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Is Turbine developing an MMO for mobile devices?
No. Yes. Maybe? We're going to level with you, dear readers: We frequently have no idea what Turbine Entertainment is doing. We had no idea the studio was going to bring back Asheron's Call 2, for example, and our bets about Infinite Crisis were way off. So when we say that the company might be developing an MMO, well, it's a shot in the dark, but there's reason to suspect this might be happening. The studio is looking for both a Senior Mobile Engineer (that is, an engineer experienced with mobile engineering, not an engineer who is both a senior and mobile) and a new Art Director, both of which seem to imply that the studio is developing something completely new rather than a mobile port. Or maybe it's baseless speculation. Who knows?
The Mog Log: On the twilight of Final Fantasy XIV's story
As I write this, we don't yet have the patch notes for Final Fantasy XIV 2.38. Supposedly this is when we're getting personal housing, and people are abuzz with speculation about how that will be rolled out, what will work, what will be broken, and so forth. Alas, I can't yet address any of it -- not prices, not availability, not any of that. It's all just guesswork until the powers that be let us know what's going on, which will likely be in the evening after you read this. My guess is that there's going to be something to make people angry, but there usually is. So since I've nothing to offer regarding Final Fantasy XIV's mini-update other than speculation, it's best to turn to something that can be much more clearly seen. We're not at the end of the 2.0 update cycle just yet, but it seems pretty obvious that we're on the back nine, so to speak. So where are we going from here? What awaits? And what does all this mean from a storyline perspective? (If you'd like to avoid any potential spoilers, do look away now.)
Captain's Log: Star Trek Online's expansion and communication
So we finally know what the next expansion is going to be for Star Trek Online, and my speculation regarding the Xindi and points related turned out to be way off. Nope, we're heading into the Delta Quadrant, which is less interesting to me than the Gamma Quadrant, but I suspect the powers that be are exploring all the angles of existing content first. It's coming with a level cap increase, a new tier of ships, a bunch of new tricks, and apparently some bonus communication misses. Delta Rising is really on track to be a pretty divisive expansion anyway. It was inevitable, really; raising the level cap now was going to lead to problems no matter how it was handled. Unfortunately, Cryptic Studios hasn't done a great job communicating what's in the works for players, nor have the first few things that we've heard exactly countered some early suspicions. It was a minefield that's thus far been navigated largely with a push and a blindfold.
The Mog Log: Final Fantasy XIV's 2.3 primer
Tomorrow, patch 2.3 will descend upon Final Fantasy XIV like a flight of angels. If you can't tell, I'm pretty excited. While I was by and large disappointed with 2.2, 2.3 is adding a lot of features I want, undoing some of the dumb features added in 2.2, and adding in a few more features that I didn't realize I wanted before but now know are immensely important to me. Kind of like the Challenge Log, except more. Unfortunately, the fact that it's landing tomorrow as of the time you're reading this means I have not yet actually played this patch. But I can still put a guide of some preliminaries together so that you can at least know what you're doing even if you haven't necessarily examined the patch notes with a fine-toothed comb just yet. So let's dive into it. When the patch goes live tomorrow, pick your destination, and go to it.
Why do games prompt cruel behavior?
Games like DayZ and Rust have become a whole genre unto themselves: open-world survival sandboxes that quickly turn into simulations of human cruelty. But why is that, exactly? Why do people in a sandbox devote so much of their energy to tearing one another down with such vigor? A recent article on Wired asks exactly that question, exploring these open-world games and why they tend to provoke such abject cruelty in their participants. The piece comes to no hard and fast conclusions, speaking both from personal experiences and from interviews with other players. One player speculates that the core of it is that these games give you nothing but tools, so players invent their own fun by using other players as content. Another possible explanation is the very nature of catharsis, envisioning dark behaviors whilst knowing that you would never carry them out in the real world. Take a look at the full article if you'd like a deeper look at why players spend so much time in games where anything goes by clubbing others with rocks.
