New Wave of Browser MMORPGs

I’ve talked about browser MMORPGs and MMOs in the past, but it’s outright remarkable how many new browser games are launching each and every week. Even though these numbers are impressive, it’s a bit sad that every single new game launching is pretty much the same old thing we’ve seen before. DDTank – one of the newer browsed based games that launched on Aeria Games and numerous other portals, is a shameless Gunbound clone that makes no attempt to hide that fact. If you’ve ever played Gunbound, it’s downright funny how similar DDTank is to Gunbound. I guess it’s better than seeing yet another WoW Clone – as there are countless WoW clones already. I think 4Story, Runes of Magic and Allods Online are all pretty shameless, but at least these games are genuinely fun to play. DDTank isn’t bad, but Gunbound is much better imho.

Gamigo released the browser based strategy MMO Cultures Online last month, and even though it does make an effort to differentiate itself, the game still looks and feels like every other strategy game. To be fair, it’s a tad bit original as it does mix Shakes and Fidget style slow paced RPG gameplay with Ministry of War style strategy elements. Might and Magic Heroes Kingdoms launched 2 months ago, and the game seemed promising. Too bad after playing it for a few weeks, the game really didn’t offer anything original. For a game built on such an epic franchise, I expected a lot more out of it. I mean aside from a handful of unique browser based MMOs like Urban Rivals, Adventure Quest Worlds and Roblox, it’s fair to say that the genre has a definite lack of originality. I can’t be the only one this burnt out of strategy games…

I think the problem is that every game company is trying to make a quick buck – so instead of investing a lot of time and money into making a new product, they figure that making a cookie cutter strategy game like Grepolis or Travian is the way to go. In their defense, developing a totally original game like Pirate Galaxy or Nadirim could be very expensive. Just look at BigPoint – they spent over $5 million developing PoisonVille and the game has been an utter failure so far. BigPoint is making a ton of money off of Deepolis and Dark Orbit, which were both much cheaper to develop! Making a cheesy strategy game is the easy way out for most developers. Too bad most of these strategy games are failures – as games like King and Conqueror and World of LordCraft simply cannot compete with the more established games.

So hopefully the next few months will bring some much needed innovation to the browser game platform, because as is, I’m really disappointed. I think the only really impressive game that launched on the browser recently is Sacred Seasons 2, but it’s not entirely original either. It plays a lot like an regular MMORPG.

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.

LaTale vs MapleStory vs WonderKing

There are three major free to play 2D side scrolling MMORPGs currently out there. MapleStory from Nexon is by far the largest as it’s old and established. The game has been available since 2003. Then we have LaTale which is by OGPlanet, which was released to compete with MapleStory. The graphics and art style are a bit different, but the core gameplay is for the most part identical. The one real difference is that LaTale has PvP while MapleStory does not. Then we have WonderKing from Ndoors. WonderKing sort of combines the fun aspects of both MapleStory and LaTale and adds a bit of its own touch. The game has sleeker 2D graphics, PvP, plenty of quests and more.

Out of the three my favorite is still MapleStory, as it’s been around forever. Since it’s been around so long the game has much more content than its competitors. In fact, the game now has over 12 different playable classes and each of those classes have 3 job advancements, for a total of 36+ playable classes. Plus, Nexon has been updating the game often with more and more new areas and classes, so that’s really awesome. Nexon also has the following games – Mabinogi, Vindictus, Combat Arms and Dungeon Fighter Online.

WonderKing is a far second. The game is certainly fun and well worth the download, but if you’ve played MapleStory before, the two games are just way too similar. You’ll just feel like you’ve ‘been there’ before if you play WonderKing. The PvP in the game is pretty interesting though, but you really have to invest a lot of time into the game to get to the fun parts of the PvP arenas. One issue with WonderKing is that it’s not nearly as popular as MapleStory, so finding people to party with and people to sell your items to may take a bit longer. Luckily though, the game has an awesome auction house system, which is something MapleStory has been missing for years.

LaTale is by OG Planet and comes in third place in my opinion. The game’s artstyle is distinctly different than both MapleStory and WonderKing and come off as weird to me. It’s published by OGPlanet, so you can always use your login for Lost Saga, Hockey Dash and Rumble Fighter for the game and it’ll work fine. In terms of PvP though, LaTale takes the #1 spot. It has the most variety in PvP and it’s also the most balanced, as there’s one option to equalize everyone in terms of level and gear for the duration of the PvP battle. This makes it so PvP actually takes skill and teamwork.

All three Free MMORPGs are good though, so make sure to try them all. I still think MapleStory is the best though, but if you guys disagree, let me know in the comments!