"Dofus is a steal compared to other subscription based games costing in upwards of $40 monthly."

Uhh -- excuse me? "World of Warcraft," "EverQuest," "Star Wars Galaxies," "City of Heroes," and ALL the rest start at about US$10-15/month. "Guild Wars" is free, once you buy the retail box. By saying "upwards of," you makes it sound like $40/month is some kind of minimum, but I'm hard put to figure out how you can spend that much in an MMORPG without buying high-level virtual goods on eBay.

Although you make an interesting point on "buying high-level virtual goods on eBay", what I meant to say was $40+/- for purchase price, plus the subscription.

Dofus is free to download, then pay to play. [Edited above. Thanks!]

Il était temps que Macromedia remarque ce magnifique jeu, apres tout c'est eux qu'on développé Flash ;-)

(yes I know it's in French :p)

(sorry I'm French)
Je joue à Dofus depuis plus d'un ans. Durant cette périodes, Ankama Studio a continué à faire preuve d'énormément d'imagination et d'innovtion pour un prix trés modique. Avec mes amis, nous attendons chaque jour le moment où nous nous retrouverons "In Game".

La réalisation du jeu est magnifique et avans de voir le jeu, je ne pensais pas que c'était réalisable en Flash.

Thank You Ankama Studio!

I play with dofus since more than 6 month in the french version (i'm french lol) ...
It is a very good game with lots of objects and differentes characters. Lots of gamers, it is very funny.
The cost of the game per month is ok for me.
I invite you to play with dofus (1 week free with all options for testing).
An english version in started last month.

@ +
Le_Phasme (sorry for my not good english ;-))

Very large project indeed. I'm cheap with game fees, I think $1-$5/mo. seems a lot more reasonable for something that's not 3D - these days. I do see people swapping play between their PC & Mobile device(s). Nice graphics definitely.

I just read a good interview with Arena.net (Guild Wars) and they said the big money went into network optimization to reduce bandwidth glut. For fun, calculate 4+ million subscribers (World of Warcraft) @ $13/mo. brings in 52 million dollars per month. Netting 624 million dollars for that full year, and they're signing more each day. Star Wars Galaxies is $15/mo., Rose online is free download/play, and (not an MMO) Half-Life 2 (Steam powered) will soon be getting new "chapters" online every three months, something Capcom promised back on the Sega Saturn days. I'm geeky. :)

I've played to dofus this summer, and from single graphics: without 3D and seem chidlish, but with dimensions so attractive and so mysterious, with many hidden things that I let you discover.
I think it's a great game, firstly, all people I meet were friendly except can be some french player, who logged out the game when it was paying game, 'cause they play on french one.
Next, the battle is very funny, lonely or with other people. The trade system cause no matter, just the craft systeme could be repetitive when one arrives at the top of level 50(that's huge^^), at this moment just go make monster bashing to change your ocupations lol.

I think to judge this game and find all the others things, just try the 1 trial free week, without engagement, just have fun=)

So I hope you had, and you will have happiness on that game, enjoy the game and one more time HAVE FUN!!!!

See you, bye

i like dofus its very fun. i encourage u to join though im an kid and i have a mom who wont let me play non educationa stuff so i say good luck to all!^^

Dofus is a flash-based 2-D MMORPG that's more suitable as a free online game no doubt. I have to admit its a good concept, but it lacks what is necessary for a truly good game thats worth a subscription plan. Plus, a $40/month subscription is quite a rip-off if you ask me. With that deal, getting something more out of your money can be included in console games, official PC games (counter-strike) or other subscription games (Final Fantasy, Guild Wars, etc.). Examples for other subscriptions that equals to that payment: Comcast, XBOX live (in which you can play a variety of other games) and other RPGs that i personally think is more worthwhile, and better yet, worth your money.

Dofus is a game that should be a 5 dollar subscription, if not completely free!

it's worth mentioning that Akamana Studios has gone back to making Dofus totally free. looks like we all got what we wanted!

i jumped back into the game yesterday to find the world has grown immensely with lots more to explore.

again, dofus really is testament to amazing experiences that can be created in flash. enjoy!

