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Chaos Theory: Why TSW's quest art thrills me to no end
Every Secret World fan has his or her own list of reasons why the game feels special and unique. Perhaps it's the investigation missions, the contemporary setting, the flexible character builds, the dark subject matter, the well-done voice acting, the creepy tone, the immense pile of lore, or the sheer fun that is the dressing room. Steadily climbing to the top of my own list is an aspect that I haven't seen mentioned much at all: the quest art. Is that the best terminology for it? I don't know what else to call it. What I'm talking about here are the images that often pop up through quests, from photographs to journal entries. These pieces of art aren't just sprinkled in here or there; they are so dang prolific that I've devoted an entire screenshot folder to holding them. Once you start really noticing them, it's hard not to marvel at all of the work that was done to put them in the game. So excuse me this week as I go on about why quest art is seriously terrific and terribly underrated. I may even share a favorite or 27 of them along the way.
Defiance previews the next DLC pack, Gunslinger Trials
Some of the early story threads from Defiance's launch haven't been addressed. The nature of the Biodyne Project and control of the Earth Republic are both questions with no answer, but that's all changing in March with the release of the game's next DLC pack, Gunslinger Trials. Players will explore three new quest lines involving members of Von Bach Industries, leading to events that see both the revival of Biodyne and a look at the power gaining strength behind the scenes of the Earth Republic. The DLC content isn't limited to story developments, though. Players will also be taking on new four-person challenges in which a group of hunters struggle to reach the end of a course, killing and progressing as quickly as possible. And raw damage isn't all that matters; teamwork and coordination will play a major role in clearing the end. Gunslinger Trials is planned for release in March, so get your trigger fingers ready if this sounds like your sort of fun.
WoW Moviewatch: Quest
This short, holiday movie from Casuals at Play is a charming piece of warm spirit. Quest is a relatively simple story, told with very little dialogue and text. But the serene music and inexorable movement of the plot tells you everything you need to know. It's only a few minutes long, but captures some of the most vital essence of the season. Kick back with a little bit of nog and let Casuals at Play share their holiday wishes to you. Interested in the wide world of machinima? We have new movies every weekday here on WoW Moviewatch! Have suggestions for machinima we ought to feature? Toss us an email at moviewatch@wowinsider.com.
Wizard101 fulfills a child's wish
Wizard101 is a kid's game. It's designed to be played and enjoyed by kids. So what does Kingsisle Entertainment do when the Make-a-Wish foundation calls up with a wish from a child who's a big fan of the game? Apparently, the staff brings him in to the studio and surprises him with a brand-new character modeled and designed by the child in question, making him a permanent part of the game. What better way to wrap up a tour of the offices where your favorite game is made, right? Allan GhostDust and his pet, Lord Snoopie, can be found in Khrysalis as part of a new quest titled "Message in a Bottle." Any player who has completed the "Secret Heart" quest in the region is eligible to take on the new quest. If you'd like to read more about Allan's story, take a look at the full dispatch for your daily dose of heartwarming.
The Daily Grind: Is the mystique of MMO questing lost for good?
World of Warcraft is often credited with inserting questing into MMORPGs, but veterans know that classic MMOs like Ultima Online, EverQuest, and Asheron's Call all featured quests, be they simple escort quests for gold or elaborate multi-week quests for epic weapons that required a few dozen of your mates to lend a hand. Those ancient quests weren't designed as "content," exactly; they were a means to an end, and the reward was the point. Quests were just a unique way to gather money or special loot when you weren't hunting or camping in dungeons working on skills and levels. What WoW did was popularize the idea that quests should be the primary method of leveling up through an MMO. WoW's quests provide experience above all else; few WoW quests award gear worth using at endgame, and most rewards are vendor trash. Now, as quests have slowly become core content across many themepark and sandbox MMOs, we even hear gamers refer to "quest grind," when the reality is that quest-driven leveling was intended to replace something far more boring: mob grind. By turning something special into something mundane, have MMO developers shattered the mystique of The Quest as a roleplay and storytelling element? Are you sick to death of quests (and dynamic-events-that-are-really-just-quests) as a character development prop? Can designers make questing feel epic once again, or is it simply too late? 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!