Guild Wars 2 starts Season 2 of the Living World on July 1st
It's happening, all right. Season 2 is coming to Guild Wars 2 starting July 1st, meaning that we've got a month of what will no doubt be teasers, hints, and taunts. That image above is a teaser. If you stare deeply enough, you may be able to uncover its mysteries. For within its depths lie... well... who knows? No, seriously, we don't know either. It could be anything. Speculation has already begun, but that first image is all we have to go on for certain right now, and that means... what? Take a gander at a larger version of the image just past the break and start your speculation engines. Or just wait a month if that's your speed.
The Mog Log: Final Fantasy XIV's latest Live Letter
As of this writing, the Letter from the Producer LIVE took place yesterday, and that means we have a whole bunch of Final Fantasy XIV news to discuss! It's a happy time for people like me, because it's at least a couple weeks of very chewable information to discuss. And at just the right time, too, we were in the middle of a serious drought there. Not that all of the information is good, mind you. Every time I think about Atma my hands instinctively ball into fists. Still, there's stuff to chat about, there's good stuff in with the bad, and perhaps most importantly there's enough to fuel some speculation and some off-the-cuff reaction before we dive into the meat of E3 and we learn even more about the future of the game. So let's get right into it, starting with the bit of news that I already foreshadowed in the intro.
Captain's Log: A look at Star Trek Online's Season 9 to date
It's strange to be stepping on to an unfamiliar bridge, isn't it? To be in charge when previously you were just an observer, especially when the crew hasn't necessarily changed at all. But you didn't come here to read my metatextual woolgathering; you came here because you want to read about Season 9 of Star Trek Online. Yes, it's been out for about a month now, but that's enough time to get a fairly good sense of it, isn't it? Season 9 is an odd beast, in some ways; elements of it suffered for its long development, but it moves the game as a whole forward and introduces some interesting shifts all around. Its biggest weakness is in how much of it is based not around content so much as improvements of existing content and systems. But let's not focus on that; let's start at the huge upheaval that came with the featured episode and the overhauls it brought.
The Mog Log: Whispers of what comes next for Final Fantasy XIV
When I find myself in times of trouble, friends of mine will comfort me, speaking words of wisdom: "There are more patches coming to Final Fantasy XIV." And it's true! While I'm not as happy with 2.2 as perhaps I would like to be, as odd as that statement sounds, it's not the end of the world. In fact, there's a lot of stuff around the corner that should make me a lot happier. We've heard rumblings about what we'll see at E3 next month, we're hearing discussion of what's next on the docket for patch 2.3, and there are tantalizing hints about what's going to be arriving beyond even that. Some of these are things that I've discussed elsewhere; some I haven't had the opportunity to chat about yet (we only got the live letter announcement on Friday, after all!). So let's go ahead and dive into what's on the horizon for the game.
The Nexus Telegraph: What it means that you can buy Wildstar
On March 10th, I opined that we were close to seeing a release date for Wildstar, along with the end of the NDA and a real change to beta structures. On March 12th, Carbine Studios announced all of that. Prescient? Possibly. All right, no; I just made an educated guess that turned out to be educated completely right. Astute readers will remember that I also made an educated guess about Medic and Engineer that turned out to be more or less completely accurate, as well, so I am apparently on the same wavelength as the people over at the studio. I didn't find out I was right on the money until you all did. That having been said... do I need to stress that this is a huge deal? Here's a game that fell under the "most anticipated" header for this site two years in a row, and now it's finally going to be a thing. We're finally moving out of beta testing and into launch. So let's talk about the impending launch, the pre-ordering, and all that comes along with both.
The Road to Mordor: What could LotRO's new class be?
Wow. A new class was at the very top of my wish list for 2014, but to be honest I never thought it would happen. However, last Friday Aaron Campbell confirmed on a livestream that the team is working on a 10th class to put into the game sometime this year. Instantly, speculation exploded among the Lord of the Rings Online community as to what the class could be and how it will fit into the game. Campbell gave us a few clues to guide our speculation: The new class would be in accordance with the lore (Turbine talked to Tolkien Enterprises about it), it has been mentioned in the trilogy several times, and it will be a freep (PvE) class and not a creep class. He also thinks it's a "great fit" for the game. I'm absolutely overjoyed that the game will finally be expanding its hero roster and giving us vets a good reason to go back through the entire journey, but I'll admit that I don't see a clear winner among the possible candidates. Let's hunker down together and look at the possibilities for this LotRO's newest class and see if we can sort out a lead candidate.
