Champions of Regnum

Champions of Regnum
Developer(s)	NGD Studios
Publisher(s)	NGD Studios
Engine	NG3D
Platform(s)	Windows, Mac, Linux
Release	May 24, 2007
Genre(s)	Fantasy MMORPG
Mode(s)	Multiplayer

Regnum Online is a fantasy massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) developed by NGD Studios, a game development studio located in Argentina. This game is also known as "Realms Online" in America. The game focuses on full Realm vs Realm team player vs player combat, with a three-way war constantly in progress over forts and castles. There are monsters and an element of grinding, but these are considered secondary to the war.

The name Regnum means realm in Latin, and is also a tribute to one of the first games ever published in Argentina by some of the team members (which was named Regnum). It is abbreviated as RO or ROL (which in Spanish also means role, as in role-playing games). The game was officially released May 24, 2007.

Although the game has more than 500,000 subscriptions, the number of players online is around 200–300, distributed on five servers (probably more now). NGD studios made a contract with gamigo AG, a German gaming company, and opened a German server. Soon after, gamigo added another German server to meet the demand for the game, then at the end of 2009, opened a French server called Nemon. In 2009, UnitedGames gained the exclusive rights for the Netherlands and Belgium and a new server, Tyr, was opened, with Dutch as its official language. However, Tyr has since been shut down by UnitedGames and the players database has been merged with the Horus International server. In 2011, a US-oriented server named Raven was opened through GameSamba. Raven has active GMs and fairly regular xp boost and other GM-run events. Later that year, a lack of take-up on the Raven server caused GameSamba to reconsider their management of the server, and it was decided to merge the Raven and Horus Servers to create a much larger international server called Haven.

Overview

Players create characters as their avatars in a fantasy medieval-themed persistent virtual world. Individual appearance of characters is customisable. The player has to choose between three realms: Alsius, Ignis and Syrtis, with each having their own races. Players then level up by grinding on monsters or with quests. The game is designed so that you can level up to about level 25 purely on quests, which can take place within a day or two of constant playing. You are permitted to enter the warzone above about level 10, but players recommend you enter at about level 25 or above.

Community

The game has a very vibrant and numerous Argentinian community, where it originated. Each local server has a strong local language. However, the international servers named Raven and Horus (now merged into a single server named Haven) both have a dominant population of English speakers, although many languages such as German, Swedish, Spanish, French and Polish are shared.

Officially reported top 11 countries (in order), are Argentina, the US, Spain, Germany, Brazil, the UK, Chile, Canada, Mexico, Poland and Italy.

Overall Gameplay

The inspiration for Regnum Online is the online game Dark Age of Camelot (DAOC). As such, RO is heavily focussed on Realm vs Realm (also known as faction pvp or team pvp) combat. In general, at all times a player can find active wars occurring in the "Warzone" where players of the 3 realms fight for control of forts, gates and castles.

Realms

There are three realms a player can choose from: Alsius, Ignis and Syrtis. Each realm has four races, and some of the races are essentially the same across the three realms. For example, each realm has a race of humans, and each realm has "lamai."

The differences between the races of the three realms is cosmetic as all share the same character classes and powers. Alsius is a snowy realm, Ignis is a desert realm and Syrtis is a grassy realm.

Character gameplay

Regnum offer the three standard character classes: archer, warrior and mage. Each class is further offered two specialisations. At preset, the full range of classes are: Marksman, Hunter, Barbarian, Knight, Warlock and Conjurer.

Combat skills, stealth and spells are drawn primarily from the lore of DAOC and Dungeons and Dragons, with much shorter durations and magnified effects.

Combat takes place by the use of the W, A, S and D movement keys and clicking on the target. Autoattack is only available for ranged classes. Each class has a unique skill tree. The game's combat is considered by some reviewers to be fairly well-balanced.

In order the promote intensity and smoothness of combat, the developers deliberately reduced the graphics detail. However, the artwork and ambience in game is considered by some reviewers to be exceptionally good.

Quests

There are over two hundred quests you can do in each realm. Along with many side quests, there are storyline quests that reveal things about each realms past and the war between them. Quests reward players with experience, gold, and some items that they could not obtain otherwise. There are also player versus player quests which require the player to accomplish a certain task such as killing x number of players from another realm or holding x bridge for a certain amount of time.

Clans

To make a clan the player must have 2,000,000 gold and have eight people over level 15 in their party. They must then go to the main city of their realm, and search for a clan NPC which will have an option to make a clan.

In-game chat

Following the system of DAOC, there is no facility in the game for players of opposing realms to chat to each other. There is realm-wide chat inside realm wall and in the warzone. NGD made these choices to discourage spam and promote clans and organisation of players.

Servers

Regnum Online offers the following servers:

International Servers

by NGD Studios

• Ra (Spanish)

by GameSamba & NGD Studios

• Haven (International) (Raven & Horus Merged)

gamigo Servers

by gamigo AG

• Valhalla (German)
• Nemon (France)

Test Server

by NGD Studios

• Amun (Experimental)

Commercial model

Although initially the game was planned to require a subscription fee to play, NGD Studios decided to change the commercial model to what is known as Free-to-play with Premium content. This means that the player can play for free, as long as they want, with no restrictions whatsoever, but for those who desire an enhanced experience, they can purchase premium content with real-life money.

NGD Studios attempts to separate its premium content from player vs player combat so as not to give premium players an advantage in war. Premium players can travel faster via mounts, reach the level cap in less time with boosters, or use boxes for a chance to get a good item or gem—either for personal use or for trading with other players.

Premium content

The following Premium items in game as of now are:

• Mounts: Permanent Horses
• Health regeneration potions (cannot be used while in combat)
• Mana regeneration potions (cannot be used while in combat)
• Experience bonus scrolls: with 50%, 100% 200% or 500% bonus
• Teleport scrolls: Teleports to a specified town
• Repair hammers: Personal method to repair armour and weapons
• Tintures: Color available as an add-on to armour
• Scroll of Mastery: Instant level 30
• Expand number of characters from three to six permanently
• Name Change
• Change Hair type
• Lucky boxes: Several levels of box each offering the chance for a better item
• Surprise Magic Gems: three levels of 'pot' each offering the chance of better Magic Gems
• War Banner: Posts a message and location for all the realm to see, Places a physical banner on the map for duration
• Fireworks: Can be purchased in a single color or an entire multi shot 'show'
• Items Fusion: Transfer the attributes of one weapon/armor item to another like item

System Requirements

Regnum Online provides clients in Windows and Linux (native client). Regnum is noted for having relatively low system requirements compared to other leading mmos. The client is distributed via the web, and receives periodic updates of content and bug fixes while online. Both DirectX and OpenGL 3D graphics are supported. An experimental native MacOSX version was announced on February 4, 2011.

Minimum

• AMD Athlon (or superior) or Intel Pentium 4 (or superior) processor.
• At least 128kbit/s Internet access.
• 1024 Megabytes of RAM
• ATI Radeon 7500 or nVidia GeForce Series

Recommended

• ATI Radeon Series 9500 or nVidia GeForce Series 6x00, 7x00, 8x00

External links

• Regnum Online (English)
• Regnum Online (German)
• NGD Studios Official Website (English)
• IGN Interview, Part 1