For those who don’t know what the hell Free League and the Game and Game World Championship are, the former is a daily player-versus-player competition on all Atlantica Online servers while the latter is, as its name implies, a world championship featuring three massively multiplayer online games—Atlantica Online, Shot-Online, and Silkroad Online.

The Game and Game World Championship, or GNGWC, has three regional finals—Europe, North America and South America—and will culminate in a grand championship in today’s undisputed MMO capital of the world, South Korea.

Well, enough background information. I’d like to take this opportunity to congratulate two players from Atlantica Online’s Delphi server—DaimonFrey and Baharia. I’ve had the good fortune to test my character Cooky’s mettle against DaimonFrey in the Free League and sincerely wish him the best in the GNGWC European Regional Finals, which will be held on July 31st, 2009, in Leipzig, Germany.

The 14 other players who made it to the GNGWC European Regional Finals are: Fustilio and Sepp of Mycenae; SarahPhoenix, Didik, 6rum3 and extinction of Argos; Sharingan and Sogil of Thebes; Inmolation and Ortodoks of Macedon; and Orions and ParisHilton of Sikyon.

Oh, before I end this posting, I’d like to remind the finalists to confirm their availability for the GNGWC European Regional Finals before July 26th, 2009, at 5 p.m. Pacific Daylight Time.

Congratulations to our Atlantica Online representatives to the GNGWC European Regional Finals!

Post from: MMOtaku

Actually, ever since we came out with news that The9 was sour-graping cooking up plans to launch a new game to replace World of Warcraft, nothing extraordinary has happened. Well, nothing except for my almost getting hospitalized because of overexposure to the afternoon sun while painting the house.

But let’s not talk about that. Rather, let’s focus on what we’ve been up to and what we’ll come up with in the next few days.

First up on MMOtaku’s plate is Rohan: Blood Feud, both the international and the Philippine versions. It’s been quite some time since I laid my hands on Rohan and I’ve been rearing to play a giant. Thing is, I uninstalled the client to the international version a couple of weeks ago and haven’t gotten around to reinstalling and updating it.

As for the Philippine version of Rohan Online, I’m back at Square One. This means I have to work my way up before I can write any substantive article. Fortunately, good friend Alcarcalimo is playing the game and I might get a bit of help from him in terms of proper equipment and (hint, hint!) in-game currency.

Of course, I’ll continue to play my current game of choice, Atlantica Online. The guild we help put up on the Delphi server, the Guardians, is doing great, and my character, Cooky, is shaping up to be one of my best Atlantica characters. The latter is more the result of my wife’s help, through her character Elphame, than anything else.

Look forward to more postings on Atlantica Online. Without going into too much details, I plan to launch a one-million-gold-a-day promo for players who will transfer to or open an account on Delphi server. I’ll also come up with more in-depth articles on Atlantica Online such as guides and features.

And because I can’t possibly play more than a couple of games at the same time without sacrificing the growth of some characters, I just vow to find some time to play a bit of the other games I’ve come to love in the past six years I’ve been playing online games. These games include Ragnarok Online, Fly For Fun, Granado Espada, and Perfect World.

Well, that’s it for now. Time to get down to business by playing online games and writing about them.

Post from: MMOtaku

This little war would have been cool (who doesn’t crave a little PvP once in a while) except for the fact that most members of the rival nation are in higher level brackets than those in Cooky’s nation. I think the only player character that stands a chance in not getting killed in this war is OCA, monarch of the Defiance nation, who is above Level 100 and ranks second in the Delphi server’s Free League.

(Simply put, Free League is a daily competition, held at regular intervals, which tests the mettle of your build. Winning in these fights requires a combination of level, skill and mercenary choices. There are 18 divisions in Free League. Of course, your character starts at Division 18 from where you slowly work yourself up through the ranks, ladder style. Just like a ladder, though, your character can also slip down from a higher division to a lower division.)

Going back to the topic, the war is indeed getting costly. Cooky, my level 30-something musician, is stuck, meaning she can’t level as fast as I want her to. When the area she’s in is hot (with dozens of enemy guild/nation players prowling the perimeter of towns), I put her in auto-craft mode to upgrade her equipment or join the Free League to score her some much-needed gold.

