Yearly Archives: 2008

Voyage Century: Business Hub-Seville

Today the folks at Voyage Century are going to talk to you about the bustling business hub of Seville.

Voyage Century is a 3D MMORPG from IGG that prides itself on its real world geography, historical design, and eye-catching graphics.

Back in the 16th century, due to Spain’s location at the mouth of the Mediterranean, ports there were very busy and prosperous, and Seville was one of the most prosperous of these ports. Because of the extremely large volume of imports and exports, people in Spain considered Seville as a business center of their empire.

Here you can see some bronze cannons used to defend this prosperous city. There are also some caissons scattered around the ground. By standing in this area, you get a beautiful view of this port. Standing here, you can see the vast ocean and the magnificent 16th century architecture, an amazing view and a perfect combination of natural and artificial beauty.

The scenery inside city is also worth a long look. Typical examples of 16th century architecture are everywhere, and along with the beautiful view, people and businessmen from all over the world fill the streets and squares. It’s not easy to rest in a city as vibrant and cosmopolitan as this. Offering breathtaking views, an abundance of opportunity in business and a variety of people from all over the world, Seville stands out among the great cities of the 16th century.

Lord of the Evil review

By Rick Charbs, Onrpg Writer

Lord of the Evil (also known as Lords of Evil) is a web based MMORPG that was released in open beta as of October 4th 2008. There are many interesting promotions for new players during this release! This game is run by servers only based in the US, being one of the only of its kind currently, with most other browser based games being hosted internationally. Lords of Evil runs on flash, and is loaded with simple, yet generic features. For example, you may pick from Human, Orc, or Demon as your race. Aside from this mysterious demon race, the Humans and Orcs are dully original. Lords of Evil also features a nifty guild system and an auto levelling system, which allows your character to continue training while you are away. During this review, I will share my personal experiences playing this game with you, as well as my input on the matter.

This MMO features a storyline/lore that is released in chapters. They are very short for storyline, but if you are interested in the story it can immerse you in the setting and context of this game pretty easily.

General Gameplay
Lords of Evil is fully browser based, all done in flash. It has no real ‘‘graphical’’ view, although the game is very complex. In basic terms, this game is a siege/war MMORPG. You chose from one of the three starting races, and then build up armies of them to destroy other player’s units to rubble. You have the choice to upgrade various parts of your stronghold such as the Lumberyard, the Ironyard, and the Gold Mine. The higher you upgrade your utilities, the more cost efficient and powerful the items that you make of them will be. Not to mention your chances of defeating other players will sky-rocket. You may also build and upgrade a house, which is used to increase your population, a council, which is used to enhance building speed, and barracks, which produces fighting units for your army. There are many other advanced buildings you may build further on in the game, but I will leave those to your own discovery! These options were somewhat difficult to locate due to the unorganized user interface, though there are many, and I mean many, helpful support guides on their official forum.

Lords of Evil also offers an extensive skills selection for your army. Most skills empower your population fighting-wise, so that you can defeat enemy armies much easier, improving overall attributes. Many commands may be used to order your army to attack enemy strongholds with your guild, or simply retreat or guard in battle.
Another aspect of the game is their cash shop. It is completely run in its own currency, called gems. These gems are used to cast magical spells on your castle, making building or gathering troops much faster for different periods of time. The longest amount you can pay for is 20 hours, but even then you have a chance of only obtaining 1-19 hours of enhanced speed; it is generated randomly. Although this may seem convenient, almost every advantage over a player is acquired when purchasing these gems, thus making the game very cash dependant. As previously stated, during this open beta phase there are many promotions to gather some of these gems for free, so go ahead and check it out while you can!

Graphics and Sound
After spending so much time explaining how this game functions, there is not much to say about this game’s graphical and sound capabilities. As far as I know, there is no music or sound in this game what-so-ever. I found this highly disappointing, due to the fact that a browser game usually makes up for its lack of graphics with immersive and relaxing music. The graphics speak for themselves I suppose. Don’t expect any. On the other hand, their interfaces and logos are really well done, despite being a little confusing. Needless to say, there is little to judge on these aspects with this game.

