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Perfect Ten: Terrible, terrible MMO names
A catchy, vivid title is essential to getting your game noticed and establishing a strong brand. Yes, we as gamers will get used to pretty much any dumb name (unless it's Daikatana), but a great one allows us to mention it in polite society without getting spat on or rejected for dates. The best MMO names in my opinion are single words that sound cool or conjure up a strong association. I'm less fond of ALL CAPS ACRONYMS and any game that can't be more inventive with its title than to put "Online" after it. For the most part, MMOs play it safe and boring with titles, with only a few outliers in the awesome or terrible fringes. Today, we're going to examine the latter. I want to make a couple of quick qualifiers here. I'm not judging these games by their names; an MMO can be good or bad independent of how silly its name is. And while I know that some of these names make more sense in context, I generally feel that if I have to have it explained to me, then it's a fail.
Make My MMO: August 3 - August 9, 2014
Well, Games of Glory didn't last long on our crowdfunding list. Soon after I added it last week, Lightbulb Crew sent out a PR blast saying that it was canceling its Kickstarter drive on account of additional funding that it managed to secure from its existing investors. We also say goodbye to Bone Gulch for now, as the indie wild west sandbox failed to reach its Kickstarter goal. The Stomping Land and Ever, Jane also made headlines this week. The former is moving engines from Unreal 3 to 4, while the latter surfaced with a new build that includes endgame sleuthing and gossip systems. Finally, Star Citizen continued to roll around in piles of money, and oh yeah, it also squashed those troublesome rubberbanding bugs, opened up Arena Commander to all of the game's backers, and added a new CTF mode. More MMO crowdfunding news is just past the break.
Ever, Jane updates on test builds and the ever-lost hankie
Yes, there is a hankie to worry about in the latest development build of Ever, Jane. Mrs. Hatch's hankie, to be specific. She's lost it before, she's lost it again, and it's up to players to retrieve it, assuming they'd like to curry favor with Mrs. Hatch. The build also adds a number of endgame raiding systems, by which we of course mean the first pass of the game's gossip and sleuthing system, key to the overall social experience of the game. Essentially, the gossip system allows you to craft a few different potential responses to NPCs and to track what other characters are saying about your character. This means that in addition to assassinating or bolstering the reputations of others, you can also try to sort out your own reputation for good or for ill. Take a look at the full update for an explanation of the system, future updates, and other improvements in the most recent build.
Make My MMO: Crowdfunding February 23 - March 1, 2014
This week's Make My MMO adds Trials of Ascension's Light the Forge campaign, which is Chaos Forge's company-specific (i.e., non-Kickstarter) bid to raise $40,000. The fantasy sandbox canceled its initial Kickstarter campaign because it "failed in showing its true potential," according to a news posting on the ToA website. If the Light the Forge drive is successful, the devs will use the $40,000 to finish the game's demo and return to Kickstarter in the hopes of attracting additional funding. Head past the cut for a breakdown of other crowdfunded MMO projects for the week ending March 1st, 2014.
Make My MMO: Crowdfunding February 9 - 22, 2014
In the world of MMOs, no news is not necessarily good news -- especially when it comes to crowdfunding. Silence often denotes a lack of progress on a game, and that can certainly make investors nervous. Thankfully, many games provide players with updates that we, in turn, provide for you here. If no news is bad, then news is good, right? Unfortunately, this doesn't hold true. In the case of Star Rider and Hot Rod Hustle, the news is that neither met its funding goals. So we say farewell to these two games from Make My MMO. And Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen's campaign was chock-full of news, but in the end, its Kickstarter didn't succeed either; Pantheon, however, is continuing the fundraising effort on its official site. At least some news is good! War of Omens also leaves this round up, but for different reasons: Players can hop in and play the game! Likewise, HEX: Shards of Fate and StarCraft Universe move on now that both have moved into testing. Another sandbox, Terrayn, also joins the Kickstarter ranks. To hear other good news, keep reading.
