Pirates Online (4.7)

Pirates Online is a long-lived server with (at the moment) 2 very busy servers and quite constant 2k players. With it's newest server, it's promise is to keep it as close as possible to a vanilla experience. Click Here to play this server.

Newbie Friendly (4.5)

Pirates Online is the closest it gets to a Newbie-Friendly server. There are Discord-based guides everywhere, and they have a whole forum dedicated to guides to do pretty much everything. Moderators sure make an effort to keep all guides updated, and they've even take the extra step on even adding links on NPCs so you can visit the guide in a single click.
The reason I am not giving it the 5 stars is simply because everything can always be improved - If I could request something as a player, it would be to be able to have actual guides inside the game rather than going to an external website... or, if you're going to keep the external thing, make it so guides can be accessed since the very beginning (Add a link to the welcome pop up with an actual starters guide maybe!). But yeah, other than that, PO has done one of the cleanest jobs into making a newbie-friendly game.

Effort to Value (4.8)

Wether you love PK or simply enjoy cooking for others, your effort has a huge chance of being rewarded. Be it cooking, or farming, or simply assisting mazes, there are galores of goods to be distributed. You can pretty much have fun by simply doing the average tasks in-game without ever worrying about running out of gold or having to spend days without doing a single activity just to save up to have fun for a couple of mazes.

Content Availability (5.0)

Content. Everywhere. What can I say? It is basically impossible for you to have "nothing to do". From newbie-friendly mazes, to like 30 ways of money making, to like 20 different mazes... You just can't get bored, more likely, you'll even get tired of having stuff to do, even during the night hours where there is a little less content. Also, players themselves create a heavy amount of fan content everyday, and players are mostly talkative both in-game and in Discord. There is nothing dead about PO's content other than my character on the floor in PK mazes.

Quality of Life (4.9)

I must just say.... Wow. Nearly everything fixable has been fixed, all the way from animations, to bug fixes to even adding new visuals to a lot of skills! For real, if you log in, you will encounter a lot of tiny fixes that are usually overlooked but generate such a welcoming feel to it. If anything, just to make it perfect, I would add a few more visuals for the skills that still remain invisible such as Abyss Mire and Cursed Fire... I really can't think about much I'd fix, so props on the devs for this insane work.

Pay to Win Rate (4)

If you want to play casually, just enjoying the game's content, you're guaranteed to do that even if you play for just a couple hours a week. It is pretty simple to make a character gemmed to an average level, specially if you're to choose a cheaper to build class. If it were just this, I would totally give it a 5.
However, the reality, is that many players want to be at the very top while spending as little as possible. That's totally understandable and natural. However, if we are real here, there is a very small chance you can make it to the top without spending as much as the top players, specially if you choose a popular class such as crusader or champion. The harsh truth is that you will possibly not make it to the very top, but hey, if we all can enjoy life even while being average, things are always better!

Fluidity of Gameplay (5.0)

Gameplay is smoother than my brains. Ping time to server is basically inexistent unless you live extremely far from the servers. Also, with the animation tweak fixes, every movement is as smooth as it gets. Also, flash bombs have been edited in a way you cannot get locked-in forever by a guild using 999 flash bombs. Weak internet connection? Worry not! you will not get disconnected at random... unless your internet takes over 30 seconds to send another ping.

Customer Voice (5.0)

Absolute 0 complaints here. Even though it used to be much worse, nowadays the staff really redeemed themselves. You've got a suggestion to make? I guarantee it will be at least heard. Many suggestions will cause changes in-game (unless, of course, they're terrible suggestions). A rarity in our community.

Overall Experience (4.2)

This is the only one where I am mixed about the whole experience. Everything about the game by itself is so smooth and enjoyable! Probably the best overall experience I've ever had in any server. However...... there are 2 little things that just don't sit well with me, one being the fact that toxic players seem to be slightly more common in this server and penalties for it are sort of non-existent. This is pretty much nobody's fault so it is a hard take for me to rate it in the experience, but I wish to keep these reviews as real as possible for me.
Another thing that just kills me inside a little... Even though I just LOVE! there being so many things to do at every given moment... When you get to play this game very actively, you may get... overwhelmed, even to the point of a burnout, specially if you decide on taking higher roles such as guild leader/subleader
Other than that, everything else, as described above is extremely enjoyable! As long you're not a weakling like ol' Luisa, you will probably be able to enjoy it a lot more than I possibly could.

Pirate King Online (3.3)

Pirate King Online is one of the oldest servers out there with a long history of different servers opened and merged in the past, while also keeping the closest it gets to a vanilla experience of the 2007 game. Click Here to play this server.

Newbie Friendly (3.5)

As the experience of vanilla stays true... It is also very limited on guidance for those new to the game. There are some guides in the webpage but they're hard to access (or to even know they exist). Website navigation is a true beauty for those who understand the work behind it, but for the average user... it is complex.

