Video Gaming

11 Things We Probably Miss from the Old MapleStory

Whether you’re a hardcore gamer or a casual gamer, chances are you’ve either played or come across one of the more popular games back then: MapleStory.

However, so much has changed since then, with the Big Bang, new classes with dragons floating over their heads, and new maps with even weirder monsters. The real essence of MapleStory is so much different now.

For the sake of nostalgia, here are some awesome memories from the old MapleStory we all knew and loved.

  1. The best hangout spot in the whole game

Maplestory-BasilMarket-Screen-230815-1

Who could forget this spot, where people just came here to chill and relax? Back then, levelling was so tough that reaching level 30 almost seemed impossible unless you had no life. Instead, we hung around and just talked or flirted while passing time. Despite being a MMORPG which emphasis on levelling, we took the social aspect more seriously, and made plenty of friends.

  1. Kerning PQ, autoclicking the way to victory

Levelling was so mundane back then that doing party quests was the easier and more fun way to level up. Everyone would queue up in Kerning City around the sewer area and just wait for their turn to enter the quest. I believe the instance system was relatively new at that point in time, thus disallowing parties to enter at the same time.

Maple0016

Let’s not forget the endless challenge of trying to jump to the 3rd sewer drain

Most players would end up downloading a software called ‘Autoclicker’, which did exactly what it’s named after, so as to increase their chances of getting in.

Probably the earliest form of boss fight you can encounter as a player was the King Slime in the Party Quest, where you had to kill it.

MapleStory 2012-02-11 21-02-13-92

The damage it dealt was ridiculous and back then there wasn’t such a thing as tanks and aggro. This means that you had to jump out of reach and constantly deal damage to it at the same time.

  1. Grinding in the Slime caves

10857810_1054392284587725_5941708544535548362_n

Speaking of these little green cute’ses, everybody at the point knew that to maximise levelling, you had to train at the slime caves, where spawn rate for these green little dudes were the highest. These caves were located around the town of Ellinia, where the mages reside. Training here and also listening to the soothing music was surprisingly de-stressing, especially after a whole day in school where you had to explain why you didn’t do your homework since you were too buy mapling!

  1. The best BGMs

Probably the most memorable parts of the old games were the Background Music. They had almost the perfect combination of soothing and uplifting tones and were also addictive. They change as you travel so that it was hard to get bored of them. Have a trip back to nostalgia-land by listening to these:

  1. Exploring Sleepywood

Sleepywood (and subsequently Ant Tunnel) was a memorable location (amongst all the other memorable locations) simply because if you reached here, chances are you already invested a lot of time into the game.

sleepywood

People who reached here probably already had their 2nd job advancement and were ready to tackle the next stage of their levelling process.

10959609_431223107041366_7978030865306765610_n

We used to challenge each other just to see how deep we can travel through Ant Tunnel before our entire party got wiped. Although seemingly a waste of potions, it was fun just to see who had the wit and skill to survive all the way till the end.

10419577_1070467229646897_2804837629337114369_n

Sleepywood, especially in the Sauna Room, is usually where the infamous ‘Drop Game’ is played. A ‘Drop Game’ is like gambling, where each player (usually 2) would take turns to drop their items, and the other has a chance to snatch it up.

  1. Testing your patience during Jump Quests

MapleStory-BasilMarket-Screen-137182

These quests were probably the by-product during the creation of hell. They were the true tests of patience, where you needed to accurately jump on each platform all the way to the top. One misstep or loss of tempo resulted in a fall that either required you to restart the whole process or death where you had to restart everything all over again.

Personally, I never got around to completing these quests. I’ve never regretted it.

  1. Experiencing the crowd at Perion ‘Marketplace’

Channel 1 of Perion will definitely bring back fond memories of the events that take place here. Forget the night markets of Taiwan or even any shopping mall during the holiday season. THIS was where the action was.

