Im wondering how these asian grindfests are developed....

do they just take the code from lineage 2, slap on a new coat of paint, and call it a "NEW" game?

As long as idiots keep buying/playing these Asian grindfests (where all the males look like femaies, where are the stories involve gaia and some looming cataclysm), the companies will keep making them.

It boggles the mind what crap folks will consume (esp. when it's free).

Oy.

You mean how WoW took the engine from Everquest and slapped a new paint job on it? And how LoTR took WoW's setup and slapped on a new coat?

Lack of originality exsists in western MMOs too, is my point.

Lineage 2 is super huge overseas, it only seems natural for ever other Asian MMO developer out there to try to emulate it in hope of getting a slice of the pie. Just like every western MMO developer is going to try to emulate WoW, because they want a chunk of WoW's subscriber base.

Should do ur research before u keep complaining about asian grindfests!   Asians love the grind rather then the thousands of pointless quests that the western audience likes!

/rant

I'm getting to the point of liking them more and more.  I'd rather work for my XP and lvl progression over a long period of time.  The feeling of actually accomplishing something, yeah the grind can kinda be boring sometimes and does take a long ass time, but it sure beats outs, "go kill 10 boars for 50k XP and lvl up in 10 min." instead of hours or days.

Then whats that go kill 10 black boars now for another 50k XP...yeah fun I got 3 lvls and only killed 20 enemies...oh next quest is kill 15 rabbits for 80k XP.  Whoa that is so fucking boring!

/end rant

i kinda agree with katashi, i dont like to max a toon in a matter of days thats not a challenge for me.. the things that bother me in most f2p games is the lack of support, the goldsellers, the bugs but most of all the item mall.

theres enough western games that are a grind aswell, go ahead and try to get lvl 200 in the free version of AO, i got to 164 and went on p2p cause the expansions offer so much more and its a great game, but the free version is a big grind.

I've played this game since the 26th, when Fileplanet subscribers got early access to the CB build. I'm now a level 15 Defender, with a log full of quests. Yes, quests. I've had to do very little grinding in this game because you're given an adequate number of quests that give good XP, not to mention nice useful gear. And when you've done the NPC quests, there's always the scroll quests you can buy and do, as well as rounding up some friends or guildmates and running a few instances.

So there's a lot more to do in this game than simply grinding out level after level.

You should really avoid the solo-grind in this game.  Its pretty bad.  There are alternatives like the poster above mentioned, although after 18 the quests start to run thin.  Doing instance runs is probably the best method aside from quests just because of how they are designed.

Its pretty hard for this game to take code and models from Lineage II and slap it into thier game and get it out in less then 6 months as you seem to be suggesting.  I mean it does happen in Korea where they take a pre-existing engine slap in art assets bought and call it a new mmo.  But this one has been in production since 2002.  Thats 6 years of development by one of the more successful mmo companies.  Also Gravity LLC has some of the best Customer Service of any mmo company on its released games.

I dunno, I like this game. it definitely brings something new to the table imo. I love the art and style of it. there's many cool lil things too. like being able to cast a spell WHILE moving. or the way your char looks bloody as hell when you're close to dying. the havoc engine is a very nice touch too. and if you have a good pc, the graphics actually blow lineage 2 away by miles.