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The Free MMO Überlist

AldoAldo Hippo HoorayRegistered User regular
edited July 2011 in MMO Extravaganza
The Free MMO Überlist

Introduction
Welcome to the new and improved Free MMO Überlist. For years I have been keeping track of free MMOs and this is the place I have decided to collect them. The goal of this thread is to make other PAers aware of these games and to give them some sort of clue on what games to avoid and what games might actually be fun to them. My descriptions of games are often patently wrong, biased, incomplete and ridiculous, this is mostly for my own amusement. If you feel a description is wrong: please let me know in this thread and I'll edit it.

Now, before one decides to play one of the games on this list one has to realise that these games are not for everyone. It also helps to lower expectations. These games are made as cheaply as possible with one goal in mind: making the game just interesting enough for people to purchase premium services or to attract advertisers. There are exceptions: some games are fan projects or showcases of companies to show what they can do.

Definition (or: what goes on the list)
Free: the game must be accessible without payment. A large part of the content of the game needs to be playable free of charge without any time limits. Additional content may be accessible for payment, but the base game must be free.
M: Massive. The definition of massive is very loose. As long as there is some element of a persistent world and/or the possibility to interact within the game with people you did not explicitly invite to play with you I'm going to add this to the list.
M: Multiplayer. The game must allow you to interact with other players in-game.
O: Online. The game requires an internet connection to play.

Table of contents
01. Introductory post
02. MMO RPG #-D
03. MMO RPG E-J
04. MMO RPG L-R
05. MMO RPG S-Z
06. MMO Strategy
07. MMO In-browser manager
08. MMO Shooter
09. MMO Sports
10. MMO MUD
11. MMO Arcade
12. MMO Rhythm
13. MMO Building
14. MMO Racing
15. MMO Other
16. Promising Titles
17. MMO Free Trials
18. Additional Information
19. Aldo's Recommendations
20. Glossary

Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    MMO RPG #-D

    MMO RPG is: a role-playing game. A game in which you take direct control of a character or in some cases a small group of characters and you improve them by performing in-game tasks. There is usually an element of leveling, items and skills.
    The 4th Coming
    An extremely dated 2D RPG with hideous graphics, very slow and unforgiving gameplay. The original release dates back to 1999. That's old. This game might be manageable if you're very patient and used to old games, but otherwise you might as well scroll on.

    4story/Gates of Andaron
    A game that looks almost identical to WoW, but slightly uglier. Classes are uninspired, combat is slow and quests are the same old FedEx/grind affair. The only redeeming quality seems to be that there's quite a few other people playing. One thing that saddened me was that you start in a tutorial on max level with all skills and you're killing demons left, right and centre while you're being prepared for becoming a guardian of a deity. And just before you get to that part the screen goes white and you find yourself in a small camp, level one, no skills, weak weapons and a first set of quests that send you to the local NPCs and to kill a few baby boars. Worst.anticlimax.ever.

    9dragons/EU version
    3D grind-mmo based around Asian myths. The classes have fairly original backgrounds, but they all boil down to killing loads and loads of mobs. Everything about this game looks a bit dated. You upgrade your skills by using them a lot..and the game allows for macros, meaning that many folks just level their buffs by running a macro for a few days to reach max level. Once you look past the interesting backgrounds there's hardly anything appealing left about the game, it's not a bad grinder, but it's nothing more than a grinder.

    Adventure Quest
    An in-browser 'lunch break mmo'. It's just a whole lot of grinding in ugly flash environments. The game is tailored for young players and has a strong focus on the pay to play aspects. The art is simply hideous and makes you wonder if the artist has ever thought about his life and where it brought him.

    Adventure Quest Worlds
    An in-browser 'lunch break mmo'. It's just a whole lot of grinding in ugly flash environments. The game is tailored for young players and has a strong focus on the pay to play aspects. Apparently this is some sort of improvement over Adventure Quest, but they look the same, play the same and are by the same company.

    Aegis
    In-browser fantasy MMORPG on a site that seems to mostly consist of broken images and JPEG-artefacts. Avoid

    Age of Armor
    A game that looks a tad bit like transformers/gundam wing/whatever other mecha stuff you can think of. Not sure about the actual gameplay, but it looks decent enough and come on: giant robots.

    Age of Conan:Unchained
    Decapitate topless girls and pretend you're Arnold Schwarzenegger [but without the whole hiding a child you got with your housekeeper] in this fast-paced action MMO based on the work of Howard. It kinda failed as a P2P game, but that was mostly because they forgot to put in content and stuff besides the boobies and big swords. Apparently it's pretty decent now. Just hope your mom doesn't walk in to you while you stare at boobies.

    Age of Lore
    Hideous in-browser mmo, the site does not tell me what the gameplay is like, but it appears that it's one of those "click this button once every day to spend your action points"-ones. Only try this when you hate yourself anyway.

    Aika
    A fairly pretty looking Korean MMO with a very strong focus on PvP, their main selling point is battle fields that can support up to 1,000 fighters on each side. They also promise an interesting story and all the other stuff every MMO tries to promise. Anyway, it looks nice, big PvP battles are interesting and gPotato has delivered quality games to the west before, so I guess this game shows some promise as well.

    Alganon
    A small time MMO that didn't cut it as a subscription based game. It's a rather standard in set-up and offers 2 races (order/chaos), 4 classes (with specialisations) that get to duke it out from time to time, most of it is PvE though. The game is unresponsive and laggy, quests are uninspired and graphics do not contain much in the way of charm.

    Allods Online
    Russian cash shop scam based on the first Russian RPG ever: Allods (Rage of Mages). The graphics look very cartoony and colourful. There are a lot of classes. Combat is mostly standard MMO fair but lacking an auto-attack, however, teams of 5 to 25 persons can go on a flying ship and use that for air battle against other players. There's a rather strong focus on PvP.
    Avoid this game, the cash shop is very ugly and every time you die your items can get cursed and you have to pay a cash shop item to remove the curse. There is also a cash shop buff that increases your damage by 250%, practically forcing you to keep buying that buff to be able to kill anything.

    Altis Gates
    A fantasy 2D MMORPG without any interesting features. There's 2 bases classes that you can specialize further in to end up in one of the 16 subclasses and there's pets that fight for you.

    Anarchy Online classic
    Part of this game is for free, the original game plus three expansions. The rest of the game is only accessible for paying costumers. These two groups can play together. Anarchy Online is one of the very few successful MMOs not set in a fantasy theme. It is very complex, even without the extra expansions you can buy. It's also ancient in gameplay and graphics.

    Angels Online
    A 2D game with sprites where you control a cute little character and can deploy robots and all sorts of pets to fight with you against an endless stream of cute mobs. The game looks horribly dated and the features it offers hardly make the game unique. See also: Wonderland Online.

    Another World
    An old-school 3D RPG on a medieval/science fiction world. Most players appear to be Russian, but the client is in English.

    Aranock Online
    Spiritual successor of Astonia. This old MMO looks terrible and the game seems to be focused on people who do not play games for fun. It's way too old fashioned to be a viable option for us modern age gamers.

    Archlord
    Game didn't cut it when it was Pay to Play, so they're trying to cut their losses by making it Free to Play. By free MMO standards this game is pretty decent. Game has a strong focus on PvP. Main selling point is the "Archlord": every once in a while there's a massive battle and the winner becomes Archlord. Game still gets support, so that's something.

    Armored Legion
    Hideous in-browser MMORPG with mechs. It has been in "open alpha testing" and they say that real-time combat will come "soon". Basically, you walk around on a featureless plain, click on an enemy and you can choose attack. After that you can use skills such as dodge, shield and power shot. It's just terrible.

    Asda Story
    The quote on their site made me giggle. Besides that: this is a game you should play with someone else. You can be soul mates and share exp between each other. You also gain access to special skills. The game looks painfully cute and is obviously tailored towards girls. If anything, it will be fun to see desperate teenagers asking you to be their soul mate.

    Ashen Empires
    A rather old game, graphics look dated. Fairly standard by the looks of it. Vile Toxin had the following to say about this: Really fun PvP system(free for all), MANY items to craft, lots of tradeskills to master. Paying members also gain access to their revived game. He wrote that years ago. The game is still supported, though.

    Aurora Blade
    In-browser MMO with four standard classes. The game is very slow and does not explain properly what to do. I had to reload the page a few times just to get to the next screen. The graphics are in pixelart, but don't look very charming at all. After trying for a few minutes I still couldn't figure out how to kill something, so I gave up.

    Avalon Heroes
    (warning loud noises on website)
    A game wherein you control one character that is tossed in arenas against/with other characters. There are tons of different types of arenas so that's something. There is also a PvE part which plays a bit like Diablo and you can further upgrade your character further through it. The focus is very much on PvP and character upgrades appear to be a small part of the actual game. (Think Dota or League of Legends)

    Azuga
    Standard Asian grind MMO. Graphics and character models are ugly. The game has two features that make it slightly more interesting than other games in this setting: giant robots and the fact that there are no classes, only weapons you freely switch between. Not much, but it's something. Game only launches through a website that is only accessible in internet explorer, further reducing any motivation I had to play this thing.

    Battle Edge II
    Ugly in-browser RPG set in a generic fantasy univer. Site refuses to give any other information on account of "see for yourself ahaha!" ... *facepalm*

    Battle of Phantasia
    This is what digital vomit looks like. Avoid avoid avoid.

    Benign
    Site hosted on freewebs, looks hidious. AVOID AVOID AVOID

    BlackMoon Chronicles
    An ugly 2D MMO from Canada. It seems to be based on a graphic novel, but the game looks so bad that I don't actually believe that. It's your standard point-n-click RPG.

    Bitefight
    Vampire vs Werewolf in-browser game. Focus on PvP, but no useful information available on their site.

    Bloodline Champions
    DotA/League of Legends clone by Funcom. More freemium than f2p. 3D. Nice concept art. Still dota-clone.

    Bounty Bay Online
    A game set in the age of discovery. It used to be pay to play only, but a Free to Play server got released. You can sail, explore on land, trade and hurl metal balls at each other.

    Bright Shadow
    A cutesy grind MMO that is exactly like other grind MMOs. The game did nothing wrong, but there is just no reason to pick this over older grind MMOs you might already have characters in. Kudos to the developers to make a decent game, now make a game that is actually interesting please.

    CABAL Online
    Open Beta for North-America
    Played this game for a while. It plays like World of Warcraft on speed. Combat is fast paced and good looking. However, that is pretty much all there is to this game: combat. All quests involve ripping through loads of enemies, all levels must be gained by ripping through enemies, all every ever has you ripping through loads of enemies. You don't really have to play together with anyone else until very late in the game. At the rate you're leveling this takes months. It's fun a for a while and it looks pretty.

    Canaan Online
    A cutesy Asian in-browser MMO with your standard classes, isometric camera and pets. Combat is turn-based and rather fast with your pet functioning as your meatshield.

    Cartoon Network Universe: FusionBall
    In-browser 3D MMO for the kids. For an in-browser game it looks surprisingly good and it is being made by a big company. The game has no classes, but you collect "nanos" which give you abilities.

    Celestial Destroyer
    An Asian grind MMO with no interesting features.

    Champions Online
    Make your own superhero and fight against crime in a cell-shaded universe based on some unknown license full of people you've never heard of but who are apparently a big deal. The game is fast-paced, looks pretty and used to offer a lot of freedom to create your own character. However, the game only went F2P recently in an effort to revive the game and their idea of reeling in more money is by limiting your freedom in making your own special hero as a free player.

    Clone Wars Adventures
    Kid-friendly mmorpg following the same model as Free Realms. So that means loads of mini-games with leader boards and tons of customization to your toon. Just like FR you are pushed pretty aggressively to make use of the cash shop..

    Cloud Nine
    Cute looking Korean MMORPG with nice graphics. It has a lot of potential and gives you a lot of skills early on. It has it's shortcomings, mostly bugs, engrish and horrible chat-support. It dodged some of the usual pitfalls and that fact alone makes this game something worth checking out. Heir to Holic, a shortlived game that looked exactly the same.

    Conquer Online
    Ridiculous grind MMO set in medieval China. Everything boils down to killing hundreds upon hundreds of identical mobs. It doesn't look very pretty as well. It is somewhat enjoyable for a few hours, though. After that it's time to uninstall it. Ask SkutSkut about it some time, it's kinda funny when he does that thing that makes his head turn red and veins pop out.

    Craft of Gods
    A small-time MMO based on Slavic mythology. You're completely free to pick abilities from 14 different schools, although you have to keep in mind what combinations might work with regard to your stats. The game claims to cater to both PvE and PvP in equal measures. Actual gameplay is very slow and leveling happens at a snail's pace. Graphics look good at first, but there's something about them that screams early 2000 benchmark graphics demo. This is no game for the modern and fast man.

    Crazy Tao
    A 2D mmo which gives you control to 3 pets at once. Besides that it looks like standard MMO fare. This appears to be a predecessor of Eudemons, also hosted on that 91.com thing.

    Cronous
    Grind-based Korean MMO. It has a lot of skills, though. And there's something about controlling castles. It's obviously aimed at boys, what with the bulky characters and ridiculous monsters.

    Crowns of Power
    The closest thing to Ultima Online I've seen in some time. There's PK, you drop [some of] your loot and gold when you die, there are no character classes and instead you can develop in whatever way you like. Graphics are terribad, though.

    Daimonin
    An open source MMO! You can just play the game, but the main attraction is that you help making it along with other people. This project has been around for a few years already, but it seems they'll need a few more decades to get my interest.

    Dark Eden
    Grind-based Korean MMO in a fairly unique, gothic setting. Good ol' vampire vs human, but with sci-fi weapons tossed in the mix. The previous thread warned against heaps of hackers etc, but considering the game is still going strong and receives regular updates, it appears that problem isn't really *that* game-breaking. The game looks a bit like Diablo 2, but much slower.

    Dark Swords
    Ugly 2D game claiming to be revolutionary in its social aspects. No idea where they base that on. The site looks smooth, though so they aren't complete idiots.