Maplestory-BasilMarket-Screen-230779-1

Players from all over Victoria Island would come and sell, trade or buy stuff there, using ‘@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@’ to help bring their chat bubbles slightly higher. There really wasn’t a need to go to the Free Market, since the action is all there.

  1. ‘Selling Fame at 7k!’

Any MapleStory player would have at least seen someone either buying or selling ‘Fame’ in their journeys. In fact, ‘Fame’ was probably Maplestory’s first ‘service-orientated business’. A player can either give or take away another player’s ‘Fame’ once a day. People who wanted Fame (usually for some equipments or just for lulz) would end up buying them, while selling them was an easy 7,000 mesos a day.

MapleStory-BasilMarket-Screen-83524

Henesys, the town of the archer, was notorious of having all sorts of pros running around buying Fame, and all sorts of noobs running around selling Fame.

Bullying was also done using Fame as well. When there was a certain someone you wanted to bully, you would call all your friends just to go to that person to ‘De-Fame’ him. This became such a huge sensation, especially for people who went through painstaking efforts to increase their Fame.

  1. KS-ing

The hostile act of KS-ing, or kill-stealing, arguably started in MapleStory. This involved the act of killing the other player’s mob before they can deliver the finishing blow. By doing so, you deliberately lower the experience they can get from the monster. Once again, there was a thing where you could call all your friends and simply go out to mass KS a person’s mobs, slowing his entire levelling process. You may get sharp ‘CC!’ requests (which is a request to change the channel which you were playing in) or him just attempting to run away. However, MapleStory had a ‘Find’ function where nobody could escape from anyone’s target.

fbeaa99e178f53fc521436fbfe312b27

  1. Taking a plane to Orbis

Probably the highest point of the Maplestory timeline was the opening of Orbis, where you had to pay for ticket to get there. After almost 2-3 years exploring the old Victoria Island, the opening of a new island was definitely appealing for all.

10384826_1083887004971586_3977820137767497300_n

One particular instance then was the occasional appearance of the Crimson Balrog, which was the most powerful monster back then. It was probably the thing that would piss anyone off the most, after paying the money to get to the new island and ended up in a gravestone back in where you came from.

  1. Exploring

Maplestory-climbing-and-exploring

Overall, the general feeling of playing MapleStory wasn’t grinding for levels. Sure, there were people who set out to do that to reach the maximum level of 200. But realistically, 200 was a level so difficult to achieve that people don’t really bother.

Instead, we ended up partying and just exploring Victoria Island together. We could spend all day simply travelling from Lith Harbour to Henesys, Perion, etc. Or maybe visit new spots like Florina Beach or going deep into Ellinia forest. There was plenty to do and see, and we had fun every second along the way. Present players wouldn’t understand the feeling, since this isn’t an economical use of time (even WoW tries to promote map exploration somewhat by granting experience if you uncover new locations).

—

Other than MapleStory, MMOs in general has placed much more emphasis on the levelling, rather than the social aspect. However, emphasising too much on the social aspect of a game stagnates it (think Habbo Hotel, Second Life) MapleStory back then had a good balance of both to cater to all players alike. No matter the reason why you played the game, there is always a way to fulfil it, be it to be the highest level or just to hang out with friends.

So, what do YOU miss most when you were playing MapleStory? Comment below!

217 thoughts on “11 Things We Probably Miss from the Old MapleStory”

      1. old ms days were amazing. especially hhg1 where we would all chill if we didnt feel like training, and evry1 would talk to one other, now adays, i dont think many people socialize on there anymore 😦

        Like

  2. There are still private maplestory servers in the old style for people who wish to reminisce on the good ole times.

    Nightsoulms is one of them and it is an incredibly fun serve. Imagine doing simple stuffs such as kpq all over again, the ever frustrating jump quests, and even just decorating your own Christmas tree in happyville during Christmas eve.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  5. This brings back so much memories. I used to spend tons of cash just to buy nice clothes and change hairstyles! 🙂 I pretty much had no life because I am up late at night playing Maplestory and I’d spend most of my time in school sleeping in class. :O

    Like

    Reply

  6. this made me laugh and smile a ton! I recently checked back on the new maple, and it totally changed. thanks so much for making this!! haha. My favorite place was probably Hene park, I used to hangout there for hours & try to jump all the way to the top of the pet obstacle!!

