Record of Lunia War
 

After a couple of server transitions, Record of Lunia War, more commonly known as Lunia, is returning for another chance at MMO supremacy. The game has the look and feel of an arcade beat-‘em-up, much like Gauntlet Legends, mixed with the RPG feel. Others might agree that Lunia can be a top contender if the game was released in the coin-op or console market. But is the game good enough to live as an MMORPG?

Lost in Lunia
The epic of Lunia begins with the gods of Rodesia Continent. The gods – Lunia, Foriel, Ceres and Wlydur – created their own respective races (humans, elves, hobbits and orcs) to inhabit the land of Rodesia. These gods gave divine protection towards their created races, and in return, they needed their race’s faith and worship to maintain their divine power. In time, the races conflicted with each other due to differences in religious beliefs, causing an all-out war. Upon the end of the war, the gods agreed to tone down the attributes of each race to prevent further conflict. Many years later, the dominant races are on the move again. To what purpose it will serve, no one knows.

The story is typically based from the likes of Lord of the Rings and other fantasy-related titles. It shares the common plot of a racial war, wherein one race tries to dominate in a power struggle to rule over the land. Lunia’s story is predictable and uninspiring, to say the least. Plot-related missions give out monotonous battles against the typical evil races or characters. Nothing in the game’s story will surprise you because of the common plot devices present in most fantasy stories. You are strictly limited to choosing four main characters (and two unlockable ones via quest) playing their part in the game’s progression. However, Lunia’s unique features make the game interesting, in a sense that gives players a certain feeling of accomplishment similar to console RPGs.

Lunia’s presentation of Rodesia is different from your typical MMORPG. The game is divided in to stages, having at least 10 instanced sub-stages each. Each main stage tackles an “episode” of Lunia’s story, focusing on the main characters. The map of every sub-stage is laid out in a straightforward manner, just one direct path leading to the end. Monster groups are fixed in certain locations of the map, with usually no chances of respawning. At the end of the path is usually a boss character or monster. Therein lays the frustration for item-farmers. You have to repeat a sub-stage time and again just to get your fix on loots. The sub-stage finishes off with a scoring system that calculates your exp according to the rank you’ve achieved upon finishing, determined by factors such as combos done and time spent. Your rank also determines the bonus prizes awarded after every sub-stage. For completists and casual gamers alike, achieving the highest ranks per sub-stage not only heightens the challenge, but also reaps the best rewards and the highest amount of exp.
 

Quests, on the other hand, have not been ignored. Lunia’s quests are more of “sidequests” than mainstream ones. It usually involves killing monsters or collecting certain items. Quest availability is determined by green or silver-colored markers above the NPC. These quests can be tracked via the notices appearing in the UI, saving you from the effort of continually opening the quest window. Rewards vary from useful items to exp and gold. Thankfully, most of the quests are repeatable, thus players can collect as many quest rewards as they can. 

Track Records
Lunia has simplified features, most of which are common staples in an MMORPG. A noteworthy feature is the tweaked party system. Lunia encourages players to group together when exploring the maps of every stage. As party members increase in number, so does the exp value, item drop frequency and stage difficulty. Players can organize themselves in private parties or automatically join open parties upon entering a stage. The downside to this is the shortage of monsters to kill in a stage if the party gets too big or crowded. Fewer monsters to kill would mean achieving lower ranks at the end of a stage. In addition to the party system, Lunia also has a guild system. Guild management is the same as the typical scheme found in other MMOs, such as invitations, guild info, and member rankings. The guild can also be upgraded via certain quests from a Guild NPC.  

PvP lovers aren’t forgotten in Lunia. The game features a separate PvP level, different from the PvE level accumulated when traversing the stages. Lunia has a PvP channel, accessible in town, where players can make rooms for free-for-all or team deathmatches. There are also quite a number of items usable only after achieving a certain PvP level. Fortunately, Lunia does not compel all players to engage in PvP.
 

Lunia also features server channels in the form of “squares.” Lag is greatly reduced through the numerous server channels, a welcome sight for players. The square is, however, the only town map in the game. You begin and end your Lunia day in the same town, see the same NPCs, and hear the same BGM. Eventually, the sight of the town becomes bland and boring.

Items in Lunia resemble the recent trend in MMORPGs. The items are colorfully marked according to their rarity. Most armors and weapons have hidden enchantments that can be unlocked once appraised by a specific NPC. These enchantments may give positive or negative stat bonuses. Thankfully, players have a chance to reverse the appraisal to hide the enchantment again through a cash shop item, just in case the item gave a negative bonus. Weapons and armors can also be upgraded to provide additional damage or defense and positive stat bonuses. Strangely enough, the chances of upgrading success are high even when fortifying high level items.

Speaking of items, Lunia’s inventory management is very limited. Bank and inventory slots are severely inadequate. The cash shop offers non-tradable bags and bank upgrades; however the validity is limited only for a few days to a month. Sadly, non-cash shop players can only avail of these upgrades as rewards from one-time quests.  

Cheap Tricks of War
As for controls, the game uses two attack buttons plus the numerical shortcut keys. Movement is controlled solely by the arrow buttons. The mouse only serves as your interaction with NPCs and the UI. Button-mashing lovers will immediately enjoy dishing out numerous hits, both ground and aerial ones. There are occasional mishaps during combo-making though. The game has difficulty responding to the players’ button presses, thus missing a beat and cutting off the combo. Worse, even if the players adjust their speed to match the game’s pace, their character will still miss out on responding. Even moving the character becomes a chore. Players will often get stuck at a certain point in the open path while moving, only to find out a split-second later that the character was actually running in a dead end. Oftentimes, the characters tend to overshoot their movement too, making it actually hard to negotiate tight spots like evading incoming boulders.

To create the best combo moves, Lunia offers a variety of skills and skill trees for every class. Skills can be learned from the skill tree using of skill points acquired every level. Most of the skills can be cast instantly and can thus be combined with the attack buttons for a devastating combo. However, just like the controls, queuing skills in a tight combo tends to delay greatly or won’t appear at all since the game has difficulty catching up.

Lunia’s presentation can be summed up in one word: “upbeat.” Cel-shaded graphics and anime-inspired characters make the game lively and the story interesting. Environments are colorfully illustrated with amazing artistic detail. Even skills have their own sparkle and luster that can light up the screen. Sadly, camera angles are just fixed isometrically. Zooming in or out is the only possibility of changing the view. Cutscenes are present in every stage, though character animations are largely static. Comic-style chat balloons make the scenes less cinematic and convincing too. As for sounds, Ragnarok Online veterans will immediately take to the game as most of Lunia’s music is somehow inspired from Lee Myoung-Jin’s masterpiece. Sound effects are also fine tuned to match the environment or skill. The game’s aural presentation can be perfect if voice-overs were added to the cutscenes.

Third time’s a charm?
The fixed character selection of Lunia was intended for story purposes, which is pretty much excusable. However, the annoyances of having to depend on the item mall, server lags, and faulty control response is the game’s heavy burden to compensate with. The action-RPG style is a nice touch to gameplay, and the cel-shaded looks make the game stimulating enough to play. Lunia is an interesting game, well worth the wait for newcomers and veteran players alike. But then, one big thought comes to mind – it would have been better if Lunia was launched as a console game.   

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License.

Only MMOsite has permission to redistribute or give minor edits to this article.