MapleStory Iceberg: The Race to Level 200

[@ToProfessionalize]

you are singlehandedly saving an entire generation's memories

[@tcg2717]

Time to archive this video!

[@andrew-11]

well said. hard to describe my feelings as I watch this. I can close my eyes and be there, almost.

[@Kydino]

Very much so, we need this kind of content badly for these old mmos from the early to mid 2000's to archive older internet culture, I hope we get another person with the same level of passion as him to do the same to something like ragnarok online or tibia too. So much history and memories from that era could be lost.

[@nguyenluan-bm5us]

Remember Tiger ?

[@johnvuu4679]

​@@nguyenluan-bm5usohhh I member

[@SwayNoir]

Random fact: Fangblade really was all about the leveling, by power standards he actually was weaker than other DK's far lower leveled than him. He never put much effort into his gear. In fact I believe the surfboard he's often seen with had to be donated to him by his friends/guild as an upgrade to his current weapon and even that took a lot of convincing for him to accept it. I remember reading about a conversation he was involved in where someone was asking in guild if they should spend an extra million mesos (I forget the actual number, its likely far more) to buy an item that had a 1 stat upgrade over their current gear and Fangblade commented something like "Why would you spend a million mesos to get 1 stat when you could just level up for free and get 5 stats" - Kinda says a lot about his mentality haha

[@PacmanLickThisGuysAs]

what a chad mind set

[@Applesgosh]

damn he was based

[@FLONCH-ZONE]

absolute beast

[@McDudes]

What a gamer. Sounds like he just grinded and had his eyes on his goal without stopping.

[@jjh7611]

Someone get fangblades opinion on 6th cap. “Why spend 50$ for a booster every month when you can just quit”

[@xvkk]

Thank you so much for covering a topic so nostalgic to me, and with such high quality and care! :) Please don't feel obligated to, but I'd LOVE a video where you cover the famous MapleStory players of the good ol' days in-depth. Wishing you the best! Hopefully you'll get more subscribers and views!

[@timr.2257]

Yeah, and about those their top guilds if there are any info about them.

[@realcartoongirl]

so you very rich and can give $100 to random people

[@SonicSW]

I don't know why Nexon just doesn't put out a MapleStory Classic and milk the game for another 20 years lol

[@dewwwd3431]

There’s private servers doing this just because nexon won’t…. I bet it would be HUGE I still play a private server just because I miss OG maple it’s fun just grinding senselessly

[@elquiness5254]

In kr there is maplestory classic called mapleland its like a private server but it is owned by Nexon and it follows nexons TOS

[@elquiness5254]

​@@dewwwd3431 mapleland (maplestory classic) is incredibly huge as you mentioned in kr, 3rd class and zakum(?) Was just implemented this month

[@dewwwd3431]

@@elquiness5254 they do it for Korea but not the rest of world

[@Mazer19944]

MapleLegends is what you search for. Most realistic OG with players.

[@LawsofPaul]

I distinctly remember Tiger had made a quitting video where he dropped his spear and sat in a chair until is expired. Not able to find it but remember it being a big deal on basilmarket forums.

[@Ivazdy]

Very late, but are you sure you're not talking about BSUCLA instead? That video is pretty easy to find on youtube if you just search for "BSUCLA Part VIII"

[@524_td]

Ayumilove. That's a name that brought back so much nostalgia

[@keturahms]

Great video and trip down memory lane for me. Having been part of this race (my bishop keturah finishing at #8 on Jun 8, 2008) and being part of what you termed FangBlade's bishop squad was a great time for me. I'm impressed with your attention and accuracy with the details. Thank you so much for preserving this part of the Maple Iceberg, it is truly huge!

[@Noahtheorigianl]

I hope someone interviews irl old legendary maplers kina like the smash documentary

[@McDudes]

​@@Noahtheorigianl Isn't it hard to get into contact with them? Or someone would already have done that.

[@McDudes]

@Keturahms how old where you back then if you don't mind asking? Or maybe rather how many hours a day did you guys play 😂

[@Noahtheorigianl]

@@McDudes it’s just weird bc most old games from like 1995-2005 we have info, like arcade game legends, pro players from age of empires 1, or smash bros melee from 2002, stuff like that, because eventually pros players, they come out and talk about there story EVENTUALLY but gms is soooo quiet

[@McDudes]

@@Noahtheorigianl that is true 🤔

[@HVTCA.]

fun fact in kms a bowmaster was the first lv200

[@kigas24]

Amazing video! I remember before FangBlade hit 200, he went around joining the top guilds like a kind of celebration tour. Each one gave him a gift. The guild I was in at the time (Imperials, which can be seen in screenshot of FangBlade hitting 200) gave him a blue surfboard.

[@accelerate7956]

Hi Keenan! You don't know me on this acc, but it's Dylan - burnedbyfire/Prohibits if you remember those igns LOL.

