character-creation
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The battle is joined: Starting new and fighting through Final Fantasy XIV's relaunch
I know a lot about Final Fantasy XIV. This is surprising to no one; there's a reason Joystiq sent me to the preview event, a reason I write a weekly column about the game, and a reason I still have the Final Fantasy XIV collector's edition box sitting in my office. The net result is that I have spent a lot of time playing the game. As a result, I was more than a little nervous when sitting down to play the revamped version at the Final Fantasy XIV press event in San Francisco last week. Done incorrectly, playing the game could feel subtly wrong, like a stranger pretending to be your old friend. And even if I avoided that pitfall, the gameplay could feel inelegant or forced. I'm happy to report that none of that is the case. Make no mistake -- the game is very different from its original incarnation, but it also sports enough familiar stuff that you aren't left wandering around baffled.
Storyboard: Profession discussion - the Spy
Long-time readers will remember that back around the end of this column's first year, I wrote a series of columns about character archetypes. It was a series I'm quite proud of as a whole, and one that I've wanted to follow up for a while, but I had to wait until I had an idea that fit. That was when I started thinking about how that series talked entirely about who a character is rather than what he or she actually does. In reality, the two can be miles apart. Take my first choice of profession, the spy. A spy might believe that she's doing something for the greater good. She might see this simply as part of her duty and a necessary task. She might be doing this because she's fundamentally amoral, she might be hoping to find the answer to a puzzle she's long agonized about, or she might even be doing this because she just really wants to know secrets. But today I'm not going to talk about that. You want to make a spy; let's talk about what goes into that.
Massively's video guide to Neverwinter character creation
Are you impatiently waiting to get your Dungeons and Dragons on in the upcoming Neverwinter beta events? Then we're sure you have already planned out what your character will look like. No? Well then, let us help you. Yesterday, we previewed the character creation tools for Cryptic's upcoming MMO, but we didn't showcase all of the customization options for every race. Today we remedy that with not one but six videos showing off all of the hairstyles, faces, scars, and tattoos for both genders of every race! Enjoy the previews after the cut.
Take a look at character creation for all Asta races in new videos
Character creation. For some players, it's the boring part of the game that you have to click through quickly in order to get on with the hitting. For others, it's half of the reason you're playing the game at all. If you're of the former camp, you're probably not going to get much out of this series of high-definition videos detailing character creation for all the races in Asta: The War of Tears and Wind. But if you're in the latter camp, you've got some viewing ahead of you. All six races from the game have character creation extensively displayed, including both genders for the dimorphic races getting separate treatment. Each of the races also has some unique features, ranging from the horns of the Dragon race to the tusks of the Oni race to the spine apparently constructed from flexible tubing of the Fox race. (Or maybe the female model is just posed oddly.) While there's no word yet on release, you can still look longingly at all of the videos and start thinking about what you'd want to play if and when the game comes overseas. [Thanks to steparu taru for the tip!]
Naoki Yoshida discusses the upcoming beta for Final Fantasy XIV
It won't be long now until long-time Final Fantasy XIV players and eager test applicants can experience the beta of the game's new version. Producer Naoki Yoshida has understandably been busy with the ramp-up, but he's taken the time to pen a new letter for the game's players that starts off by displaying all of the racial creation screens for the revamped creator. That includes showing off genders that had previously been unavailable, including female Highlanders and Roegadyns. Beyond that, the letter talks about some of the restrictions in place from the beta that are still being developed, acknowledging that some character creation options will be held back until later in testing (the team is working to vastly improve hair color and style selections, for example). Yoshida goes on to talk about the production staff's New Year festivities and a visit from some of the Mythic staff members involved with Ultima Online. There are only a few more weeks until the beta stats, but Yoshida and the rest of the staff seems to believe that it's the first step to a better new year.