    Like

    Reply

      1. I first played MapleStory 11 years ago and I still miss that darn addictive game. It was tough to level but somehow the difficulty made it worth playing. Played the game on and off for a good 5 years. Fast forward 6 years, I tried the new post Big Bang patch and MapleStory definitely lost its appeal it had long time ago. Private servers on the other hand have far too few players to make the socializing experience enjoyable.

        Great article. Definitely feeling nostalgic now.

        Like

  12. Thanks for creating this article, probably one of the best I have read so far. Author still remember The Pig Beach? Hahah

    Like

    Reply

  15. I miss guarding maps. Stayed up many nights to guard the hard-to-get and 2mil-to-buy mp3 maps. Would stand on top of the van and chat away with guildmates while shouting “cc” to intruders.

    Like

    Reply

  16. The most memorable thing is Monster carnival normal mode. Where players have compete each other to have the highest score. Once 1 min mark is reached, players spam the cancel buff.

    Like

    Reply

  19. you definitely missed the showa town where the boss came in with a limousine !!
    and also summoning boss in towns xD

    Like

    Reply

  21. Thanks for writing this.. I took tonnes of screenshots when I was playing. When I miss the old days I’ll dig out my hard-drive to look through them and it really brings back memories (both good and bad).. No regrets playing though, the game made me who I am today 🙂

    Like

    Reply

  23. Seriously!!This hook up alot of my best memories in Maple.When one friend get KS-ed,all friends will start gather at the location and start KS war~~~~ >,<!!

    Like

    Reply

  24. Thanks for posting an article like this. Reading this made me recall back all the nostalgic times i had back then! I also remembered those 6am-6pm coolie grinding map daily routines and the times i had training purple sotong at level 9x-10x before i quitted. My guild was Davincii and guild leader was AkikoAkiko haha. Kohzhikai 17x dk and xshadowsinx were those in my guild who helped me get to lvl 100! I also remembered all the peole

    Like

    Reply

  25. Thanks for posting an article like this. Reading this made me recall back all the nostalgic times i had back then! I also remembered those 6am-6pm coolie grinding map daily routines and the times i had training purple sotong at level 9x-10x before i quitted. My guild was Davincii and guild leader was AkikoAkiko haha. Kohzhikai 17x dk and xshadowsinx were those in my guild who helped me get to lvl 100! Shoutout to all this people whom i lost contact with y3ngzaick, icepower1993, mrkee, wuiei , calli chua from damai sec !!

    Like

    Reply

  26. Great post! I came in slightly later than this era I think, but I remember the days where I would go around Orbis, explore the underwater worlds, and go PQing at Ludibrium – searching for party members were always fun, though I had the occasional problem of DC-ing at the boss stage which often pissed my PT members off 🙂 Then they began introducing new maps such as Singapore (KS-ing was especially rampant at the MP3 areas), Malaysia, and Amoria. Things were fun back then – I met a lot of great friends (some who I think will be for life), and have travelled far to meet them. There were great guild times, Zakum times, Wyvern times…and I remember even going online to look up guides when I couldn’t find any other way to do things. Then there were the 2x EXP events where everyone just simply went hardcore.

