My stay at Saturday’s IP e-Games Guild Congress and Road to Domination VI kickoff event was a short one, but for the brevity of it all, it was still pretty sweet.  Though I arrived shortly before lunch and the event officially started, the atrium of SM Annex Cyberzone was already brimming with members of IP e-games’ massive community.

As a kickoff event for the upcoming Domination VI, various tournaments were set up in order to fill slots for the finals at Domination later this year. Among the tournaments scheduled were:

• RAN Online – Matira Matibay
• CABAL Online – 3×3 Carnage National Tournament
• Point Blank
• Audition Dance Battle – Master of 8Keys
• Bandmaster – Guild Congress SOS

Aside from the main gaming draw of the event, The CM’s for each respective e-Games title were also on-site to meet, greet and entertain queries from the community. A merchandise and game item booth was also set up for gamers looking to score more loot aside from the free swag handed out upon entry to the Guild Congress.

And finally, to cap off my stay, the show floor was treated to a five-song set by Join The Club, a band that I actually haven’t seen live in about four years. For that stretch of time, The guild congress stopped being a gaming event and more of a rock show. Anyway, I had to scoot out early because of other commitments, but Boss Mac took my place shortly after. You’ll hear his side of the story in a bit.

[BossMac]

Arriving around 4pm, I immediately got down to business and went on stage to cover the activities there. The place was packed by this time so it was hard to move around the gaming areas. Shortly after my arrival, Paramita performed a 4-song set and rocked the house. Vocalist and drummer Ria really does a good job hyping up the crowd with her epic drumming. Heck she even broke her drum stick. We appreciate Paramita’s constant appearances in hobby conventions, last time I saw them was Toycon 2010 so if you guys are seeing this… rock on!

Wrapping up the event, the hosts gave out prizes including Dasher mouse-mats from Tt eSports and PointBlank PH shirts. This is a short prelude to the awarding ceremony where winners were awarded goodie bags care of their sponsors. Notable prizes were the Tt eSports Challenger keyboard given to a sole winner as well as 6 Tt eSport Shock headsets for the Bandmaster champs and a ton of Tt eSports Azureus mice and Thermaltake shirts. We’ll release a list of winners and their respective prizes as soon as we get the list so for now we leave you with photos from the event.

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After one long week of doing a lot of Art Schooling and gaming off in Steam (thanks to Kuya Vince!), let’s get into the groove for Week 5 of MMO Shenanigans!

This week, we cover on some Music/Dance-themed online games. I’ve had a lot of friends who LOVE the Music/beat genre. they are Epic on DrumMania, DJ Max/Technika, GuitarFreaks, DanceDance Revolution, ParaParaParadise, Dance Maniax and even my own cousins owned many when it comes to Harmonix games such as Guitar Hero and Rock Band! It took them skill, time, and guts to master these skills by playing songs over and over in the arcades, watching gameplays of other people trying to perfect these songs (in times those particular players use alternative ways of playing such games in order to drag themselves to the next level), and mostly just not be a sore loser when someone loses or fails.

And yet, here I am, reviewing to you three dance/music-themed MMOS that give us the sense that we can be as awesome in the arcades by the means of competitive battling, cooperation, and the fact that we can use our computer keyboards to unleash the divine power of ROCK!

O2Jam

Country of Origin:Korea

Genre: Casual MMO

Company of Origin: O2Media

Playable Distributors: E-games (no longer online)

Current Gameplay Status: Dropped

O2Jam, one of the earliest MMOs in the Philippines that uses and promotes the musical genre, is a game that many have played, mastered, and/or loved. It’s technically using the power of typing on a keyboard at the same time the notes fall and hit the destinated zone (Beatmania!). Sorta like when you play DDR/Guitar Hero with a regular controller: It’s not really too fun when you are not using your entire body to groove. But when you master such an art of doing a music game using a mere controller, well… it’s pretty sweet and imba.

We do have a server here in the Philippines a while back, and all rooms were free-to-play. I will tell you guys the problem with the item malls in a bit. Default song list are you usual K-Pop songs famous at the time and you can download some OPMs and the latest songs by usually downloading from the item mall. I dunno where it went now, but it was somehow replaced by the newest game called Bandmaster and those who still want the sweet taste of O2Jam would go to sites and download some free clients for non-stop gameplaying! (I’m not promoting anything here, just saying that th… I’ll shut up now.)

The Game’s HUD. I have nothing else to say.

One time, I have played with a German friend in a Malaysian server. And yes, while I had to use a proxy to play a few times every day just to play with other people from other countries (Germany was one of the countries that the Malayian server approves of). It was a pretty good time, though nowadays i play with strangers who I HAVE to trust or I simply play alone.

Oh yeah, knowing how to type on a keyboard? Great Advantage! No seriously. Learning how to properly type on a keyboard will give you a really great advantage in surviving the harder versions of songs! Practice is also a must.

