KwonHo

Infobox VG| title = KwonHo: The Fist of Heroes


developer = Radio Games / Vertigo Games
publisher = TBA
engine = KwonHo Engine
released = Never
genre = Fighting game
modes = Online Multiplayer
ratings = N/A
platforms = Windows
media = Internet Download
requirements = Windows 98/2000/XP
DirectX 9.0+
Pentium III 500 MHz
16mb Graphics card
128MB RAM
input = Keyboard / Mouse / GamePad

"KwonHo: The Fist of Heroes" is a Korean online fighting game developed by Radio Games (which was merged with Vertigo Games) and is currently hosted by Hangame. It was in the process of being translated and serviced for North America by their American counterpart ijji (Both of them owned by NHN) before being canceled on November 14 2007. In Kwonho, the player has the role of creating his own character, choosing a fighting style and buying (or acquiring) clothing and/or items (such as tattoos, guitars, teddy bears and other miscellaneous items). A player's goal is to gain experience by fighting other players in a variety of game modes, or by fighting computer-controlled opponents in the Mission Mode. By winning these fights, a player acquires credits, which he can use to buy new techniques or items, and train to become the best fighter there is.

Fighting styles

When creating a character, the player may choose among five fighting styles in "KwonHo: The Fist of Heroes". Once determined, the style stays fixed to the character.
As fighters level up, they gain points that they can use to enhance their attack power, defense power, counter-hit power or counter-defense power. They also gain skill points, which they can spend on a skill in their list to upgrade its damage capabilities. Finally, they can purchase new moves with the credits they receive from winning fights.The list of fighting styles are as follows:

Tae Kwon Do

The fastest style in the game, Tae Kwon Do excels in kicking arts and long-range attacks. Tae Kwon Do has long strings of combos that can easily devastate opponents, as well as agile get-away moves that can cover a retreat. Finally, Tae Kwon Do also has the Flamingo stance, which allows users to stand in a defensive posture to deal out attacks at will. Tae Kwon Do has a large arsenal of pokes, not really a punishing style, but rather, a style that can do damage when the opponents guard is down, as Tae Kwon Do has many combo's. Tae Kwon Do is possibly the most used of the styles in Kwonho.

Muay Thai

Muay Thai is the national sport of Thailand, and is also known as Thai Boxing, Predal Serey or Science of the Eight Limbs. This is the all-around fighting style in Kwonho that excels in powerful, average reach attacks and combos. Muay Thai shows its greatest performance when played offensively, but practitioners are relatively weak when put in a defensive position.

=Tai Chi Quan=

Tai Chi Quan is an internal martial art, specializing in teaching awareness of one's own balance and what affects it, awareness of the same in others, and how to apply this to self-defense--this makes its attacks in KwonHo revolving around counters to take incoming attacks and reverse them for massive damage. Tai Chi Quan specializes around confusing movements, stance changes, and counters. This fighting style exhibits great defensive potential due to ambiguous stance changes, their counters, and their short-but-fast combos to punish misses or mistakes, but can also be used in an offensive manner to constantly put pressure on an opponent and whittle them down to nothing.

=Ba Ji Quan=

Loosely translated as "eight extreme fists", Ba Ji Quan is a powerful style in Kwonho--however, their attacks are relatively short and leave practitioners wide open, but successful attacks are quite damaging. Current upgrade to the game leave Ba Ji Quan with many options in combos. This is one of the more difficult styles to master in Kwonho, due to its slow speed and lack of moves effective against sidesteppers. As with Tai Chi, study of the opponent is needed, but not to counter their movements, but rather to see when they are open for a devastating strike.

Judo

Judo is a powerful grappling style in Kwonho. Exclusive to this fighting style is combo grabs which allow the possibility of performing one grab after another. Judo contains little offensive power outside of its throws and differs from the other styles in the sheer variety of throws they have. Judo practitioners are the capable of attempting a grab while running, on the ground, in the air, or even while the opponent is crouching. In Kwonho, it is possible to break grabs, so Judo practitioners must constantly monitor their opponents, and use mix up attacks against the opponent that catch him or her off guard. This will leave them open to a powerful throw.

Jeet Kune Do

This style has only been available in a separate Korean server. Though not much is known about it, Jeet Kune Do is a rather balanced style in Kwonho. Specializing not only in quick jabs but powerful flying kicks, this style has much potential. Many of its quick moves are backsteps, which helps dodge incoming attacks. This style is still in a beta phase. Many videos have been posted on the Ijji forums, and it seems as if this will be well received, as many players have asked for a new fighting style. [http://forums.ijji.com/showthread.php?t=85549]

Release dates

The Closed Beta stage of the English edition ended on 10 December 2006.

On 8 May 2007, Ijji announced the Second Closed Beta open on 9 May at 5:00 PM (EST), and is to end on 23 May.

On 30 May 2007, Ijji announced that live service would begin on the next day: May 31st. [http://forums.ijji.com/showpost.php?p=234664&postcount=1] The public beta has since opened and is playable to all.

On 6 November 2007, Ijji decides to close its Kwonho game after much difficult discussion. It is not the first game that they decide to drop in such way. The main cause of the closing was because their wasn't enough premium items on korean kwonho therefore kwonho was closed

On 14 November 2007, Ijji removed KwonHo from their servers because there was no one to support it and not enough donations.

External links

* [http://kwonho.hangame.com Official Site (Korea)]
* [http://www.hangame.com Hangame]
* [http://radiogames.co.kr Radio Games]