Before a single dungeon was cleared or a single quest accepted, players rushed to claim their names in the world of Dokkaebi — and the window closed in an hour. Kakao Games' upcoming MMORPG, rooted in a beloved Korean web novel and webtoon, drew such overwhelming demand during its character name reservation event on September 22 that the planned four-hour window collapsed into one. The moment stands as a quiet but telling signal: anticipation for this pixel-art world, built alongside the studio behind Solo Leveling, has already outpaced the infrastructure designed to hold it.
Kakao Games' 'World of Dokkaebi' Name Reservation Sells Out in 1 Hour
The surge forced the company to shut down the reservation window early
Mark
So the first reservation event lasted one hour instead of four. Was that a technical failure, or just that people wanted the names that badly?
Mimi
The source says an influx of players prompted the early closure, so it sounds like demand, not a crash. They shut it down deliberately.
Luke
Right, but we don't know how many names were available in that first pool. If there were only a few thousand single-character names and tens of thousands of players showed up, one hour makes sense. If there were millions of names available, that's a different story about player enthusiasm.
Mark
Fair point. So what's the second event actually testing?
Mimi
It opens up the name space to 2-8 characters instead of just single characters. That's a much larger pool, so it should theoretically last longer.
Luke
Should. But we don't have numbers on how many people tried to reserve in the first hour, or how many succeeded, or what the actual player base looks like right now.
Mark
Is this game already known in Korea, or is this hype from the IP?
Mimi
It's based on Myeolgwisu Dojeon, which is a popular web novel and webtoon on Naver. So there's existing audience there. And they're working with REDICE Studio, who made Solo Leveling, which is a pretty big name.
Luke
The IP has an audience, yes. But we don't know if that audience is actually planning to play the game, or if this is just curiosity about name availability.
Mark
When does the actual game come out?
Mimi
October 8. So we're about two weeks away from knowing if this early interest holds up.
Il Polso
- A four-hour reservation window for character names vanished in sixty minutes, forcing Kakao Games to shut it down early as players flooded in to stake their claim.
- The scramble was likely sharpest for single-character names — the rarest and most coveted — which the second event will no longer offer, suggesting the first event's small pool simply couldn't absorb the crowd.
- Kakao Games responded quickly, announcing a follow-up reservation event for September 23 at 11:00 AM, this time opening names between 2 and 8 characters to a presumably steadier, broader field.
- The game itself — a 2.5D MMORPG blending pixel-art characters with 3D Korean-motif environments — carries the weight of a popular IP and a high-profile studio partnership, raising expectations ahead of its October 8 launch.
- Whether this early frenzy reflects deep loyalty to the source material or simply the competitive instinct to secure a name first, the real measure of momentum arrives on launch day.
Before a single dungeon was cleared or a single quest accepted, players rushed to claim their names in the world of Dokkaebi — and the window closed in an hour. Kakao Games' upcoming MMORPG, rooted in a beloved Korean web novel and webtoon, drew such overwhelming demand during its character name reservation event on September 22 that the planned four-hour window collapsed into one. The moment stands as a quiet but telling signal: anticipation for this pixel-art world, built alongside the studio behind Solo Leveling, has already outpaced the infrastructure designed to hold it.
On the evening of September 22, Kakao Games opened character name reservations for World of Dokkaebi, its upcoming MMORPG based on the Naver web novel and webtoon Myeolgwisu Dojeon. The event was meant to run four hours. It lasted one.
The surge of players attempting to claim names — particularly single-character ones, the most competitive to secure — overwhelmed the reservation system, and Kakao Games closed the window around 9:00 PM, well ahead of schedule. It was an unplanned early ending, but also an unmistakable signal of player appetite.
Rather than leave the process incomplete, the company announced a second reservation event beginning September 23 at 11:00 AM. This round opens names between 2 and 8 characters, explicitly excluding the single-character names that likely fueled the first event's rush.
World of Dokkaebi is being developed with REDICE Studio — the team behind Solo Leveling — and carries a visual identity that merges 2D pixel-art characters with 3D environments built around traditional Korean aesthetics. The game is set to launch officially on October 8, when the true depth of this early enthusiasm will finally be put to the test.
Kakao Games opened character name reservations for its upcoming MMORPG World of Dokkaebi on September 22 at 8:00 PM, expecting the event to run for four hours. It closed in one hour instead. The surge of players trying to claim names forced the company to shut down the reservation window early, around 9:00 PM, far ahead of schedule.
The game launches officially on October 8. It is a 2.5D MMORPG built on the intellectual property of Myeolgwisu Dojeon, a web novel and webtoon published on Naver that has already built an audience in Korea. The visual approach blends 2D pixel-art characters with 3D environments rendered in pixel art, a style chosen to emphasize traditional Korean aesthetic elements throughout the game world.
The early closure of the first reservation event did not end the process. Kakao Games announced a second character name reservation event beginning September 23 at 11:00 AM. This time, players will be able to reserve names between 2 and 8 characters in length. The first event had apparently allowed single-character names, which may have contributed to the rush; the second event explicitly excludes them.
The company is developing World of Dokkaebi in collaboration with REDICE Studio, the team behind Solo Leveling, a property that has itself expanded from webtoon to animation and gained significant international recognition. This partnership signals an effort to build the game with production quality and narrative depth that might appeal beyond Korea's domestic market.
The one-hour sellout of name reservations is a straightforward measure of player appetite. It suggests either that the game has already attracted substantial interest before launch, or that the pool of available single-character names—typically the most desirable and competitive to claim—was simply too small to accommodate demand. The second event, with its broader character range, will likely run longer, though demand may remain high. The October 8 launch date will be the true test of whether this early enthusiasm translates into sustained engagement.
Citazioni salienti
An influx of players prompted an announcement of an early closure around 9:00 PM— Kakao Games (via announcement)
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