eurogamer-expo
Latest
EGX London 2014: Guild Wars 2 promotes e-sports
ArenaNet was in London this past weekend promoting its Guild Wars 2 e-sports angle to show-goers, including some who might never have played or even heard of the MMO. A pair of videos serve to explain how Guild Wars 2 works; the first covers PvE from character creation to skills to armor, and the second, hosted by Competitive Community Manager Joshua "Grouch" Davis, covers all things PvP. We think having a Competitive Community Manager is a pretty serious declaration of your e-sports intent. Enjoy the vids below.
Guild Wars 2 promotes its World Tournament Series Championships, goes on sale
Earlier this morning, ArenaNet delivered its 2014 Guild Wars 2 World Tournament Series Championships roadmap from London's Eurogamer Expo, where the studio is livestreaming its latest e-sports endeavor. ANet is calling the tourney the game's "first truly international competition" as it pulls players from three continents; opening rounds of qualifiers have already concluded. The studio explains, "Each event will pit four teams in a fight to become the world's best Guild Wars 2 PvP players, with the top two teams from the host region facing off against two visiting teams. The debut event is scheduled for December 4-5 in Beijing, where players will vie for a $50,000 (USD) prize pool and the title of first-ever Guild Wars 2 WTS Champion." As promised Tuesday, the buy-to-play MMO's free trial also began this morning at 3 a.m. EDT; it's active for a week until the wee hours of October 2nd. Box prices (specifically, Digital Heroic Editions and Digital Deluxe Editions through the GW2 storefront) have also been halved throughout the promotion. [Source: Anet press release]
PS4 playable at Eurogamer Expo 2013
Going to be in London at the end of September? Drop by the Eurogamer Expo and you just might get some hands-on time with the PlayStation 4. What hasn't been confirmed yet? Exactly which titles will be playable at the show. We've got our fingers crossed for The Elder Scrolls Online, ZeniMax's upcoming fantasy MMO. UbiSoft's The Crew and Turbine's Infinite Crisis are also confirmed for the PS4 but not for a demo just yet, according to a new press release. The Expo starts Thursday, September 26th, and runs through Sunday, September 29th. Super passes and weekend tickets are already sold out, but Thursday and Friday tickets are still available on the official event website. [Source: Eurogamer Expo 2013 press release]
CCP shares EVE's social calendar
It's the busy season for conventions and expos. There are events running all 'round the world, and now you can know which ones CCP is taking part in. Flip open your calendar and ring up your travel agent if you've got your heart set on meeting your favorite EVE Online devs. The EVE DUST Summerfest runs this weekend, September 14th-16th, in Loutraki, Greece. It's followed shortly by the Tokyo Game Show on the 20th-23rd. The player-organized VETO EVE event is in London on the 29th, so if you're in town for the Eurogamer Expo, which runs from the 27th-30th, you might as well check it out. After that, the party moves to Igromir in Moscow, Russia before winding up in the Las Vegas for EVE Vegas. Check out the EVE blog for full details and hit up the official forums for word of more player meetups.
MMO Roundup: Titan, why you gotta hurt me like this?
Sometimes you'd like to know that there are other MMOs out there, right? It's not all WoW, all the time! Our sister site Massively can provide you with everything you need to know about all of the other MMOs around -- past, present and future. Blizzard's not talking about its unannounced MMO at BlizzCon this year Remember that one time when Blizzard accidentally leaked some info stating that it's working on a new MMO (codenamed Titan), and we all got excited? And then BlizzCon happened, and we all thought the studio would tell us more, but it didn't? And then remember when that happened the next year, too? Well, it's happening again this year. BioWare founders: We make the decisions, not EA BioWare has a message for critical fans who blame the company's perceived inadequacies on its corporate overlords at Electronic Arts. "I always chuckle because we are EA, we're BioWare -- we're both, and we still have huge autonomy in terms of what we do," cofounder Greg Zeschuk recently told Eurogamer. MMO impressions from Eurogamer Expo 2011 Some of the industry's biggest names were at Eurogamer Expo last week, including BioWare, NCsoft and Trion Worlds. Massively's Brendain Drain was on the floor at the expo to get some hands-on experience with several upcoming MMOs, including Guild Wars 2 and The Old Republic. Not So Massively: Eurogamer Expo 2011 edition Not So Massively, Massively's weekly column for not-quite-MMO multiplayer games, covers all the latest and great not-so-massive Eurogamer news: League of Legends, Dark Souls, Diablo 3, and more. Star Wars: The Old Republic accidentally taunts potential testers What's the worst thing that can happen when you're waiting for a chance to play a highly anticipated game? Being inadvertently taunted about the fact that you aren't in the beta. Massively's week in review Don't let WoW Insider do all of the talking when it comes to Massively's best content of the week. The Massively staff themselves have picked out what they think is the best content their site has to offer in their own weekly roundup.