Personal Recommendation
Personally, I have never really been fond of non-graphical browser based games. That does not imply that this game was a horrible experience or anything, but it was just not my style. I could not find anything exceptional enough to keep me playing, though the community is currently loving this game to bits. If this is your style of gaming, and if you wish to play games without having to download anything, try this one out. Again, I would suggest you make the best of their current promotions for new players as they are going to eventually move on to a full release. They need your help to suggest new features, races, skills, and overall ideas. They have various suggestion methods, such as their forums, their support service, or their in game ‘‘complain’’ button I found oh-so-comical.
They could easily improve most aspects of their game, such as their lack of music and sound, customization, rankings, and maybe even adding greater role play value. Since this game is in such an early stage of testing, I cannot judge its future possibilities, because it has great potential; however I just didn’t enjoy this open beta version at all. Even though I enjoyed creating an army and sending it out, most of the other players were out of my league and I had too much trouble figuring out how to play effectively. I was also quite disappointed by their revenue system, as the gems can get costly and other paying players can easily have a great advantage over a non-paying player in every possible aspect. If you have ever enjoyed browser based MMORPGS, I recommend you take a peek at this title, and examine it as much as you can. Give Ray Flame Entertainment as much feedback as possible due to your liking, and hopefully your suggestions will see their way into the game. Plus, for all you undead/demon lovers out there: this demon race is really cool! Happy gaming!

Pros
– Heart warming community
– Clean and crisp graphic art

Cons
– Lack of music/sound
– Large learning curve
– Under populated
– Can be costly

Black Prophecy

Black Prophecy is a fast-paced 3D real-time combat space MMO with state of the art visuals. Both the Player-versus-Players combat and an exciting storyline in a rich universe are important aspects of the game.

In the 26th century, mankind has expanded across the galaxy, yet only few of its colonies are controlled by Humans. The true rulers are the cybernetically enhanced Tyi and the biogenetically perfected Genides. Their striving for total control over all human species drives them into the territory of an ancient alien race that does not tolerate other cosmic civilisations: the “Restorers”.
To survive this war and uncover the motives of the alien’s destructive behaviour, you are forced to join one of the two dominant human races. Their search for the origin of the Restorers becomes a race for survival of all three human species.

Created in close cooperation with science fiction writer Michael Marrak, the online universe of Black Prophecy lets players jump into countless missions and massive cinematic space battles, to save and sculpt the future of mankind.

La Tale Review

by Rick Charbs, Onrpg writer

LaTale is a brand new MMORPG to the English gaming market, being fully released to the public as of September 18, 2008. Being an anime, cute styled 2D sidescroller, one may come to judge this game too quickly. Its counterpart, MapleStory, plays completely differently. There is not much to be compared between both of these games aside from their graphical resemblances. LaTale features a more distinctive character sprite, having full body proportions to a certain extent. You will also have many more customization choices in character creation on LaTale, having about ten hairstyles with many colors to choose from, and other customizations such as face and skin complexion. The game is also much more quest based, in my opinion.
Anyhow, LaTale has been highly anticipated ever since OG Planet signed the contract to this game back in March 18, 2008. The game had extreme hype value, so did it live up to its dreamt glory?

Undoubtedly, this is a question of personal preference and opinion, but this review should give you my personal thoughts on this manner as well as my opinion on this game in general.

General Gameplay
LaTale brings a whole new style of gameplay to the 2D sidescrolling MMORPG genre. It has more of an arcade feel with its controls, being somewhat slow rather than fast paced, which I found to be a little disappointing. The controls were difficult to use, making it an annoyance when trying to run and jump. On the upper hand, I absolutely loved their skill systems and classes; you can truly customize your character. LaTale has four standard classes that each branch off twice. That may sound generic to you, although every class has their own skill trees. For example, wizards can pick from four elements to add to their skill arsenal, either focusing on one specific element or combining a few, and explorers can choose from knives, to bows, to crossbows and more! On top of these skill trees, second classes have even more to choose from. This diversity truly makes up for the lack of attribute point allocation in the game, which also adds simplicity for younger players.

