Dungeon Fighter Online!

[Lekon]

Alright, as before, Lekon finds a strange and fun game. This time, he brings forth...

DUNGEON FIGHTER ONLINE

...a translated Korean Free To Play game, that as of yet, doesn't even have a cash shop.

Now that I've scared off a number of you from "Ew! Korean! Ewwww!" take a look below. Both videos captured by me, and well, of me! Yes. it's a mash up of an RPG and a Brawler. Double Dragon and Diablo. Golden axe and Guild Wars. It's a RPG Brawler MMO, though I use mmo vaguely.





The game is amazing, and starts open beta this Tuesday or so, (22nd), so give it a shot and hell, throw up some vids of your own here. The ones above were of me with a group of four players, and one of me with a high level NPC version of a player class.

Linky to DFO main Site

Mechanics wise, you pick from one of five classes (that later change into separate "upgraded" classes based on a quest) each with their own style. That's part of the fun though. The mage plays almost nothing like the priest, who's barely anything like the gunner, etc.. Slayer/fighter have a bit in common though, just one's quicker, one's got wider hits. The combat's fast paced, and many quests are based around things like time trials or kill counts, so they are fairly easy to stack up.

Now, the downside: the game has some issues still that need work. Some annoyances as well. It's only in small screen, so playing windowed on anything but a laptop isn't the best idea. It also has no ignore feature. You can type /ignore name... but it doesn't *do* anything to add someone to a block list, they still keep spamming, so yeah, on several channels, gold-spammers are out in force.

Teaming is awesome or awful. Most often it is a hit, with everything working wonderfully. However one laggy bastard can screw it up. Fortunately everyone can see who is lagging by a little flashing icon under their portrait.

Other annoying problem, more as a warning for anyone who tries this game come the 22nd. You can only create 2 characters per day. I have no idea why, but just.. well, chose wisely that first day. There's also a limit to how much dungeon crawling each character can do in a day, but unless you are hardcore playing with only one guy, you probably won't hit that barrier too soon.

Edit: Almost forgot: it has a Profanity filter you will learn to hate. Fast. It counts spaces as a word, so saying "about it" makes it think you're saying tit. *gasp* A lot of people are starting to type their-messages-like-this-to-avoid-it.

Despite the annoyances, the game is amazingly fun.

Edit 2: Wiki Links for game info!

DNF Wiki

DFO Source Wiki

DFO World

[Ravenlock]

I mentioned on the PAX podcast that I tried this out and had a surprisingly good time with it - I was expecting it to be a throwaway MapleStory-esque thing, but as you said, it's actually much more Final Fight meets Diablo. And that's a good thing.

I don't think it's a game I would pay for, but for mindless monster-thwacking, I endorse the idea.

[Lekon]

Originally Posted by Ravenlock

I mentioned on the PAX podcast that I tried this out and had a surprisingly good time with it - I was expecting it to be a throwaway MapleStory-esque thing, but as you said, it's actually much more Final Fight meets Diablo. And that's a good thing.

I don't think it's a game I would pay for, but for mindless monster-thwacking, I endorse the idea.

Indeed! As far as I've read, the only things that are "pay for" are extra life tokens(Basically like "Continue?" option in an arcade game) or clothes. Neither of which I'd be likely to use.

So, as of this moment, I can heartely endorse it. IF the cash shop starts charging for every uber item that gives you an edge, believe me, Ill be the first to say something here.

[Superman's Dead]

This sounds really cool...does it need a fast connection for everyone not to hate you?

[pseudopseudo]

I'll definitely be checking this out. Not like I need another reason to be tethered to my computer... but it looks like a lot of fun.

[Lekon]

Originally Posted by Superman's Dead

This sounds really cool...does it need a fast connection for everyone not to hate you?

As far as I've seen, you can get by on any sort of broadband, even DSL or whatnot, as the game does p2p connections once you go into a dungeon with a party, with everyone splitting up the hosting. This can suck when one person goes wonky for a bit though. I've had a download from gametrailers going on in the background with no trouble, and Shrinn, who's connection is the worst on earth, was able to play solo just fine.

[Panthera]

I want to play this, but it won't connect to the server.

[Lekon]

Originally Posted by Panthera

I want to play this, but it won't connect to the server.

