Kartuga PvP – Domination – No chance for egoists!

Now that I have told to you so much about the design, the different ship classes and quests in the world of Kartuga, I will this time take care of one of the key points of the game Pirates: The PvP! And we start by introducing Domination:

As you probably already know, you can choose between the Kartuga PvP modes “Domination” and “Destruction.” In both cases, two teams of four compete against each other – this is where the similarities between these two modes already end. First, I would like to bring you closer to the Domination mode here. One thing I can already tell you, however: Groups that don’t play as teams won’t stand a chance, no matter what level they already achieved!

Once you have queued for the Domination mode, the matchmaking system will look for suitable opponents. Shortly after, you find yourself on a special multiplayer map. On this map, five ghost ships are distributed, which players have to take control of in order to win. Two of these points are located in the vicinity of your starting position, two close by your opponents and one ghost ship is exactly in the middle of the map. If you are close by one of these ghost ships, a progress bar will start filling. If it completely fills itself without you being disturbed by an opponent, you have taken over the point for your team. Then your score ticker is steadily rising. The more ghost ships are in your possession, the faster your score will increase. It is always a pleasure to see when your team has taken all five ships and the points display almost rolls over – check it out in the video! Once you have reached 2500 points, the game is won and you get some team and also personal statistics. A game usually lasts about 10-15 minutes.

That’s the theory. In practice, the relatively simple gameplay of Domination, however, turns out to be guaranteed fun. You have to constantly be aware of the map in order not to miss any attempt to conquer the enemy. At the same time you also have to try to exert pressure on the opposing team by holding your points and constantly pushing for theirs.What me and a lot of other players already learned the hard way: If you do not play together as a team, you have no chance of succeeding, even if single players of your team are are superior to the enemy. battles therefore show the great balancing of the three classes : Teams who cleverly cooperate can provide excellent support for each other and defend key points of the map effectively. If your group has rather fast and maneuverable ships you can constantly show up in different places of the map, attack, steal points and retreat, and avoid direct confrontations. Or a heavily armored protector intercepts the damage aimed at the weaker engineers who then again support him with repair drones. Even higher-level opponents can’t do anything against teamwork and interaction between the classes, unless their team is also working together. So you see, there are a lot of tactics and ways you can be successful in Domination mode.

Soon we will tell you more about PvP in Kartuga and we will also introduce the second mode, Destruction, in the near future. Maybe I can still share a few tricks with you =)

Attention Pirates: massive Update for Kartuga released!


Wow, when I first saw the changelog for the current Kartuga update, I was totally stunned: So many cool new features and improvements to the game design – I could not wait until the new version would go online. Now it’s finally here and I can’t decide what to tell you first. Let’s start with the new reward system: From now on you will be rewarded for regular play. To do this you will receive a little more gold and experience points every day for your respective first PvP victory. On the fifth day you will not only get more gold and experience points, but in addition, also 30 gems! Great news for those, who regularly roam the oceans of Kartuga and love to fight against human players. Speaking of fighting against human players: the matchmaking has once again been improved and the level of each player character will now more important than. As a result, the battles are more balanced and unfair teams belong to the past!

But those of you who prefer to fight against NPCs can also look forward to the update: If you found loot in the past that required a significantly higher level than you had and thus was virtually unusable, this will now change with the new update. The loot from NPCs will be no more two levels higher than your own character level and thus clearly useful. So you no longer need to clog your inventory by items that you can only after you leveled up several times. Also the minimap has now been improved. This informs you about the level of NPC aggression, so that you can see at first glance which area you maybe you should avoid and which one provides safe passage. How often did I escape with an almost destroyed ship from a battle, only to cluelessly sail in front of a hostile pirates’ guns … This now belongs to the past, thanks to the improved map overview!
You can already see, we’re working hard on almost all areas of Kartuga, and the changes described above are only a tiny part of the whole update. The complete changelog can be found here.

So, thank you once again for your great support and extremely useful feedback to us. Only because of this we are able to further improve the game and add new features. Stay tuned, we see ourselves on the high seas!

Kartuga Reloaded – Update includes first and only server reset

Ahoy Pirates,

We were so excited when we officially started Kartuga’s Closed Beta at the end of February, and the first players started exploring the oceans. Since then, our development team has continued to work diligently on the game and incorporated new features, improved existing ones and applied lots of minor bug fixes. All this would not have been possible without your active support! Whether in blog comments, on Facebook or on the official forum, you have always given us useful feedback, brought forth new ideas and reported bugs in the game. For this, we want to thank the entire community of Kartuga!

Let’s talk about the update we just published – In short: It resets all server data. For you, this means that all of your characters start at level 1 again, With an emptied inventory and your current rank being deleted. Crucial to this decision was mainly the idea of fairness: Many of you have already played one or more characters extensively, reached a high level and obtained powerful items. Furthermore, from now on, you’ll be able to purchase gems, which was also not possible before. Therefore, it would be unfair to all new players who were not yet lucky and couldn’t participate in the closed beta. In addition, some of the changes that we now made, were much easier to implement for the programmers, because of the reset.

