Dancing MMOs.... EVERYWHERE

Why are there so many free to play dancing MMOs? I honestly have no idea. I think the first dancing game (not MMO, just game) was Dance Dance Revolution. The first dancing MMO I played was Dance Online back when Acclaim Games published it. Ever since they went bankrupt, the game did eventually relaunch as Super Dance Online through Cubizone – a Malaysian MMO publisher. Luckily, the game itself didn’t change much. In fact, the Malaysian version was much more popular than the U.S. Version Acclaim had. For some reason, every MMO publisher decided that they needed a dancing game. Snail Games launched ShowUp (which actually launched as 5Street. It changed its name to Showup much later). Even the Korean MMO juggernaut Nexon jumped onto the bandwagon when they launched Audition Online. Now I played audition Online for a while, and I do have to admit the gameplay and visuals were faily polished. After all, Nexon has always been known for publishing some of the highest quality free to play titles out there. Their current portfolio of titles by itself is very impressive actually. They have Vindictus, MapleStory, Combat Arms, Mabinogi and Dungeon Fighter Online. Notice I left out Audition Online from that list? That’s because Nexon eventually shut audition Online down, but luckily the game didn’t shut down for good. Just as Acclaim Games closed Dance Online and it relaunched sometime later, Audition Online relaunched through RedBana – which is actually owned by T3Fun which publishes CardMon Hero and Aika Global.

Anyway, the purpose of this entry is to talk about how all of these dancing MMOs are all the same. Obviously they’re not all identical, but they’re just as similar as Combat Arms from Nexon and Sudden Attack from GameHi are similar. They’re basically the same games, except with slightly different visuals. Even Perfect World jumped on the whole dancing game bandwagon when they launched Hot Dance Party (Steps). Unfortunately, this one isn’t available in North America. It’s published through Cubizoe in Malaysia, but those in North America can still access it, as it has no IP blocks. I actually played every single one of these games, as I generally enjoy these rhythm based titles, as I think they require a lot of skill. They’re also very much competitive. In fact, you could argue that they’re just as competitive as any FPS or League of Legends style Aeon of Strife game. Unlike FPS games though, these dancing MMOs don’t differentiate themselves in gameplay. They all share the same button pushing DDR style gameplay mechanics. The only thing that really separates Super Dance Online from Hot Dance Party is its visuals. MMO Shooters like Alliance of Valiant Arms and Genesis A.D. Although similar, so have some different gameplay mechanics. Unfortunately these dancing games don’t.

The thing about dancing MMOs is that not a single one is particularly successful in North America. So I’m not sure why there are so many of them. I think Osu! Is the most popular rhythm based multiplayer game, but it’s not even a traditional dancing game. I think it’s popular because it’s actually does something different while everyone else is off copying each other.

Lost Saga MMO Has Awesome Graphics

Lost Saga, a fighting MMO from OGPlanet, has some really awesome anime inspired graphics. The graphics are actually a mix of Western and Eastern animations, as they blend graphics from games like Cloud Nine from Netgame and Team Fortress 2 from Valve. I’m surprised other new MMORPGs don’t opt for “easy on the eyes” style cartoony graphics, as in my opinion games with brightly colored anime graphics are the best. At least in terms of graphics. I loved the visuals in Battlefield Heroes, Bright Shadow and even Luna Online. One of the main benefits of cartoony graphics is low system requirements. Brand spankin’ new MMORPGs like Martial Heroes and Vindictus look great, but not everyone can play them due to the high system requirements. I figure games like Mabinogi and Secret of the Solstice are popular because they’re easily accessible. Shiny new graphics aren’t always the best, as they require most expensive graphics cards to run.

I think newer games need to start looking closely at games like Lost Saga for inspiration. Lost Saga seems to be the most popular fighting MMO out there and even found its way into the World Cyber Games tournaments. The game is more popular than Mini Fighter Online from Netmarble and Rumble Fighter from OGPlanet. The other reason why Lost Saga is rockin is because of its incredible amount of variety. The game has like 20+ playable characters which can all be leveled up individually. Players can switch between them mid game as well, so if you ever get bored of playing one “class” you can simply switch! Some new games like Heroes in the Sky also have excellent variety, but other newer titles seem to forget that gamers WANT variety. Variety and choice in my opinion is what makes Lost Saga so fun. Gameplay of course is important too.

Seriously though. I appreciate pretty 3D graphics as much as the next guy, but I sometimes think that better graphics do more harm than good. The most popular free MMORPGs today are the simplest ones. Games like RuneScape and Dungeon Fighter Online for example have simple graphics that most computers can run without lag. 3D MMORPGs on the other hand tend to be less accessible all around, at least the newer ones. So MMO Developers. I urge you guys to take a page from Lost Saga’s book and focus on making your games more fun and varied rather than “pretty”.

Free 2D MMORPGs You Never Played

There are a lot of 2D MMORPGs out there. So many that I bet I can name a handful that you’ve never heard of. Obviously we’ve all heard of epic games like MapleStory and WonderKing, but what about obscure games like Destiny Online from EnjoyMMO or Great Merchant from AK interactive? These are both ‘unknown’ games that very few people play. The first game, destiny online is actually decent, but Great Merchant is pretty terrible. So if you want to try one of the two, try Destiny Online. Another game that I bet you haven’t heard of is Esteria Mythos from Seed C Korea Inc. I’ve never heard of this one until a few days ago, but it’s a pretty random game. It’s meant to be an old school 2D game, but it just feels too old in my opinion to be good. The biggest issue with the game is that it has a really low playerbase, so just finding others to play with can be hard.

Next is Battle of Destiny from the Malaysian publisher Cubizone. Know how people call games like Runes of Magic and Talisman online WoW clones? Well Battle of Destiny is a Dungeon Fighter Online clone. In fact the games are nearly identical. I’m pretty sure Battle of Destiny is a shameless rip off of Dungeon Fighter Online. More so than ANY other game is a clone of WoW. Seriously. Look at some side by side screenshots, it’s really funny. Another weird unknown 2D MMO is Blitz 1941. The game is a World War 2 tank based MMO by TwoWar – the same company who makes Navy Field. The game’s translations are so bad it’s funny. I can safely say Blitz 1941 has the worst translations of any MMO i’ve ever played. Stay away from this one lol.

Next is Mini Fighter Online from Netmarble. This game is actually pretty fun, so if you haven’t played it you really should. I threw this one on the list because the game doesn’t have as many players as it deserves. Seriously, the game is awesome. It plays like a chibi street fighter MMO. How awesome is that? The more unique aspect of the game though is that it has both lobby style MMO gameplay as well as a persistent world MMORPG section. Another good unknown 2D MMORPG is Wonderland Online from IGG. It’s actually one of the best turn based MMORPGs out there. The game has a community too, which is win. The town areas in the game are incredibly packed! The gameplay reminds me of final fantasy, which is good. Anyway, if I missed any obscure 2D MMOs, let me know!

Only 2D MMORPGs

There’s one free to play MMORPG publisher that ONLY makes 2D MMORPGs. This company is TQ Digital and they don’t have one 3D MMORPG. I think TQ Digital is the only major MMORPG publisher that only has 2D games. IGG has a bunch of good 2D turn based MMORPGs, but they have 3D games like Tales of Fantasy and Zu Online. TQ Digital currently publishes 5+ games, but out of all their games my favorite is Zero Online.

Zero Online is a sci-fi MMORPG with fast paced gameplay. I like it because the game has an incredibly high level cap (120+) as well as a really high XP rate. I played the game for a couple of hours and really liked it. The combat itself isn’t anything special, but it’s so fast paced that it’s hard to stop playing. Unfortunately the game only has two playable classes and a handful of maps, so the game doesn’t have a lot of variety. I found that the Artillery class in the game is absurdly over powered compared to the melee character. Another reason I like Zero Online is that the game is one of the only 2D sci-fi MMORPG out there.

Aside from Zero Online, TQ Digital also publishes The Warlords, Eudemons Online, Conquer Online and Crazy Tao. The only game from TQ Digital that I strongly dislike is Crazy Tao, and that’s because it’s so similar to Eudemons. The game has no originality. The only difference between the two games is that Crazy Tao is a cute MMORPG, while Eudemons has more realistic 2D graphics. On the positive side though, I think cute graphics look nicer on a 2D platform, but no one really plays Crazy Tao anyway. Eudemons Online is just better in every measurable way.

So if you guys haven’t heard of TQ Digital or haven’t played Zero Online, I strongly recommend you guys give the game a download. It’s only 500 or so MB, so it won’t even take up a lot of space on your hard disk. What do you guys think of TQ Digital?