top 13 most played online games in the Philippines

In the Philippines, internet cafés are also referred to as computer shops or computer cafés. And they’re everywhere. Those places are perfect for those who do not own a computer or laptop or those who want to play games alongside their friends – very literally. While you may also go to computer cafés for internet surfing and offline socializing, most computer cafés in the Philippines are inclined to target gamers.

Although there are many titles that gamers love to play, due to certain circumstances and limitations such as PC specifications, internet speeds, or game accessibility, there are only select titles that can be found in computer cafés across the country. Here is a list of commonly found game titles in computer cafés in the Philippines.

Multiplayer Online Battle Arena (MOBA) Games

1. Warcraft III DotA (WC3 DotA)

Availability: 5/5
Website: Official DotA Downloads

Warcraft III DotA, also referred to as WC3 DotA or DotA 1, is the game that other popular MOBA games like Heroes of Newert (HoN) and League of Legends (LoL) have been based on. WC3 DotA is not a stand-alone game, but is actually a modified/customized map of the Blizzard’s Warcraft III and was based on Aeon of Strife, a scenario from StarCraft. Originally created by a mapmaker known only by the alias “Eul”, WC3 DotA has been passed on from one creator to another, the current developer known only by the alias “IceFrog”. Since its debut, WC3 DotA had always been free and is not owned by any major developer or company. Aside from having a LAN feature, playing online is also possible via gaming clients such as Garena or Ranked Gaming Client (RGC). Even with the release of its sequel DOTA 2, WC3 DotAstill remains a favorite not only in the Philippines, but also in other parts of Asia.

2. League of Legends (LoL)

Availability: 4/5
Website: League of Legends

With five million peak global concurrent players, League of Legends  has the most number of players among any MOBA game to date. It was developed by Riot Games with the help of Steve “Guinsoo” Feak and Steve “Pendragon” Mescon”, one of the previous designers of _WC3 DotA and the administrator of dota-allstars.com respectively. It has the same concept as WC3 DotA, but with significant changes such as not allowing “denies” and introducing the concept of “zoning”. LoL is generally free-to-play, but there are also items and champions for those who are willing to spend extra. Unlike WC3 DotA, DOTA 2 and HoN, LoL does not need a separate client for playing online.

3. Heroes of Newerth (HoN)

Availability: 3/5
Website: Heroes of Newerth

Another MOBA running on the Garena client is Heroes of Newerth (HoN) by S2 Games. While sharing the same general gameplay as DotA and LoL, HoN has its own notable differences such as having an automatically included courier for each team at the start of every match. Initially, HoN was originally a pay-to-play game until it became completely free to play in July 2012.

4. DOTA 2

Availability: 3/5
Website: DOTA 2 Official Blog

The sequel to WC3 DotA, DOTA 2 spent two years in beta before it was finally launched on July 9 this year. DOTA 2 was developed by Valve with the latest and current developer of WC3 DotA who is only known by the name “IceFrog”. It is also currently the most popular game on Steam with more than 400,000 concurrent users to date. DOTA 2 kept even the smallest important details from its predecessor including the fog, the attack animation, and even the color scheme for each hero. However, unlike its predecessor, it requires better computer specs.

Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPG)

5. Dragon Nest

Availability: 4/5
Website: Dragon Nest SEA

Developed by Eyedentity Games, Dragon Nest is available across nine regional servers to date, namely in Korea, China, Japan, North America, Europe, Hong Kong, Thailand, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia. The Dragon Nest Philippines is included in SEA and is under the publisher Cherry Credits. Dragon Nest is known for being a fast-paced action RPG due to its non-targeting system of gameplay. To date, there are six playable classes in Dragon Nest SEA namely the Warrior, Archer, Sorceress, Cleric, Tinkerer, and Kali. Each of these classes branch out to secondary and tertiary classes as the character goes up the levels.

6. CABAL Online

Availability: 3/5
Website: CABAL Online PH

CABAL Online is a free-to-play MMORPG created by ESTsoft, a Korean studio, and is published by E-Games in the Philippines and AsiaSoft for SEA. The game currently has six job classes – the Warrior, Wizard, Blader, Force Shielder, Force Blader, Force Archer. Aside from having its own game client, CABAL is looking to be playable on Steam as it is currently on ESTsoft’s Workshop on STEAM Greenlight.