[@Ayl0n1]

what a great video, I'm actually speechless how well made this is, thank you so much for this

[@spazzwazzle]

I have kind of a cute story about curryishott. So I made my first alt character, a bandit, at some point in 2007. I had just maxed savage blow and mastery, and since I was approaching 50, I was looking to check out my damage at coolies, a map I wasn't super familiar with. I saw a female priest training there, level 81, and sat back in awe before CCing. She sent me a party invite and let me leech for a bit while I slowly killed one by one. It must've been obvious that I was gawking at her ability to control the map, since she said "you're partied with a pro lmao" I replied with something like "haha, yeah," before she revealed that she was actually he--curryishott. I was in obvious disbelief wondering why the rank 2 person in the game was wasting time training a comparatively low-level priest. Apparently, he had gotten a temporary ban triggered by someone messing with him through AIM, like the messenger, but I'm not sure if that was true or if I was getting messed with. Dude just couldn't stop grinding. Anyway, I obviously went and visited him at gobies (not sure why he wasn't at bone fish) the next time I saw his main online, and we had a little laugh about how we met. He never forgot me, even almost a year later when we all celebrated him hitting 200. Tony, if you're reading this, I never forgot either, and you gave me one of the best memories of my childhood. I loved watching you grind 190-200 at a way faster rate than anyone ever did once the pressure was off. Also: in the video, you mention that Tony was the first likeable and sociable person in the top 5. I definitely agree, but I would really love if you could make a vid exploring the many myths and rumors surrounding Tiger. As someone who got to talk to him once and was on his buddy list (for probably a day lmao, I was just selling him elixirs), he came off as extremely impersonal, and I'm wondering if that was intentional. There used to be a rumor that Tiger was multiple people, and that the name 'Tiger' was meant to represent each of their names--no idea if that was just a spicy rumor or not, but his only confirmed identity does start with a G (Gavin). Anyway, it would make sense for someone who's account sharing, to make sure each person communicates with as little zest as possible so as to not give out any conflicting identities. Might be a nice and easy 30 minute video, and you could find most of the rumors on the old forums!

[@SeanIsAFatty]

Regarding Tiger's deletion, I was on Scania but was in L3aF at the time. I was given an account by my brother on Scania, a level 135 Bowmen. It was a high-level guild, and we knew a lot of the other high-level players. The speculation at the time of Tiger stopping to play was real-life related. His real name was Gavin, and it was confirmed by people that knew him, that he shared his account with his girlfriend. Back then, account sharing wasn't punished, but was looked heavily downed upon by the community. One day, Tiger would be silent, training away. The next day, they're talkative in buddy chat, and just generally chatting. The switch between the personalities was pretty apparent. He suddenly stopped logging in, and no one really knew why. It was common to see him online at Gobys, but strangely, after about a week of absence, people started to worry and ask questions. Fast-forward about a month later, and he disappeared from the rankings. No one could find him or get in touch with him. The next month, the rankings updated and a female warrior, named Tiger, level 41, appeared. To appear in the rankings back then, you had to be level 30 or higher. They did play, but never talked. No one knew who it was, but they were grinding away while being harassed by countless people. Back then, /find was a command that would list where the player was in that channel. They located her, and would harass her constantly, preventing her from grinding. Eventually, they, too, stopped logging in. With the confirmation of there being two people with access to Tiger, it was speculated within the high-level community that they broke up, or something related to it. Tiger would log in at the very least, once every 2 or 3 days, but for him to suddenly stop without a word was strange to those that knew him. Again, it was only speculation, but it was the most probable at the time.

[@xzigzag]

The two players that shared the account were Gavin and Craig. One of my old friends used to know Craig (I think) from playing Neopets together. I didn't believe him because he was new to Maplestory, but sure enough he sent a screenshot as proof which was Suuushi at gobies saying hey (my name). It also confirmed that they took over Suuushi's account after she quit, and you'd often see Suuushi online more than Tiger at that time. Or one played on that account while the other played on Tiger.

[@SeanIsAFatty]

@@xzigzag So THAT'S where Craig came from. My guild master said his name a few times, but I never met a Craig at all. It's not surprising that Suuushi quit, though. She used to grind at squids, but was constantly harassed by hackers just mob-vaccing the map, so she was forced to CC. When the top players started getting banned for training on maps with AFK hackers, it became a harassment technique.

[@SeanIsAFatty]

@DirtyFan2 Back then, the top 5-10 were followed around by heaps of people. Hackers would typically go to the maps, mouse fly to the roof, and mobvac all the monsters. Because of how often hackers would troll them, GM patrols usually started at the top ranks, then patrolled the popular hacker maps at the time. Fangblade usually had his posse of fanboys sitting on ropes in Skelegongs when he was training. His famous helmet, black crusader armour and maple flag were all equipped before he logged off, to not show his items. There are a few videos from 15 years ago showing him training legit without a worry. I don't know anyone in Bera, only Scania, so I can't comment if Fangblade did or did not share his account, but according to people who played back then, Fangblade never logged in during different times or missed days. Kind of like the LynxTitan but for MapleStory back then.

[@SeanIsAFatty]

@DirtyFan2 FangBlade never came out of nowhere. He overtook the top 5 slowly. FangBlade was top 10 for almost an entire year, then 4th job came out in v54, he pushed straight passed everyone. Because of how much mesos the top players were stacking, he most likely bought all of his mastery books as soon as possible. To top it off, he was the first player on the rankings to have a Dragon Faltizan. There are literally videos on KZbin showing him training at Himes with a 4 man party, and there's literally 5 people dead spamming chat. Tiger had fanboys as well when he trained at Gobys. In the video you can see that Tiger has an active HS service, someone who was CCing and buffing in Deep Sea Gorge. They then leave as to not disrupt the EXP gain through party share. I lived this Maple through highschool, I know exactly what was going on.