Audition Online (aka Dance Battle Audition, X-Beat)

Country of Origin:Korea

Genre: Casual MMO

Company of Origin: T3 Entertainment/YD Online

Playable Distributors: E-Games (Now in X-Play)

Current Gameplay Status: Dropped

A Korean Dance game that plays along the lines of Enix’s rhythm-dance classic “Bust a Move/Groove”, this little game involves you and many other players battling together by the means of dancing to the 4-step beat. The game is simple enough, fill the arrows within the 4-beat timeline and most of your points will determine on how fast can you fill the assigned buttons and how accurate is your timing on the fourth beat (the space bar.) the better you are earlier in the game, the more levels will you reach, the harder and more buttons you will press to fill your quota while still be in the beat, the more points will be given to you.

Uhm, never mind.

And if you do reach past level 7, the highest in-battle level possible in the game, you end up doing a fever time: which is just you break dancing unexpectedly. And you go back to level 4… or 5 until the game ends. You win points and gold which you can use for your shopping spree. The music list is pretty much your average K-pop, but one thing I did love was the Audition trailer which had a pretty catchy tune that I didn’t hear in any of the game battles I have played!

Freestyle Mode. Always.

Also, there is an Audition 2 that is released only in Korea, with better graphics, more music, and the fact that we Filipinos are still waiting for it if we ever know of its existence.

So yeah, before I leave this mini-review, have some awesome Thai Audition Online commercial. And this is why we Filipinos need nice things.

Bandmaster

Country of Origin:Korea

Genre: Casual MMO

Company of Origin: YD Online

Playable Distributors: X-Play (E-Games’ Casual Sister Site)

Current Gameplay Status: Playing

This game over here, is one of the games I solely admit to just play recently, due to the fact that this was one of the newest games in the E-Games lineup. But one of my friends who did play this game offered some of the observations of the game and the problems she has faced while doing so. But yes this is a mix of O2Jam, Beatmania and Rock Band, where every instrument has its own beat to tune to. So yes, you get to play in a variety of instruments: Guitars, drum sets, Pianos, Bass, Synthesizers and even SKA up your game by adding Brass (Saxophone?) instruments.

Seems familiar, isn’t it?

Musicwise, the selection is more mixed with your average K-pop, J-pop, C-pop, and even something from our Western friends with some Pop Rock, Disco, Heavy Metal, and… Christmas Songs? Though you still need to buy some premium songs by the means of ITEM MALLING!

So the gameplay is pretty simple: If you are good at O2Jam or all those beat games, you can pretty much master Bandmaster since the keyboard commands is technically easier with A,S, and D on your left, and right arrow, down arrow, and left arrow in your right. Simply, press those buttons to the correct circle the moment it hits the zone. You can either co-op with other players to level-up your skills (with the theme of if one falls, the band falls along ideal of the game), survival of the fittest members with the SOS concerts, or the last band standing with VS Battle.

One big problem I have with this game? The Item Mall.. Clothes, items, and other stuff are divided into two types: Those that are paid with normal in-game money which is too simple and nothing very unique, and those that are paid by your charged money by the means of loading through prepaid cards which contains epic, pretty and awesome. Also, the problem with some of the E-game Item malls is that your items are pretty limited. You end up renting all of the items for a certain period of time instead of buying the stuff that will last forever. There were also complaints from my friend about some lagging problems with her Windows 7 laptop, but it leaves speculation to many.

That does it, I’m gonna go to 7-11 and buy a top-up card.

Tune in next time, where we go for… a SURPRISE THEME!

E-games is in full force with the preparation for their annual event now titled as Road to Domination V. In-line with that E-games finally started with the Mindanao and Visayas leg of the RODV. Here’s the advisory from their site regarding the event:

The Road to Domination 5 is set and the Mindanao and Visayas legs are in full swing!

To get into the Finals, you must first join the Qualifying Rounds. Winning an R2D5 Final will then give you a slot in Domination 5, the biggest annual gaming event in the country.

Below is the list of the participating internet cafés in Iloilo, Tagum, and Bacolod R2D5 Qualifying Rounds from February 8 to 12

Be at the R2D5 Qualifying Round location as early as 2PM.

* Registration for the Visayas R2D5 Qualifiers will start at 2PM and the tournament proper will go from 4-7PM
* Mindanao R2D5 Qualifiers will be from 3-7PM

Be sure to bookmark this post as it will be be updated on a daily basis! Click here to get the TOURNAMENT MECHANICS!

Just got word that Dragonica PH will be opening a brand new server to compensate for the numerous amount of dragonica players in their server. Here’s the announcement from their site:

Due to the number of gamers playing Dragonica, IP e-Games‘ hottest casual MMORPG, we are announcing that the second server called Hydra will be opening very soon! With this new server, you can create new characters and carve your own fame and legend!

Check out the Dragonica web site at www.dragonica.com.ph and the e-Games Portal as to when the Hydra Server will be up!

Thank you again to all of our Dragonica Slayers for your continued support!