Koreans Are Pushing The MMO Genre Forward. New MMO: C9

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4UnItU4FLP4

Great, another game to endlessly wait for until you can actually get your hands on it yourself, right? Amazingly, I am lucky enough to be playing this game at this very moment through the Korean Open Beta which started yesterday.

I am absolutely stunned by how smooth this game runs while graphically looking better than Aion(Character Creator: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5eOPn25WcI ). The movement and combat gameplay in C9 is extremely fluid and fast paced to the point where I was VERY surprised just after doing my first quest. It's also a nice touch that items in the environment(like crates) are fully destructable or can be picked up and thrown. The game just overall has a well-polished Modern MMO feel to it.

Yes, this is a full-on MMO with every MMO feature you would expect:
-Multiple Classes
-Questing/Multiplayer Dungeons
-Customizing your character with Loot
-Leveling Up to improve and learn new abilities
-End-game PvE
-End-game PvP
-Player Towns/Cities, Auction House, Crafting, etc.

It also seems that the game is out of NDA or not enforcing it agressively as you can find many youtube videos of Closed/Open Beta play by searching "Continent of the Ninth" or "c9".

Here is a great gameplay trailer I found of the Shaman class which also includes 1vs1 PvP in the middle of the video:
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JgW43eBs8_I
Here is a nice compilation of non-edited Low-Level(lvl4-7) Shaman Gameplay videos:
Shaman Gameplay 1- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qK-O5r2ZHxU
Shaman Gameplay 2- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wGhJnVXFl9k
Shaman Gameplay 3- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsPAzDJrFFw

To get a better feel of how the controls work in C9, here is a short basic tutorial video showing a little of two classes at early levels(Video is almost a year old):
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2E3_MNEV6Us

Like the title says, I really feel that the Koreans, of all people, are really moving this genre forward with games like C9, Tera, and Blade and Soul. It will be very interesting to see what Blizzard decides to do with their new MMO, whether they will stick to the same WoW-Style combat gameplay or to a, dare I say, more "modern" type of gameplay like C9.


Tera:
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jEIWjAzBugM

Blade and Soul:
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtA1jSreK84