huxley
Latest
Jukebox Heroes: City of Heroes' soundtrack
Really, how could it be anything else this week? By the first of December, a major MMO influence on my life will be gone for good. We will talk about it in the past tense with wistful tones, remembering the superheroic escapades and villainous schemes. It will be given a place of honor in many of our memories, and I truly believe that City of Heroes will echo throughout the industry and community for years to come. One of those echoes is the game's score, which will endure, as does every MMO's soundtrack. When I first started playing City of Heroes in 2004, the music made a big impression on me. It painted a picture of the game's locale and atmosphere perhaps better than anything else. Heck, you could play the game with your eyes closed and know which zone you were in by the music cues. That's how integral the score was to the game. So this is my final send-off to City of Heroes: a look at the highlight from its soundtrack from the launch through Freedom. Goodbye, City of Heroes... I'm going to really miss you. I won't miss the whine from the force field bubble, but I'll miss almost everything else.
The Firing Line: 16th century fragging edition
What do War Thunder, World of Warplanes, Leonardo da Vinci, and Tribes: Ascend have in common? Not a whole lot aside from their respective appearances in this week's edition of The Firing Line. Won't you join me after the cut for a rundown on some recent and notable online shooter news? If you're feeling particularly ornery, you can point and laugh at the fact that I'm still not in the War Thunder beta.
Webzen to resume publishing duties for Huxley: The Dystopia
NHN USA, or ijji.com, has been the company responsible for publishing Huxley: The Dystopia internationally, but the people in charge have announced that they're passing it back to developer Webzen. Webzen will be self-publishing Huxley, but it's not as much of a change at it might seem at first glance. NHN USA and Webzen are separate divisions of the same company, NHN Corporation, and the two divisions will continue partnering with one another to publish other projects. If you've purchased G Coin Cards, don't worry about losing out: "G Coin Cards branded with Huxley imaging will remain valid as long as they're purchased through an authorized retailer." NHN USA's official statement will appear on ijji.com today.
Ijji.com boasts over 9 million registered accounts
Ijji.com has hit a major milestone recently, revealing that their systems have tallied over 9 million accounts in their database. That's a pretty big number, and while they may not all be active accounts, it's still a very impressive amount of sign ups for anyone to have. This comes as good news to players of Rohan, Soul of the Ultimate Nation, Luminary, HolyBeast Online, and Atlantica Online, as ijji.com funnels players into all of those games. More people means more players, and more players ultimately means more of, well, everything. Ijji.com is still working on the upcoming MMOFPS, Huxley: The Dystopia, so those 9 million members will certainly come in handy in the future, as we'd all like more targets to shoot at for easy experience. Keep on signin' up, newbies! Fresh experience for all!
Redefining MMOs: The Shooter Invasion
The MMO industry is always changing, and if we're going to stay ahead of the curve, we need to re-evaluate some of our views and ingrained notions from time to time. The Redefining MMOs series at Massively is our look at the state of massively multiplayer online games as it is today, and where we see it going. This week we're going to look at how shooters have invaded the MMO space, give you a run-down of some promising MMO shooters on the horizon, and finally tackle the question of whether or not they should be covered here at Massively. Something we're seeing more and more is a blurring of the lines between formerly distinct game genres -- this is especially true of shooters and MMOs. There are a number of shooters on the horizon that fit the bill as MMOs (although not RPGs), but such games are a radical departure from the DikuMUD pedigree shared by most MMORPG titles we cover at Massively. These shooter-MMO hybrids may have quests, levels, and classes, but they cast few illusions about being true RPGs. They're shooters through and through, but have persistent settings or are massively multiplayer -- traits which catch our attention.
