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Being #1 MMORPG of the world may be not impressive at all. It's due to the great success of the WoW series instead of the game being the best game ever. Others like ragnarok online were much more impressive since they got their fame from scratch. MMORPGs are around for some time already... I really think WoW online is much more like a fever and will not last long, like most games do.

My girlfriend and I play Rangarok Online, a Korean-made game that I assume is/was popular there (as well as Japan and the United States, where they run commercial servers). Soon after the game came out of beta, they implemented a Cute Pet system.

Quite a few things, but probably most popularly the MMORPG Ragnarok Online http://ragnarokonline.com/ Since this MMORPG is a pretty big deal in Korea (and even in the US, among the anime-fan community), it's understandable that greedy people would try to extort for TLDs. Those crazy Koreans.

Indeed. There are games that not only provide the client for free, but give you some free time to try it out before you buy. The only good reason I can think of for doing this myself is that Blizzard knows they have their customer base by the short hairs and that their particular market will bear this kind of fee structure.

Something that is overly dynamic (such as an FPS, RPGs, etc), it's not easy to represent an enviroment with static 2D images, whereas other game genres that don't require dynamic graphics like visual novels/hgames where things are always some sorta restrictions to the storyline, I have to agree that (good) 2D images far surpass 3D.

Having tried both forms of H-Games (IPVR and
That said, it's possible to combine both 2D and 3D together. In a not-so-recent example, Ragnarok Online combines 2D sprites with a 3D enviroment to bring the best of the two types together, although apparently there were some 3D monster models in the data paks that they were testing, but it's mostly 2D sprites.

Ragnarok Online is an MMORPG with ~$12 monthly fee. However, they don't make you buy a disc. Not only can you download the client for free, but you can play free for 15 days. And that's free, as in, they don't ask you for a credit card number or anything until your 15 days are up. I wish more games followed this model! Seems to be working great for them, but maybe the rules are different when you're based in Korea? ;)

Now if the game was free upfront and it was only the monthly fee, I could be lured in...

Like the Korean MMORPG Ragnarok Online, perhaps?

I suppose it depends on what MMORPG you are playing.

Ragnarok Online for instance has a much larger female population becuase it's an MMORPG with a lot of cute characters and you can collect hats, glasses and whatnot. Then it's a mostly social game. The actual/fighting becomes kinda secondary and only the way to gain levels to collect the rare hats.

Ragnarok Online (from korea) seems to have a much more female-friendly gameplay.
check out www.ragnarokonline.com to see the cuteness yourself.

A fine example of what happens when the "1337 h4xX0r" kiddies get out of control would be Ragnarok Online. Because of botters (some of them running a dozen or more at once), the market is saturated with rare items that sell for monetary amounts that only other botters could possibly afford due to the global devaluation of the games currancy. Going out and finding them yourself is quite a hassle too, considering that most maps are brimming with bots that can make finding enough mobs to effectively level on almost impossible. The game is effectively ruined and they've only been P2P for a few months now.

I honestly wish I understood why someone would pay good money to let their computer play a game for them...

Ragnorok Online already have merchant class.

The MMORPG Ragnarok Online uses the Korean citizen ID to keep track of who is who, make people accountable for their actions (e.g. cheating), and also to prove ownership of accounts in the event you need them to do something like tell you your password. For this reason, some of those administrative things are not possible/enforceable on the International server.

What this does do is make the punishment for cheating much more severe--you can't simply establish a new account and start cheating again. But it also means Gravity might punish you when you don't think you deserve it, and in a fairly damaging way as far as the online game experience goes. Unfortunately, Gravity has a somewhat totalitarian stance on things: Regulations. I know people have been punished for complaining on the message boards (which are tied to your user account). Some of those regulations are very annoying to abide by due to the game dynamics, e.g. looting and kill-stealing. Others are extremely open to interpretation. I remember having to constantly watch my mouth because I wasn't sure who I would offend by an offhand comment.

Big Brother is watching. And you will learn to like it.

...when Ragnarok Online is still free?

Anime-based MMORPG with players from all over the globe, free (for now at least). Grab Beta 2 while it's hot.

Well, there were quite a few problems with the initial rollout. Here is an account of some troubles on the first day. Square's old friend/nemesis has had something to say about it too.
More recently, more problems have surfaced, and Square has upgraded the PlayOnline servers and released a patch (creating the need for players to recreate their characters).
With so many problems, I think I will stick to Ragnarok Online for now. If only I could get it to work in WINE...