GoonZu is different than your average MMORPG. Right from the beginning it shifts the focus from the usual style of play of such kind of games (battling endless waves of thousands of monsters) and puts the gamer in charge of what happens to the world itself in a realistic economic and political simulation.

While GoonZu is funnier than your average online RPG, it is also a place where serious business is handled in every corner. You can be elected to run your favorite town. You can buy shares from said town and sell them to the highest bidder. You can back stab or double cross your opponents but you can also, and should, cooperate to make your town the biggest and richest of the game. Reality is taken to a whole new level and the cliché system of crafting or selling dropped items is exposed to a new way of making money.

In fact, questing and fighting take on a support role. But nothing good comes by itself and this way of playing has its downfalls. Players will find it difficult to keep up if they choose to stick with fighting, and since the entire economy of the game is decided by players (there are virtually no vendors, except for gamers, to establish a price) some items tend to cost more than you bargain for. However, most players that try or play this game know that GoonZu is different and they are searching for something other than the traditional and the game is made for that kind people.

As a true son of the Korean expertise this game comes with the good and the bad. It is presented to us in beautiful 2D-isometric graphics and a large world to explore with hundreds of equipments available to us and almost every one of them craft-able by anyone with the skills. However good old "Engrish" haunts GoonZu like every other game from the Far East (still, this particular piece of software can be considered above average) and many features of the game are, as of today, still unavailable, or working under heavy bugs.

But imagine the joy of being elected GoonZu (Server Master) by your peers and make important decisions that affect hundreds of players or holding enough stocks on a town to bring its leadership down. Imagine being a supreme craftsman and create all kinds of items or a ruthless business, looking for the best buy whether it's stocks, items or real estate. This game is all that and much more.

Let's face it... GoonZu is hard to learn, very difficult to master and most gamers will stay the hell away from it, but its laid back playing style and free-forever status may fancy more people that one might expect. It all boils down to if you're the right person for this game and if you truly are, then GoonZu will entertain you for a very long time.

Game Score

B+

Reviewed By: JR Ewing