Your login information, social contacts and friends lists remain, of course, so that you can get back to normal immediately after the reset. In addition, I can promise you that this will be the only time we reset the server and your characters. Everything that you earn from now will remain! Therefore – Anchors Away! From now on, it counts!

Between realism and fantasy – the Design of Kartuga

A computer game is a very complex thing with many different parts. Starting with a general idea of what kind of game it should be, the game designer thinks about what could be fun and what not. After many discussions, ideas and preparations, the programmers will create the first playable version of the game. They are the guys who write the code and make sure that there are no bugs which would destroy all the fun. Sound designers create the background music as well as the sound effects with the goal of an appealing atmosphere.

For me, the graphic design of a game is the most important thing, though. The game could be really good on the programming side and could have an awesome sound, but when the graphic is bad, I won´t play longer than a few minutes. That´s why I am so happy with Kartuga´s great and piraty graphic design. Our designers wanted a style between realism and fantasy. They wanted Kartuga to be a world which is absolutely plausible in itself, but the players should also be able to explore mysterious places and beautiful paradises.

The guys did indeed a great job with this, as you can see in the area trailer, for example:

With every game start, the slightly caricatured look, the bright colors and nice textures let me sink into another world. Besides that, our graphic guys were able to integrate many different graphical facets into the worlds of Kartuga. Because of the great design, I always know if I am in the oriental waters of the Empire of the Sun or shipping through mysterious Kartu. I am still fascinated by the beautiful world and sometimes I lose myself in dreams of the beautiful beaches…

Board the Servers: Kartuga opens the beta for 3 days

Attention Kartuga Fans: From the 24th until the 26th of April we will deactivate our Kartuga Closed Beta Key System. Therefore, everyone will able to test the game without a key – simply register, or if you already have, log in and you can set sails in Kartuga’s beautiful pirate setting. This way we can test our servers the hard way and see how many players at once we can handle without performance issues. So, everybody wins: You as players can try out Kartuga before the official launch, we will gain valid info on our system’s stability.

We are also interested to see what will happen with the newly introduced rankings, when so many new players at once start the game. We noticed that some of you already appreciate the rankings very much and love to add just one more PvP-session to improve their rank. But the newbies don’t need to worry – our updated matchmaking will keep all sessions as fair as possible, with everyone having similar skills and levels of proficiency. ‘Cause the beautiful thing about Kartuga is that not only the level of yours and your teammates’ ships defines if you win or lose, but rather your abilities and the way your team cooperates. More than once I’ve experienced teams with higher overall levels loosing, because the seemingly weaker ones showed great teamwork. Well, during the “Board the Servers” days week, you can see for yourselves – have fun!

Get ready for tight battles! Kartuga Community Event has started!

Before some time we have already published a video about the quest system of our pirate game Kartuga and exposed some information about the story:

Now it’s time to focus again on the PvP part of the game:

Cheers of victory or crushing defeat – a round of Kartuga’s domination mode can evoke a wide spectrum of emotions. Matches are often decided within the last few seconds. You’re not paying attention for one second, and the enemy team takes over a control point, shifting the odds in their favor. Sometimes I felt like biting my keyboard, because my team lost a seemingly secure victory. Exactly those situations we’d like to capture in our first Kartuga community event: We want Screenshots of your closest game results. It doesn’t matter if you were the ones that managed to snatch the victory or if you had to admit a close defeat against your opponent – what counts is the difference between the teams’ scores, which should be as low as possible. If you have a screenshot of such a result, please visit our Kartuga forum. Here you have to post your screenshot in this thread. The closest three games posted will be rewarded with diamonds: 1500 for the first place, 1000 and 750 for the respective second and third. Only conditions are: Only one screenshot per player and the game took place after april 16. Our event ends at April 26th – so go out, play domination and take screenshots, there are diamonds waiting!

Kartuga: Raiders of the Lost Treasure

Regardless if you rather duel in heated PvP matches or like to do missions for NPCs, our pirate action game Kartuga offers both. You probably have realized by now, that some of the quests are quickly finished, and invite you to try out some of your skills, while others are longer and turn out to be part of a larger story. Those main quests; or story quests, will lead you through the five large PVE areas of Kartuga. Passing remote islands and beautiful beaches, aspiring pirates shouldn’t lose focus for their goal: The lost treasure chest of Kartuga!

According to rumor, it contains a mysterious item, which might stir the balance of power on the oceans. But be warned: searching for the treasure won’t be without danger. On several occasions, you will get caught in the crossfire between enemy factions. The Ithosian Trade League, the Empire of the Sun and Kartu Qucha are trying to get their hands on the powerful treasure. On your travels you follow the tracks of infamous pirate John Greybeard, last known owner of the chest. Further and further you’ll sail, meeting new allies and foes, experiencing wild sea battles, power struggles and vicious treason. During your wild hunt over the oceans you’ll encounter powerful elite enemies, like Robert the bloody or Gondom the Shipwrecker. In order to defeat them, the right tactic and lots of skill are vital. So, better pack lots of ammunition, equip your finest cannons, and get ready for treasure hunting!

