When is Altis Gates going to Release?

When is Altis Gates going to come out? IGG originally promised the game’s release nearly a year ago now. The game was supposed to be a 2D turn based MMORPG which was supposed to play a lot like Myth War 2 Online and Wonderland Online. Too bad the game never made it to release. I’m not ready to completely write the game off yet, as IGG never officially announced that the game would shut down and join the MMO Graveyard. They did announce the game would be delayed indefinitely though, so we could see Altis Gates join the huge list of delayed MMORPGs which may never get released. Come to think of it, IGG has been dropping the ball lately.

The only new game IGG launched lately has been Tales of Fantasy, which is a pretty bleh 3D MMORPG and Tales of Pirates 2, which is basically the same exact game as Tales of Pirates, with minor graphical tweaks. I didn’t really like Tales of Fantasy, because even though it has good graphics, the gameplay just looks and feels bland. It’s a fairly generic Chinese developed MMORPG, which brings nothing new to the table. While IGG has been releasing these substandard games, Perfect World Entertainment has been growing like crazy. They launched the mega successful Battle of the Immortals, a killer fun Diablo 2-esque action MMORPG, and Forsaken World. They also launched a major content update to their enormously popular Jade Dynasty game while announcing the “Genesis” update for Perfect World. They also announced a brand new game – Legend of Martial Arts, which will be entering closed beta testing in late November. So why is IGG dropping the ball so much lately? How come they didn’t have any major new game releases?

Well, I really don’t know. I do think IGG has several really well known and popular MMORPGs though. Games like Godswar Online, Angels Online and Voyage Century for example, are all quite popular. How long Voyage Century will remain popular though is something I can’t quite answer – as Uncharted Waters Online – the new ship based MMORPG from Netmarble is now competing with Voyage Century. Uncharted Waters Online is an incredibly popular Japanese MMORPG. And we all know how crazy some Westeners are for all things Japan. Dynasty Warriors Online from Koei has been midly successful in the West already. So I wouldn’t be surprised if Uncharted Waters Online took away some players from Voyage Century. Many of IGGs games have remained pretty stagnant too. Games like Zu Online and Aurora Blade haven’t really received any major updates in quite some time. Even their browser MMO Lords Online hasn’t gone anyway in some time. While on the topic of IGG dropping the ball, they also never released Dreamland Online, which is another game that seems to be indefinitely delayed.

Ever since I played Atlantica Online from Ndoors and Pet Forest from PlayOMG, I’ve been pretty fascinated with turn based MMORPGs. I’m looking forward to trying Altis Gates if it ever does come out.

MMORPGs and Graphics

New MMORPGs like Vindictus, King of Kings 3 and Forsaken World bring a lot to the table – most notably better visuals. It shouldn’t be any surprise that graphics amongst free to play MMORPGs are improving, as technology keeps getting better. In fact, even older games such as Mabinogi and RuneScape have undergone major graphical overhauls since their original release dates. The thing is though – even though graphics keep getting better, some people are being left behind. A lot of gamers out there don’t have powerful enough PCs to handle the more visually intense games. I guess the reason why older MMORPGs like Fly For Fun, MapleStory and Rappelz are still popular is because more people can actually play them.

Don’t get me wrong – MMORPGs like Vindictus that have top notch graphics are great. Heck, I was just playing Savage 2 the other day and I love the game’s graphics. Graphics most certainly do matter in games, it’s just that games that shoot for ridiculously high quality graphics are sort of screwing themselves over. The most popular MMORPGs today aren’t the best looking. Just look at The Legend of Mir 2, Fists of Fu and Fiesta Online. These games are relatively successful, but the graphics in them are nothing to write home about.

I think the company that found the perfect balance between graphics and gameplay is Perfect World Entertainment. They publish Perfect World, Jade Dynasty, Forsaken World, Heroes of Three Kingdoms and Ether Saga Online. All of their games look great and feel great, but don’t require high end PCs. If you do have a high end PC, you can play these games on 1920×1080 resolution with anti-aliasing, shadows and all that jazz, but if you’re on a lower end PC, you can still play these games, just on a lower setting. Perfect World Entertainment is good at optimizing their games to run well on older machines.