    I had to stop eventually because life was catching up and I was spending too much time plus money on the game. The memories, however, are for life. I may have moved on from MS, but I will never forget about the days where MS used to be a huge part of my life. Cassiopeia was where I used to hang. I remember that due to my inexperience, I crafted out a Mage which had a higher-than-normal STR points instead of INT. My character may not have been perfect, but she WAS my character – I loved her nevertheless 🙂

    Like

    Reply

  27. U forgot ludi pq and also shanghai!!! Imiss shanghai so much!!!😢😢😢😢anyway I likr ur post do much…it make me smile so much while looking ur post in public….ppl seriously though I’m crazy hahahaha

    Like

    Reply

      1. Ikr! I miss butchering the Chickens. XD My level was pretty low back then, so I used to kill Chickens to level up. I was just moving on to Ducks and BOOM Shanghai gone. T^T

        Like

  28. This is a very nice post. Bring back lots and lots of memories.
    Use to tell others if you can’t play past level 30. this game is just not for you.

    From Lith harbour from hunting Green/Blue/Red snail to Pigs to Slime, Hunting Lid cover, to Esther Shield (I was a Priest) To going to Sleepywood to farm Tails.
    Hopping around from Town to town even when you have town scrolls

    Trying to train all the job class till level 70 as you get bored of your own characters.

    Joining Guild and have Guild outings, BBQs In real Life.
    Even have a guild video online.

    These were the days since 2003 to 2006. Skipping schools just to train level. Challenege one another to Level up to lvl 80, 90,100 and 120 to get 4th Job.

    And there is sooooo many patch, new jobs, till you no longer know what you are doing anymore.

    The legends will always be Magician, Bowman, Warriors and Theif.
    And the Ultimate champion is always a level 120 Beginner.

    Like

    Reply

    1. Ikr! I still remember that I used 50 mins to get my second advancement while now I don’t even need 10 mins.

      Like

      Reply

  30. The crowd in Pig Beach (OMFG ITS IRON BOAR! RUN!)
    The pain to buy potions and we chose to sit to recover hp and mp.
    The beg for mesos. ↑+↓+↑+↓+↑+↓+↑+↓
    Dance together ←+→+←+→+←+→+←+→
    Selected Mage because we can turn job at level 8 and start to beg for blue potions.
    Only archers are able to hit Jr. Boogies in Wild Boar Land. (And credits to those random high levels)
    That F**kin Panlid got looted in Sauna due to drop game!! F5

    We can’t back to the old days anymore 🙂 but it is indeed some great memories.

    Like

    Reply

  31. back then Maplestory channel 1 always full hard to enter. And Dragon Roar for DK is a must for skill. But now.. Maplestory change so much even dragon roar also remove. Miss those days ks war

    Like

    Reply

  32. The pre-inflation days! Highlights included getting lost inside Sleepywood, getting lost in Perion, elation when I first hit level 30, anguish because I added points to all stats (warrior with 50 int), rolling for hours to get that 4/4 roll for your perfect character, more elation when you had found a 60% scroll for wand/claw because those went for 350k each and that was A LOT of mesos then. Good times

    Like

    Reply

  34. Very good read! (Nostalgic for sure)
    Personal highlights include:
    Getting lost in Sleepywood
    Getting lost in Perion

    Elation when I first reached Level 30.
    Subsequent anguish because I had added points to all stats. (Mace-wielding Wizard anyone?)
    Rolling for hours to get that 4/4 stats for your perfect character.
    More elation when one found a 60% scroll for claw/wand, because they were worth 350k each and at that time, 350k made one look like Mr Moneybags.

    “CC OR I WILL SUMMON MY LEVEL 300 HERMIT!”

    MrYandao
    MrYandao gossip

    Also, starving to buy @cash.

    Like

    Reply

  35. I still remember we can go Shanghai and train there. I think it cost 10k meso to go there but now it’s no longer available. Great place to kill chickens and ducks and cows thought :’)

    Like

    Reply

  37. Omg! I remembered I first play it in 2004. Knew about it when I noticed a promotional CD at the back of a magazine. I didn’t know anything about it before I started playing so i got my str stats to 16 and chose a thief job LOL. When I realized it’s wrong, I deleted the character and started all over again -.-

    Time wasting but yes, them nolstagic memoirs. Hahahahaa.