[@SeanIsAFatty]

@DirtyFan2 Not a lot of people remember why the sudden appearnce of players happened, and it's understandable. During this era of MapleStory, you launched the game through the website. When you went to the MapleStory website, the top 5 players were always on display. The only way to see the ranks further, would be to click specifically into the ranking page through the top menus, much like you have to today. Because of this, people don't remember those who were top 10, or even top 25. They would have to specifically go out of their way to view these players, as each page on the rankings page only ever showed 5 players at a time. Even then, you were typically skimming through, looking at some names, and then forgetting about them. This is also why you can use WayBackMachine to go on to the web pages for the old MapleStory website, and nearly all of the ranking related pages are only the FIRST page. That's the page that was cached the most. Very rarely will you be able to view the second, and there's not even a third page on there. Due to the amount of people who didn't check those rankings, you can understand now why people don't remember. This is why the phenomenon of them suddenly appearing on the rankings felt unnatural. It's entirely understandable. Let's take CurryIsHot for example. In this video, he first appears on the top 5 at 30:45, May 20th, 2007. In the span of one month, he outpaced every single person on the top 5 leaderboard. Now did anyone say he was cheating/account sharing? No. Because Curry documented some stuff on KZbin, and he was friends with a lot of the content creators at the time. This still didn't slow him down. Then FangBlade comes along and does the same thing, an identical push and eventual overtake at 32:21, with Curry still out pacing him, and closing the gap on Tiger due to him slowing down his leveling speed. The reason it feels foreign was because he appeared in between people we know. Curry got a free pass, FangBlade didn't, but they both did the same thing. Do you understand why I said never came out of nowhere? L3aF was a high level guild in Scania, and we had an IRC channel we kept in contact with until we all eventually stopped logging in. Some people used Skype, others used TinyChat on blog websites. We regularly talked about the game, and we had players in the top 50 in our guild. We would regularly talk about people running the rankings up and down. As for Tiger being Self Sufficient, he wasn't really self sufficient at all. Tiger regularly used a HS service, and partied with high-level mobbers to drag gobbys to the top of the map. He was regularly seen partied with Bayleef, a priest who would party all his customers and CC through the channels at Gobbys, and LightOne, a 145+ ranger who was his mobber at Gobbys. He wasn't very self sufficient, he had a strategy much like the rest of the top 5. FangBlade wasn't the most talented, he just grinded the most. He typically grinded more regularly then most other players meaning the gap never got smaller between him and second, and only ever grew. Here's a littler Trivia: Did you know that the MapleStory website listed Stone Golems as the highest level monster? This remained until their first website re-work where they removed the monster information. The first rework came after 4th job, but the website was made for v0.32 release, which was the first version MapleStory had out of beta. Because of this, the community effort to document all information was made, and websites such as BasilMarket and Hidden-Street became the go to places to get information. Not a lot of people know the origins of these websites, but they certianly didn't know that Stone Golems weren't even close to being the middle-level monsters. I learned that when I joined the Hidden-Street Demethos guild, which lasted a total of 8 months before everyone quit the world. We all moved from the big worlds to Demethos thinking it was going to be an even playing field for rankings, however hackers made sure that we didn't stand a chance. :)

[@Armamenting]

That "congrats :D" everytime they leveled hit me right in the nostalgia

[@Twinstroker]

Gz

[@diamondhands3671]

ccplz

[@ReyahsCommet]

cc f3

[@ryuman757]

I physically need videos like this in my life, because there was so much history that I not only missed out on (I might have started playing GMS in 2006-2007), but so much that I've forgotten about in my own head. I STILL have a couple of the "road to 200" AMV videos that people would put out, that I used to be obsessed with 😭 Bless you for making these videos of my childhood 🙌❤️

[@IphnirDraco]

45:25 "Novinha" is bugged when you say it. Im a little sad that She got 4 place, because she is the only brazilian in the race to lv 200 (Fun fact: Novinha is a slang to yong girls in brasilian portuguese)

[@BlameAkon]

First Corsair level 200 was AnnaVette. Also xxcoreanzxx was a WK/Pally in top 5 (see timestamp 11:43). He disappeared around the time it became publicly known that he was on the LAPD Most Wanted list iRL (where he remains to this day)... otherwise we might've seen a Paladin contender 😂 I think LightOne cracked top 5 at one point as a BM... not sure about that one though. Great video, what a throwback

[@QSauce]

We need more of these super long documentary style videos, I love watching these while I'm playing LOL. Some ideas: - A whole episode about maplestorys development / beta - Full timeline of maplestory from start to present - breaking down big bang / reboot / other major changes for the game - Why maplestory 2 failed - Hidden maps npcs and easter eggs from OG maple - Maplestory OG culture, like drop games, faming, mules, megaphones, etc

[@heromeister]

I was also born on September 29th, although 2 years after you. Happy early birthday! Amazing video as always. These blast-to-the-past OSMS documentary videos are really interesting because as a small child I was only playing without knowing even a bit of what it has to offer or what was happening. Heck, I picked page as my 2nd job. I wasn't a masochist or anything like that, just didn't know any better. Level 36 was my breaking point, before I decided to open a new character.

