Here is a first look at the stylish sleek Golf Star by Gamigo.
Yearly Archives: 2011
Empire and State Teaser Trailer
Empire & State’s world of Altea is on the horizon and OnRPG can’t wait to get our grubby hands on this hostile ‘Political MMO.’
Cardmon Hero Trailer
Cardmon Hero is now in full swing. Here is a look back at the trailer for the release.
Empire & State
Empire & State represents a unique MMO that focuses on society and status rather than grinding monsters to acquire power. Like the real world, the major driving factors for the players will be politics, economics, crime, and warfare. Empire & State gives you a wide range of freedom in designing your character and story. From a CEO, to a General, to even a mob boss, the choices are yours in how you play.
In Empire & State you are measured by wealth and societal status rather than XXX amount of strength as a sign of your power. To acheive great success, you will have to win over the trust of your fellow players ad prove your worth in one of the various modes of gameplay available. Will you lead armies to battle against the android uprising? Perhaps negotiate a peaceful truce to a long standing diplomatic disagreement with a foreign leader? You might even gain the trust of the masses and be elected to president of a nation yourself!
Of course the dark side is very present in Empire & State. Just like our world, politicians are not always selected for their utopian plans and platforms promising benefit for all. If you can twist your way through the criminal underground and come out alive, vast power will be at your fingertips. Through bribery, espionage, and blackmailing you maybe able to overcome a much greater opponent and claim power for yourself.
Now say you aren’t a leader of men? What place could you possibly have in this world then? Well there is much to be gained by betting on the winning horse. Use your connections to help raise your syndicate to global dominance, and the rewards will shower upon you even if you are not the figure head of the ship. But say something were to happen to the leader once your position was attained? Oh what a shame it would be if you had to replace your former leader, fallen from grace.
As these examples show, Empire & State is a dark gritty world of deceit, diplomacy, and cunning. If you want to be tested in a way no MMO has tested you before, Empire & State is waiting for you to try.
Grepolis Review: The Scholar’s Wargame
Grepolis Review: The Scholar’s Wargame
By: Kei Beneza (dividelife), Onrpg Journalist
Grepolis is a browser based strategy MMO set in Ancient Greece. Much like Ikariam, each player starts with a small town that eventually evolves into a powerful empire. The game also lets facebook users connect it to their profiles, thus making it easier to access the game without having to relog in a different window.

Different Servers Mean Different Rates
Upon entering the game, you will notice that Grepolis will let you pick a server to play on. Note that this form of server selection is not as simple as just picking a server with the most/least players. Each server has its own speed and limitations. The Mu server for example has a limit of 150 players per alliance and makes use of the new ‘Conquer’ system while the Kappa server has a higher game speed and an alliance limit of 100. Regardless of which server you choose, you will always have a lot of players to play and have fun with. For now, it’s all a matter of how fast, PVP-oriented, or hard you want your gaming experience to be.
Learning Curve
If you’re new to browser based strategy games, I would advise you to stay away from Grepolis. The game (like its counterparts) are quite easy to learn, provided that you have played other games of the same genre. The tutorial was actually rather quick, and runs you through some of the mundane tasks you do in your Grepolis career, but it does leave at least 80% of the system to learn on your own. There is a help page, but I would rather see tutorials tackle most of the basics rather than have everyone do some hefty FAQ reading before enjoying the game (it IS a game after all— not research).

Pillage The Village!
One of the best ways to earn resources is to loot helpless NPC villages by sending your troops to attack them. It’s a very brutal way of earning gold, but hey, when in Rome, do like the Romans do!
More!
Once you finish your doctorate in Grepolis, you will find the game actually has a lot of features that make it one of the best browser based strategy games out there. Aside from training soldiers and pillaging your neighbors, the game also lets players research various technologies and different systems that can greatly boost the powers of an empire. Religion is also another factor worth noting as players can gain access to different divine powers depending on which god they choose to worship.

