Why was Ragnarok Online good? - Early History of Ragnarok Online
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- Опубликовано: 19 янв 2018
- Now I don't intent to infringe on any copyrights or anything here so here are the sources I used.
Video Sources:
• Lychnis [리크니스] Game Sa... - Vysethedetermined2
• Antman 2 개미맨 2 PC,So... - koreanretrogaming
• Arcturus - The Curse a... - BuffMaister
Text Sources
ragnarok.wikia.com/wiki/Ragnar...
adultimum.net/rw/extras.php?se...
/ history_of_ragnarok_on...
irowiki.org/wiki/Servers
www.neoseeker.com/forums/2910/...
forums.warpportal.com/index.p...
hg101.kontek.net/korea/part2/c...
www.usamimi.info/%7Ehuge/index...
github.com/rathena/rathena/wi... 
Игры
There was something magical about RO that evokes nostalgia like no other.
Unfortunately, no one....not even the creators understand that magic and that is perhaps the reason why there was no other game like RO ever made.
Seriously though! Oh my god. I wish I could go live as a child with this game forever.
Playing Ragnarok mobile after for sometime..... u know that happen
Now playing RO on private to save my wallet
Thank you for the video. It brings back soo many rememories. I play exclusively on the official english servers and I was maybe one of the few who have played it around 1999/2000 in the US. It has grown... GM GodPoing will always have a special place in my mind.
The music is a big part of it. Still an awesome soundtrack to this day.
This is an AI era. I think it's time to HD-ize all graphics of Ragnarok.
I grew up playing this game. I won’t forget the grinding and hunting for cards. Ragnarok Online always have a special place in my heart.
same feeling bro ! T...T i'm so busy recently! but i will dive into that magic world again someday !
welcome join Originsro. 2019Jun08 still many peoples play.
hunt....
card drop...
happily clicking on the card...
character don't move...
"Disconnected from server"...
panic click to login again...
card is gone.
orz
most of us do. it's one of those special games.
still play ro sir?
One of the few games you'll come across that hits the Soundtrack perfectly.
What I like about RO is the non-linear exploration aspect of the game.
Not just non linear exploration, but non-linear character development.
@@ecoterrorist This! MMO now are so linear. Do this or else you won't access endgame fast.
@@ecoterrorist i feel like renewal ragnarok fails at this miserably, in older versions you were able to do well with a melee wizard or a spell casting assassin, nowadays every class has two or three builds if you are lucky, same goes to exploration, there are maps that are just so efficient you have no reason to explore the huge world
Hearing Prontera's soundtrack just now almost made me tear up.
Same.
still play ro sir?
That magic revolves around the incredible amount of detail and love in every element of the game, especially the artistic part. Every monster and NPC look like they could have a story or even become a protagonist with their own game. The sound effects are snappy and fun, they feel very impactful and satisfying to hear. The music score is diverse, from the calmest music in history to the strangest action-based techno music. The color variation in the game is very wide, from grey areas to cheerful colors while keeping a distinct artistic design. Even the social emotes are charming and funny to use due to the strong expression without reaching a critical level.
There are many different areas and a huge overall map, makes you feel like a true adventurer. Part of that reason is also the high difficulty because not all areas are accessible without proper level and some monsters in your leveling area are far stronger than others (e.g. the butterflies, bosses, etc.). Another thing that strengthens this fact is the class system. The change in look, while unlocking new abilities and gaining more stats is incredibly fulfilling and satisfying for all the hard work you put into your character. With new power, you also unlock more access to the newer areas, while not completely be aware of what area you are capable of clearing. It just makes you curious as a player, yearning for knowledge of: What can I clear now after I became stronger? And because you allocate stats rather than gaining fixed ones, no one can tell you for sure what you can clear now.
The areas are extremely diverse too, taking real-world places and making it into a fantasy world. They even carefully select the instruments to fit those places, making it more cultural-feeling.
Even the skills are carefully selected. For example, heal is the standard healing skill in any game. But in RO, you can use it on enemy as well and if you heal a zombie, you will damage it instead. So a priest in a zombie dungeon would be much more effective than attacking poring outside the dungeon.
Heck, even the items are affected. From card collections to .... dead branch. Basically, an item that summons a random monster (including bosses) anywhere you are, including the city, causing chaos even a sudden "raid" while in the safest places. If you are unlucky, someone summons a dark lord or Baphomet, and the city literally becomes a red danger zone without the support of high-level players. I could go on and on (item menu and its modern and creative feel; loading screen pictures, etc.), I might never finish.
