This MapleStoryM fan played it ‘more than 12 hours a day’ during circuit breaker

When circuit breaker started and people across Singapore hunkered down at home, many turned to online shopping or streaming platforms to kill time.

For Olivia Lee, however, she turned to the mobile game MapleStoryM to connect with her friends during a time when people had to be apart.

While Lee and her friends have been playing the game since its inception in 2018, she observed that they became more active during circuit breaker, where they spent “more than 12 hours a day” completing quests and killing monsters.

The 31-year-old audit manager has been a fan of MapleStory for 10 years and in the past, her group had to meet physically to play. But with the mobile app, it “makes it more convenient” to play.

Lee said: “Now, we just have to click a button and the character will just train on its own. So during the ‘Hot Time’ event, when we get a lot more experience points, we can just leave the phone there and your character will level up on its own.”

‘Hot Time’ events are events where players get more experience points, so it’s faster to level up a character.

They may be physically apart while playing, but it doesn’t mean Lee and her friends aren’t banding together figuratively. They’re part of a guild called KnightTeam and they have taken on many in-game challenges that require everyone to contribute and collaborate.

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One event, which awarded a coveted in-game item, needed everyone to achieve a series of challenges by a certain deadline — including levelling up a character to 140.

“It was very stressful but the reward was so good. The whole guild helped each other out to level up in time because the event had an ending time. There’s a specific period you have to complete everything by and if you miss one day, there’s a good chance you’ll miss the ultimate reward,” Lee explained.

Lee shared that the guild encouraged and reminded its players to achieve their daily objectives, to level up, and even shared tips on how to complete certain tasks as some of them were not straightforward.

New class, and double the fun

MapleStoryM has been around since 2018 and despite being just two years old, the game has achieved great strides. Now, it’s time to check out MapleStoryM's newest class, the Demon Avenger.

The mobile MMORPG experience has been giving fans what they want as they play with classes such as Dark Knight, Bow Master, Night Lord, Bishop, Corsair, Shadower, Hero, and Arch Mage.

With the new update that dropped on Dec 1, players can now experience the might of the Demon Avenger.

Like previous MapleStoryM heroes, the Demon Avenger comes with its own lore that longtime fans will surely enjoy. The Demon Avenger was once the Black Mage's (the big bad of the Maple World, like Thanos was in the Avengers movie) loyal commander until he was betrayed and locked away.

Now, he's back on the side of the Resistance, serving up revenge on a silver platter and players will get to do that in all his demon-winged glory.

Apart from bringing a new playstyle to MapleStoryM (more on that later), the Demon Avenger offers extra mobility options. Based on this Facebook video, it seems that you can glide across the screen while parading that pair of menacing wings on your back. There also seems to be a double jump of sorts that allows you traverse the different platforms quicker.

And if that's not enough, how about area-of-effect attacks that allow you to swallow groups of enemies in an explosion of dark energy with fancy big damage numbers splashed across your screen? That's bound to get your heart pumping as you hack, slash, and blow your way across your screen and demolish any who dares stand in the way of revenge.

As mentioned, the Demon Avenger also brings a new playstyle to MapleStoryM and its skills use your health — or hit points — instead of the traditional mana resource. This translates to in-game savings as players will only need to purchase health potions instead of both health and mana potions.

We also get that no one likes to grind in any game, which is why MapleStoryM is offering players extra levels in a limited-time event from Dec 1, 2020 to Jan 12, 2021. During this time, each time you level up, you gain three whole levels instead of one with any character that's between level three to 100.

That's just the tip of the iceberg as MapleStoryM is also giving players rewards to celebrate the launch of the Demon Avenger.

Otherwise, it's time to download the game on Google Play or Apple’s App Store because — and this is probably the best thing about it — MapleStoryM is free to play.

This article is brought to you in partnership with Nexon Korea.

bryanlim@asiaone.com