NCSoft’s amazingly detailed martial arts MMO role playing game Blade & Soul is breaking loose from the Far East and heading to North America soon. There’s no release date, but it’s still encouraging news.

Announced back in 2008, Blade & Soul quickly name a name for itself as a new type of massive multiplayer with a focus on melee combat and extremely intricate character designs.

If the game looks familiar to you, Korean artist Hyung-Tae Kim is the lead character artist, also known for the Magna Carta series,—famous for its intricate clothing designs and ample, long-legged female figures.

NCSoft has had great success with Blade & Soul, which performed so well in Korea that it temporarily displaced Diablo III as the most-popular MMO in the region. For a subscription-based game, that’s a great feat.

Arguably, NCSoft is one of the last pioneers of the paid MMO market, with a robust portfolio to boot.

Their stable of games includes perennial heavy-hitters like Guild Wars, Guild Wars 2, Aion, Lineage II, and the upcoming space-faring MMO adventure Wildstar.

Source: NCSoft