Effort to Value (4.0)

Bruh... this server is HARD! it takes forever to achieve anything, and every maze can consume entire days worth of work. However, once you do level up and gem up a character, that character is sort of guaranteed to keep it's same value forever as the game rarely ever gets any updates.

Content Availability (1.0)

I understand it is a server meant to be vanilla, which has truly achieved that but... it just isn't 2007 anymore. Give the content some love, allow players to actually have something to do besides mazes (which are extremely costly to assist). There is literally nothing to do in between mazes - sometimes those gaps of times can be over 24 hours. I mean, if you only play a couple times a week, then maybe this works for you...

Quality of Life (3.0)

Eh. While there have been pretty nice QoL updates such as sell stall, offline stall, wings previews, potions countdown counters, and a few others... there have been updates that seem pretty pointless, such as the talisman npc at CA teleport... there are better ways to spend the workforce of the already tiny staff.
Also, why making extra accounts should be that hard?

Pay to Win Rate (4.8)

This is the one specific part where PKO just triumphs best... because, no matter if you're a maller or a casual player, you will suffer equally. Money has very little meaning in the server as you cannot buy any kind of power-up, just a few consumables here and there. If anything, this makes mallers extremely rare, and the price of IMPs are insanely high, so you might at least have a slightly easier life if you do happen to sell your IMPs.

Fluidity of Gameplay (4.0)

Beautiful ping with nearly 0 lag. Also has servers close to pretty much anywhere due to their complex server connections. However, sometimes you will experience run-back bugs that will appear as if it were lag, and movement is just much slower than you will ever experience in any server due to the lack of existant movement speed items and potions.

Customer Voice (1.0)

The best part of this server as a whole is truly it's community, having the nicest people I've met in the entire ToP community... And the staff of this game... aren't bad people per se - it just happens to be nearly impossible to communicate any discontent with them, be it because language barrier, them not understanding the weight of the issue or straight up rejecting any form of modification to the game or experience. There are the exception of 2 specific staff members that actually try their best to care about the issue given... but them by themselves can only do so much.
Also, every forum and game event has been repeated since 2017 and updates are extremely rare.

Overall Experience (4.7)

I am extremely biased in this one, simply because, as pointed above, the community is just insanely nice for the greatest part. It truly feels like playing with other adults, who always try and understand what must be done for the best of the community. These people always try their best to fix the unfixable, even with 0 support from the staff team. If you can overlook the heavy flaws pointed above, then you're in to knowing awesome players.

Rage of Sage Online (3.6)

Rage of Sage is an unique server running since 2011, making it possibly the longest-lived server there is. Differently from PO and PKO, this server does not attempt to be a vanilla, it is truly it's own thing. Click Here to play this server.

Newbie Friendly (4.3)

The game is extremely simple and straight forward. It is easy to get a grasp of it, and assisting activities is as easy as it gets. Also, there are leveling systems and money making ways specifically meant for newbies. Guides are also rather easy to access in the website.

Effort to Value (4.0)

Pretty much every activity will generate crazy amounts of earnings... but you will also be spending a lot. Whatever activity you do however has a guaranteed earning side to it. Also, maxing out a character is relatively easy compared to other servers, and once you've maxed out, you can keep that character's value for a long time.

Content Availability (4.5)

The game staff keeps adding it's own kind of content and gets updated very often. The game itself can get pretty bizarre at times, to the point of it being basically it's own game rather than a ToP server, but that's what makes it unique.

Quality of Life (2.0)

The server has already had most of the basic updates that better the overall Quality of Life. However, I've heard (I don't know wether this is still true), it is possible to create terrible "tweaks" that destroy the experience by making targets unmissable for example. Please do correct me if this has been fixed already.
Also as far my memories go, it was always SO HARD! to do anything once anything stunned you... and pretty much everything that exists stuns you. Got clicked? you're locked-in. A flash bomb somehow caught you? you're out of luck.

Pay to Win Rate (4.5)

As I've mentioned before, maxing out is not specifically the hardest task in the world, wether you mall or not, so the P2W sentence holds very little meaning in servers of this kind.

Fluidity of Gameplay (2.0)

As far as my memories cover... while the PvE sense of it is great and smooth... the stuns really kill the experience. Everything stuns you and locks you in forever until you either die or move enough to counter attack.

Customer Voice (4.0)

I can see that most of the oldest players do have a voice in heavy weight issues with the game, and the staff is overall helpful whatever the situation is. Most staff are open to suggestions, and game does get updated according to such sometimes.

Overall Experience (3.5)

If it weren't because of the stuns... it'd be a game I'd enjoy a lot more. It is unique and it offers a difference completely different from the rest. It is the server that most allows you to be a solo player, and most likely will always have something to do. I love the bizarre side of this server, but the PK side of it feels so underwhelming.