Yearly Archives: 2008

Metin 2: Free Holiday gifts!

G4BOX Inc, a North American publisher and distributor of interactive entertainment media, announced today that it is celebrating the holiday season with a special Holiday Present promotion and a special Mystery Holiday Gift Box sale price for its popular MMORPG, Metin2. Hidden amongst these magical holiday gift boxes is a special Grand Prize that includes every item in the entire Metin2 Q Shop (item mall).

Beginning in mid-December, U.S. players of Metin2 will receive a Free Holiday Present which is a gift box containing a random mystery item.

No purchase is required for players to participate. Players simply need to login to the in-game Item Mall. Once there, players will automatically receive a Free Holiday Present. Players must be at least level 35 or higher in order to qualify to receive the Free Holiday Present. The presents are also available to low level players who reach level 35 before mid of January 2009.
Additional Metin2 Mystery Gift Boxes can also be purchased as gifts.

Mystery Gift Boxes are available for purchase for U.S. $2.50 (250 MP), U.S. $3.50 (350 MP) and U.S. $9.5(950 MP. Each of the Mystery Gift Boxes will contain a random item from the item mall.
“We are thrilled to kick-off the holiday season this year by offering this incredible Mystery Gift Box Giveaway to our Metin2 community,”

said Howard He, CEO of G4BOX. “It is a great way to celebrate the holidays with our loyal players and there is already an incredible amount of excitement surrounding the special Grand Prize Giveaway.”

Depending on how many players are at or above level 35 during the promotion and how many boxes are either purchased or picked up by players who received it for free, one or more players has a chance to be the winner of a grand prize-a holiday gift box that contains every item from the Metin2 item mall (that is $3,400 worth of Metin2 items!).

Voyage Century: Cool Gear from the Colonies

An update patch designed to solve the colony loss problem will be released soon, so players can stop worrying about whether they should invest lots of money in the construction of colonies. Meanwhile, the 2x profits from business trips event just came into an end, which was definitely good event for those players who are dedicated to developing colonies, because building a colony can be costly.

Hey, no pain, no gain. After building a colony, players will enjoy the many benefits it brings. For instance, you can get new materials, new vessels, and advanced gear like the Blood Knight Gear.

Meanwhile, Blood knight jewelry has had some newly added attributes attached to it such as load, lull, HP recovery, and SP recovery which will help players in battle a lot.

Last but not least, players can just buy blood knight gear, so there’s no forging to worry about.

WoW causes students to drop college?

The Duluth News Tribune is reporting the following news:

It’s 10 p.m. on a Tuesday in Duluth and Dean Walczynski, 26, is hacking at foes with a two-handed ax. Haunting Celtic music accompanies his journey through villages, fortresses and snowy ranges.

Walczynski, in the guise of Deandarko the blood-elf, is a fanatical World of Warcraft player who invests six to eight hours at a time, sometimes five days a week, in the computer game.

It’s easy to see how this endless role-playing fantasy world envelops players, with battles to be fought and treasures to be collected at every turn. But the effects of such infatuation have led to problems for many, such as college students who skip class and forget to study as they lose themselves in virtual worlds.

Academic counselors brought the problem to the attention of UMD Chancellor Kathryn A. Martin in recent months when they discovered students with academic difficulties were spending enormous amounts of time playing computer games. The issue was addressed more directly with UMD freshmen and resident advisers this year.

“These are very, very bright kids, and if you can’t get them back on track, you’ve lost a lot of potential,” Martin said.

Dangers of problematic gaming include changes in sleep and wake cycles that can affect concentration, memory and physical health, and when meaningful relationships are neglected and the gaming world becomes more satisfying than the real world.

According to the American Psychiatric Association, 90 percent of America’s children play video games and 15 percent have a problem. About 10 percent to 12 percent of adult players play more than six hours a day, said John O’Neill, director of addiction services at the Menninger Clinic in Houston.

UMD senior Stephen Dolence says he used to be obsessed with computer games, sometimes to the point of neglecting his fiancee, who also played, and forgetting or skipping class.

Often playing World of Warcraft six hours at a time, “I wouldn’t get my work done,” he said. Dolence and his fiancee decided together to cut out gaming after it began to bore them. Now preparing for graduate school, Dolence still plays a bit but says if he were hooked, graduate school would be impossible.

While not technically an addiction, online and video games can be habit-forming and have an effect on the brain, said David Swenson, a forensic psychologist and professor of management at the College of St. Scholastica. Gamers experience an adrenaline rush and gain satisfaction from playing, and they tend to repeat their actions to experience those feelings, he said — much like compulsive gamblers.

Walczynski, who has a penchant for tea and energy drinks while playing, said he’s in it for social aspects and unwinding from work. He meets new friends and plays with real-life friends.