Verdict
All-in-all, Grepolis is a game worth playing, especially if you are into browser based strategy games. It is a bit deep, and has tons of features that will keep you researching until you get your desired results. Still, I can say that I’ve enjoyed my stay in Grepolis. The game was just so rich with PVP, I just couldn’t help but pillage neighboring towns when I ended my 5 day grace period. So what are you waiting for? UNLEASH THOSE DIVINE POWERS!
Pros
-Good PVP
-Easy to learn (provided that you read stuff)
-Plain enjoyable
Cons
-Bad tutorials
-Some icons on the interface were not explained and lack description
-Graphics are a bit dated
Free Jack Enters Full Release with New Modes
Free Jack Enters Full Release
It has been an exciting testing and balancing period the last half year as players from around the world tested out the Parkour racing game known as Free Jack! Game Bridger Entertainment has heard the requests of the players, fine tuned many aspects, and is about ready to put their seal of approval on Free Jack at long last! Free Jack will be entering its released state as early as May 2011. To celebrate we will gain access to a new exciting competitive mode known as Graffiti mode.

Graffiti mode is a new team-based mode that pits runners against each other in a race to collect paint and spray the ultimate tag! Graffiti matches promise to be hectic and unpredictable as players attack each other in an effort to steal each other’s paint! The team to spray their tag first wins! Check out the trailer video of this new mode here.
For those outside the loop, FreeJack is a free-to-play parkour racing game in which players race head-to-head across the urban metropolis of New Jack City in high-octane foot races, chaining together stylish flips and tricks into combos to increase their speed and cross the finish line first! Players can personalize their character with fresh outfits and running gear and even customize their own unique in-game living space with cool furniture and accessories to show off to friends! FreeJack also supports online leaderboards, a club/clan system, in-game friends lists, and more!
Conquer Online Sends Veteran Players to China!
Conquer Online Gives Away Three Vacations to China!
Heads up OnRPG viewers! I have big news for a few uninformed Conquer Online players. If you happen to be a travel freak and always dream of seeing the world, we’ve got some great news for you!

Conquer Online is offering up 3 spots on a free trip to China, and this sweepstakes event will be going until Apr. 30th! All CO players with a character over lvl 50 are eligible to take part in this drawing! Up until now, there have been over 600 participants that have been entered into the drawing, which means you’ve still got a good chance (1/200) to win this awesome vacation worth over $3000! Someone has to win, and it could very easily be you! Why not give it a shot?
During the free 7-day trip, the winners will get to visit the cities of Beijing, Luoyang & Fuzhou, where they will be able to see the Great Wall, Shaolin Temple as well as many other fantastic scenic locations in China! The TQ team will take care of all the expenses for the travel visa, airfare, accommodations and ground transportation during the trip. You can even bring a guest of your choice, though some extra expenses will be involved.
Coming from someone who has spent 10 days touring China, I can say this trip is one you will never forget. Don’t waste the chance to enter for this trip.
Eudemons Unveils New Class: Vampire
Eudemons Unveils New Class: Vampire
Vampires, the dark, mysterious, and beautiful creatures, exert a peculiar fascination on a huge number of people. Though they are believed to be evil and dangerous, they are also portrayed as equally attractive and hypnotic. Everything about them draws you towards them, and that is how they manage to get their prey so easily, as depicted in the vampire legends.

As the current bloodsucking trend tells, we can find vampires just about anywhere. They have been mentioned in many literary works, and even television and movies have not been able to escape from the pull of the vampire. Vampire fans try all kinds of ways to be like them, and lead their way of life. But there is one way that we can become like the children of the night, and don’t have to drink blood or wear heavy makeup! You can just play an MMO!
However, we might find it hard to find a real good vampire MMORPG. It’s difficult to recommend a specific game to play too, because everyone likes something different. But there is one game we can definitely give a shot, and that’s Eudemons Online.

