Halika 3.0

ABS-CBN Interactive, BayanTel team up for online game ‘Tantra’ [source]

ABS-CBN Interactive (ABS-CBNi), the Internet services arm of ABS-CBN, and Bayan Telecommunciations (Bayan Tel), the telecommunications arm of the Lopez Group, has joined hands t to launch Tantra, the new massive multi player on-line game (MMOG) that offers rich 3D graphics and a compelling storyline that is expected to attract serious interest from the growing population of on-line gamers in the Philippines.

Tantra is one of the newest and most exciting MMOGs that have come out from South Korea, where on-line gaming has reached high critical mass. The game offers richly textured graphics and animation based on a story of love and revenge among clans of gods and goddesses. Players can choose from among several exciting and colorful characters to adopt as a role to engage in various quests while going through different multiple levels of fantasy worlds set in colorful and reaslistic landscapes.

“Tantra represents an excellent opportunity for ABS-CBNi to build on its equity to deliver quality interactive entertainment to the youth market,” said ABS-CBNi managing director Carlo Leo Katigbak. “We believe Tantra will further enhance the quality of MMOGs available in the market and will boost the growing popularity of on-line gaming in the country.”

At the same time, Joevel Rivera, BayanTel vice president for product and development, believes the popularity of on-line gaming would further increase demand for Internet services. “We partnered with ABS-CBNi on Tantra so we can take advantage on the growing popularity on online gaming to bundle with our various Internet services like Blast and Loaded pre-paid Internet cards, Sky-Internet regular dialup and Sky DSL broadband connection. While Tantra can be played on any Internet connection from the house or from an Inernet café, on-line gamers who choose BayanTel to play Tantra can expect to get the best Internet connection when playing the game.”

Under the partnershp, ABS-CBNi will take the lead in launching Tantra in the market while BayanTel would provide the network infrastructure to support the on-line game.

Tantra is now on beta session testing where about 14,000 people have already registered to participate. Commercial launch is scheduled in early 2005.

This entry was posted on Monday, December 6th, 2004 at 11:50 am and is filed under Kapamilya (ABS-CBN 2). You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.