Best MMOs of 2010

The year 2010 is almost over. It has been a pretty good year for free to play MMORPG and MMO players. We got a lot of great new games, and even a few previously pay to play games were converted to free to play. Let’s take a look back at the year and highlight some of the best games.

Something I find very exciting is the growth of genres other than RPGs in the f2p MMO sector. Racing games, Shooting games, Sports games, Strategy games, we saw great new free to play games that fall into all these genres. Let’s start with racing. Need for Speed is perhaps one of the most popular video game franchises of all time. Many gamers will find it surprising that a free to play version of Need for Speed is now available online, for free. That game is called Need for Speed World and can be downloaded on EA’s new f2p portal – play4free.com Amazing right? Need for Speed World has great graphics, realistic cars, and even a persistent world city to explore. There’s a night/day system, and plenty of customization options. Most free to play games are still coming out of Asia so lets take a look at some Asian racers. FreeJack is a parkour themed MMO racing. That means players have to race across urban settings filled with streets, traffic, tunnels, railing, and so forth. Its based on a real sport, but has stylized anime graphics. Its a very appealing game, and the mechanics require some practice to master.

Moving right along, 2010 has been a good year for MMO shooters. MMOFPS games like Combat Arms, Operation 7, or Cross Fire are pretty common and we saw a bunch of new ones come out in 2010. Some of these include Mission Against Terror, K.O.S. Secret Operations, and my personal favorite of the year — Genesis A.D by ijji. Unlike most shooters, Genesis AD has a sci-fi theme, but is more realistic than S4 League. The graphics are top notch since the game uses the latest Unreal Engine. It has some cool mechanics like wall jumps, jet packs, and futuristic weapons. The interface is very similar to that of Alliance of Valiant Arms (AVA), also published by NHN on their ijji portal.

One of my favorite genres, especially as a PC gamer, has always been RTS. Its rare to find a free to play RTS games, but we’ve gotten two great ones in the past two year. Last year we had EA’s BattleForge and this year we’ve got Company of Heroes Online by THQ. Its a world war 2 themed game with fast paced gameplay, and less emphasis placed on resource management and building construction. It comes with a single player campaign so beginners can learn the basics before subjecting themselves to humiliation against other players.

There were many other MMOs in 2010, so be sure to check out all of them! If you're looking for something else, check out this huge list of MMOs which include mobile, browser, client, and more.

New MMORPGs with Amazing Graphics

September so far has been a great month for free to play MMORPGs. Why? Because so many awesome free to play MMORPGs with top notch graphics are being released. Unfortunately, there aren't many new 2D MMORPGs, but there are tons of 3D ones. The Vindictus early access open beta begins September 15 and Vindictus is easily one of the best looking free to play MMOs out there. Nexon really out did themselves this time, as the graphics in the game are vastly superior to games like The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion and Dragon Age: Origins which were both praised for having top notch graphics. When I first saw Vindictus I was surprised to learn that Nexon publishes it, as Nexon is best known for MapleStory, Dungeon Fighter Online, PopTag!, and Mabinogi – four anime MMORPGs which look like they’re designed for kids. Vindictus on the other hand is more like Requiem from Gravity than anything else, as it has blood graphics. The game was built on the Source Engine, which powers many of Valve’s games – including Alien Swarm. I think the only other free to play MMO that uses the source engine is K.O.S. Secret Operations from YNK interactive. But that’s an MMOFPS – while Vindictus is an MMORPG.

Aside from Vindictus the next major MMORPG release comes from Turbine as they released The Lord of the Rings Online as a free to play game on September 10. Prior to September 10, the game has been pay to play. In fact, the game has been running successfully as a pay to play MMORPG since April, 2007. Unlike Dungeons and Dragons Online, which Turbine also launched as a free to play game, The Lord of the Rings didn’t NEED to go free to play. The game was very successful as a pay to play title, and Turbine is taking a big risk by making it free to play. I hope the game is a big success though. I’m downloading it right now to play, but it’s taking forever as the game client is like 8GB in size.

Another cool release this month is MicroVolts from RockHippo productions. The game is an online Toy Shooter that looks and plays a lot like Valve’s Team Fortress 2. It’s an MMO third person shooter that looks and plays like S4 League, except with a more distinct anime look. The game is pretty original as it has a third person view while most MMO shooters including the popular Combat Arms, Soldier Fromt and Operation 7 all use first person views. Plus the game isn’t another “Modern tactical” game, where players look like Swat members. Instead, the game is cartoony and takes place in various areas inside of a house. Players are technically dolls, so they’re really small. This makes the level’s really different, as it’s easy to hide in corners. It’s one of the more interesting MMO shooters. My only complaint with the game is that there’s some serious lag issues for North American users.

Another new release for September is Maestia from Big Point. It’s a 3D fantasy MMORPG that looks really incredible. The visuals are between Karos Online and Aika Online. I was surprised to see BigPoint published Maestia, as BigPoint is better known for browser games such as Dark Orbit, Sea Fight, And Deepolis rather than client based titles. Regardless, Maestia looks awesome and it’s coming out September 15.

Aside from maybe Iris Online and Legend of Edda, that’s it. Those two games are also new, but they aren’t anything too impressive – in terms of graphics that is.