This free-to-play game is presented by TQ Digital, one of the top developers in China. It has a fabulous pet system and a massive community. Currently there are three different classes to choose from, and a new Vampire class will join very soon. TQ games have managed to attract hundreds of thousands of players from all around the world, and in Eudemons Online, this brand new vampire class will inevitably turn out to be a perfect addition. Their team created and tweaked the character all along the way, absorbing different ideas from players and team members.
Everyone is curious about the look, the power, the pets and the skills of the Vampire. The TQ team will soon be releasing several previews for all the players, followed up with some exclusive giveaways before the final release in July! It’s sure to be an exciting time for all of the EO fans!
The Devolution of MMOs
The Devolution of MMOs
By: Kei Beneza (dividelife), Onrpg Journalist
MMOs have been around for more than a decade, constantly boosting its capabilities while coming up with various ways to make the experience better than ever. What was once a game of grinding and running has evolved to questing and riding, and what was once an ingame taxi service has become a free-roaming flight experience. It’s amazing how MMOs managed to evolve throughout the years, continuously coming up with new titles and new subgenres to welcome into the MMO industry.

I remember playing RF Online for the first time and being blown away by its awesome mechanics. Being transported into a war-filled universe where your only purpose is to help your race reign supreme is just awesome, and I’m sure you enjoyed your first MMOs as much as I did. Remember what it was like back then when only a handful of MMOs existed? Everyone was always waiting for the next patch/episode, and as an RF Online player, I was waiting for the next siege kit for my Accretian Annihilator. The game evolved continuously, constantly giving us new class rebalances, and various features that made the game better than ever.
How I wish MMOs could stay the way it was back then… back then when the genre was growing rapidly, where the only way to go was forward. Sadly, progression stopped, and developers started to lack ideas, or at least the means to enact said ideas. Enclosed is my take on the Evolution and Devolution of MMO gaming. I hope you guys enjoy this as much as I enjoyed writing it.
IT’S EVOLUTION BABY!
MMOs have progressed in a variety of ways. Back then, during the MUD (Multi-User Dungeon) days, players weren’t blessed with epic visuals. Instead, they operated on a DOS/IRC like interface and used their imagination, much like the table top games they were modeled after. Back then they did not deserve the M in MMORPG, as the game could only hold a few players. Back then it was all about reading and projecting, which would most likely bore you to death if you were to play it on this era. But we had lower expectations of what was awesome!

No Need For A Second Controller
When I first played an MMORPG, I was astounded at how broad the game was. It was like an open ended world where your decisions matter. Unlike the old Final Fantasy RPGs I used to know and love, these games didn’t run on rails. Sure, you are still tasked to do horrendous jobs like killing three bears or killing a boss monster, but the STORY will always be stuck at a specific moment in time until the developers decide to move it further. It then occurred to me that this was my story, and that I was about to contribute to this world as myself, not Cecil, Crono, Cloud, Squall, Fei, Vahn, or any other premade protagonist.
My role or importance was completely up to me, depending on how much I make my impact on this world. The world was full of players, and back then I was in awe at how interactive this genre could be– this “Online RPG”. I could freely talk to everyone, and ask them where ‘THAT’ monster is, and they would answer in a variety of ways, unlike single player RPGs where most of them say the same thing every time you interact with them. I didn’t need another controller to not feel alone. It was indeed Massively Multiplayer.
PVP, Dungeons And Bosses
Remember what it was like to control three separate characters in a turn-based game where you would most likely think for each character? That was seriously a drag. During my days in Ragnarok Online (the first MMO to ever grace my country), it was a blessing to have someone ELSE cast that healing spell on me. As a DPS assassin, all I did was slap that overgrown man-goat with daggers while the mages and priests back us up. We all had our roles to play, and it was awesome. As more players entered the scene, bigger and harder bosses were made– bigger, badder, and ready to match blades against a larger player base. Dungeons also grew to become another epic feature in MMORPGs as they put teamwork to the ultimate test. Hell, I remember my first WoW (World of Warcraft) instanced dungeon; at first I thought that the instances were like dungeons in Ragnarok where you can just run around freely and wish someone has your back. Turned out help was not coming in the end.