EVE Evolved: Ghost Sites and PvE goals
PvE in most MMOs revolves around killing hordes of NPCs for currency, XP, tokens, or loot, and EVE Online is no exception. Players can hunt for rare pirate ships in nullsec asteroid belts, farm Sansha incursions for ISK and loyalty points, or team up against Sleeper ships in dangerous wormhole space, but most prefer the safe and steady income of mission-running. Missions are essentially repeatable quests that can be spawned on request, providing an endless stream of bad guys to blow up in the comfort of high-security space. Completing a mission will earn you some ISK and a few hundred or thousand loyalty points, but most of the ISK in mission-running comes from the bounties on the NPCs spawned in the mission sites. Similar deadspace sites with better loot are also distributed randomly throughout the galaxy and can be tracked down using scanner probes. But what would happen if the NPCs in these sites were a dangerous and unexpected interference that could get you killed, rather than space piñatas ready to explode in a shower of ISK? This is a question CCP plans to test with the Rubicon expansion's upcoming Ghost Sites feature, which promises to introduce a whole new form of high-risk, high-reward PvE. In this week's EVE Evolved, I look at EVE's upcoming ghost sites and explain why I think its goal-oriented approach to PvE should be adopted in other areas of the game.
What's the next big shock in WoW?
While we're not going to reveal the big spoiler in the latest patch here in this column, I think it's fair to say everyone's aware... there was one. Something big just happened in WoW, answering the biggest Azerothian "Will they or won't they?" since Ross and Rachel. (The orcs. Did you miss that quest?) In our role as helpful video game journalists, a few of your intrepid WoW Insider staffers made our best guess about what the next big shock would be. Read on to see what we thing... and leave your own guess for the Next Big Spoiler in the comments!
Chaos Theory: Three ideas to improve TSW's replayability
In my opinion, a lot rests upon The Secret World Issue #8's shoulders. While the past few issues have offered up top-notch story arcs, I gobbled them up quick and then looked sadly at an empty plate while wishing for seconds. It's the blessing and curse of quality content that takes a lot of time to make and far, far less time to play through. So our eyes are on the promise of Issue #8's scenario system and the possibilities that it might bring. MJ did a great job of touching on the potential there, but I'd like to add that the game sorely needs a system like this because there are only so many times you can run the same missions and dungeons before getting really restless. It doesn't have to be just up to scenarios to cure the replayability blues, however. Off the top of my head, I can think of three ways that the devs (given appropriate time and resources, of course) could add more layers of fun and activity into the current framework of The Secret World.
First Impressions of RuneScape 3 from a returning player
Over a decade ago, two brothers working out of their parents' house in Nottingham set themselves the impossible task of building their own graphical multi-user dungeon, a genre that later evolved into the MMOs we know today. RuneScape launched to the public in 2001 as a low-res browser game with only a few hundred players and 2-D sprites for monsters, but several years later it boasted over a million paying monthly subscribers. The 2007 Sunday Times Rich List even estimated the Gower brothers' business empire to be worth over £113,000,000, due almost entirely to RuneScape. The secret behind RuneScape's success is that it's been continually updated throughout its lifetime, not just with regular infusions of new content but also with several major graphical and gameplay overhauls. The game was recently reincarnated as RuneScape 3, which is as far as it gets from the primitive game many of us grew up with. It now boasts a visually improved HTML 5 client with graphics acceleration, orchestral music, some voice-acted quests with cutscenes, and a fully customisable UI. This combines with last year's Evolution of Combat update and over a decade of new quests and zones to produce an MMO with more depth and character than many other AAA titles. In this hands-on opinion piece, I put RuneScape's three major versions side by side and look at how far RuneScape 3 has come since those early days of punching 2-D goblins and mining for fish.
Psychologist asks designers to shorten quests to fight addiction
It's impossible to play video games without noticing that some people have downright unhealthy gaming habits. Addiction to games is discussed a great deal, often without solutions being offered. Dr. Zaheer Hussain does propose a solution in a recent study, however, arguing that game designers need to cut down on the length of quests to prevent people from forming unhealthy habits. He suggests that designers need to look at the structure of the game and how mechanics might encourage pathological behaviors. You may feel like it's a good suggestion or you may feel like it's comparable to fighting alcoholism by selling beer in smaller bottles, but the study goes into more detail than that simple suggestion. The study, which was published in the Addiction Research and Theory journal, recommends steps be taken before games see the sort of government administration as seen in countries such as China and South Korea. It ultimately concludes that anywhere between 7-11% of all gamers suffer from "pathological" behavior. The full paper can be purchased by those interested for closer review.
The Daily Grind: Do you skip quest text in MMOs?
