[Caustic Saint]

Can Korea Be Kingpin Of Online Games?

In Taiwan last year, NCsoft earned $21 million in royalties from its local partner, Gamania Digital Entertainment Co. In China, Korean games currently account for well over 50% of the market. In Japan, NHN Corp. of Korea in mid-2003 overtook Yahoo! Japan Corp. as the country's largest game portal.

Don't know how I missed this when it was originally posted.

Korea could be the MMORPG king - if they'd stop playing f'ing Starcraft! I know it's highly regarded and all, but it's over 6 years old at this point, which is getting up there in terms of gaming. Seriously, if some kid in the US went to school talking about how he spent all weekend playing Starcraft, his friends would look at him like he was crazy.

Some of my kids are getting into MMORPGs more now, but they tend to shy away from the ones that charge a monthly fee. But I can understand that.

When a dragon called Antaris unexpectedly appeared in Lineage II in January to wreak havoc, "it was as important for the players as a political scandal rocking the country."

Maybe because dragons are much more interesting than anything that could ever happen in Korean politics.

[GargoyleTS]

Lineage 2 ...strike that NCSoft pissed me off badly.

Open beta, we report bugs then find out that NCSoft has known about them all along (cause we are actually playing the original, nearly a year old retail Korean release call Prelude). Botters and farmers abound (and I could care less where they came from, China, US, didn't matter they ruined gameplay for low-level players). Then, after numerous interviews saying that Chronicle 1 would fix a lot of bugs and problems and would be released to retail, ONE WEEK before retail launch they say that Chron 1 would be mid-june release instead.

Unhelpful GM's in game who spoke (or typed) little english and lied outright combined with little direct communication from the company itself, other than to say L2 Non-Korean (Incl. North America, Taiwan, and others) would not have their own development teams and would be merely translated copies of the Korean version made a lot of people tell NCSoft where to stick it. (and I hate open PvP in a role-playing game)

[GargoyleTS]

I started on poor beloved Seighardt, then moved to Erica a week after it opened. I also started with a Dwarf on Seighardt and abandoned that idea when I moved for an Orc Fighter. Even made 20th Level and switched to Monk! Then dropped my weapon one death and realized I was screwed.