    Dead Frontier
    Some sort of top-down zombie survival MMO thing. Think Diablo1, but with zombies and guns. You get to fight in instanced areas and you can decide to go for a single player instance or a multiplayer one. Multiplayer is laggy as fuck and you'll die in a slideshow. The game has a cash shop, but half the game's elements aren't in (yet). If an apocalypse happened and this turned out to be the only game left on earth I might consider playing it.

    Death's Dungeon RPG
    Terrible site, terrible name. I have no idea about the actual game, because they don't bother talking about that on the site. I assume it'd be terrible too. TERRYBULL.

    Deco Online
    An Asian game with a strong focus on PvP, cute graphics and a lot of skills to tune your toon with. The game is a huge ever-grind, but leveling is fast, there's just no good reason to waste time on this game. As with most PvP-focused games a lot depends on balance and if it is worth fighting over something with a bunch of 13 year old boys with big mouths.

    Deicide
    Generic looking fantasy mmo, they seem to be very proud of their 3D sound. I have no idea what to make of this.

    Dekaron/2moons
    Asian styled fast paced MMO. Main selling points are its original story, nice concept art and raids that end in a free for all death match. Gamehi appears to have taken over and the game has received some new classes and has a much nicer website.

    Deliantra
    A 2D MMO with a strong focus on exploring and there is a strong focus on playing together. The game is being made by a very small team. At the moment there's only like 10 people playing on an average evening, so it's really unknown/unpopular. The tutorial is very good, so at least try that out and cheer up the developers or something? I don't know, they sound adorable.

    Dragon's Call
    In-browser MMORPG that seems like a shiftier version of Estiah. It's the way the site looks and the fact that they're hosting a contest with as a big prize a time card for World of Warcraft. Classes are standard mage/warrior/assassin, concept art looks cool, but actual game is more of a spreadsheet with concept art as backgrounds than anything else.

    Dragon Fable
    An in-browser 'lunch break mmo'. It's just a whole lot of grinding in ugly flash environments. The game is tailored for young players and has a strong focus on the pay to play aspects.

    Dragon Oath / TLBB
    An Asian fantasy grind MMO with a few interesting sounding classes and dated graphics that still managed to charm me. The tutorial and subsequent quests are presented to you in a clear format and the automove button means you don't have to click much. However, there's no motivation to keep playing: killing more mobs certainly makes you stronger, but there's no "what's behind THAT hill?" feeling and most quests boil down to automoving to a NPC, killing a few mobs and automoving back to a NPC.

    Dragon Raja
    A 2D Asian MMO that has been alive since 2002-ish. The names of the classes have me fistpumping: lv91-99 priests are called pope, lv51-60 rogues are called Pilferers and it goes on and on. The actual game is terrible with full on PK, very dated graphics, a very unclear tutorial and you have to hold your mousebutton to continue attacking...which gets old very soon because a lv1 zombie already takes ~15 seconds to kill. I'm willing to cut them some slack for calling a class toreador, but if you ever get to that high a level you're insane.

    Dragon Sky
    Yet another ugly MMO based on Asian mythology. There is nothing that sets this game apart from other MMOs. This game automatically installs Xfire for no apparent reason. Avoid this game.

    Dream of Mirror Online
    European version
    Penny-Arcade thread
    Cell shaded graphics, lots of classes and a system that makes teaming up with other people actually interesting. The Goons of SA also seem to appreciate this, so there must be some redeeming value to it? A note for European players: we can't play with North America at the moment.

    Dungeons & Dragons Online
    PA thread
    After charging a monthly fee for a few years they're now going f2p with a cash shop to buy more content from. The game follows the D&D rulebooks up to a level, but instead of the turn-based it's all in real time, there's still dice to be rolled, but it's all behind the scenes. The game is heavily instanced and requires teamplay...pretty much like the source material.

    Dungeon Party
    A game wherein you make and develop a cute character, enter a dungeon map with a few others and try to steal the treasure while not getting murdered by the NPCs trying to protect that treasure. Got some attention in mainstream gaming media and it wasn't all completely negative. The game is rather MMO-lite, though. No insane character development and endless quests.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    MMO RPG E-J
    Eden Eternal
    Cutesy MMO with branching character classes you can swap between. It also has player-run towns and it claims combat is "fast-paced"

    Elf Online
    2D cutesy Korean grind MMO with uninteresting classes. Dime in a dozen.

    Emil Chronicle Online
    Cutesy Asian grind MMO, this one has fairly original classes. Localisation focused on SE Asia.

    Empiriana
    An old-school medieval roleplaying game with the focus on playing your role. There's is some dungeon crawling to be had, which works similar to the old Shin Megami Tensei games.

    Endless Online
    AVOID AVOID AVOID.

    Epic Duel
    PA thread
    An Adventure Quest clone with equally ugly 2D graphics.

    Esteria Mythos
    A 2D MMO with beautiful graphics that remind me of Baldur's Gate II. The game has a strong focus on crafting and the player community. Unfortunately the whole game is very slow, from combat to crafting to running to exp gain, everything would improve from a speed up. A missed opportunity, but certainly a charming project.

    Estiah
    Penny Arcade thread
    In browser MMORPG. The site looks very slick and it seems to offer a sort of M:tG sort of gameplay where your actions are determined by the cards you play. Lezard says you can enjoy this game on as little as 10 minutes per day.

    Eternal Lands
    Has been in beta for years, doesn't look like they're really trying to sell this. Maybe cute for a while, maybe you'll even see another player. I don't know, this looks more like something some guys made after work than a full-blown MMO.

    Eternum Online
    An in-browser hideous 2D MMO. It seems to play like Runescape, but it somehow managed to be uglier than that.

    Ether Saga Online
    From the same company that released Perfect World in the US. It looks ridiculously cute with NPCs having fantasic designs. You should play this just to look at the NPCs. Character design is rather bland and the game itself is a complex grind with so many mechanics that I gave up after a while.

    Eudemons Online
    Cutesy Asian MMO with 3D isometric view. It seems to offer a smooth experience with a strong focus on community.

    EUO
    An extremely old school mmorpg, they like to compare themselves to the early Ultima games and with that they mean: just as ugly and complex.

    Everquest II
    You know, like Everquest, but newer and prettier. They recently made most of the content prior to the latest expansion free, but they're severely limiting the amount of gold, bags, characters, skills and quests you can use, more stuff is unlockable in the cash shop or by paying a monthly fee. Pretty much the same deal as Dungeons & Dragons Online.

    Exteel
    PA thread
    MMO with mechs. Heavy focus on PvP. Looks pretty enough, but there is a lot of grinding to be had and if you're not playing with a premade team you're pretty much fucked. Frosteey also states that gear is completely out of balance. I guess it's fun if you're really into mechs, but otherwise I would avoid it.

    Face of Mankind
    A fantastic sci-fi MMO with most of the content generated by your fellow players. The game is run by a bunch of douche bags who delete all negative feedback and demand money from anyone who wants to to generate aforementioned content. This game has been released before by other companies, but they fucked it up too. I can give no other advise than to avoid this game at all costs. At least until the current publisher goes under and a less terrible publisher picks it up in a few years time. Shame on you, Duplex Systems.

    Fairy Story
    A very cute game with cute graphics and a cute little story about a magical fairytale world where kids save the day. Actual gameplay appears to be the regular grinding, though. Will have to look into this more.

    FaitH
    No idea what the point behind this game is, from their site: FaitH is a team-based Massively Multiplayer Game. Lead your Kingdom to Religious victory by kidnaping Children of Targar and wreaking Chaos! across the Aloradius! Looks very dated to boot. Best to avoid

    Fallen Sword
    In-browser fantasy RPG. Not much in the way of extra information on their site.

    Fantasy Earth Zero
    This Japanese MMO has already been released many years ago in Japan. Recently it has been released to the rest of the world. The graphics and feel of the game are dated and the gameplay is not up to par with other titles in the same pvp genre. Small hitboxes, a lack of interesting skills and low level players being completely useless make this a title you might as well skip.

    Fiesta (Same game on gamigo.de)
    Not so sure if this game is such a party. It looks like a standard grinding game, at least it has asdw support and tab-targeting. Graphics score high on the *schoolgirl voice* kawaii *cough* -scale and are kinda smooth. Classes are standard, site doesn't elaborate much on anything.

    Florensia
    A cutesy looking Japanese MMO set in the age of sailing. It's like a cute version of Voyage Century, maybe this game is more for your baby sister?. The website looks rather decent for a free MMO, there's no Engrish on it and the art style has a certain charm to it.

    Fly for Fun
    Don't be fooled by the title! Flying is not fun in this game. It's about as much fun as it is in World of Warcaft; which is to say-- kinda neat for a while, and then you're back to grinding. This game is a grind-MMO from Korea. Everything is pretty basic, grind grind grind level grind grind grind. Et cetera. Probably fun if you can play with friends.

    FOnline:2238
    A MMO version of Fallout 1/2. It's hosted on blogspot...Perhaps the actual game does not suck, but I doubt that. You need several files from a Fallout game to even run this game.

    Forsaken World
    A new high fantasy MMORPG published by Perfect World International to the west. This one has quite a few races, pretty nice graphics and combat that gets pretty complex with pets and reactive abilities. Nothing ground-breaking and very much WoW-lite, but a decent title anyway. I found the game to be a bit frustrating, because it claims to have an exciting story, yet the nicest way to level up is to grind daily quests.

    Fragoria
    An in-browser RPG that runs rather slowly and seems to hold no interesting features over any other MMORPG ever. It looks good for something made in Flash, though. Good job there.

    Free Realms
    SOE's free MMO providing all sorts of entertainment for the younger gamer. It looks fairly cute, you can play chess, do races, burn down monsters, dress up your toon and tons of other things. All in all, this seems like some sort of 3D alternative to what Gaia and Neopets do on their websites. Just tons of silly mini-games but with achievements that don't go away after closing the game. The game pushes its cash shop rather aggressively and locks most of their games and challenging missions behind cash shop purchases.

    Fung Wan Online
    Western version evaporated from the internet, Malaysian version still has a website, but it does not seem to be kosher. Best to avoid.

    Furcadia
    ...Yup. A MMO for furries. It's almost completely focused on community aspects to boot.

    Ghost Online
    Sidescrolling 2D fast paced grind MMO from Korea. If you dig Maple Story you probably dig this as well. For everyone else: best to protect your sanity.

    Gladiatus
    In-browser RPG that puts you in the codpiece of a gladiator who kills everything that looks creepy.

    Gods of Time
    Final Fantasy-like battles, looks ugly, you can try it out without registering.

    GodsWar
    Cutesy isometric MMO in a faux ancient Greek setting (with medieval styled buildings here and there :P). Nothing sets it apart from other MMOs. You can set up an in-game bot that plays the game for you and quite frankly there's no reason not to use that, because you gain exp just as fast and the bot cannot make mistakes.

    Golemizer
    An in-browser MMO in which you are a mad scientist and create a golem to do your laundry and fighting.

    Graal Online
    Hideous 2D MMO with a strong focus on the community. No idea why anyone would play it.

    Grand Fantasia
    A cutesy Asian MMO with a strong focus on pets. The classes and graphics aren't very interesting and it's a huge grind at heart.

    Hero Online
    Asian fantasy 3D MMORPG with old-fashioned graphics. Plays like diablo, but doesn't reallly have any skills and is very slow. Huge grind-fest.

    Holy Beast
    A cutesy grind MMO. Like a lot of these games pets play a big role, this time they evolve (gotta catc---ah never mind) from cute pups to fearsome beasts (Magicarp is evolv--I'm terribly sorry) provided your grind enough. Your toon can also fight by way of standard MMO combat with classes divided in clans based on animals.

    Hostile Space
    (site only accessible on internet explorer)
    A space MMO with ugly 2D graphics that started in 1997. Combat is "twitch-based" and the focus is on playing in small groups. The game has a lot of kinky alien races and there's a lot of exploring to do for the Doras among us. Even though the game looks pretty horrible it might hide some beauty in its old and wrinkly shell.

    Illarion
    An old 2D MMORPG that sells itself as the game in which you don't have to fight. Strong focus on roleplaying. Graphics are terrible as is the artwork on the site.

    Illutia
    Formerly known as Aspereta. It's a 2D cutesy grind MMO in a fantasy setting. Looks very dated.

    Irth Worlds
    Pretty old fantasy MMO at the end of it's life cycle. The game was pretty decent, but now it is mostly dead. Check it out before it kicks the bucket for good.

    Iris Online
    A cutesy Asian MMO with a bit more instances and quests than most Asian grind MMOs. The game has one unique feature: tarot cards. Mobs drop cards you bring to a fortune teller, she will "predict your future" which results in buffs for your character or gear. You can also buy these cards from the cash shop, making the cash shop extremely unbalanced.

    Jade Dynasty
    A standard Asian mythology based grind MMO, it has pretty graphics and an interesting story. EXP is easy to get: you get it from meditating or by setting up a script so you can do other things while your toon levels. Game gets boring very fast if you do that, though. On the other hand: maybe the other things you'd do would be a lot more fun. Win/win?

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    MMO RPG K-R
    Kal online
    Game looks generic. Site is full of Engrish and lies about being the first 3D mmo set in Asian mythology. Try at your own risk, I suppose.

    Karos
    Standard Asian Grind MMO with decent graphics. There is plenty to do with crafting and quests and the world is nice to look at, but it is a grindfest at heart.

    Kingdom Heroes
    Another MMO based on Chinese mythology, this one's unique feature is that you can lead between 2 and 6 soldier into battle. You also get to tweak them to your preference, so that's something. Site also lists ship to ship battle and catapults to take down keeps. The focus is on PvP, I'm not sure how much grinding you have to do before you can join in the fun.

    Kingdom of Drakkar
    A very old school 2D RPG with some seriously dated graphics that will be sure to brighten your great-grandfather's heart. I have no idea how old this one is, but they appear to be proud that their shark mobs are animated.

