Chapter 1
Silia Online.
A virtual reality game developed in Korea, Silia Online has taken the world by storm, gaining massive popularity as an MMORPG.
However, when news of its development first spread, Silia Online didn’t receive much attention.
In an era where virtual reality games were already commonplace, the word “virtual reality” no longer held much appeal.
Moreover, the MMORPG genre itself was losing its charm.
While games and media were evolving to deliver strong, instant stimulation, MMORPGs took the opposite approach.
Though there’s enjoyment in role-playing and character growth, the pacing is too slow. To develop your character properly, you quite literally need to sink time into the game, making it a love-or-hate experience for players.
The few MMORPGs that survived managed to resolve this dilemma by allowing parts of the character progression to be replaced with money—what we call microtransactions. But…
As a result, these surviving games gained a reputation for being difficult to enjoy unless you spent money.