I have very mixed feelings about RIFT.
First, the game didn't seem to be friend with my ATI (Radeon 5700 series, 1Go) card, which seemed to be the norm for other ATI uses as well. Introduction videos were very choppy at best, and the chargen screen outright refused to display my character unless AA (anti-alias) was disabled. This, with the latest WHL driver. However, the 2011 eyecandy definitely is there, and once I could settle for some mid-level but stable settings in the video options, I quite enjoyed gawking at the world.
Next, I really liked the role/souls system. I thought it was well designed and implemented in game, if rather poorly explained in or outside the game. New players might find the amount of skills/talent to choose from rather overwhelming at first. I suspect threads about FOTM ("flavor of the month") builds to monopolize the game forums for quite some time still after launch. However, if this allows for a greater versality, switching between different configurations depending on playstyle (grouping, raiding or hunting solo) or mood, it should be hailed as a welcome feature in my opinion.
Unfortunately, RIFT misses the opportunity to fully exploit this original feature in combat, as the pace during battles is awefully (snail-like) slow : hit… cast… hit… hit… yawn. Thi is aggravated by the fact that once you find a decent combo of useful skills/spells, nothing in the game really motivates you detracting from it. So, from level 4 all the way up to level 20 something, I basically used the same attack sequence (of 3 or 4 skills), for every type of enemy, because it just wasn't efficient to do otherwise. It could have varied depending on the type of encounter, or enemies, for example.
Finally, and above all, despite the quite interesting "rift invasions", getting players to band together to fight off threatening undeads/demons, I found the game extremely… the same than any other MMORGPs out there. A boring (after a while) grindfest, with its inevitable and very classical FEDEX quest system and a pretty limited inventory (which, for a 2011 game, I really hated). Quests items take some of that space too, so watch it not loosing on some nice stuff while hunting.
Anyway, if you enjoyed WoW/WAR, you might just enjoy this game too. Despite the evident graphical enhancements, the crafting (which didn't seem very elaborate to me), the pvp'ing, the dungeons, the levelling, the mounts, will soon seem like familiar acquaintances from the past.