Guilds are also given a unique standpoint in LaTale. By creating a guild, you chose an alignment to go along with it: neutral, order, or chaos. Depending on the type of guild you create, characters in the guild will earn stat bonuses on specific stats. This stat bonus augments as the guild levels up.

Another fun feature in LaTale is the pet system. As opposed to MapleStory, you do not have to buy pets in the item mall. Some of them are purchasable, but every player has a right to the use of the pet system in the game, usually acquiring pets from quests. This system is not completely developed in the version Outspark hosts; however they are testing it currently. Pets do not last for any longer than 60 days (some may become unlimited in the future), however you can always revive them with cash shop items. Pets offer skill assistance during battle, and evolve from three stages as they get stronger: egg, baby, and adult.

LaTale hosts many other interesting features, such as the mailing system, used to communicate with friends while they aren’t online, and the waypoint system, used for easier access to the entire world map.

Questing
I wouldn’t say LaTale’s questing system is that elaborate, but it is essential in every character’s development. In order to level up without hours and hours of constant grinding, players can undergo repeatable exp quests. This makes hunting much more interesting, and of course offers nifty rewards. One can get very rich by completing many quests, without too much trouble. Recently, there were pet quests added in order to test out the system, and hopefully we will see more interesting events through new quests!

Graphics and Sound
LaTale is filled with vivid colors and inciting music. The sounds are average, but the graphics are where this anime MMO shines. Skill animations and character emotions are really well done, as well as the sprites and armors, being very unique. There are some recolors in the monsters department, but otherwise they are very detailed and most are fun to watch. The environments are at some times dazzling and at others just mediocre, but overall I liked them very much; this falls under personal preference. Surely, if you like the 2D genre, the chances are you’ll love this style. Some may find it a little too colorful, but I enjoyed it myself.

Personal Recommendation
LaTale was a really fun experience. I believe I love as many things as I dislike about the game. Firstly, the graphics were beautiful and very unique. Everything was smoothly colored and well done, in my point of view. The music and sound was alright for the most part.

After a while I just muted the game and switched to my personal music player, only because things got a little repetitive. Another feature I loved was the character classes. Some of them are generic, but the possibilities of each class are endless. I loved trying a few characters out, wizards being my favorite due to their elements. I have yet to see a more extensive mage class in a sidescroller- I was impressed. The controls however, I highly disliked. I logged into the game expecting a fast paced sidescroller ala MapleStory… big mistake. The game is actually somewhat slow paced, at least in the early stages in the game. I found it difficult to run and jump at the same time, and running alone was a challenge in itself. My character walked too slowly for my taste. This also made grinding much more difficult for me, and I discovered that there was a lot of grinding in this game despite the quests. On a much happier note, my all-time favorite aspect of LaTale is the customization value of the game. You can be truly unique in this game without having to completely cash out. It was an awesome bonus for me as I love to be unique in MMORPGS. Anyway, if you’re into 2D sidescrollers, you cannot pass this game up. Some may be turned off by the slow combat as I was, though the game in its entity is really great. It is loaded with features and the community isn’t nearly as bad as it was in the previous beta stages. If you don’t mind a little grinding, I highly recommend you give this one a shot!

Pros
– Graphics are welcoming
– In-depth skill system
– Interesting class development
– Unique style
– Enjoyable atmosphere

Cons
– Heavy grind
– Slow combat/movement
– Odd controls

The Mysterious Sascillia Steppes of Runes of Magic unveiled

The sixth area in the game world Taborea described in detailed game design document

