Edit: This game is horrible after the spring 2020 update, dont waste your time on this game.

Uhm I feel like I'm qualified to make a detailed and very honest review since I have easily spent over $1000 usd on this game. And I have a total of 5 accounts, I had 6 until I got banned, and I have been and active member of the community for as long as I can remember. Hopefully this review helps someone on the fence about the game decide whether or not its worth spending money on and getting into.

So I'm going to start off by saying this game is great. The combat system is easy to learn and get used to. The gear looks pretty good for a 10 year old game. Completing the game makes you feel a great about accomplishing it. But it does have many, many negatives. Would I recommend this game to someone? Yes, I would for sure recommend this to someone. But anyone who even attempts to try and get into this game needs to understand how pay to play and in pvp pay to win sometimes it can be.

Lets get started with the pros of this game. Like I said the game is very easy to get into and learn the mechanics of how battles work. Once you get to the later worlds bosses start to add some really fancy cheats that changes the dynamic of how you battle. The graphics are quite nice for a 10 year old game. They are constantly trying to improve and update the graphics of the earlier worlds so it adds a fresh new look to the game. In Empyrea I forget the name of the exact zone but I think its called the "Aerial Meadow" or something like that. The whole scenery in that area is beautiful and I was amazed when I saw it. Wizard101 has a very dedicated player base that has been playing and supporting the game for years. The developers take very good care of this game releasing updates and fixes to things all the time. Cosmetics for the game are a little bit limited but you can definitely make some unique sets for your characters. The insane amount of mounts and pets to choose from lets everyone sort of be their own person. I know some people might disagree with this last point but as far as card based mmo's go, in my opinion, Wizard101 is one of, if not, the best one out there. All around a good game to play casually or grind like a no life, like me.

Now lets talk about the cons. I'm going to start with this point because I know almost anyone who has been playing the game for a long time will agree. We NEED more free worlds. The game is 10 years old now and we can't even get all of Wizard City free? Really? Most new incoming players have about 5 hours at best of content to play through and thats if your taking your time to do it. Someone like me who has beat the game on 4 different accounts can blow through Wizard City in less than 2 hours, heck I can finish the first arc in less than 48 hours. But anyways Kingsilse has been updating Wizard City instead of actually listening to the community for once. How do you expect a "Free to Play" game to be free if after 2 hours you have to pay to progress anywhere, its absolutely absurd. And at this point everyone in the community knows that you can just flip a switch and boom, all of Wizard City is free so why not make it free for everyone, forever? I'm going to finish off by saying this is by far the most agonizing part of Wizard101.

Next up, you guessed it, we'll be talking about how pay to win the game is. I'm going to move on from the fact that you have to pay to progress and talk about pvp and in some cases pve aspects of the game. Some of the best gear, cards, mounts, and jewels you have to spend actual money on. In most cases there is absolutely no where to farm for these essential things especially for hard core pvpers. So to get them you have to open crown packs, how many? No idea complete and utter luck. On my Jade Death wizard I spent about 30k+ crowns which is $50 dollars in total trying to get 4 items. Why would I do that? Because for end game and some cases of pvp having a tank is required and the best gear to tank is locked behind a pay wall. Also when you want to get into pvp and if you want the absolute best gear you're going to have to buy either a pack or a whole bundle, which is around $30-40. This is literally for one stat but it can and will be the game changer in some of your matches.

Alrighty so you managed to survive the pay wall and pay to win aspects of the game, so lets talk about the grind. As a casual or solo player its going to be incredibly difficult to get through some worlds or bosses by yourself. And since you can't finish a certain quest because of that you decide to go farm for gear. But the time it takes to farm for this gear is long, like really long. And in some cases its hard even finding people who are willing to help you. I spent almost a week farming for the Paradox Hat on my storm, but you can get lucky sometimes like I did on my fire and end up getting the full set in a few hours. And don't even get me started on the defeat and collect quests. Whenever you see the good old "Defeat and Collect ..." you already know its going to be a second to finish the quest. You could collect everything in 1 battle or collect absolutely nothing and go through 7 battles and not even be finished. As someone who has 4 accounts all maxed out I can tell you even when I'm quad boxing this is still a dreadful process.

Lastly lets talk about Kingsilse as a whole. They are a greedy company and will try and make anything and everything you want to do cost money. I'm not even trying to be rude I love this game and can play it any day of the week but its the truth. The developers pick and choose what they decide to listen to from the community and add it into updates. They ignore adding more free areas which would boost the player base and instead add useless feature like being able to turn into your pet. I'm going to be honest I have wanted to see this is the game for a while now, but now is not the time to be bringing it in, let alone making it a major part of an update instead of a minor one. They completely dropped Pirate101 which in my opinion is a much better game, but they refuse to give a reason as to why and only tell us "More updates are coming soon!" They are changing how much gold it costs to hatch a pet which in some cases is upwards of 300k gold. Which honestly isn't a lot but when max gold is a little over 500k, sorry I don't know exact numbers, it makes spending 300k gold on ONE hatch an absurd amount. They don't allow cheat engine in pet training but you can use it anywhere else in game with no worries about getting banned as long as you're smart enough not to get caught. Boosting in pvp is the new meta, yea you can earn your rank, but why would you when you can just boost yourself to warlord and move on since you most likely won't get banned.