Combining all that, and you get something we call an immersive experience. It just sucks you into their world, makes everything feel real. This is something no other MMO/MMORPGs have achieved over the last decade.
Touché!! Well said ❤️
Perfect description 👍
the main reason Ragnarok Online is good was not the game, it was the memories, the lessons you learned, the cards you farmed, and the friendships you made or the people betrayed you. Ragnarok Online is more than a game, its our childhood :)
I played this game 17 years ago and still love everything about it. If I can just go back to the past and play this with my old friends and former classmates again.
It was perfect MMORPG and had fantastic music. It had community where people cared and shared. Plenty times I shared my equipments and stuff with strangers, and the best part is they also returned it honestly after use.
not just perfect but the FIRST!! mmorpg that ever hit the international market, and was A HUGE SUCCESS at that time
yeah, i loved being a cleric and healing novices in orc dungeon
@@ericklestrange6255 those annoying bats in Payon dungeon and accidentally clicking on those eggs in Payon dungeon level 2 and running for your life.
My I miss those days.
@@69Solo and going all the way to the last floor avoiding as much as you could that boss who was a waifu with a bell followed by foxes because she would wreck the hell outta you, i remember gathering fox loots to make a mask and also the branches to summon mobs.
payon village was the first time where i felt how awesome the community was, i remember going there as a noob, asking for directions and a pro giving me an armor, a lot of advice etc~~ was awesome
@@ericklestrange6255 hey i use to help in payon. My class use to be archer, so i use to hit those long stem like cratures and always use to hangout outside payon dungeon.
The boss waifu you talking about i think her name was moonlight or something.
i played this game back on 2004, and here i am,, 16 years later already several times back & forth to play this magical game...
*shit i feel old... :3
I also played back in 2004. Played for like 4 years lol. Nothing compares and I’m probably getting a pc soon so I can visit again.
I play this shit since 2006. Lol
Theres no other game as good as ragnarok even nowadays. FFXIV is super super good, but my love for ragnarok is eternal.
14 years playing this and im not done yet.
I think it's a combination of some big elements and some small things that made RO "magical" even after all this time.
1. *You can be whatever you want.* I mean yeah you are limited to the classes that are given, but even then you can morph them into however playstyle that you wanted thanks to status point distribution. It makes every classes "unique".
2. *You could progress however you want.* Current MMORPGs are generally pretty linear are clear in how you progress from beginning to endgame, and it could feel stale, especially if you want to replay the game with different classes.
3. "Modern" MMORPG designed the current game gameplay progression so much around the quest that it felt like a chore. They should've made questing an option instead of mandatory. Not only that, they also made it so that experience numbers that you get from beating monster so little that the only way to level up is only through quest and more quests. That's not the case with RO, RO allows you to level up from questing, beating multiple small monsters, or from a couple big harder difficulty monsters. Basically up to you.
4. Charming artstyle. Whether or not you like "anime" style, it's undoubtedly artstyle that is really easy to pull people in.
5. Great music. I know music taste is subjective, but RO really do have "instant to get recognized" iconic musics.
6. Being some of the first mmorpg. Yes it's not the first, but it's quite an early mmorpg game, so they got quite a foothold there.
7. Seeing the front of your character. Now this one is maybe not something that people may agree, but personally I think the fact that you that you can see your character as a whole(front, side, and back) doing stuffs instead of just their back, subconsciously made you think that you are the character that you made, that you are in the world doing that stuffs. It gives you enough immersion without you noticing it. Cause in current mmorpg, no matter how detailed you designed your character, most of the time that you see is their back.
That's just some of my thought, I'm sure I missed some other reasons, you can add into it too! Or if you disagree with some of my reasonings please do tell me~
I have to disagree with the questing. They were optional, you aren't forced to do any of it if you are not willing to. The quests fleshes out the world of ragnarok so much that it's very interesting and intriguing, unless you're not into reading conversations. Ragnarok is unlike any MMO regarding quests. If u think about recent MMORPG's, (for ex. ToS) you are required to do quests to advance. That's just my 2 cents
@@ellarca5127 Ah sorry, the way I wrote it made you misunderstood me. When I said "They designed the current game gameplay progression so much around the quest that it felt like a chore", I was referring to how "modern"/current mmorpg force you to progress with quest, not RO. RO is definitely up to you to how you want to progress. At the bottom of point 3 I said that RO let you progress however you want.