Check out ten minutes of Asta game footage
The folks at Asta: The War of Tears and Winds are probably hoping that Mists of Pandaria players will crave even more Asian World of Warcraft action as evidenced by a new video that shows off the game's looks and combat. It's a lengthy 10-minute tour that begins with character creation (why are MMO characters so fidgety, anyway?) and progresses through several zones with an emphasis on battles, scenery, and East Asian designs. Asta's been in the making for quite some time now and features a gorgeous look powered by the CryEngine 3. Check out the new footage after the jump and see whether this might tempt you to put your current game down in the future. [Thanks to Paul for the tip!]
The Art of Wushu: The right martial arts school for you
Normally at Massively, we start off a column by linking to relevant community sites and information resources for a game. Things are a bit different with Age of Wushu, however. Aside from the main community site and the wiki currently under construction, there isn't much information about the game available in English. Running biweekly, The Art of Wushu will help you navigate the sprawling Wushu sandbox. This week, we'll be looking at the various martial arts schools in the game and which schools to select in order to fit your preferred playstyle. While we can't go over each school's intricacies in depth, we'll do our best to give you a brief primer on what you can expect as a member of a particular school.
Breakfast Topic: What character creation feature do you wish WoW would add?
I need character size scaling. No, you don't understand -- I neeeed it. My characters suit me best when they're on the same scale as I am in the real world: average frame but a little on the short side. I have never, ever gotten used to gallumphing about as an awkwardly towering night elf. (And don't even get me started about the size of those mitts.) If I could dial down the height, though, I'd feel perfectly at home in her skin. My husband could spend all day (and thanks to City of Heroes, RIP, he sometimes did) tweaking obscure character settings to come up with the perfect individual. I'm not so fussy. Faces, for instance, are not a big deal. I appreciate being able to go beyond a standard half-dozen, but let's face it: This is not the part of my character I'm staring at day in and day out. That's right, you devils: I want my character's butt to be exactly the dimensions I prefer. I want to feel at home trotting along behind this figure for years to come. What character creation features do you wish WoW offered? If you could further customize one thing about your own beloved Azerothian, what would it be?
Storyboard: Mistakes at the creation level
A lot of character mistakes come down to experimentation, essentially. You have what seems like a good idea, but it turns out in play that it's messy or annoying or unfun or whatever. There's nothing in the world wrong with that; you try something out and it either does or doesn't work. While good concept work does a lot to help you catch these things, sometimes good ideas won't work. But then there are problems that come up time and again based on a fundamentally bad assumption. Something goes wrong right from the point that you click "New Character" because you're making an assumption that can immediately be recognized as a bad idea. So I'm going to go ahead and list a handful of these problems that are bad ways to start off so that hopefully we can all stop making these mistakes in the future and make some exciting new ones.
The Daily Grind: When was the last time a character creator didn't tick you off?
For me, it was PlanetSide 2. Admittedly, I usually prefer insanely robust character creation systems; give me five million options or go away, right? And yet even with all the options, those games with the very best character creation systems -- a moment of silence, please, for Star Wars Galaxies and City of Heroes -- were saddled with their own strange quirks, like crazy boob sliders, insufficient tools for making non-European characters, and an obvious disdain for aging or overweight or otherwise socially unacceptable toons. You can have 50 different mohawk styles, but if you want wrinkles, realistic breast physics, or a waist thicker than your wrist, then god help you. By limiting options to four heads per gender (only one apiece European) and by making sure my female character is believably muscled and armored, PlanetSide 2's character creator manages to secure an advantage over more robust systems. By going minimalist and choosing to leave out almost everything instead of only one or two things that make me question the designers' motives, SOE has effectively curtailed complaints. But is that worth it? When was the last time a character creator didn't offend you? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
Breakfast Topic: Do you use proper in-character names for all your characters?