The Mog Log: The last stretch before patch 2.2 in Final Fantasy XIV
The past week has brought up an interesting problem regarding the timing of this column and upcoming releases. On the one hand, I had planned to talk today about why there aren't more tanks in Final Fantasy XIV. On the other hand, we also have received a lot of news about patch 2.2, which is launching in a little over a week. Do I push back discussing the patch previews in favor of talking about a larger structural issue? I don't think I can, especially when the reason there aren't as many tanks is one that's been explained dozens of times in other games whilst still being applicable here. Instead, let's talk about 2.2. We've got a week and change until this drops, and while I've already discussed a good portion of the endgame elements, we've got a clearer picture of what's coming out other than that. So while we'll doubtlessly learn more during the next live letter, let's talk about what we've got now.
Why what you think about that "new category" thing may be all wrong
Spectacle. We love it. That moment when technology changes and our minds are blown. It's easy to forget that many "one more thing" things were actually pretty boring: the iPod mini, Safari for Windows, the Power Mac G5. Our current obsession with "new categories" derives from the heroin-like highs of the iPhone and iPad. While every year, Apple's laptop and desktop lines iteratively improve in user features and hardware, it's hard to get past that rush of newness that iOS delivered. Even iPod, the consumer device that more or less revolutionized Apple's marketplace in 2001, didn't produce the kind of magical expectations that iOS mobile did. Is Apple still innovating? Is the Tim Cook catholic...er...in the woods...um...wait, I'm pretty sure there's a metaphor here that means "yes". Yes, Apple is still innovating. Since we haven't had our next holycrapdoodle moment, I'm going to guess that none of these internally developed products have been suitable or mature enough to bring to market yet. There's the whole wearables thing... If you're willing to strap your iPhone 5S to your forehead, it's already here with its new-fangled motion chip supported by literally several apps! It's not what everyone was expecting, but it kind of positions Apple. There's also Apple TV, which keeps getting better but still doesn't "rule the living room" in any meaningful way. And then there's that car thing, which, *shrug*. Back in reality, there are lots of hints in iOS 7 about possible future directions. The latest OS now supports hardware keyboards including control keys, and alt keys, and stuff like that. There's also massively expanded support for document containers like RTF. It all could potentially hint at a toasterfridge merging of iOS and OS X -- or not. The problem is that two major innovations do not a corporate trend make. They were amazing but they may not have been defining as in specifically "Apple is the company whose new products always produce paradigm shift". Sure, we want more amazing but it's not something that it's reasonable to expect on a regular, scheduled basis. You know the meme. Meth, not even once.
The Nexus Telegraph: Between the lines of WildStar's quiet weeks
Did you miss us? I know, it was probably weird not seeing an installment of the Nexus Telegraph last Monday, since I sort of have a reputation for turning in everything early and without fail. (Like the week when I had no power and still turned in my columns.) But there's no need to worry; we're still going live biweekly. Or were you mostly missing the weeks in which we were absolutely swamped by WildStar news? It certainly seems a lot more quiet lately. We've gone from big system reveals to a few tidbits here and there; the two big stories over the past two weeks have been confirmation that we're not getting another big wave of beta invites and that the game's default UI is being revamped. These are both worth talking about, but in this case I think the silence actually says quite a bit all by itself.
The Nexus Telegraph: WildStar's NDA and impending release
The release date approaches for WildStar, and that day is... entirely unclear. Maybe it'll be next month; maybe it'll be six months from now. The official word is still silence. Mirroring that silence are the game's current testers, still under an NDA that prevents them from talking about the game even as we in the press can talk about much of the content and leveling currently in place through both text and streams. Are these relevant points to discuss? Yes, they really are, especially in the wake of two prominent illustrations of what can be done with testing phases and NDAs. So let's talk about the NDA, the lack of a release date, and how those elements might tie into one another. Especially as we're coming off of a weekend when more people got to try out the game, it's important to talk about when the gates and the lines of communication will be opened.
