MMOsite member buddhabeads posted an article to discuss the difference between Asian MMORPGs and Western MMORPGs. He gave out his opinions from 4 parts: Grindfest, Community, Gameplay and Graphics. Everyone who is interested in this topic can take part into our forum to share youe opinion with us.

Over the recent few years there has been an in flood of Korean/Chinese MMORPGs into the Western market, and a slow but steady flow the other way. Yet there is a clear cultural clash at play. In this thread i hope to answer some qualms about why Asian MMORPGs are made the way they are.

1) Grindfest
Personally i think grind is the sole killer to many if not most of all the potentially great MMORPGs. The grindfests restricts players from the exciting gameplay features with a time-based lock. In other words, a player must spend XXX amount of boring grind before the game becomes somewhat enjoyable and the XXX amount of time required does not weigh up to the eventual ?fun?. The finger can be solely at a production line of Korean MMORPGs for making grindfest the norm. The formula of a grind-wall where upon reaching a certain level, the amount of experience gained from kills exponentially drops in conjuntion with an exponential growth in the experience required to level up and in my view this feature has designed for the sole purpose of a turnoff for players. Yet, if grind is such a turnoff why do Asian game makers still persist with this forumla. The answer may be lie in the difference in approach on grinding between Western and Asian players.

Sometimes killing mobs is only pleasure in the Asian MMORPGs

For starters, the sheer number of gamers of MMORPGs in Asia is is without comparison in the West. Literally hundreds of thousands of people are logged onto one server at a time. Amongts these people there are surely those who do not mind and have the time to grind, and in turn they are rewarded with better weaponary and fancy armour. They are aslo idolized by the gaming community. The rest of the players, striving and competeting to reach that level of idolization reluctantly or willingly put with the grindfest for the eventual outcome.
Secondly, most Asian MMORPG grindfests are designed to be grounded in groups, with exp bonuses, so players evel up faster when leveling in groups. With the sheer number of players in servers, group play is a constant thing players of all levels. When viewed under this context, the grind becomes quite bearable. If you play the game and level up with a consitent group of online friends, then the grind at least is less tedious as solo play. Asian MMORPGs seems to view the grind as kind of substitute for MSN.
Thirdly, the grind has an outcome, apart from wearponary, armour and skills, many games have group dungeon systems and group PvP systems, so the all the grinding will enable access to these features.