MMO impressions from Eurogamer Expo 2011
Some of the industry's biggest names were at Eurogamer Expo last week, including BioWare, NCsoft and Trion Worlds. I was on the floor at the expo to get some hands-on experience with several upcoming MMOs and countless singleplayer games. Guild Wars 2 and Star Wars: The Old Republic stole the show, with hands-on gameplay sessions and in-depth developer talks. BioWare also made the bold move of announcing SWTOR's official release date during its talk at the convention. In addition to promoting the heck out of RIFT, Trion showed off upcoming MMORTS End of Nations with a hands-on demo and encouraged attendees to sign up to the End of Nations newsletter. RIFT and World of Tanks were both playable on the show floor for the entire weekend, but nothing new was being shown. Hack-and-slash adventure RPG Dark Souls and the beautifully zen Journey both demonstrated incredibly innovative multiplayer aspects that I'll likely cover in my weekly Not So Massively column, but neither falls neatly into the MMO box. OnLive had a spectacular showing at the expo, giving away free home consoles to every attendee and demonstrating the system's surprisingly lag-free gameplay on the floor. We discovered that although there are no MMOs in OnLive's current lineup, this isn't due to technical infeasibility, so we may yet see MMOs launched on the service. Skip past the cut for my in-depth hands-on impressions of Guild Wars 2, Star Wars: The Old Republic and End of Nations from Eurogamer Expo 2011.
Guild Wars 2 wins Eurogamer's Game of the Show
Not many games can claim that they stood up to Batman and prevailed, but Guild Wars 2 fought off the Dark Knight and more to win the Editors' Game of the Show at this past weekend's Eurogamer Expo. Competing against such high-profile titles like Battlefield 3 and Batman: Arkham City, Guild Wars 2 came out as the clear favorite of the editorial staff at Eurogamer. Guild Wars 2 was picked from a field of 10 nominees for its scope and ideas. Eurogamer's Tom Bramwell handed out the high praise: "It was almost impossible to choose between some of this year's nominees, but Guild Wars 2 eventually won us over with its incredible depth and intelligent new approach to MMO design." Eurogamer Expo 2011 attracted over 34,500 attendees, who made up what the show runners claim is the largest audience for the convention yet. [Source: Eurogamer Network press release]
End of Nations not launching in 2011, aiming for 2012
If the end of the world happens in 2012, then End of Nations might be the cause. Or effect. Or just an innocent bystander. In any case, Trion Worlds' MMORTS has moved its projected release window from late 2011 to sometime next year. The news came at this past weekend's Eurogamer Expo 2011, where Trion demoed the game live to an excited crowd. The studio also showed off some of the in-game store options that players have to pick from, including unit colors and skins. End of Nations will be free-to-play with these optional microtransactions, but Trion promises that there will be no way for players to "pay to win." Trion was mum when asked about End of Nations' beta at the expo. The studio announced last month that the title would be going free-to-play from the get-go, a move that it hopes will draw in prospective armchair generals by the droves.
Guild Wars 2 Necromancer, Thief gameplay videos captured at Eurogamer Expo
If you're a Guild Wars 2 fan who couldn't make the trip to London for this weekend's Eurogamer Expo, Cynical Brit's Total Biscuit has the next best thing. The site sent a gaggle of its community members to the event, and their impressions are collected in an ever-expanding threadnaught sure to put a smile on ArenaNet fan faces. The news post also features a series of gameplay videos shot live at the event, and all told the three clips clock in at just under an hour of footage. The videos feature both Norn Thief PvP and high-level Sylvari Necromancer shenanigans. Check them out after the break and head to Cynical Brit for more info.
