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 It was about 20 years ago—well, maybe not exactly 20, but around then, anyway—that I saw Mabinogi Online Generation G1: Advent of the Goddess all the way to the end. Even now, I still remember the very last line in the Thanks to list, that “And you,” and how deeply it stayed with me. That’s how completely I had fallen into the story, and how seriously my two friends and I threw ourselves into repeated attempts and long strategy talks just to take down the final boss, Glas Ghaibhleann. Little by little, through meeting the NPCs who lived in Tir Chonaill, Dunbarton, and Bangor, I came to realize they weren’t just NPCs at all, but people carrying stories of their own—and that feeling, that story awakening in me as I interacted with them, still remains in my heart. So does the sight of Nao crying with the dead Maurus in her arms.

 But now it’s 2026, and instead of Mabinogi Online, I’m playing Mabinogi Mobile. Since it’s the same IP, the legendary three warriors are still there, and the residents of Tir Chonaill feel familiar too. Not exactly the same, of course. Bebhinn, for one, has been turned into a completely different person. Still... anyway. In this version, Nao is one of the three companions who adventures alongside me. Before, Ruairi, Tarlach, and Mari were one team, while the adventurer, the adventurer’s friend, and another friend formed another team moving through the main story, but in Mabinogi Mobile, the main story itself unfolds with me, the adventurer, together with Nao and Tarlach.

 Because of that, the story has changed somewhat as well. Nao is always there at the Tir Chonaill lookout, gathering information with you and moving the story along as your companion. But even so, the Mabinogi Mobile main story—which takes a story I already loved and expands on it from so many different angles—is tremendously enjoyable in its own right. Since it looks back into the past from the future, elves and giants have already appeared too. A lot of the setting has changed. And more than anything, I could really feel how much more care had been given to each character’s narrative—not just the main figures you meet through the central story, but the NPCs living in every village as well.



It’s true that there are moments that leave me a little disappointed, but if you took story and narrative out of Mabinogi Mobile, there would be nothing left but a corpse. There are definitely other things that keep me playing every day, but the reason I wait for every update so impatiently is simple: I need to know what happens next. So the moment a new chapter opens, I rush in to see it, then go back and read through it again, and there’s a real joy in talking with friends afterward about whether we missed some hidden clue or buried bit of foreshadowing. Back during the Witch of the Wastes arc, Tii already knew that Esras belonged to the Holy Court, and when Esras was taken by the Witch of the Wastes, the diary also let us confirm where the research into Tabartas first began.

 Maurus’s affection for Tarlach, Tarlach’s thoughts of Ruairi, Morrighan protecting Erinn and Cichol standing in her way—maybe this is why I’m still playing, because there’s such a particular pleasure in following these unresolved threads one by one. If you’re someone who values narrative in games, then this is one I really hope you’ll try.

Reverse: 1999

 Reverse: 1999 is a very different kind of game from the RPG Mabinogi Mobile—it’s turn-based. You pull characters, build a team around them, and progress through the game using different strategies. And at the center of it all, of course, is the story. Just like Erinn, Reverse: 1999 has a world of its own that feels firmly built and self-contained. It’s a world where, from one day onward, time itself begins to run backward, and where arcanists, humans, and awakened beings of perception appear.

 If Mabinogi Mobile throws the player directly into the story as one of its central pillars, then Reverse1999 keeps you firmly in the position of a reader. You’re someone watching their story unfold. But because of that, it also has an easier time than an RPG when it comes to capturing finer details. The emotional lines between characters, the stories behind them—those things come through with more precision. Since the game gives you the images, their conversations, and the written narration itself, it becomes much easier to follow those emotional currents, and easier to understand the story as a whole too.

 The greatest pleasure this game offers is simply the joy of following the story and seeing where it goes. New stories keep arriving within set periods, one after another, so there’s barely any time to catch your breath. For people who love in-game storytelling, it’s a genuinely wonderful game. And it isn’t only the characters you use often, or the ones considered strong—every character carries their own personality, narrative, and background, which is why I’d wholeheartedly recommend it to anyone who plays games for the story.

 Lastly, even though I haven’t gone into detail here, World of Warcraft—better known as WoW—is also a game with an excellent story. Its world is divided into the Alliance and the Horde, and players directly take part in those factions themselves. That’s why real PVP happens there too. Even now, years after Classic, I’ve heard that WoW Forever is coming on November 5. They say it will expand further within the world of Azeroth, and I can’t help wondering what kind of story it’s going to build and bring out next.

 Today I talked about two games with great stories, and also touched on WoW, which feels like it still has a strong story waiting ahead. So how about all of you reading this? Are you ready to sink all the way into a story, and then sit down and talk about it together? I’d love that. Lately, I’ve been talking with a friend about the timeline in Mabinogi Mobile.

 Before the story where you first meet Nao and go to save Morrighan, there were the legendary three warriors, and before them there was Maurus, who disappeared. If we roughly assume that when the legendary three warriors set out to rescue the goddess, Ruairi and Mari were teenagers and Tarlach was in his early twenties, then now Tarlach would be a druid nearing his thirties, while Nao and Ruairi could be seen as fully grown adults. And if Mari was 0 years old when Maurus—the master Tarlach looked up to—went missing, then judging from how Shira and Maurus looked at the time, if we place them somewhere between their mid-twenties and early thirties... then if Maurus is still alive now, he’d have to be somewhere in his fifties or older, right? Then wouldn’t Duncan and Meven be around that age too? Those are the kinds of theories we end up tossing around. And beyond that, there’s still so much more to talk about. That’s what happens when you find yourself in a game with a truly solid story.