feel like you have seen the basic loop.
Or you can continue for years.
There are now players reaching levels so high that the developers literally added special level-up announcements for people passing 25,000 and even 1,000,000+.
At that point, game length becomes a philosophical question.
Extra Content
There is considerably more content now than when we originally started.
Events, pets, professions, guild systems, world bosses, PvP, player markets, crafting, Abyss Gates, collections and endless piles of loot provide plenty of reasons to keep checking in.
The temporary events are probably some of the better extra content because they give the endless grind a short term target.
Replay value
You do not really replay SimpleMMO.
You simply never escape.
Starting completely over would be madness after building a high level account. The replay value instead comes from returning after breaks, checking new updates and continuing your existing progression.
For players who enjoy incremental games, that can produce an absurd amount of playtime.
Rating
After thoughtful consideration, I decided to rate the replayability and game length of SimpleMMO review with an 8.5.
Suggestions and comparisons
Suggestions and feedback
My biggest suggestion would be to ease up on the pay to win side.
Real money Diamonds and progression advantages do not completely ruin SimpleMMO, but they undermine competitive systems. If PvP, leaderboards and economic power matter, being able to accelerate progress using your wallet will always create an uncomfortable imbalance.
I would also like to see more meaningful differences between pets rather than simply continuing a ladder where something newer becomes better. More situational bonuses could make collecting them more interesting.
Comparisons
Compared to a traditional MMORPG like RuneScape or World of Warcraft, SimpleMMO removes nearly everything complicated about physically navigating a world.
Instead of manually walking for five minutes, you press Step.
Compared to modern idle games, however, it has much stronger social features. Guilds, PvP, trading, player markets and community events make other players matter significantly more than they do in most incremental games.
That combination is why SimpleMMO works. It is barely an MMO mechanically, yet somehow very much an MMO socially.
Personal experiences and anecdotes
My favourite memory actually comes from when I was still actively playing with Simone.
There was an event where we needed to travel through different areas and hunt down chests. Collecting everything eventually allowed us to trade the rewards for a special pet.
I sold mine Then I sold basically everything else I owned. Equipment? Gone. Whatever value remained in my account? Pretty much gone.
I gave the proceeds to an artist who made my Discord avatar a Cyndaquil like creature and Ms. Tape for Simone.
So after all the stepping, levelling, PvP deaths, events and grinding, the best thing we got from SimpleMMO was ultimately artwork we still associate with ourselves.
I think that was a pretty good trade.
Simone carried on considerably longer than I did and reached a frankly absurd level. Even though the screenshots for this revamped review were taken somewhat later than when she stopped playing regularly, they still show how far she went.
Rating
Taking in all the personal experiences with SimpleMMO, I give it a personal rating of 8.
Last words
Pros
- Extremely simple gameplay that is easy to pick up anywhere.
- Surprisingly deep MMO systems underneath the Step button.
- Frequent updates and events keep adding new things to do.
- Huge amounts of long-term progression for dedicated players.
- Strong social systems including guilds, PvP, trading and markets.
- Runs well on phones and works perfectly as a game to check throughout the day.
Cons
- Real money Diamonds can provide meaningful progression advantages.
- PvP can be brutally uneven against vastly higher level players.
- The core gameplay becomes extremely repetitive.
- Audio is almost completely forgettable.
- Constantly stronger pets and progression systems can create power creep.
- The endless grind can consume a ridiculous amount of time if it hooks you.
SimpleMMO is still exactly what its name promises: an MMO stripped down until pressing Step somehow becomes the central gameplay mechanic.
And weirdly enough, it works. I stopped much earlier, while Simone kept going until her level became completely ridiculous. There is something genuinely addictive about finding items, improving your character, completing events and watching the numbers climb.
The monetization remains my biggest complaint. Being able to spend real money on Diamonds and gain progression advantages does not sit particularly well in an MMO with PvP and competitive systems.
But SimpleMMO gave us a lot of entertainment over the years, appeared in one of our Daily Quests, and even indirectly resulted in the Discord avatars we still use.
That is a pretty memorable legacy for a game mostly about pressing one button repeatedly.
FINAL RATING
7.5
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