Saturday, January 11, 2014

Ragnarok Online - the game that changes my life

CAUTIOUS: This post is seriously long and boring. it's just my some of random thoughts and old stories.



Actually recently I had been keep thinking about this, then this morning I saw this post by my friend, and I finally decided to blog about Ragnarok Online.


10 years ago, I started playing RO when I'm 14, form 2, secondary school. How I found out about this game? That time RO was so popular that they even had TV ads for it, but no, I only know about it after I started playing. That time, most of my male classmates are playing this game. I wanted to join the hype so I started as well. However, few weeks after I started playing, most of my classmates got bored and stopped playing. Only me and few more of them continue playing.

I started playing in eRO Thor server, it's Malaysia official english RO server. It was a new server that consists of very less players, compared to those old servers like Iris 1 & 2, Penril, Odin. I started playing as a Thief, trying to be an Assassin. That time, I'm playing RO almost whole day once I'm back from school. Of course, I'm leveling my character manually, until my Assassin reached 90 level. At that time, I learned about bot. I started to config different kind of bots, using them to level up my characters and earning zeny. *zeny is the game currency* During that time, I helped many friends to bot. Although using bot is against the rules, but people don't care because it's a lot easy. I'm also not bothered about it, until my brother's account get locked because get caught by GM. During that period, I stopped all my bots and went back to play manually. At that time, I already had a 99 level Assassin and Wizard, and I was leveling my Merchant. Okay, so the leveling story will stop here first.

Guild. I guess I don't need to explain this since most MMORPG have guild or clan system. The first guild I joined in RO, I already forgotten the name, but my guild leader is still my Facebook friend. Well, this also has a long story. After I joined the guild, I had a lot of fun *I guess*, but very soon, not sure I left the guild or the guild disbanded. Well, luckily I added my guild leader's MSN. Yes, MSN. During that time, this was the best tool for communication with online friends. After 1 or 2 years later, my guild leader joined my current guild at that time, and of course I remembered his IGN. After that, during some random chatting in MSN, I found out that he actually staying in the same condominium with me, same block, just 4 floors above my house. Well, that time I was very shy and I never meet him, until I moved to my new house also I never met him before. After that, since I had his MSN, I added him when I created my Facebook account.

So, After the first guild, I continue to join other small guilds. Small guide as in those chit chat and leveling guild, guild that don't go for PvP and Guild War. I also know many friends from there that until now I still know them. And finally, I forgotten how, but I joined the strongest guild in the server, Brotherhood Guardian. At first it was known as BH, for BrotherHood, but soon, it was known as Guardian, where all sub guilds are named with Guardian, like xxx Guardian. I remember that time I was 15, where I'm having PMR during end of the year, and the first MSRC was held during that time as well. MSRC, if not mistaken, it is called as Malaysia Singapore Ragnarok Championship. My guild won in Thor server. Not long after that, my guild were disbanded. I still keep in touch with some of the members that I'm close with, and that time I only know very few people in the guild. After that, I joined quite many different guilds, almost all of Thor server guilds I joined before. Then, at last I joined the guild that was supposed to be enemy of Guardian, Seremban Area. Seremban Area was one of the few strongest guild in Thor server as well. Like the guild name, the guild leader and those core members are all from Seremban. There are many members from Singapore and KL as well. In this guild, it was my most fun time during eRO. We often go MVP, PvP, Guild War together. A few friends from that guild are still my good friends until now, although some still never meet before yet.

Not sure after how long, eRO announced that servers will be merged. Thor server was merged with Penril and Iris 2, and they became Idun. After the servers merged, most of the existing strong guilds in Thor combined as one, known as [ R ] e v a l u t i o n. After several guild wars in Idun, I stopped eRO. Why I stopped? Because that time I was 17, form 5, having SPM during end of the year. I can't touch the computer until my exam ended. And so, the story of eRO ends here.
Here are photos from eRO. Photos taken from Tenka's facebook.


and this! a RV keychain mailed to me from Singapore by RV Guild Leader during year 2006! I'm still keeping it well.


BUT, this is not the end of my RO story yet. After SPM ended, I'm able to get online again. I found out that most people in the guild stopped playing eRO as well due to cash items and lagness. Most of the members went to a private server, IvaliceRO. This was the best private server I had ever played. The first guild I joined in IvaliceRO was Celestica, because most of my friends joined, and then later is Apostate. In there, I know many friends that until now we still keep in touch. On year 2008, I even went to Singapore for the guild gathering during Christmas. That time was really fun, where it's the first time I meet many friends that I know for a long time. That gathering was really awesome and I will remember it forever. I blogged about that, but it was in my old blog, which was already gone. I still kept some photos though.


After IvaliceRO closed, I still played another few more private servers like TransquilityRO, EnjoyRO. EnjoyRO was my last RO, which I stopped playing in 2012. During these 2 servers, I also made quite many friends. This morning I was so free, so I went to count my RO friends that are in Facebook. Out of my 545 friends in Facebook, 130 of them are friends from RO. In real life, I've met almost all of them who were from KL, Selangor and Singapore, except those who are from further states and countries. Nowadays I still used to meet with some of them from time to time.

10 years... It's been 10 years since I started playing. RO really changes my life a lot. I'm used to be a quiet person in school, until I started playing RO, get to know many friends, meeting different people and it changed me. Well I can actually write a lot more, but I better stop here because my RO stories are like never ending stories, I can write non stop about them. Like what my friend said in his post, "Most ppl probably won't understand this, but RO was definitely more than 'just a game' for me. It was a big part of my teen years and in some ways, a real place to me."

lastly, here's 2 of my favourite Ragnarok Online OST

Prontera theme


Wanna be Free!! (War of Emperium theme song)

2 comments:

  1. ohhmygod this post brought back so many memories of mine! :')

    ReplyDelete
  2. Omg... I miss those old times... memories flash back when RO extreme mysg just launched... but it’s just not the same anymore... Ex eRO penril Uve&OP... Ex IvaliceRO Vendetta

    ReplyDelete