There’s something a little intimidating about Storm Legion . It’s supposed to be an expansion to Rift, but that’s about as much of an understatement as claiming the British just got itchy feet during the 18th century. Storm Legion adds two new continents, four new souls, seven new dungeons, ten more levels and an ambitious player housing system. When you consider this in light of the fact that Rift only shipped with a single continent, suddenly ’expansion’ seems inadequate.

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But there’s very good reason for it: wandering through the original continent is almost claustrophobic, with rifts, quests, and an overabundance of distractions demonstrating quite how little room Trion Wolds left themselves with. Dusken and Brevane, the two new continents, should provide some much needed breathing room for a studio that has been relentless in its content updates since release well over a year ago.With so much on offer, to expect it all to be incredible would be fool-hardy, and while the majority impresses, there are some missteps on the new continents.There’s a main quest structure still in place, which will be familiar to the seasoned MMO player, but Rift has moved further and further away from that over the past few months, morphing into something that has its attention fractured between a few too many pursuits. With the Instant Adventure and Looking for Group features both providing the instant gratification of achieving something quest-like at the touch of a button, along with quests that are auto-assigned just by interacting with the world, the amount of tailored experiences start to get lost in a whirlwind of activities all vying for your attention to the point of feeling overwhelming.Kill an enemy and you start a kill-quest, and interact with any slightly-shimmering object on the floor and you’ll probably have to collect ten of them. It makes the world feel fuller, but doesn’t do much to stand out from the same tired old MMO design that has plagued the genre for years. Better are the story quests which lead you through the ascent of the giant storm dragon Crucia. Right from the off you’re placed in epic battles with giant mechanical dragons and steel constructs, and by the time you’re plumbing the depths of the Golem Foundry the presence of the Storm Legion has been such a constant that you feel as though you’ve got a personal beef with them. Better still are the artefacts; collectibles that encourage you to explore and platform your way around Storm Legion’s beautiful landscapes.And it is beautiful. Trion's confidence is thrust right to the forefront and demonstrated with a scale that’s regularly breathtaking. Giant vines weave through the countryside of Brevane, while a perpetual storm darkens Dusken’s barren landscape. They create a sense of place that was often not quite there in Rift’s original areas, which favored fantasy tropes rather than breaking out into something wholly unique.That confidence extends to the new Souls, one for each of Rift’s classes. They operate like sub-classes, and each class can have three active at any one time. It creates a versatility that allows you to really create a build that suits your play style. Storm Legion’s Souls take this to an extreme, with an eye on the esoteric.The Mage gets the Harbinger, a Soul that revolves around enhancing the Mage’s trademark staff with ethereal blades, which turns it immediately into a melee class. It’s an impressive move, as it not only completely alters the role of the Mage in groups and raids, but also alters the entire class on a far more fundamental level. Using Eldritch Armor, the majority of channeled spells can now be cast instantly, vastly increasing the damage output of the class. It’s a tradeoff for placing yourself right in harm’s way, and it feels suitably powerful.The Rogue’s Tactician, similarly, alters the class in a hefty way, providing a unique flavor. Taking cues from the likes of Team Fortress 2’s medic gun, suddenly the Rogue can hose down an area with healing, flame or necrotic damage in a sort of directed AoE that shifts it from being all about single-target DPS to something else entirely. Throw in a bunch of traps and placed contraptions, and the Tactician becomes a pretty interesting prospect.Less revolutionary are the Warrior and Cleric Souls, Tempest and Defiler respectively. While the Tempest gives the Warrior a little more ranged oomph, it doesn’t have nearly as drastic an effect as the Tactician or Harbinger. The Warrior is still the guy that’s going to take the hits, and deal them out. The Defiler, meanwhile, is a new kind of healing, focused on stacks and ‘links’, where you essentially attach yourself to one target. There are some nice touches like the Beacon of Despair, a placeable construct that takes your aggro and tanks damage but fundamentally you’re still a healer, still supporting.The dungeons, too, quietly rework the formula of what came before. Complexes like the Empyrean Core go a fair way to creating the illusion of a living compound, with soldiers going about their business and the indoctrination of Storm Legion troops going on around you. It’s not just bosses sitting around waiting for you to murder them, which gives just enough personality to maintain the illusion of a living, breathing area. The fights themselves are kinetic affairs, with lots of AoE nukes to keep you on your toes and make the battles feel fluid. There’s a certain disconnect between that movement and the static nature of spell-casting, but it works to keep things tense and involved. The trash mobs hit hard, and the bosses hit like garbage trucks, as befits any high level dungeon.And then there’s Storm Legion’s player housing. Of all the things the expansion provides, it’s the Dimensions that most impress, taking the idea of giving players somewhere to relax and instead giving them somewhere to create and show off.You’re provided a space and then tasked with filling it, taking the bare Dimension and constructing something personal and unique with it. You get items through playing the game -- tables, chairs, light fixtures, wooden planks -- and then place them in your Dimension wherever you see fit. More than that, you can resize, rotate, even levitate every single one, until you’ve got things exactly as you want them.Players have already done surprising things with them, and thanks to a rating system and leaderboards, you can visit high-ranking Dimensions right from the get-go. One player decided to turn their Dimension into a wooden maze, elevated towards the ceiling so enterprising players can’t just pan the camera upwards and cheat. Another filled the large lake in the middle of a lagoon with a giant hotel, complete with draconic egg collection in the lobby. This is all just shortly after launch, and with the versatility of the editor it won’t be surprising if truly astonishing constructions start to emerge after a month or two. Player housing is always high on community request lists, but Trion Worlds have truly outdone themselves here.This leaves Storm Legion in the odd position of being simultaneously impervious and enticing to newcomers. It’s undoubtedly created to serve the existing player base, which it does admirably, providing the space and content they need to stay interested and entertained, but at the same time with systems like Dimensions and an ever-increasing roster of Souls, Rift is looking more and more attractive to those who aren’t already subscribed.