Two developers involved in the MMORPG Elyon answered our questions: Jim (Project Manager at Kakao Games Europe) and Sunwook (Director at Bluehole).
How long did the adaptation for the European and American markets take? What were the main difficulties?
Jim, Kakao Games: Game adaptation (translation) is the most time-consuming and resource-intensive task. As the game is constantly evolving, so is the in-game text that our adaptation team must translate, check and refine. We recently completed the first phase of English translation for the second closed beta and are now moving on to verification procedures.
Did you apply any particular element of your previous experiences in adapting an Asian game to the Western market?
Jim, Kakao Games: Our past experience has definitely helped us on many levels in our day-to-day work, but not as much as you might expect, because every game is different. Each game has its nuances, its strengths, its weaknesses, its differences, and above all our experience has allowed us to adapt more quickly.
How was the beta from your point of view? Did you learn any interesting lessons?
Jim, Kakao Games: Yes - an interesting data point we could observe was the performance of the server under heavy traffic. It turns out that our hardware can handle more concurrent users than we originally anticipated, and this information has helped us a lot in defining our infrastructure for game release.
Sunwook, Bluehole: From the feedback received, we realized that some needs of European and American players differ from those of Korean players and we are currently working on this.
There were several technical issues on the first day (launcher not updating, unable to connect), do you have more details to share on the causes of these problems?
Jim, Kakao Games: Indeed, we encountered some difficulties on the first day.
We had actually increased the size of our infrastructure to cope with the number of players from the first closed beta, but when the big moment came, we found that the web server response time was extremely slow. After a long search, our technical team found the culprit: a software level value that needed to be adjusted. It was really an interesting lesson!
The first 20 or 30 levels go up really fast, then things slow down. Aren't you worried that players will be jaded when their characters suddenly stop progressing?
Sunwook, Bluehole: We've seen players struggle to pass level 33. Improvements are on the way to ensure players can take this step with ease.
What are your plans to impose yourself on the MMORPG niche, against the giants of the sector? Do you think a new MMORPG can still find its audience in 2021?
Sunwook, Bluehole: We think Elyon's biggest strength and most differentiating factor is its active combat system. We are confident that players will not be able to experience a similar experience in other games.
Could you detail what you plan for the high level in the weeks and months following the release?
Sunwook, Bluehole: We plan to add different types of content such as PvP, PvE, RvR (Realm vs Realm), asynchronous content, SvS (Server vs Server), etc.
In the comments, some players are comparing the game to TERA or AION. What is your opinion on this?
Sunwook, Bluehole: TERA has a very sophisticated combat system, but there's always a "best option" that wouldn't involve players experimenting with different builds (which can make combat a bit boring at times). With this in mind, Elyon offers a more active and free combat system with no ready-made answers, which allows players to experiment with different strategies.
Another big difference is that TERA's main content is group dungeons, while Elyon is more focused on larger scale content that has a lot more players involved. Elyon also has group dungeons, but that's just one of the many options available to players.
A little teaser on the next steps, like a date for the next beta?
Jim, Kakao Games: How about a little teaser on the pre-order rewards? Here is an image of the exclusive "cat pet knight"!
A final word?
Jim, Kakao Games: I think this is also a good opportunity to answer a frequently asked question regarding platform availability - Elyon will be available on our Kakao Games platform and on Steam upon release! We just launched our Steam page and you can find it here.
Sunwook, Bluehole: We appreciate the interest players have shown in our first CBT and hope to see you all again at the second CBT and launch.