I think ChangYou has the right idea between graphics and gameplay too. Their newest game Zentia looks fine on new PCs, but it’s also designed to run smoothly on much older, weaker computers. The same applies for their two other games – Dragon Oath and Blade Wars. Netmarble made sure their Uncharted Waters Online game runs well on older PCs too, which is good. Runes of Magic on the other hand runes decently on older computers, but the problem with it is the download is way too big. No one wants to sit and wait for a 6+ GB game to download and install. I think that’s the game’s biggest drawback. 4Story and Gates of Andaron on the other hand, aren’t nearly as big, which is why they’re able to grab players from Runes of Magic. RoM is a much better game, but the download just takes too long.

So what game do you really like that strikes a good balance between visuals and gameplay?

MMOs That are Aging Well

As new free to play MMORPGs like Vindictus, Kitsu Saga and Iris Online launch, older games like Shaiya, Last Chaos and MapleStory are starting to show their age. If you compare Shaiya or Last Chaos from Aeria Games to any of the newer titles out – you’ll quickly realize that Shaiya and Last Chaos aren’t aging too well – in terms of graphics that is. The fascinating thing however is that both Shaiya and Last Chaos are still around and being updated. The same goes for MapleStory. In fact, MapleStory is over 5 years old, yet it’s still growing incredibly fast. It’s still one of the most popular free MMORPGs ever – with over 100 million accounts world-wide. Even Rappelz and Fly For Fun from gPotato are still around and growing. It may sound surprising, but Fly For Fun is actually more popular than both Allods Online and Aika at the moment, and it’s over 5 years old. How can a 5+ year old game with lousy graphics be more popular than a game like Allods which cost over $10 million to develop is fascinating. It shows that older MMOs can age well. Another example of an older MMORPG that has aged well is RuneScape from Jagex and Tribal Wars from InnoGames. Browser games tend to age really well, mostly because visuals on browser games haven’t improved too drastically over the years – though Unity wants to change all of that now.

I think the reason some older MMORPGs are still a big success is that graphics aren’t the most important thing in the world. Users are clearly looking at things like gameplay and content when deciding which game to play, and older MMORPGs like Hero Online, Silkroad online and Grand Chase have more content than newer games, as they’ve been around for a longer time – meaning, they had more time to add content, instances and characters to their games. Obviously newer MMORPGs like Fists of Fu, Uncharted Waters Online and Dungeons and Dragons Online have numerous advantages too, but people are clearly more interested in gameplay and content than visuals. Having good visuals certainly helps, as I think so many people became fascinated with Vindictus because of its graphics. The game has solid gameplay mechanics too, but its beautiful graphics are what pulled in users while the gameplay kept them hooked. This theory applies to FPS games too. Just look at Cross Fire from Z8Games – it’s HUGELY popular, even though Cross Fire isn’t exactly a new game. In fact, Alliance of Valiant Arms has 10x better graphics, but it has a smaller playerbase.

Are there any older MMOs you still play? I personally still MapleStory and GunZ, even though they’re both old games with less than stellar graphics. I’m also more interested in gameplay elements than visuals. Because if I wanted “good graphics” I’d watch a movie. When I’m playing an MMO or an MMORPG, I want fun gameplay. Visuals help, but in the end gameplay is what matters.

9Dragons Relaunches on GamersFirst – Woot!

GamersFirst, the free to play MMO publisher best known for War Rock, Knight Online and Sword 2 recently relaunched 9Dragons. 9Dragons is a 3D martial arts themed MMORPG that the now defunct Acclaim Games used to publish. Playdom – the social games company behind Market Street, Kogaumu, and a handful of other facebook games actually bought playdom in early 2010. The purchase was clearly a mistake, as Playdom shut down the Acclaim website along with ALL of the games Acclaim used to publish (Including 9Dragons). Luckily, GamersFirst saw this as an oppurtunity to expand and bought the North American license to run 9Dragons from Indy21 (The independent Korean game developer who made 9Dragons). I’m actually not too surprised that 9Dragons was brought back to life as it was easily the most popular MMORPG that Acclaim had. I personally wasn’t a big fan of the game, as the graphics were a bit lacking and the interface felt a bit clumsy. For martial arts themed games I’d much rather play Twelve Sky 2 or even World of Kung Fu than 9Dragons. I’m not saying 9Dragons is bad, because it isn’t. The game has a fairly sizable playerbase, so there’s clearly something to the game.

