China’s Internet industry, led by the likes of Tencent, normally maintains a domestic focus. Younger companies such as social gaming outfit Rekoo are now changing that by looking to overseas markets.

Tencent, the country’s largest largest Internet company, has thrived by relying on Chinese customers for its instant messaging service and online games. It is bigger than eBay in terms of market capitalization, yet outside China its services and even its name are mostly unheard of.

By comparison, Beijing-based Rekoo, founded as recently as 2008, maintains 90% of its 400 staff in China but has built up

such a following that it is now the leading social game developer in Japan’s top social network, Mixi. It is also very popular in Gree, a mobile social network in Japan. Rekoo’s popularity among mobile users is set to grow after the company recently agreed to cooperate with KDDI, Japan’s third-largest mobile operator, to setup a mobile social game platform together. At present, the Chinese company’s social games have 2-3 million visitors every day in Japan, its revenue from the Japanese market is several million dollars a month.

Like many of the Chinese entrepreneurs, Rekoo founder Liu Yong started with the domestic market, but soon found it much easier to develop in the overseas market. “The problem with the Chinese market is that the social networks are game developers themselves. There is a conflict of interest. If your games are popular, they [the social network companies] will not help you, and even squeeze you out,” said Liu.

There are at least four popular social networks in China – Renren, Kaixin, Tencent’s QQ and 51.com – each with its own rules. In 2008, their platforms were not completely open for third-party game developers. Kaixin, in particular, depended on its self-developed games to build its popularity and was not ready to open its platform for other game developers. Moreover, users did not want to pay. “Chinese game players have been playing online games for over 10 years. They are spoiled. They won’t pay easily,” said Liu.

Rekoo’s fortunes turned when it looked outside China’s borders. In March 2009, it started to land on Facebook, the world’s most popular social network, and soon found it had hit a gold mine. By the third quarter of 2009, Rekoo was among the top 10 game developers on Facebook with hits such as Sunshine Ranch and Animal Paradise. It had 3 million daily visitors on the network and was earning revenue of US$1 million per month. At the same time, it had 10 million visitors per day in China, but only 1 million yuan (US$150,000) in revenue per month.

Rekoo entered Japan in August 2009. “In June 2006, Japanese social network Mixi got listed. We know each other and I thought it was a good opportunity. Our games work in Facebook, and they should work in Mixi,” said Liu. Sunshine Ranch and Animal Paradise were launched, then Sunshine Deep Sea became very popular.

Liu found out the Japanese market is as big as the US and not only were people as willing to pay but there was much less competition. In third quarter of 2009, Liu decided to focus on the Japan market.

“We are a small company. We could not spread our resources over too many places,” said Liu, “It is easier for us to understand the Japanese culture. Many of us grew up reading Japanese comic books and we know their culture and aesthetic standards. For the US market, most of the time, we can only guess what they like,” said Liu. Strong rivals in the US, such as Zynga, also made Japan appear more attractive to Rekoo.

In one indication of Liu’s determination to succeed in his target country, he started to learn Japanese. Rekoo built up its local presence in Japan to where it now has a 30-person office there – most of the staff being game designers and producers, or involved in customer service, marketing and business development.

Even smaller Chinese startups are having success overseas. Beijing-based Happylatte developed a shooting game called High Noon with only 15 people over a nine- to 10-month period. The iPhone game created quite a fuss in markets such as Singapore and Hong Kong and has picked up fans in Britain, France and elsewhere. So far, it has 2.4 million downloads and about 100,000 people play the game every day.

“Every now and then, we see our traffic shoot up in a particular market, said Happylatte founder Bjorn Stabell. “We don’t know the reason. Our guess is a core group of players pick it up and soon it spreads in a particular country. The game is quite contagious.”

Papaya Mobile, founded in Beijing by former Google executive Shen Si, is also focusing overseas. Before leaving the Internet search company, she was responsible for Google China’s development for mobile technologies. When the iPhone became very popular from 2008, the new platform attracted Shen’s attention and she believed it was time to form her own company. Its aim was to develop social games for mobile phones, and iPhones seemed the perfect platform.

Papaya Mobile, with about 40 employees, has in the last two to three years built more than 10 social games for the iPhone and attracted more than 10 million registered users for its games. Most are from the US, Western Europe, Canada and Australia. On average, its paying users spend about $30 per month.

