After the end-of-term ceremony, we’ve finally made it to summer break. It’s depressing to think about the pile of homework I’ve been given, but I’m glad I’ll have more time to play Another World. After all, it’s not like I have any plans for summer vacation. Haha.. Feels kind of empty.

The official release of Another World also starts just in time for summer breaks everywhere. As far as I can tell from game info sites, it’s not that different from the open beta. The only change is probably that paid items are now available. I’ll take a look at the official site and see what kind of items we can buy, since there’s still time until the official release.

But as I’m looking at the game info site, I see an article that catches my eye. It says that an MMO that I used to play has shut down. There’s no official explanation given for why it shut down, but the article says that the cause may be a drastic decrease in players due the persistent lack of new features and events and, most importantly, the rise of VRMMORPGs as the next generation of online games.

Huh, so that game shut down. I haven’t played it lately since I’ve been playing nothing but Another World, but I can’t help but feel a tinge of sadness now that it’s gone. Memories of the first day I logged in and defeated a monster suddenly flash in my mind.

Though, MMOs aren’t a charity. It costs money to maintain servers, and the labor costs for game admins are also nothing to sneeze at. If they can’t expect to make a profit, they have to shut the game down. In fact, around one to two hundred MMOs are launched every year, but in contrast, almost a hundred MMOs are forced to shut down every year, and that number is gradually increasing. Few MMOs have been around for more than a decade.

Still, from the users’ perspective, it’s probably dissatisfying for the characters they created and the items they collected to be deleted after they invested so much time and effort into them. However, most MMOs’ terms of service clearly state that the admins aren’t responsible for any losses incurred by the user as a result of terminating their service. And since you have to accept the terms of service when you create an account for the game, there are no problems with the game company terminating their service and deleting user data according to those terms.

When it comes to the demise of MMOs like this, Another World is no exception. Now, it’s making a spectacular debut as the world’s first VRMMORPG, but in 10 or 20 years, there will be other MMOs with better features, so they can’t keep their advantage of being the world’s first VRMMO forever. Someday, Another World will also meet its end.

Although, judging by the current popularity of Another World, that day won’t come anytime soon. Since the company was an affiliate of the developers of Valgear from the start, no other VRMMOs have been announced since, so I’m sure Another World will stay in service for a while longer to promote the sale of Valgears.

Alright, it’s almost time for the official release. To purchase paid items, you use WebMoney or a credit card to purchase points on the official site and then use those points to buy the items. Obviously, I don’t have a credit card, so I use WebMoney to buy 2000 yen worth of points (one yen = one point), but I hope that’s enough.

Now, I’ll go see what kind of items are up for sale. There’s a lot of different types of paid items. They’re cheaper than I expected, too. Each item is about 100 to 200 yen. The Book of Blessings, the item I used in the open beta which doubles experience points, is being sold in a set of five plus one free extra. That’s some strong business sense. They also sell items that reset stat points or skill points, but I don’t need those at this point. They even have recovery items? Apparently, it’s a recovery item that has no disadvantages during emergency use. It seems like it’d be useful for stuff like PVP. I don’t need it right now, but I might buy some in the future.

Plus, there’s even a revival item called the Doll of Sacrifice. When you or another player are dead, you can use it to revive and fully recover HP. (Apparently, to use it for yourself, you set it to activate automatically.) Before, when a player died, you could only revive them with a Healer’s revival skill. Although, there’s a limit to how many of these you can have at one time, and since it’s a paid item, it’s not something you can just freely use whenever. Even so, the ability to revive yourself would be useful in an emergency.

And among the many items available for purchase, what interests me the most.. is the gacha. Gacha is a system where you receive items randomly. Basically, if you invest a little money into a draw, you’ll randomly win a rare item. By the way, in Another World, one draw costs 200 points. In other words, you can win a rare item for 200 yen.

Some people may wonder if you can even get any decent items from a gacha like this. In the past, multiplayer phone games had a system called “complete gacha” where you had to complete a set of items before you got a rare item, and apparently it was a nasty business where you had to invest hundreds of thousands a month to collect them all. But it was a problem for a while, so now it’s regulated so that you’re sure to win a rare item so there are no duds, and the estimated maximum amount of money it takes to obtain all the rare items is specified in detail. That said, since there are rare items with high and low rarities, the items that are easy to obtain will naturally become the duds, so it would take a lot of money to collect all of them.

But this gacha.. There certainly seem to be some pretty good items in this. The paid mount items are especially valuable. According to the item descriptions, a lot of the mounts in the gacha are faster than the ones sold in-game, and there are even dragons with fancier decorations than the dragons from the dragon flight I rode on before and carriages that multiple people can ride in. And apparently, these are gacha-only items that you can’t get anywhere else. And the five draw set is on sale to celebrate the official release. Dang it, this gacha is really effective on the mind of a player. ..I guess I’ll do what the admins expect me to!

