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Google says it offset all of the emissions it has ever generated
Google eliminates its 'entire carbon legacy' and plans to use only clean energy by 2030.
Pandora is shutting down in New Zealand and Australia
While Pandora got a nice infusion of cash from SiriusXM a few weeks ago, there's bad news for the streaming services' users down-under. The company just announced that its co-founder and CEO Tim Westergren is stepping down and, according to Billboard, Pandora is ending its service in the only two non-US markets it currently operates in: Australia and New Zealand.
SWTOR dishes out punishment for a major exploit
Last last week, BioWare community manager Eric Musco wrote a detailed post regarding a recent exploit that's plagued the PvE endgame for Star Wars: The Old Republic, explaining the planned punishments and the team's reasoning behind them. "We didn't take these actions lightly," Musco posts, "and reviewed every account to determine where we could be lenient. From our end, this was a no win situation. We feel responsible for allowing the exploit to occur and remain in the game for an unreasonable length of time, but we also cannot and will not condone cheating." Penalties applied to the affected accounts ranged from a warning and one day ban to even full and permanent suspensions. Musco finished up the post by encouraging players to continue to report potential exploits as soon as they are found.
SWTOR's Spoils of War update offers casinos, tweaks group finder
In Star Wars: The Old Republic's most recent dev blog, designers Chris Schmidt, Alex Modny, and George Smith discuss the major game systems headed to servers with the 2.8 Spoils of War update -- specifically, the Nar Shaddaa Nightlife event, PvP tweaks, and the story mode ops group finder. Nar Shaddaa casinos will feature slot machines that award special buffs, weapons, armor, cosmetic abilities, and mounts -- like a ridable Rancor -- to lucky gamblers. Participants in Galactic Starfighter matches and Warzones will begin receiving double rewards, and two new ship variants, the Assault Bomber and Skirmisher Gunship, will become available. In an effort to reduce queue time, the group finder will utilize the 16-man story mode difficulty for operations and bolster gear rating for all players. Rewards will also be increased. Read the full dev blog at the official site.
Allods Online transfers operations back to Mail.Ru, merges population
Allods Online is on the cusp of reverting operations from Webzen back to the original owners, Mail.ru. The firm has a couple of posts up to answer questions about the transfer. The transfer will happen sometime this month and it will involve both European and North American accounts. The creators will be merging these populations due to popular demand: "One of these [suggestions] was the desire to join the European servers: New Frontier and Goblin Republic. So we thought, why not use this great opportunity to finally unite all of our European and North American players on the same server? There are no more technical issues or other obstacles in our way, so right after we merge Webzen EU and US communities on March 18th, we will organize a migration of our players from Italy and Turkey to the same servers (it will happen two weeks later)." Allods Online will be synchronizing client versions across the board (except in Russia, which will remain ahead of the pack) due to this change and will not be supporting Polish localization going forward. The game will transfer regional accounts separately to avoid any conflicts.
Hyperspace Beacon: SWTOR's Dread War, part 2
This past week, I finished up exploring all aspects of the new Star Wars: The Old Republic patch save for the final showdown between my guild and the Dread Council. If you have been following my livestreams, then you'll know that we should finish that up on Wednesday. In this column, I've covered everything from the history of how the Dread Masters arrived at this point to the first offensive on the moon of Oricon to the first phase of the attack on the Dread Masters' fortress. Overall, it's been exciting. BioWare concluded this chapter in SWTOR history with as much flare as it started it two years ago. In the final confrontation between the player and the Dread Masters, we understand more about the characters of the Dread Masters and their motivation to conquer the known galaxy. We've already confronted Dread Master Styrak in the Scum and Villainy operation and Dread Master Brontes in the Dread Fortress operation from last week. Dread Masters Bestia, Tyrans, Calphayus, and Raptus remain. And that's who we will study this week.
Hyperspace Beacon: SWTOR's Dread War, part 1
When I freed the Dread Masters on the prison world of Belsavis, little did I know that a year and a half after the launch of Star Wars: The Old Republic, I would not only be fighting against these amazing foes but trying to destroy them. As I mentioned the last couple of weeks, the Empire and the Republic found the secret base of the Dread Masters on the planet Oricon, where they have been hiding and experimenting on the local fauna while amassing their subjugated army. Eventually, a strike team will have to invade the Dread Master's fortress, and in the two new operations of Update 2.4: The Dread War, you will get to do just that. Although I'm still not sure where this falls on the fun scale when compared to other SWTOR operations, I can tell you that it is challenging and exciting. I'll break it down for you, and if you hadn't guessed already, there will be spoilers. That said, I will limit the story-related ones.
Star Wars: The Old Republic Update 2.4: The Dread War is here
While it accidentally patched up yesterday, Update 2.4 is now live for Star Wars: The Old Republic. The update is called The Dread War and is apparently the biggest update since the game launched its expansion. Update 2.4 has a lot of "new" to it: a new planet (well, moon), new missions, new operations, new PvP options, new gear sets, new warzone maps, and new mounts. The update title refers to the Dread Masters who have taken up residence on the moon or Oricon, where a story mission series will allow players to further delve into the histories behind these happy-go-lucky folks. At the end of all this are challenging level-55 operations called the Dread Fortress and the Dread Palance. Will you be a part of the team tackling "the galaxy's greatest threat?" If so, you'll probably want to bone up on the patch notes before diving into the fray!