Good thing the war is almost over. I’d like to take this opportunity to issue an apology to Cooky’s guild, Dragon, and her comrades. At the end of the war, I’m moving Cooky to another guild, Guardian, where my wife’s character, Elphame, and our friend winwin’s character, dianne, are officers.

The Guardians’ nation, Abyss, is, as far as I know, the leading nation in Atlantica Online’s Delphi server, and I know that Cooky will grow much faster there … unless another massive power outage hits my little nook in this Asian tropical paradise.

Screenshot taken by Joel from the online game Atlantica Online, copyright NDOORS.

Post from: MMOtaku

I know, I know. I shouldn’t be harsh, since that’s why online games have a closed beta period—to iron out the kinks and ride out the birth pains. I just wish things were a little better in terms of latency.

Just this morning, I dropped by the Rohan Online Philippines homepage and read through this short announcement:

Attention beta testers!

Thank you for participating in the Rohan CBT. Two of our servers are already open, Torian and Silva.

Please be reminded that we are currently conducting our own stress tests with the CBT servers to push it to its limits and to discover errors and bugs.

We would like to ask for your help in reporting all errors, bugs, connection problems, etc. Please send all feedback to this address.

Note that our current test environment still has minor bugs and errors. We ask for your patience if you encounter them.

Vengeance is always an option!

Actually, ladies and gentlemen of Level Up! Games, publisher of Rohan: Blood Feud in the Philippines, the players can deal with “minor bugs and errors” and not break a sweat. Unfortunately, it’s the lag that’s killing our interest.

Post from: MMOtaku

All dressed in red and shades of red, the avatars welcomed the Year of the Ox with fashion and style, and of course, with bow and arrows, swords, spears and axes, and bursts of powerful spells as they strutted their stuff down the length of the Great Wall and defended the land against powerful soulless beasts.

Ehem. Yeah, that’s how the story would have been written in a bit of journalese (you know, the journalist’s lingo). But I’m very rusty now that I’m on a different career path.

Anyway, the denizens of Perfect World Philippines didn’t do that—flying over to the Great Wall, wearing their best red-colored fashion items, and rushing headlong into battle against monsters—without the light of some reward at the end of the tunnel.

Here’s the event announcement from our friends at Perfect World Philippines publisher Level Up! Games:

Greetings, Heroes of the Perfect World!

Be online, invite your friends and be present on the Great Wall inside Perfect World and received modified rates for one week!

Contest mechanics:

• Just be at the Great Wall on the date and time prescribed for your server.
• Once at the location, participants are required to wear any RED fashion.
• GMs will be patrolling the area for 20 minutes and monitor the number of participants in the area.
• Monsters will appear after the 20 minutes patrolling.
• Monsters and item drops are free for all.
• The event ends once all the monsters have been killed.

How to win:

The server with at least 199 participants will win an experience and soul points and item drop mod for a week.

Needless to say, Tiger Server won an extra week of modified experience points and item drops, as I’m sure Dragon and Serpent got it, too.

Wunnerful! Kung Hei Fat Choi!

Post from: MMOtaku

I’ve tried my hand at going solo, particularly in online games like Granado Espada (Sword of the New World to other folks), Requiem: Bloodymare, Rohan: Blood Feud and Atlantica Online, and my characters suffered immensely. Name it, they’ve got it—slow leveling, bad equipment, weak stat and skill builds.

No, I’m not an introvert. It’s just that playing on international servers makes one imagine barriers are in place—the foremost of which is the language barrier. Well, yeah, English is the common medium, but cultures usually clash, even in virtual worlds. I’ve made some friends in the aforementioned online games, yes, but they’re really not into the okay-I’ll-drop-everything-I’m-doing-to-help-you thing. I’m not expecting them to do that but, hey, it’ll be great if they do.

Of course, I’m comparing my experiences in international servers of online games to that in locally published games. Making friends, and fast, is second nature. No language barrier, no cultural differences, and adventuring in the virtual world is even better with stories being exchanged among friends.

Recently, I’ve taken more interest in Atlantica Online. I’ve delved into its virtual world a few times in the past, particularly on the Argos server. But I have moved from Argos to Macedon because a few friends, including my former Perfect World clan master winwin, his brother weejay, and the irrepressible Rovil.

In past incarnations of my character in Atlantica, I only managed to reach a maximum level of 18. This could be attributed to the fact that I didn’t really know much about the game and that I didn’t have a mentor who could teach me the hows, wheres, whats, whens and whys. My current character, Alusair (again, named after an Advanced Dungeons and Dragons heroine), is now level 26 after two days of erratic playing. Of course, I have Winwin, Weejay and Rovil to thank for my renewed gusto.

Does this mean that I’ll start playing Atlantica more? Yes, definitely, but I won’t forget all my other characters. Sure, they’ll suffer a little because I can’t possibly level all of them at the same time. I just have to visit them from time to time and see to their needs one at a time.

Screenshot taken by Joel from the online game Atlantica Online, copyright NDOORS Interactive.

Post from: MMOtaku

Have party, will grind. That’s the name of the game whenever my former Perfect World Philippines Tiger Server clanmaster winwin and his brother weejay are online on the North American Rohan: Blood Feud server Akhma. The brothers don’t seem to get tired of hacking and slashing (and shooting arrows and spells) at the mobs that spawn in their chosen hunting ground, Shadow Gorge.

Back when I was playing Rohan: Blood Feud on the Marea server, I used to go around the different towns—Einhoren, Vena, Kai’inon, Rev’Decca, Par’Talucca and Montt—and grabbing all the quests available before setting out to eliminate monsters required by the quests. Some quests gave decent experience points and other rewards, some did not. Bottomline: I still ended up grinding my characters rear bumpers off.

When I finally convinced winwin and weejay to join me in the world of Rohan: Blood Feud, I relocated from Marea to Akhma and tried to play the game winwin’s way—grinding, all the way up from Level 1. It was fine at first, and I made Level 25 in a couple of days, but the experience points waned soon after.

The low experience point modifier of x5 per 25 party kills didn’t help much. I’d probably do much better with the increasing experience point modifier for solo grinding at x7 for the first 20 kills. The brothers mirrored my thoughts, but decided to continue on their wanton slaughter of beasts, minus my knight, who went solo.

Here’s a brief description of Rohan: Blood Feud’s unique M. KILL (Monster Kill) system:

In Rohan bonus EXP are awarded for killing every 20 monsters. Additional EXPs are awarded ranging from multiples of 7 to 19 times the original EXP. Accordingly, it is advantageous to hunt a monster exceeding your level as the 20th monster to level-up. Additional EXPs are awarded for every 20 monsters hunted, and the most bonus EXPs are awarded for the 100th monster captured. But rather than hunting distant monsters and wasting time to acquire bonus points, it is beneficial to hunt monsters emerging nearby at comparably high levels.

In hindsight, I realize that solo leveling, with the help of experience points from quests, may be more rewarding, but nothing can replace the fun I have at grinding with a group of friends. I mean, that’s the very essence of massively multiplayer online role-playing games … playing with people from other places and from all walks of life, exchanging stories and making more friends.

So my suggestion is, party up and let the slaughter begin!

Post from: MMOtaku

To understand esteem or cultivation better, let me elaborate further. Esteem is simply another way of saying that your character cannot get new skills until he or she has reached a certain level of understanding. In other words, it’s a general mastery of a group of skills. At present, there are 10 esteem or cultivation levels that your avatar can access every time he or she hits Level x9 (no, not “multiplied by” 9, but [any number from 0 to 9]9).

The levels of esteem or cultivation are: Cunning (Level 9), Attuned (19), Lucid (29), Enigmatic (39), Forbidding (49), Sinister (59), Nirvana (69), Mahayana (79), Sublime or Diabolic (89), and Enlightened or Infernal (99).

When your character hits Level 89, he or she is required to choose between Heaven or Hell, or the cultivation Sublime or Diabolic. Choosing a side will determine your avatar’s fairy (the Tinkerbelle-ish Sublime fairy or the impish Diabolic [some call it a hamburger because it looks like, well, a hamburger] fairy), the skills he or she can master beyond their maximum levels (most skills have a max level of 10), and the quests you can go on.

I chose the Diabolic esteem for Malystryx when she turned 89 because my wife Joyce’s character, Cesky, walked the same path. This enabled us to continue our journey in the Perfect World of Pangu together. That was way back in March 2008.

Malystryx, named after a popular figure in the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons Dragonlance series by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, turned 99 a few days ago, almost a year since she breached Level 89. Sigh. Talk about slow leveling.

The Infernal Esteem in a nutshell (this assumes you have already finished the first few esteem quests during your Level 89-98 days) after the jump:

1. Talk to the Ghost Warden of Wolf Village inside Devildom (yes, it’s behind that red door in the middle of Universal City). The Ghost Warden will then set you down the path of Infernal.

2. Travel to Broken Phoenix Village either by running, by mount, by flight or by teleportation and look for the Envoy of Greedy Wolf, who will tell you to retrieve an item called the Samsara Shuttle from the miniboss monster Demon Mauler.

3. Of course, you can’t retrieve an item unless you kill the brute holding it. So travel to the Ancient Wasteland at coordinates 387, 481 inside Devildom, locate the Demon Mauler and eliminate it. Being a miniboss, he’s stronger than your average enhanced damage or berserk mob. Take a priest with you, or better yet, an entire party.

4. Return to the Envoy of Greedy Wolf to submit the Samsara Shuttle. The envoy will then use the power of the item to send you back in time to talk to Shen Tulie, the Elite Metal Sentry. If you’ve been around Perfect World, you’ll remember the Elite Metal Sentry as the NPC on Unknown Island.

5. After talking to the Elite Metal Sentry, you’ll be teleported back to Universal Village. When you report to the Ghost Warden in Wolf Village, he’ll tell you to kill the Elite Metal Sentry, who is apparently working up a rage in the Shura Forest at coordinates 444, 613.

6. Go back to the Ghost Warden. Your next task will be to eliminate four boss monsters—the Unearthly Demon, Banished Ox, Forsaken Demon, and Peach Tree Goddess—in the instance dungeon Hell’s Arcadia.

7. Once the nightmare is over, return to the Ghost Warden and receive your reward—some yuan, a few thousand experience points, and a shiny new fairy.

Many thanks to MarieJoy, master of Perfect World Tiger Server clan Intensity, Jaiden, War_Payne, LordLloyd, JheYc and seventeen for helping me in my Infernal quest. Incidentally, MarieJoy and Jaiden also completed their Enlightened and Infernal esteem quests. Congratulations!

Post from: MMOtaku

To date, I’ve only played two Rohan: Blood Feud character races and classes that makes use of the four elemental skills—Blazing, Frozen, Darkness and Divinity. There’s a fourth elemental skill, Poison, which can only be accessed, as far as I know, by the Dans.

Going back, the three character races and classes that have the four elemental skills in their skill trees are the Human Knight, the Half-Elven Archer, and the Dekan Dragon Fighters. Although you can put points in all four elemental skills, it is highly recommended that you specialize only in one.

Here’s a breakdown of the skills and what they can do for your Rohan: Blood Feud character:

Blazing
Sustained mana cost: 4
Adds 20 percent elemental damage, 10 percent defense against Blazing damage, and gives a four percent chance of absorbing five percent of damage to your character as hit points.

Frozen
Sustained mana cost: 4
Adds 20 percent elemental damage, 10 percent defense against Frozen damage, and gives a four percent chance of cutting down a target’s movement for seven seconds.

Darkness
Sustained mana cost: 4
Adds 20 percent elemental damage, 10 percent defense against Darkness damage, and gives a four percent chance of slowing a target’s attack speed.

Divinity
Sustained mana cost: 4
Adds 20 percent elemental damage, 10 percent defense against Divinity damage, and gives a four percent chance of absorbing five percent of damage to your character as mana.

