Maple Story

Maple Story is a FREE 2D side-scrolling Massively multiplayer online role-playing game or MMORPG. Created by Wizet and distributed by Nexon among several other distributors, Maple Story offers many elements found in other MMORPG games, including an immense level of customization through character creation, equipments, and one-of-a-kind items bought through the Cash Shop found inside the game. At over 50 million subscribers in all of its versions, Maple Story is quickly becoming a highly popular game possibly rivaling other high end MMORPG games.

Maple Story in itself is about traveling through the various lands of the "Maple World," slaying monsters and developing your characters, as in many typical Role-playing games. Players have many options to interact with each other such a chatting, trading, partying, and playing various mini-games. Players also have the option of banding together and forming guilds and "buddies."

World
In Maple Story, there are multiple servers, called worlds, that distribute the gaming population. In the beginning, there were only three players permitted per world, but due to the creation of Cygnus Knights and Arans, players may now create up to five characters per world. Players are unable to move characters to different worlds unless they have bought an item from the in-game Cash Shop to do so. In each server, there can be up to 20 sub-servers, which are called channels, each of which shows the relative density of the population and the player can join in any of the open sub-servers.

Characters
Mainly,players begin as a Beginner class character on the tutorial island of Maple Island. This is where players can get familiar with the controls and mechanisms found within the game. Upon reaching a certain level, players have the option of leaving Maple Island to the primary maps of Victoria Island where they can choose to advance their skills in various jobs including Thief, Warrior, Magician, Bowman, and Pirate. At later points, player have the option of advancing their respective classes to even more powerful characters gaining new abilities in the process.

Today, players can chose to start as Cygnus Knights, Beginners, Arans, and Evans. These four selections will vary what type of characters you can become. Try out all types of characters, as everyone has a certain type of character that they just do well with compared to others.

Quests
There are many quests offered by the many non-playable characters, or NPCs, throughout the maple world. Many of these quests differ in difficulty and requirements, but many offer satisfying rewards that make these quests worthwhile to perform and complete. Quests become available as your character levels up and can be viewed through the quests options menu.

Party Quests
Party Quests are one of the best ways to go. Party Quests are special quests where you can battle difficult monsters and solve puzzles alongside other players. Although you do not make as much money Party Questing as you do when you do normal quests or just train, they are the fastest way to level up. At first, most Party Quests will be confusing, but once you get good at them, you'll learn to level up like a pro, then show off to your friends!

Economy
The currency in Maple Story comes in the form of gold and bronze coins or stacks of dollar bills called "Mesos." These can be used in buying new equipment at shops, used in trading new equipment and items between players, and can even be use as weapons by certain classes. Although the Mesos economy will vary from server to server, it is typical that high end equipment and low stock items will be very expensive, making newly created worlds a difficult place to buy and a good place to sell early in the server's lifespan.

Mini-Games
There are several mini-games that can be played in Maple Story. Such mini-games include:
 * Omok
 * Match Cards
 * Gachapon (Gachapon is not necessarily a mini-game. You must buy tickets in the Cash Shop and then you will receive random prizes. This is basically the lottery of Maple Story. Try different Gachapons in different areas to try and find the luckiest one(s).)
 * Other various mini-games

Special Events
There are many special events that occur in the Maple World, including weddings and holiday related events what offer special items or an enhancement for characters. There are almost always something going on so you should always check to see what events are occurring and what evens are being planned.

Articles

 * Wikipedia - On-line Encyclopedia

Company Affiliated Websites

 * MapleStory - MapleStory, Global
 * MapleStory - MapleStory, Brazil
 * MapleStory - MapleStory, China
 * MapleStory - MapleStory, English
 * MapleStory - MapleStory, Europe
 * MapleStory - MapleStory, Hong Kong
 * MapleStory - MapleStory, Japan
 * MapleStory - MapleStory, South East Asia
 * MapleStory - MapleStory, South Korea
 * MapleStory - MapleStory, Taiwan
 * MapleStory - MapleStory, Thailand
 * MapleStory Tester - Official MapleStory Test Website, South Korea
 * Wizet Corp., Ltd. Japan Official MapleStory Developer's Website, Japanese
 * Wizet Corp., Ltd. Korea - Official MapleStory Developer Website, Korean
 * Nexon Corporate - Official Nexon website

Editiable Game Guides

 * MapleStory Wiki
 * MapleWiki
 * MapleTip
 * MapleTip

Game Guides

 * MapleSource - Leveling search engine

Forums

 * Basil Market - Also, in game item auction.
 * Happy Mapling
 * Hidden Street
 * Sauna - Sourced from Nexon only.
 * Sleepywood Forums - Oldest known.

Graphics

 * Orbis Outlet - Fan website with graphics database.

Music

 * Dowase.net - *.mp3 songs, login required.