Registering over 50 million users within days, Nexon Europe released an updated client of MapleStory, a two dimension, side-scrolling, massively multiplayer online role-playing game where gamers can enjoy a multitude of different skills, spells and abilities, as well as numerous community features including detailed friends lists, and even communication through humorous character animations and the facility to form Guilds and adventure parties.

MapleStory was a game developed by the South Korean company Wizet. Several versions of the game are now available for specific countries or regions, and each is published by various companies such as Wizet and Nexon. Although playing the game is free, character appearances and gameplay enhancements can be purchased from the “Cash Shop” using real currency. As mentioned earlier, MapleStory has a combined total of over 50 million subscriber accounts in all of its versions. MapleStory North America (Global), for gamers mainly based in North America and outside of East Asia, Southeast Asia and Europe, has over three million players.

In the game, players can travel through the “Maple World”, fighting and defeating monsters and developing their characters’ skills and abilities, a typical feature found in most role-playing games. Moreover, players have the option to interact with others in many ways, such as through chatting, trading, and playing minigames. Groups of players can band together in parties to hunt monsters and share the rewards. Players can also join a guild to interact more easily with each other.

Like most MMORPGs, the gameplay of MapleStory is centered on venturing into dungeons and combating monsters in real-time. The players are required to combat monsters and complete quests, and in the process acquire in-game currency called “Mesos”, experience points, and various items. Players can kill monsters alone in the game, or they can form a party with up to six total characters to complete the task. The loot is shared based on relative damage and level of characters in the party, more being awarded to the higher-level members.

MapleStory’s 2D scrolling viewpoint resembles very closely a platform game rather than the typical 3D environment or top-down perspective of other games, such as Guild Wars or Mu Online. The controls for the game are executed using the keyboard and mouse, making it a computer and user friendly game. The keyboard is used for many game functions, and much of it can be reset to suit users’ preferences. The mouse is mainly used to trigger non-player characters and manipulate items.

MapleStory characters exist in worlds or “servers” where players are allowed to create multiple characters in each world. Each world, similar in content between each other in the same version, is split into at most twenty channels, among which characters are allowed to freely switch. The ability to transfer entire characters between worlds was added in December 2007 to GlobalMS. However, this feature has a restriction — transfer of mesos is limited to one million, and players cannot transfer to the newest world.

New players are sent to Maple Island, a floating island specifically designed to be beginner-friendly. Players in the game can not choose a job when they create a character, but rather every character starts with the “Beginner” job. When characters have accomplished certain requirements, they can complete the first job advancement and become a Warrior, Magician, Bowman, Pirate, or a Thief. Further class progression is only allowed within the scope of the first class advancement chosen. There are four class advancements available progressively throughout the game.

Stay tune for the Maple Story Guides, Cheats and Expert Tips.

The Kingdom of Loathing, or KoL as it is popularly known among avid gamers, is meant for those who get a thrill out of challenging puzzles and a satirical edge.

Kingdom of Loathing is a darkly funny, browser-based, multiplayer role-playing game designed and operated by Asymmetric Publications. The creators Zack “Jick” Johnson and writer Josh “Mr. Skullhead” are included in the operation of the web browser-based game. This player turn-based MMORPG makes up for its lack of graphical sophistication – with most of the game world drawn in a crude stick-figure style and hardly any animation at all — with clever writing and a bizarre, complex world that takes months to explore entirely. This is possibly also the only game where a player can get hopelessly addicted to goofballs and then ascend to a higher plane of existence within a brief span of 15 minutes.

The Kingdom of Loathing may not for everyone, but for more people than you would care to imagine, KoL is a surface-simple absurdist role-playing game packed with entertainment value. As a newcomer in a trade such as Turtle Tamer, Disco Bandit or the mysterious Pastamancer, a player will journey through a stick-figure world of horrible puns, excellent puns, intrigue and alcohol. Best of all, KoL allows only a certain number of turns per day, so players must eventually go outside or otherwise occupy themselves rather than spending hours grinding through such locales as The Sleazy Back Alley or The Misspelled Cemetary.

The game was released on February 23, 2003, but because a lot of content is still being added frequently, the game is still considered unfinished and officially remains in open beta. It is constantly evolving and gaining popularity among more gamers worldwide.

KoL has a characteristic surreal humor, word play, parody and references to popular culture which makes it ever in vogue. In KoL, players fight monsters for experience, meat (which is the game’s currency), and items, through the turn-based system. Players can also interact with each other through player versus player competitions, participate in the in-game economy by trading goods and services, organize themselves into clans, and speak to each other in many different chat channels.

Between 2006 and 2007 alone, the game hosted a player base of about 140,000 regular users and 190,000 active accounts, clearly demonstrating its popularity. The other remarkable feature of this browser-based multi-player role playing game is that it is financially free from advertisements and fuels itself basically from donations and the purchase of virtual goods without imposing any subscription fees like many other online games.

Gameplay in KoL involves fighting monsters, completing quests, gaining skills and stats, and accumulating items and meat. A player can complete a specific number of adventures each day as assigned, which is usually 40. The game day resets at a time called “rollover”, which starts at 9:30 PM MST, and lasts about 30 minutes, except on Saturdays, when it takes about an hour and a half.

Further adventures can be acquired by eating food, binging on booze, and spleen-damaging items. However, only a limited amount of each can be consumed each day, and drinking too much alcohol can put the character into a drunken stupor for the remainder of the day. During rollover, drunkenness, fullness, and spleen damage are all reset to zero. Although a player can accumulate a large number of adventures, the number is reduced to 200 at rollover.

The KOL Wiki – (Kingdom of Loathing Walkthrough)