BioWare announces launch date for Star Wars: The Old Republic
At the 2011 Eurogamer Expo keynote address, BioWare co-founders Dr. Ray Muzyka and Dr. Greg Zeschuk announced that Star Wars: The Old Republic will officially launch on December 20th, 2011 for North America and December 22, 2011 for Europe. The retail copy will include 30 days of subscription time, with further pricing as follows: 1 Month Subscription: $14.99 (£8.99/€12.99) 3 Month Subscription: $13.99 per month (one-time charge of $41.97/£25.17/€35.97) 6 Month Subscription: $12.99 per month (one-time charge of $77.94/£46.14/€65.94) [Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]
MMOs may be on the horizon for OnLive
The OnLive gaming platform officially launched in the US last year, bringing a new on-demand gaming service to homes with broadband internet connections. OnLive hosts and renders games on a computing cloud and delivers the resulting video feed over the internet. The potentially revolutionary system lets people play high-end games on low-end computers, but has a minimum bandwidth requirement of 2Mbit. OnLive celebrated its UK release this week during Eurogamer Expo in London, and we were on the floor to ask the OnLive staff some questions about the service. Representatives were able to confirm that there are plans to bring MMOs to the OnLive service in the future but no solid deals had been made. The only thing keeping MMOs out of the game catalogue is the fact that no deals have been signed with MMO publishers. OnLive representatives stated that it would be unlikely to see Activision-Blizzard's games like World of Warcraft on OnLive, but that Star Wars: The Old Republic and other MMOs could eventually be licensed to both the PC client and the home console. Talks are already underway with Electronic Arts, which released its first game on the system this week to coincide with the UK launch. When asked about latency issues, staff explained that the service already supports a large number of multiplayer titles with similar connectivity requirements to MMOs and latency is not a problem in those games.
Gamescom 2011: ArenaNet announces Guild Wars costume competition!
ArenaNet always makes an outstanding appearance at the video game fan conventions. Last year at Gamescom, developers allowed players to play Guild Wars 2 for the first time, and fans -- begging to get a bit of swag -- would literally swarm the stage each time the staff would speak. This year will likely be no different. Holding to tradition, ANet is sponsoring a Guild Wars and Guild Wars 2 costume contest for those who attend the event in Cologne, Germany. Come to the convention dressed in your best Guild Wars-related outfit on Sunday, August 21st to earn prizes and display your love for all things Guild Wars. ArenaNet is also happy to announce that it will attend the Eurogamer EXPO this year on September 22nd through 25th in London, England. The team promises to have game demonstrations at the NCsoft booth so that you can grab some personal playtime with Guild Wars 2. A full list of convention activities can be found on the Guild Wars 2 official site. [Also, check out some of the amazing Guild Wars costumes, like the one pictured above, by Katerina Maria on DeviantArt.]
Star Wars: The Old Republic lists 2011 event appearances
Are you ready for the Star Wars: The Old Republic Hyperdrive or Bust World Tour 2011? OK, that might not be an official thing (and seriously, wouldn't you love a t-shirt with that on it?), but BioWare has announced the community events that TOR will be attending this year. So if you're willing to make the journey and eager to get some face-time with both the game and the developers, here's where you can make it happen: E3 in Los Angeles, CA (June 7-9) San Diego Comic-Con, CA (July 21-24) Gamescom in Cologne, Germany (August 17-21) PAX Prime in Seattle, WA (August 26-28) Eurogamer Expo in London, UK (September 22-25) New York Comic Con (October 13-16) Paris Games Week (October 21-25) DreamHack in Jönköping, Sweden (November 24-27) You can read all of the details of The Old Republic's worldwide journey on the Star Wars: The Old Republic Community Events page.
Sonic project lead discusses canceled Kinect / Move titles
At the Eurogamer Expo in the UK this week, Prope head and Sonic the Hedgehog creative lead Yuji Naka spoke of two canceled PlayStation Move/Kinect games he worked on that "unfortunately didn't come out." GamesIndustry.biz reports Naka as saying, "I do enjoy working with new hardware, so I am hoping to create something exciting using those new technologies." He then added, "Actually, I worked on two games which unfortunately didn't come out, but those games were using those two technologies," referring to Sony and Microsoft's motion peripherals. He also spoke to the recent, repeated comments from Capcom global head of production Keiji Inafune regarding Japanese development in comparison to Western development, saying, "You could say that Japanese developers today are behind Western competitors in terms of technology. But at the same time, Japanese developers still come up with new game ideas and styles that are very much different from Western counterparts ... so I do agree with [Inafune's] comments to some extent, but I believe Japanese games technology has its own strong areas to compete with Western titles." In light of Mr. Naka's humility, we'd also like to point out that his team used the Nintendo Wii's motion controller in a completely unique way with Let's Tap, so the thought of them working with Move and Kinect is absolutely thrilling.