Soon, I only have one draw left and not a single rare item (though I did get a Book of Blessings and Doll of Sacrifice). Let me at least get a rare on my last one! With this silent plea, I press the button on the screen for the Another World gacha, and it plays an animation of a capsule machine’s lever turning. Normally, the capsule just rolls out and displays its contents, but this time, the animation is a bit different. When the lever turns, the background of the capsule machine glows in rainbow colors. Woah, maybe this is a special animation for drawing rare items?! It looks pretty promising. And the item I won is.. a carriage! With this, we can move together as a party. Since I’m recruiting party members, this might be the best item for me. My dream is to one day give a lot of friends a ride in this carriage..

I bought a great item, so I guess I’ll start the game. I pick up the Valgear and take a deep breath. Yup, it’s all good. After finishing setup, I select Clermont, the capital of the Allied Commune, as my starting point. I wonder if I’ll be able to meet Alexia and Irene.

I arrive at the portal of my starting point, Clermont. The portals are always on the edge of town, but even so, it’s too quiet. Clermont should be the capital of Commune, but it’s way quieter than the other capitals, Mouct and Stolbrussen. The houses have their doors and windows closed, so I can’t even look inside. Hrmm, is this normal in Commune? There are no people in the city, there’s no life to it. It’s bothering me, but for now, I guess I’ll head to the Adventurer’s Guild.

The doors to the Adventurer’s Guild are locked. What the heck is going on here? Are they closed today..? Nah, there’s no way. They’ve never been closed before. Which would mean that something out of the ordinary has occurred. But I can’t see any other players, which would make it impossible to meet up with Irene and Alexia. I wonder when’s the next time I’ll see them. ..I hope I can see them again.

I leave and start walking around the city, but it looks like a ghost town, almost like all the people suddenly disappeared. I can’t tell if it’s a bug where none of the NPCs are spawning outside or if it’s some sort of event. An event on this scale would be unthinkable for a normal MMORPG, but there was another city-wide event recently.

I consider deleting the character I’m using right now and creating a new one, but since I bought items and the data doesn’t transfer, I can’t just carelessly delete it like that. I guess there’s nothing else to do but go somewhere there might be people, like the neighboring town. At worst, I’ll have to go all the way to the Castal Kingdom or the Weichsel Empire. Alright, I guess I’ll try out the carriage! Selecting the carriage icon, I take the carriage out of my inventory. The phrase “take the carriage out” is pretty weird when you think about it.

A space nearby breaks like glass, and out of a black hole appears a two-horse box seat carriage. The two horses aren’t as big as the dragons I saw before, but they’re one or two sizes bigger than normal horses, their bodies and manes are completely jet black, and they have eight legs altogether. They clearly aren’t normal horses. The harnesses are decorated, and their bits might be made of gold, because the horses’ jet black bodies are sparkling. The large, four-wheeled carriage is an incredibly plain black, and the lamps are lit with blue flame. Although it’s a box carriage, there’s also a roof above the coachman’s seat. The two horses stop in front of me and neigh, and the hole that split open closes back up like it’s playing in reverse. Woah, that’s really cool!

Anxiously, I approach a horse and try stroking him, but he doesn’t seem to dislike it, and he’s looking at me with his round eyes. He’s more gentle than he looks. In that case, it seems like he’ll listen to what I tell him.

And now, let’s head out! I board the carriage, grab the reins, and snap them like I’ve seen on TV to order the horses to move.

By the way.. I wonder how many people in modern-day Japan enjoy horseback riding. I bet most people would only have experience riding a slow, docile pony for about ten minutes at most. In fact, I haven’t ridden a horse since I was in elementary school. Even fewer people would have experience driving a carriage. At least, I’ve never done it before.

So, what am I trying to say, you ask? The horse starts running, accelerating as quickly as a car. I clutch the reins, desperate not to let them go. My hair is blown by a surge of wind. Our course is decided by the horses’ whims. The runaway super express carriage is complete.

They race towards the city gates. I spot a soldier-looking guy in front of the city gate, but to be honest, that’s the least of my concerns right now. Although the gate isn’t closed, there’s a barricade in front of me. Normally, I’d want to make a U-turn right about now, but it’s not like this runaway carriage is going to follow my orders, and it shows no sign of stopping. I cling to the thin reins. I close my eyes in fear, and in that moment, there’s the sound of a violent collision as a floating feeling runs through my whole body. It doesn’t hurt, but I never thought I’d experience the feeling of falling on a roller coaster in a carriage of all things. It doesn’t seem like I ran the soldier over, but I am not liking this carriage.

Anyway, it looks like I made it out of Clermont, but.. Horsey, hey horsey, where the heck are you guys going?