KOG Co., better known as KOG Studios, is a South Korean

video game developer A video game developer is a software developer specializing in video game development – the process and related disciplines of creating video games. A game developer can range from one person who undertakes all tasks to a large business with em ...

based in

Daegu Daegu (; ), formerly spelled Taegu and officially Daegu Metropolitan City (), is a city in southeastern South Korea. It is the third-largest urban agglomeration in South Korea after Seoul and Busan; the fourth-largest List of provincial-level ci ...

. They specialize in producing online

free-to-play "Free-to-play" ("F2P" or "FtP") video games are games that give players access to a significant portion of their content for free. The term "free-to-play business model" or simply, "free-to-play model", refers collectively to business models tha ...

games, and currently publish the

side-scrolling A side-scrolling video game (alternatively side-scroller) is a video game viewed from a side-view camera angle where the screen follows the player as they move left or right. The jump from single-screen or flip-screen graphics to scrolling grap ...

action

MMORPG A massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) is a video game that combines aspects of a role-playing video game and a massively multiplayer online game. As in role-playing games (RPGs), the player assumes the role of a Player charac ...

, '' Elsword'' and the

early access Early access, also known as alpha access, alpha founding, paid alpha, or game preview, is a funding model in the video game industry by which consumers can purchase and play a game in the various pre-release Software release life cycle, developm ...

action MMORPG, ''KurtzPel: Bringer of Chaos''. They have also developed the game '' Grand Chase''.

History

KOG Co. was founded on May 1, 2000. Their first game, '' Grand Chase'', an action

, launched in August 2003. After being a large success in South Korea, the game expanded to mainland

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

and

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

, as well as the

Americas The Americas, sometimes collectively called America, are a landmass comprising the totality of North America and South America.''Webster's New World College Dictionary'', 2010 by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Cleveland, Ohio. When viewed as a sing ...

in 2006. It was notable for reaching mass popularity in

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...

, breaking the record of most played online game in

Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...

Ntreev Soft Ntreev Soft () was a South Korean video game development studio primarily known for the development of the online multiplayer golf game '' PangYa'' as well as the anime-styled MMORPG, '' Trickster Online''. It was shut down on February 15, 2024 ...

began publishing ''Grand Chase'' for North America in early 2008. KOG ceased support for the game in 2015, 12 years after its initial release. In 2010, KOG Studios partnered with Philippine company Level Up! Games, the publisher of '' Grand Chase'' in South America, to found Kill3r Combo, a subsidiary company headquartered in

Irvine, California Irvine () is a Planned community, planned city in central Orange County, California, United States, in the Los Angeles metropolitan area. It was named in 1888 for the landowner James Irvine. The Irvine Company started developing the area in the ...

, with the objective of bringing KOG's games to North America. Their first game was '' Elsword'', which began open beta testing in North America on April 27, 2011, and released on July 2, 2014. In June 2012, KOG Studios purchased LevelUp!’s interest in Kill3rCombo to become the sole owner, and officially changed the company's name to KOG Games Inc. Since then, KOG Games has been responsible for publishing their games in the

. Although ''Elsword'' received some criticism for

pay to win "Free-to-play" ("F2P" or "FtP") video games are games that give players access to a significant portion of their content for free. The term "free-to-play business model" or simply, "free-to-play model", refers collectively to business models tha ...

systems, the game was generally well-received, and peaked with 2,500 active players on Steam in August 2013. '' KurtzPel Bringer of Chaos'' was first announced in the South Korean game exhibition G-Star 2017. It entered worldwide

Steam Steam is water vapor, often mixed with air or an aerosol of liquid water droplets. This may occur due to evaporation or due to boiling, where heat is applied until water reaches the enthalpy of vaporization. Saturated or superheated steam is inv ...

on April 30, 2019.

KOG Games

KOG Games (previously as Kill3r Combo from 2010 to 2012) is a

subsidiary company A subsidiary, subsidiary company, or daughter company is a company (law), company completely or partially owned or controlled by another company, called the parent company or holding company, which has legal and financial control over the subsidia ...

of KOG Co., and since 2012, publishes games from KOG in the

. It is headquartered in

and currently publishes '' Elsword'' and '' KurtzPel'' on the

store. KOG Games also briefly published '' HeroWarz'', a

developed by ''A.Storm'', in July 2016, but the servers were closed a few months later.

Games

References

External links

* {{Official Website, https://www.kog.co.kr Video game development companies Companies based in Daegu Video game companies established in 2000 Video game companies of South Korea South Korean companies established in 2000