7. Continent of the Ninth Seal (C9)

Availability: 4/5 (Visayas & Mindanao), 2/5 (Luzon)
Website: Continent of the Ninth Seal

Continent of the Ninth Seal, or C9, is an action MMORPG developed and published by Webzen. It currently has four main character classes, which are the Fighter, Hunter, Shaman, and Witchblade. Each of these classes also improves into their respective secondary and tertiary classes. In terms of gamers in the Philippines, C9 is more popular in Visayas and Mindanao particularly in Cebu and Davao regions. You may also find C9 in Luzon, but that would be mostly in the cities where computer cafés have better specced PCs.

First-Person Shooter (FPS) / Third-Person Shooter (TPS) Games

8. Counter-Strike

Availability: 5/5
Website: Counterstrike: Global Offensive

If you are a gamer in the Philippines and you have no idea what Counter-Strike is, I will assume that you are very new. Counter-Strike (also referred to as CS or Counter in the Philippines) is one of the most popular computer café games in the Philippines. Its earlier versions can still be found in most computer cafés, as well as the online versions. Counter-Strike is originally a Half-Life modification and was later on developed by Valve, the creator of Half-Life. The concept is pretty simple. You choose between two camps: terrorist and counter-terrorist. Depending on the map, you can win the game by successfully planting or setting off a bomb (terrorist), or defusing the bomb or rescuing hostages (counter-terrorist). Or you can just kill everyone on the enemy’s team. It works just as fine on any map anyway.

9. Mercenary Online

Availability: 3/5
Website: Mercenary Online PH

Mercenary Online is an online third-person shooter game developed by YingPei Games and handled by Massive Gaming in the Philippines. It has various player-versus-player (PvP) modes that give players various goals and allow them to work out various strategies. Unlike most common shooter games, Mercenary Online offers maps with co-op missions with boss fights, which is a good break from the usual run-and-gun or – in some cases – just camping and waiting for a good target to pass by. Character creation is also an interesting feature because it features customization including gender, hair, clothes, and face.

10. Point Blank

Availability: 4/5
Website: Point Blank PH

Point Blank is an online first-person shooter game developed by Zepetto and run by E-Games in the Philippines. Like Counter Strike, players can choose which camp to be part of. In PointBlank, the camps are the Free Rebels and the CT-Force team. There are seven game modes including AI bot matches and one where other human players play as dinosaurs.

11. CrossFire

Availability: 4/5
Website: CrossFire PH

Developed by SmileGate and published by GameClub in the Philippines, CrossFire has 12 modes for players to choose from. While it shares having two opposing teams, as withPointBlank and CounterStrike, it also varies in the sense that both teams are mercenaries – the Black List and the Global Risk. The game includes a leveling system for each character. For every game, depending on their performance, they are awarded experience points, which will accumulate so you can get promoted to various military ranks.

12. Special Force (SF)

Availability: 4/5
Website: Special Force

More popularly known by its acronym SF, Special Force is developed by Dragonfly, a South Korean developer. It’s operated by the publisher Netmarble Phils in this country. It has multiple game modes where players are either part of the Red Team or the Blue Team. These teams are not available in single battle, horror, and training mode. SF implements a capping of their frames-per-second rate. In-game, there is a capping of 32 fps while a capping of 40fps is implemented in the lobby.

13. Left 4 Dead (L4D)

Availability: 4/5
Website: Left 4 Dead Blog

If you are a fan of the Silent Hill and Resident Evil series, you might want to give Left 4 Dead a try. Unlike the aforementioned games, L4D is a cooperative game. As the name suggests, you are playing as one of the survivors against a horde of infected people/zombies after what seems to be an apocalyptic pandemic. There are also five special infected characters in the game, which are significantly stronger than the usual enemies, namely the Boomer, the Hunter, the Smoker, the Tank, and the Witch. Because it is a cooperative game, there are many features which are not available in your usual FPS game such as seeing colored outlines of teammates to see where they are even through walls, as well as the ability to help and tend to the wounds of teammates.