Ragnarok

Ragarok is an MMORPG that was launched in India a little time ago by Level Up! Till recently, you could order the CD for free from www.ragnarok.co.in but now you have to pay a hundred bucks, but that's only on delivery, and some prizes are up for grabs too.

You may be wondering what an MMORPG is – it is an acronym for Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game. Basically, its a very elaborate chatroom, where you have the added benefit of living the lives of your avatars, and killing an endless stream of demons to acquire points and skill levels. The said points and skill levels lets you kill more monsters with greater ease.

It's like playing counter strike on LAN, only you can make do with slower reflexes. You also chat with random people about your age, sex and location, and you almost never come down to any real roleplaying, because that's not something we Indians enjoy – unless you consider an alternative expansion of MMORPG – Massive Men Online Role Playing Girls. See? Exactly like an elaborate chatroom.

Ok, here is the dirt, you choose a character, personalize it exactly like a yahoo! Avatar, and you get thrown into this fantasy world (called Rune Midgard) where you let your character live its life through your keyboard. The cool part is that you meet a lot of people, you live out a few fantasy lives, and once in a while, the people in the game meet up for real life parties. These avatars are pretty cute, and you get to earn money and skill points within the game, gain a profession (anything from a sorcerer to a thief is possible), become a part of a guild (the sorcerers and thieves guilds), and when you get bored, invent spectacular ways to get your character killed. Like Sims, only random people over the net are playing with you, in a fantasy setting. The graphics are pretty cool, especially if you have a comp with good specs, the gameplay is smooth if you have a decent cable connection to the web, and the entire experience is pretty gratifying if you are into fantasy fiction like the worlds of Moorcock or Tolkein.

On the bad side, being in India, the if for good specs, the if for cablenet, and the if for an affinity for fantasy are all pretty big ifs. The investment of resources and energy does not really justify the experience, but it wouldn't be such a bad idea to find a Ragnarok café in the neighborhood (there are quite a few springing up now) and play for a while just for kicks.