Nexon looks new massively online games

Nexon Korea Corp. said Thursday it is developing a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) that can be offered not just on personal computers, but also on Web-connected portable devices, such as smartphones and tablet PCs. To make dense and complex MMORPGs equally available for mobile devices and to attract casual gamers, a senior game developer at Nexon said, the "Blood of Three Kingdoms" simplified game controls and significantly cut the amount of information displayed on screen. "With densely packed letters and buttons cluttering the screen, MMORPGs looked a like high-tech application rather than a game," said Kim Tae-gon, a vice president at Ndoors Corp., a game developer acquired by Nexon last year. Kim was speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the G-Star game trade show that kicked off on Thursday for a four-day run. In MMORPGs, thousands, sometimes millions, of gamers simultaneously play virtual characters who undertake a series of quests in a cyber world, usually set in the medieval Europe. These big-scale MMORPGs usually take several years of development and require users to learn massive amounts of information, as plots are epic and quests pose more complex and difficult challenges to keep gamers engaged. "Users were entertained in the beginning," Kim said. "But they also began to feel jaded with these elements." Kim said the Three Kingdom hopes to set a new example for MMORPGs that has intricate storylines but also is not too difficult to play. From its conception in 2009, the Three Kingdoms aimed to lure first-time players who do not necessarily see themselves as gamers. Grandparents and relatives of the Three Kingdoms developers have been testing the game to provide feedback from people who do not see themselves as gamers, Kim said. Targeting rapidly growing use of smartphones and tablet PCs by potential gamers, Three Kingdoms will be available on any Web-connected device. "In the future, the new form of MMORPGs will be the Web," Kim said adding that the upcoming game can be played on any device connected to the Web. "We are making our priority the iPhone because its screen is small." The Three Kingdom, which draws plots and characters from the Chinese historical novel "Romance of the Three Kingdoms," is scheduled to be released next year.