Archive for: November 2011

Maple Story Hacked!

Nov. 29 Korean Games Industry 372 comments

Maple Story was hacked and lost 13.22 million users’ personal information on 24th of November. Nexon, the publisher of the game, announced it to the public on 25th and report it to police.

The personal information includes name, ID, password and social security numbers. Fortunately, password and social security numbers are encrypted. If the hackers decode encrypted information, the situation could become more serious.

The board members of Nexon include CEO Min Seo and CSO Yong Suk Shin apologize to the public with a bow in recognition as well as announcing the plan for measures.

Nexon will 1) encourage people to change their password 2) build a protecting system for dormant accounts 3) integrate all memberships into one account until June, 2012 4) build Global Security Center.

It is the second biggest hacking event in Korea. The biggest was SKComs hacking event in July, which lost about 35 million users personal information. That is 70% of the whole population in Korea.

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Shutdown System Working Now in Korea

Nov. 23 Korean Games Industry 553 comments

Shutdown System started to take effect from 20th of November without any significant troubles.

Game companies in Korea applied Shutdown System into their games 2~3 days earlier to prevent any sudden confusion among customers. Young Korean gamers under 16 can not play all online games from 12:00AM to 6:00AM.

However, most of people have doubts about the effectiveness of the system. First, there are still 5% of them playing online games until dawn according to the statistics because they are using not their own account, instead using parents’ account that created by their social security numbers.

Second, the system does not provide a clear guideline. For instance, young people still could play League of Legend(LOL) on NA server instead of Korean server. Classic Battle.net from Blizzard is another exception because it is free and does not have age verification feature within it.

On the other hands, XBox Live and PSN are under the system because Xbox Live is not free while PSN is collecting personal information.

PSN decided not allowing registration under 16, which PSN gives up customer under 16 because PSN thinks they are minority. Xbox360 has internal parental system indeed and does not collect personal information but Ministry of Gender Equality & Familysimply does not accept the concept of parental system and want Xbox Live to collect personal information to apply Shutdown System. Xbox Live has a grace period for 2 months.

The worst thing could happen after 2 months when the grace period ends. Xbox Live might need to block Korean service or block everyone include adults not to play Xbox Live during late night.

We already heard that some foreign companies rescind ongoing projects in Korea or reconsider from the scratch.

The ministry wants game companies in Korea to apply account certification system into their games to prevent fault using of stolen social security numbers. Companies need to collect additional personal information such as social security numbers, phone numbers and credit card information to apply it. It is exact opposite of the personal information protection law.

MoonHwaYunDae(http://www.culturalaction.org/)(MHYD) sends the public inquiry to the ministry related to Shutdown System and requests answers. However, The ministry denied giving any more answers.

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Best booths and games of GStar2011

Nov. 22 Korean Games Industry Comments Off

 

We had the  survey at GStar 2011 with the total of 496 gamers.

Best Booth

The most visited booth was Blizzard. 67% replied that they come to GStar2011 for visiting Blizzard booth. Nexon is 2nd by 66%, very close to 1st. (NCsoft 56%, Neowiz 53%, NHN 45%)

Apparently big 3 titles, SC2:HotS/Diablo3/WOW, plus Blizzard DOTA were as hot as they could get in Korea during GStar2011.

Cyphers, AOS game from Nexon, was the booth that 33% spectators visit first because of the game coupon. Blizzard was 21% and NCsoft was 8%.

The most favorite booth to visit was Blizzard booth by 27.4%. On the other hand, the worst booth to visit was also Blizzard booth because people needed to wait for a long hours to experience games. Nexon was 2nd by 15% and also for the worst by 38% because people struggle to receive a game coupon.

Best Game

The most favorite game of GStar2011 is Diablo3 by 48% and SC2:HotS by 36%. Lineage Eternal was 3rd by 32%. Other competitors were Cyphers and Guild War2. The game people play the most during GStar2011 was online FPS Dizzel from Neowiz Games by 20%. Neowiz prepared well to have many computers with Dizzel. SC2:HotS was 2nd by 19%.

The game people like the most after they are playing were Dibalo3. Especially, 79.1% ,34 out of 43, like the game after they were playing. Kingdom Under Fire 2 and SC2:HotS were the games people like as well.

Other Games

Among social, mobile, web games, people like Homerun Battle 2 for iOS from Com2uS, Rhythm Scandal from Wemade Entertainment.

Giveaways

There were many Giveaways in each booth mostly from in-game items, mug, mouse etc. The most preferable was an in-game item coupon for Cyphers. The giveaways that people don’t like was Guild War 2 paper bag from NCsoft.

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GStar2011 Held successfully

Nov. 14 Korean Games Industry 363 comments

GStar2011 was held from 10th to 13th of October at Bexco Busan, Korea.

289,110 spectators and more than 200 companies, both the new record, participated in the event. However, some issues were remained as the homework for the organization.

The first issue was the small B2C and B2B areas. The most inconvenience was that B2B areas were separated at 3 different locations; especially it took 10 minutes to walk from 1st floor to 2nd&3rd
floor. That won’t happen next year!

Bexco is under construction for expanding the exhibition space. The 2nd Bexco, which is located at the left side of Bexco, will be available for GStar2012 B2B only. The size of 2nd Bexco is similar to existing Bexco itself. It will be connected to the original Bexco by a bridge. Therefore, you can expect 2 times bigger B2B section for 2012.

B2C will use the entire Bexco spaces with the new auditorium, which is located at the right side of Bexco. The auditorium will be used for events for game companies as well as press conference.

The second issue was Wifi. Some booth has a problem with internet at the 2nd day of Gstar2011 and mobile game companies like Com2uS had a serious problem with using Wifi because the organization prohibited using Wifi inside of B2C section. The organization promised solving Wifi problem and preparing more internet supports for the next year.

Other than the issues above, everyone agreed GStar2011 is getting better and better, especially B2B section.

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NCsoft Announced Lineage Eternal!

Nov. 08 Korean Games Industry Comments Off

NCsoft GStar Premiere event is held today for press, prior to GStar2011. They brought up two of their best MMORPG franchises – Guild War and Lineage. While Guild War 2 has been presented at various game events, there is almost no information at all for the new series from Lineage. NCsoft finally revealed!

The biggest announcement from NCsoft is Lineage Eternal – the next generation MMORPG as well as the newest of Lineage series. The teaser movie was revealed, but they did not allow recording it. You need to visit GStar2011 to watch it through Art Theater at NCsoft’s booth. Otherwise, you need to wait until it is available to all.

Lineage Eternal provides quarter view type full 3D graphics like Diablo3 from Blizzard Entertainment, but it is much realistic than Diablo3. It has also large scale siege warfare since siege warfare is almost like a trademark for Lineage series.

Did I tell you that the new game is non-targeting action MMORPG? Lineage Eternal provides more action than before as well. Especially drag skills, which follow your mouse’s moving trace and smart view system, allow you to feel more you are actually in specific situations.

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