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Soul Captor Online goes into open beta, adds two new classes
C'mon kids, those souls won't capture themselves! Soul Captor Online, the MMO that revolves around absorbing and reusing souls for noble purposes, boldly ventured into open beta as of today. To celebrate Soul Captor Online's open beta, the CM team is putting on a series of events. The first of these is an in-game anima hunt that will reward the winners with prizes. In addition to the four classes shown in the closed beta testing phase, Gamania has added two new classes for the open beta: the Celestial Master and Mystic Fighter. The Celestial Master is a strong support class that buffs teammates while debuffing the enemy, while the Mystic Fighter is a melee warrior who relies on evasion to keep the worst hits from landing. You can check out the introductory video for these classes after the jump. [Source: Gamania press release]
Soul Captor Online announced
There's a new cel-shaded sheriff coming to town, and the only question is whether the place will be big enough for a contender this cute and cuddly. Gamania is trumpeting the upcoming arrival of Soul Captor Online, a free-to-play title that revolves around the acquisition and manipulation of monster souls. In Soul Captor Online, players will be accompianied by an Anima, a customized spirit creature that will help them in their journeys. When the player and Anima defeat a monster, the monster's soul can be sucked out to be used for buffs, enchantments, and even mounts. The revealed classes so far in Soul Captor are a diverse bunch: Warrior, Priest, Shaman, and of course, the Onmyoji (mage). There is a pair of unannounced classes hiding in the shadows as well. Currently, Soul Captor is accepting sign-ups for beta. Check out the tongue-in-cheek trailer after the jump and let us know what you think!
Bright Shadow Online announced
MMO collectible card games aren't quite as prevalent as their traditional RPG brethren, but titles like CardMon Hero, Urban Rivals, and even BattleForge have been making their online presence felt in recent years. Today Gamania Digital Entertainment Europe is adding another title to that mix with the announcement of its Bright Shadow Online MMOCCG. Bright Shadow's beta begins this Friday, July 8th on Gamania's beanfun! platform. Interested players can grab a beta key by playing the Bright Shadow Memory Game at the title's website. The minigame involves matching six pairs of monster cards, at which point you'll unlock your key. Careful, though, you've only got four lives to spend. Bright Shadow Online features 20 classes, 60 randomly generated dungeons, over 600 collectible monster cards, and extensive character customization according to Gamania's official website.
Revolutionary: Special Effects
This week, graphics professionals and enthusiasts flocked to SIGGRAPH to share and discuss the latest technologies and techniques for making gorgeous computer graphics. The focus of the convention is mainly offline rendering (the stuff that we see in print, movies, and television that's too complex to be rendered in real time), but as computers and game consoles become more powerful, many of these methods and effects make their way into the realm of realtime rendering. Ten years ago, the opening cutscene for Super Mario Galaxy would have needed to be rendered by a cluster of computers and converted into full motion video. Even though the Wii is not pushing graphical fidelity the way this generation's HD consoles are, we've still come a long way and there's much to be appreciated. There are all sorts of graphical effects that, over the years, have been added to the game artist's palette, and in this edition of Revolutionary, I'd like to draw your attention to a few of them. When games like Super Mario Galaxy come along, we find ourselves questioning how it's possible for them to look so good, while most other Wii wares have the appearance of games designed for a much weaker platform. It's easy to forget that the Wii's hardware comes from the strong pedigree of Gamecube when much of what we're looking at reeks of Playstation number two. With multi-platform shovelware, and even a few high profile titles that didn't get any special consideration on the Wii (Guitar Hero 3 and Rock Band, I'm lookin' at you!), developers often drop assets and effects to a lowest common denominator. In the class which Wii is placed, the Playstation 2 has the lowest and most common specs, so our Wii graphics are brought down to its level. The PS2 has had its share of beautiful games, but the methods for making them so beautiful are uncommon enough that they're largely ignored when making games that will have to be replicated on another console in the same class. It's often the first and second party games or that rare, exclusive third-party effort that is given the budget and time to explore the depths of the Wii's fixed-function graphics hardware and pull off something it wasn't expressly designed for. And considering that the core technologies in the Wii were designed nearly a decade ago, there's a lot of "new tricks" that artists and programmers have had to teach the "old dog."
The Daily Grind: Cartoony or Photorealistic?
As far as artistic game development goes, there appear to be 2 schools of thought: Expressionistic aesthetics allow the designers to better portray emotional states, or heighten the absurdity/drama of a moment; photorealism lets players immerse themselves more readily into a world that might be unfamiliar to them, and generates a stronger feeling of verisimilitude. Of course, your mileage may vary, but in general, these modes of thought hold.When it comes to MMOs, where an overarching story frequently takes a backseat to game mechanics, which style provides a better experience? Would WoW benefit from an overhaul of its graphics, making things more realistic-looking? Would EVE Online become a completely different game if everything were cel-shaded and anime-like?
Tales of optional black outlines
The Tales of Innocence developer blog shows a new graphical feature for the game that will allow people to alter its appearance to their preference. At least, in one aspect. You'll have the option to add black outlines to the hero and monster models, giving the game more of a cel-shaded look. Or you could choose not to!Black outlines certainly make everything look crisper, but in doing so they could expose you to deadly jaggies. Either way, the game seems to look nice for DS 3D. And it's certainly kind of them to provide options like this, which can change the whole style of the game.[Via NeoGAF]
SGD '07: Conan clobbers us with new screenshots
We have three new shots of Conan from the Sony Gamer's Day event, and it's looking pretty good. While clearly influenced by the God of War series, the cel-shading and alternate mythology could make the game a solid alternative while we wait for God of War III.%Gallery-3223%
Okami: before and after cel-shading
Notably the only upcoming PS2 game to feature magical wolves, aggressive painting and beautiful cel-shaded surroundings, Okami has come a long way since its original inception. Dubbed Ohkami, the early version presents quite a different experience to the one currently preparing to hit US shores. A comparison clip over at GameVideos (embedded in the second part of the post) puts the more realistic art style of the old version in stark contrast to the cel-shaded update. It seems that the PS2 was simply not deemed powerful enough to render Clover Studios' original vision and so the shift was made to a different and more feasible art style. It's interesting that the decision marks one of the few occasions where technical limitations actually (and arguably) lead to a more visually striking game. If you had a choice in the matter, would you rather have the realistic (erm, as far as magical wolves go) Okami or the cel-shaded one? Comments from the "Zelda more like Celda" crowd are welcomed, of course. [Thanks Demian!]