[@CorySaysLets]

I LOOOOOVE this video. It took me back to those days and I really appreciate the work you put into it. I was in Broa's top 10 Paladins back during these times and I feel you underestimate just how bad they were at 46:22. I don't think even the most committed player could have made it into the top 5 as a Paladin lol. Gosh, incredible video. This really made my day. Like legit.

[@flaming007]

What happened to you, Jay & Alex? >:(

[@Orrador]

​@squid3921 Man, life can be pretty crazy sometimes. Lol Cory and I still play but Alex has dropped Maple entirely, though we consistently try to persuade him back. Hahah

[@flaming007]

@@Orrador Good to hear you're all alive. We were never on the same server (Khaini pride) but thanks for covering KMS2 and MS2 beta back in the day. Shame GMS2 was a later big bang'ed version. You're not forgotten lads!

[@KawabungaDude]

holy shit, the crossbowman you have at 41:05 was a friend/guildmate of mine in those days haha! XBish from Windia, his name is carlos and he was a hilarious dude. he was from dominican republic and i'll never forget he told me that his nickname was Dominican Thunder. and how if i ever visit there, that the police will definitely stop me as a tourist but you can get out of it by bribing them with like 10 bucks. miss that guy, hope he's doing well wherever he is. so many good memories on that server

[@user-nkho]

I love that you're going to make different videos about the topics in the iceberg. The iceberg video was one of the best videos that I've sat and watched full attention from start to end in a long time. Early days of Maple are some of my most core memories of being in my teens. I still play til this day, on Reboot now though. I remember when I played in Scania trying to track down CurryIsHott and whispering him and he would actually respond and was super nice. Excited for the next video!

[@Layvee]

Fantastic job documenting the race to level 200, it must have taken forever to document everything. Nostalgic to remember following the competition as a young kid through rankings. Only missing Xlazhar (I/L Mage from Bera) who was often accompanied by Shiriko (Priest). Xlazhar led the race, hitting level 120 ahead of all, pre-3rd job. He reached around level 122 before quitting, grinding at Bains mostly iirc. Shynobi was the first to 100, Xlazhar then took over in the race to 120. Sadly, their names faded unlike Tiger & Fangblade, due to the timing of a public ranking release. Very interesting watch nonetheless! 👏 If you search for ''Way of Bera'' here on KZbin, you can find a video my brother made back in early 2006, following Xlazhar & Shiriko grinding at Bains.

[@BlameAkon]

Thief6o9 wasn't far behind ;) I think I have those numbers right

[@kuroki]

wow I forgot both of these names but played during that time, so the memories are coming back. I was in Shiriko's guild. Thanks for the nostalgia

[@boybarf]

Literally so excited to see more Maple deep dives! I currently can't play due to hand issues so these videos are helping hold me over!

[@EmperorBello]

Few notes I'll add to this! Hot sands was best exp for melee when it was vic only. Had great drops from torties and had best spawn. Also Tiger HATED fighting for areas to train at. And him being on the Scania server there was plenty of competition. He was at lucida because there was no one there so he had the spawn all to himself. Fun fact this is why he went to gobies. Gobies aren't nessisarily faster than squids. But virtually no one was at gobies so that's why Tiger preferred that to squid. Also bera had a fairly decent shot because it launched about over a month after Scania but it had a TWO WEEK double exp event to help players catch up! Also hp washing was invented by Tiger! It was invented a bit later so no one really did that yet. CHief bandits were great at level 70 because of meso explosion... However as they leveled their utility started to demish. See they actually were not that good at mobbing because band of thieves was actually a terrible skill.. Also assaulter did slightly less damage than savage blow. So actually aside from meso explosion their damage didn't really improve from second job to third job. Chief bandits would soar from levels 70-110ish but after that the other classes could kill faster than CBS could drop mesos. Also there was a brief moment in time where Suuushi was number 1. Tigers character was completely gone from the rankings either from character deletion or from ban. The name Tiger was taken by a black female character that made it to the grand level of 12. Eventually Tiger got his character back and did eventually go on to reach 200 albeit much later. Also to further fuel the speculation of Tiger account sharing. Talking so some of his friends at the time and people who bossed with him Tiger alwaysss whispered. He never talked out loud. Idk maybe the celebrity didn't want people to twist his words or something... Untilll the rumors of the account sharing started popping up. I remember going down to aqua road to watch him grind. And one day he was very talkitive. Told people what % he was at. The attack on his spear etc etc. Almost like a different person.

[@andrewpoirier418]

This is truly a beautiful historical record of so many people's memories. I've been watching youtube since 2011 and I've never felt such a strong emotional desire to give thanks to a creator. Thank you so much for making this video. I think I'll come back to this for years to come.

[@bato5599]

I remember going against curryishott when PVP games were around. I said hi to him in chat and he said hi back, I felt like a fan being noticed by a celebrity haha. Few months later his account was gone. Good times man.

[@draked6830]

I just remembered the time I met Tiger when he was still level 153 in HHG1. He literally just hit dragon roar and level 16 me (like, 10 years old) leveling to become a page was so excited to meet the legend himself.

[@xcenario]

In the early days of official release I remember a cleric named Stephen who kept on par with Tiger around lvls 70 or so. I dont have much information other than memory, but you can probably find something related to him around. Really nice video though!

