Bad news for MMORPG fans who are into Asian action. En Masse announces that Kritika Online has failed. The game was supposed to be established as an action MMORPG by En Masse, but now the European and North American versions are being shut down.
This is what En Masse says: The Product Manager of Kritika Online speaks up with clear facts (via En Masse). He is sad but has to announce that En Masse is ending the service for the North American and European versions of Kritika Online.
They thank everyone who played Kritika Online in the last two years.
This is how it continues:
- With a patch today, the game will be placed into “maintenance mode”.
- Players can no longer create new characters.
- They also cannot spend EMP points in Kritika Online, which is En Masse’s premium currency.
- However, all shop items in Kritika Online will be made free.
- And players will receive EMP points back for the “Kreds” they still have. That is the currency of Kritika Online.
When is it finally over? On April 30, 2019, the servers will be permanently shut down.
What if you want to continue playing? Players can continue to play the Korean version of Kritika Online and take their accounts there.
Players were said to receive an email by March 22. The requirement is that they had logged in again between January 1, 2019, and March 6.
Pay2Win Asia Grinder with great fights
How did it go for Kritika Online? The game came to Europe and North America at the end of 2017. We tested Kritika Online at release:
- Users generally praised the fast-paced gameplay but missed depth.
- Overall, many found the game simply too grindy.
- There were no new, significant highlights.
After the launch at the end of 2017, there was less and less news about the game. This was probably a sign that Kritika Online had failed to retain enough players.
In discussions about the game on platforms like reddit, Kritika Online is described as a “Pay2Win” game with the hated energy mechanic. You had to grind but couldn’t because you lacked the energy for it.
Additionally, it was very repetitive, offered too little content, the instances were too small, and overall felt unsatisfying.
However, on Steam, there are also positive remarks for Kritika Online, highlighting the entertaining gameplay in combat. People who enjoy hard grinding probably spent several hours with Kritika Online.
Player numbers simply declined over the years
What went wrong with Kritika Online? En Masse simply failed to reach a player base that was large enough to keep Kritika Online alive and appear as an “active MMORPG”.
Due to the rather lukewarm rating, there was no “word-of-mouth” propaganda, and the title stayed under the radar of many players.
According to Steamcharts, Kritika Online never really managed to establish itself on Steam:
- In 2017, they could still hold about 600 people per month (average player count).
- But by April 2018, it was only 300.
- In 2019, the number dropped to 130.
If the numbers on the Kritika Online launcher were similar to those on Steam, it seems clear why En Masse is pulling the plug.
