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Netmarble Monster’s CEO talks about the creation of its upcoming monster-taming game, Mongil: Star Dive
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Ana Diaz
Sometimes big ideas come in small packages, and Kim’s team is bringing a whole assortment of concepts to its upcoming game, Mongil: Star Dive. Part action game, part story-driven adventure, and part monster-collector, the team behind Mongil: Star Dive has big dreams as it aims to bring its monster-collecting worlds to North American audiences.
As part of Gamescom 2025, I sat down with Netmarble Monster founder and CEO Ken Kim to learn more about the creation of the studio’s upcoming game, Mongil: Star Dive. We spoke for roughly an hour about the creation and vision behind Mongil: Star Dive.
This interview was conducted in person and translated by Youngnoh Jang at Netmarble. It has been edited and condensed for clarity.
Epic Games News: Can you describe Mongil: Star Dive in your own words? How would you personally describe this project?
Ken Kim: So Mongil: Star Dive is in the action-adventure genre featuring character collecting. It has a lot of cinematics and its own story. Previous [Mongil games] had a lot of mini games and a lot of features.
Epic Games News: Can you tell me a little bit more about Netmarble Monster and the team creating Mongil: Star Dive?
Ken Kim: Mongil is developed by Netmarble Monster, which is a subsidiary of Netmarble. There are a lot of subsidies developing titles under Netmarble. Netmarble Monster joined Netmarble in 2010. One of [Netmarble Monster’s] flagship titles is Marvel Future Fight, which utilizes the Marvel heroes and Disney's IP.
Epic Games News: Are there any games or other media that inspire Mongil: Star Dive? Are there any existing games released whose players might enjoy Star Dive?
Ken Kim: Well, we can't specify the IPs or dramas where we get ideas, but [Mongil: Star Dive] is the expansion of the previous title called Monster Taming. In this title, we have a lot of narrative stories, characters, and gameplay. This is for the old fans who can enjoy the expansion of the universe of Monster Taming.
Epic Games News: What's it like to work on a new project after working on Monster Taming for so many years?
Ken Kim: Monster Taming was serviced for 10 years, and there was a little bit of a gap. This gap was created by our efforts to expand our IP into a PC and mobile cross-platform game. So we are trying to expand our universe of Monster Taming into the Western core of gamers.
Epic Games News: Following up on that, there are several gacha games that are now vying for the North American audience. How will Mongil: Star Dive differentiate itself from other games like it?
Ken Kim: It’s based on the adventure genre, but it has the deep narrative of Monster Taming. The initial part of the game starts with the fluctuation of the universe, of the Mongil, and the protagonist is trying to explore it. We try to make the grammar of the game more simple and casual. That's the differentiation between the others and us.
We have focused on the narratives of the characters. There are a lot of high-end games that have great graphics. Rather than that, we try to focus on the narrative itself of the characters, to express good feelings, and give life to the characters. How they feel, how they think, and we try to interpret those things in the game.
Epic Games News: You touched a bit on this in your last response, but I wanted to ask again. It looks like there are a lot of elements that factor into the overall experience of playing Mongil: Star Dive — animation, character designs, gameplay, and story, to name a few. Is there a particular element of the game that the team focused on throughout the production?
Ken Kim: We try to make the characters more elaborate and tell the audience about what the characters think and say. We try to focus on the characters' narratives. To maximize those things, we have continuous development of the characters, and add elements like voiceover and designs.
Epic Games News: Could you give me an idea of how big the game will be at launch? How much play time and content do you plan to launch the game with?
Ken Kim: There are five main episodes and 120 main quests in the game itself. Including all the sub-quests or mini games, there are 200-plus pieces of content in the game. To convert into play time, it’s going to be over thirty hours.
Besides the episodes, we have the monsters that can be tamed. We have 150 monster species. After the process of taming and the interaction of the game, there will be an additional 50 more species that could be tamed.
Epic Games News: Can you tell me a bit more about the monster-taming parts of the game?
Ken Kim: The monster itself actually starts with the familiars. It looks like a cat, and it actually hunts the monster itself. And after the hunt, there will be collectible aspects, and characters can carry little charms. There are up to three slots available for each character. After doing some kind interactions, the monsters will help the characters fight.
Epic Games News: What would you define as the core value of the game?
Ken Kim: For Mongil, our core values are to keep [the game] simple, light, and long-lasting. We try to have multiple devices available, including PC, mobile, and other devices as well. And we try to reach the global gamers with multiple devices available. And after launching the game, we're gonna monitor the user feedback and then try to incorporate the feedback into the game and revise it.
Epic Games News: How can players give feedback to the team as they play the game?
Ken Kim: There are two ways: One is closed beta tests, and the other is the fan community, like social channels. We had a series of closed beta tests in Japan, Korea, and the United States. After each closed beta, we try to show the gamers the advancements of the game itself. And we try to open major updates, interact with the fans, and get user feedback.
For the social channel, we try to create our own Mongil-branded broadcast, so we do actually have a studio that can interact with the live broadcast. So that's how we try to incorporate the feedback. This is our first try. It has a lot of failures and trials, and we're just trying to interact with the fans as much as possible.
You can wishlist Mongil: Star Dive on Epic Games Store now. The monster-collecting adventure will be available to play on Windows PC and mobile devices.
