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E3 2010: Your complete Massively coverage roundup
The 2010 edition of the gaming nirvana known as E3 has come and gone, and Massively was there to bring you three days of exclusives, firsts, and hands-on impressions for all your favorite MMORPG titles, studios, and developers. This year's Expo saw plenty of news and announcements regarding highly anticipated games, as well as plenty of information on assorted titles large and small. We thought it best to collate our coverage into a complete and concise roundup post for your viewing pleasure, so read along after the cut to make sure you didn't miss anything. You can also check out all of our E3 galleries along the way.
E3 2010: Dragon Nest hands-on
Dragon Nest couldn't be more different from Vindictus, Nexon's other new title. Where Vindictus is all about "elegant brutality," Nexon describes Dragon Nest as "kinetic and beautiful." And though both games are lovely in their own way, Dragon Nest's style is more typical of what you'd expect from Nexon: The art is stylized, with a bit of an anime feel to it. Gameplay felt a surprising amount like Nexon's 2-D classic arcade-style MMO, Dungeon Fighter Online, though DN is fully 3-D and much more like what you'd expect of an MMO. But like DFO, DN's combat is fast-paced, full of flashy animations, and just a lot of fun. With every game we see from Nexon, it's clear that they're taking everything they've learned from previous development and adding it to their latest project. Though we haven't seen everything the game has to offer, Dragon Nest may be their most polished game yet. %Gallery-95665%
Nexon reports last year's revenue up 56 percent
The free-to-play model is increasingly popular in the MMO industry, and the powers that be at Nexon say there's a good reason for that -- in their case, at any rate. The free-to-play publisher has announced its revenues for last year, and it was very good news: "...worldwide revenues increased 56 percent last year, growing from 450.8 billion won [359.7 million USD] in 2008, to 703.6 billion won [561.4 million USD] in 2009. Additionally, Nexon America posted a 31 percent increase in revenues in 2009, as for the first time, non-Korean contributions accounted for the majority of Nexon's global revenue." Nexon's CEO, Daniel Kim, says that their handling of the free-to-play model as applied to "very outstanding games" is responsible for their success: "Here at home, we have been able to fend off the tough times and continue growing our revenues while adding more and more players to our games. Going forward, Vindictus, Dragon Nest and Dungeon Fighter Online represent the next generation of free to play games that should appeal directly to gamers in North America."
Nexon MMOs not coming to Mac or consoles any time soon
There's been quite a bit of talk coming out of Nexon from the time of the GDC -- revealing two games, more news on the venerable MapleStory, and even a developer initiative announced shortly before the conference. But if you were waiting for the other shoe to drop, there is one after a fashion, because the company still has no plans to develop anything for the Mac or for consoles. Both Vindictus and Dragon Nest are apparently popular choices for players to request on consoles, but according to Nexon America vice president Min Kim, neither one is planned for development for the console platform. Kim went on to explain that his company's base of operations in Korea meant that Mac support was a distant afterthought at best -- the market for non-PC games in Korea is minimal. Of course, in both cases he said that the support is something they would like to expand to eventually, but for now there's just not enough reason to expand. Which is sad news if you're one of the many users who prefer a fruit-based computer, especially with more and more games expanding to be playable on any platform. [Thanks Tracey!]
GDC10: Dragon Nest hands-on
Ever since the Diablo franchise hit it big with gamers across the world, competing companies have attempted to replicate Blizzard's addictive click-and-loot gameplay with varying degrees of success. There's just something satisfying on a primal level when you wipe out entire armies of monsters with a mere 2,142 mouse clicks. Mega-MMO publisher Nexon (Mabinogi, Dungeon Fighter Online) is bringing over another contender in Dragon Nest, a fast and furious dungeon crawler (minus the Vin Diesel, unfortunately). At GDC 2010, we were fortunate enough to nab a hands-on with Dragon Nest, a title could almost be considered a sibling of Nexon's Vindictus. Both games are action-oriented, twitch-based and include cutting through swaths of enemies for the glory of your inventory. However, while Vindictus is serious in tone and looks, Dragon Nest goes for a "cuter" feel. In markets where Dragon Nest and Vindictus exist simultaneously, such as Korea, each can co-exist peacefully while not undercutting one another. Of course, Dragon Nest is more than a cute face and a mouse waiting to be worn out -- hit the jump after the gallery to chew through this colorful game with us. %Gallery-118909%
Impressive new Dragon Nest and Dungeon Fighter Online gameplay videos
Nexon America is coming to the Penny Arcade Expo this year, and they've released two very cool new Dungeon Fighter Online and Dragon Nest gameplay videos. Now, we were already curiously interested in Dungeon Fighter Online before, but after seeing this video we're now officially excited to try the game out at PAX.Then you've got this Dragon Nest gameplay video, which really caught our attention when we watched it. This game has seemingly come from left field with combat that looks as though it were ripped straight out of a console action RPG. If you're into these games at all, it should be good times soon enough when they officially release in North America -- DFO sometime soon and DN next year.Click and ogle the videos after the break.
Dragon Nest MMO announced from Eyedentity Games
From Korean developer Eyedentity Games comes a brand new MMO called Dragon Nest that bills itself as a "dynamic action fantasy online game", and uses Eyedentity's own proprietary Eternity Engine technology. The announcement was made earlier this week, including a collection of screenshots and a gameplay video released as well.The game itself is centered around the action of combat, with a healthy dose of visuals that seems to remind us of the Final Fantasy series. Following a trend that promises to benefit all players on a global scale, the game is said to be accessible to those with lower-end computers, thanks to the low polygon count and streamlined graphics engine. Beta testing will begin in late 2008, with a projected global release date of 2009.