With the presentation of the Sascillia Steppes, Frogster now unveils the 6th region in Taborea, the fascinating game world of Runes of Magic. The Sascillia region is home to a nomadic goat people, the Capra, which some time ago split into two clans: the Whitefurs and the Blackhorns.
Dogamor, once capital of the Capra lands and home to the Whitefurs fell when attacked by the Cyclops, and the goat people were driven away. Since then they have been trekking through the Sascillia Steppes, their minds always set on recapturing Dogamor. Therefore the Whitefurs formed an alliance with the Order of Dark Glory to stand up against the Cyclops. But they do not stand alone, as the conspirators of the Zurhidon support them as well. This bloody conflict has continued throughout the ages, and exists even today. While the Whitefurs were roaming the plains, the Blackhorns occupied the mysterious city of Khant. There they have been pursuing their own interests which appear to be tainted by black magic.
Daring Players can set out to explore the mysterious Khant and the grave of the once mighty chief of the goat clan, or support the Whitefurs in their fight against the Cyclopes. But the Cyclopes are not the only creature’s one should avoid, the Blackhorns, roving bandits and some mysterious giant wolves, guardians of the animal world could all prove deadly as well.

An extensive game design document describes the intricate conflict of the Whitefurs and Blackhorns and reveals even more secrets of the Sascillia Steppes.

Knight Online Expands Its Borders

The struggle for domination continues

GamersFirst, a service of K2 Network and one of today’s most popular free-to-play online game destinations, introduces Forgotten Frontiers to the Knight Online World.

It was conflict that begot the world of Carnac, and so it is fitting that in conflict the world should forever live. Monsters and beasts, nightmares of legend rose up and attacked, laying waste to all that man had built. Those that survived the sundering of the six once great nations of mankind retreated, and turning the fledgling city of El Morad into humanity’s final stronghold. Though they prayed, there were two types of gods that heard their prayers: those that were apathetic to their pleas, believing men were no longer worth the effort it had taken to create them and bloodthirsty gods who reveled in their plight, actively seeking their destruction. It fell to men to and men alone to rescue themselves from total eradication.

“It is exciting to provide our gamers with a new chapter in the Knight online saga,” says Joseph Willmon, Associate Producer, Knight Online. “We look forward to creating new and exciting events for our gamers in the Forgotten Frontiers world”

The expansion features three exciting new zones for players to explore. Each of these areas will test a player’s skill and courage as they fight to advance their nation’s cause. In the new Lunar War map Oreads, the nations of Karus and El Morad are once again pitted against each other, this time with castles, new siege vehicles, traps, and even combat affected by the terrain on which it occurs! Lower level players have a chance to test their mettle in the new Ronark Land Base before moving on to more formidable enemies. Knights looking for a real challenge will want to make their way into the Dominion of Krowaz, where they’ll need to contend with terrifying bosses, vicious traps, and even enemy players in their search for quests.
Cursed Weapons are a brand new addition, and players with the skill and luck necessary to create them will undoubtedly be the most intimidating foes on the battlefield.

NDOORS Interactive pays you if you don’t like Atlantica Online

NDOORS Interactive is confident you will like their game. They are so confident they are offering a satisfaction guarantee for Atlantica Online. Players who have a level 50 character can trade their character in for $20 if they don’t want to keep playing.

Players must have started their account after Oct. 11, be level 50 and have a PayPal account to be eligible. A player’s login ID will be void once they receive the refund. The offer ends Nov. 30, 2008.

NDOORS Interactive is also currently running a promotion that gives players multiple chances to win thousands in cash and prizes through participation in the game’s PvP area called the Free Leagues. Players now have until Nov. 30 to win any of the bonuses.

Atlantica Online is set on Earth, in a parallel reality that takes players through an arduous journey to unravel the hidden secrets of Atlantis. With its heavy emphasis on strategy, Atlantica was designed to stand out amongst the ‘cookie-cutter’ MMOs. The strategic gameplay incorporated into the turn-based combat, mercenary and country management systems will appeal to strategy and RPG players.

Tantra Online: Manual Patch and New Client

Good day, players of Tantra!

To players who are experiencing lag and disconnection problems with Tantra Global please download the manual patch.
A new client is also found at the official download page. The new client ensures new players that they will not be experiencing the lag and the disconnection problem other OBT players have experienced.

Players who already have the client installed won’t need to download the new client, you just need to download the manual patch at the Tantra Global website.
We are sorry for the inconvenience this may have caused you and we do hope you continue the support of Tantra Global!