I was mentioning the great points of RO, There's no way I would mention the bad thing about RO in that post right? Haha. But I can see why you misunderstood my point. I edited it to made it easier to be understood.
Ahhh I remember playing in 2008-2009 in XileRo and having THE TIME OF MY LIFE. I would even wake up at 5am (before going to school) just to level up!! Ahhh my first character was a priestess c: and then I switched to archer while my friend was an assasin
I played back then too. I used to stay awake all night and get maybe 2 hours of sleep before school. Come home, crash and do it all again getting like 4 or 5 hours a night of sleep. During the summer I literally remember rolling out of bed to my desk and playing Ragnarok deep into the night/morning until I couldn't stay awake anymore. Best game ever ruined my life
lol i played at that private server too!!
NO WAY!! I played Xile too. PVP server was awesome. Great memories.
Im Late but 1 thing is clear:
My parents played both Ro in my childhood and in this time, man I loved it so much.
Now im 21 year old and I play Ro (NovaRo Server) and I dont want any other Mmo...(every dispointed me hard).
Its an big time of my life and it will always be for me
i am playing in originsro :)
WOE IS DEAD
RIP RS
RIP RAVAGE
NovaRO is a pay to win trash server. Why are old bio HG locked behind cash shop? 😂😂
@@VoidReplicant I dont see NovaRo as Pay 2 Win. I got my Old Bio HG without cashing, just did my Daily Rounds with Party there. The only Iteams that are locked inside the cash shops are some nice shields, but even than...you can farm for it without spending eny Dollar/Euro. I dont see your problem there. Nova is very newbie friendly and not P2W like Iro or Fro.
Man ! i soooo envy you ! What a childhood memory !
there is 1 downside here tough... where is part 2? it's almost christmas already, nostalgia ro time!
I remember paying for my RO subscription by mail. Playing on dial up and in love with the game I once walked over 10 miles just to play RO.
Ayy lmao same
First and only Full role-playing server.
We are starting the international group for our game.
We are a Brazilian community of realism (Role play), and our goal is to provide players with a more realistic gameplay, where they can play following the rules of the RP, in addition to several systems for immersion, tavern with drinks, fishing, mining, salary, all the extremely useful classes, with no exp rates (personalized character evolution for real life), buying cities for guilds and much more.
A new experience in playing Ragnarok online!
Invite your people to this different adventure!
Learn more and know the rules at:
discord.gg/ASAYzqd English Discord
discord.gg/7TReSsB Brazilian Discord.
I did that too.
What year were you doing this? By the time I was a beta tester for ragnarok online in 2002 I had cable internet, I can't imagine how it would have been playing ragnarok on dialup, although ragnarok wasn't a very graphically demanding game so I guess playing on dialup wasn't an issue?
@@cssplayer91 Poor in 03-04 maybe we had DSL actually I think by that time still bad though lol.
I still remember vividly my days playing RO even today... I played it since the beta days, then it changed to pay to play, then free to play. (haven't played it in a decade due to work thou)
my first character was a mess (my 1st ends up as a merchant for the sole purpose of just selling/buying items), because its my first time playing MMO and I only play because a friend invited me to... but as I play, I started getting immersed in it thus I start investing time to research about the game, the classes, etc.
then I make my 2nd character, a swordsman.
i became a shut-in in the culvert (sewer) hunting those cockroaches/Thief Bugs from level 12 until I reached level 58 in a month. Got tons of zeny from selling all the drops (especially when they drop lots of Slayer sword), also got dozens of cards... I also accidentally got Golden Thief Bug "MVP" drop because a wizard got disconnected when he almost killed it (I waited but he never return so I just kill it by spamming magnum break until it finally hits). I was expecting to be dead so I can go back without spending a butterfly wing but that 1 hit with just 11 damage killed it... XD (unfortunately it only drops a gold and a golden mace)
Then I proceed to hunt in Byalant Cave, looking for Iron Cain... and I finally got 1 when I was level 68 (killed lots and lots of mermaids)... then news about the 2nd alternate jobs came out and I waited for it, then when it is officially released I immediately change to Crusader. Then I joined a guild, hunt together, grind together, WOE times, etc... so much fun.
OMG you reminded me of my brother, he killed SO many Obeaunes to find his iron thingy.
@@XimenaConstanza yeah, that thing never drops when you needed them. Got dozens of Obeaune Cards thou (and they're useless).