In this Video we show you how the quest system of Kartuga works and fight against one of the elite enemies:

Kartuga Dev Letter, no. 1

In the recent weeks, I told you a lot of my experiences with our new pirate game Kartuga. Now it’s time to hand over the word to the people who developed this great game. Please find below a letter from the Kartuga Dev team, informing you about the current status of the game and their plans for the future.

Kartuga Dev Letter, no. 1

Fellow pirates!

We as the developers of Kartuga would like to address you, our loyal players, with this first Kartuga Dev Letter. The purpose of this letter is threefold: we’d like to give you an insight into some current numbers, and we’d like to let you know what we are currently working on regarding future updates of the game. Finally, we would like to thank you for your interest in Kartuga, and for your absolutely awesome support so far – keep on looting, plundering, and roaming the seas!

The reception of Kartuga was absolutely great, we are really overwhelmed by the enthusiastic player base that has been building up since the start of the closed beta, and even before that. Let us substantiate the great acceptance by some key numbers we’ve been tracking so far:

During the course of the closed beta, you have been playing for an accumulated 1.76 million minutes (that’s an astonishing 3.3 years!), you have been playing 3000 PvP matches, and have bought over 30 million cannon balls!

Current Development

We’re of course not going to rest on our laurels – here’s what we are currently working on to improve Kartuga (some of these improvements have already been implemented with Wednesday’s patch):

  • Matchmaking has been improved, favoring slightly longer waiting time over large gaps in levels between opponents
  • The stability of both client and server has been increased – this should already have become effective
  • Filling up matches if someone left the match has been made better and more fair

An Outlook on the Future

In the future, we will tackle the following features – and of course we’ll continue to fix occurring bugs. A big thanks goes out to all of you who have helped us with their reports – keep up the good work!

  • A ranking will be implemented
  • The options menu will be improved drastically
  • A feature many of you eagerly await will come: customizable controls will be introduced!

Listening to our Players

Finally, we have been summarizing your valuable feedback over the last weeks, and we will focus on the following areas to make Kartuga an even better game:

Many players have expressed their wish for a better chat, and we will work on making the chat more convenient to use

  • Some of you have been wondering whether the progression is not too fast, and we will look into it to guarantee long-time motivation and somewhat slower progression in terms of levelling
  • Of course we would like fair and square PvP battles, and would like to limit the loopholes for abuse as much as possible – nobody likes to have a team mate just being afk for the experience, and we will try to find ways to limit such abuse

We hope to have provided you with an update regarding our work and future plans for Kartuga – stay tuned, keep on playing, and please continue to provide us with your feedback – it is very important to us, and we’ll keep on listening to your suggestions, criticism, and improvements.

Sincerely,

The Kartuga Developers

Kartuga: new update improves match-making system

The canons are hot, your opponents despair and your ship keeps getting more powerful – The closed beta of Kartuga is running very well and thousands of players are fighting for supremacy on its vast oceans. Now there is another reason to be enthusiastic. Our developers just released a new update fixing some issues and improving the whole gameplay.

I’m looking forward to the new match-making system. You may have recognized that the difference between the players’ levels rose. So there is a risk that the battles become uneven. The new update is designed precisely to fix this. In the future, we want only very similarly leveled players to compete against each other. To achieve this, the time was extended in which the system can take to match up players. This will increase the chances of the system finding more appropriate opponents, and the frustration factor will drop considerably. The update will also ensure that you never have to play alone against two opponents.

Those who want to learn more about this patch, and upcoming ones can visit the official forum.

Oh, and if you are still getting this message in the game, “We are currently undergoing maintenance – please check back later” then clear your cache. Once you do that, everything should work!

Attention Pirates: New beta keys available!

For some time now pirate captains all over the world roar “Fire away”! Thousands of pirates fight exciting sea battles and try out various character builds. No easy task considering the three totally different classes Protector, Engineer and Destroyer and a total of over 80 Skills to choose from. Whoever did not have the chance so far and wants to try out our brand new pirate game should register on www.kartuga.com and use this key:

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After you have logged in, you can pick your own class. If you are not sure which class to choose, check out our new skill video in which we present the skill trees of the classes:


After you have solved the tutorial, you start in a lovely harbor. Now you can start to take on quests and fight NPC’s. If you prefer to fight against human players, you should select the domination or destruction modes. As soon as enough players have queued for a pvp match the battle starts.

The domination mode is about area control. Each team tries to control as many control points as possible. For each captured position your team gains a constant stream of points. The team that first reaches 2500 points wins.

The destruction mode is about planting a bomb. The bomb spawns in the middle of the map. If you collect it you have to bring the bomb to your enemies’ bomb spots. Once you have arrived, you goal is to arm the bomb and wait for the explosion. But attention: While the countdown is running, you opponents still have a chance to disarm the bomb.

You see there are a lot of things to discover in the world of Kartuga, so be fast and join the game!