“In 2008, the most ready mobile platform for game developers was the iPhone, so most of our users are from overseas,” said Shen. IPhones did not become officially available in China until 2010.

Still, in spite of success overseas, most of these entrepreneurs have not forgotten the China market, which has the largest number of Internet users. Both Shen and Liu plan to expand their Chinese business.

“Android phones will be growing fast in China,” said Shen, referring to the Google-developed mobile-phone operating system. “We have developed Android versions of our games for the China market, and we have also established a mobile social game platform, and opened it for third-party developers. So far, it has over 200 third-party games.”

Last year, social networks in China became more cooperative with third-party developers, and Liu’s Rekoo formed a close partnership with Tencent. With the promise of cooperation from Tencent, Liu expected its Chinese users to surge rapidly, from the current level of 5 million visitors per day to tens of millions per day. And he expected revenue in China to grow from current level of 1 million yuan a month, to US$1-2 million a month by year-end.

Zemi Interactive’s Free to play MMORPG 4Story is about refining! For those of you who don’t know, a huge amount of fun from 4Story comes from upgrading and refining items and gear. Refining is basically the function of adding additional stat options to your armors or weapons. Players are able to go to a specific NPC and add on different stat options of their choice to make their strong weapons and armors even stronger!

Since refining is a big part of the game every other weekend ZEMI will throw in a Refinement Event or sometimes even throughout the whole week! The event makes it so that the success rate of refining increases so that the players will have a higher chance of transferring the options they want over to their items. Refinement of weapons and armors does take great amount of work, however it’s that much fun and exciting at the same time! With the help of the Refinement Events players will always have a chance to get the best of options on their items and when you do you can brag about it to all your fellow guild mates or friends! So come and improve your items, get strong, get stronger and be EPIC!

Most of the free to play MMORPGs and MMO Games here on MMOHut originated in either South Korea or China, most of them coming from South Korea. It’s a shame that there are only a handful of Western free to play titles, as the few out there are actually quite good (Battlefield Heroes and Battleforge are the only two that come to mind at the moment). Even though there are hundreds of free to play Korean and Chinese MMOs here in North America there are easily hundreds more in Korea that never made their way to North America yet. Naturally, I got curious. I wondered which free to play games in Korea were the most popular. After asking my Korean friend for help, I came up with the following list:

#1 MapleStory

This one really shouldn’t come as a surprise. MapleStory is enormously successful in both South Korea and In North America. The game boasts over 100 million accounts worldwide. In case you haven’t heard of MapleStory, it’s a 2D side-scrolling fantasy MMORPG with cartoony graphics.

#2 Sudden Attack

This one may be a bit of a surprise to us Western gamers. Sudden Attack is available in North America but it’s not that popular. In Korea though, Sudden Attack is as popular as Counter-Strike. Sudden Attack is one of the major games in the ‘competitive gaming’ leagues in Korea. Graphically speaking, Sudden Attack looks a bit newer than CS 1.6 but worse than CS: Source. It’s currently being published by GameHi in North America.

#3 Kart Rider

Kart Rider was available in North America for a brief period years ago, but disappeared without any proper announcements. The game is a huge sensation in Korea, as some news outlets actually claim that around 1/3 of Korea’s entire population has at one point played Kart Rider. The game is a Mario-kart style racing MMO published by Nexon.

#4 FreeStyle: Street Basketball

This one came as a huge surprise to me. Personally, I’m a big fan of FreeStyle: Street Basketball, but the game isn’t at all popular in North America. It used to be published by Sierra Online here, but they shut it down and GameKiss picked up the service. In Korea, the game is incredibly popular. It has many more features than the latest North American version of the game. As the game’s name suggests, FreeStyle is a basketball themed MMO.

#5 Prius Online

Prius Online is a 3D fantasy MMORPG that’s popular in Korea but not yet available in North America. It’s published by Netmarble and offers a unique pet system. The game actually made the news recently, as a Korean couple actually let their child die from neglect while playing the game at a local internet cafe for hours on end.