Man, I always wondered why they suddenly stopped the international RO beta. I was in that beta, and I always thought they just didn't care about players in the US. Thanks for explaining the situation. I never knew.
i cant quit this game, it has been 12 years
Do you still play it? Can you tell me what's the endgame?
@@MultiMetalsnake I haven't played in a long time but, there's MVP hunting, card hunting, PVP, WoE (Guild castle battles) chilling with friends
Here's the real secret WHY:
1. It's really because of Ragnarok's BGM (background music)
2. It's so EASY and SIMPLE to play (unlike those 3D games)
3. It almost had no "quests" (except for job change) - which makes it 1000% more exciting!
Sorry to disagree but Ragnarok Online is not that simple in terms of gameplay. And this game also contains tons of quest.
@@thedjentlemen1230 back in 2004, no, ragnarok almost have only job quests, being a 1000% grind mmo.
I definitely agree about the BGM. It made a HUGE impact to me and how the game presented itself. I still listen to the OST from time-to-time when i'm working. It's just so good.
1. Agreed man, the BGMs are perfect.
2. It's simple, but it's not easy imo. Once ppl figure out optimal cpmbos and equips it's easy to execute but it's hard to achieve them in the first place (unless you spend money ofcourse).
3. Some ppl like quests actually, but this game doesnt need them simply because of reason number 2 above. We just didnt have time for stuff other than grinding xD.
Simple ?
Wait till you learn PVP switching ;)
Hi Mew's, what a great video and summary on what Ragnarok Online really was. This video deserves way more views. Ragnarok Online was my first MMORPG, i spent many years playing it, i have a lot of very good and strong emotional memories with it. I hope you continue making videos, especially about RO... So i'll be waiting for part 2 to this!
Cheers mate.
Christmas for me is Ragnarok nostalgia fest.
Every Christmas I listen to the Christmas RO songs, specially Silver Bells. They are pretty good for the season. Unfortunately they have the side-effect of breaking my heart to pieces.
so sad this is the only video you ended up making cause it was really good and super informative, i just started playing again and love this game so much
Awesome video man, Never knew about all that samsung stuff.
Looking forward to part II .
Wow! I never thought this small channel will have such good content! Thank you for sharing the history of Ragnarok Online. I started playing from Philippine official servers right from the start in 2002 via LevelUp! Games and it was Pay2Play. I never knew the history of this nostalgic game until now. Your channel deserves more views.
2003 not 2002.
This game will forever be my first love. Since closed alpha up until the travesty of the cash shop.
it was good bcs u could explore it by urself. not a shitty story line with boringness.
u was playing it for month/years and still explore new stuff. like the cave on prontera on the left side, i never explored. but then someone showed it to me. its an amazing blow mind what u can explore in this gmae.
this. i think the big draw of RO was discoverability - both of existing content that you haven't come across yet, and of entirely new content being continually added to the game.
Was excited to watch part 2 but then I realised it's not out yet! Is it still in production or did you put down this project for a while / forever?
Thanks for making the video. Really enjoyed it.
Great video that deserves more views. I hope you'll make more
Great presentation. Thank you for doing all of this research. Very much appreciated 🙏
3 years later still waiting for ep 2
I started on the official server. Later, due to the fact that the server had massive hacking of accounts, as well as some guilds received items directly from Game Masters. Our guild is completely transferred to the pirate server. It was in this guild that I met my first girlfriend. This nasty assassin who stole my mob-trains. Who would have thought that this would be a pretty girl living a couple of blocks from me.
Later, the official server was closed. He was never able to restore his broken economy. (Bots were added to the hacks.) I probably could write a book about how the Russian server was closed.
At present. Even private servers in my region is no longer there. Our guild has broken up ... I don’t know where they are now. I have a few new acquaintances with whom we periodically play on international servers (like Nova or Talon), but this is not at all what it used to be. I still love this game. But there are too few of us to create a serious guild and we cannot find a good server for the game.
Are you talking about bRO?
This was amazing man!!! You gotta make more vids dude please!
Great video, I hope one day you make another episode, this was very interesting
Linage 1 or whatever you called , in USA it was called Redmoon online. It was my first mmorpg before ragnarok. There was a server up and running but it went down a few months back
Great Video!