Confession: My very first healer, the one I made after discovering that I liked to heal but which I still very much considered an alt, had a joke name. This was in a game that allowed surnames. When I dinged the level at which I could finally choose a surname, I found myself overly dry on inspiration and overly moist with wine -- and it was thus that I burdened my stalwart cleric with "Bubuquisser." It wasn't 10 levels before I was petitioning a GM for a name change (which he magnanimously granted, thank goodness). I'd learned my lesson. Silly names are not for me. I'm not a full-on MMO roleplayer, but I do strive for a sense of immersion. Even something as common as naming conventions makes me uneasy at the character creation screen. I have a few patterns that I follow, and I keep things like race in mind, but I break away if I get even an inkling that another name might better fit my idea of that character's sensibilities. What's your naming style? Do you use a mix of in-character and out-of-game, real-world references? Would you find a tip of the hat to a fictional or historical character or reference off-putting? Are you cool with pun names?
Neverwinter boasts character customization equal to Cryptic's other titles
Even with the fantasy trappings and Dungeons & Dragons background, it's important to remember that Neverwinter is as much a Cryptic creature as anything. And because of that fact, the game will ship with a very robust character creator on par with the studio's other offerings. A new character creator dev diary walks us through the process of making a dungeon runner, which is both as you'd expect and slightly different for the genre. One important note is that you will actually roll for your ability stats. These stats will be augmented by the race chosen; each race has a special ability and specific stat bonuses. Once you get past the stats, it's on to the visual creator. It's here that you'll customize a unique-looking avatar. Cryptic says that if you've played one of its other games, you'll know what to expect here. The creator includes all kinds of skin complexions, skin color, tattoos, hairstyles, horns, scars, and a plethora of sliders.
Cabal II preps Korean launch, rolls out new trailer
Cabal II is looking good, real good these days. The CryENGINE 3 title boasts eye-popping visuals, although we haven't gotten any face-time with the game to judge how it handles. We'll be hearing more about it soon, however, as Cabal II prepares to launch in South Korea next month. The sequel to Cabal is the first of the CryENGINE 3 MMOs and is being developed by ESTsoft. We've got a spiffy-looking trailer for you that shows off not only the game's good looks but also its many classes, from Warriors to... um, Force Bladers. Check it out after the jump! [Source: ESTsoft press release]
Jukebox Heroes: EverQuest II's soundtrack, part 2
Last week, the laid-back folks at Sony Online Entertainment released the 118th expansion for EverQuest II, Chains of Eternity. Fortunately, it's available as a digital download so you won't have to suffer the embarrassment of a store clerk yelling, "PRICE CHECK ON 'CHAINS OF ETERNITY' FOR THIS PERVERT HERE -- THE ONE IN THE 50-SHADES-OF-GREY COAT" over the loudspeaker. Even more fortunate, for us, is that the expansion continues to grow EverQuest II's already immense symphonic library. SOE's been adding to the score with not only the game's expansions but also several of the larger content updates, and it's absolutely impressive to behold. As in most scores, there's a lot of forgettable noise that could probably be replaced by humming bees, but there still remains quite a few great tracks to appreciate, cherish, and adopt into one's own music library. Instead of focusing on the game's initial soundtrack, we're going to be skipping around to look at many of the terrific pieces of music that have come out of Norrath post-2004.
Neverwinter details pour in from China
Our eyes are on the bounty of the Forgotten Realms, and our fingers are itching to get a hold of Cryptic's Neverwinter come next year. Today we are able to broaden our insight into the game with a series of screenshots that reveal most of the game's races and classes -- at least as they're coming along in the Chinese export of the game. The screenshots show the title screen, the map of the world (with helpful English subtitles), and several of the character selection screens. We're able to see four Neverwinter's five classes (Devoted Cleric, Guardian Fighter, Trickster Rogue, and Control Wizard) as well as the game's seven races (Human, Half-Elf, Tiefling, Dwarf, Drow, Elf, and Halfling). So far, Cryptic's only publicly announced the Control Wizard and Guardian Fighter classes. Head over to MMO Culture to check them out and then let us know what you're planning to roll!