    Kingdom of Loathing
    PA thread
    Hilarious in-browser MMO. The graphics are amusing, the fact that there is a haiku chat channel makes the game awesome. You only get a limited amount of actions per day and you navigate the world from screen to screen.

    Knight online world
    MMO with a focus on PvP. No idea about actual gameplay.

    Land of Magic
    This game has been live since 1994. Players from way back when are now NPCs in the game. Actual gameplay, however, appears to be hidden away on their site. It is clear that a MMO from 1994 is not going to be easy on new players.

    Lands of Hope
    In-browser MMORPG developed by one guy. It appears to offer a full range of functions usually reserved for bigger titles. Sounds strangely hopeful.

    Last Chaos
    Fantasy grind MMO with a strong focus on playing in personal dungeons. Unfortunately the game has you grinding from the moment you step out of the tutorial dungeon and half an hour in the only redeeming quality remaining is the promise that there might be another personal dungeon open for you soon. Said dungeon does open up, but you'll die in it unless you grind some more levels. Combat feels unresponsive, graphics are glitchy, game text is hard to read and there's only a few skills for your character to employ.

    LaTale
    A game like Maple Story but with more fluid combat, also just as ridiculously cute. Probably still going to be an evergrind.

    Legendary Voyage
    Small indie MMO. It's 2D and looks ugly. The game focuses on discovery. There's all sorts of hidden stuff and when you find it then that makes you awesome.

    Legend of Ares
    Fantasy MMO with a strong focus on PvP, it looks rather bland and the site offers about zero information besides "hey, it has pvp and you get rewards for clubbing people to death.

    Legend of Mir 3
    Standard Asian fantasy grind MMO. Unique features are weapons that you can level, it's dark outside so you need to bring torches and you can get extra loot by clicking the attack button a few times while standing over dead animals. Not impressive at all.

    Legends of Zork
    In-browser MMO that works with limited action points per day. ZombieMambo seems to enjoy it.

    LOCO
    A fast paced DotA-clone MMO where you join arenas through a lobby. You have multiple characters at your disposal and can pick one before you start the arena. You earn money during matches and you can buy gear with it that improves your characters. So this game isn’t much of an MMO, but hey it’s free and I don’t want to be too picky.

    Loong
    Generic Asian fantasy MMO with pretty graphics, a very thorough and clear tutorial and a lot of rewards early on. It is certainly fun for a few days, but I got frustrated by the inventory limit (at 10c a slot in the cash shop it's quite expensive to fix this) and ultimately the grind was just too much to hold my interest. Certainly not a bad game and a good example of the quality available in free MMOs.

    Lord of the Rings Online
    Penny Arcade thread
    1 week trial
    LotrO's goal is to put the whole of Middle Earth as described in Tolkien's books online. That world is being brought alive with a lot of quests, including epic quests with lots of scripted elements.

    Luminary: Rise of the Goonzu
    Fantasy anime MMO with a heavy focus on economy and politics. According to froggy it is nice. According to Mith it is as exciting as Progress Quest (which is to say: no it is not exciting).

    Luna Online
    Standard Korean grind MMO, this one has some extra classes to evolve to and you can build a farm with your in-game family. Everything else? Just another cutesy grind MMO.

    Mabinogi
    Penny Arcade thread
    Celshaded graphics, fast paced combat. Graphics are scoring high on "cute" and "kawaii". You can react to what the mob you're fighting does with counterattacks or defences, besides that it plays like a normal MMO. Quests are standard, but there are some dungeons you can run in with a challenging boss at the end of the ride. Unless you're coughing up money you can only create one character. Recently a lot of features went from cash shop to free.

    Maestia
    Another game hosted by Bigpoint, there's been a lot of commercials and ads appearing for this one, which is odd because the game is as mundane as they can come. This one is a rather standard high fantasy game with 2 factions and 4 classes. The game's defining feature seems to be the fact that you can further develop your character after hitting max level. The actual game is slow, quests are uninspiring and boring with your character's lines being terrible and nothing like you'd want your character to react to an archangel appearing in front. This is one of the better boring Asian grindfests: quests are delivered to you by an angel appearing in front of you, the quest guide points you towards the right location and the first few quests slowly introduce you to the relevant mechanics one by one. It is still a boring grindfest though.

    Magic World Online
    It's a new game, but already looks dated: Isometric camera, site looks incredibly cheesy and the art direction seems to love glow sticks and Asian mythology. The game seems to offer everything you expect out of a MMORPG, but adds player housing and marriage. All in all it doesn't stand out in any way.

    Maple Story
    Extremely popular for no particular reason. Only play this if you hate yourself. It's a 2D sidescrolling MMO where you will be grinding monsters for an eternity to gain a level, then you repeat the process. This is not my idea of "fun".

    Martial Heroes
    Based on martial arts, this appears to be a mundane grind MMO. It appears they have received a shitton of complaints about all sorts of things, so I would advice against playing this game.

    Martial Empires
    Asian grind MMO set in a fantasy Asian universe full of martial arts.

    Mech Quest
    An in-browser 'lunch break mmo'. It's just a whole lot of grinding in ugly flash environments. The game is tailored for young players and has a strong focus on the pay to play aspects.

    Meridian 59
    The first MMO with graphics. As a result: not very attractive to the modern gamer.

    Metin 2
    Asian Fantasy MMO with fast paced combat. And the possibility to fight while mounted. The game is in 3D but looks very dated. Classes are uninspired, text is hard to read, quests are vague and exp gain is slow.

    Milmo
    A cutesy in-browser game for kids with the generic MMO quests. Seems to try and ride the "social gaming" wave. Runs on unity web player.

    Minions of Mirth
    From the old thread: Notes (from Philthy): Basically, an EQ clone. And a decent one, at that. It has a few twists. Instead of controlling one player, you can control up to 6. An entire party. You can then play on the multiplayer server and group up with other players parties and do raids this way. The game also can run in server mode, and you can basically run your own server. You can edit everything within the server, add your own mobs and zones, edit items and quests, stats and models. You can also submit these to the devs to be included on the actual live server as well.

    Mix Master
    2D MMO with the unique function that you get to mix various components and monsters to create your own awesometastic monster.

    Monster and Me
    A MMO that takes its influences from neopets and pokémon. Art looks horrible. There should be no reason one would play this game.

    Monato Esprit
    Cutesy Asian grind MMO. All dungeons in game have been bugged out for nearly two months, meaning I can't even finish the tutorial. Probably best to ignore this title in favour of one of the kazillion other cutesy asian grind MMOs.

    Mo Siang Online
    A Chinese MMO with very fast combat and very pretty spell effects. The website and game made me very confused, everything seems to move at 2x speed or something. The client is only 450MB so I guess that is nice.

    MU Online
    Game is tailored for boys, lots of muscled characters and gritty looks. Everything looks horribly bland and uninteresting. No idea about the combat, but it advertises itself as "easy to get in to". Maybe fun for a few hours.

    Mystic Realms
    A very ugly 2D game with a ton a very ugly website that hasn't been updated since 2005. They seem to be proud of their combat not being 'hack n slash' and that there's a lot of options for races and classes. But seriously, this shit's so old it should have died 5 years ago.

    Myth Angels Online
    An Asian grind MMO based on the life and works of Mao Zedong. There is only one class and loot is distributed equally among all players on the server. Oh no wait it's just another Asian grind MMO, this time based on Greek mythology. Their trailer is horrible, their game looks like a cheap knock-off of Ragnarok Online and their classes are dull.

    Mytheon
    MMORPG by Petroglyph (Star Wars: Empire at war; Universe at War: Earth Assault). You take on the role of a commander who leads his armies against the ancient Gods themselves. Greek, Egyptian and Roman myths confirmed. Besides the fairly original setting the unique selling point is the use of stones that allow you to summon aid and cast spells. After that the stone gets replaced randomly by another stone in your deck. Besides that it has the usual leveling/armour/skills to further finetune your character with.

    Myth War II
    A 2D MMO with hand-painted models. The game only runs in 800x600 so everything looks blurry. Combat is a mix of real-time with turn based, think JRPG. There's also a strong social aspect to this game, players can get in a position of power through politics or can fabricate rumours that might turn out to be true (???). Kasanagi tells you to avoid this outdated POS. This is a slightly updated version of the original, which was closed Feb 13th, 2009.

    NEO
    Half-decent looking Asian grind MMO with one unique feature: players can switch on a buff to get more stuff from mobs, but that will fill a chaos metre. When it reaches max the zone will switch to a chaos version with PvP, aggressive bosses and stronger mobs. Rewards are better in that stage, but it's a lot more dangerous. Besides that characters are not tied to one class and there's costumes to prance around in. The Engrish is terrible, though. The biggest challenge is figuring out what the fuck they mean.

    Neo Steam
    This one has a very charming neopunk-ish art style, a lot of classes and races, has wasd-support and feels pretty smooth. It is at it's core a very boring and Korean grind MMO, though, don't be fooled.

    NEStalgia
    A nostalgia trip to old RPG games, but now you're online so you can play with other people. The game uses the BYOND engine so it's kind of a bitch to set up, but with a 2MB client you can't really go wrong with checking it out yourself.

    Neverland
    An in-browser RPG with turn based combat. Graphics score high on cute and hard to make out anything. The game - in essence - works, though. If you're looking for in-browser MMOs this is seems to offer the complete package.

    NIDA
    Fast-paced 'action' MMO. They're proud of their good looks and constant rewards for playing, but I can't figure out what it is you actually do in the game.

    Nodiatis
    And old-skool MMO that starts with the reassuring message that it contains no spyware or malware. Glad to know. The next thing you see is a halfnaked girl chained to a wall. I think I like this game, it won't break my computer and it seems to promise ample opportunity for sex. Unfortunately the game itself is very old-school. Your character is reduced to a simple portray that moves from tile to tile and encounters enemies that are nothing more than a fancy picture with numbers appearing above it when you hit it with auto-attack or with skills. This is all very boring and does not contain enough female bodies to keep my attention. The lev2 drunken fisherman did nothing to cheer me up either.

    NosTale
    2.5D cutesy grind MMO in which you can capture monsters to do your laundry and fighting. It has a decent tutorial and you'll have a clear idea on what you're supposed to do from the get-go. Client does not support large screen resolutions and it's a big grind at heart.

    Nowhere Else and Beyond
    In-browser MMO with 2D graphics. You move around from screen to screen with the arrow buttons. It doesn't look half bad, but there seems to be little reason to play this game. You can check it out without having to register, which is nice.

    Oberin
    MAC ONLY MMO! It's been going for 8 years. But seriously guys, it's Mac only.

    Ogre Island
    Flash-based MMO. Looks fun for 30 minutes or something? At least it doesn't pretend to be something it is not. Does anyone know more about this?

    Oz
    Community MMO based around cute characters. Appears to cater to teenage girls, one of the games is "spot the pedo"*, others include fishing and making out**

    *that was a joke
    **this is not a joke

    Pandora Saga/also here
    Asian 3D MMO with the standard classes, a bunch of races including dwarves and standard gameplay. It's all rather standard fair, but the site looks decent and it doesn't look very ugly, so I guess it can't be too bad.

    Perenthia
    In-browser game set in a standard fantasy world. Game's a spreadsheet.

    Perfect World
    Penny-Arcade thread
    Fantasy MMO with a very elaborate character customizer. The game looks a lot like World of Warcaft, but without the unpopular parts such as ugly races and small swords. What it does have? Huge swords and wings and wings made out of huge swords. The game does look very nice and it has some quality. It's still a huge grindfest, but it's a decent one.

    Phoenix Dynasty Online
    An isometric point-n-click Asian style game with 4 classes and some options to make your avatar unique. Big focus on playing in groups. There are a few quests and there is crafting in place. Interestingly mobs don't drop loot, but you have to make stuff yourself. Skutskut seems to like it.

    Pirates of the Burning Sea
    A pirate game that didn't cut it as P2P and is now F2P/Freemium. The game offers a hefty dose of economics to keep the nerds amongst us interested, while there's also some other shit to keep everyone else happy.

    Pirates of the Caribbean Online
    (10$/mth to get rid of ads)
    Customize your pirate, get a pirate ship, recruit a crew and do what pirates do. Game looks pretty, it's published by Disney and it has Jack Sparrow. Alas, the Free to Play is a money-making scheme, according to korodullin you have to pay a fee to complete a quest or to level up. Try again later, Disney. D:

    Pi Story
    It's a 2D sidescrolling MMO that appears to be less retarded than Maple Story. Still, it looks very dated and the gameplay video on their site makes it look like a game from 10 years ago.

    PlaneShift
    An MMO in development by an Italian company, it looks fairly original for a fantasy-mmo and they're trying to stay away from the common mmo-traps like grinding. This game has been in, what they call, tech-demo stage for a while, it appears that they can't afford a QA-team and decided to let the world play around with it while they keep on updating.

    Priston Tale 2
    Your average Korean grind MMO, it looks pretty, but it is very slow, repetitive and there is hardly any information available to the beginning player.

    Project of Planets
    Grind MMO with mechs. Graphics look dated, gameplay is dated. If you wank to mechs this might hold your interest for a while, otherwise it is advisable to look for a better game.

    Project S
    Standard MMO that claims to have fast combat and lots of gambling.

    Project Shinru
    A hideous 2D MMO with a lot of spelling errors on their site and misdirected links. I'd like to advice against playing this, as it looks rather shifty.

    Queville
    Small MMORPG being developed by two people. It's set in a fantasy world and you are a hero, that's pretty much the jest of it. It looks hideous and the site seems to be made in the 1990s.

    Ragnarok Online
    PA thread
    The mother of all cheap grind-MMOs. If you're looking for someone or something to blame for half the titles on this list...look no further. This game is enjoyable if you can play with others. On the Free server you only get 75% of exp, everything is more expensive and takes longer. If you were were already bored with the normal version, you'll hate this one more.

    RAN Online/Rosso version
    3D MMO placing your standard classes in a more modern and urban setting. Seems to be standard grindfest.

    Rappelz
    It looks wonderful, but it isn't anything new. Huge grind and you don't *need* anyone else to play with, everyone else is just getting in the way between you and your next level.