Waiting for the next part :)
nicely done, was hoping for more memory dive into the whole game history with all it's patches
but it was short and sweet
I remember looking around for this game so much as a 11-year-old and not being able to find it anywhere for some reason and being so heartbroken about it
great work sir! waiting for the second episode
came back here after 2yrs just to tell you my guy, you're doing good.
ill come back a couple of years and im pretty sure you're loving it? aren't ya?
It wasn't just the hackers. The company president was apparently siphoning money from the company... Maybe either one of the events would bring the problems their combination did, maybe not, however with both happening, they would stand no chance if it wasn't for Samsung.
Also, the choice to have subcontractors run the game in foreign countries might have not been the smartest one - at least one of them leaked server files a couple of times. The "official" server (note: some components still needed to be emulated as they weren't available in all leaks) was not as popular as the emulator due to its requirements (I guess running MS SQL server which wasn't to be had for free was the main problem) but it was out there; and the official DB as well. And due to how the SW was sold to subcontractors, it was sometimes more advanced than some of them had.
Hoping for part 2 :-)
Thank you for making this, good info. I love this game.
Wow! I played a ton in 2003-2004 and all I knew was vaguely some info about Arcturus - I think I even got a copy of it at one time. I had no idea about the other history, background, and other post-hack info you provided! Thank you for this. Let me know if you need any motivation to continue telling the story as it's obviously been a while.
Great work an, played this from 2006 to 2010, still got fond memories of it.
awesome video, keep up the good work and make more RO related stuff if possible
Thank you for this great history lesson concerning the game I grew up with! Much love to all who played (or still play) this awesome game :)
2 years later still waiting for the ep2
The one thing that made Ragnarok Online special is its community-centric game mechanics. It's the only game I remember to have complete chat functions in the game, as if it was designed to be a big chat room with a game. It has animated emoticons and each character depends on each other to level up. Nowadays, online games doesn't have this community-centered feel.
This music would get stuck in my head as I goto bed almost every night as a youngen. Ahh fond memories. ^^
Wow this is incredible. I never had any idea that the lore of this game was so extensive. Thanks a lot for this. I have started playing Ragnarok Travels today.
8:22 Im reading what was originally intended, and it actually seems like Gravity ended up developing most of those things. Aside from the housing, most of those things they've listed ended up getting into the game.
the alpha ver. of the game started out at the end of 1998 if i remember correctly i was one of those players back then
Ragnarok online was absolutely amazing and its music brings tears to my eyes to this day.
This is so informative, I had no idea this was the history of my first MMO.
Just listening to the bgm makes me happy
RO was my childhood, so now as an adult I've come back to it again... almost. Been playing Ragnarok M, though it's tempting me to get back into a private server.
Hi, where do i can find the information about systems that were gone because of hack attacks? Like in min 8:28. A forum post, a blog, a directly note from Gravity, etc.
Nice video!
I never get sick of that opening theme song in RO. :D
I NEED PART 2...
Damn he only made this account just to explain why RO was good, respect.. i am a living player that are still playing RO till today ( 2022 ) since 2002.. i never quit playing, yes, the official server has been shut down a couple of times for the past 20 years, but every 1-2 years after they closed down, new local publisher would just revive it again and again. And every time they release new official server, i would play again
RO is so damn good, i can't move on, i played RO when i was 14 years old, now i am 34 years old with 2 kids, and still can't let go of my nostalgia of RO. XD
Thank you for sharing your research!
hey i just stumbled on this video and was just asking if you are going to make a follow up video to it :c
where is the rest of it? please make more story like this, nostalgia hit me unexpectedly
RO was made great by the social system and the nonlinear progression where i.e. high level players also spent a lot of time in low level dungeons to reach deeper areas or they may have even been keen on items from low level monsters.
Thanks for making this! I was playing during closed beta and had no idea the hacking happened! I was only 11 at the time 😅I ended up playing this game for nearly 4 more years - such good memories.
Great video! Hoping you'll make a follow-up to this.
It’s a shame this dude didn’t do part 2. This was wonderful.
x2 :C
I think the graphics and the simple idea of the combat, made it easy to learn at the beginning. I didn't made far on my time playing beta, but I enjoyed a lot.
Progression on character leveling was MEANINGFUL, very meaningful. This is a key aspect that we have not today. All leveling is redundant. Getting good stuff was also meaningful. These days almost no game offer meaningful stuff. Too much handholding, that makes meaningless experiences. Even on high rates privates you still have to farm for gear. The effort vs reward made the game cherished.
I feel like the sense of exploration is better from the Birds Eye view. You get a sense of safety and the music is phenomenal.