No, it's not free anymore. You can play for free as long as you want...yes, but you cannot venture very far beyond the starting town and forest because if you do, you cannot interact with anything.

For someone who pays for WoW, this game seems very shallow and not worth my money. $7 is half the subscription fee for WoW. What does WoW do better than Dofus? What does almost any 3D MMO do better than Dofus? Pretty much everything.

No offense guys, but this is just another one of those cutesy Korean-esque (yes I know it's French, hence the 'esque') MMOs that has no depth. There are so many basic things wrong with this game.

As for the $40 statement. That's the initial cost. Woopty, you're paying a bit extra for a MUCH MUCH MUCH more polished piece of gaming. Also, to the person who commented about console games...one, it's not $40/month. That's a mistake on the writer's part. Most are $15 a month. Forget about the initial cost of the game. Many MMOs drop down to cheap $20 box prices after a few months (WoW hasn't because it's so popular). Secondly, I've never had a console game last me nearly as long as ONE MMO ever has. I spent over 20 days in FFXI before I quit. That's over 480 hours. You definitely get your moneys worth.

I'm the devil's advocate. Shoot me down.

i'd like remind anyone reading this thread that this is a macromedia based blog. as part of the experience design team we often talk about great digital experiences built on our technology... this is why i originally brought dofus to this forum.

dofus is particularly interesting to us because it is built in flash; things like low system requirements, delivery, and a free platform for publishing the game.

comparing dofus to world of warcraft (or *any* major mmorpg for that matter) is not really comparing apples to apples. dofus is incredible for what it is, and i'd love to hear from others' what they think about the technology driving this experience. any thoughts?

RST.
XD

That's the point though. The reason we're comparing it to WoW is because Dofus requires a monthly subscription. Sure, the subscription is cheaper by half, but honestly, I'd rather be paying $7 more for a game like WoW.

Games like Maple Story are free (though they have options for you to spend your money but are not REQUIRED), much more polished than Dofus, and have very low system requirements.

Ok, great, Dofus is unique in the fact that it's flash. It's malleable to any type of computer basically. That's great. That's fine. Hurrah! However, it's easily forgettable because because it's hardly worth a second glance. Only the people who have crappy computers or an OS that doesn't support the popular MMOs out there will enjoy Dofus. The rest of us will say "hmm" and look the other way.

In other words, Dofus isn't exactly a poster child for flash MMOs. It has a lot of improvements that need to be made before we can actually say that flash MMOs are even worth our time and money.

Dofus makes the best using of Flash that we never see of all the time.
Flash is a great engine, why we can't use him for make reals games, and not "2-minuts-games-like-Maple-Story" ?
I've got an exemple, Gam Boy Advance and Gamecube have got same prices, games too, but the GBA got only 2d games, there's not games?
So why Dofus can't be a real games? there was 4 in 2003, there are 25 today, Flash can make great game... if we got hope.

Oh, the studio announced in this moment a second game with Flash 8: "Dofus Arena", it will be totally oriented to Player versus Player, very most that the original games...

JbcX (and sorry for my crappy english :o)

I couldn't understand a couple of your points. However, there are some flaws in one of your arguments.

Firstly, Gameboys do not cost the same as Gamecubes (unless we're talking about GB Micros here...but the SPs now have a better backlit screen making the GB Micro a mere luxury with a smaller screen). Yes, the difference in price is small ($20), but it's still a flaw in the point you made.

Secondly, GBA games cost $15-$30 cheaper than most GC games (the most common price is $30 for a GBA game).

The biggest issue with Dofus is that it's greatly lacking in quality and content when compared to games that are a mere $7 more expensive to play. Many other games similar to Dofus are free, or a majority of their content is free. To me, it seems that Dofus is thinking quite highly of itself. It's missing some key things that would make it much more user friendly, it's not exactly GRREAT on content (it's a very grind heavy game from what I hear), and there are actually performance issues that are just inherent flaws with flash (go get two or three people cutting grass down and then try and run across the screen and you'll appear to be losing severe FPS). To me, the game just isn't worth $7 a month. $2-$5 maybe, but half the price of a full-fledged MMO is stretching it. It's almost as if they're taking advantage of people with crappier PCs and such.