I heard an odd complaint in the Massively offices this week: One of our writers was annoyed with Guild Wars 2 because it isn't delivering enough backstory through regular gameplay and normal questing. He couldn't figure out what was happening in the plot and didn't want to have to hunt down an out-of-game wiki page or NPC with a prepared info-dumping spiel; he just wanted the basic lore presented during the quest itself from normal quest NPCs. Crazy, right? Why would a designer put lore in quest text? No one reads quest text -- everyone says! Might be it's time to challenge that assumption, especially with games like WildStar with tweetquest philosophies on the horizon. Do you, in fact, skip quest text in MMOs? If you do, would you read it if you knew the text actually mattered to the plot of the game and wasn't just a 500-word essay on why you should kill 10 rats? 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!
The Daily Grind: Do you bring MMOs into real life?
One of the aspects that I like about MMOs is the sense of accomplishment when it comes to achieving specific goals. Maybe they're my goals or maybe they're goals set by the game, but checking things off a list and knowing that I've made progress is satisfying. That's why I often look at real world chores like an MMO quest log these days, filling my to do list up before knocking them out. I'm only slightly disappointed when victory music doesn't play when I turn in a quest to my wife. Mental note: Must buy wife a kazoo. Anyway, do you ever experience moments where your passion for MMOs bleed over into your real life? Do you grind reputation with your boss at work? Have you found yourself opening up a fridge and wondering what kind of epic consumables are inside? Did you strip to your skivvies and dance on top of your mailbox until the neighbors complained? Is all of this a cry for help? 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!
The Daily Grind: Do you still love the traditional questing model?
Lately I've been enjoying somewhat of a gaming renaissance in Lord of the Rings Online. I've been gaming in both high- and low-level areas, chewing through quest lines, and actually reading all of the story text. It struck me that in this day and age when MMOs are attempting to bring storytelling and questing to new levels, there's still something attractive and addicting about "old-fashioned" questing models. Perhaps it's the straight-forward presentation, the promise of "do this and get rewarded." Maybe it's still satisfying to vacuum up eight quests at once and check them off, one by one. And I think that great tales can still be told through such models. But enough about what I think -- what's your opinion? Do you still (or ever) love the traditional questing model? 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!
The Daily Grind: What quest has frustrated you more than any other?
I have a relatively acrimonious relationship with most of The Secret World's investigation missions for reasons too ornate to detail here. Hell and Bach, however, deserves special mention. It's not that it's one of the game's worse examples, but that the actual mechanics behind clearing the mission are very finnicky. You have to click a series of symbols in just the right way to spell out a phrase, but the symbols are close together, it's easy to miss a click, and to top it off it won't work if you have the reference guide open as you do so. For all-time frustration, that mission ramped up pretty highly, although I enjoyed it once I cleared it. But it's not about what frustrates me, it's about what frustrates you. So what quest has frustrated you more than any other? Was it unclear in its objectives, or were its clearly stated objectives just dizzyingly hard to actually accomplish? Or was it something even more mundane, like a Final Fantasy XI quest that irritated you because you could never find the other people to do it with? 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!
The Daily Grind: What's the most insulting quest you've ever done?
The other night, a friend of mine took to Twitter to express her displeasure over an EverQuest II mission. "I have to do something called Jenni's Stained Pants," she said, nonplussed. "This may be the most insulting quest I've ever done." While the actual mission turned out to be more benign than she'd anticipated from the title, I could relate. There have been so many quests in MMOs that aren't just beneath my stature but outright mocking my status as a hero. How many times have we had to pick up poo on the whims of a developer? Or pluck flowers for Elves? Or run extremely pointless errands because an NPC has a deadly case of fat butt and doesn't want to stop watching Honey Boo Boo? So let it out today: What's the most insulting quest you've ever done? Vent! Lance that wound! Rebuff those devs who think it's OK to make a monkey out of 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!
Patch 5.2 PTR: Wrathion's quest continues
The black dragon Wrathion has a new chapter for players to complete when patch 5.2 releases. The updated patch notes has revealed that in the new Throne of Thunder raid, Wrathion is going to charge players to infiltrate the palace. While we don't know exactly what tasks he'll want us to perform, it's bound to take some effort and skill involved. What exactly are we going to get performing these random tasks for Wrathion? It has to be good since we're diving into another raid and challenging all these raid bosses. The reward is a legendary quality metagem called Crown of the Heavens! It remains to be seen if this gem can fit into any socket or if, like the weapon counterpart, must be inserted into a Sha-Touched helmet. I can't help but wonder if the gems will have special or enhanced properties compared to the normal meta gems that we use. Here's hoping we'll be able to select a version of the gem which helps enhance our roles. Stay tuned though as we expect to find out additional details on what Wrathion has in store!
