Difficulty:

Hard

Time Spent:

100 or More Hours

The Bottom Line:

"Highly addictive"

Maplestory is a great game for youngsters, but when you grow up, you understand that this game is kinda "sux", and sux in inverted commas because maybe I think that this game is boring and senselessm, but I've spent too much time on this game in my youth so I cant say that this game is sux. lets examine Maplestory w/ my criterias:

Gameplay:
It is really hard to examine maplestory in this criteria since the game is revolutionary and diffrent from any other RPG, the fact that this game doesn't have lockfight system make this game diffrent from many other RPG's, but the game is still easy-to-controll because it is a 2D game. There are smooth controls just because you can modify them. The fighting is good but also bad - good because there are many attacks that match together and give the game an intense fighting system, but it is bad because the fighting in repetitive and you might find yourself fighting in the same place for weeks, cause there isn't a good reason to change your training locations and the only way to vary your training is to do quests and party quests (repetitive missions that you do w/ a party). The bossfights are amazing, just because somehow you feel the intensity, but they aren't really require teamworking.

Look:
Since it is my first review I will explain you what the hell "look" is. because some games pretend to be realistic and some games pretend to be artistic and diffrent, I can't really make a category called "graphics", so look is a category the examine the game in the look it pretend to be.
Maplestory look is freakin revolutionary!, this is the first fully-featured 2D game. the game looks like mario, and register all the attributes of an RPG, and massive multiplayers that carry many players in one map and let them act together, which make the look of the game so revolutionary.

Community:
The community in Maplestory is full of immature autist that don't know a **** about the game and these noobs ask innocent people for mesos (the money in the game), there is no need to broaden about this, but these noobs ruin the game.

Longetivity:
Maplestory has a very rewarding progression system that let you level up and become stronger, the progression can be done in many ways - you can become a rich marchent by buying and selling things, or recruit peoples to kill bosses and sell the drops for a wealth, and than buy with the money weapons and upgrades, or you can level up by training alone or w/ a party, or doing quests and party quest.

Special features:
Maplestory has many features like encyclopedia that you can record information about monsters in it, a free market which everyone can buy and sell in it and many more - here are 3 of them
- Cash shop: the cash shop is a feature that let you buy items and customizations w/ real money. they items are pretty cheap and stay for a long time (usually 90 days), but there are countrys like Israel which blocked from buying in this shop, and there are some items that are very important and some people cant buy them.
- Maplestory trading systems (MTS): this feature let you buy and sell in-game items for in game cash (certainlly you cant convert it back to real cash..), this feature let's people that can buy cash earn some, but the feature became less popular because of the overblown taxes that the buyers have to pay.
- Party Quests: party quest are missions that you do with a party. this missions have time limit and they are divided to stages that you solve puzzles and fight monsters in them, at the end you fight a boss. this feature is amazing and it lets you meet the community, the only one problem is that some party quest are more rewarding then others, which made people abandon some of the party quests.

for summary I want to say that Maplestory is amazing for some ages but it become a pure nonsense when you grow up. this game gets 7 out of 10.