I think 9Dragons is successful because it’s one of the most PvP heavy martial arts MMORPGs out. The game has 9 “clans” and two factions. The factions are at war with each other and the game also features open ended PvP where players can pretty much PK each other anywhere in the game world. Dragon Raja, Conquer Online and Legend of Edda are some of the only other MMORPGs with open world PvP. Plus, the faction battles in 9Dragons should keep things interesting. They aren’t as ridiculous as the 1000 vs 1000 faction battles of Aika Online, but the PvP in 9Dragons beats the PvP in more modern games like Runes of Magic and Heroes of Three Kingdoms. I do suspect that some of the newer PvP MMORPGs like King of Kings 3 may be superior, but only time will tell whether those games will be successful or not. 9Dragons has already proven itself to be a sustainable game over the last 3+ years. The game launched in North America and Europe back in early 2007 in case you guys didn’t know.

My only concern about 9Dragons is that it might not be able to “keep up” with new MMORPGs like The Lord of the Rings Online and EverQuest 2 which both recently became free to play games. Sony Online Entertainment also announced that they will be making Pirates of the Burning Sea free to play too. These are just the pay to play MMORPGs going free to play. There are a ton of triple-a free to play MMORPGs which launched this year including Vindictus from Nexon, Uncharted Waters Online from Netmarble and Forsaken World from Perfect World Entertainment may eventually put 9Dragons out of business. It’s difficult for older games to compete with newer ones with vastly superior graphics. Some people pretend that graphics aren’t important, but the fact is graphics do matter. People tend to like games with better graphics. It’s just the way it is.

So will 9Dragons be a success on GamersFirst or no? Will it be able to compete against newer MMORPGs? I personally think it can’t, but only time will tell.

Great MMORPGs with low end System Requirements

Have an old low-spec computer but still want to play some free MMORPGs? Well, you can. There are actually a lot of really popular MMORPGs out there that run smoothly on older computers. The graphics for these games aren’t super high end, but they’re still really fun MMORPGs that you can play on an older PC. Anyway, the list below has the top 5 best MMORPGs for low spec computers:

#5 – Grand Chase

Grand Chase is a somewhat old MMORPG from Ntreev – the same MMORPG company behind Trickster Online and Pangya. The game has 3D character models but the game is largely 2D and flat as it’s a side-scrolling MMORPG. It’s one of the highest rated free to play MMORPGs and it runs perfectly fine on most older computers

#4 – Conquer Online

Conquer Online isn’t an old game, but it does have low end 2D graphics. The game is brought to you by TQ Digital and is well worth playing because it has an enormous playerbase, intense PvP and plenty to do. It’s a game most people would look at (screenshots) and pass on because of the graphics, but don’t let the visuals fool you. Even though the graphics aren’t the best the gameplay itself is fun. The game is a bit similar to EuDemons Online, The Warlords and Zero Online – three other games from the same company

#3 – Rumble Fighter

Rumble Fighter is the original fighting MMO. It’s currently being published by OGPlanet and is definitely a fun game to try if you’re looking for a fighting game to play. Come to think of it there aren’t very many fighting games, but Rumble Fighter is definitely an interesting game. It takes quite a bit of skill to master, so don’t give up!

#2 – Lost Saga

Lost Saga is another fighting MMO from OGPlanet, but Unlike Rumble Fighter, it has crisper anime inspired graphics. The game will run on most older PCs, but don’t except to be able to run the game on anything too ancient. Pretty much any Pentium 4 or high end Pentium 3 should be able to run the game. It’s one of the better brawler MMOs. I like it more than Rumble Fighter because it has more characters.

#1- 4Story

4Story is sort of like Runes of Magic and Allods Online, except with worse graphics. In this case worse graphics is a good thing, as it means the game will run better on an older computer. Even though the visuals are worse than Runes of Magic and Allods, they aren’t that bad. In fact, it’s safe to say that 4Story has the best graphics out of all the games on this list! Definitely try 4Story!