Another feature that caught my attention was the PVP aspects. Teaming up is always fun, but of course, there must always be something to satisfy the player’s hunger for player to player combat. Back then, Counterstrike was the biggest game we had, and no other game could bring that many players into the same arena. Fortunately for the genre, Ragnarok’s PVP mode stepped up to the plate. It was amazing how the game managed to fit 99 players in the same room. In what better way can you test your skills than fighting a whole battalion of bloodthirsty players, ready to wipe you off the field?
And So On…
As more games were released, more and more systems were made available. Gunbound for example, brought a whole new light to MMO gaming, branching out from the RPG genre to a Worms Armageddon type game. It was somewhat refreshing to have a PVP based game after years of killing monsters and grinding experience nonstop. Gunz Online also appeared soon after that, giving us a Matrix-like shooter that lets players run on walls and do epic acrobatic shooting techniques in midair.
“Maybe that’s where Dante (Devil May Cry) got it.”
Devolution Stage
And now we move on to today… As much as I would want to be all enthusiastic about this article, I believe that it would be quite irrelevant given the growing number of disappointments released the past few years. Like many of you, in the early 2000s I believed the only way this industry could move was forward. Boy was I in for a surprise.

Soon after the release of Ragnarok Online, more and more games followed. At first everyone was happy to see 3D MMOs, especially after playing 2D games for a long period of time. Yes, more and more games came out and the corporate suits realized this industry was not just a passing fad. Soon after there came a time when a new title was just another renamed game with renamed classes, renamed weapons, renamed skills, and reworded plots. 9 out of every 10 games just became an exercise in tedium.
The Age of Mediocrity
It was as though the developers were running out of ideas. Games started to copy other games, which led to a continuous game cloning process. A good example would have to be the MMORPG genre. Before, everything seemed fresh and each game had its own specialty. Whether it’s RF Online, Ran Online, Khan Online, or MapleStory, every MMO had its own trademark feature, and players would play that game for their distinct content. Sadly, most of the MMOs today are rehashes of semi-succesful games launched before them. You find yourself asking how many times you can really support Lu Bu in Ancient China’s Three Kingdoms before it gets old.

Despite a few minor tweaks, you will always have that weird feeling that you have been there and done it all before. Boss battles started to feel linear, and even though some games have intense scripts that make the experience worthwhile, the majority of games just drown it with their standard repetitive systems. The designers put more time into designing hotkeys and auto-attack features to make these instances less straining than they do designing content to excite the player into active participation.
Character creation also became mediocre, despite the constant growth of quality graphics. Most of the new classes being released are now but renamed classes from 5+ year old MMO games. Some of them even divide a single archetype just to come up with two PSEUDO-NEW characters in an attempt to keep the experience fresh. I don’t even want to get started on the lack of character look customization and how free-to-play games make you pay out the nose just to get any resemblance of uniqueness.
It is as though the developers have branded this genre as PERFECT and that it no longer needs to be improved. The grinding was still there, and most of the quests given were nothing but monster checklists that often just point you to your proper leveling grounds.
Bait
Back then, I didn’t mind buying prepaid cards and having my card charged to play quality content. However, it felt like manna from heaven when these MMO started to become free-to-play. I mean, who could resist playing their favorite games for free right? Being charged $14.99 per month was acceptable, but it is definitely a whole lot better when you are not being charged. It was in this era when the item mall was introduced, giving players a premium boost whenever they decide to pay for content, giving them higher exp, better drops, and a lot of extras (and I mean, a lot). Somehow the lure of the next shiny toy distracted me just enough that I wasn’t put off by the realization; I had begun to pay more for Free-to-Play than I ever paid for a subscription.
Soon, more and more buffs and privileges worked its way to various item malls, which slowly turned the words free-to-play to free-to-get-owned. Games started to become imbalanced, with paying members holding a big advantage over those who are playing the game for free. Things even got worse after THESE games started to charge for content necessary for character progression. Free-to-play became a bait for players who wanted to play for free, eventually forcing them to pay MORE to keep up with the competition. In my honest opinion, it may be free-to-play but it’s definitely pay-to-enjoy.