It should be noted that the figures cited above are for Level 1. Maximum level for skills is five.

Human Knights and Dekan Dragon Fighters benefit most from three of the four elemental skills—Blazing, Darkness and Divinity. So what skill should you specialize in if you’re playing a Human Knight or Dekan Dragon Fighter in Rohan: Blood Feud? Well, it depends on your playing style.

Those who prefer to eliminate mobs without using attack and damage skills should stick to Blazing or Darkness. Blazing will help your Rohan character recover hit points even as he or she deals damage and Darkness will lessen the damage your character takes. Skill spammers, on the other hand, will benefit more from Divinity because of its damage-to-mana conversion.

Half-Elven Archers, meanwhile, could choose any of the skills but would benefit mostly from the Frozen skill, as it gives your character ample time to shoot a few more arrows or bolts into mobs thanks to the slow effect.

Like I said earlier, it’s better to specialize in a single elemental skill because at Level 5 each elemental skill gives a 100 percent boost to your damage and a 50 percent bonus to defense against that particular skill.

My Rohan: Blood Feud Human Knight uses the Blazing skill to help her recover health while dealing serious damage to monsters.

For a more detailed breakdown of what these skills can do, you may want to check out RohanStats.

Screenshot taken by Joel from the online game Rohan: Blood Feud, developed by Korea-based YNK and published in North America by YNK Interactive.

Post from: MMOtaku

By the gaming gods! Is it true? Have five days already passed since I last posted? Apparently, yes. Whew! Time flies so fast when you’re having fun. Unfortunately, my five-day hiatus had not been even remotely fun.

Yes, you guessed it. The flu—at least I think it’s the flu—hit me right after New Year’s Eve, right in the middle of writing a Top Ten Asian MMORPGs of 2008 post. Don’t worry, I’ll finish the story … soon.

Right now, I’m just starting to recover. Of course, as a fanatic of massively multiplayer online role-playing games, there’s only one way for me to get back to tip-top shape—that’s by playing my favorite games.

At the moment, I’m playing two MMORPGs more than I’m supposed to (meaning game time is eating up some of my spending-quality-time-with-the-family time and my need-to-post-something-on-MMOtaku time). These two MMORPGs are Perfect World (yeah, it’s still great despite the rise and fall of great Philippine Tiger server clans Guardians and Legacy) and Granado Espada.

What? You mean to say, Joel, that you’ve taken a liking to Granado Espada? Yes … and no. I’m giving the game a chance to redeem itself in my eyes (notice that I said “my eyes,” meaning “in my humble opinion,” etc.). Perhaps PJ Punla of Granado Espada: Dispatches from the New World fame is right. Yes, playing on a new server and reaching new heights with the family and characters I’ve made are great.

My Granado Espada highlights, at least for the moment, include defeating Grace Bernelli in a match (although I did lose about nine times before I figured out how to beat her), taking her character card and creating her in my family barracks, and beating the crap out of Claude Baudez and Andre Janzur. Yes, Granado Espada veterans, I’m a noob when it comes to these events, but I’m happy to be experiencing what you’ve experienced in the past year.

As for Perfect World, I’ve encountered virtual life-changing events, too. First, my character Calumet’s current clan, Intensity, managed to take over Biting-Cold Land from Heroes clan in a great territorial battle. A week later, we also successfully blocked the bid of new clan Hyperion for the right to attack our territory. Why block the attack? Well, it’s like this: Hyperion is composed mostly of characters Level 90 to 101, while Intensity is made up of characters with levels between 75 and 99, with more than 50 percent of the members falling within the 75 to 88 bracket. See the discrepancy? So here’s a word of advice to Hyperion from me: Go find some other clan to screw if you value your integrity. Bullies!

Well, that’s it for now. It’s time to get the juices flowing again.

Screenshot taken by Joel from the online game Perfect World, developed by Beijing-based Perfect World Co. Ltd. and operated in the Philippines by Level Up! Games.

Post from: MMOtaku