Make My MMO: Crowdfunding January 26 - February 8, 2014
The crowdfunding train just keeps rolling right along, with passengers always coming and going. New passengers hop aboard while others hop off at their desired destination. Sadly, some have to disembark early -- such is the case with Universe Rush and Antilia. Although the Kickstarter campaign fell far short of its goal, Antilia does plan to continue development on its own. On the brighter side of things, some passengers reached their stop; Tales From The Strange Universe reached its goal, and both it and Novus AEterno (which brought in over 3.5 times its initial goal) will now take their places in the funded category. The Repopulation, earning over 175K during this latest Kickstarter run, disembarks at Betawatch station thanks to its ongoing alpha testing. Catch up on all the news for all these titles as they journey through crowdfunding here in Make My MMO.
Make My MMO: Crowdfunding January 12 - 25, 2014
After a sleepy holiday season, the crowdfunding crowd has woken up and gotten down to business. And amidst that new bustle of activity, Make My MMO's ranks are altering a bit. Two games leave our listing, but each for different reasons; the cross-platform space sim Space Unfolding folded after missing its goal, and Face of Mankind moved along to Betawatch to join the ranks of the games in testing. And now that War of Omens' campaign has wrapped up, it moves into the fully funded category. Some campaigns have really kicked into high gear. Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen joined the crowdfunding race and has delivered a slew of nearly daily news. Novus AEterno has nearly tripled its goal and is closing in on yet another stretch goal these final days of its campaign, while The Repopulation has also blown away its initial goal and is aiming for its eigth stretch goal (not to mention revealed plenty of juicy new bits). A smaller title, Tales From The Strange Universe, is more than halfway to its modest goal with a week left. And newcomer Star Rider also jumps on the Kickstarter bandwagon. Unfortunately, others aren't faring as well. Things aren't looking promising for Antilia or Universe Rush, whose campaigns end soon and are still over $85K and $98K short of their respective goals. Want more details on these stories or an update on all the already-funded projects? We've got the round-up right here.
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Free for All: An interview with Ever, Jane's Judy Tyrer
Ever, Jane caught my eye as soon as I read about it. I wish we had access to more non-combat MMOs, or MMOs that attempt to do something so different that they are hard to categorize. I have to say that I had never read a word of Jane Austen -- the author whose books Ever, Jane is based on -- but I didn't care. If anything, the interesting gameplay described by Judy Tyrer, the creator of the game, made me want to pick up a book or two. Of course, the game is barely in a playable state at this time and will likely be in development for a time longer. Still, the MMO genre needs games that takes chances, or we'll all find ourselves stuck on some hamster wheel of grind. I asked Judy a few questions and she surprised me with some of her answers. She's been making games for a long time, so hopefully you'll be hearing more from her here on Massively for a while! Let's get to the interview.
Make My MMO: Crowdfunding December 29, 2013 - January 11, 2014
Was 2013 the year of Kickstarter? Whatever you think personally about the funding model, you can't argue with the fact that over $480 million was pledged through the crowdfunding platform in the last calendar year. That's definitely one hunk of change! But whether or not that figure translates into a tidal wave of awesome games has yet to be seen; the jury will remain out until even more funded games actually release and players get to experience what they backed. As for specific MMO news this past fortnight, the bulk of it involves new titles vying for a slice of 2014's crowdfunding pie. The CCG War of Omens has already grabbed a piece; it met its goal and has moved on to stretch goals for the last couple of days. Other hopefuls include more two space strategy games. Learn more about all of these, as well as the news from the funded front, right here in Make My MMO.
Crowdfund Bookie, December 2013: Squeaking by
The Crowdfund Bookie crunches data from select successful Kickstarter and Indiegogo campaigns that ended during the month and produces pretty charts for you to look at. As the weeks go by, the video game crowdfunding space appears to be under a shift of sorts. December 2013 saw the second-lowest total amount of dollars raised by gaming projects ($2,331,061) in the last seven months, since we began tracking such data. Unlike September 2013's $2,211,975 raised, backers in December managed to fund 40 projects, the second-highest number of successful projects in, again, the past seven months. December 2013 is the first month in which crowdfunded projects failed to raise $1 million over the top of their combined project goals, toppling the combined goal amount by $568,518. While it still seems like a lot of extra money, that averages out to $14,213 in extra dollars for each of the 40 crowdfunders last month. The trends we've tracked to this point indicated that crowdfunding was especially a boon for creators to reach stretch goals to bring games to additional platforms. Therefore, December's numbers go against the grain, showing that money spread out a bit more evenly across more projects. Whether that has anything to do with the holiday season is unclear. Head past the break to see the month's breakdown by genre as well as a list of December's top five-earning games.