Get a look at Cabal II's character creation
While some of you have been waiting in front of your local brick-and-mortar outlet in anticipation for Cabal II, you might... what, you didn't know there was going to be a Cabal II? There's going to be a Cabal II. Consider yourself informed. In any case, before we were so rudely interrupted, we were going to tell you that Steparu.com has given us our first look at the game through its character creation system. Both male and female versions are present, along with a vast array of sliders, skin tones, tattoos, and saucy underwear. You never know if Cabal II might be in your future, but if it is, then the following videos will most certainly be your first steps into the game. Check them out!
The Perfect Ten: Character creation options nobody uses
There are two types of people in the world: those who can't get through the character creation menu fast enough to start playing "LordBladezz" and those who spend hours crafting the perfect face that will be seen by the player only 0.03% of the time. I've heard rumors of a species of middle-ground player, but I've yet to see one. I think there could be a doctoral thesis for someone willing to investigate which visual character creation options most of us use and which ones we ignore. My hunch is that most of us are looking to recreate an impeccable standard of beauty or handsomeness, resulting in game worlds exploding with Abercrombie & Fitch models. Because exploring the "most-used character creation options" isn't as much fun, today we're going to examine the 10 options that pretty much nobody uses. And yes, you'll feel compelled to comment that you do indeed use one of these and prove me wrong, so let me give you a gold star in advance for doing so. You're awesome.
The Game Archaeologist: A City of Heroes memorial, part 1
When I first heard that City of Heroes would be given a hero's farewell, I felt for the players who call that game home. I also was depressed because I spent a fair amount of time in Paragon City myself and have a particular affection for the game. But beyond empathy and misery, I knew that the Game Archeologist had a duty to perform: to preserve the memories of what would soon fade into history. Thus, I put out a call for your City of Heroes characters along with their stories so that I could share them with the world at large. Dozens of readers responded, and for the next couple of weeks, we're going to be looking at the digital face of tragedy and memories. These are the avatars who genuinely meant something to someone, and while they are about to be deleted from the servers forever, I hope that by archiving them here, they'll live on for future generations (read: December 2012 readers) to discover. Let's go meet some of them, shall we?
Some Assembly Required: Citadel of Sorcery interview reveals a dynamic world
When word filtered to us that a new virtual world was in the works with unique features, I said what any other sandbox-loving player would: Yeah ri... er, I mean, "Show me what you've got." And that's exactly what the folks making Citadel of Sorcery did! And they didn't just tease me with a couple of phrases and leave me dangling; they offered a deluge of information about the upcoming game. In fact, they sent me enough to complete five different articles. That's more Some Assembly Requireds than you can shake a stick at. Not only did I get to learn many facts about Citadel of Sorcery, but in sitting down and talking with Philip Blood, Director of Game Design at MMO Magic, Inc., I also got to experience first-hand the passion that the developers have for their game. Philip graciously answered a barrage of questions (perhaps part of the reason the interview grew so long!) and helped paint CoS as a game that might satisfy the longing of players who yearn for a vibrant, living world where their choices make a difference. Unlike traditional games, CoS promises a vast world where each player will experience the game in very different ways. In all, the game sounds innovative and exciting. But don't just take my word on it; check out the details for yourself in this in-depth interview.
The Daily Grind: What character creation option do you wish MMOs would include?
I'm one of those players who takes forever and a day just to make it through the character creation process (forever and two days if it's a superhero title). It takes so long because I just agonize over every little aspect of how my character looks, even though I'll be spending the rest of my game time with them looking at his or her back. Because of this, it does frustrate me when games skimp out on character creation options. MMOs that have only three hairstyles, or identical faces, or nothing but an absurd standard of beauty have me gnashing my teeth. I don't need sliders all the time, but some interesting options to allow me some degree of personalization would be dandy. So what character creation option do you wish MMOs would include? Are there beards, hair styles, scars, or accessories that you never see but wish you did? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
