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Nexon America Unleashes Massive MapleStory Expansion

North America’s most popular free-to-play MMORPG has released a new expansion ”The Crimsonwood Keep” with new epic storyline and adds original maps, enemies, story-focused quests and weapons.The details are as below: 

Nexon America Inc. unveils one of the largest expansions in the history of Maple Mesos, adding to the continent of Masteria and delivering a truly new gaming experience to one of the most beloved games in North America, with over 5.9 million players.

The “Crimsonwood Keep” expansion delivers a wealth of new content including 31 new maps, 11 unique enemies, 12 extensive, story-focused quests and a collection of new weapons and objects. The updat.e will also give pets an additional skill and improve the user interface with language filter updates and additional platforming features.

Maple Mesos has amassed over 87 million users worldwide by creating a fantastical online world. One of the most popular places in the Maple Mesos World is the continent of Masteria. Here players will get a chance to explore the expanded Phantom Forest, which is filled with leprechauns, wraiths, the Headless Horseman and a new boss monster, Bigfoot.

Players who navigate their way through the forest will reach the Crimsonwood Mountain, featuring numerous new enemies and challenging platform-style game play.

Maple Mesos Story’s popularity has also led to the opening of a new server: Yellonde. To celebrate the new opening, Nexon will award the top 75 ranked players across the first month with prizes!

In addition to all the new content, Maple Mesos delivers the second part of its Summer Break Events, including two exciting video events. Participants can win a wide range of prizes and learn more about the events and expansion at http://maple mesos.nexon.net. 

 At the Austin GDC, an interesting panel took place on the issue of changing business models in MMOs - Free To Play has an easy to read, to the point summation of the panel, which included Robert Ferrari of Turbine (LOTRO), Hilmar Veigar Petursson of CCP (EVE Online), Nicolay Nickelsen of Funcom (Age of Conan), and Min Kim of Nexon (Maple Mesos), reported by KOTAKU.

The details are as below:

Robert: F2P has a huge influence. But we have been based on subscriptions for years, with some games being around for 10+ years. Subscripitions hit a hardcore audience that is really embedded in those games. But as you expand your audience, they aren’t as hardcore anymore and F2P becomes more enticing as subs only wouldn’t appeal.

Nicolay: Both models work. Hardcore gamers are comfortable with sub model and most of the games with microtransactions have been casual games. But it is possible to have more than one biz model in a game.

Min: There is room in the market for both biz models. F2P in North America will make a large push as teenagers can’t commit to ?15/month, so F2P will work well with them. Nexon saw lots of success when the market went beyond core to mass market.

Hilmar: Consumers are changing the business model of games - consumers making decisions. You can play Eve online through our trial program as a F2P program - users are able to “game” our trial system to play it as a F2P game. It’s a challenge for companies to adopt the needs of the market rather than keeping their head in sand. People will play the game how they want.