By Donna Desborough

Arcade RPG action is what the soon to come MMO Lunia: Record of Lunia War boasts. An anime inspired piece of visual beauty this soon to be released game has just entered open beta and I had a chance to ask the developers some questions about their creation.

MPOGD: The art of Lunia is very reminiscent of Japanese anime and manga. Where have you drawn your inspiration from for the art and look for the game? Were you trying to emulate a certain style or feel?

When we first imagine exciting action, combo-oriented game "Record of Lunia War", we thought it should be very pleasant and delight game. So, we decided "Sieg" as the main character who is very fit to pleasant adventure. At that time when we decide main character, it hit us that the main character's appearance might be like "Dragon quest" or "One-piece" - they are all Japanese anime. All team member agreed that main character of delight adventure would look like exact same to the main character of those animations. Moreover, popular animation "Dragon ball" is read all around the world, so Japanese animations are not just familiar with only Asia, but also they are very acceptable to all gamers around world. So we don't have to hesitate to decide Japan animation style game.

The game that player becomes the main actor of a delight and pleasant animation, and plays the most exciting action! That was our graphic concept goal that makes our distinction against all the other games in aspect of graphic concept.

MPOGD:  Just how open is the character growth? What kind of things will you be able to do to make your character unique and grow with the player as they progress?

The basic structure of Lunia's skill system is not very different from other MMORPGs. Players can grow the skill point what they want. With specializing the skills in some types such as damage or speed, players can choose the way how they make their own character as a damage-oriented character with one big skill or as a speed-oriented character with short combo skills.

But more interesting part is that players can create their own combos with those skills. Just like fighting games - Tekken or Virtua Fighter -, player can fight in very different way although they operate same characters. This is the game which makes different character because players' combos are different, not because the game developer makes different skill sets. That is why we call this game as the "Arcade RPG".

MPOGD:  What is the Arcade Action Control that is used for the PvP? How is it different from the standard mode of PvP? How is it better? How does it work?

Why don't you imagine the PvP combat scene from the point of MMORPG player's view? It would be like this: there are characters who stand besides enemy team's characters with automated sword slashing (they also miss or bash randomly), and players push the skill button at the appropriate timing.

Now, let's imagine the combat scene from the point of fighting gamer's view : Players will control their lever and push buttons to succeed their combos to enemy character. To hit good combos, they always decide every situation including psychological fight.

The PvP of Lunia War enables players can fight each other with the fighting game style in MMORPG game. In other words, this is the massive role playing PvP in arcade action style.

MPOGD:  Players constantly ask for content updates from the makers of the MMOs they play. Usually the easiest way to this need for content is to add more quests. You currently at having many different types of quests. Where's your room for improvement? How will you expand on your quest structure and quest types?

The present quest system in Lunia is the normal style quests that fit to game story and item like the other mmorpg games. This fertilize the game contents and play, and as we thought this style of quest is the basic system, we made this style first.

However, as Lunia is representing "Arcade RPG", we are planning to add new style quests that players haven't seen in other mmorpg games.

Now, we are working on the "Hidden quests." Using stage system which is one of the distinctive feature, we try to make our own style of hidden quests. Players can find hidden (secret) spots in the stages like console games, and you can get hidden quests there! Or players can get hidden quests when they meet special conditions in stages. With these, we try to give different joy when players enjoy stages more and more.

More than these, we are thinking we will make "Arcade style quests" in some day. Like console action games, this quests will require meeting some action conditions such as "make 10 air combos" or "clear this stage in 5 minutes." We hope we can provide new style quests that players haven't experience in mmorpg games.

MPOGD: The story in an MMO is one of the finer points for many players. Just how much will players be able to get involved with the stories and lore? Will they be able to help its development along?

The storyline of Lunia War is designed to follow one fantasy tale. We hoped players can enjoy story just like Japanese animation with following stages. So, in principle, players cannot create their own storylines, but we are looking players' reactions to make storyline funnier as episodes or quests go on.

MPOGD: Events within an MMO can help keep things interesting and players interested. What kind of events are you planning to run? Will you be running events that require direct interaction with GM characters or a more automated system?

Events in Lunia war is based on Stage or Items. Players can enter some special stages with special conditions, and they meet special monsters and missions to meet their event goals. Or players can get special items from monsters in event period, and sometimes they should combine items to make some special items. Lunia is the game that players join the stages in small party to clear stages, the most appropriate events are those that use stage systems and arcade style game play. It means automated stage system.

MPOGD: The character classes seem very limited currently. Will there be a move in the future to expand the character classes? What other types might you choose? Why are there so few currently?

We will add characters continuously with characteristic action styles. Thief, doll summoner, and monk characters are planned, and other characters will be added watching user reactions.

The most important things we focused at while making Lunia is to make players feel 'totally different' when they play other characters they are used to. We thought it is impossible when we just follow the game play that is pressing skill button while characters are slashing swords automatically. So we tried to make totally different action style among characters. Players should make efforts to get used to one character because every action timings is different, so it differentiate combo commands and combat styles to different characters. This makes us to create one character difficult, so we could make only small number of characters, but we achieved our goal - 'different game style between characters'

Besides this, we hoped Lunia becomes very easy game to all players even if they are newbies to massive multiplayer online games. Because our game style, game play, and structure is different, we just decided make other settings (like characters) to be very familiar to original fantasy. However, when you play Lunia, players can understand what I mean 'different action game style' between characters.

MPOGD:  You have chosen a mixed game system. While you have used levels, you have also decided on a very sandbox type skill system allowing anyone to learn any skill. What was the thinking behind this? What types of skills are there? Are some better suited to one class or another?

As I mentioned, we hoped Lunia should be 'easy game'. So, we accepted very easy skill system for users to learn skills without studying any other constraints like skill trees.

But, we planned to deep game style with combo system. For example, with using the same "Cross Cut", player can make easy combo like "Cross Cut- Sp - Sp - Sp" that everyone can do it at once. But also player can make very difficult combo like "Cross Cut- Sp - Sp - (Dash) A,S -Kicking- Destruction Fist" only when he practices much. But this combo is derived from same starting.

Now, do we had to make other constraints for users to combine combo skills? No, we didn't want to. For players to focus on creating their own combos with practice and practice, we made easy system in learning skills. Why don't you just connect to Lunia and try to make your own combos?

The world of Lunia is full of fighting, fantasy and magic that is waiting to be explored by an adventurous player. Interesting gameplay and world design is going to make Lunia something to definitely play when it goes retail.  For more information on Lunia please visit http://global.lunia.com/.