Some of these games marketing teams even sunk as low as to disguise their advertisements as porn, redirecting porn hungry users to their generic games. MMO browser games are notorious at using this form of baiting. The bright side is that no matter which you get baited by, the gaming experience is almost precisely the same as each other. So at least you won’t have to worry about what you are missing in those other browsers you bypassed!
Good Things Come To Those Who Wait…… Right?
I’m not sure if the games really did devolve as much as I said it did, but I believe that it’s still something to think about. Did I just get used to MMO games? Maybe that is why I think they are devolving into the state of absolute stasis. Expansion packs are known to improve the game further, but most of the expansion packs I have seen lately are nothing but recycled content served on a silver platter. New content does not seem that new anymore, with innovation being as rare as a successful indie game company (coincidence?). The added storylines also seem forced, like a lackluster filler of Naruto you just can’t wait to get over.

Don’t get me wrong though— I still love playing MMOs and still have a lot of recurring subscriptions for a bunch of games. I just hope they come up with something new soon because the possibilities of the industry are limitless. If they managed to give us that magical feeling they did back then, maybe it’s only a matter of time before history repeats itself. A new decade is upon us. Let us hope 2011 proves to be the turning point in which the claims of ‘next generation MMO’ are more than just marketing hype.
Thanks for reading my article. What is your input on at what point the MMO Industry went wrong? Check out our new reorganized forums and give us your thoughts!
Lucent Heart BFF Beta Approaches
Lucent Heart BFF Beta Approaches
Love deprived gamers can rejoice. In just a few short weeks (May 12th is the current tentative date!), the BFF beta for Lucent Heart will arrive. In addition to the usual bells and whistles of MMORPGs, Lucent Heart also features a very interesting zodiac system and soulmate system that provides players with unparalleled ways to cooperate with your closest friend or lover online.

Lucent Heart’s producers were kind enough to give us a sneak preview of one of its many World Bosses being tested in this beta:
Lucent Heart features exciting world boss encounters spread throughout different areas of Acadia. One such encounter takes place in the Well of Silence where a powerful Outlaw Tyrant and his organization of ruffians have taken up refuge. It is up to brave adventurers to travel to the Outlaw Tyrant’s fortress and face him within his shattered tower. Reaching him will be no easy task though as the Outlaw Tyrant’s fortress is guarded by some of his most powerful henchman, a dangerous collection of snipers and brawlers that would enjoy nothing more than ending your adventure in a deadly fight. Due to the shape of the tyrant’s lair, these ruffians will be no simple task to dispatch and only an organized powerful team stands a chance of reaching the inner sanctum.

Even after you’ve fought your way to the Outlaw Tyrant there is no guarantee that you will be able to defeat him. Only a skilled team working in perfect harmony can defeat such a powerful Tyrant. The Tyrant is no fool, and keeps his strongest body guards nearby to keep any daring team on their toes that tries to harass him. In terms of tactics, you will find that traditional techniques such as stunning and slowing do not work on powerful bosses like the Outlaw Tyrant. He possesses an immunity to most crowd controlling abilities that makes him a dangerous, unpredictable foe. His lackeys, however, are still susceptible to crowd control so focusing on them and removing them from the fight is a potent strategy and key to successfully defeating him. It’s best to bring a tank and plenty of DPS if you hope to stand a chance against the Outlaw Tyrant. He has no plans on giving up his fortress and his foothold in the Well of Silence without a fight, and neither do his minions.

Lavish rewards of gold and crafting materials await those skilled enough to vanquish him. Be sure to grab your beta key here (while they last!) and try your hand against Outlaw Tyrant in May 2011.