Earning rewards and respect from other players is part of it, he said, “and you assume a role of something you would never be in normal life.”

While the St. Mary’s Duluth Clinic nutrition services employee says he sets aside time to venture into the real world, he has turned down requests to go out at night when he was focused on reaching new levels within the game.

“I can be really out of control, but I can sometimes draw a line,” he said. The longest time he’s played is 18 hours straight.
UMD academic adviser Vince Repesh worked with two students last year whose grades had plummeted from straight-A’s to F’s after months of playing World of Warcraft.

“I accused one of them of coming in loaded from smoking dope, he looked so bad,” Repesh said. But the student had been up all night playing a computer game.

During freshman orientation this year, three of the 70 students Repesh talked to in groups about computer use had been to counseling for problematic gaming, one because he was too competitive to stop.

“I tell parents during talks, I believe it’s one of the hidden causes for kids to fail that nobody knows about it,” he said.

The computer is often an underlying problem for students who receive counseling from UMD health services, said Kathy Morris, the department’s director.

“It’s something else causing the pain that brings them in,” she said, such as loneliness, poor grades or exhaustion. Counselors work with students to better manage time or develop outside social relationships to get excitement in their lives in other ways, she said.

Gaming provides benefits when done in moderation, said O’Neill, of the Menninger Clinic. Many games are difficult and require an intricate thought process, but playing might have moved from a hobby to an obsession, he said, when:

* The amount of time spent playing increases to a point where you lose track of time.
* Others comment on how much time you spend playing.
* Work, relationships or school are neglected.

“I’ve worked with people who have deleted World of Warcraft,” he said. “But then they reinstall it, or throw it away only to go buy it again. You can stop if it’s a hobby.”

Nathan Kleinke is a St. Scholastica student and former GameStop store employee in Duluth. He said college-age players can be more susceptible to overuse because they have more freedom.
“Kids that don’t have jobs or have much responsibility [can] end up… taking entire semesters off to sleep, eat and play,” he said.
Wired college dorm rooms with high-speed connections make it easier for students to hole up, O’Neill said.

Aside from World of Warcraft, which has more than 11 million subscribers, popular massive multiplayer online role-playing games include Everquest, Dark Age of Camelot and Star Wars Galaxies.

When a new version of a game comes out, players will buy it and sometimes take a week off school or work to play the new game, Kleinke said.

Players joke about the urban myth that some people concoct makeshift catheters so their play can be continuous. Dolence has heard of it and doesn’t doubt that it’s true.

Walczynski doesn’t go that far. He started playing at 8 p.m. Tuesday and finished at 1:10 a.m. after developing a headache, taking four breaks during play. If he needed to, he’d be able to quit, he said, “but I don’t want to.”

Zu Online: Pet Combination System Overview

Pets are a necessary companion of every inner cultivator. The strength of the equipped pet affects the strength of its master a great deal. So, to develop a pet is every bit as challenging as developing its master. So, the Zu Online developers have designed a Pet Combination function to help players to develop an extremely powerful pet.

Supernatural Pet Combination System
The strength of the equipped pet affects the strength of its master great deal. Players may take advantage of the Pet Combination function to combine a relatively weak pet with a primary pet to develop the primary pet faster.

Before the Combination
It is simple to combine two pets. First of all, a player should equip the primary pet and then unfold the pet interface. Then, the player should place the pet to be combined with the primary pet in its designated slot. Just by doing this, the player can begin combining the two pets.

After the Combination
The pet to be combined with the primary pet should be level 40+. By default, each primary pet can only be combined with 3 other pets at most. But, the primary pet can be fed some certain items so that it can be combined with other pets more times.

The numerical value of the primary pet’s stats increase is determined by the sub-pet’s stats. Pet Combination’s may fail. So, players may use 1 Pet Aptitude Grass to combine two pets and increase the success rate.

Pet’s Star Level
The Pets’ star level system is being released with the Pet Combination system. When a pet hits a higher star level, its stats increase. If you wish to develop a more powerful pet or win a better ranking for your pet, just try to raise the star level of your pet.

Pet Boluses can be used to change the numerical value of a pet’s stats increases at random and therefore change the pet’s star level. If the pet gets a high numerical value of stat increases, its star level increases. Instead, if the pet gets a low numerical value of stat increases, its star level will be reduced.

Gilfor’s Tales

Gilfor’s Tales is the latest fantasy MMORPG made by Studio Sodigital, the creator of Arthic. The graphics are a mix between 2.5D environments with 3D characters rendered in real-time. This creates a nearly photo-realistic feeling when you’re playing the game.