Massively's Third Annual Frindie Awards
It's time once again for me to throw out my awards for the best of free-to-play, indie, and oddball MMOs, a real niche-within-a-niche. It might seem that I am assigned many of these titles as though I were some modern day Mikey, but the truth is that I get a huge thrill out of finding a new game but get even more of a thrill when I realize that no one is covering it. I had to really think hard about the criteria for the awards this year, mainly because "indie" is quickly becoming one of those often hard-to-define words, alongside "MMORPG" and "free-to-play." Fortunately, I think I know it when I see it. I kept my choices to games that I have actually played this year. I wanted to avoid games that appear to be really cool. If you want a more broad batch of prizes, check out Massively's best of awards. (Side note: I voted for Defiance as my game of the year.) These awards are for games that are being created on a shoestring or independent of massive budgets. Some of them are connected to some money, of course, but instead of trying to define "indie," I will only repeat: You'll know it when you see it.
Make My MMO: Crowdfunding December 15 - 28, 2013
'Tis the season... but not for news! With minds focused on the holidays, it looks as if not much happened in the realm of crowdfunding since our last Make My MMO update. Just how slow was it? It was so slow that Star Citizen did not announce earning another $2 million. A few tidbits did, however, did trickle out. Novus AEterno met its goal within 102 hours and still has a month of funding ahead. On the other hand, Empires of Tahn followed what seems to be the new norm: cancel the project before getting the dreaded "unsuccessful" label. And one title that is already strong in its development has jumped back into the crowdfunding realm; The Repopulation aims to incorporate even more features into the sandbox. There are also a couple dev blogs to speak of and a few odds and ends, all of which you will find rounded up for you below.
Women are a major marketing target for Ever, Jane
Maybe you're not quite the target market for Ever, Jane. You may not like the works of Jane Austen, for example; that would be a major deterrent. But according to project head Judy L. Tyrer, one of the major areas she wants to target is the women's market, which she feels is neglected by companies as a whole. She feels that one of the major failings of game companies is failing to realize how large the game market is for women. Tyrer goes into more depth about the game's mechanics, noting that what appealed to her as a designer was the rigid stratification of social classes in Austen's work. Social movement is a major element of the gameplay, with most of players' time devoted to attending balls and gossiping about one another. No word on endgame raids against Mister Darcy or whether or not wit will be seen as an overpowered stat.
Make My MMO: Crowdfunding December 1 - 14, 2013
If it seems as if crowdfunding's gone into a turkey coma lately, you aren't just imagining things -- at least as far as funded games are concerned. News on that front has seemed scarce compared to the deluge of some other two-week spans, but the current campaigns are trying to make up for it. Life is Feudal canceled its Indiegogo campaign, but devs vowed to "survive according to Plan 'B'," so we'll keep an eye out to see whether it moves into personal funding as other games have done. (That route is working for Neo's Land, whose donations keep creeping higher.) Similarly, Novus AEterno scrapped its second Kickstarter campaign, but in a twist, it's already restarted another with a lower goal. Outer Worlds Online, however, just didn't make the funding cut. On the successful side, manners and dinner parties will be coming to an MMO near you; Ever, Jane got an invitation to join the funded club. A few other funded titles also saw some progress, and still others joined (or re-joined) the race for your support. And topping all that, we also bid farewell to Elite: Dangerous, who leaves Make My MMO for Betawatch now that its alpha has started. You can catch all the updates below.
The Queue: Jane Austen for Warlord
Welcome back to The Queue, the daily Q&A column in which the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Alex Ziebart will be your host today. This isn't a joke about Warlords needing lady characters. I swear. erebhir asked: Now that Ever Jane, the Jane Austen MMO, has reached its Kickstarter goals, do you think we'll see Blizzard add ballroom dancing to compete before the end of WoD? I don't think they have a choice. If Blizzard doesn't keep up with the enormous strides Ever, Jane is making in gossip-based gameplay, we have a new WoW killer on our hands.