[@AlonDrums]

I always remembered that Tiger was level 160 when I started to play but I couldn't remember the year because I was so young back then. I'm very happy to learn that it was around August 2006, or v0.28. Crazy how new the game was still.

[@Applesgosh]

Seriously incredible stuff, I'm honestly speechless at how knowledgeable you are with classic maple. You are the hero we needed!!

[@Atobe112]

Great video. Bigfoot/Anego meta was 100% a way to level at the time. if you were able to juggle Bf's in a corner you could open his hitbox. It was a large amount of exp for a very short amount of time. You could see people shoot up large levels with BF/HH hunts. the unfortunate thing was the around 6-12 hour spawn timer and too many maps to make it consistent outside of maintenance.

[@KiwiSenseiYT]

Holy crap that's a ton of nostalgia. As someone who did play the beta and also looked at rankings pretty frequently, seeing the old spots, the updates, the names on the rankings, this video definitely hit a spot xD I saw curry when they were still in the 30ish range once, specifically remembered the name, was so surprised to see it on the leaderboards later on ^^

[@ChikoWhat]

Seeing Tiger in early GMS footage is kinda funny. The loser was floating above the map and vac-hacking like a loser under ludi. Idiot forgot that you could click a pet to view their profile just like clicking their player model. I was a low level Cleric/Priest that could sustain enough to stay in the highlevel ghost pirate area (forgot that whole area under ludi is called) and follow the vac hacker until they would go into hiding for the day. I wouldn't grief, just

[@Zrynnn]

this was really fun to watch, a trip down nostalgia road, seeing all the exp rates is not something id ever seen before since i only reached level 62 in vanilla maple

[@AbbeRustMojo]

Im happy I made the top 5 rank in maple and that some people still remembers me. Nice video

[@Thiefwriter]

​@DirtyFan2 The guy in the video. Who u?

[@CommanderArmin]

Best maplestory video in years thank you for your hardwork. This one and the iceberg were very enjoyable to watch.

[@GMSDark]

Very cool video! At 40:50 you mention that Bigfoot was most likely killed by classes like Hermit, it was actually very difficult for Hermits due to how Bigfoot's knockback mechanics were and how hard the touch damage hit, almost a guaranteed 1 shot unless they were heavily HP washed. Bigfoot after being hit would have a slight invincibility frame where it couldn't be hit again immediately, making it almost impossible for a Hermit to knock it back enough to pin it in the corner. Bigfoot was actually mostly done by warrior classes that were able to utilize rush and pin it in the corner easier while also having enough HP to tank the high touch damage.

[@PurpleDragonSpike]

I don't remember exactly how it worked, but I seem to recall some leech / boost strat involving bigfoot? I think a War would give you the HP boost and you'd hit it once (somehow, don't recall the details tbh) and it would get you like an entire level lol. My memory isn't great and I don't recall if I ever actually did the boost at any point but that sticks out in my mind.

[@flaming007]

​@@PurpleDragonSpike Power Guard leech! Page & Fighter could learn a damage reflect skill called Power Guard at level 31 which didn't check accuracy. The leech seller would bring a level 31 Warrior mule, get it to suicide into Bigfoot & then you'd gain EXP. As long as you were level 26 or above.

[@plugmeinplease1193]

6:20 what is the map viewer for MapleStory? Is this how you get map + mob animation footage? Is this available for download or a website? A quick search got me 404 links but I’ve been looking done something like this for forever!!!

[@Tomi-sc7dv]

I feel some pain looking back to old maple because I went so hard on level grinding but at the same time those times were some of the most memorable and fun times of my life. Great video, thanks for covering this kind of a topic.

[@xForbin99]

I think most of us old school players feel the same way

[@MawiaUwU]

Speaking of Curryishot and him being a nice guy, I still remember grinding with him on several occasions in a party at squids, he waa always friendly and invited me and some friends to grind with him several times. Good times with a great dude :]

[@Maplecello]

Great video, could listen to u for Hours! You really can tell how much effort you put into these videos, awesome editing !!

[@tirosc]

I remember forming expedition teams as a fresh level 30 bandit and traveling to tauros with my friends to see the high level players train during beta. Learned the hard way that the lightning strike kills through darksight too. This was back when LAN shops were still a thing. Great memories

[@Mattarii]

Great video, looking forward to much more of the MapleStory Iceberg!

[@Rick020]

I remember stalking Tiger and Suuushi when they we're level 14x. Somehow I can't comprehend that that was in 2005... I was literally 9 years old. My brother reached level 71 at that time, which was already insanely high to me. I never got higher than level 60 on my Dexless sin. Call of Duty became my new favorite game.

[@raiza1626]

really hope you blow up big with these vids, so much research put into this and the iceberg video. Genuinely enjoyed, cheers.

[@coppersan]

46:50 PALADIN BEST CLASS

[@FunBox.]

Fantastic level of research and the constant EXP growth of the top 5 on the left side of the video is a great detail. Old Maple Best Maple.

[@Etrac9445]

Tons of work went into this vid and it shows. Keep it up dude you're killin it with these.

