( This article comes from http://rpgvault.ign.com. Click here to go to its original URL. )

A very long time ago, Lucifer, the King of Devils, led his frightening Death Legion out of Hell to attack the Magic Continent and its human race, which was celebrating the annual harvest festival on site of its origin, the Golden Plain. Odin, the King of Gods, reacted without hesitation by sending his Super Corps to save the beleaguered victims. However good his intentions, his quick decision led to dire consequences. His forces, which soon proved no match for their foes, were soundly routed. The fiends then advanced to storm the Gods’ stronghold, Frozen Mountain. The situation there rapidly grew desperate until Odin was left with but a single option. To prevent the fall of the entire universe, he made the ultimate sacrifice, fusing himself with a magical blade, the Dominant Sword, thereby sealing the border between the two realms.

This divide would endure for many centuries before it was unintentionally undone. In the meantime, the humans split into two factions, Dynasty and Empire. Centered in the Magic Continent’s north and south respectively, they also grew apart culturally. Eventually, the former’s discovery of a rare magic crystal mine, which it was unwilling to share, furnished the spark that ignited open hostilities. Then, the discovery of the Dominant Sword allowed the devils to return. Magic World Online takes place within this chaotic scenario, giving players on the two sides the option of fighting each other or their common foe. Developed by Goldcool Games, the title will be available in the west through Ingle Games. With the second round of closed beta currently under way, it seemed like a particularly appropriate time to find out more by questioning Product Director Kane Hao.

Kane Hao: Magic World Online is a new concept fantasy-themed MMORPG that takes place in a persistent magical world that combines character action and progression with social interaction and actual role-playing. By using the title Magic World Online, we primarily want to convey a sense of identity recognition, namely fantasy MMOG, to people who come across this game. In addition, we would like the name to give them a hint about the magic of the content it offers.

we want our players to enjoy the essence of MMORPGs with relatively small investments of their time… say one hour per day. And we want them to skip the unnecessary parts such as walking across maps and clicking on mobs

The game boasts gameplay that is both unique and balanced. We believe it is readily distinguishable by its tempting features, which range from the intriguing combination of cozy in-game video communication and the thoughtful official MWO Robot to the realization of personal ambitions as well as the accomplishment of nourishing community life. Other notable elements such as the availability of honorable official positions, romantic marriages, multi-functional houses, intelligent mounts and incredible growing weapons are also available. Going beyond that, we are now undertaking the task of bringing in even more from the latest Chinese version.

Kane Hao: Goldcool is a new rising online game developer located in Shanghai, China. Magic World Online is its first successful product; the company has been working on it for over two years. We’re very excited that it has hit 180,000 peak concurrent players in Mainland China, and has also surpassed the 60,000 mark in Taiwan. At the moment, Goldcool is engaged not only in developing MWO expansion packages, but also in bringing out a new MMOG featuring a comic-type style.

( This article comes from MMOSite.com. Click here to go to its original URL. )

Summary: Magic World Online is a recently released Action MMORPG. Innovative new concept, that’s what made Magic World Online distinguish itself above other titles. This game is the first MMORPG to integrate in-game video chat system and official robot system.

Magic World Online is a recently released Action MMORPG. Innovative new concept, that’s what made Magic World Online distinguish itself above other titles. This game is the first online RPG to integrate in-game video chat system and official robot system. They are all for the pursuit of gameplay and giving players more time to enjoy real-time community with their hands freed from repetitive grinding job.Now let Kane Hao, the product director for Magic World Online, give us some latest news and details about this anticipated MMORPG.

MMOsite: First, congratulations you’ve successfully concluded the first closed beta for Magic World Online. How many players have taken part in the test? And what’s the feedback? What exciting content will be available in the second round of closed beta?

Kane Hao: Thank you very much. We are very happy about the result of CB I. Over 2000 players had participated in the first Closed Beta and they were overwhelmed by the unique and innovative design and game play of MWO. In particular they were most impressed by the in-game Video Chat system and the MWO Robot. The Video Chat system allows players to have a certain degree of intimacy while playing the game, and the MWO Robot provides huge convenience to our players, and make MWO a truly “FAIR” game, since it completely eliminates the use of illegal bots. In the second round of closed beta, we will introduce some high level maps, new instances, as well as Siege War and State War.

MMOsite: To those who have never heard of Magic World Online before, how would you describe Magic World Online in your own words?