SWTOR's Scum and Villainy operation charges up nightmare mode
One thing we know about Star Wars: Villains like saying "So be it!" One thing we know about Star Wars: The Old Republic: Players chew up operations, spit them out, and keep asking for tougher ones. BioWare's hoping that today's Update 2.2.2 will give even the most ambitious team a tough go at it, as the studio has patched in the nightmare mode for Operation: Legions of Scum and Villainy. Where there are new challenges, there are new rewards, of course. For players who can survive the carnage, there is the elite Kell Dragon armor set and the cool Titan 6 Containment Mode mount to snag. If operations aren't your bag, then there are always Ewok companions, Czerka dailies, and bounty hunting contracts on the horizon.
Nightmare in neon: SWTOR posts Update 2.2 pages
While the news of Star Wars: The Old Republic's Update 2.2 was revealed almost a week ago, BioWare's created a couple of pages to highlight the update's key features. The Operation Nightmare page details the new level 55 nightmare-mode operations (Terror From Beyond in 2.2 and Legions of Scum and Villainy in 2.2.2). There's also information on the high-level underworld crafting plans, guild and reputation bonuses, and bonus weekends coming to a game near you. The next such bonus XP weekend is June 21st through the 24th, by the way. The guild rewards program page has the full scoop on why it's so cherry to be part of a SWTOR guild these days. Aside from the free hugs and moral support, there's a substantial increase to gained XP that guilds can provide -- especially if these guilds go on a recruiting spree.
Hyperspace Beacon: SWTOR consolidates comms
Star Wars: The Old Republic's Rise of the Hutt Cartel hit the public test server last week, prompting a lot of players to rush to see the latest changes to this Star Wars MMORPG. Unfortunately, the majority of content slated to come out with this expansion has not been released publicly -- namely, the new planet of Makeb. Fortunately, we did get a sneak peek into the new gear progression as well as the Scum and Villainy operation. Gear progression is a common subject for this column and with good reason. Although there is skill involved when playing SWTOR, gear is the great equalizer. As in many themepark MMOs, a player's gear greatly determines whether or not he can defeat specific instances or bosses. Because of this, how a player earns gear and which gear happens to be the best at any given moment becomes top priority when new content comes out. With an additional five levels being added with Rise of the Hutt Cartel, gear becomes especially important. Let's examine how everything breaks down.
Hyperspace Beacon: The SWTOR awards
The Oscars were given out two nights ago. Celebrities, actors, and film crews dressed in their red-carpet best to be handed a 13.5-inch golden statue of a naked bald man. As I heard these writers and directors give thanks to various loved-ones and talent agencies, I thought about Star Wars: The Old Republic. (Sad. I know.) SWTOR contains some of the best writing and storytelling in all of MMOs. In my opinion, it's better than some of movies represented on that stage. Sure, it didn't impact the world like Zero Dark Thirty, but it did impact my world, and I'd like to recognize some of the best parts of this MMORPG.
Star Wars: The Old Republic kicks off meeting the developers with Jesse Sky
Like every MMO, Star Wars: The Old Republic is not a game produced by a single person. The community team behind the game has kicked off what promises to be a series of articles introducing the developers, starting with the lead Flashpoint and Operations designer Jesse Sky. Like BioWare's similar articles for other franchises, the interview is a mix of questions about Star Wars: The Old Republic and questions about who Sky is as a person. Sky goes on record as mentioning that he sees designing Flashpoints as similar to designing an adventure for a tabletop game, with the story choices having a major impact on how the instance is paced out. There's also a science to making sure that the encounters are designed to be challenging while at the same time not insurmountable. If you'd like to know more about one of the minds behind the game's content, check out the full interview, and perhaps throw a few more questions into the official discussion thread.
Hyperspace Beacon: SWTOR's tools of the raid
I've mentioned that I don't like the idea of judging other players by arbitrary numbers. It annoys me when a person is included or excluded from an event or guild simply based on something like gearscore or pure DPS numbers. However, the importance of these numbers shouldn't be undervalued in a game like Star Wars: The Old Republic. A couple of weeks back, I wrote an article about how the gear grind is "unfun." I don't like the grind, but I do like building good gear. I hate to admit it, but there is a little bit of min-maxer in me (just a little!). With SWTOR turning nine months old, many news and guide sites have settled into a routine. Surprisingly, the sites that I visited pre-launch are not the sites that I visit now. Now I am interested in the more granular sites that help me with very specific tasks of the game. Granted, I still visit Darth Hater and TORWars when I'm looking for news, but I have a completely different set of sites and tools for character building. These are the three sites I use almost daily.
