Ragnarok Online

From FAS Virtual Worlds Almanac

Ragnarok Online
Developer(s)	GRAVITY Co., Ltd.
URL	http://www.ragnarokonline.com/
Software license	Proprietary
Status	Active
Platform	PC
Type	MMORPG
Minimum Subscription Cost	warning.png"{{{minimum_cost_currency}}}" cannot be used as a page name in this wiki. 12 Per month
Free Trial	Yes
Year released	2005
Avatar-based	Yes
Multiuser	Yes
Interactive	Yes
Immediate	Yes
Persistent	Yes

Use and Demographics
Primary use(s)	Community, Gaming
Type	MMORPG
Target Audience(s)	Teenagers, Adults
Language(s)	Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Japanese, Korean, Russian, Spanish

Features

Graphical and Content Features

Communication

Management and Privacy

Ragnarok Online (라그나로크 온라인), often referred to as RO, is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game or MMORPG created by GRAVITY Co., Ltd. based on the manhwa Ragnarok by Lee Myung-jin. It was first released in South Korea on 31 August, 2001 for Microsoft Windows and has since been released in many other locales around the world. Much of the game's mythos is based on Norse mythology, but its style has been influenced by Christianity and Asian cultures. The game has spawned an animated series, Ragnarok the Animation, and a sequel game, Ragnarok Online 2: The Gate of the World.

Contents 1 Screenshots 2 Setting 3 Job System 3.1 Class progression 4 Player vs. Player (PvP) 5 Ragnarok Mobile 6 Kafra Shop 7 F2P server 8 Private servers and emulation 9 References 10 External Links 11 In the News 12 Scholarly Research

Screenshots

Setting

Ragnarok Online is divided into a series of maps, each of which has its own terrain and native monsters, though many monsters are native to multiple regions. Transportation between maps requires loading the new map and monsters cannot travel from one map to another.

There are three major nations in Ragnarok Online, the first of which and where all players start is Rune Midgard. The Schwaltzvalt Republic, an industrialized neighbor to the North, was added in Episode 10^[1] and Arunafeltz, a religious nation modeled after a combination of Israel and Turkey is the subject of Episode 11.^[2]

A series of other, minor nations also exists, generally modeled after an ancient society in the real world, examples such as Amatsu, which is modeled after ancient Japan,^[3] and Louyang, which is modeled after ancient China.^[4]

Areas from Norse mythology are also included, such as Niffleheim, the land of the dead, and Valhalla, where players can become Ragnarok Online’s Transcendent Classes. New map content is constantly being added to game in the form of Episode updates.

Job System

Jobs are one of the most important aspects of Ragnarok Online, as the job a player chooses will have profound implications on his or her strengths and weaknesses, both in a party and outside of one. The job system includes a total of 39 different jobs, divided into 6 categories: Novices, Super Novices, First Job Classes, Second Job Classes, Transcendent Classes and Extended Classes. First classes consist of six basic archetypes; Swordman, Magician, Archer, Acolyte, Merchant, and Thief. Each specializes in certain skills, and uses class-specific weapons and gears. The list of job classes are as follows:

Novice
Novice
Super Novice
	First class
	Swordman		Acolyte		Mage		Thief		Merchant		Archer		Taekwon Kid		Ninja	Gunslinger
	Second class
	Knight	Crusader	Priest	Monk	Wizard	Sage	Assassin	Rogue	Blacksmith	Alchemist	Hunter	Bard / Dancer	Star Gladiator (Taekwon Master)	Soul Linker
	Transcendent
	High Novice
	Transcendent first class
	High Swordman		High Acolyte		High Mage		High Thief		High Merchant		High Archer
	Transcendent second class
	Lord Knight	Paladin	High Priest	Champion	High Wizard	Professor (Scholar)	Assassin Cross	Stalker	Whitesmith (Mastersmith)	Creator (Biochemist)	Sniper	Clown / Gypsy
	Third classes[5]
	Rune Knight	Royal Guard	Archbishop	Sura	Warlock	Sorcerer	Guillotine Cross	Dark Chaser	Mechanic	Generic	Ranger	Minstrel / Wanderer

Class progression

All players start in the game's first class, the novice. Novices are, as their name implies, largely a tutorial class built for allowing new players to get the general feel of the game. Once reaching a level goal, players can change to one of six first classes, or choose one of the expanded classes, along with Super Novices. Upon reaching another level goal, first classes can then change into one of two second classes. Once the player reaches base level 99 and job level 50, they can elect to "rebirth" their character, and relevel as a transcendent class, which has more skills and a larger number of status points to work with, although the experience curve is much higher.

