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You must watch this teaser video for a Mega Man game you'll never play
Rockman Online is a side-scrolling online game that mashes up the Mega Man and Mega Man X worlds. It's also only being released in South Korea. Luckily, then, this anime-style teaser video is cool enough for us to enjoy as a standalone work, because for us, it might as well be!
'Mega Man Online' confirmed for PC
The acronym "MMO" has new meaning for Capcom, which has revealed that it is working on Mega Man Online for PC, this according to a report by GameSpot. The game is being co-developed by Korea's Neowiz Games, maker of EA Sports FIFA Online. There's a chance that MMO (see!) could be related to Capcom's recent Mega Man Universe trademark filing, but if it is, the company isn't saying. When contacted, a rep told Joystiq, "We have no comment at this time as Capcom does not respond to rumors and/or speculation." Whatever MMO turns out to be, we can only hope it doesn't take after Ghouls 'N Ghosts Online, Capcom's last (and unreleased) attempt at turning one of its classic IPs into a massively multiplayer experience. It was scary ... bad.
Kingdom Under Fire dev working on new MMO
Korean development studio Blueside is hard at work, not only on Kingdom Under Fire II, but also a new MMO. According to Videogamer, it's called Project T (the "T" is for "tentative") and will be a fantasy MMO with a focus on "stylish action." Blueside will be working towards a worldwide release by 2011 and has signed on Neowiz to help with some of the heavy lifting. While that's all great, there's just one thing we want to know: will Blueside's fondness for the cornrow find its way into Project T?
Neowiz Exec VP on F2P market saturation and working with EA
When it comes to the Western market, the name EA will jump out at many gamers far faster than the name Neowiz will. However, Neowiz was involved not only in successful redesigns/ports like EA's FIFA Online, but is also localizing other Western games like Age of Conan. In a recent article with Gamasutra, Neowiz Exective Vice President, Sang-Won Chung had a lot of very interesting things to say about the current state of Korea's free to play market and the business of recycling ideas in the current MMO space. Among the many topics of discussion, one of the biggest quotes that jumped out at us was the statement that free to play gaming was "like having too many channels on your digital cable, and now you have like 300 channels and you don't know what to watch anymore." With the flood of Eastern f2p games entering the market seemingly daily, we can definitely relate to that feeling. Along with this, Chung also talks about taking MMO ideas from console games, and the difficulty of turning non-f2p titles into f2p games more in keeping with the Eastern revenue model. On top of that, there's also a pretty amusing anecdote about EA's first venture into Korea; well worth the read if just for that story alone.
Age of Conan expands its bloody conquest to Korea
It looks like Age of Conan is headed for South Korea thanks to a distribution deal between Funcom and well-known Korean publisher Neowiz. You thought you were safe from King Conan's wrath just 'cause you live 7,700 kilometers from Funcom? We could've told you that was a false assumption -- this particular blogger is almost 6,500km away and he's still knee-deep in the barbarism!We won't predict that it'll be more well-received there than StarCraft, but Korea is a bastion of online gaming, and Neowiz plans to offer full localization and support, as well as all the same content updates the US and EU players get, to the Korean audience. The release date "has not yet been finalized," though -- not even a hint was provided in the press release, so, uhh, we guess we'll just wait and see. Having fun in Conan's homeland? Make sure to check out all of our previous Age of Conan coverage, and stick with Massively for more news from the Hyborian Age!
ION 08: State of online games keynote
Globalization is one of the session tracks here at ION 08, as befitting an industry seeking the holy grail of a truly global marketplace for online games. Tuesday's keynote was delivered by Won II Suh of Neowiz, a Korean online games company with 20 titles currently supported or in development by 1000 employees across 8 regions around the world. Mr. Suh described the current landscape of online gaming in Asia and the state of East-West partnerships happening at an increasing rate around the world (Activision and Blizzard, Neowiz and EA, THQ and Shanda to name a few). Crossover from West to East already has some success stories (NBA Street, e.g.) while the East to West crossover is still fairly nascent. Suh spoke to a fundamental paradigm shift in the way games are made and played in both markets as part of the reason so much of this crossover is happening now. He stressed the importance of prioritizing human and cultural connections as predicates to success for Western companies hoping to break into Eastern markets, indicating that even if the business and financial plans make sense, companies are still prone to fail if they misunderstand or gloss over the critical steps of establishing real human relations and corporate culture due diligence when aspiring to do business in Asia. All of the slides from the keynote are available in our gallery.%Gallery-22795%
EA's world conquest continues with new Korean dev studio
According to Digital Chosunilbo, Electronic Arts -- the planet Jupiter of game development -- has plans to open a new studio in Korea this year. EA intends to make three or four new titles for the Asian market. The studio will be a 20 million dollar investment, and its first projects will be online versions of NBA Street and Battlefield. All this will be helmed by Danny Isaac of FIFA Soccer fame. Gamasutra noted that this is not EA's first foray into the Asian market. The company invested in Korean developer Neowiz back in March, and shortly thereafter announced plans to release in Asia one or more titles from the Battlefield series.This is just one more step towards total world domination, unless EA's newly-formed rival Activision-Blizzard has something to say about it![Via The Escapist]
Play as Ken and Chun Li in Korean MMO fighting game
A massively-multiplayer online fighting game. Now why didn't we think of that? Korean company NeoWiz is beginning an open beta this month for Perfect KO, an MMO that allows players to customize avatars and pound on each other in typical fighting-game fashion.Insert Credit reports that Street Fighter's Ken and Chun Li will be playable avatars in the game, meaning that NeoWiz has struck some sort of licensing deal with Capcom to give players access to these heavy-hitters. The company is also apparently not averse to inviting other licensed characters into the fray, which could make for some interesting match-ups. We're keeping our fingers crossed for Necrid.Check out some footage of the MMO in action after the break (the video's audio is NSFW due to the grating Linkin Park soundtrack).[Via Massively]
Ken and Chun Li coming to Perfect KO MMOG
The Insert Credit site has the news that the Korean online fighting game Perfect KO (which enters Beta test this month), will feature the Street Fighter characters Ken and Chun Li as playable avatars. The licensing deal for this unique Asian-aimed title surprised commentator Brandon Sheffield: It's interesting for a few reasons - one is that the characters are customizable, so you'll be able to tailor your SF folks a bit. Another is that the company has stated (according to the second linked article) that they're open to more licenses in the future from other fighting games. And in fact, it's quite interesting that they'll be 3D. Who will provide the models, I wonder?The news comes originally from the Japanese gaming site 4gamer (babelfish translation). Perfect KO is in development by the company Neowiz, makers of titles like Silk Road, Shot Online, and SEALS Online. The best example of the game's playstyle I could find is a YouTube trailer for the title. (Sound is NSFW, as there is a Linken Park song dubbed over the footage; video should be fine.)