Source:

This list was compiled using the top most searched games in Korea on Daum.net. The list changes periodically based on the time of day, so this list isn’t ‘perfect’ but is still useful for getting an idea of what MMOs are popular in Korea. Two other games were extremely popular, but didn’t quite make the list. They were Tales Runner and Dragon Ball Online.

Kids. They’re small, hyperactive and easily distracted by colorful bits of plastic. There’s no doubt that if you own one of these little tykes then you probably show some emotion towards them, maybe even love them, so you may want to introduce them to the things that you love doing; like playing MMOs. It’s likely that alarm bells go off in your head when you think about your ankle biters interacting with a bunch of strangers, as if they are toddling into the Mos Eisley cantina from Star Wars and asking if anyone wants to play hide and seek. There’s also the problem with the amount of violence involved in most MMOs. The majority of the time combat in such games isn’t a bloody affair, with bits of flesh being hewn off, but you still may not want to subject your little dears to games with too much fighting.

Fortunately, MMOs aimed at a young audience aren’t exactly rare. In fact, a study by VentureBeat showed that the most popular games are child oriented, such as Wizard101, Club Penguin and Free Realms – so you shouldn’t be pushed for choice when choosing a suitable game that they will enjoy.

Club Penguin – A Popular Kids MMO

It’s a Kind of Magic

Like most kids, yours probably likes the Harry Potter books, so it’s easy to assume that they would like to play a game that has the same theme. Wizard101 is a free-to-play MMO with the option to pay for more stuff, and it’s very much inspired by Harry Potter. You play as a student in a school for wizards called the Ravenwood School of Magical Arts, where you enrol in a specific school of magic such as fire, ice and balance. The big difference between this game and most other MMOs out there is the combat, which uses a collectible card system to allow you to cast spells on your opponent. This removes any realistic violence from the game, as you’re not going at each other with axes and swords, but instead flinging magical energy at your opponent which makes things much less visceral. The chat system can be limited to preset phrases and parents can set the game so that only trusted friends can freely communicate with your kid.

Wizard101 – Popular Harry Potter style Wizard themed MMORPG

Running Free

If Harry Potter isn’t their thing, or if you can’t stand it yourself, then Sony Online Entertainment’s Free Realms offers an experience more akin to ‘grown-up’ titles like World of Warcraft but with the child-friendly goodness. This fantasy themed MMO is great for kids as you don’t have to engage in combat at all. Instead, your little angel can focus on exploration, mini-games, house-building or just hanging out. Again, you are able to change the chat settings to presets and due to the social networking aspect of the game, like being able to exchange pictures and videos, you have the option to limit what little Timmy can send or receive.

Free Realms – Extremely Popular Kids friendly game. Fun for older audiences too!

Lots of Mini-games

SOE also created the Clone Wars Adventures MMO, which allows your kid to become a character in the Star Wars universe, more specifically the Clone Wars cartoon series. Players get to interact with all their favourite characters (which would be the least favourite to older folk like myself) by playing mini-games like lightsaber duels and taking part in fun events such as costume contests. Both this and Free Realms are free to play with the option of purchasing memberships for extra goodies.

Clone Wars Adventures – A Star Wars Themed MMO Filled with Mini Games

There are absolutely loads of kid-friendly MMOs to pick from, but these are some of the best. They feel more like traditional MMOs than social games like Club Penguin and Moshi Monsters but they still retain the same charm and appeal that kids love.

Another year is coming to a close. 2010 has been a great year for free to play gaming. We’ve seen the launch of dozens of high quality titles, and the conversion of previously pay to play MMORPGs to the free to play model. There are far too many to name here, but lets take a look at some of my favorites. This list will only include games that were released or were converted to F2P this year.

Now without further ado, here are MMOHut’s Favorite MMOs of 2010.

10. Company of Heroes Online

Like several other games that made this list, Company of Heroes Online didn’t technically come out in 2010. Its a slightly upgraded version of the WW2 themed real time strategy (RTS) game that originally released in 2006. The game earned great ratings here, but when THQ wanted to release the game in Asia they had to contend with the fact that practically every video game over there uses to f2p model. With the help of Shanda, an MMO version was tailored for the Asian audience. That MMO version received further updates and is now publicly available here in the USA. Like the Warhammer 40k RTS, Company of Heroes Online focuses more on getting straight to the action, and less on resource/building management. There’s still a pretty steep learning curve involved, especially when playing against other players. Luckily, the original single-player campaign missions are included which gives beginners a chance to train against the AI before facing off against veterans.