TL;DR
Great game with a HUGE paywall. Be ready to spend some cash. Try not to become a wallet warrior in the process. <3

Edit: This game is horrible after the spring 2020 update, dont waste your time on this game. Uhm I feel like I'm qualified to make a detailed and very honest review since I have easily spent over $1000 usd on this game. And I have a total of 5 accounts, I had 6 until I got banned, and I have been and active member of the community for as long as I can remember. Hopefully this review helps someone on the fence about the game decide whether or not its worth spending money on and getting into. So I'm going to start off by saying this game is great. The combat system is easy to learn and get used to. The gear looks pretty good for a 10 year old game. Completing the game makes you feel a great about accomplishing it. But it does have many, many negatives. Would I recommend this game to someone? Yes, I would for sure recommend this to someone. But anyone who even attempts to try and get into this game needs to understand how pay to play and in pvp pay to win sometimes it can be. Lets get started with the pros of this game. Like I said the game is very easy to get into and learn the mechanics of how battles work. Once you get to the later worlds bosses start to add some really fancy cheats that changes the dynamic of how you battle. The graphics are quite nice for a 10 year old game. They are constantly trying to improve and update the graphics of the earlier worlds so it adds a fresh new look to the game. In Empyrea I forget the name of the exact zone but I think its called the "Aerial Meadow" or something like that. The whole scenery in that area is beautiful and I was amazed when I saw it. Wizard101 has a very dedicated player base that has been playing and supporting the game for years. The developers take very good care of this game releasing updates and fixes to things all the time. Cosmetics for the game are a little bit limited but you can definitely make some unique sets for your characters. The insane amount of mounts and pets to choose from lets everyone sort of be their own person. I know some people might disagree with this last point but as far as card based mmo's go, in my opinion, Wizard101 is one of, if not, the best one out there. All around a good game to play casually or grind like a no life, like me. Now lets talk about the cons. I'm going to start with this point because I know almost anyone who has been playing the game for a long time will agree. We NEED more free worlds. The game is 10 years old now and we can't even get all of Wizard City free? Really? Most new incoming players have about 5 hours at best of content to play through and thats if your taking your time to do it. Someone like me who has beat the game on 4 different accounts can blow through Wizard City in less than 2 hours, heck I can finish the first arc in less than 48 hours. But anyways Kingsilse has been updating Wizard City instead of actually listening to the community for once. How do you expect a "Free to Play" game to be free if after 2 hours you have to pay to progress anywhere, its absolutely absurd. And at this point everyone in the community knows that you can just flip a switch and boom, all of Wizard City is free so why not make it free for everyone, forever? I'm going to finish off by saying this is by far the most agonizing part of Wizard101. Next up, you guessed it, we'll be talking about how pay to win the game is. I'm going to move on from the fact that you have to pay to progress and talk about pvp and in some cases pve aspects of the game. Some of the best gear, cards, mounts, and jewels you have to spend actual money on. In most cases there is absolutely no where to farm for these essential things especially for hard core pvpers. So to get them you have to open crown packs, how many? No idea complete and utter luck. On my Jade Death wizard I spent about 30k+ crowns which is $50 dollars in total trying to get 4 items. Why would I do that? Because for end game and some cases of pvp having a tank is required and the best gear to tank is locked behind a pay wall. Also when you want to get into pvp and if you want the absolute best gear you're going to have to buy either a pack or a whole bundle, which is around $30-40. This is literally for one stat but it can and will be the game changer in some of your matches. Alrighty so you managed to survive the pay wall and pay to win aspects of the game, so lets talk about the grind. As a casual or solo player its going to be incredibly difficult to get through some worlds or bosses by yourself. And since you can't finish a certain quest because of that you decide to go farm for gear. But the time it takes to farm for this gear is long, like really long. And in some cases its hard even finding people who are willing to help you. I spent almost a week farming for the Paradox Hat on my storm, but you can get lucky sometimes like I did on my fire and end up getting the full set in a few hours. And don't even get me started on the defeat and collect quests. Whenever you see the good old "Defeat and Collect ..." you already know its going to be a second to finish the quest. You could collect everything in 1 battle or collect absolutely nothing and go through 7 battles and not even be finished. As someone who has 4 accounts all maxed out I can tell you even when I'm quad boxing this is still a dreadful process. Lastly lets talk about Kingsilse as a whole. They are a greedy company and will try and make anything and everything you want to do cost money. I'm not even trying to be rude I love this game and can play it any day of the week but its the truth. The developers pick and choose what they decide to listen to from the community and add it into updates. They ignore adding more free areas which would boost the player base and instead add useless feature like being able to turn into your pet. I'm going to be honest I have wanted to see this is the game for a while now, but now is not the time to be bringing it in, let alone making it a major part of an update instead of a minor one. They completely dropped Pirate101 which in my opinion is a much better game, but they refuse to give a reason as to why and only tell us "More updates are coming soon!" They are changing how much gold it costs to hatch a pet which in some cases is upwards of 300k gold. Which honestly isn't a lot but when max gold is a little over 500k, sorry I don't know exact numbers, it makes spending 300k gold on ONE hatch an absurd amount. They don't allow cheat engine in pet training but you can use it anywhere else in game with no worries about getting banned as long as you're smart enough not to get caught. Boosting in pvp is the new meta, yea you can earn your rank, but why would you when you can just boost yourself to warlord and move on since you most likely won't get banned. TL;DR Great game with a HUGE paywall. Be ready to spend some cash. Try not to become a wallet warrior in the process. <3