Because its not up yet. Its only on "early start" so far. Without an early start key, no dice. On the 22nd, everything opens up.

[LongStepMantis]

I'll have to try this out. I love me some beat-em-up action. Adding RPG elements is just icing.

And while it's good to know that the "real moneys" portion of the game is slight now, we all know it's a question of when, not if, they start gearing it more and more towards paying players with each update. It's the way of free online gaming. It can take a while though, so why not enjoy it before it goes to shit.

[OrangePulp]

I've enjoyed it so far. My one gripe is that it has no real gamepad support; Might end up going with my pad and JoyToKey after all.

[Lekon]

Originally Posted by LongStepMantis

I'll have to try this out. I love me some beat-em-up action. Adding RPG elements is just icing.

And while it's good to know that the "real moneys" portion of the game is slight now, we all know it's a question of when, not if, they start gearing it more and more towards paying players with each update. It's the way of free online gaming. It can take a while though, so why not enjoy it before it goes to shit.

Well, on the plus side, this game has been out over 2 years now overseas, its just now coming to America, and they still have their cash shops just being clothes, life tokens and skill resets. Of those 3, the only really unbalancing thing might be the skill reset, though I honestly don't know how they work.

Also, nice job guys. You broke one of the wiki's I posted.

[Shrinn]

Here's a video of me playing on my super craptastic packet shaped port blocked on campus connection.

I'm also really bad.

Level 6 slayer.



EDIT: You can turn that auto-zoom off.

I can't say enough good things about the game. It's super fun and Lekon did a really good job selling it while telling you guys about its downsides.

[LordDon]

Everyone had a DFO bag at PAX so they certainly advertised well. I gave it a shot and I'm having a blast so far. I love me some RPG beat-em-up.

[Hotcod]

looks interesting, i'll have to try it out turns out i already have an account with them for some reason lol probably some other f2p random game

[Shieldmaiden]

I'll give it a shot, it looks like a lot of fun.

[Karmakin]

I'm planning on giving this a shot on Wednesday. I've been looking forward to it.

[LongStepMantis]

Originally Posted by Lekon

Well, on the plus side, this game has been out over 2 years now overseas, its just now coming to America, and they still have their cash shops just being clothes, life tokens and skill resets. Of those 3, the only really unbalancing thing might be the skill reset, though I honestly don't know how they work.

Also, nice job guys. You broke one of the wiki's I posted.

I just mean that all free games I've played, when they start to decline in popularity, shift more and more into the pay model. I don't blame them, it's just the way it is. If you lose a large portion of your base (and therefore a large number of cash paying customers) they have to make ends meet somehow. In most cases, they whore out pay options increasingly more and more until, in their twilight days, almost everything you can do requires payment. Then, the game dies.

This game hasn't had nearly the time to stagnate into that mess, especially since this is the opening days for our region.

[Lekon]

Originally Posted by LongStepMantis

This game hasn't had nearly the time to stagnate into that mess, especially since this is the opening days for our region.

I couldn't agree more with the rest of what you wrote. I've seen it happen before too.

This same company does Maple Story, so they probably aren't hurting for cash. Two of the classes we have weren't in the original DFO at launch, but added later, and over in Korea/JP, there are 2 classes we don't have access to (yet) and 3 more "Acts" of story/quests that are coming over soonish.

The two classes that are coming to America are a Female Gunner, and a Thief/Ninja character.

Also, since I've been asked: The record video feature is a ton of fun. It is literally click one button to start it up, then press the "stop" button to stop recording, and it saves to an AVI file, all ready to be uploaded to youtube.

Servers are down for now, but there's a note saying open beta starts tomorrow (22nd) at 10am.

While checking the forums, I found this lil gem. If you type the ] (Right bracket) you will get a listing of all open parties nearby, and let you join them, or create your own. This helps as you can just kill general chat and avoid the spammers while searching out a party.

Really wish I'd known about *that* sooner.

[nixpayn]

I'm downloading it now. looks like it could be a fun once in a while game.

[LongStepMantis]

I'm preparing to sign-up and download, but how in the hell is this game over a GB in size? I'm sure it's pretty large in scope, but really?

Not a huge deal, but I seriously expected a couple hundred MB install, tops. I'm just curious how that is. Especially since they say you need 5GB of HD space minimum, and 10 GB maximum...that seems huge for something like this.