Being a Flash-based MMORPG I am pretty impressed. I mean, is there any other Flash-based MMORPG out there? If so, how does it stand up to Dofus?

Dofus has very artistic created worlds from a 2-D standpoint. The brains behind this Flash-based game was done pretty well also. Let me quote a snippet from Macromedia's site here:

"Macromedia Flash and Director handle scripts differently. In Macromedia Flash all events are attached to a specific button, frame, movie clip, sound or other element, and are not reusable or separate elements in the movie. In Director, scripts are separate cast members that can be associated with more than one movie element (cast members, sprites, or frames). The exception to this rule, is cast member scripts which are defined for a specific cast members. When you define a script or handler in Director, Director looks for the event according the event model hierarchy. In Macromedia Flash, the scripts are executed when the Flash element they are attached to is encountered in the Timeline."

Considering the nature of Flash, Dofus is some pretty impressive work. Weighing pros/cons, Flash was the best choice in this approach. The 3-D engine in Director is just a complete joke in my opinion for creating MMORPG's. I mean, if you're going to use a 3-D engine use one that is very professional and do not rely on Director to handle your 3-D.

I do agree it is funny and cute in a sense. I personally prefer immersive 3-D worlds that give a sense that not only are the people/characters a factor in your gameplay but the enviroment as well.

Regardless though I give Ankama props for a great job on Dofus.

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come come come

wow, amazing, thanks!

Nicole.

D: Man, you guys are so cruel. Dofus is meant to have that kiddy cute cartoon effect. I don't see why people are complaing about the flash, and the price. It's a new a refreshing approach to an mmorpg. It's not boring side scroll like Maple, and it's not some 'rich, detailed' 3D world. I'm glad they decided to go this route, because it seems lke the only true way to express the feeling of this game PROPERLY. I'm currently P2P and it's a good game once you get more involved. Have some patience. .___.;

omg you wrote all that?
i personnaly love dofus it rocks and i would love to see more games like it not like those 15$ per month games with ppl saying things like f#$k off or any hot girls want a good time press 123 dofus is way better then that so if anyone wants to team presspics i am grandwizard in the game see ya!! =)

Hmm, it's very amazing ! I'm looking forward to playing it ;)

Its a very good job

Huh... hello
I hope you're going to play to Dofus soon , it's a really good game. Just try it, you'll be "in love" :p
I hope to see you again on Dofus

Syntrax (from the french server)

Great site ! Thanks

I'd just like to point out to a few people who have been disparaging Dofus in favour of games like WoW, that I love Dofus, I think its really fun and enjoy it alot.

I don't, however, like WoW. Its ugly, boring, and far less persistant. So, you probably shouldn't generalize and say that only people who have crappy computers/obscure OS's will like it, because I'm running a 3.4gig P4 with 768 RAM and a GeForce graphics card bought less than a year ago. My PC will quite easily play WoW. But I make a concious choice to avoid it, because it is one of the most overrated games I've ever encountered.

Thats all I wanted to say ^^

i love the people saying that dofus has no depth or content, but i'm playing dofus for long and i knew lot of people leaving dofus for wow and coming back to dofus once they were lvl 60 because there was nothing more to do, because in the time they were trying wow, lots of add ons come in dofus, and they are still waiting wow's first addon

in one year dofus worlds size has been increased so much, you can ask how it was possible to play.

soon there must be a new addons, with a new class to play and another new island with new town, new monsters.

what is very impressive with dofus is how beautiful it became addons after addons, when you came near the old castle, it looks really horrible next to the last maps and town added

hi every 1^^!
people are typing alot in this game, wel forget about that. dofus is the best game alos im very bored of it cause im not p2p and whne i try to pay my mom tells me they gonna steal our money but i dont believe any of that stuff the price isnt bad i eman i dont play Wow or some other games, but imagine u made a game like that u cant let people go in for free after a while so u have to make them pay slowly, but sometimes u feel bad fro those who have money problams and cant pay for dofus, well thats wt i thik any way i do play dofus me and my freind share 2 account but u can find me on one of the folowing caracters:XxTimeMagexX;DarkangelII;OzironII;
Catnap; or nett

dofus is cool game im lake it but is wery hard to get kamas. anybody knows how get fast money write me to xtremalas@yahoo.com

thank you ankama stodio.