    Like

    Reply

  38. Did you just miss out one more point? Most of the people loves to see the greatest maple player training there. Mr Yandao!! I am so happy he reply my whisper once

    Like

    Reply

  39. OMG!!! i am missing every single part of old maple T_T thou leveling was hard and slow, but hard alot of fun =) im pretty sure there are more den 11 things to remember. xD

    Like

    Reply

  41. -The ride to orbis? Remember all that swearing to get Balrog to appear >.>
    – The impossible jump to the third pipe was made possible by the existence of BATHROBES.
    – This isnt really old, but i remember being chased all the way to ariant station and was stopped from boarding the genie-ship cuz this person was begging me to be their mage. (At least one mage was required in romeo-juliet pq in magatia, it was where all the lv70s would go to level… and there was this stage where teleport was required….)
    – I would walk from town to town because 800 mesos was too expensive for me.
    – I got stuck in El Nath once cuz i couldnt survive the jr.yeti/pepe out there, ran out of mesos and potions, back then Nearest town scrolls couldnt be used in the tower…. we had to climb all the way up! Or die and start from El Nath all over again. (Or be rich and buy super expensive rock scrolls from FM)
    – Summoning stones/ Magic stones/ AC pots were precious.
    – Everyone did that one quest in Shanghai to (possibly) get a steely to sell at 450k for. 450k was a fortune back then….
    – Speaking of Shanghai, everyone killed ducks and sheep to get to second job! There was alot of map thieving and ksing. The occasional mokbi would drop and everyone would go crazy about it.
    – Christmas events. Anniversary events were the bomb back then. For christmas people went about making snowboards for their DKs/ (recent-er times, Arans).

    And last but not least… *MM SESSION @ FMCC1RM21*
    – thats where everyone would go and actually get to know other people!! …..Or go wife (or husband) hunting or something like that 🙂

    Like

    Reply

  43. Remember the time when you could ‘jump and drop money’ so nobody could steal it?how about monsters in a bag,having fun trolling noobs by placing one in a home town?then when singapore was introduced,the helmets where you can either get sevice from a seller or your guild?those were the best days!

    Like

    Reply

  44. MIss The Time When I trained almost a day just to level up 1 level with friends
    Trying to intercept other party kerning pq hiding talking to each other
    let other party member kill the croc n take the coupon asking for answer of the coupon
    and when the time that 100k was a lot of money

    Like

    Reply

  46. The game was fun but it eventually spoiled due to unnecessary jobs. It would be nice if there are lesser jobs and less complication like now. Mesos used to be most important stuff in game but it seems like useless right now got replaced by real currency. Disappointed. Good post anyway 🙂

    Like

    Reply

  48. to get a zakum helmet is so difficult during those old days. need to farm meso with hardwork killing noob monsters and selling woods or leaves to pros just wanna save 3mils to 5mils. register online for those squad offering service and seeing bandit dropping meso to bomb zakum. maybe 10 ppl buying this service and only 2 or 3 zak helm will drop.

    Like

    Reply

  49. Mushmom, zakum, that stupid ghost mob in showa that dealt super high dmgs and so painful! And not forgetting Bain where ice mages will train and before that you must kill a psycho boss that can kill u in 1 slap! Maple was so fun then, anybody has the links to where we can play it again? The old Maple?

    Like

    Reply

  50. The problem started with Big Bang. Maybe it’s not a problem for new players, but old players definitely. Cash shop went from purely cosmetic with exception of gacha to GAMBLE BOX GALORE. Exp gain was increased by a lot. Most maps became unimportant because there are now “standard” leveling spots. Too many classes added that unbalanced the game completely. No need for jump quests or exploring because level 70 is done in a day now. They really broke it for old school players IMO.

    Like

    Reply

Leave a comment