    Realm of the Mad God
    An in-browser rogue-like with cute retro graphics. You get dropped in a world at level one, you hit stuff with your left mouse button and launch spells with shift+LMB. Go apeshit on the wildlife or rather: the wildlife will go apeshit on you. Death is permanent, but a new char is rerolled in 2 seconds. Try to survive for 20 levels, find the best gear possible and take on the mad gods of the realm. You will die. You will die a lot. You will die some more. But you'll come back for more anyway, because it's simple, yet challenging.

    Realms of Loria
    In-browser old-skool RPG in a standard fantasy setting. The game has been out since 2003, but the makers still say it is far from finished. Gotta love the small projects.

    Realms Online
    A poor WoW clone with outdated graphics. Looks bland to me.

    Red Stone
    Game looks like Diablo2, has a ton of classes that can - if you have the right level - transform into something else. Like a mage can turn into a werewolf as to stand a chance against magic resistant mobs etc. My previous entry for this game was needlessly negative it seems, this might just be some classical fun.

    Red War
    ugly looking 3D dungeon crawler. You can own your own castle. Looks like a Diablo clone.

    Regnum
    A standard fantasy MMORPG with a few localized clients to appease the masses. The game seems to focus on PvP but offers no refreshing features besides this.

    Requiem
    A horror MMO, if you love blood, slime and sharp teeth, you might like this game. It has asdw-controls and ragdolls. Actual gameplay is pretty grind-happy.

    RF Online
    The game is a pretty basic Korean grindfest, but one of the factions consists of robots. It's also very pretty. (thanks NAND NOR) The site also points out that there's Realm vs Realm combat to be had, which can be pretty fun. Recently changed hands and had exp gain increased by 300%.

    Risk Your Life Part 2: Incomplete Union
    Malaysian RPG with dated graphics and seemingly offering the same gameplay as oh so many other grind MMOs. It does offer territory wars for some sort of benefit for the winners or whatever. I think the name is the most awesome part of this title.

    Rohan
    PA thread
    High-fantasy grind MMO with unique classes and nice character models and combat effects. There is a lot of missed potential here, less downtime between fights, less glitches and a more optimized game code would do wonders for this unpolished gem. The game still gets active support, so maybe they will enhance it one day.

    ROSE Online
    PA thread
    The only real heir of Ragnarok Online. The gameplay has hardly changed, but it is slightly less unforgiving to making mistakes, it's in 3D and it is just more structured all together. If you are looking for a mindless grind MMO this is one of the sturdiest.

    RPG World Online
    Most generic name ever. It has been around since 2000 and is still being updated every now and again. The whole thing is created in Visual Basic, so that's quite a feat. Does not a good game make.

    Rubies of Eventide
    Used to be Pay to Play, but wasn't successful. It got resurrected by some fans and has been going strong since then. The game looks very dated and is far from an intuitive experience. Unless you just love playing old shoddy games I would avoid this.

    Runescape
    (more content available for subscribers)
    The most popular free MMO in the world. Long Running Java Based Fantasy MMO: Good lunchtime game with decent questing, there is enough to do to keep you occupied for a while. Runescape is fundamentally all there, combat is decent if a bit repetitive, quests are entertaining, there are many different skills to train and a lot of variation in how they are trained (JamesDM).

    Runes of Magic
    PA thread
    A game with a class system like Guild Wars and graphics like World of Warcraft. It has all the standard functions of modern MMOs including PvP, player housing and fashion armour slots. It also lists wasd-support as a feature. So yeah, it sounds like it could be a decent clone mmo.

    Ryzom
    An old 3D MMO set in a kind of alien future with lots of weird nature masks and melee weapons. The game's main selling point is the option to create and share your own missions and maps. The actual gameplay is rather clunky and slow and to get anything done you'll have to grind quite a bit. I didn't like it much, but the original art style was quite charming.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    MMO RPG S-Z
    Scions of Fate
    A prime example of everything you can do wrong with an Asian grind MMO. There is no starter tutorial, you can only start the game from a website that only opens in Internet Explorer, mobs below your level die in 1 hit and net little exp, mobs one level above you take 20 hits and net just as little exp, classes are uninspired tank/healer/ranged dps/melee dps, graphics are dated, setting is stereotypical Asia with the same god damned Chinese restaurant tunes on repeat, if a mob moved since you moved into range, you will not start attacking, you only get your first skill at level 10.
    Game also installs Pando Media Booster, a P2P client that runs in the background without a user interface and can upload and download large files without notification.

    Seal Online
    A MMO based around clubbing baby seals (and various other cute animals)! It's standard MMO fare, only hardly anyone plays this game. It has a fairly original combo-system and offers tons of customizing for your character's battle prowess. However, it's a huge grind and it doesn't help that you move very slowly.

    Secondhand Lands
    A hiiiiiiiilariiiiiiiious RPG where you play as a wolf, sheep, scrapper or catgirl and dick around in a world where every fairytale ever is a target for the hiiiiiilariiiiious wit of the developer. Actually, there's not a single funny thing on their website and the 'satire' sales pitch seems to be based solely on the fact that fairytale figures have turned violent. Oh that jester

    Secret of the Solstice
    Ragnarok Online clone. Cute 2D graphics, endless grinding and tons of crafting. Just like Ragnarok the game runs on the assumption you know what you're doing and your in the possession of a lot of time off. This makes this title rather frustrating and boring, it makes no efforts to lead you to the fun bits.

    Secrets of Mirage
    An extreeeeeemely small and veeeeery old RPG with 2D graphics. The original version of this game was made in 2002 with a toolset that's even older. At the moment there's only a few people playing and the servers break down every few weeks due to lack of funding and hardware failure. This is clearly an amateur project and as such deserves a tip of the hat for trying.

    Seyken
    A copyright infringement if I've ever seen one. It's a MMO version of games like Secret of Mana and Chronotrigger.

    Shadowbane
    used to be Pay to Play, but wasn't successful. The developers have made the game 100% free, which is very kind of them. It's high fantasy, 3D and gets updated regularly. The starting area is fun, but it gets boring after that. Probably fun for a few days.

    Shadow of Legend
    A MMORPG for your handheld devices. It offers 16 classes and besides that it seems to be standard grind mmo fair. Seems like a very elaborate and fancy game for a handheld device.

    Shadowtale
    In-browser fantasy RPG with ugly Flash graphics.

    Shadow World
    An extremely small 2D MMO from Germany. No screenshots on their site and only 10 people online at a Sunday evening. Game is so bad that JamesDM almost gave up before reaching the first waypoint of his first quest. Let us let this game die in peace.

    Shaiya
    This one gets hailed for its pretty graphics and they hail themselves for their Realm v Realm combat, meaningful PvP and everything else you expect out of a MMORPG these days. Interesting is that there are various difficulties to play the game at and you unlock more as you level up. Depending on your difficulty you will gain more stat-points per level. Not sure if it isn't just an excuse to make people grind more. It does use Gameguard (see below for more info) so play at your own risk.

    Sherwood Dungeon
    Ugly in-browser RPG set in a generic fantasy version of the tale of Robin Hood. It looks extremely dorky, but it's not bad or anything. Just looks bloody dorky.

    Shin Megami Tensei: Imagine
    PA thread
    Game based on the JRPG Shin Megami Tensei. Defining feature is that you get to convince mobs to fight for you. Graphics aren't too bad either.

    Sho Online
    A generic Asian fantasy MMORPG with a focus on PvP. Ugly graphics, slow and unresponsive combat, uninspired quests, no other players around. All the ingredients for a game you should not want to play.

    Silkroad Online
    Game looks pretty, setting is original and combat is solid. However: most characters look the same, combat is repetitive, all there is to do is grinding and a bit of PvP. Enjoyable for a day or two.

    Spiral Knights
    Made by the dudes who made Puzzle Pirates and published by Sega. It's Zelda Four Swords set in a Sci-fi/fantasy setting. Do note that if you don't spend any money you will be rather limited in the amount of time you can play per day.

    Star Wars Combine
    A Star Wars game not published by LucasArt. In this hideous in-browser game you play a person living in the Star Wars universe during the movies. You can join in the battles or just play some no-no. Oh, there's also a chance you get to be a jedi. Did LucasArt not sue these folks on account of their game being too shitty or something?

    Stone Age 2
    A casual MMO set in the stone age. You can get pets and let them do the dirty work for you. Zombiemambo says the art style is exactly like the old Pokemon games. The game is aimed at the young kids, what with this stuff on their site: color me. Omega71 recommends you avoid this game at all costs, he says it's aimed at 5 years old and broken enough to become unplayable.

    SUN
    Asian MMO with a strong focus on instanced play (including solo) and you get to set up your own mission maps. Game looks very detailed and pretty, but is a boring grind at heart.

    Supreme Destiny
    An full-bred Asian grind MMO with 3D graphics and some shit about PvP. There's no interesting features to this one. At all.

    Sword of the New World(Granado Espada)
    A baroque MMO with very pretty graphics. Main selling point is that you control 3 characters at once and that you can develop these three characters separately. Fun for weeks, if you can look past the retarded community and the ever-grind. The client is huge and almost impossible to download. Used to be called Grenado Espada.

    Syrnia
    Flash-based game in a generic fantasy world. Players get to construct a lot of stuff including houses and shops for other players. It's a very small project, so don't expect too much from them.

    Tagoria
    In-browser RPG in a generic fantasy world. Their "special features" are so completely uninteresting I can only imagine the rest of their game is even more uninteresting.

    Tales of Fantasy
    Generic Asian MMO with wings and combat with mounts. Sounds rather generic, which would fit with the rest of IGG's portfolio.

    Tales of Pirates (aka: Pirate King)
    Generic cute grind MMO. This game is ridiculous, it's not pirate-y at all and most fun is to be had on land. You can get ships early on to sail to different islands, but this is not really exciting. You can make a lot of profit by putting a mechanical arm on your ship and loot crates from sea. You can sell those at harbours to make enough profit to always have the best gear available. And that is really the only interesting thing I have to say about this game.

    Tales Weaver
    This game was released 7 years ago in Asia, but it's now getting an international version through Game&Game. It's a cute little 2D game with an actual story line and characters you can tell apart. Combat is slow, resolution doesn't go above 1024x768 and after the intro movie the storyline angle falls flat.

    Talisman Online
    A 3D MMO based on Random Asian Mythology, game looks like a badly executed version of WoW with the settings on "my pc is a wet cereal box". The game kind of forces you to work together with other players to get anything done. There's also a "Talisman system" which boils down to a system where you can upgrade your weapon and your skills are dependent on what stuff you have equipped.

    Tanoth
    In-browser mmorpg based on the game 'Legend - Hand of God'.

    TerraWorld
    Very small 2D cutesy MMO. Site doesn't offer much information. I would avoid this.

    Tibia
    2D, sprites, weird perspective. Looks extremely dated. This game has been going strong for ten (10!) years now and still has thousands of players.

    Trickster Online
    Extremely cute MMORPG. It emits rays of cuteness, really. This is a game like Ragnarok Online, so you do need a group of friends to level with, or rather...talk with while in a group so you all get massive exp bonuses. When you're in a group you can earn up to twice as much exp per mob, so everyone is just grouped up, without really having to work together or anything. Besides that it has some fun classes and it is rather popular.

    TRPG
    Ancient MMO where only roughly 10 people can be on a server. Setting is standard fantasy stuff. Eventually everyone is either cheating or grieving. Nerdtendo seems to like it.

    Twelve Sky
    Portrays itself as a more mature MMORPG. I'm not really convinced by this, at its core it's just another grind-mmo, only with darker graphics.

    Twelve Sky 2
    Open Beta
    Updated version from Twelve Sky. Pretty graphics, Asian setting. Very strong focus on PvP, but to play with the big guys you have to grind a lot of mobs. Although the combat looks flashy and your character looks cool, this grinding is way too slow to genuinely enjoy.

    Uncharted Waters
    A game situated in the Age of Exploration. Players get to own ships, houses and islands. There's PvP stuff and enough content to last you for three years...according to their website. Right, gonna check it out later.

    Voyage Century
    The better alternative to Bounty Bay Online. Beautiful MMORPG set in the Age of Sailing. It offers naval combat and trading. Less lag, more fun than BBO.

    War of Angels
    A 3D Asian grind MMO with uninspired graphics, classes, quests and storytelling. There are no features that sets this one apart from the rest of the grind MMO pack. It claims it has combat on land, underwater and in the air, but this is hardly a selling point in this millennium.

    War of Titans
    aka: Gladius 2. Providing fancier graphics and more options, War of the Titans seems to be some sort of RPG set in the classical world. Their site is confusing, but I think it's all in-browser and there are gladiators involved.

    Warrior Epic
    open beta
    Interesting detail is that you are leader of a mercenary guild and that you send out fighters on missions, then you take direct control of that fighter and s/he gains exp. If you level enough you can get some new characters. Nearly all features require your credit card (although it is possible to sell off your mercenaries for cash shop cash) and it is a gigantic grind. Not cool.

    Water Margin Online
    Absurdly cute looking Asian fantasy MMO. Support seems to be focused on Malaysia.

    Well of Souls
    Cheap looking MMO with the special feature that you can create your own quests, maps, player skins, music and servers.

    Windslayer
    2D sidescrolling MMO. Graphics look like pixel-art and the game seems to be going for pure brainless action. If anyone knows more about it: do tell.

    The Witcher Versus
    A sort of in-browser card game where you spend your time fighting others and progress your deck/character. The site unfortunately lacks clear information, but it is published by CD Projekt Red so it is kosher.

    Wonder KingEU version
    Cutesy 2D sidescrolling grind game with 4 base classes and 4 subclasses for each base. It is a lot like Maple Story, but with none of the fame.

    Wonderland Online
    A cutesy 2D game with sprites. It seems to focus mostly on community things and fighting is just one of the things you can do. Fighting is done in some sort of Tekken/Street Fighter kind of way. The game looks very dated in all aspects they show on their website. Game looks extremely similar to Angels Online.