The unique gaming experience is set in a world of fantasy. The player creates a team and explores the magical world, experiencing surprizing and amazing adventures. The Gilfor’s world is inhabited by beasts, monsters, and demons who lie in wait for the adventurers’ team at each twist and turn of the versatile plot. Various types of weapons, armor, and jewelry protect the team from danger.

Tales of Pirates: Version 1.38 Now Available

The Tales of Pirates team is proud to announce that the latest version of the hit game, version 1.38, has been released on December 11, 2008. Version 1.38 has many new features, apparel, and quests to keep you entertained. With some players having previewed the new version, they’re reactions have been overwhelmingly positive. There are some most popular features as below:

Feature 1: The brand-new Head-gear Forging System, included the Hear-gear NPC, cool new caps and the Head-gear Forging and Refining functions.

Feature 2: Introduces the 2nd Rebirth, including the “Gorgeous Rebirth” quest.

Feature 3: Launches the “Honorary Treasure Chest” to reward the bravest warriors who prove themselves in guild wars. Members of the winning guild will receive this precious prize as well as the honor owed to true pirates.

Feature 4: A new map called “Island Prison”, which includes PVP, and fun items like the Good Guy Card, Arrest Warrant and much more.

AOA Operation: Happy New Year

Age of Armor, Operation: Happy New Year is coming into action! In this new version, one’s characters will reach Level 70, with the new 10levels added; one can get more knowledge points, which would enable the player with more options on weapons and armors.

Not only the players get New Year rewards, so does the mobs, all the world bosses will get new loots and new skills. Bosses hunters now need to rearrange their tactics for boss raid again.

For this operation, the UI system is also optimized, auto pilots system and fighting assistant is intellectualized as well.

Fighters of Freedom, gear up now, Operation Happy New Year need you to keep the peace in Age of Armor.
December 16, 2008, do not miss the time.

War Rock Update Available Now

War Rocks new map named Disturm is Home to the Hamina Naval yard, Disturm has been ravaged by constant battles in the Derbaran civil war. The legendary Hamina battleships were dry-docked here during the calm years preceding the crash of the War Rock and outbreak of civil war. Over time, the small port has taken significant damage and the battleships were either destroyed by sabotage or stolen by international pirates. Rumor has it that one Hamina battleship remains and the Derbaran and N.I.U. have dispatched squadrons to capture the ship waiting at Disturm. Along with the new map the War Rock team has included the Hamina Battleship and two additions to the armory with the Stamina PX Item and Double Up PX Item. War Rock has also recently put Hackshield into place as the games newest weapon against hackers.

War Rock is a tactical, modern FPS (first-person shooter) exploding with intense, fast-paced combat. Play 1 of 5 Strategic Character Classes, Military Engineer, Medic, Sniper, Assault, or Heavy Weapons Expert. Armed with the world’s deadliest weapons and controlling the most lethal vehicles, players attack three story-driven, killer game play modes in the air, on the land and over the sea. The game is free to download and Free2Play so players can get right into “pwning” other players from around the world.

Phoenix Dynasty Online: New Patch for Christmas

As Christmas is drawing near in the heart of winter, we are happy to present a special patch that expands many new contents. In this newest pack you will brave the danger of an Elder Evil Beast of Annum to save Christmas Eve, go through trials of wisdom and strength to win a god’s favor, and finally revel in firecrackers to celebrate the holiday. A lot Christmas rewards you will get from them, and we hope you will fully enjoy the newest gaming experience through this greatest festival.

Firecrackers
All non-humanoid mobs may drop firecrackers. When ignited, not only will they produce various eye-catching effects to dot the holiday, also will give you Christmas gifts including Silver Pig, Golden Pig, Christmas gems, Festival Gem Box, Game Passport ( the item required in the Immortal’s Test) , and much more.

Beast of Annum
Drawn by the bustling yet joyful Christmas, an Elder Evil Beast of Annum suddenly strikes in PDO, seeking to shatter the holiday atmosphere and all that the adventurers value too much. Rally your forces and eliminate this unthinkable thing before it is too late!
Beast of Annum will appears to attack Phoenix Village or Bayer .Each time the monster will show up only for 3 hours before retiring back to his realm. Therefore you and your friends have to kill him within the time limit. Astonishing loots will drop if you manage to kill the monster, and pay close attention to the system broadcasting, which will tell you the place where the monster assaults.

Immortal’s test
Besides the Beast of Annum, the festival atmosphere in PDO also mesmerized an Immortal, drawing him to the world of man. Impressed by the mortal world’s sheer exultation in Christmas and the adventure’s spirit against the Beast of Annum, the Immortal prepared to lend the mortal his knowledge and prowess——he will bestow an Immortal’s Silk Purse on any adventures brave and wise enough to find him in the Map of Immortal Mountain.