Kane Hao: The focus of MWO is on its new concept gameplay. If you are among those who are tired of the unnecessary job for character control, those who are curious about the idea of growing weapon and intelligent mount, those who find the implementation of video communication technology purely a blessing not a curse, as well as those who feel the existence of guild must be highly community oriented and even have a real estate…you should give MWO a try.

MMOsite: How many classes are available in Magic World Online? And how does the class transfer system function in Magic World Online?

Kane Hao: MWO has 4 starting classes: Mage, Warrior, Summoner, and Archer. Each class can diverge into different professional tracks as your character levels up, through a very unique feature called the Class Transfer. Each subclass has its own unique skills. One of the most interesting thing is that in the 3rd class transfer if one decides that he/she has made the wrong choice of the career path, he/she can talk to an NPC to cancel the path, and re-select a new path, while keeping all the skills of his/her old path on the 1st and 2nd class transfer. This way, one could enjoy more choices in class development.

MMOsite: A unique feature of Magic World Online is its growing weapon system. Can you give us more info about this system? Anything different from the normal weapon upgrade system?

Kane Hao: Yes, the system is quite different from the normal weapon upgrade system in other games. In most games, players can upgrade weapons by using certain gem stones. In MWO, a grow weapon feeds on other weapons, and absorbs the attributes of the weapons it feeds on. Thus, a growing weapon might have infinite possibility for its attributes. Growing weapons in MWO are categorized into 4 types: Physical Attack, Skill Attack, Critical Strike Rating and Hit. To find out more, we definitely encourage you to experience this feature yourself.

( This article comes from TenTonHammer.com. Click here to go to its original URL. )

Questions by Cody “Micajah” Bye, Managing Editor
Answers by Kane Hao, Product Director of MWO, Ingle Games

Over the past year, the growth of free-to-play massively multiplayer online games has been enormous. With each passing month, more games and publishing studios jump into the North American market, and it’s been interesting to see how these have pushed the boundaries of how MMOGs are developed and designed. To set themselves apart, these developers really have to create some incredibly unique products and features. One of the games with some of the most intriguing concepts is Magic World Online, a recently released game that is drawing some attention from the North American press, including the editors at Ten Ton Hammer. Recently, Cody “Micajah” Bye sat down with Kane Hao, the product director for Magic World Online, to learn the intricacies of the game and why North American gamers should be interested in the title. Enjoy!

Ten Ton Hammer: When was Magic World Online first released? How many expansions and/or updates have been made to the game?

Kane Hao: MWO is actually an MMORPG made by a Chinese design team called the GoldCool Studio. The game was first released in China in March 2007, and after that, five expansion packs have been released for the Chinese servers. For North America, we simply skipped the first two expansion packs and start with the third one, which is a more stable version with much enriched game contents. We will release the subsequent expansion packs in the next few months.

Ten Ton Hammer: How do players advance in Magic World Online? Do they simply improve their skills or is MWO a class-based system?

Kane: There are many ways for players to advance in MWO: Training by killing monsters, and doing quests are the two basic ways. MWO is a class based game, with four basic character classes for players to choose. There are a ton of skills available for each class, so, in addition to leveling-up, players can work on their proficiency of different kills.

Ten Ton Hammer: How many classes and/or races are there in Magic World Online? Can you describe them for us?

Kane: There are two basic races named the Dynasty and the Empire, representing the two opposing camps in the game. There are 4 basic classes for each race: warrior, archer, summoner and mage. Furthermore, there is a unique feature in MWO called the Class Transfer, meaning that after your character of a particular class reach a certain level, you will have the choice to transfer it to a more advanced sub-class. There will be a total of four times that you can transfer class for each character. All together, there are a total of 52 sub-classes titles available, out of which 16 are final sub-classes.

Ten Ton Hammer: Can you tell us a bit about the backstory of MWO?

Kane: Sure. The background story of MWO sets in a ancient mythical world describing a haunting myth of Gods, Humans and Devils. Dynasty and Empire, namely Humans’ two historically opposing camps, once invited a catastrophic abuse of Gods’ Dominant Sword, a divine magic sword used to seal the destructive nasty Devils that had long been troubling Gods’ dominion and Humans’ survival. Released from the long-standing solitary confinement, Devils turned out to be such an irresistible force that they poured out all their pain and suffering, hostility and hatred to justify themselves as the savage killers of the remaining Gods and Humans. Driven to the edge of extinction, the sinful and helpless Humans have no choice but to try desperately to sink their differences and fight their way out. For the miserable, is there one crumb of hope left to change the ultimate fate?