    The World
    Horrible looking 2D mmo vaguely based off the .hack games. There's also an (even more horrible looking) 3D version of this coming up. Judging from the site my only advice is: AVOID AVOID AVOID.

    World of Kung Fu
    Based on Chinese mythology. The game tries to break away from standard mmo fair by introducing complex economic and social aspects, you can start your own family (with drama! according to their website) or martial arts school and there's a lot of interaction with GMs and other players. Actual combat is a rather uninspiring grindfest, though.

    Xiah
    Generic Asian Grind-mmo set in a just as generic Asian setting. Fun for a few hours.

    Zentia
    A cutesy Asian grind MMO with diverse classes and a large number of 'races' to mix and match with. The game looks hideous and very dated.

    Zero Online
    A grind MMORPG set in space with mechs and pew pew! The game looks fairly nice, but there's little in the way of help for new players. After a short tutorial about how to move and equip items you get thrown in a big space station and you get bombarded with pop-up screens. After accepting one I leveled from 2 to 25 which was...kinda unsettling. Combat is point and click and weapons need ammo forcing you to head back to camp every now and again. Game's clearly trying to get you to a high level to participate in new features. You fight against 10 mobs at a time most of the time.

    Zodiac
    Cutesy Asian grind MMO with classes based on the animals of the zodiac. This means there's a lot more classes than you're used to, but you get to distribute your skill points yourself, so you can make a useless character in many new and exciting ways. It all looks kinda cheap and a lot we have seen before.

    zOMG (gaia online)
    MMO from the social networking/forums site Gaia Online. The game is tailored towards people who are on Gaia, so if you don't feel like joining their site it is not worth it to make an account just for this game. It is a full blown MMORPG, but it's just not worth grinding for if you don't care about the rest of the site.

    Zu Online
    Cel-shaded graphics, fastpaced combat. Looks pretty enough and it has asdw-support. There are a lot of quests, but to get new skills you have to grind a lot. Like a prohibitive amount of the same few missions over and over. Fun for a week or two.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    MMO Strategy

    MMO Strategy is: war-game. You take on the role of a commander and order an army or group of characters around a battlefield. Most MMO Strategy games have a strong management aspect: besides the actual combat you also get to equip your soldiers, buy new ones, control cities and/or make deals with other players.
    2029 Online
    RTS/RPG hybrid, placing your favourite fantasy races in a sci-fi setting. Graphics are 2D and look dated, interface makes JamesDM's brain hurt and their website does not provide much in the way of information. Please let me know if you know more.

    Artifact
    A MMORTS with 2D sprites. This game has been out since 1999 and it still has some people playing it. News section has not been updated since April 2007. Probably not the game for those looking for some easily accessible fun.

    Atlantica Online
    A stunning looking TBS offering a persistent world in which guilds can control cities. You can control up to 27 characters on the battlefield whom you can tune just like you want to. However, they age and lose power when they get older. That makes it important to keep attracting young blood to fight for you. The game becomes a huge grind on the higher levels, but it's a very neat grind with a lot of depth in the gameplay.

    Atulos Online
    Ugly old 2D MMORTS in a generic fantasy setting. Only for those dreaming it was 1998 and your dad just bought a modem.

    Bang! Howdy
    A fast-paced RTS game set in a Wild West setting. It has robots wearing cowboy hats so it can't be bad. It's from the same company as Puzzle Pirates, so there's some serious talent involved.

    Battle Forge
    3D RTS with a trading card system. You get a starters pack for free, you can earn extra cards by doing PvE battles and can trade cards on the market, or you can buy extra packs for cash. Battles are very epic and look pretty.

    Battle of Gods
    Flash based version similar to Master of Magic.

    Battle Position
    An arcade-y Korean multiplayer game. Looks like Worms with tanks. Art is atrocious. Still going strong after release last year.

    Battleswarm
    A shooter/RTS hybrid. Most players fight on the field, one player plays as the enemy and gets to send a zerg at the other players. Unfortunately the creators decided to put a MMO twist to the concept and provide you with items you can loot. Unfortunately the creators also decided that they want to sniff coke off the back of a hooker and the only permanent items you can get cost your real life money. There is also grinding involved..somehow.

    Boundless Planet
    Some sort of futuristic RTS with dated graphics and a site that contains hardly any information about wtf it is. I'm going to try this one some time...

    Call of the Kings
    In-browser, fantasy setting. Absolutely no clue wtf is going on.

    Castle of Heroes
    A flash version of Heroes of Might & Magic in a massive world (you are the owner of a kingdom and you expand your kingdom, explore your surroundings, exploit natural resources and exterminate other players and monsters). Time progresses slowly and instead of turns it just takes a lot of time for things to move. The game looks pretty nice and the tutorial and first few tasks make you a bit familiar with what you can do. The utter slowness is kind of a let down, you mostly play this by logging in once in a while to make sure everything is going according to plan. Combat is starts of ridiculously simple and if you have enough units you can just auto-battle through them. All in all this is not a bad game at all, just a bit slow and with a severe lack of immediate enjoyment.

    Cosmic Supremacy
    4X game with procedurally created galaxy.

    Dark Elf
    A hideous Czech MMORTS in 2D set in some sort of Lord o/t Rings setting. Strong focus on PvP.

    Deepolis
    An in-browser 2D submarine game in which you trade, re-enact Das Boot and try to reduce other ships to canned tuna.

    Dofus-Arena
    Whereas you only control one character in Dofus, Dofus-Arena gives you control over a group of characters, making it into some sort of FF Tactics MMO. There are no levels to grind, and is mostly focused on PvP.

    Dolumar
    A Belgian in-browser strategy game. They try to make it play a bit like Age of Empires, but I have no idea if they actually succeeded in that.

    Dreamlords
    MMORTS with some RPG things tossed in for good measure. The game looks very promising, providing a full MMO experience with enough checks and balances built in to keep it fun for all players. Half the game can be played in-browser. All in all it's a lot of management for minimum enjoyment.

    Earth: 2025
    With Asdef's words: a post apocalyptic text based MMO strategy game. You create one country and rule it. It's turn-based. The goal is to come up with the highest net value. You can do this by whatever means necessary.

    Gunbound/Gunbound Classic
    PA thread
    Worms with tanks, very popular. Blow your friends to pieces in cute tanks. It's popular for a reason, it's easy to understand, funny to play and looks cute. PA prefers the classic version, as it is less dependent on the cash shop and overall more old skool fun.

    Heroes of Gaia
    A flash-based semi-turnbased game that seems to play like Heroes of Might & Magic and similar titles. The descriptions on their site are a bit full of it, but as far as browser games go this does sound like a good title. They just gotta drop the attitude a little, bunch of self-satisfied wankers.

    Kingdom of Drakkar
    Old and ugly 2D MMORTS in a generic fantasy setting. Not much in the way of extra information.

    Lords of Ultima
    PA Thread
    An in-browser strategy game ran by EA, set in the good ol' Ultima setting from the beginning days of MMOs. This one puts you in the gold-laced boots of a freshly minted king and you get to fuck around a fantasy universe expanding your town, sending your heroes on quests and stealing the riches of other players and NPCs.

    Navy Field
    wiki
    Penny Arcade thread
    In this game you control a ship in WWII. You gain levels by winning battles against other opponents. It is quite popular, check the wiki or PA thread for more detailed information.

    Operation-B
    In-browser TBS in a comic setting. It looks ugly, and they have a suicide bomber called Khalid Kaboomaz. It made me groan.

    Pokemon Global
    Fan-made open-source online Pokémon using Java, Slick (OpenGL) and Apache Mina. They're still early in development and everything is very slow, but it seems there's some folks with experience on their team.

    Pokémon Indigo
    MMO Pokémon in Java. Very slow. No idea how this site can exist.

    Pokemon World Online
    MMO Pokemon. According to JamesDM this is the best one.

    Saga
    A 3D MMORTS offering all classical fantasy races. Build your own town and country, conquer others etc. The free version offers most features the subscribers have, but some of them are unavailable. It looks pretty enough.

    Seafight
    An in-browser tactical game where you control a 17th century pirate ship and play games against other players. Graphics are fairly decent for an in-browser game, I have no idea about the actual gameplay.

    Soul Master
    MMORPG/RTS hybrid with cute graphics. Basically like Sacrifice in that you have your avatar and an army trailing behind you that you can order to attack targets and stuff.

    Starport: Galactic Empires
    They market themselves as "the best free MMO game on the internet!" Which makes me rise an eyebrow. The game is a 2D 4X space game that resets every few weeks as to appoint a winner. JamesDM seems to like it so far.

    Shattered Galaxy
    Stolen from old list: Really quite neat. A bit like Starcraft, with each player on the battlefield controlling a squad of units in capture-and-hold missions, and occasional dungeon crawls against alien armies.

    TanaduKongregate version
    In-browser strategy game that kinda works like King's Bounty and Heroes of Might and Magic. The focus is on PvE which is a nice break from the usual "oh lets have everyone play against other players so we don't have to bother implementing difficult opponents."

    Terra Militaris Ministry of War / Kongregate version
    An in-browser MMORTS wherein you take control of an empire and conquer the whole planet. Although the game has real-time combat wherein you take direct control of your soldiers, there's quite a bit of managing to be had as well. Will have to try this to see how much of an in-browser management sim it actually is.

    Drop Shock Previously:Tiny Warz
    Turn-based strategy game where you have a commander unit who you earn exp for and unlock more skills/options with. You also have to buy your own units, salvage them from won battles or buy them from other players. There's persistent PvP, PvE and regular updates by the developers. Sounds pretty big for a tiny war.

    TPPC
    Text based in-browser online Pokemon game. Cross-breed between Urban Death and Pokemon.

    War of Conquest
    Management game in which your rule a country. The game offers all sort of cash rewards for playing, yet claims to be completely free to play. I do not trust this at all.

    War Online
    Combat is played out in turns, but there's an overhead world where you manage your town, train your armies and move around that is persistent. It's clearly a very small project and there were only 10 people online on a Saturday night.

    World of Battles
    Good looking free RTS game set in a generic fantasy setting. The game is rather simple and does not require much strategic thinking at all. A more damning error seems to be the cash shop scheme: people with big bags of money can make stronger armies than anyone else.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    MMO In-browser management

    MMO In-browser management is: a game that can be played in your browser. You are taking on the role of some sort of manager, ruler or god and take control of some sort of object. It can be practically anything and most of it is terribly boring. Sometimes you get to lead a nation, other times a sports team. Usually these games revolve around spreadsheets: you have to calculate what the best course of action is and that's it. Some of these games work in 'games', after a month or longer the game is ended and a winner declared. Good in-browser managers make sure there's more to the game, like Ikariam that offered a strong political dimension.

    Most of these games are utter shit. They are boring, uninspired and require you to wait a lot just to do another small adjustment to your spreadsheet. I first wanted to list all these games here, but there are simply too many and they all fuck up in the same way: their homepage offers zero information, most games are exactly the same... except for the setting. So I'm going to say 'fuck you' and just not list them. If you still feel like playing them: god speed.

    Actually: if you are so fucking desperate to play a game like this, go and browse through this blog here: http://bestbrowsergameslist.blogspot.com/ The writer sucks at ABC, spelling, grammar and providing any information, but it's not like I'm going to outdo him and write thoughtful descriptions of these games.

    I also can't believe I wasted an afternoon in an attempt to list all these games. At least I stopped at the letter D.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    MMO Shooter

    MMO Shooter is: a game in which you get to aim at enemies and pull the trigger. The MMO aspect comes from the fact that these games have a character that will not evaporate the moment you log out. Normally you can improve your character by buying gear and weapons and/or by gaining EXP from shooting dudes.
    Alliance of Valiant Arms
    MMOFPS (military setting) with pretty graphics, some fun mechanics and HarshLanguage recommends it.

    Battleswarm
    A shooter/RTS hybrid. Most players fight on the field, one player plays as the enemy and gets to send a zerg at the other players. Unfortunately the creators decided to put a MMO twist to the concept and provide you with items you can loot. Unfortunately the creators also decided that they want to sniff coke off the back of a hooker and the only permanent items you can get cost your real life money. There is also grinding involved..somehow.

    Blitz 1941
    A MMO tank simulator set in the tank clashes between Soviet Russia and the Third Reich. So there's the bad guys and the .. and the communists. Hmm. Anyway, 3D graphics, focus on PvP, option to occupy towns and plenty of ways to deck out your tank to become an unstoppable force of nature.

    Combat Arms
    A MMOFPS in a modern war setting. Score your headshots and rule supreme. Fleck0 said it sucked and that he'd rather play American Army or War Rock.

    Dark Orbit
    In-browser space shooter with a strong focus on winning IRL cash. Looks pretty neat for in-browser.

    Dark Space
    Space MMO that recently went F2P. Fly around in a spaceship and blow up other players or NPCs. To get better ships you have to exploit planets

    DDTank /Yoogames Game321
    Think Gunbound, only up-to-date. Take turns flinging deadly weapons at each others on a 2D field. Playing games nets you experience and money you can use to upgrade your toon. The game is bright and cute and if you know how to aim you'll be successful quickly. Really not all that bad to play for an hour. Game does suffer from a big cash shop that will most likely fuck up any resemblance of balance there was.

    Earth & Beyond
    This private server is all that remains of the glorious Earth & Beyond. It's a space MMO with real time combat focusing on space battles and trading. The original game never came out of beta, despite a big fanbase. Some of the biggest fans have now started a private server and have been hosting the game for a while now. It seems EA Games isn't interested in shutting them down.

    Global Agenda
    A sci-fi MMO-third person shooter. Think Team Fortress.

    Gunz
    This game has been in development for a long time. The artwork looks amazing and the idea of a FPS mixed with an MMORPG is original and exciting. No idea about the actual gameplay, but a lot of people have said that it was fun for a while.

    Heroes in the Sky
    A World War 2 flight sim wherein you join fights through a lobby and duke it out against other players or the computer for loot and exp. Graphics are ugly and controls are very limited, but it's actually one of the better free MMO flying games... which is mostly an indication of how terrible the rest of the pack is.