Demo impressions of Star Trek Online from Eurogamer Expo 2009
We recently mentioned that Star Trek Online fans would get a chance to play through a demo of the game at Eurogamer Expo last week. One of the first reports we've read about the Star Trek Online demo comes from Oli Welsh at Eurogamer who was uniquely positioned to check out the game (it was their Expo after all.) Welsh begins by writing, "Trekkies can put one fear to rest right now: Star Trek Online feels just like Star Trek." Although this might assuage a bit of the apprehension some gamers have about trying yet another Star Trek game, Welsh is up front about the fact that the demo he played through was a contained single player experience. It's too soon to say what gameplay will feel like when hundreds of other players are thrown into the mix. He writes about the demo's transitions between locations via warp jumps, keyboard navigation of star ships (standard WASD, with additional throttle control), and the pacing of ship combat. Welsh also walks the reader from the bridge of a Federation vessel down to the surface of a planet where Klingon opponents await. Fans of the game should read Eurogamer's hands on with Star Trek Online and may also be interested in the video footage of STO gameplay from Limited Edition, shot at this year's Eurogamer Expo (starting at 02:40. They've also captured gameplay of Global Agenda as well.) We've got a video embed of that for you after the jump.
Ubisoft not planning to release Assassin's Creed 2 demo
Much like that other highly anticipated Q4 blockbuster, it seems Assassin's Creed 2 won't receive a pre-launch playable preview. According to Connected Consoles, a Ubisoft representative recently confirmed at the Eurogamer Expo that the company has no plans for a demo. We've contacted Ubisoft to try and corroborate this report, and to see if the company has a good reason for not putting out a sneak preview of the title. You know, a reason better than "you guys already know what stabbing people is like." [Via Kotaku] %Gallery-49869%
Chet Faliszek crushes Left 4 Dead 2 DLC rumors
Remember those pair of error messages that a few folks found in the demo for Left 4 Dead 2, referecing "Miracle" and "Apocalypse" DLC? Yeah, those ain't no thing. At least, not according to Valve's Chet Faliszek, who recently addressed the error messages while speaking at the Eurogamer Expo. "What, those error messages?" he reportedly said, "Why, those ain't no thing." Of course, Kotaku's slightly more accurate transcription of this quote had Faliszek saying, "if you're reading in the forums and you're reading about the 'Miracle' DLC or whatever, that's test code." He added, "to get tested through Microsoft certification we had to do test scenarios with DLC. We haven't actually come out internally with what we're going to do yet." Hmph. We liked our version better.
Players to get hands-on time with Star Trek Online at Eurogamer Expo
Some people have already gotten into the closed beta for Star Trek Online, but for the rest of us it's going to be a waiting game. There may be good news for some of our UK-based readers, though. Those in attendance at this week's Eurogamer Expo will get to experience both ship-based action and ground combat firsthand in a Star Trek Online demo Cryptic Studios has set up. According to Eurogamer, Cryptic will allow Expo attendees to fight a fleet of Klingons and follow that up with an away mission on a planet's surface, where they will encounter the "Guardian of Forever." Eurogamer Expo will run October 27-28 in Leeds, and October 30-31 in London. You can check out the full details of this public hands-on of Star Trek Online in the Eurogamer announcement. %Gallery-28615%
Uncharted 2 plundering Europe October 16
The time is almost upon us to saunter back into ancient ruins and murder hundreds upon hundreds of mercenaries in Naughty Dog's upcoming quarter-tucked adventure, Uncharted 2. Stateside Nathan Drake enthusiasts have known the date their bread would be buttered on for quite some time (October 13) -- now, Sony's confirmed to Eurogamer that the title will be hitting European store shelves just three days later. (Whoa, don't hurt yourself. That's October 16.) If you're on the fence about your Uncharted 2 purchase, you'll be able to check out the game -- along with MAG, Heavy Rain and God of War III -- at the Eurogamer Expo, which runs October 27–28 in Leeds and October 30–31 in London. Tickets to the event are only £6, which we're fairly certain translates to about $0.16 in real currency. What a steal!
GameOn! London is off
HMV's GameOn! London event is officially off with the official website making the cancellation expressly clear. Ticket holders will be refunded for the event, which was to occur in November, after already being delayed from June.For an event that had several big publishers allegedly committed to the show when it was first announced, organizers obviously ran into some major issues. Perhaps the Eurogamer Expo -- also partnered with HMV -- which takes place at the end of October, was just more attractive.[Thanks, Shaffy]