Jane Austen-inspired MMO 'Ever, Jane' uses gossip as a weapon
If you ever wanted to tell Mr. Darcy to take a long walk off a short cliff, here's your chance. Ever, Jane, an MMO based in Jane Austen's universe, has been successfully funded, closing with $109,563 of a requested $100,000 on Kickstarter. In Ever, Jane, the main weapon is gossip; players will live and die by how the strict social hierarchy perceives their actions. The game includes traditional RPG stats such as strength, dexterity and intelligence, and a party invitation system allows players to alter their reputations. If a person of a higher status accepts your invitation, your status goes up, but whether it was accepted out of duty or happiness determines how much of a boost you'll get. If the invitation is rejected, your status drops. It sounds like a lot of smack talk, manipulation and false flattery. Ah, high school. The prototype is available to download now for PC and Mac, free for at least another two weeks while developer 3 Turn Productions wraps up Kickstarter things. The studio is headed up by Judy Tyrer, former Lead Engineer at Sony Online Entertainment and Senior Engineering Manager at Linden Labs, where she worked on Second Life. Ever, Jane is 3 Turn's first attempt at turning historically accurate, literary worlds into digital reality.
Ever, Jane meets Kickstarter goal
Good news, Austenites: Your shared dream of a backstabbing dinner party MMO is one step closer to coming true today as Ever, Jane has met its Kickstarter goal. "Thank you all so, so much!" Lead Developer Annabel Smyth gushed. "I can't quite put into words what I feel right now -- overjoyed, overwhelmed, over... over the moon, if you'll forgive the cliché. Thank you, thank you, thank you!" The Jane Austen-themed title passed its $100,000 funding goalpost just before its campaign month was finished. The team said that while it will continue to run the free prototype, the weeks ahead will be concentrated on setting up an account system, establishing funding stretch goals, and hosting in-game end-of-year parties.
Make My MMO: Crowdfunding November 17 - 30, 2013
One thing gamers can definitely be thankful for this year is crowdfunding! Thanks to this phenomenon, we have many more options opening to us than ever before. And there are definitely some good gaming prospects on the horizon, even if news about all but one is seeming a bit scarce lately. While it's true that a few funded projects tossed out a news morsel or two, two new campaigns replaced two unsuccessful ones (neither The Zodiac Project nor Omuni Online made their goals), newcomer The Mandate already made its goal, and another hopeful -- Ever, Jane -- has secured three-quarters of its goal with only a couple of days left, the majority of the spotlight has been stolen the upcoming space sim Star Citizen, which continues to blast the crowdfunding record to smithereens. If you missed any of the news, you can catch up on it all right here in Make My MMO.
Make My MMO: Crowdfunding November 3 - 16, 2013
A quiet fortnight in the land of crowdfunding these past two weeks have not been. In fact, with the popularity of this funding model, it may never be quiet again. The past two weeks have had their share of campaigns starting, campaigns closing, and campaigns obliterating goals and funding records alike. Three new prospective games have popped on the radar (including one for those with impeccable manners!), and one has disappeared. But even that game isn't gone for good; although pledges had climbed to over $86K, Trials of Ascension canceled its campaign in order to "regroup, rework, and return." Another title, City of Titans, is taking its place among the fully funded crowd. And there there is Star Citizen, which proved that a single fortnight can't go by without the game's gathering another million or two. All that information and more can be found here in Make My MMO!
Jane Austen MMO looks for funds and decorum
Say goodbye to swords and sorcery, and say hello to gossip and high society relationships! Ever, Jane, a social MMO that takes inspiration from the works of Jane Austen, is looking to raise funds through a Kickstarter project. Ever, Jane puts players into prim and proper avatars who build stories, gossip against each other, explore family connections, and go to dinner parties. Mini-games are there to flesh out the challenge of navigating this type of life and include sewing, ballroom dancing, and puzzles. 3 Turn Productions is attempting to raise $100,000 to get the modest MMO off the ground by May 2014. Currently there's a downloadable prototype available to tinker with, so give it a whirl and see if it's worth your investment dollars. [Thanks to Sharvis for the tip!]