[@doctorquib]

I remember being there in Hene Hunting grounds 1 when Curry hit 200, my computer almost exploded from how many people were there. Such good memories, can't believe it's been over 15 years since then 😢 thank you for the nostalgia

[@sebbie_gonzo]

Thank you so much for this. I remember seeing Tiger get dethroned after such a very long time at #1 and it was unreal. 46:22 As a 159 Paladin pre-BB, I can attest that WKs/Paladins were consistently considered worse than Crusader/Heroes because of their lack of a useful party skill. Additionally, Blast, while it was one of the easiest attacks to hit the damage cap when it was still 99k, would actually do LESS damage than a Hero who could hit 3 (or was it 5?) times with their main attack. Although it was weaker than Blast, it would amount to more damage than hitting 99k. Essentially, Paladin damage had a hard cap whereas the other Warriors didn't.

[@EphemeralPseudonym]

Paladins were considered viable at low funding levels and the elemental charge was decent at some mobs at least

[@katsukamijo3943]

Loaded with nostalgia, good presentation and good storytelling. You earned a subber, my friend.

[@TheTikeySauce]

Note on 40:34 - People most likely didn't grind Bigfoot pre-4th job because it was extremely risky compared to Himes. It was a fast moving boss mob that dealt enough touch damage to 1-shot Archers, Thieves, Magicians through Magic Guard, as well as lower-level Warriors without Hyper Body, so one mistake would be devastating. It being a public boss also meant that someone could come in and attack it to briefly change it's aggro and prevent you from knocking it back.

[@CrunkleSSBM]

Only 5 minutes into the video but it’s incredible how thorough you’re being and how much I’m learning already

[@pompeocavaliere1962]

20:20 Hermits specifically get a TON more out of raw attack power and stat than other classes. Pre-BB Lucky 7 scaled off of LUK stat, and each point of raw attack power was IMMENSE. This is why dexless thieves were so popular, you could be level THIRTY, still throwing Subis (the weakest throwing star) would still hit 1k lines (which was SUPER high at that level). It was not uncommon to see Hermits OHKOing end game mobs when other players would need three-four hits. This meant they would 1) be using one skill to kill an enemy 2) be able to kill at the SAME rate as other classes, technically, but most importantly 3) be able to move around the map, having more access to mobs and less downtime.

[@Tehgreenz]

Yes I think they missed this. Archers ATK scaling was trash, and Assassin had the highest ATK scaling. Even with the cost of scrolls, assassins were easier to scroll to higher damage. And you can NEVER understate what an advantage mobility was in early maple.

[@Everdred]

The reason Chief Bandits were not up high in the ranks but Hermits were, is because getting to Chief bandit alone was a feat in itself, it was statistically the slowest leveling experience up to 70. Considering CBs had to single target as a Melee only really sucked it was comparable to the way Beginners level. All that aside once you do finally hit 70 for that sweet Band of Thieves, you find out quickly that it doesn’t even start with its mobbing potential. At level 1 you could hit 2 monsters at once and it would very slowly increase through levels until cap. So as a CB you were not even efficiently mobbing until 80 or so.

[@HiImRawr]

Also band of thieves was super weak lol the best way to level was killing much higher mobs with meso explosion, but it was also very expensive

[@fingerbvngbeng9851]

Big true I played a chief bandit as my first character befor 3rd job was a thing , definitely one of the worst leveling experiences ever lol

[@Ghost1170]

Bruh hermits were just as bad if you were poor. You know how shit a feeling is when every bandit/hermit pre 60 is? We both suffered bro LOL. Couldnt ever make money cause pots + refilling the shitty low level subis were too expensive

[@HiImRawr]

@@Ghost1170 lmao no, Sin's/Hermits were WAY better without meso's and with a lot of funding they were extremely strong. The cost of refilling stars isn't the same as actually doing terrible damage.

[@Ghost1170]

@@HiImRawr bruh, I struggled way less getting a chief bandit than I did a hermit. You dont need money to auto attack. You need money to auto attack as a sin. What? Even if the process is slower, you win out at a net positive if youre making money. Making money in old maple was literally a time waste unless you hacked. That shit was cancer

[@damnt3iktai]

thanks for making such videos, it's a treat to walking down the memory lane. also would you make more videos perhaps something related to releases of regions(or maps) over the time, events (in-game or irl events, guild meetups) or the transition of maple's economy (trader) from f2p to p2w? i feel like if anyone were to do it, it has to be you.

[@alonshlider4881]

That level 102 fighter in beta...wtf!. And that level 93 assassin - it amazes me that he even got access to level 80 gear, this is absolutely nuts in the beta era

[@Darkfire9189]

Fangblade, he quit MS after 200. I lost touch with him but he did interact with guild at times. But, he was so focused on leveling that he had zero time for social stuff. Once he hit 200 he was so burned out he quit never to return. Occasionally he'd stop by to say hi but, eventually he just stopped all together. I dunno what happened to him. I hope he's well.

[@MozillaNL]

The factuality and expansiveness of this video is absolutely insane. I picked up MapleStory as a 13 year old during oct/nov 2005 and played upto Big Bang. Hanging out on forums when not playing the game. I vividly remember the release of 3rd job and Ludibrium. Always interested in the top players and the current meta. You went so far into the details of grinding in gMS.

[@UltimateNPC]

yoooo this video was so in-depth and informative to people who may not know Maplestory's history that well. Would love to see a race to 250 and race to 275 video in the future :)

[@TheFictionTube]

YA

[@EtherGaming604]

200 was the race that mattered. MS was still one of the top 3 games played which imo makes it a huge achievement. It's insane going on these days and seeing how far it's fallen. I was so surprised by how many servers were deleted.

