Naïca Online was intended as a Free2Play MMORPG for old-school and pixel art fans. At the end of 2020, a beta started, but now the discontinuation of the game has been announced.
What happened? Naïca Online launched on November 10 in a beta for PC and Android and shortly after for iOS. However, the game will not experience a full release.
Because the developers announced on Discord that the work on the 2D MMORPG has been discontinued. Furthermore, a large part of the team has to leave the studio. Instead of 8 employees, there will now only be 2 people left managing the studio.
However, the two will not work on the MMORPG, but on a new project related to Naïca. What that will be is to be explained later.
What did it fail on? As the developers revealed, Naïca was their first project ever. However, even at the beta launch, there were numerous problems. The game had several bugs, and with new updates that fixed some issues, often new bugs were introduced.
In the end, Naïca Online simply was not profitable for the company, which is why the work will not continue. According to their own statements, the developers spent about 2.5 years on development before the beta started.
In comparison, the 2.5 years for Naïca seem rather short. However, due to the pixel look and the 2D world, several time-consuming aspects of development are eliminated. The successful Tibia Online, which is booming in 2021, was developed in a comparable timeframe.
Naïca reminded players of classic hits like Tibia Online
What is Naïca anyway? The MMORPG transports you into a colorful fantasy world where beastmen coexist with humans. You choose one of five races and begin your adventure in the Cerulean Forest, which looks beautiful but is full of dangers.
- There are no fixed classes, you determine your play style based on skill trees (sword, magic, bow)
- You can explore dungeons with other players
- You can expect boss monsters in the open world
- You can compete against other players in PvP
- There are two gods for whom you can earn reputation. You can choose one god or improve both simultaneously, which is supposed to influence your character development.
Visually, the game is reminiscent of titles like the MMORPG Dragon Eye from the 16-bit era of the SNES and old-school MMORPGs like Tibia or RuneScape.
When will the game be discontinued? Currently, it is said that Naïca will continue to run for the time being with the current state of updates. Anyone wanting to try the game should hurry. There is no guarantee for a long runtime.
Have you checked out Naïca ? Or were you put off by the graphic style?
Even if the discontinuation of another MMORPG is bad news, there are still some positive messages for fans of the genre in 2021:
