IAHGames changes Granado Espada model again - returning to free-play
After announcing that Korean MMOG, Granado Espada, would be commercial on 30 August, 2007, Asia-Pacific operators IAHGames have announced that the MMO will be free-to-play at some (as yet) unannounced date in the Asia-Pacific region in the very near future (The game is, as we understand it, already free-to-play in North America, having gone free-to-play on 21 August 2007). That's Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Vietnam.
Granado Espada (also known in North America as Sword of the New World, where it is operated by K2 Network), won the 2006 Korean awards for Best Graphics, and for Game of the Year. Reviews and responses in North America have been more mixed, but Granado Espada does provide some interesting departures from more regular MMO fare.
Granado Espada is family based, and each player's family will consist of a number of created characters and recruited NPCs. Each player may purchase up to four barracks, and each barracks may hold up to nine characters at once. It is also team-based, allowing each player to control up to three characters simultaneously - a feature rarely seen in other MMOs.
Quests are not central to Granado Espada, but handy if you like the grind, and missions are only lightly instanced - usually just the bosses.
The setting of the game is in a fantasy world, at a period of expansion not unlike the colonization of the Americas, and tensions are high between the Royalists and the Republicans.