    Infantry
    A fast-paced top-down shooter in which you order around a group of infantry to victory. If you have a computer from before the year 2000, this game might just work on your PC!

    Manga Fighter
    casual MMO-shooter with cute graphics. Relatively kid friendly. Mostly focused on PvP matches.

    Mars War
    The English version of Welkin 4591, the first Chinese MMOFPS and wildly hailed as the game that comes closest to Planetside. That means huge battles with tanks and lots strategic occupation of areas and shit.

    Parabellum
    Good looking FPS with a terrorists and anti-terrorists. It's a team-based shooter, basically. They're very proud of their customizing options, even going so far as to say that there are "Over 9 septillion possible character combinations". Besides that it has a "global campaign" and you can influence the outcome through individual matches.

    Pawn
    2D MMOFPS. Looks horrible. Best to avoid

    Pirate Galaxy
    A game that doesn't require a client download. You can play through their website. You are controlling a spacecraft and going pew pew on other spacecrafts. For an in-browser game it looks awesome, really. Actual gameplay is a boring point-n-click affair.

    Quake Live
    PA thread
    Open Beta
    An in-browser version of Quake. Since you gain new weaponry/stuff by fighting a lot it kind of plays like an MMO. Make your own character, shoot some dudes, gain access to better weapons to shoot some more dudes etcetera.

    S4 League
    PA thread
    A MMO shooter. You gain levels to unlock weaponry and armour. The graphics reminded Elimination of Jet Grind Radio and Gungrave, omega71 says it's just fun to run around and shoot shit. And lets be honest, what more can you demand out of a shooter? The game is very unfair, however: you buy items that last a few days of real time (so not time you you play the game) so it's pretty much a subscription based game, only you pay a subscription to wear pants instead of log in. =/

    Star Sonata
    Fly around in space ships and pew pew or do some trading. You can also trade slaves, woohoo.

    Star Port
    A 2D space MMO with pew pew. You can also trade stuff, no word about slaves, though.

    Soldier Front
    Boring and dated MMOFPS. Military setting, dated graphics.

    Sudden Attack
    FPS with MMO tendencies. It's basically a Counterstrike clone, but you get to keep stuff between maps. It feels dated and is boring.

    Taikodom
    PA thread
    3D space sim from Brazil. It's like MMO Freespace. Graphics are up to par with EVE, but cartoony. At the moment it's full of spelling errors and it's still in development, but it's already pretty awesome.

    Twinkle Gunners
    Cute shooter with leveling up and items. May or may not be gay porn.

    WarpFire
    In-browser 2D space shooter.

    War Rock
    MMOFPS. Basically free Korean version of Battlefield 1942. Horrible cesspit full of hackers and spammer. Avoid avoid avoid.

    Wolf Team
    MMOFPS. Basically a free Korean version of Battlefield 1942...with werewolves.

    World of Tanks
    A team-based WWII shooter with tanks. Their trailer is funny and they want to do 30v30 tank battles. There's also something about leveling your tank and conquering territory. Seems like there's some quality behind this project.

    Xblaster
    Mech fighting game. Equip your mechs with good equipment, then start fighting (with) other players in a top-down battle map. Earn exp/gold/stuff to further upgrade your mechs. Apparently there are also cash prices involved, so I'd trust this game as far as I can throw it.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    MMO Sports

    MMO Sports are: games in which you play a sport that exists in the real world. How the real world gets translated to the virtual one differs from game to game. Usually these games depend heavily on your personal skill with the buttons, but there are usually also elements of leveling, items and skills. Most of these games are not similar to the real world sport.
    Enblic
    A hockey game with hideous graphics. You play in teams of other players, no NPCs, just multiplayer action with character progression and items tagged on. It plays nothing like real hockey and more like Project Powder and more of these games.

    Fantasy Tennis
    Simple tennis game with the added feature that you can pick up power-ups to hurt your opponent or protect yourself. Cutesy graphics, too.

    FF Showdown
    A football game. The site is pretty much broken and full of Korean gibberish and Engrish. Best to let this one go by ignored in Game&game's portfolio.

    Football Superstars
    A football (soccer) game where you play as 1 player and you get to level him starting from a young age until you're in the Premium League. You can make your own team with other players and NPCs and compete in competitions. Additional features include gear and dressing up in a tux and hanging around virtual clubs.

    Freestyle
    a MMO street basketball game. Graphics are cell-shaded and hip-hop-esque. It seems to be set up like Project Snow, which means you start out with a toon that only knows some moves, but as you play more you'll unlock more moves. The problem is that it doesn't look bad, but the site makes it look like something I can't take quite serious.

    Gold Slam
    A MMO Tennis game. Play matches, make your character better, play more matches and so on. Gameplay wise you move around with the arrow buttons and your racket with asdw. I haven't tried this out, but if they can make it fun to play and worthwhile to level up this might just be an interesting thing for the (Mario) tennis players among us. Engrish is pretty bad.

    KICKS
    Online football game. Has an urban look over it. Probably fun if you like to play football on the streets, but it's raining, or you're not cool enough. Or you aren't muscled like every character in that game. I don't know. It's awesome that games like these are being made, though.

    MLB Dugout Heroes
    MMO baseball game, it's officially licensed, so it won't be complete shit. You create a team, play games with them against NPCs or other players, your team gains exp and you can upgrade them. It has a comic art style and very low system requirements. If you like baseball you might like this, just don't come in expecting a EA Sports title.

    Pangya
    Cute golf game. From their site: "This is the game for those who didn't fit in with the "gaming" crowd. However, this is not just a simple game. As you play, you find more and more things to do, and you will find yourself deeply submerged in the PangYa." Veeeery casual.

    Quick Hit
    In-browser game running on adobe AIR wherein you take the role of the coach. For those who have ever played Madden, citizen059 said that it plays like "coach mode". Playing games earns you points which you can use to level up your coach, which allows him to make his players better and give them more and better skills.

    Shot online
    Anime-style golf game. With equipment to buff your character and what not. Looks pretty fun, really.

    Smash Online
    A casual tennis MMO with cutesy graphics. Play matches against other players and rise in level and become like an online Federer without having to touch any actual balls.

    Ultimate Baseball Online
    MMO Baseball game. Fun if you like baseball.

    Wrestling Game
    An online wrestling manager. In browser.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    MMO MUD

    MMO MUD is: Multi-User Dungeon. It is the predecessor of the MMO. These games do not have graphics, but only text. You type in what you want your character to do and if the game engine allows for it you perform that action. Interaction with other players goes like this as well. Practically all games on this list enforce role-playing: you have to act out the character you created. So if you made an Irish girl with magical powers you are not allowed to talk about your raging erection and that you just ordered pizza.

    Creativity is a must.
    Aardwolf
    MUD in a fantasy setting. Many unique races (half-griffons for example). They don't have original artwork, it's mostly copy/paste'd from other fantasy works.

    Achaea
    MUD in a fantasy setting. Has been live since 2000 and is still receiving support and updates.

    Angels of Fasaria
    Old-fashioned ugly MUD in a generic fantasy setting. Different classes gain exp at different rates, which is just weird.

    Arctic MUD
    A MUD that started back up in 1992. It has PK'ing, full loot and certain items are literally unique, so if someone has a specific shield, no one else can have it, unless they murder that person. If you are nostalgic and old, you might enjoy this.

    ConQUEST
    A fantasy MUD with all the crazy elaborate mechanics you can think of. It is classless, levelless and there's a focus on combat. You improve your character through magical items and character traits. You can re-choose your character skills as many times as you like.

    Discworld MUD
    A MUD based on the glorious books of Terry Pratchett. Various classes and subclasses, shops, houses, newspapers etc.

    HellMOO
    Penny Arcade Thread
    Promoted as a text based MMO Fallout. This MUD says it gives you absolute freedom, meaning you can rape and abuse women to your liking, fuck dead dogs oh and maybe kill some mutants while you're there anyway. This game can best be described as "way fucking old skool, dude!" Check out the PA thread if you feel like raping some dead babies.

    Lost Souls
    a MUD that started in 1990 and is still supported by the developers and is still in development. It's extremely complex, it has a steep learning curve and it's absolutely not for some quick fun. I suppose people who get a raging boner from D&D rulebook will appreciate it.

    Star Conquest: Catalyst
    An old MUD that got revived a while back. Fly spaceships, trade cargo, act like you go pew pew pew. RP-enforced, you don't get to use all features until you make a detailed profile. That'll teach your lazy ass.

    Treshold
    Penny Arcade Thread
    This is a MUD, a text based game. That means there are no pretty pictures to fawn over. The game enforces role playing, if you're not acting in character you'll get warned. If you don't need graphics and don't mind putting a lot of time into coming up with stories of your own you should really check out the PA thread.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    MMO Arcade

    MMO Arcade is: a game that draws on the arcade games of yore. In this genre I have placed beat-em-ups, vertical and horizontal scrolling fighters and games like Asteroids.
    Ace Online/AirRivals
    Penny Arcade thread
    Space Cowboy restarted, this game is a hybrid between a space shooter and a MMORPG. The game has been going strong for a few years with gpotato, but they recently shut it down. Now someone else is going to host it. And deliver a patch for it.

    Armada Online
    Loosely based on the DC game Armada. This is Asteroids the MMO. With giant bio-mechanical enemy crabs. Six races split into two factions. The game is based around several different zones. All zones are semi-instanced, a maximum of 16 players can be in a zone, if you try and join a zone that's full a new instance will start and any other players who join will join that zone. (shamelessly copy/paste'd from Alistair Hutton)

    Battle of Destiny
    A 2D beat-em-up-MMO with a fantasy setting. There's four uninteresting classes (fighter, mage, archer and "fighter" (aka rogue), but the fast-paced combat in which you can make combo attacks should outweigh that.

    Bots
    MMO beat-em-up with robots: build your robot and unleash it on single player maps or in multiplayer with up to 8 players. You can gain levels on your robot to make it stronger, successful combos fill a bar that lets you transform your robot all FLCL like. The game is dated, the combat is uncreative and there is little reward in finishing a mission.

    Cosmic Break
    This one has been out in Japan for a while and now they're releasing it to the rest of the world. It's a fast-paced shooter with mecha-suits. Best thing is that you can make your own suit complete with picking your own skins and everything.

    Divine Souls
    Terrible grindfest beat-em-up with shitty quests, repetitive combat and no interesting features at all. Uninspired classes and clunky movement make this pile of turd the smelliest pile pooped out in a while.

    Dragonica(European version) /Dragon Saga (American)
    PA thread
    A 3D sidescrolling arcade fighter with adorable graphics. Quick gameplay, slaughtering mobs by the dozen, strong focus on teamplay, good graphics, easy to pick up, hard to master. It's being mismanaged into oblivion, but the base game is pretty decent.
    Dungeon Fighter Online
    2D sidescrolling beat-em-up. Opinions on PA vary between shit and the shit. It doesn't look bad. Not available outside North America (boo hiss)

    Dynasty Warriors Online
    A MMO rehash of Dynasty Warriors. Make your own warrior and hack and slash your way through whole armies of soldiers. All fighting is instanced on battlefields and you're often on a timer of max 15 minutes. There is a bit of variety in the quest objectives, but most of the times it boils down to killing lots of soldiers. The localisation and tutorial are well done and you will understand what you're supposed to do sooner rather than later.

    Elsword
    A sidescrolling beat-em-up with a fantasy setting. Truly the weaker brother of the other games in the same sub-genre. We can't have enough of these games, I guess.

    Fists of Fu
    Sidescrolling beat-em-up with cutesy graphics. Gameplay is clunkier than Dragonica, graphics are slightly more dated than Dragonica, story is less interesting than Dragonica, characters are dull and rewards come slowly. The other MMO beat-em-ups blow this one out of the water.

    Get Amped 2
    3D beat-em-up with focus on PvP but also some fights against bots. The graphics look horrible, but you get to edit your own model through the in-game designer. Not that that makes the game prettier, but maybe it does become more enjoyable. The site is full of Engrish, but the main gist seems to be that you play the game like a beat-em-up in arenas, but you can get some better items in the shops when you're done.

    GhostX
    A cell-shaded MMO beat-em-up set in a futuristic setting. This game sets itself further apart from the mainstream by using nano-bots: weapons that you can personalize to your liking, or something. Hit detection is off and combat manages to get boring by having all enemies fall to the ground in 3-4 hits.

    Grand Chase
    Some sort of MMO adaption of Super Smash Bros. You play against up to 5 opponents, you gain experience and levels which allow you to customize your character and gain extra skills/stats/whateveros. In the graphical department it has 3D characters on a 2D background, which looks good enough for the genre, I guess.

    LaMB
    Dystopian MMO in which prisoners are controlled to do the shitty work the rest of society no longer wants to do. Through playing this game you'll find out what happened and you will decide what side to join. It seems to revolve around some sort of arcade games, it's all very vague.

    Lost Saga
    A 3D multiplayer version of Power Stone. It provides fast beat-em-up action, a lot of different characters and graphics that bring a smile to my face. The cash shop is kind of a huge thing, though, so I don't know if it has lasting appeal to folks who don't want to spend money.

    Lunia/IJJI version
    A hybrid between an MMO and a beat-em-up. No auto-attack, no automatic anything. You attack by hitting the attack buttons, you dodge by jumping out of the way. The combat in this game is fantastic, there are a lot of items to improve your character with and there's enough content to keep you busy for weeks.

    ourWorld
    A game with a bunch of mini-games, you gain levels, batches and clothing for playing these. Games include all the usual suspects that used to be on sites like Newgrounds.

    Rakion
    From the old list: Fantasy action deathmatch. Shoot arrows, spells and stab people, or play co-op and stab monsters. Based on the Serious Sam game-engine, and remarkably good.

    Vindictus/EU
    A fast-paced Korean MMO with very direct control over your character, including manual dodging and the like. It looks beautiful, although I'll remain sceptical due to the Korean developer being you know Korean.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    MMO Rhythm

    MMO Rhythm is: a MMO that requires you to have rhythm. Think Guitar Hero.
    Audition
    This is a rhythm game: some music plays and you have to push the right buttons at the right time. Graphics look horrible and they somehow managed to get grinding into a bust a move/bust a groove clone. I am shocked and amazed.