[@LittleJoeT]

The other two races were a bit faster tho😂 just one minute video

[@DreamtOf]

Brought back so many good memories playing this game. Even some from after big bang, racing to 200 in new world releases, the 250 race and community, tower of oz discoveries. Great job on the video :)

[@RsSooke]

The only thing I don’t miss is not being able to afford potions but once you got past there, old MS was so fun. Dexless warriors and trying to get accuracy was a fun challenge.

[@MolecularMachine]

19:45 🎉🎉!!!!WINDIA MENTION!!!! 🎉🎉 I chose Windia as a totally casual player, did not gaf about rankings or leveling, just doing PQs and exploring the cool areas. It was way less populated than the older worlds, so it was perfect for me. Rarely had problems getting into PQs.

[@Sang15Mitang]

The Deep Gorge era was my era in MS. I was in Bellocan and I was the highest level I/L mage on the server. I trained in squids with my friend who was a crusader, or my friend who was a priest. Sometimes we would train on gobies with our friends who were crusader/priest, but my internet connection was really bad and if I disconnected I'd often respawn on gobies and die without my magic guard (although we did try to coordinate them killing the gobies with me respawning). The only person I know who regularly trained on sharks was my F/P mage friend who I think was the highest level F/P on the server at the time as well.

[@lyhed5234]

What a fantastic video along with your iceberg overview. I didn't pay attention to all of this while playing so it's so much fun to hear about it now. Thanks for making these videos :)

[@Ereklo_Game]

Love these videos sooooooo much. Keep these up PLEASE. So interesting, here for the whole video every time!!

[@boybus1208]

100.000% that the level cap was like that, I played literally since releasedate.. Tiger rank 1 first ever to lvl cap 120 in Scania GMS (back in the days when there was no 3rd or 4th job yet).. If my memory is correct he did the final kill at the Crimson Balrog spawned on the boat from Victoria Island to Orbis that would travel once per half hour.. I love your video’s man, they bring back memories! Keep it coming! 😄

[@Mrexantexan]

Very interesting video for an old player like myself. The video reached new heights for me when I noticed I appear in it as SirJordan, FangBlade's training partner at the 40 minute mark. Good times for sure. Maybe it's time to log back on and start the journey to 300, lmao

[@DefinitelyNotDavid1]

This brings back so many memories. I remember when Perion used to be the FM, when FM didn't exist. I also remember the summer events when they gave tubes and maple weapon drops. I remember a lot of people were grinding at bubbling's for the maple shield. Good old days. Pig beach was my favorite spot to chill at.

[@theremix54]

Havnet played ms for 15 years. Saw this on recommended. loved it man. subbed

[@penguinpun94]

I remember Fangblade from the good old days that getting to lvl 200 was an achievement and a miracle, reaching a certain lvl to get to orbis and try to get to el nath just to get stuck in the tower. Same as ludi, good old ludi PQ and CCing to find an empty ch in order to grind the pq. Hell, even trying to get to Leafre was a goddam challenge back in the day. Bishops spamming genesis boosting low lvl accounts. Damm I miss those days.

[@SystemBot]

There was a time where you could level a fire poison mage at high level mobs like skelegons at only second job.

[@Turtlebear]

Looking forward to maplestory iceberg series! The research and detail these videos go into is very impressive

[@Tehgreenz]

The only thing I remember about iliketoks was a mega where they explained their name was I Like To KS (Kill-steal).

[@llalukardll]

great video! im an old school ms player now im 37 i have some screen shots of me following my fav top players. just an extra info. there was a couple players who reached 200 before fangblade 1 from scania and 1 from broa but they were unranked players. not sure why they got unranked. but the one from scania was a bishop

[@RoiskyRoyce]

Well done. Can't believe how much research you did for this. I remember soooo many of these players.

[@Yakra1]

GMS beta player here, I'm honestly impressed with how much history you've unearthed and documented on the game. I wish I had useful info to add to your research, but my memory is hazy and my old hard drive of images and videos from 2005-2009 was lost ages ago. But there are a handful of things I do remember. I apologize for the incoming wall of text. MOONshining was the only person I saw during the beta over level 60, and I thought I lost that name to time given that it's been around 18 years and some change. I vividly remember a level 92 mage chilling in Sleepywood at the time and it shocked me, and his armor looks identical to what I remember. His robe was something I wouldn't see again until months after the official launch. As for my experiences with top players post-beta, I've had a few run-ins with people like Tiger. Most of my experiences with them were neutral. However, I had one encounter with Tiger in 2006 that did pique my suspicions. I was trying to secure a spot at Zakum for my guild at the time. I recall him and his guild preparing to do a run while I tried to track a group currently inside. What I do remember then was a GM popping up at the entry map and I crashed. When I relogged minutes later I tracked Tiger and found him at the alter. I never confirmed if there was a connection to those events. I really hope you dive into more MS history, because these documentaries are interesting, and shed light on my childhood experiences that I've mostly forgotten.