Man this was a nostalgic trip , WHERE IS PART TWO GOD DAMN IT D:
the best memories i had at 2002+, no online games can replaced it, even AAA games till now
Man... whenever a holiday occurs, Ragnarok Online is the first thing that comes to mind. Their holiday events especially in the early days are just so memorable.
Great content in this video, I played official once in early 2003 but still a kid back there cannot afford to Pay-to-Play that time , but yeah remembering old days where I just leveling my novice until level 40 and no idea any classes exist before. Btw using CC and watch u read Korean name and it turn into some word I wont type here...Do more man , love Ragnarok Online , I even play today official RoMySG - under RoExtreme company they called , but bot attack as always.
I'll try to make some more. Thanks for the feedback. Hopefully no korean names anymore.
Oh man, I remember reading up that the first RO version had no loadings between maps etc, and the thing we got later was just a quick fix to get back on track after the hacks. Would have been a different game :(
Would really love to see the second part ;)
I don't really buy that. So many cool features lost, but in the following 10+ years, where RO got insanely popular in several countries, they couldn't redo those at some point? There must be some deep issues in this company if this is true.
Oh hello there !! i checked your links and i can't find any source for the image at the minute 8:33 can you please provide me with the source? thank you a lot !! I super liked your video and your investigation work !
This game is my all-time favorite. TY for keeping it alive ;)
I missed this 😢
Nostalgia and the soundtrack is memories
Would love a follow up on this. Very entertaining.
really liked the video, but wheres that other episode? is it still planned?
Part 2 please!
First MMORPG I played, the player immersion was top notch, the mechanics and game play was so addictive and unique (though the grinding was a nightmare but fun). I made a lot of friends that would last to this day since the day I started playing way back 2004. I couldn't find any mmorpg as epic as Ragnarok Online, no wonder this game will always have a place in every mmorpg player's ❤️. Nostalgic to the very end 😌✨❤️
long time player here (and still playing)... and still i found here a few things i didn't know so far... thx ;)
(plus seeing the old, old old beta versions made me nostagic-ing HARD)
Thats Nostalgia on its finest.
I Player euRO from the day it release, up to the day it shut down.
I Was there in the last Hours of euRO, and it broke my heart to see the game go.
I played many MMO's after euRO, and NEVER again have I found a game that had so much love in it, or a community that great and supportive.
In other MMO#s you need sometimes hours or days to find a lvl group, or people to play with, and even then, they sometimes don't take you because "You don't have the right gear". In Ragnarök Online gear was needed, yes, but with Cards and Stats you could build amazing Characters, some even totaly Unique.
And it never took more then a few minutes to sit in Pron, Gef, Ama etc. with a chat open "Looking for lvl party or heal slave" it was guaranteed to get one. Either a party that was missing a Member, or a Priest / High Priest that wanted to make a quick buck by heal slaveing.
Further more, the WoE was something never seen before, as much as I can tell. Having entire Guilds fight for Castles, was amazing.
And while I was for many years a Solo player without Guild, I later on joined up first with a samll guild on Loki "Infernal Mercenaries" and later on, much later, with one of the top WoE guilds "Equality".
It was magical and fun, the bloopers or sometimes just stupid deaths were icing to the cake that was Ragnarök Online.
I Tried games like:
- Fiesta Online
- Cabal Online
- Grand Fantasia
- NosTale
- Maestia
and so many more.
Never did I stay longer than a few weeks.
EIther cause the game was missing that vibe I was looking for, it was Pay to win, End game content hidden behind a Paywall, or just the gameplay was bad.
I can agree with many people, the new MMO's are shit in the level system. You are forced to do Quests, Repeatable Quest, or do Major Raid's with people to increase your level.
In RO you could just equip your best gear and go hack and slay what ever monster you wanted.
Be it Myst Cases in the Toy Factory (And running into Stormy more then once), or hitting Glast Heim.
It was YOUR choice.
The only game I ever found that had a lvl system balanced through Quests and Monster farming, was Cabal Online, proberly why I played it for nearly a Year.
But even then, it never stood a chance.
And sadly, I was for a long time not a fan of Private Servers. Most of them had a bad rep. Getting High powered gear by paying real money, or forcing players to buy Character Slots (iRO did that too I think).
That changed when an old friend from euRO contacted me, and told me "Hey check this PServer out. It's just like euRO."
SO I looked at it. The server?
Talon Ragnarok Online or TalonRO.