Hyperspace Beacon: Gear grinding is unfun
If you have been following me for the last few years on this column and some of the podcasts that I've done, then you are aware that hardcore progression raiding and PvP are not my thing. You will also know that I don't fault players for having their own fun, but the MMO industry often assumes raiders and PvPers are the ones game developers need to target and pursue. It could be that they are the loudest, the fastest, or maybe just the most competitive. I appreciate the players who blast through content. They are usually ones who make the guides that the slower players use to fight the "unbeatable boss." Unfortunately for developers, these are not the players who stick to the game. BioWare made a lot of naive mistakes with Star Wars: The Old Republic, but one of the biggest is that it listened too much to the vocal minority instead of attempting to make a game that caters to the long-term player. I consider myself and my guild long-term players. We play SWTOR for a multitude of reasons, ranging from basic Star Wars fanboyism to exploring new content to engaging in intense PvP battles. But one thing that is consistent among all of us is that we don't like to gear grind. Don't get me wrong; I understand that there need be a carrot for the players who complete high-level content, but I believe that SWTOR, along with other MMOs, is doing it wrong, and frankly, it's not fun.
Star Wars: The Old Republic previews Terror From Beyond
If you can't wait for the next tier of Operations in Star Wars: The Old Republic, you'll be happy to know that the newest tier is being added in update 1.4. You may be slightly less happy to know that the new operation, Terror From Beyond, is not meant to be a cakewalk by any stretch of the imagination. A new developer diary explains the lore behind the operation and some of the threats that players will be facing on the swamp planet of Asation. Colonized and largely abandoned by the Gree, Asation is a swamp planet that houses a massive hyperspace gate. The Dread Masters, a group of Sith not known for sunny dispositions, have opened the gate and started filling the planet with all manner of horrible creatures. The operation promises to offer new encounters and mechanics beyond what's been seen in previous raids, something for dedicated endgame players to look forward to in the next major content update.
SOE alters ProSiebenSat.1 deal to include EQ, Vanguard, and Wizardry Online
After months of insisting that the deal with ProSiebenSat.1 was locked in, SOE announced that it is expanding the library of titles that the European operator will take over and run for the region. In addition to the MMOs and other titles included with this past February's announcement, ProSiebenSat.1 looks to take over EverQuest, Vanguard, and Wizardry Online as well. All in all, it gives ProSiebenSat.1 the exclusive license to operate these titles in 40 European nations. SOE President John Smedley said that this is nothing but good news for European gamers: "ProSiebenSat.1 is the ideal partner for us to reach an even broader audience in Europe. We are confident that the combination of the media power provided by ProSiebenSat.1 and our expertise in developing high-quality online games will appeal to players in a new and captivating way, creating the perfect prerequisite for achieving great success with our games in Europe."
Leaderboard: Raid vs. small group content
When it comes to partying up in MMOs, it seems like everyone has his or her own preference for what size is ideal. While I've dipped my toes into the waters of raiding, I found it far too chilly and impersonal for my temperament. Yet while I prefer small group instance runs, I'm not blind to the fact that raiding remains immensely popular among part of the population. Small group content offers a more intimate setting for you and a few friends (or strangers with potty mouths) to tackle an instance. Because there are so few of you, each player needs to pull his or her own weight and become a hero. These runs tend to be less stressful and far more accessible to the game's population. On the other hand, raids offer the most challenging content in the game. A raid requires all involved to be geared up, skilled, and knowledgeable in the ways of fight patterns. Participating in one can feel downright epic, especially when you consider that you can see content that many players will never witness. So let's put it to a vote! Which do you prefer: raid or small group content?
Star Wars: The Old Republic's guide to the group finder
In a perfect world, all Star Wars: The Old Republic groups would be composed of several friends working together. But sometimes your friends aren't online or just have other things to do, and for those times, there's the Group Finder tool. But why is it that you can select a role you can't perform? Why do you queue up as healing or damage but always get picked for healing? How does the whole daily reward work? For answers to these questions and more, production team member Toni Phillips has put together a rundown of some of the Finder's more esoteric features. Phillips explains that daily rewards require you to complete the final step of the Flashpoint mission rather than simply clear the last boss, which usually involves clicking on an object at the end. Role selection, meanwhile, is determined by what your advanced class can do rather than what you're currently able to do, and if you select multiple roles, the finder will tend to pull from the rarer roles first. For more information and a more thorough breakdown, take a look at the full guide.
SWTOR podcast discusses operations design philosophy
Switch on the old Victrola because the BioWare DJs are back with the second episode of the official Star Wars: The Old Republic podcast. The podcasters chat with the devs about their daily routine, operations design philosophy, nightmare mode, and legacy perks. Lead Flashpoints and Operations Designer Jesse Sky says that the design process of operations is organic and flows from a central idea: "Yeah we often just start with the theme, develop from there. One of the big things we try to do is differentiate the combat from the rest of the game. You're dealing with eight or 16 players at once; it's got a very different feel from most of the Star Wars-type combat in the game. You often fight humanoids in the rest of the game; we're often fighting big creatures and droids. And so a lot of the development centers around making that fun." It's a meaty podcast that can be enjoyed in several different ways, from reading the transcript to listening to it on YouTube. Give it a listen and see if you don't hear a few teasers for upcoming content!
