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Level Up! Philippines, an online gaming publisher, will be hosting
the Ragnarok World Championships (RWC) 2008 on October at the World
Trade Center exhibit halls in Pasay City.
“For the first time it’s going to be held in
Manila. For the past years, it has always been held in Korea,”
said Jane Walker, chief executive officer for Level Up! Philippines.
RWC, an international gaming tournament that
started since 2004, will be held for the first time outside South
Korea, homeland of Ragnarok Online game developer Gravity. This will
be held simutaneously with Level Up! Live! scheduled on October 18
and 19.
“Level Up! has cultivated Ragnarok as a
successful online game in the Philippines, so we thought it’s
about time to hold Ragnarok out of the country,” said Changki Kim,
general manager, Business Development Division, Gravity Corp.
There were about six to seven countries that
have shown interest to host the international tournament. “There
were actually two countries [Thailand and Philippines] they were
considering,” shared Kim. Fortunately, the Philippines bagged the
opportunity.
Locally, Level Up!’s Ragnarok Online, a
massively multiplayer online role-playing game, has currently seven
million subscribers.
Level Up! was optimistic the Philippines will
win the title for this year’s competition.
Level Up! Philippines Marketing Manager Carlo
Ople said: “Definitely, 100 percent, I think they can win. As
early as now, it’s amazing to see that everyone is so excited and
people are already practicing.”
“In games, people are always fighting
one another, but for this particular instance everyone is united.
They really want to prove to the rest of the world that the best
Ragnarok players are in the Philippines,” Ople added.
During the sequel of worldwide cyber competition
in 2007, Team Armada, the country’s representative in RWC 2007,
secured a third-place finish.
Twelve teams from 32 participating countries
will battle for the title of Ragnarok World Champion and over P1
million in cash prizes. Among the 32 countries include: Korea,
Philippines, Japan, Thailand, Brazil, Indonesia, Russia, Taiwan,
Hong Kong, USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, France, Belgium,
Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Turkey, Austria, United Arab Emirates,
Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman, Yemen, Iraq, Egypt,
Israel, Lebanon and Jordan.
-- Cris-Ann G. Odronia
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