Archlord to transition from Codemasters to Webzen
Codemasters, while best known for running Lord of the Rings Online in Europe, was never a one-trick pony. While many people have been adventuring through Middle Earth, a brave few gamers were still calling the realm of Chantra, the continent of the archlord, their home. Sadly, however, all things must come to an end as Codemasters will be shutting down their service for Archlord.However, this is not a game sunset, but a game transition. Codemasters has failed to come to an agreement with NHN, the Korean developers of the game, to continue their service. NHN has transferred operation over to Webzen instead of Codemasters. If the images of Huxley and Soul of the Ultimate Nation just popped into your head, then you have indeed remembered the correct Webzen.This transition will move all character data over to Webzen's servers, making Webzen the go-to spot for almost everything Archlord related. What hasn't yet been confirmed is if item data will be transported with the characters as well.Archlord has shut down new account creation until October 2nd, when everything will be transferred over to Webzen. For the full details of the transfer, or if you want to make a new account, check out Webzen for all of the gritty details.[Thanks, Adam and Doran!]
The Daily Grind: FPS 'mah MMO?
Combat systems are always an integral part of games, as they provide the main source of conflict and challenge for most players. Lately, however, we've been seeing a change in how our MMOs handle combat. Traditional systems have always been based on click targeting and skill usage, but a number of MMOs have opted to utilize new technology and integrate aiming and elements of first-person shooters into their systems. PlanetSide has been one of the first (as it's built to be a first-person shooter MMO, obviously) but other games like Darkfall, Face of Mankind, Hellgate: London, Huxley, APB, and others have embraced the aiming concept. Our question to you today is what do you think of this shift? Do you like having to aim in your games, as it presents a new level of skill-based gameplay, or does the aiming just not work for you, as lag and other factors can give some players a hefty disadvantage? Take your thoughts, pull them out of your head, smash them against your keyboards, and let them land on our webby page. We're used to these sort of things.
Huxley's closed beta now open to North America
If you've been following the saga of MMOFPS Huxley and anxiously awaiting your chance to play, then here it is, as Fileplanet is offering entrance into the beta for all US and Canadian gamers. The rub is that you must have a Fileplanet account and an account at developer iiji's site, though setting up both takes but a few clicks and keystrokes. So get out there and play, which, to be honest, is a possibility we've long associated with things such as riding on the back of Nessie and playing blackjack with Big Foot.%Gallery-63056%[Via Massively]
Huxley's closed beta now open to everyone via Fileplanet
Yes, we know, that title sounded like a complete oxymoron. How can a closed beta be open to everybody? It just doesn't make any sense! We understand your confusion, but it's best not to question it. Fileplanet is giving out Huxley: The Dystopia closed beta keys to all account holders now, not just their subscribers. A couple quick button presses is now all it takes to find yourself braving the lunar apocalypse with all of your friends! A small note of instruction: if you get your beta key from Fileplanet, you will have to still make an ijji.com account for the closed beta test. You can do that right over at the Huxley closed beta page without much fuss at all. Now go forth and kick those Sapiens all the way back to the early days of evolution. Update: As so many commenters have pointed out, this offer is only available for the US and Canada. European gamers, it appears, are locked out of this promotion being offered by Fileplanet.
Huxley closed beta phase two to begin tomorrow
The e-mail announcements have gone out and clients are being downloaded as Huxley fans prepare for closed beta test phase two! The servers will be opening up tomorrow for CBT1 veterans and CBT2 recruits alike, starting at 2:00 PM Pacific time and staying open until 10:00 PM Pacific. (For us Eastern time people, that's between 5:00 PM and 1:00 AM.) Closed beta test participants have already received e-mails informing them of their acceptance to the new phase of beta. Former participants should delete their old Huxley clients and download the new, larger client from the closed beta test main page. Weren't accepted or didn't sign up? Well, bad news first, the closed beta registration is over. However, for those of you who are FilePlanet subscribers, you can run over there and still pick up a key if you weren't in CBT1. Closed beta phase two will be running until Wednesday, August 12th, and 10:00 PM Pacific time.
E3 2009 highlights: The Xbox roundup
E3 was brütal! If you blinked, for a split/second, you missed something. Even if you were trine to keep up, it was a blur -- staying a.wake like that, you only pushed yourself to the brink of your own dark void. That's where Joystiq comes in; to crackdown on the madness; to reach out ... with conviction -- phew! Crysis averted. We've scoured the dark corners and survived the inferno to piece together this roundup of all things Xbox at E3. Why? Just 'cause we love you. So, draw nier and shift your eyes past the break.
Ijji.com unleashes new screenshots for Huxley, Soul of the Ultimate Nation
Ijji.com sent us a whole slew of information about two of its upcoming titles to us today, and we figured that we should pass on the love. If you're looking forward to either Huxley: The Dystopia or Soul of the Ultimate Nation, you'll be happy to hear that we added 10 new screenshots of each to our galleries today. Huxley's screenshots show a few more battle scenes, including the scoped in view on one of their guns, while SUN has elected to show off some spectacular landscapes accompanied by some nice armors. If that wasn't enough, we also have two trailers, one featuring gameplay and the other a pre-rendered video, for Soul of the Ultimate Nation, featuring the Shadow class, included in this post right after the break. The Shadow looks like one heck of a wicked rogue class, so take the leap across the break to see his high flying, fast running stunts that even put the Team Fortress scout to shame. %Gallery-48874% %Gallery-65491%
Huxley will not offer cross-platform play, goes free-to-play
Speaking with ijji.com earlier today, just before we got a hands-on with upcoming MMOFPS Huxley: The Dystopia, the company confirmed to us that the game is going with the microtransaction model. Furthermore, the once announced cross-platform play between Xbox 360 and PC has been cut from the game. Boo Won Kim told us during a presentation of ijji.com's upcoming offerings that, "At this point, yes, [Huxley is] microtransaction supported." We then asked whether or not the cross-platform component of the game -- once it's main selling point -- had been cut. Andy Hong confirmed to us the fact, though he added that that's only the case "at this point." Considering how long the game has been in development -- and the heavily twitch-movement focused gameplay -- we're putting our money on the cross-platform functionality never returning.
Soul of the Ultimate Nation finally makes its way to America
It's only two years late, but hey, we're not complaining! Ijji.com has reported to us that they've obtained the rights to publish Webzen's Soul of the Ultimate Nation in North America and that the game will release somewhere in late 2009. Soul of the Ultimate Nation, called SUN for short, is a hack and slash MMO developed by Huxley creators Webzen. The game was originally slated to be published in North America in late 2007, but the game's status went silent and slowly slipped off of everyone's radar. SUN features a quicker style of gameplay, more akin to a game like Dynasty Warriors than your standard MMO. To perform this feat, the game breaks the world map up into zones created by players in towns, very much like creating your own match in a first-person shooter. Players create these fields in order to hunt down monsters, solve missions, or complete quests. Players can also take objectives to assult areas in a siege-esque manner, where many players create rooms to assault one objective. In these cases, successful and unsuccessful sieges affect how the other in-progress games play out, altering the difficulty of the battle to show the turning tide of one side winning or losing. The game does feature persistent cities where players can mingle, much like it's first-person shooter brother, Huxley.
Joystiq interview: Huxley project manager Andy Hong
You remember Huxley, right? It's that Webzen-developed MMOFPS we first heard about way back in 2005. We even played it ... in 2006. Not ringing any bells?Huxley was billed as the first MMOFPS to hit the Xbox 360 and PC, and it was to offer cross-platform multiplayer and promised 100-vs-100 online battles. Sounds to good to be true, right? Apparently. The game suddenly disappeared from public eye -- for years! And then, just as sudden, Huxley re-emerged from hiding through a handful of new screens and is now under the (hopefully!) steady hand of ijji.com (owned by NHN America).We caught up with Andy Hong, project manager for Huxley: The Dystopia, to see where the game has been and where it's going:How different is Huxley now, as compared to the original coverage (back in 2006)?There's been a real focus on polish and that really shows in the current version. There haven't been any major changes to the game, but the gameplay has changed a lot, it's a lot faster ...
Huxley still exists, closed beta accepting entries
Click for more first-person screenshots It's been a while since we've been able to talk about Huxley, and now it seems the MMOFPS thing has not been taken out back and shot dead. Indeed, the closed beta for the game is getting into full swing, and players are able to sign up for participation.But, before you get all excited, know that you can't play the game yet; Huxley's teaser site is only accepting entries at this point in time. You can merely sign up to maybe play it in the future.%Gallery-63056%[Thanks, Paul!]
Huxley: The Dystopia beta signups begin
Huxley: The Dystopia is the re-monikered MMOFPS from Webzen that will be published in the West by NHN USA and ijji. Huxley clearly puts more emphasis on FPS than MMO although elements of the latter are certainly there, and Massively had a chance to see a bit of what the game can offer at GDC 2009. Shortly afterwards, they launched a teaser site counting down to... something. We admit, we must've looked away from that countdown for too long because the teaser site changed today, adding video footage, forums, screenshots, character descriptions and backstory info. The main thing we'd like to mention to our readers is that Huxley: The Dystopia is currently taking closed beta signups. The signup period is May 6 - May 20, and the first round of closed beta testing will last from June 3 - June 14. If you've been looking forward to fragging in Huxley, head on over to the Beta Test Registration page at ijji, and check out all the new info about the game they've added to the site.%Gallery-48874%
Huxley: The Dystopia gets new teaser site with countdown
Huxley: The Dystopia is one of the new breed of games about to hit the massively multiplayer online world -- a hybrid first person shooter and sci-fi MMO, built on Unreal Engine 3. Massively took a good look at Huxley at GDC 2009, which we (naturally) feel is a solid starting point to catch up with what this game is shaping up to be, given its long hiatus between the early announcements and its re-appearance in the games journalism sphere. So what will come of this splicing of FPS and MMO? We're not sure how well-received titles like Huxley: The Dystopia and Global Agenda will be, but it'll certainly be interesting to see what these games will add to our online gameplay options. In the meantime, Huxley: The Dystopia has launched a teaser web site with a countdown clock showing just under 30 days. We don't believe this is an actual launch countdown, but it's expected that more game info will be revealed at that time. If you're devouring everything you can about this particular game, you'll want to have a look at the Huxley teaser site and its front page video showing off more of the game. [Via IGN]
GDC09: Massively previews Huxley, a hybrid sci-fi MMO and FPS
Huxley: The Dystopia is a massively multiplayer online first-person shooter (MMOFPS) in development at NHN USA. We haven't heard much about the title since mid-2008, so we were happy that NHN USA was willing to sit down with us at GDC 2009. We spoke with Andy Hong, Huxley's Project Manager, who showed us some of the basic concepts behind the game. Huxley is a persistent world built upon Unreal Engine 3 foundations and is a game that differs from many of the MMOs we cover at Massively. Like other titles entering the market such as Global Agenda, Huxley is a marriage of the twitch combat of a first person shooter with classes, skills, trading, banking, and player housing we associate with MMOs. "At the core of the gameplay in Huxley, at its heart, it's an FPS," says Hong. But the depth of the rest of Huxley's gameplay, not limited to its quest and crafting systems, makes it a title quite unlike any pure FPS. %Gallery-48874%
GDC09: Massively previews Huxley: The Dystopia page 2
Quests and PvP You can pick up quests in the city. Those are either story quests or instanced quests where you can either go solo or group up to wipe the map of enemy NPCs. Huxley's cities are large and while a player can navigate on foot, it's much faster to take a hoverbike, or travel by tram or train. The quests themselves often bring a player outside of the city (via train) or beneath the city, where they need to fight against the hybrids in the sewers. While the game's quests can either be handled solo or in squads, players can also advance in Huxley through PvP. "With PvP you earn experience points as with quests, but you also earn rank points which let you level up your rank, such as private, sergeant, lieutenant, and beyond. The benefit of higher rank is access to the most powerful S-type weapons and bragging rights. People see the symbol next to your name and see what rank you are," like a title system, says Hong.