[@BalancedStar]

These iceberg videos are so well researched and so engaging as well. Thank you for putting together the lore and other information about the game into one super intriguing package that we can all consume easily. Excited to see more

[@Araraura1]

I remember when I used to mess around with private servers and very very old versions of MS in the past. One of the earliest versions did not had a level cap of 200, because in that versions levels were a "signed byte" variable, and signed bytes can only range between -128 and 127. So technically, the very first level cap was 127 (But nobody reached it before they changed it to 200).

[@LeBeautiful]

wow, very interesting. how old are we talking about? pre v10?

[@Araraura1]

@@LeBeautiful I think it has to be a beta(?) version of KMS. I don't think there's a version of GMS that was like that.

[@EphemeralPseudonym]

-128 to 127 is effectively 255 as was covered in the video. -128 can display as 1, it's arbitrary

[@Policeblue1080]

This is the greatest trip down memory lane I've ever experience from any video I've ever seen. Amazing documentary and I swear I'm not crying. Subscribed!

[@Sujinpuffy]

Seeing that curryishot was so well liked for being a pleasant person makes me really happy, I was there when he climbed the rankings but I knew nothing about the guy, so my feelings on him, as well as the other high rankers, were neutral at best. But hearing how well liked he was made me actually cheer for him in this video, despite knowing what the result would be.

[@JK-gw9jb]

the reason you weren't able to get as much exp in your aqua road tests is because bows and crossbows had slower skill animations. L7+booster is Faster (2): 600ms, bow and xbow stafe/arrow rain/arrow eruption+booster is Fast (4): 720ms. that's an extra L7 for every 5 strafes. combine that with the damage gap and this is a very huge difference. since scrolls were more effective on claws because of scaling, hermits overall had more damage and attacked a lot faster. yes, the damage may seem close if you just look at the numbers, but if hermits are attacking more often per strafe cast, then they do more dps.

[@LeBeautiful]

bros bringing back memories with these happy bday btw!

[@BrandonDoebler]

Gosh i really enjoyed this! appreciate the hard work put into the editing and research.

[@CloudCrash]

Great video dude, this was very nostalgic. I didn’t start playing MS until the start of 2008 but man does this bring back memories of the time, wondering what everyone is doing nowadays, including my old guild mates. I want to say I made it to level 80-100 something pre-BB as a White Knight in Bellocan. I will say while I think WK/Paladin was an underrated class and mostly just not as popular, I will admit we weren’t secretly super good or anything, I wish lol. Shoutout to my old guilds Peace and Jr. Carnage. Thanks for the memories

[@RonyIsCool]

You really nailed it with this video. I never really got into maple story but I really enjoyed this whole video. Would love to see something like this for other old MMOs too.

[@garywang4359]

I remember training on sharks as fire poison mage. IIRC, you cast fog facing away from sharks, and when you start from the beginning again, explosion to kill everything before they cast dispel and repoison. Was still quite dangerous but was doable

[@BruceLee-qc2lm]

I remember back then my friend's older brother was one of the first 50 people to hit 200 on Bera, it was so hype when he hit it. We weren't even close to him for levels, but eventually caught up when the level cap was raised a few years later

[@Aeron_GMS]

I was playing jMS at the time, and the first level 200 worldwide was a jMS master thief, mostly due to how good himes were for master thieves, and since they had them for longer along with the 25% exp bonus jMS had. I remember being really happy to see a MT do so well since I was one myself.

[@mcaso123alt2]

Ah all the memories. ISlapWhale was Kradias pride. Kradia was pretty underpopulated and very poor, so for us to be the first to get a level 200 in the first new class was pretty huge. He was a nice dude too

[@carlossabillon4116]

I do remember those days, I saw him a couple times at fm.

[@Nightmare200X]

Keep making these videos, they are a great amount of obscure-ish information about MS and the beginning time period. It's also a great listen.

[@hazecoin7274]

Hey man, been big fan started watching since the reboot progression series. this video got me readdicted to maplestory. This video was so well put together and so motivating to come back. Thanks for the content

[@SirOtterz]

To this day I wish I would have raced seriously, I was always committed to the grind but didn’t ever sit down and just full send. I did however help SO many priests get to bishop on training on their own while nuking Newties lol. I was somewhere in the 170’s when 4th job arrived. Ice Lighting was my first main and yeah, that class could definitely keep up like Curry did if they wanted to. Fast forward to today and I main a Hayato on reboot and can’t even deal with a teleport class lmao. Who’s ready for classic to be re-made on maple worlds (when ever that comes)

[@alfredzhao2475]

big foot was insane, in broa there this "big foot police' where you're not allowed to kill big foots, (they dc hack you @@@@) it was probably the best exp source at that point. people were selling bigfoot carry (the mexican big foot police) xD

[@BalancedStar]

Not sure if I missed it but I would've liked to see you touch on the hero class and how Novinha broke through the ranks, eventually taking 4th place in the race

[@xForbin99]

I can't believe how good your channel is. You need way more subs

[@lsffan]

What happened to curry? He was removed from the rankings and replaced with loopedd

[@bonkonomicon958]

Loved the last video, glad to see more break down videos like this. Keep it up man :)

[@xForbin99]

I've been looking for content like this for so long thank you

[@vexxysmexxy5941]

Absolutely love your videos. Been playing maplestory since I was 4 or 5 (24 now) and I just got back into it for the 100th time recently. Love watching these videos along side of it.