began playing last november, and i actually found it fun for a long time. lost interest 2 months ago because of the same in game routine, but i just got interested again. xD
I agree the game is filled with a lot of kids, but it's not that difficult to train and get experience if you really try. In my experience the people are pretty nice, and supportive if you don't act like a moron or 'n00b'.
anyway for my full opinion on the game just check out my review: (to lazy to resay my review lol)
http://www.animesecrets.org/games/maplestory/maplestory.html