I think everyone has missed the point here, this is not meant to be a game review, but a review of a Flash application.

I am a Flash developer and have not seen anything quite like this before in Flash. It would be interesting to know some details about the server side technology driving this.

This game is pushing the boundaries of Flash and is a pretty solid application. I manage to play a couple of instances of the game at once with no problems (apart from some framerate issues with certain spell effects etc). They must have a pretty fat server behind this as there is no lag whatsoever when running multiple instances of the game. The data transfer is fast and very efficient because of the modular nature of the world.

As I spend all day working in front of a computer I rarely play games but I actually quite enjoyed playing this and I experienced a lot less problems than rival games written in Java. I think what kept me interested is that I had to remind myself this was made in Flash.

Flash applications are coming on leaps and bounds and this is cutting edge. The kind of stuff that keeps us developers on our toes! Lets hope Adobe continue where Macromedia left off and develop this constantly evolving platform further so we can create even more stuff that we thought Flash would never be capable of (and so I can continue to feed myself) ;)

I got a junky computer, but even I wouldn't play that.

Oh well, there's always Runescape...

Dofus is very cool to play, but it should have a 1-time payment only, like some rival MMORPG's.

Yes, I know that seems very little money, but it would attract many subscribers. I like the game design, Flash is a great platform for games and it's amazing how they were able to create a game so good in Flash.

I dowloaded the game and i dont know if it dosent work or just takes ages t open but i have been sitting here for like half an hour and it wont work...also it is my first time logging in on my new accout.

Can someone tell me if this is supposed to take ages or is my game stuffed.

Pay or not pay, that is up to the developer. Afterall creating a game with a strong concept like Dofus isn't that easy. By paying you help the developer a bit. I dont mind paying $7 at all. Wow is a great MMORPG but they are in a different world.

-------------

I'm just amazed of how fast my computer renders the graphic, afterall I heard that you cant use too many loops in Flash. Now we have quite a lot of people running around, casting magic and stuff.. and yet the game runs smooth. Great job!!

I have to say DOFUS it is a master piece of his category of games and for sure it is the number one of all the applications made in Flash :) However one can only hope that this is just a beta and the developers will also optimize it because in my opinion this is the main aspect that can be improved.

Servers are often going down, maps fail to load, you lost the connection to their server during the fights and that makes you loose energy and become ghost an that is frustrating, server mentenances takes many hours and many other in game latencies.

I am a programmer myself and I also have good experinece with Flash, AS, soket communication and so on and I'm quite imagine what a huge job is to keep everything stable, but , now I am speaking from the point of view of one of the users (which I am , p2p !!!! and is the first time in my life I ever paied money to become a registered member of something on the net :))) ).

So ,,, hey Ankama ! french developers, optimize that cummunications, buy better server wtf !?! that's why you have so many paying members !!!! You made a great job , but you have stopped half of the way.

Eh, Hello everyone! Dofus is a great game! Although some classes are overpowered... >.> It's really neat, I mean look at all those cute little characters and the iresistable look of a panada. You even get to tranform into littler creatures! So anyways, the game's great!

Dofus is amusing as a timekiller, and while I can appreciate the amount of depth the game has, from grinding/killing things to a crafting system, it lacks what most "popular" 3d MMO's have. Anybody who has played one of the aforementioned will know what I'm talking about. I absolutely refuse to play a game that suckers you in with the guise that it's "free to play", but imbalances itself by only allowing high-end content to subscribers. You can go explore, but you can't talk to any NPC's, or even use the zaap gate to get back to the only city that free players are allowed to use.
I wouldn't waste the money on this. The art is beautiful, the Flash is well-coded, and though it does lag horribly with so many people on the screen (and having to sit in a queue of 6000+ on some evenings), I wouldn't even spend 6 bucks for the 1-month subscription.