There's a saucily dressed priestess in all of us, as I like to say. She's probably wearing a hat shaped like a cat. If this sounds familiar to you, it's probably because, like pretty much every gamer on the planet, you have a history with the adorable manga-esque Ragnarok Online. Most of us have thoroughly abandoned the fantasy MMO's grindfest for good, but maybe the new sequel, now headed to Steam, will pique your nostalgia-fuddled interest.
Ragnarok Online 2 follows on from its decade-old predecessor, offering a recognizable world that— finally —is rendered in full 3D. Based on from what we've seen in the beta, there's a hell of a lot less mindless grinding this time, though the questing system looks so streamlined that I wonder if we'll run into the opposite problem of leveling simply being too easy. It won't cost much to find out, as the series has gone free-to-play, and at the very least it'll be worth downloading for the nostalgia hit. Who doesn't want to see how porings have evolved in their new 3D environment?
Ragnarok Online 2 has been in open beta for a few months, but May 1 marks its official release on Steam . It was originally handled via the nightmarishly clunky site WarpPortal, and unfortunately, we'll still need to register an account there—but come the official commercial release, we'll also have the option of playing through Steam. Hopefully it'll make the in-game transactions a lot less difficult to complete; it's been too long since I donned the birthday cake hat.
