An early look into CardMon Hero

For those who have ever enjoyed collectible card games, the idea of an MMO that features collectible and playable cards might be intriguing. Well, if you're in the market for a new game, Redbana, T3fun and Hanbitsoft have a treat for you. Their newest free-to-play game, CardMon Hero, offers a system that is heavily based on building up certain cards and playing them in the world against mobs and other players. Not only will players get cards for skills, but adventuring through the world will net special monster cards known as mercenary cards, which are picked up via questing, crafting, and drops. As of this evening, the game is entering closed beta as well.

We had a chance to take a look at CardMon Hero with Redbana's Project Manager, Damien Moreno, who gave us an early peek at some of the things players can expect within the game. Many of the systems present will be fairly familiar to veteran MMO players. Movement is handled through either click-to-move or WASD. Also present are familiar UI options like action bars, maps, a quest journal, character sheet (with a cosmetic pane) and the like. Eventually, a cash shop will also be implemented, although Moreno informed us that it is being worked on to provide a plethora of cosmetic and helpful options, as opposed to gear or weapons that will create game-breaking imbalances between paid players and free-to-play gamers -- a very important thing to many Western gamers.

For more on this free-to-play game, join me after the break, or check out the gallery of concept art and in-game screenshots below!
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Ultimately, what sets CardMon Hero apart from many others in the imported free-to-play market is the game's heavy use of cards, which grant players all manner of fun ways to take down monsters. Not only will you have mercenary tank-style cards that will fight for you, but other card types are available to assist your mercenary with healing, buffs, and the like. Being an excellent CardMon Hero player will require a good deal of adventuring to find different cards, as well as learning how to use the cards you have effectively. Cards will level with you, but eventually you'll likely want to use it along with other components to craft a newer, more powerful mercenary card via the game's combination system.

Currently, there are three "seasons" worth of cards that will be available in the game, as the game has been available in Korea and Japan for quite some time. As with other card games such as Pokemon, each mercenary card has a specific type of element it is weak against. Players will find it in their best interest not only to look for powerful cards, but to hunt for a variety of different types of cards so that they can use their card stock to build different strategies against monsters in an area.

For more information, or an early closed beta key to check out CardMon Hero, head over to the CardMon Hero site. Keep in mind that this early stage involves a great deal of localization work, so there's quite a bit of odd wording at present. However, for those interested in seeing this game come to the Western market and willing to put in the time helping to hammer out bugs and translation issues, there's quite a bit of potential to be found.