    Dance Groove
    A game based around dressing up fancy and dancing. Site offers no information.

    Dance Online
    DDR for people who like to dance on their keyboard. ~66 songs available, so that's neat.

    R2Beat
    Skate down tracks while tapping the arrow buttons on the beat of the music. Looks ridiculously cute and not really massive, it's mostly clothing you get with races. Anyway, free games wherein rhythm plays a big role are rare so I suppose this might fill the gap in a way.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    MMO Building

    MMO Building is: a game type where you get to create your own content. In some cases there is no context and people just make whatever they fancy, in other cases there is a context that limits what you can make and how things can look. The gaming element comes on the second plane in these games: it's more about creating things than anything else.
    Active World
    Kinda like Second Life, but a little bit more structured. So basically: the internet in 3D.

    Entropia Universe
    in game currency<-->RL money system
    This game tries to market itself as a sort of reality 2.0, but without a crazy AI trying to kill you. No idea what the fun in this game would be, but it had a turnover of 360$M in 2006. They also took a license on the CRY-engine 2. The point seems to be that you live a second life (get it?) and you invest real life money into it and try to make profit by selling your products to other players/business partners.

    Planet Calypso
    in game currency<-->RL money system
    Uses the same engine and business model as Entropia Universe. This time you get to launder your money on an alien planet.

    Roblox
    Build stuff out of blocks and when people visit/use them you earn rewards.

    Second Life
    The internet in 3D. Not much more to say about this that you didn't already know.

    Wurm Online
    Penny Arcade thread
    Tutorial Island Free to Play
    This game...wow. This is probably the most hardcore thing I have ever played. If you die in here and can't find your corpse, you should reroll. This game is based around surviving in a harsh environment through working together with others. Everything you see in the game is crafted by other players. From a compass, to the food you're eating to the castle you stand in front of. Although the game doesn't look stellar, the system requirements are high because it runs in java. See the PA thread to prevent some frustration.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    MMO Racing

    MMO Racing is: Games in which you get behind some sort of wheel or have to move superfast in some other way.
    Drift City
    A driving MMO. Drive around a big city, fulfil quests to become better and better. Looks pretty fun, but the grinding might get on your nerves sooner or later.

    Free jack
    A cool urban looking MMO inspired by parkour. Gameplay consists of timing your jumps and tricks properly and loads button tapping to climb poles and stuff. Races are joined through a lobby. Not as much fun as Project Powder.

    Hovorun
    A cheap looking online version of Mario Kart with none of the charming characters and all of the bright colours.

    Level R / US: HEAT Online
    Previously known as Project Torque.
    A MMO racing game with very shiny graphics. Drive some races, raise to e-fame and get the coolest car, basically. The game has been out for a while and seems to pretty popular among the MMO-less people who had no place to go after the other "car"-MMOs closed down.

    Need for Speed: World
    A persistent online racing game made by the NFS B-team, it appears that most content is locked away behind the cash shop, but there is enough of a game left to casually drive a few races. Also: yes EA is really making a game with a F2P model. Critics shit on this game, it's no where near as good as other NFS titles. Sales are so low that EA has decided to remove all restrictions for non-paying customers, you can now only get faster cars from the cash shop. The grind has not been shortened, however.

    Project Powder/Snowbound
    A snowboarding game. After global warming has melted all snow on earth humanity develops wormgates to travel to planets with snow to play in it. I could play and download it just fine, Mith crashed twice. My mind boggles.

    Racing Star/ Come on Baby
    A simplistic racing game in which you play as a baby. Words fail me and I fear I may have gone a little funny in the head just by gazing at the website.

    Tales Runner
    A MMO racing game in which you control a character and ...well, race. The camera faces your character and then you run as fast as you can without crashing into exotic objects. It looks hideously cute and the oldest character you can play is 21. Probably aims for a young crowd.

    Vector City Racers
    A F2P top-down racing MMO specifically aimed at boys between 6 and 12. It's all in Flash and has simple graphics. Just drive around, collect coins and speed boosts. Perfect for if your little nephew is being a pest and all you've got on your PC is porn and Fallout.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    MMO Other

    MMO Other is: basically anything I couldn't put in a different category. There's a few card games, social games, puzzle games, educational games and survival games on here.
    Afterworld
    A game situated in post-apoc Syberia. Gameplay is of the realistic kind and there's a thing where you can exchange in-game money for real life money, placing this firmly in the 'don't give these fuckers your creditcard' category.

    Alteil
    In-browser trading card game. Cards are made by Japanese artists. Demo made my brain hurt. Gay J-pop tune did not help with that. Arfort tells us the game is a huge money sink and it's only fun if you feel like staring at some manga for a while. In which case, you're on the internet, what's wrong with you?

    AnnihilationX
    In-browser trading card game. This time with a sci-fi theme.

    Blue Mars
    A Second World like game, using the Crytek engine. Most likely a scam, but it looks funny to walk around in for a second or two.

    Dizzywood
    A social MMO focused at 8 to 12 year olds. Loads of mini-games, loads of moderators. Clear and honest information for parents and adorable graphics. I would let my imaginary daughters play this, I think. And I would play too...secretly.

    Elements
    An in-browser card game in which you take on the role of an elemental with 100hp and a deck of cards to summon creatures, cast spells and equip permanent buffs/stuff. First to reach 0 hp loses. There's all kinds of tournaments going on and there's team vs team play along side the normal 1v1.

    Eredan
    An in-browser card game with cards that level up as you play more games. You also get points for every game you win, lose or ace, with more points for acing it. You can sell and buy cards and compete in tournaments.

    My Diva Doll
    A game aimed at young girls wanting to dress up a doll and doing things young girls imagine older girls do: work an awesome job in fashion, flirt with cute guys and dressing all cute like. I will have to be serious here for a moment: this game is obviously aimed at young girls, yet there is no information available for parents and hardly anything on 'how to deal with creepy people' on their forum. I would absolutely not let my imaginary daughters play this.

    Myst Online: Uru Live again
    PA thread
    Remember the impossible point-n-click adventures of Myst? They made a MMO version of it a while back. It absolutely tanked commercially, because it was very complex and slow. Now it has been resurrected as a free game. It's main selling point is exploration: there's a wild world out there and slowly but surely you (and friends if you like) can uncover it, uncover the secrets and have a blast. I mean, if you're into complex serious adventure games, otherwise you'll probably be bored soon.

    Neverdaunt:8bit
    An 8bit game that is a bit like Second Life, only there's some PvE content hidden away somewhere. It's still in beta. The way everything looks has a certain charm over it that I can't quite place. I guess it's the dorky graphics that tickle my fancy.

    Pony Stars
    My Little Pony copyright infringement game. Best to avoid.

    PowerUp
    A free educational MMO game aimed at teenagers. Learn how to save the planet, play some sort of racing game with your friends/strangers and do some other shit as well. Game looks pretty enough and is developed by IBM. I guess it's decent enough if you're looking for something completely different.

    Prize Island
    Cheap knock-off of Puzzle Pirates. Look at the cute little animals on their landing page, LOOK HOW SAD AND SCARED THEY LOOK! We have to save them, let us storm Acclaim's headquarters.

    Puzzle Pirates
    PA thread
    (payment required to unlock all games)
    Tycho and Gabe liked this game. What else is there to know? Oh right. This is a game build around mini-games. You're on pirate ships and you pillage other ships (both PvE and PvP). All of this is done in the form of mini-games like Bejeweled et cetera. Insanely cute and very popular. The game runs in java and runs surprisingly well.

    Quarantine 2019
    PA thread
    In-browser zombie survival game. It's the modern Urban Death.

    Sleuth
    An in-browser detective game where you get to find clues, interrogate suspects and solve cases. This nets you experience you can use to make your detective better at what s/he does. Interaction with other players is limited to sharing items and chatting.

    Spineworld
    A social MMO for young children. It looks extremely cute.

    Urban Dead
    PA Thread
    In-browser zombie survival game. No graphics, just text.

    Urban Rivals
    In-browser trading card game situated in a futuristic metropolis full of factions that fight each other. You have a starter deck, can trade cards for free, earn more guards by leveling or fighting other players. All cards can be leveled up.

    Zombie Pandemic
    In-browser zombie survival game in NYC.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    Promising Titles

    Promising titles are: games that are not out yet, but seem to be really cool. This means that some games that are coming out won't be listed here, purely because I think they are completely uninteresting.
    Ages of Empires Online
    The world-renowned RTS series is getting a free to play MMO-ish game. Apparently it's being made by folks who used to work for Ensemble. Every player owns a capital city placed in a persistent world. You can furnish this town to your liking with stuff you earn during quests. Gameplay is pretty much similar to AoE. So far only the Greek civilization has been shown.

    Battle Star Galactica Online
    An in-browser game with good looking graphics, adjustable avatar, ships, two factions and quests. This game is marketed as the next generation of in-browser MMOs, which makes me veeeeeery cynical, but if only half of these promises turn out to be real it will be impressive.

    Black Prophecy
    A space shooter with role playing elements. The focus is firmly on PvP, but PvE content is also available. The game was supposed to be subscription-based, but with a new publisher a new payment model was picked. I wonder if this is going to result in a better game, but earlier previews showed a really fleshed out and interesting looking game. If you ask me it's going to be one of the games that can prove that the F2P model is economically viable.

    Company of Heroes Online
    World War 2 RTS that has been out in Asia for a while. The game focuses on smaller units and you get to upgrade their gear and add extra soldier as you kill more krautz. It has awesome graphics and THQ and Relic are the companies involved, so it all sounds rather promising to me.

    Firefall
    PA Thread
    Shooter offering a world with 100s of players working together/against each other. Kinda comes off as a lovechild between Halo and Tribes. The game is F2P with microtransitions, it is unclear how free this game will actually be. Time shall tell.

    Glitch
    A project combining world building, digital art and MMO with a large dosis of quirkiness. It's being run by the co-creators of photography site Flickr and will rely heavily people working together to build a culture. Currently in Alpha testing.

    Legends of Qin
    3D MMO set in Chinese mythology. They say they offer quests beyond the 'kill X' or 'deliver Y to Z' and they give a lot of in-game information on these quests. Their site doesn't really tell you how the game plays. Guess *someone* will have to check this one out.

    Metal Rage
    A shooter with mechs making big explosions. There's eight different sorts of mechs with different functions and weapons. The graphics look good, up to 32 players per arena and there's boss fights where everyone cooperates against huge bots. It's a bit unclear whether this game is actually a MMO, but I've been convinced to put it on this list until we can figure it out.

    Picaroon
    Start on an island and conquer all other islands in 3-week long massive games or quick skirmishes.

    Stronghold Kingdoms
    It's MMO Stronghold! Build your castle, man the walls and watch as your soldiers and traps take care of thousands of attackers. Or try and destroy someone else's castle. Build the perfect army to counter all traps and get your army on their walls to set fire to the town centre.

    Three Kingdoms Brawler
    Shameless clone of Dungeon Fighter Online. Which is fine by me, because that game isn't available in my region.

    Tiger Woods Online
    Put balls in holes for free in ten golf courses. Give EA money to put more balls in more holes and to get access to gear and other stuff.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    MMO Free Trials

    Free Trials are: trials for games that cost you money. You can usually play around with them for a few days and that can be a source of free fun too.
    Asheron's Call
    2 weeks trial
    8 years old, but still going strong. Fairly basic high fantasy MMORPG.

    A tale in the Desert
    wiki
    first 24 hours free
    Hailed by many as as the ultimate sandbox* game. By working together with other people you are able to build things. As a community you will have to work towards goals. When you have reached those goals, you have completed a tale and the game moves on a to another tale. There is no fighting in this game, you will have to work together to achieve anything.
    *That was a joke, you know...sand, desert? get it? eh? eh? EH?

    Battleground Europe: World War 2 Online
    wiki
    2 weeks trial
    Play as a soldier in World War 2. Game is apparently very hardcore.

    Dark Age of Camelot
    Penny Arcade thread
    2 weeks trial
    Hailed as the first game to have Realm vs Realm combat.

    Dark Ages
    Free up till level 21
    Interesting little project. Appears to be a sandbox-y game in which the players can form their own lore and politics and culture. It doesn't look very modern, but it has style. Worth a shot, if you're looking for playing something none of your friends have ever heard of.

    DarkSpace
    2 weeks trial
    3D Space mmorpg. Command a few ships and pew pew away. Kinda reminds me of the ugly sister of EVE. No idea if it's more fun to play.

    Dofus
    First 20 levels free
    It's 2D and plays in Flash. It plays kinda like Final Fantasy Tactics, but you only control one character. It's one of the most played MMOs in the market.

    Eve Online
    Penny Arcade thread
    2 weeks trial
    See PA community for more information. Basically, it's a space sim in which you try to do whatever you want to. Penny Arcade's guild is pretty active in politics, but a friend of mine says he has a blast with just mining, hunting pirates down and making a shitload of money by playing the market. Not for everyone, but certainly something you should look into if you like to step away from the high fantasy MMOs.

    Everquest
    Free up till level 10
    Commonly referred to as "evercrack". This was one of the first MMORPGs and it defined the genre. I don't know if this game is still "fun" or if it's more like a study object for aspiring MMO-gurus.

    Final Fantasy XI
    2 weeks trial
    FF has a strong focus on group play, so bring friends/hire friends to play with. The game has a kind of medieval/steam look to it and allows you to switch between classes without having to jump through too many hoops.

    Istaria
    2 weeks trial
    Game looks horrible, company looks to be in bad shape. AVOID AVOID AVOID

    Lineage
    1 week trial, creditcard required
    This is the game that made Korea go crazy. Important to play for aspiring MMO-gurus. Everyone else will be better off with the other games on this list.

    Lineage 2
    2 weeks trial
    Newer version of Lineage, with prettier graphics and slightly less scary for newcomers. It never managed to get as popular as its predecessor.