A player will change jobs multiple times over the course of playing, though the number of changes will be determined by choices made by the player.^[6]

Player vs. Player (PvP)

Player vs. Player in Ragnarok Online takes place on a series of maps identical to the game's major towns but devoid of all exits and non-player characters. Access to these maps is restricted to players level 31 and above and comes in two modes: Yoyo Mode and Nightmare Mode. The primary difference between the two modes concerns the penalties for dying; Yoyo Mode has no penalty for death, while Nightmare Mode has the experience point loss found in all non-PvP/town maps and the additional risk of the loss of a piece of equipment.^[7]

Ragnarok Mobile

Gravity Co. Ltd. released 8 separate games for the mobile phone allowing players to experience the game on the road. Each version focuses on the main aspect of the acolyte, thief, merchant, mage, archer, and swordsmen class based on the version of the game they have. Players are able to advance their characters using the attributes STR, AGI, VIT, LUK, INT, and DEX. Though not placed in the server, players control their character and complete a series of quests or tasks. As players earn zeny, (the in-game currency), they are able to send the zeny to their real accounts. Along with that, a ranking is present where characters are ranked by the amount of zeny the character has.^[8]

Kafra Shop

As Microtransactions have become an increasingly favored revenue stream over monthly subscriptions for online multiplayer games, the Kafra Shop (an Item Mall) was added to iRO (International Ragnarok Online) on June 19 2007. Users are able to purchase Kafra Credit Points with U.S. dollars as a currency for the special items limited to the Kafra Shop.

This service appears on most other localized servers of Ragnarok Online such as jRO (Japanese Ragnarok Online), idRO (Indonesian Ragnarok Online), pRO (Philippine Ragnarok Online) and kRO (Korean Ragnarok Online), using the currency of the respective countries for points instead of U.S. dollars, of course. In addition, upgraded forms of normal equipment can be rented using Kafra Points.^[9]

F2P server

There are official "Free To Play" servers where players can play Ragnarok Online free of charge, with a few differences in game play. Major differences are the limited use of the Kafra Teleport service, upgrading RO weapons and armor never have a "safe zone" in which you cannot break the Weapon/Armor, items have had their costs changed or been removed entirely from the game, the Acolyte skill Teleport has been modified, and prices on certain NPC items received a moderate increase. Changes vary from server to server.

The use of free servers has resulted in a higher reliance on the Kafra Shop item mall for revenue stream. Many localized versions of Ragnarok Online have implemented free servers during 2007-2008.

Private servers and emulation

Ragnarok Online's official server software is called AEGIS, which is used by iRO, kRO, euRO, phRO, bRO and other local versions. Several server emulators have been developed for use in hosting private servers. Regardless of the legalities, many private servers are active today, and it is debatable whether or not their existence has created a loss of revenue for legitimate official servers. With many official servers changing over to a Free-to-Play with cash shop revenue model, their future viability is called into question. Although many private servers have no donate-for-advantage models, some players feel more secure in the environment. Server emulation follows the development of the Korean version, thus they often contain more recent updates than other local versions, although quality is often far below that of the official servers.

One of the main differences between official and private servers is that the rates are often modified in private servers to make it faster for the players to level, or to obtain specific items. Sometimes private servers also modify original content, add new items, and implement a donation system to make money out of these custom items. There are servers that implement a new job by deleting an original job (e.g. Padawan, Jedi). Adding or deleting maps is also very common in private servers, as well as relocating NPC's (Non-Player Characters) to a common area. In addition, there are some private servers that try to imitate official servers by staying as true as possible to the original game.

References

External Links

• Ragnarok Online Official Site
• iRO Wiki, an English language free content wiki, has information related to Ragnarok Online
• Nifelheim - Ragnarok Online World Fan Site

In the News

Scholarly Research