I was Sceptical, but then, it was there, the RO magic. people sitting in Pron looking for Party. Merchants lining the side of the Streets.
Guilds recruiting, active WoE I was in paradise.
I started playing, and faster then I could see, I spend 4 Years on TalonRO. Work come, and my Private life took some turns, I could only play TalonRO for a few hours a week or sometimes had an entire year paus ein it.
I come back after a 2 Year Break (Work and being in the Military) I rejoined and nearly had a Heart attack.
TalonRO doesn't have the newest Classes (Third CLass I believe, Warlocks, Rune Knights that shit) BUT the Admins and the server owner had gone out of their way to Balance the newest Maps and Monster so you could play even thous new maps with Advanced CLasses.
Long story Short.
I'm Old (Compared to many other gamers)
But Ragnarok Online was part of my Childhood.
It even brought forth some RL friendships.
It is a one of a kind game.
It will forever be in our Hearts.
I wish you all good Hunting. And should you still play ragnarok Online, like I do,
go Kick Satan Morroc in the Balls and give Valkyrie Randgris a Big fat Kiss.
And don't for get to pat the NineTails and Hug the Sohee's they need the love.
Cheers~
Medui
Please make a follow up vid. So informative.
please make the continuation of this 😔 it's almost 1 year old
Ragnarok was my first mmorpg that i played since 2003 and i still play it untill today :)
Every time someone whines to me about grinding for some 1% drop mount in some cushy MMO I tell them of a game I used to play where end game equipment and enchantments used to have 0.01% drops and could break on refining. We did used to walk in the snow uphill both ways. And we really were grateful!
I remember the breaking on refinement, my friend almost had a suicide trying to +9 a dagger like literally! 😅
Waiting for that second episode :^) pretty good watch, didnt know of the hack that deleted a bunch of game data. I suppose that's why official art of the mercenaries are so hard to find aside from the amazon archer and that general background image.
i have always had this odd feeling that it wasn't the playerbase who did the hacking attacks on gravity, i mean i can believe them hacking the developer servers to get a copy of the source code of the game and perhaps even the concept arts, ideas & plans, whitebox designs, gameplay features, etc. but i cant imagine them intentionally sabotaging gravity to the point of destroying everything they worked on out of spite, only for samsung to swoop in? i don't buy that. what i think happened is that samsung themselves masqueraded as one of the hacking groups that attacked gravity, corporately sabotaged them to a crippling level, then waited for them to go bankrupt before buying them outright for peanuts.
my theory for this is based on the fact that shortly after the forced acquisition the CEO and founder of gravity as well as a lot of the senior staff and developers were booted out and replaced with samsung's corporation goons. in a real-world scenario this would have never taken place since back then senior game developers were very rare and hard to find, especially online game developers, dont forget that this was in 2002 - 2003 when there were literally only a handful of mmorpg's anywhere in the world. there's no way in hell that the CEO would have allowed this to happen in the first place otherwise, gravity was his baby and ragnarok was his most ambitious work. i'm almost certain that there was some kind of foul play involved.
note that later in the future samsung through gravity would endlessly accuse the private servers of destroying ragnarok online long before any of the private servers even had the staying power to compete with the official servers directly, at ragnarok onlines peak it had hundreds of thousands of players across the world while the private servers had at best a few hundred with the best private servers having a few thousand players. its obvious that they were shifting the blame away from themselves, but what isn't obvious is that samsung likely orchestrated it to use the community as a scapegoat to allay any suspicions away from themselves.
it wasn't until the shuttering of official ragnarok servers across the world that the private servers started to grow in size, and only because the playerbase had nowhere else to go, the renewal update destroyed the foundations of the game and began the beginning of the end for gravity as the slow exodus started; and then the development of ragnarok 2 spelled the end for the franchise since it signaled to the community that development and support for ragnarok 1 was ending. with the closures of servers around the world every few months, the future looked bleak. the most hardcore communities tried their best to keep the strongest ragnarok servers alive with Ragnarok Singapore, Ragnarok Malaysia, and Ragnarok Philippines being some of the last servers to shutter in 2021 despite still having strong communities due to gravity (samsung) blindsiding their publishers on the contract renewals. in the end the private servers didn't do anywhere nearly as much damage as gravity itself did, and i believe that samsung is the culprit behind it all.
of course for any of this to be proven someone would have to sue samsung for corporate sabotage, but there really is nobody left who can, since gravity today isn't even a shadow of its former self, its a thin veil in the aether of its former self. i have a very strong belief that the community would have never done such a horrible thing to the OG gravity since we love this game so much that we still think about it fondly after more than 20 years since its original debut.