The Roll Club
You can bet that the builders of the Serpent's Spine wall in Pandaria never planned for this to be used. Who would've guessed that a defensive fortification meant to protect Pandaria from it's enemies would also be used as a form of amusement? There's a secretive group of Golden Lotus warriors. They're called the Roll Club. But of course, we're not supposed to technically talk about the Roll Club. The Golden Lotus offers a daily quest where players literally roll down the wall. You can pick up Roll Club: Serpent's Spine from Kelari Featherfoot located in the Setting Sun Garrison. I'm not sure what the exact prerequisites are to get the quest. When I first picked it up today, I was halfway through revered with the Golden Lotus and had finished the quests involving the Battle Spear of the Thunder King, Battle Helm of the Thunder King, and Battle Axe of the Thunder King. I wish there was a timer that showed how fast you complete the course. If you can beat the course in under 70 seconds, you get the Roll Club achievement. Tips Hit every speed boost (they look like boots) within reason Avoid tar pits as they slow you down immensely Oh, and I recommend playing it with this song in the background. Mists of Pandaria is here! The level cap has been raised to 90, many players have returned to Azeroth, and pet battles are taking the world by storm. Keep an eye out for all of the latest news, and check out our comprehensive guide to Mists of Pandaria for everything you'll ever need to know.
RIFT expands beta in second weekend event
The beta for RIFT: Storm Legion continues to grow as it heads into its second beta weekend event. The new beta event starts on Friday the 19th at 1:00 p.m. EDT and includes the zones of City Core, Eastern Holdings, and Seratos. Beta participants will also be able to get their hands on two of the expansion's new features: Dimensions and Hunt Rifts. You can guarantee a spot in the beta by pre-ordering. Better do it fast if you have a hankering because the second beta weekend will come to an end on October 24th at 11:00 a.m., at which point the countdown clock will commence for the third event. In the meantime, RIFTers are invited to check out the evolution of the game's questing system through a Hungry Man-sized livestream after the jump!
The Soapbox: RuneScape is a proper MMO
Most of us will remember RuneScape from its first incarnation: a tiny and blocky world with simplistic gameplay, no sound, and only a handful of quests. The product of two brothers operating out of their parents' house in Nottingham, the original version launched in 2001 and slowly carved out its niche as a game for kids that could be played in a web-browser. RuneScape has a special significance for me as the first MMO I ever played, and it's responsible for starting my life-long love affair with online gaming. A whole generation of gamers grew up with that primitive, blocky world and eventually left for more polished games. But RuneScape has grown up too -- and boy did it have a growth spurt! Today's RuneScape bears little resemblance to the classic version many of us played as kids. The graphics are now considerably better, the world map is about five times the size, and it has features most people dream of getting in their favourite MMOs. RuneScape now has player housing, guild halls on huge floating islands, a full player-designed battleground system, procedurally generated dungeons, regular content updates, and 186 quests packed full of British humour. People sometimes say that RuneScape isn't a proper MMO like World of Warcraft, but I'd argue that it's actually more worthy of its "massively multiplayer" title than most of the MMOs released in the past decade. In this editorial, I look at just how far RuneScape has come and argue that RuneScape may be more worthy of being called a proper MMO than some triple-A releases.
The Daily Grind: Are dynamic events another MMO fad?
Move over, MMO story: dynamic events are this season's buzz word. Popularized by earlier MMOs like Warhammer Online and RIFT, dynamic events have become such an integral part of modern MMO design that brand-new Guild Wars 2 employs them as its central content conceit. Skip dynamic events in GW2 and you're going to have a rough time leveling (or surviving the ridicule of the commentariat, who consider dynamic events to be far superior to mundane, quest-like renown hearts). Even MMOFPS titles like Firefall are adopting the mechanic for their PvE fans. But is this actually the type of content we want to see from our MMOs, whatever their flavor? Never mind whether they're actually dynamic -- do you actually think they make for fun, desirable content? Or are we just so sick of themepark-style questing and leveling that we're willing to accept anything in its stead, even if that "anything" might be a fad akin to MMO story? What do you think -- are dynamic events all that and a bag of chips? 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!