    Nexus, the kingdom of the Winds
    Free up till level 49
    Small, cute, 2D sprite based MMO. It markets itself as a social MMO. Looks..promising, in a way. Does anyone know anything about this?

    Ryzom
    wiki
    A 4 y/o futuristic MMO with swords. It was free-to-play for 8 months, but now they want your money for this cheap and old-fashioned MMO again. It offers the fairly unique feature of creating your own scenarios to let others play through. The game looks painfully dated, though. It does claim to offer near complete freedom in creating and evolving your character and a living world where mobs have behaviour patterns other than "docile" and "kamikaze".

    Star Wars Galaxies
    2 weeks trial
    This game got a lot of flak from the people who played it in the early days. Sony changed the way everything worked and everyone who was used to the old ways believes the new way is shit (not "the shit" just "shit"). If you look at this game without trying to think about how it could be or how it was, you're looking at a fun MMO in space. Give it a try, some time, if you like Star Wars.

    Time of Defiance
    8 days trial
    MMORTS, games last for weeks. Build a base, build an army and attack other players. Provides a massive world. Don't know too much about how much fun the game really is, but it looks okay-ish.

    Ultima Online: Kingdom Reborn
    2 weeks trial
    the game that started it all, now with updated graphics.

    Vanguard
    PA thread
    2 weeks trial island
    One of the more complex MMORPGs out there with a lot of personal freedom to do what you feel like. The trial island offers one small zone where you can check out the various aspects of the game without being tossed into the huge game world. Although the game had a rough start, anyone who has played it will tell you that they actually did patch it correctly and that it now looks beautiful without making your PC melt.

    Warhammer Online
    lev1-10 (tier 1) free to play
    PA thread
    RvR MMORPG, it has some interesting classes, takes place in the brutal warhammer universe and it has some decent PvPing going on.

    Wizard 101
    free newbie zone
    A trading card game for kids in their early teens. You basically walk around, do quests and what not, but instead of combat you play a card game and when you win you get more cards, exp and other loot. Like what the title hints at it puts you in the role of a starting wizard going to school.

    World of Warcraft
    10 days trial
    The game that almost got my parents divorced. Enough said.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    Additional Information

    Anti-cheating software
    Big developers put their anti-cheating software in the game software itself. Small developers usually do not have the resources for this and buy a license on existing software. It's par of the course for most games and it can be quite annoying as this software can take a long time to load, can soak up more resources than strictly needed and can sometimes block perfectly legal actions. Sometimes the software does not get deleted when you uninstall the game, it can lay dormant in your PC for ages and god knows what it's up to.


    The players
    Free MMOs are full of the following two types of people:

    Those who are too young to pay a monthly subscription
    Those who are too cheap to pay for a monthly subscription.

    As such, the community in free MMOs is, on average, horrible. This is why I advice you play this sort of games together with friends or people you've played other games with. These games can get boring very fast when you play alone, you need others to have someone fun to talk to and do stuff together with.

    Like a game? Make a thread!
    This thread is for all free MMOs, but it's not for in-depth discussions and [lets plays]. If you like a game and want others to play with you the best way is to make a new thread and tell everyone in more detail why the game is fun and why they should play with you. Successful threads have been made in the past for Dragonica, Ikariam, Lunia, SMT: Imagine, Urban Dead, Perfect World, Vindictus, Dungeons & Dragons Online (see SE++) and Atlantica.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    Aldo's Recommendations

    These are games I personally enjoyed for more than 2 weeks and can recommend to you. Although there is plenty wrong with these games, they have provided me with an enjoyable experience and I think you (yes you) will like it too.

    Lord of the Rings Online
    Atlantica Online
    Perfect World
    Lunia
    Shin Megami Tensei: Imagine
    Puzzle Pirates
    Zu Online
    Realm of the Mad God
    Dynasty Warriors Online
    Spiral Knights
    Eden Eternal

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    Glossary

    Avoid: these are games I believe are bad for you. You might get STDs.
    Cash Shop Scam: a game that tries to hook you in the early levels, but then demands more and more money from you to continue getting the same level of enjoyment out of it.
    Cute/kawaii/cutesy: these games give me tooth-rot. They are full of bright colours, cute animals, giggling girls and lollipops.
    RTS: real time strategy (see starcraft, red alert etcet)
    TBS: turn based strategy (see: board games)
    FPS: first person shooter
    2D.: the game only has two dimensions
    3D.: the game has three dimensions
    2.5D.: the game has two dimensions, but you can change the camera angle to look at objects from a different direction

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    reservé

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    Right, that'll do.

    Now the fun part: updating the list with the backlog from the previous thread.

    Aldo on
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    ButtcleftButtcleft Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    You spend way to much time on this shit Aldo

    Buttcleft on
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    citizen059citizen059 hello my name is citizen I'm from the InternetRegistered User regular
    edited November 2009
    You are credit to team!

    citizen059 on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    Buttcleft wrote: »
    You spend way to much time on this shit Aldo
    It's my claim to e-fame, what else am I to do? Get hobbies? Actually play games? Work out?

    Aldo on
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    ButtcleftButtcleft Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    Aldo wrote: »
    Buttcleft wrote: »
    You spend way to much time on this shit Aldo
    It's my claim to e-fame, what else am I to do? Get hobbies? Actually play games? Work out?

    Masturbate?

    Why don't you move all the AVOID games like Evony into their own catagory so its easy to reference the scams?

    Buttcleft on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    I was thinking about that. But it'd illogical to me, because I've only sorted games on genre and alphabet. I also use the world 'avoid' liberally. I mean, Evony is really utter black-death infected shit, but some other games are just...iffy, but I have no idea how much they should be avoided.

    --

    Can anyone figure out if this http://site.apocalypse-board.com/index.html is a MMO or just a multiplayer boardgame?

    *e: While we're here: this isn't actually a game, is it: http://www.bank-rush.com/

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    http://www.bots2.net/aboutbots2.html

    "FIGHT

    You can challenge another bot for battle. Note that this results in a fight 'to the death', i.e. the fighting continues until either one of the bots is destroyed. The defending bot will probably not be online and therefore can not decline a challenge. So your bot can be challenged while you're sleeping. If you have a problem with this, don't play the game. "


    Something tells me no one plays his game.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    Mytheon
    MMORTS by Petroglyph (Star Wars: Empire at war; Universe at War: Earth Assault). You take on the role of a commander who leads his armies against the ancient Gods themselves. Greek, Egyptian and Roman myths confirmed. expected: March 2010.

    1000 A.D.
    Pick a nation and outmanage other players. Games last about a month and then it all resets.

    Armored Legion
    Hideous in-browser MMORPG with mechs. It has been in "open alpha testing" and they say that real-time combat will come "soon". Basically, you walk around on a featureless plain, click on an enemy and you can choose attack. After that you can use skills such as dodge, shield and power shot. It's just terrible.

    Alteil
    In-browser trading card game. Cards are made by Japanese artists. Demo made my brain hurt. Gay J-pop tune did not help with that.


    AnnihilationX
    In-browser trading card game. This time with a sci-fi theme.


    Aurora Blade
    In-browser cutesy MMO that seems to offer all features full-grown MMOs have. Me no understand.

    Aardwolf
    MUD in a fantasy setting. Many unique races (half-griffins for example). They don't have original artwork, it's mostly copy/paste'd from other fantasy works.

    Angels of Fasaria
    Old-fashioned ugly MUD in a generic fantasy setting. Different classes gain exp at different rates, which is just weird.

    Age of Conflict
    Hosts 2 versions of the game Strife with hardly anyone playing them. It seems like someone forgot to tell them to give up and find a new hobby.

    Battle of Gods
    Flash based version similar to Master of Magic.

    Battle Edge II
    Ugly in-browser RPG set in a generic fantasy univer. Site refuses to give any other information on account of "see for yourself ahaha!" ... *facepalm*

    Cosmic Supremacy
    4X game with procedurally created galaxy.

    Aldo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    Page-: you were right, listing in-browser managers was foolish. I just wasted ~3 hours on it and it's just impossible. So I decided to throw it all out.

    I had no idea there would be room on the internet for multiple Cricket management games. And who would have thought people were willing to play a game in which you manage a Counterstrike pro-gamers clan?

    Aldo on
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    CognisseurCognisseur Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    Wow, kudos.

    Cognisseur on
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    NerdtendoNerdtendo Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    You ever consider putting a website together for this, Aldo? I mean, you've got quite the extensive list, and you obviously are interested in feedback from the community. A few decent banners, and your site would probably pay for itself.

    You could make a joke about putting up Evony ads while constantly bashing the game.

    Nerdtendo on
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    PikaPuffPikaPuff Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    can you add to audition's description that it is a bust a move(jp)/bust a groove clone? that's pretty much exactly like BAM's gameplay.

    PikaPuff on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    I'd love to make a website out of this, but I have high demands, not enough free time for my hobbies and a social life and I don't know anyone who could help me make a great site.

    I had my first days off this school year and they've been my best days in months. I've spent an afternoon watching the last episodes of Arrested Development. I've spent a day playing Lord of the Rings Online just grinding out the last virtues I needed and picking up some epics, just so that I'm now fully prepared for the expansion. Today I've spent my whole day making the new Überlist. Tomorrow I'm going to draw and finally put these original historic maps I got on the wall somewhere.

    Anyway, these are the last games I've added to the list. The descriptions aren't very good and I will slowly work my way through the list updating entries left and right to be more cynical or closer to the truth. I feel I've been far to easy on these MMOs.


    Dizzywood
    A social MMO focused at 8 to 12 year olds. Loads of mini-games, loads of moderators. Clear and honest information for parents and adorable graphics. I would let my imaginary daughters play this, I think. And I would play too...secretly.

    Dolumar
    A Belgian in-browser strategy game. They try to make it play a bit like Age of Empires, but I have no idea if they actually succeeded in that.

    War of Titans
    aka: Gladius 2. Providing fancier graphics and more options, War of the Titans seems to be some sort of RPG set in the classical world. Their site is confusing, but I think it's all in-browser and there are gladiators involved.

    Legendary Voyage
    Small indie MMO. It's 2D and looks ugly. The game focuses on discovery. There's all sorts of hidden stuff and when you find it then that makes you awesome.

    Operation-B
    In-browser TBS in a comic setting. It looks ugly, and they have a suicide bomber called Khalid Kaboomaz. It made me groan.

    Perenthia
    In-browser game set in a standard fantasy world. Game's a spreadsheet.

    Sherwood Dungeon
    Ugly in-browser RPG set in a generic fantasy version of the tale of Robin Hood. It looks extremely dorky.

    Star Wars Combine
    A Star Wars game not published by LucasArt. In this hideous in-browser game you play a person living in the Star Wars universe during the movies. You can join in the battles or just play some no-no. Oh, there's also a chance you get to be a jedi. Did LucasArt not sue these folks on account of their game being too shitty or something?

    Syrnia
    Flash-based game in a generic fantasy world. Players get to construct a lot of stuff including houses and shops for other players. It's a very small project, so don't expect too much from them.

    Tagoria
    In-browser RPG in a generic fantasy world. Their "special features" are so completely uninteresting I can only imagine the rest of their game is even more uninteresting.

    Tanadu
    In-browser strategy game with very bright graphics, a good looking website and no useful information about the actual game. Funny how that works.

    Tiny Warz
    Turn-based strategy game where you have a commander unit who you earn exp for and unlock more skills/options with. You also have to buy your own units, salvage them from won battles or buy them from other players. Sounds pretty big for a tiny war.

    Realms of Loria
    In-browser old-skool RPG in a standard fantasy setting. The game has been out since 2003, but the makers still say it is far from finished. Gotta love the small projects.

    War Online
    Combat is played out in turns, but there's an overhead world where you manage your town, train your armies and move around that is persistent. It's clearly a very small project and there were only 10 people online on a Saturday night.

    Warstorm
    In-browser Trading Card Game. Fantasy Setting. Site looks cluttered, card designs are nice. Dunno what to think of it really.

    Xblaster
    Mech fighting game. Equip your mechs with good equipment, then start fighting (with) other players in a top-down battle map. Earn exp/gold/stuff to further upgrade your mechs. Apparently there are also cash prices involved, so I'd trust this game as far as I can throw it.

    Zombie Pandemic
    In-browser zombie survival game in NYC. It's supposed to come out any day now.

    Aldo on
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    NocrenNocren Lt Futz, Back in Action North CarolinaRegistered User regular
    edited November 2009
    Head's up, O2 Jam is dead.
    Dead-dead.
    Deader than a certain parrot dead.

    Nocren on
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    ZombiemamboZombiemambo Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    Kudos for keeping this thing alive. It's a big task and you've done a good job :^:

    Zombiemambo on
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    Dac VinDac Vin S-s-screw you! I only listen to DOUBLE MUSIC! Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    To this day I'm still amazed on how most of my networking class has been playing Evony for a good while now. You'd think someone would have catched on to the shittiness, but it's been four months or something and they are still going strong.

    Then again, not long ago they wanted to come back to neopets so I guess they're actually just dumb.

    Dac Vin on
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    ZombiemamboZombiemambo Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    Oh hey, Sherwood Dungeon! It's actually pretty fun.

    Zombiemambo on
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    AldoAldo Hippo Hooray Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    Nocren wrote: »
    Head's up, O2 Jam is dead.
    Dead-dead.
    Deader than a certain parrot dead.
    Cheers. (:

    Dac: playing together makes a lot of things fun that would be boring if you did them alone.

    *e: zombiemambo, huh, didn't expect that. Where does the quality shiny through in particular?

    Aldo on
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    ZombiemamboZombiemambo Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    ...Or at least that's how I remember it. It's actually not very good at all.

    Zombiemambo on
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    SkulkrakenSkulkraken Registered User regular
    edited November 2009
    Star Conquest: Catalyst

    An old MUD that got revived a while back. Fly spaceships, trade cargo, go PEW PEW PEW a lot. RP-enforced, with key features locked away from new players until they create a detailed profile for their character.

    Skulkraken on
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