The Mog Log: Final Fantasy XIV's future patches
A week after I mention that Final Fantasy XIV's next patch seems a little light, 2.16 comes around and lets us know that gardening is incoming with the next patch. What does gardening involve? Who knows? We haven't been told. I would tend to guess that it involves FC housing, which means that it's a non-entity for the majority of the playerbase, since the house prices are still insane for anything other than a small plot and small remains tiny. I mentioned some things that the game is going to need to aim for over the course of the year, and all of those remain on the table. In many ways, the game is going wonderfully -- we're hearing rumblings about the next expansion, the first patch did its job quite well, the second is on its way, and based on the current content schedule we can expect a couple more before the end of the year. While we don't yet have a roadmap, we can start putting together some basic guesses about the next few patches for Final Fantasy XIV -- and what they won't address.
The Nexus Telegraph: Stuff the endgame needs in WildStar
I'm going to go ahead and totally dispense with any vagueness here because we already know that WildStar will have a raiding endgame and a PvP endgame. That's great, that's valuable, that's absolutely nothing. That's exactly what lots of games launch with. It's what lots of games consider their bread and butter. It's also not going to cut it. If WildStar sells itself on providing the exact same endgame that we've seen in every other game ever, I'm hesitant to say "it will fail," but it sure as heck won't be dazzling anyone three months out from release. You can't make a game with the selling point of "play however you like" and then surreptitiously add "except when you get to endgame, and then you'd better raid, buddy." With that in mind, let's talk about what the game needs in terms of endgames that we don't see on a regular basis.
The Mog Log: Patch 2.2 and beyond for Final Fantasy XIV
Supposedly, we're still on track to see patch 2.2 in March. Assuming later March, that would mean we're still on a roughly four-month schedule for updates to Final Fantasy XIV, which feels just a bit slow... especially since what we know right now about patch 2.2 is just a bit thin compared to what we knew about 2.1 at the equivalent point in time. Admittedly, I'm biased. New turns of Coil? Not really my jam. (Being able to stomp the old ones will be kind of nice, though.) Still, in some ways this update currently feels smaller than its predecessor, even though I'm pretty sure it isn't. We've got a lot of stuff incoming, but between a deluge of in-game events and the PlayStation 4 beta test, less attention has been paid to the update. So let's shine some light on it. Yes, there's going to be some speculation, but let's start looking at what patch 2.2 is going to mean and what we'll be getting.
The Nexus Telegraph: Making it how you'd like in WildStar
I freely admit that I have not dived heavily into crafting in the WildStar beta, for the same reason that there is a lot of stuff in the WildStar beta that I have not heavily invested in. That reason is simple: I plan to be playing this game for a long while, and I'd really like to avoid burning out before it even releases. I didn't adhere to that rule in the Final Fantasy XIV beta and kind of felt the pinch, so this is a rule I learned the hard way. That having been said, I've fooled around with it enough to be really excited after the last interview I had regarding the crafting experience. What I heard confirmed my limited experiences and offered some interesting food for thought. There are a couple of elements that might seem counterproductive and a lot more that are worth looking forward to in the future.
The Mog Log: Final Fantasy XIV's story post-2.1
Something kind of surprising happened in Final Fantasy XIV's first major patch: The story kept chugging along quite coherently. And not just through the main story quests, either. Yes, the primary focus was obviously there, but there were a lot of things taking place, wheels within wheels, building on the narratives established in 1.0 and seriously working toward the next major set of events rather than simply being a set of padding. I should warn readers, once again, that there will be spoilers for the game's story below. That includes both the patch story material and the main story from the core game. If you haven't finished the main story and unlocked the Crystal Tower yet, you may want to stay away. Or you can just read on ahead and be spoiled. I'm not going to tell you how you should enjoy your game stories. You should also finish the Hildibrand storyline, although I'm not spoiling that; it's just amusing.
