In my mind, "RO" has always been a magical IP. When I was a child, I used to listen to the post-80s seniors talk about their fond memories of Ragnarok (hereinafter referred to as "RO"), whether it was researching loadouts and adding points, or chatting with strangers in a corner of the capital all day. As I grew up, I became an RO player and had a lot of fun with the game. But with the passage of time and practical reasons such as busy studies, I had to choose to "quit the pit".
After entering the game industry, I found that "RO" is even more amazing than I imagined - "RO" still has a large number of passionate fans who continue to share their gaming experiences with the community. Stepping into the era of mobile games, "RO" has also launched several official mobile game sequels and maintained long-term operation.
You can also see newcomer players who want to enter the pit "RO" in the post bar
22 years later, on September 13, 2024, "Ragnarok RO: New Voyage" (hereinafter referred to as "RO New Departure") published by Zilong Games will open the public beta of the national server. I started following this game back in 2020, when it "topped" the best-selling list in Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan for quite some time; In 2021, it won the "Google Play Game of the Year" in several countries in Southeast Asia. According to public information, the total annual turnover of the game's foreign servers at that time exceeded 2 billion. After the national server was launched, the popularity and attention were quite high, and many players thought that it was the closest to the "original" IP adapted mobile game at the moment.
In 2020, "RO New Voyage" achieved good results on the best-selling list of Taiwanese iOS servers
In my opinion, "RO New Voyage" not only maintains the IP experience that the sentimental party craves for, but also keeps up with the times in terms of technology and design concepts, attracting many young players. For all similar games, the sequel to well-known IP, "RO New Voyage" has full significance.
Cuteness and fashion in Japanese fantasy
As an IP adaptation after many years, whether "RO New Voyage" can attract core players many years ago depends on whether there is a "RO flavor". As the first carrier of information to players, art has a strong "RO flavor" in art design.
The main visual promotional image of "RO New Voyage".
In many cases, the main feeling that "RO" IP works bring to players is "cute", but "RO flavor" is not limited to this. More generally, "RO flavor" represents a cyber fashion trend dominated by cuteness. Limited by the technology of the year, in the "RO" screen, players see the most character images, and the clothing style caters to the Japanese fantasy world view of swords and magic, but in the specific style and accessory design, more modern fashion elements are integrated. When these designs with modern fashion elements are combined with the character's unique Q version of the shape (especially referring to the popular 3 to 4 head and body cartoon characters in Japan and Korea), a unique style is produced.
Millennial "two-dimensional" style
The variety of exaggerated headgear (e.g., heart-shaped eyes, half-drooping rabbit ear headgear) adds to the player's perception of this - in this regard, the "RO flavor" can be interpreted as a Japanese fantasy with enough realistic feelings. From the perspective of the current market, it has a faint retro feeling.
"RO New Voyage" retains this design concept in its original form, and at the same time makes iterations in the art style and technical presentation, so that players can feel the "RO flavor" while also having new content.
One very obvious change is that RO Voyage retains the Q style of RO, but with a highly saturated watercolor presentation, which allows players to perceive the character more clearly, rather than just seeing a blurry cloud of pixels. When a character wears certain outfits, their body shape changes subtly in the eyes of the player. What's more, the game is not limited to the pure 2D graphics of "RO" and the 2.5D top-down graphics that are more common in other IP sequels, but allows players to switch between 2.5D and 3D perspectives more freely to better appreciate the scenes and characters.
There is a kind of texture of a blind box figure
Another typical example is the UI full of soft and rounded feeling, which is unique in the current MMORPG market with thin bezel translucent bottom design. Despite its compact design, it's fully functional and doesn't feel crowded when actually playing. Compared with the classic "RO", which pays more attention to the basic functional requirements and does not deliberately emphasize the sense of design, the UI style of "RO New Voyage" adapts to the worldview of the game and deepens the player's sense of immersion.
Broad and deep social design
Socializing is another major feature of RO, and spending fun time with new and old friends in the game is a common youth memory for many old players. In the era of RO popularity, it was social that determined the long-term retention and deep engagement of players, and many of the game's designs were designed to serve social.
Therefore, "RO New Voyage" also reflects the "RO flavor" on the social level.
Judging from the content and publicity of "RO New Voyage", the game attaches great importance to IP fans and old players of "RO". And we can always sketch a portrait of the post-80s and post-90s "RO" players: in the life stage full of novelty, there is a desire to explore the content of the game in depth, and more emotions will be invested in the game; At the same time, they were able to afford RO points that were higher than the average price of MMOs, and now they have a higher demand for game quality and social design. This is exactly what the project team needs to do - to analyze the user portraits and the behavioral commonalities between players more deeply to meet the social needs of deep players.
On these levels, RO New Voyage is well done. For example, in terms of casual gameplay, the first is a DIY system based on a large number of materials, and "RO New Sailing" has thousands of fashion looks, including more than 300 headwear alone. In the past, limited, special headgear was an important profit point for RO; In RO New Voyage, players can freely craft all the headgear as long as they collect blueprints and materials, and the materials are free. For some casual players, exchanging very low resources for enough loadout options can be said to be an important selling point of RO New Voyage.
This is followed by a variety of social activities. The photo function of "RO New Voyage" is very complete, with elements such as face recognition, head stickers and AR photography, which are all available, and full of portability; There are also many resident events, such as beauty pageants, singing, and street photography, that can give players full social satisfaction. These casual activities aren't just "other MMOs have it, so we have it too", but because they can connect players or can be combined with other systems to create a chain effect.
Importantly, this connection is not limited to casual players, but is also reflected in core gameplay such as combat. Like PvE and PvP, the game is not limited to simple mechanics and numerical competition, but more to let players enjoy competition and cooperation.
For PvE players, in addition to a variety of dungeons, RO New Set Sail also inherits the most classic MVP gameplay of traditional PC games, that is, "Eat Boss" - there are exclusive regional bosses in various parts of the game, and players can get rich rewards by killing bosses, and the reward amount is determined by the player's dedication value during the boss battle.
Wild bosses drop rare equipment and cards
Dedication is generally divided into three major indicators and two main points. The three major indicators are output, damage bearing and healing, and the higher the player's three values, the higher the dedication value; The two main points are the bonus devotion points from the first and last boss attacks, commonly known as the head and tail knives. For passers-by and casual players, you can get specific boss props by touching the boss, or grabbing the head and tail knives; If you are an aspiring player, you can play a high enough dedication point through a specific lineup to compete with other participating teams in the dedication ranking, and the team with the highest ranking can get rich rewards. At the same time, depending on the mechanics of different bosses, the battle will have different dramas - it may be that when the boss releases a certain mechanic, many players are killed before they can react - the "nearby" chat channel will be filled with the sound of happy communication, and this lively atmosphere further amplifies the fun of the boss fight.
The biggest highlight of PvP is GvG fighting, which is also a strong social gameplay. Players use the guild as the basic unit to carry out offensive and defensive operations for the purpose of occupying each main city, which not only tests the player's individual strength, but also tests the command and on-the-spot ability of the guild management. After the guild occupies the main city, the whole party can regularly receive high rewards and challenge the abyss area exclusive to each main city. Considering some market change factors, strong social GvG gameplay is relatively rare in the current MMO market, and compared with the "head-to-head" GvG of some similar games, "RO New Voyage" emphasizes professional collocation and tactical strategy, and is more hardcore - this kind of hardcore is also the "RO flavor" that core players crave.
Operate at reduced prices
Compared with the old RO and other IP sequels, another major feature of RO New Voyage is the open economic system that is completely driven by players. This seems to have nothing to do with IP, but it gives players enough freedom and immersion in terms of game economy, which is the common impression of old players on terminal games in that era. And it also makes "RO New Voyage" a certain differentiation from other MMO games on the market.
The open economy system refers to the fact that all players rely on trading houses to buy and sell items, and the official tax is levied according to the player's transaction amount, which naturally produces a set of economic models that determine the price by supply and demand. Players can recharge the paid currency "Diamonds" they purchase, which can be exchanged for "Crystals" in both directions, and theoretically, as long as the player plays long enough, they can get all the items in the game without paying.
Perfect trading system
This idealistic-sounding situation somewhat eliminates the sense of "class" among players. There is no direct perception of how much players are paying each other, and there is no disparity due to other players paying too much more than themselves. What's more, there is no combat power display in the game, and there is no leaderboard appearance, players will not feel anxious due to numerical feedback, and players in small and medium classes can have a better game experience.
From this, we can see that the project team wants to expand DAU and reduce ARPU, which is also in line with the current trend of the game market. For a considerable period of time after the new player registers the character, the game will not be paid for guidance, there will be no face-jumping gift packages and recharge activities, and the only paid functions unlocked by the player are monthly cards and basic diamond recharge. It's hard for players not to feel good about this kind of non-forced approach - especially after the free-to-play of RO, those old players who have been drained of their wallets by additional paid projects, and hand over the proceeds to the open economy system, which can also show the project team's determination to do a good job in long-term operations.
The monthly card party can also have a comfortable gaming experience
It is worth mentioning that due to the exchange rate problem, the recharge of the national server of "RO New Sailing" is much cheaper than that of the foreign server - because diamonds are the general equivalent in the game, which can be exchanged for the game currency "crystal" in both directions, and the recharge price will not affect the transaction price, so in theory, players in the national server can get more game items while paying less. At the same time, the project team has also made a lot of "price reduction" measures in design and operation, the price of some fashions in the game has been reduced to 6 yuan, and the rarity of equipment only represents the type and not the quality.
Wandering through the ages
Looking at the people who came and went in the market area of Prontera to hand over the missions, I could feel the good experiences of those veteran players in RO in the past. It can be said that as an IP sequel, "RO New Voyage" has shown strong feelings in terms of content presentation and operation strategy. However, this kind of emotion is also quite easy to consume, or rather, the player consumes it faster than expected.
On the one hand, this consumption comes from within. From the content point of view, in order to attract old players, "RO New Sailing" has achieved "originality" from art to gameplay. This authenticity not only makes "RO New Voyage" unique, but also has certain risks. Although the game has added some systems that are more suitable for newcomers, such as automatic pathfinding and automatic medicine drinking, the global design still presents a strong retro feeling, and it is even a bit "retreating" for the MMO market. As a result, some players who are used to playing today's mainstream MMO mobile games may still feel uncomfortable in RO New Voyage; With the blessing of feelings, old players will have a higher standard of judgment for the "RO" IP sequel. To put it more bluntly, it remains to be seen whether this kind of retro can be recognized by players.
On the other hand, not only MMOs, but also the domestic game market in the second half of 2024 can be said to be quite "volume". Shooting, action, two-dimensional, life simulation, casual, card, placement and other categories have heavyweight games launched, including high-cost, large-scale masterpieces, as well as products with strong publicity and distribution strength and emphasis on buying. In such fierce competition, it is not easy for "RO New Voyage", which follows the original design and maintains the "RO flavor", to stand out.
But no matter what, I still have expectations for "RO New Voyage". In today's game market, it is not easy to stick to your own style, and the strong "RO flavor" in the game can also make players feel old feelings and new fun. What it needs to do may be to go one step further - on the basis of absorbing the experience of waifu operations, it will launch a targeted operation strategy that not only reflects enough feelings, but also builds new memories.