Its been 5 years im still waiting on the next episode 💀
Glad it was re-released for mobile. I'm playing it again lately after 2 years hiatus in the pandemic. Just finished Al de Baran quest, now I'm in Lighthalzen.
Yes. RO was my first MMO. And I love it. Making friends, grinding cards, going for WoE and such. Good old days. How nostalgic.
And I'm currently playing FF14, waiting for the new patch 5.4
I have the same feeling like no other MMORPG could mimic but it's with Priston Tale. I think a lot of it have to do with how important it was during my childhood and teen years, I played it in 2020 and it became a money machine where you can't do anything without paying hundreds.
Great video!
I played iRO back in both (or more?) betas, and a bit even after it went official + pay. Most of what I'm saying is entirely about PvE where a vast majority of players send time in any MMO despite online chatter making it seem like more than half of people engaged want to PvP. Ragnarok Online was fun because you had the potential to seem (or be) OP, and you had to grind for it! You could easily *see* other characters in the same world scaled way beyond your current capabilities hitting for numbers 10x your damage at ridiculously fast speeds. Monsters you couldn't even fathom touching were being toyed with and killed en-masse by a particular job. The limits you had as a novice were just a bit of time and effort to morph it into something really strong. You yearned to reach the power level where your current threats were trivialized and you were getting "more" exp and better loot for it constantly.
Also, loot drops when you were killing monsters was a mini-game: were you going to get that 1% rare? 5% rare? Either way, 40% or 60% drops were solid enough to keep your bank account rolling in the early levels. Loot drops with semi-rares, and super rares (cards) was like winning the lottery! Maybe you could use those cards directly in your equipment, or you could sell it if you knew the economy/demand for it could finance what you actually wanted! If you *knew* what to do, you were 5x more efficient than the next player.
Of course, some of those issues were exactly RO's problems. How much did you have to grind? Why did you have to *know* certain things through Google and other players to be effective at the game? Some jobs and builds were only situationally OP while others were univerally OP making the game super imbalanced for PvE. Hunter/Wizards were damage dealers -- no one else really was. You didn't need a tank to absorb damage if the monsters couldn't reasonably touch you because they were dead, or being stun locked or frozen by incoming damage.
Note: if having a party with diverse roles/jobs isn't safer AND more efficient way of leveling, then your game design is broken. That is the core of why RO would be a terrible game if released today even if some of the easy quality of life aspects were changed.
Over time, some of the OP strategies and approaches to playing the game were curbed, but in a way that just made the overall game far too much of a grind. The initial gear + card + elemental + type + size system was pretty much cracked, so Gravity had to design another way to keep injecting new gear in the game that actually was stronger than the prior gear and split things off so unless you were filthy rich, you had specialized gear rather than "this gear set and build covers 80% of what you would want to do anyways." Unfortunately, some of the other older systems didn't scale up well either -- HP/SP regen and weight limit carrying items to me is a big one that makes leveling in later levels a silly grinde. Also, the way monsters needed to behave to make Wizards/Warlock/Hunter/Sniper's less OP in PvE entirely made leveling PvE at very high levels look stupid -- literally teleporting around a map and hijacking random monsters.
hey bro its been 5 years now, give us the follow up for this masterful vid
Im planning to Play the game and Thanks for explaining me.
what's sad about this video is there wasn't a follow up video
Still waiting on part 2
edit - It's been one year, and I'm still waiting
wow i never imagined ragnarok had so many stories behind it and this its just the beggining
I remember I had access to the alpha back in 1999. Been playing ever since. Now on Ragnarok M
get out for playing Ragnarok M.
I started playing RO when they were doing all the fun testing.. For example when we was playing RO there was only male classes which was Archer,swordsman... Eventually the other classes came along and female characters were introduced..Hang out spots was payon cave level 1 and eventually the smokies map... It was the best game to play back then... My current account is my original account I still have today... I was there when it went from free to p2p back to free. And yes we were there playing when the attacks had happened.. 20+ years later it's still going strong! Most likely this game will be going when all other games vanish.
I played Philippine RO for 8 years starting when there were only 2 servers ;Chaos and Loki. Until Valkyrie server. No bots no cheats only scammers 🤣. One of the best things that happened in my childhood. Met a lot of friends.