9. Pirates of the Burning Sea

Free to play games tend to be simple. They usually a very linear progression path, both in terms of geography and character development. For its depth alone, Pirates of the Burning Sea is a welcome addition to the F2P market. It started life as a subscription game, but made the switch on November 22, 2010. Set in the 18th century Caribbean, Pirates of the Burning Sea includes hand-to-hand swashbuckling combat and naval battles. But its most original feature is the deep, player-driven economy. The only game I’ve played that rivals PotBS in terms of economic depth is EVE Online. Anyone looking for an immersive MMORPG that they can invest months into should check out Pirates of the Burning Sea.

8. Genesis A.D

IJJI publishes a lot of shooters, and Genesis A.D is their latest. Unlike their previous games, this isn’t a modern era tactical shooter. Genesis A.D has a sci-fi theme and a variety of original features like the ability to boost around on jet packs, and perform wall jumps. The guns are also futuristic which is a breath of fresh air. The interface and controls are very similar to those in Alliance of Valiant Arms. That makes this MMOFPS both easily accessible and original. That’s difficult to pull off in the crowded FPS genre.

7. Battle of the Immortals

Perfect World released several games this year, and it has several in the pipeline that are currently in closed beta. Many of PWE’s games have been faulted for being too similar to one another, but that’s not the case with Battle of the Immortals. BOI plays like one of those old school action-RPGs with an isometric camera view. Its point-and-click, but combat is fast paced. Battle of the Immortals has a pretty linear progression path, and auto-navigation makes finding quests & monsters very easy. That makes the game casual-friendly, and very accessible. Some key features include instanced dungeons, an in-depth pet system, and a unique equipment system.

6. Iris Online

Eyasoft is a prolific Korean MMORPG developer, and many of their games have hit US shores in 2010. The best of the bunch in my humble opinion is Iris Online. It’s a 3D fantasy MMORPG with anime inspired graphics, but with a slight twist. It has a Gypsy theme! Plenty of free MMORPGs have added monster transformation features, but Iris Online incorporates them in a more innovative way — through Tarot Cards! The game world will feel familiar to gaming veterans, but the Tarot card themed dungeons and other small touches help it feel a bit distinct. The game has three playable races, each with two base classes to chose from. The varied class and skill specialization features help make Iris Online a solid MMORPG that’s well worth checking out.

5. Allods Online

The graphic style and user interface in Allods Online is undoubtedly inspired by WoW, but the addition of steampunk elements, an original game world, and the overall high production value help it stand out from the typical f2p grindfest. Allods is developed by a Russian studio, and perhaps that explains the some of its uniqueness. The game has slower, but more steady pacing than most Asian developed games. Allods has two warring factions, but the action isn’t limited to terrestrial combat. Players can take to the air and fight it out on air ships. When the game was first launched in North America, it caused a scene with its cash shop. Most of those problems have been ironed out by successive patches, so anyone whose held off on the game should use their holiday downtime to give it a spin.

4. EverQuest 2: Extended

in 2010 SOE has followed Turbine’s move into the free to play market. First with animated games like Free Realms and Clone Wars Adventures, but most importantly, with a total f2p conversion of their EverQuest 2 title. EverQuest 2: Extended exists in parallel to the subscription based service which is still up and running. This arrangement means current subscribers are kept happy while a whole mass of new gamers are allowed to experience the world of Norrath with no up-front costs. EQ2 has years of development behind it, and is truly ‘massive.’ There’s a huge world to explore, plenty of races and classes to chose from, and deep character customization options to tinker with. Expect many other MMORPGs in SOE’s portfolio to make the F2P switch in 2011.

3. Need for Speed World

Many of the games on this list are MMORPGs, but Need for Speed World didn’t make the list simply for diversity’s sake. It offers top-notch graphics comparable with what you’d find in retail games today. Its also easily accessible and is part of EA’s larger push into the free to play market. As a well known racing franchise, Need for Speed World has broad appeal, and gameplay that gamers of all ages are familiar with. It doesn’t have as many RPG elements as a game like Drift City, but it still has a large persistent-world city to explore combined with instanced races. Customize cars, race on urban tracks, and experience the future of PC gaming.

2. The Lord of the Rings Online

With the success of Dungeons and Dragons Online F2P conversion, we here at MMOHut suspected that it was only a matter of time before many other subscription based games made the switch. Still, LOTRO was in much better shape than the distressed DDO. Turbine decided to make the switch purely to boost revenue, it wasn’t an act of desperation. Their second bet on F2P paid off and now The Lord of the Rings Online is more popular than ever. But LOTRO isn’t just notable for its p2p-f2p conversion, it also has the advantage of being tied to a very popular franchise. There’s a lot of lore to draw from, and Turbine has a done a great job making LOTRO more immersive and story-driven than most other MMORPGs.

1. Vindictus

Vindictus was originally known as Mabinogi Heroes since it was set in the same Celtic themed world as Mabinogi. But the name change made sense since the two games are vastly different. Vindictus is powered by the Source engine and has high end graphics, realistic physics, and fast paced action oriented gameplay. The game has persistent world towns, but players head off into instanced adventures via longboat. Vindictus stands out both for its quality, and originality. Its a fun game and well worth checking out, especially for gamers looking for something different.

Oh internet, whatever would we do without you? Once upon a time if I wanted to play a board or card game I had to use something called a ‘telephone’ to ‘call’, as it were, a friend to see whether they were free to play. Needless to say that when I first started playing Magic: The Gathering, arguably the world’s most famous collectable card game (CCG), I had very few opponents. But then the internet came along and basically eradicated the need for face-to-face play (although playing the physical game is always better in my opinion). Now if I want to play some Magic: The Gathering at some unholy hour, in my robe, I know that I can log on to Magic Online and start flinging spells. However, if you don’t fancy forking out a wad of cash for the privilege of playing Magic Online to its full potential never fear, for free alternative CCGs await you in the amazing universe of the intertubes.

It’s a kind of Magic

If you’re wanting a game along the same lines mechanically as Magic then you might want to give Ederon a spin. Like MTG, Ederon is all about wearing your opponent’s health down to zero before she does the same to you. Instead of pitting creatures against each other, players attack with weapons, whilst trying to block their foe with their own weapons. The mechanics are a stripped down version of MTG, making Ederon a great game for newbies to the genre to get their teeth into. If you fancy a challenge then you can take part in a ranked match, but there is the option to play friendly games too which don’t count towards your overall score. Ederon is fast, furious and a lot of fun.

A whole new world

But the world of CCGs is a big place, so perhaps you want to broaden your horizons. As far as high quality browser CCG MMOs go, Urban Rivals takes some beating. Sporting some fantastic artwork, Urban Rivals is all about collecting and levelling up character cards. Your character might begin as a weak, scrawny little wisp of a thing, but once levelled up to its maximum it will be a force to be reckoned with. The rules are easy to understand and can be picked up quickly. Each player has a selection of character cards on their side. The aim is to attack the opponent’s cards with your own to reduce the opposing player’s 12 life points. You can use ‘Pillz’ to give your characters a bonus to attack, but with a limited supply of these babies you will need to think tactically when best to use them. Aside from the battles themselves, Urban Rivals allows you to train up your characters to gain XP and you can also accept missions which you unlock as you progress.

When two worlds collide

What if you want a more animated CCG? After all, you’re no longer restricted to just little cardboard rectangles when you’re playing online. BattleForge is a mighty hybrid of RTS and CCG with both PVE and PVP modes. Playing cards gives you access to units that you can move around the battlefield to complete objectives. You can also summon defense towers and cast spells with your deck, each of which costs points that can be acquired by capturing power wells. Your 20 card decks can be customised to your heart’s desire depending on your play style. You’re also able to trade cards, however you can also purchase new cards with points that can be bought from the cash shop. If you’re a fan of RTS or CCG, BattleForge is worth your time.

There is a fair amount of MMO CCGs out there for you to explore, many of them free. While I’ll always enjoy sitting at a table and playing a game more, the convenience and inexpensiveness of online CCGs makes them a good alternative if you can’t get friends around.

How do you think MMO CCGs compare with the real thing? Can you recommend any to other readers?