alpha-testing
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Blizzard kicks off WoW's Warlords of Draenor alpha
In a blog post on the official site today, one interestingly timed to coincide with a big launch going on today and tomorrow (ahem), Blizzard officially announced the start of the World of Warcraft Warlords of Draenor alpha test. The studio cautions players that not all of the promised content is in the alpha client, so don't panic when dataminers can't give you all the nitty-gritty on garrisons. They're not in yet. Players interested in signing up for later phases of testing are instructed to create a beta profile on Battle.net. Applicants will be selected randomly.
ArcheAge FAQ mentions testing plans, optional subscription, and housing limitations [Update]
Trion Worlds has published a new FAQ for ArcheAge today that concentrates on testing plans and core features of its upcoming Western version. The team said that alpha testing is imminent and will be followed by beta events leading up to launch, still set for sometime in 2014. While fans can sign up on the site for a chance at a key, Trion said that soon-to-be-revealed founders packs will guarantee beta access. ArcheAge will be adopting a hybrid F2P model including an optional subscription. This subscription will be necessary if a player wants to own his or her own house in the game, as the "limited real estate" will be earmarked for paying customers only. Trion addressed its level of control over the title in its relationship with developer XLGAMES and indicated that the Korean 1.0 patch changes will not be coming to the West: "We work with XLGAMES to understand and new features that are added to ArcheAge in the East to determine how well they will be accepted in our regions, and then offer feedback. XLGAMES has been fantastic in addressing that feedback as best as they can. In situations where a feature is added that we don't think will be appropriate for our audiences, we work with XLGAMES to modify or remove that feature from our version." [Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]
Hands-on with TUG, The Untitled Game
In my youth, my father handed me nails, wood, and a hammer and told me to build whatever I wanted. I managed to create swollen fingers and a few tangled heaps of wood and nails. Nerd Kingdom is a lot like my father, but instead of wood, the studio is handing me TUG, or as I like to call it, everything. TUG is a sandbox RPG akin to Landmark or Minecraft, but something about TUG is different. Maybe it's the development team that contains working titles like Economist or Behavioral Scientist. Or perhaps it's the data-driven design philosophy, which claims to deliver a better experience by analyzing how we play. Regardless, it's clear that Nerd Kingdom is attempting to give us more tools to create, both for the players in game and the modders outside of it. My recent demo, interview, and hands-on session showed me how TUG will unlock the creator's imagination -- with fewer swollen fingers.
TUG is now available through Steam Early Access [Updated]
Do you have $9.99, a yearning for a unique open-world sandbox, and a tolerance for a not-quite-ready-for-primetime experience? If so, TUG is ready and waiting for you to explore it. Nerd Kingdom's MMO is now available through Steam Early Access for 10 bucks. The low introductory cost is due to the "unfinished nature of the game" and will be raised as time goes by. TUG currently features two modes, creative and survival, for players to enjoy. Developer Peter Salinas said that the title has made great strides through its alpha testing: "We've had such tremendous feedback and support from our players in our early alpha, and we can't wait to see all the amazing and creative things players will continue to do with the game. By looking at our community's play patterns and listening to their feedback, we can keep our development focused on what our players want." Massively has a hands-on look at TUG coming to you later this afternoon, so stay tuned! [Update: A message sent to Kickstarter backers assures everyone that the official launch date for the game is still January 2015 and that all backers will receive Steam keys early next week.] [Source: Nerd Kingdom press release]
Norrathian Notebook: What EQN Landmark's business plan says about you
As surely expected by all involved, EverQuest Next Landmark's proposed business plan ruffled a few feathers. After all, it's a given that you can't please everyone. And also just as expected, some folks are crying foul; you can't have SOE say boo without someone screaming doom and gloom. But has the studio laid a big goose egg with this monetization plan? I say nope. It may appear a little scrambled in an aspect or two, but the majority of it seems to sit pretty well with players. In a nutshell, the strategy as currently outlined focuses on selling cosmetic items like outfits and pets, shortcuts (like potions, paying upkeep, and renting market space at the hubs), additional claim flags, claim music/sound packs, and raw materials. We know what the actual plan itself says because it was posted front and center on EQN Landmark's alpha forums, which are viewable by the public. But instead of dissecting what the plan is, today I'll focus is on what it says. It's more than just the sum of its words; the plan says something about SOE. And did you know the plan also says something about you?
Valiance Online preps for combat testing
Superheroes of the world, stop moving around so much! This is the cry of Valiance Online's creators, who said that they are rooting players during combat to achieve "a familiar feeling" in the game. This is just the tip of a new postberg in which the devs talk about plans for upcoming combat testing. Valiance Online will be doing a stripped-down pass of the game in the near future that will allow players to level from 1 to 50 in one of 10 different archetypes. However, the devs warn players to expect unbalanced powers, gimped powersets, and a complete lack of secondary powersets during the test. "Our first pass will be all about inclusion, and not so much about balance, so don't be surprised if you find the majority of the powers to be a bit unsatisfactory in regards to balance. The balancing pass is planned for later patches," the devs said. Valiance Online is one of the self-proclaimed spiritual successors to City of Heroes.
Hands-on with the Elite: Dangerous alpha
I don't have much history with Elite. I played the original, circa 1985 on my dad's green monochrome Apple II, but frankly I didn't understand a bit of it and subsequently went back to Sundog and subLOGIC's fledgling wireframe Flight Simulator as a result. By the time Elite II and Frontier: First Encounters shipped in the early to mid 1990s, I was already losing copious amounts of my adolescence to Wing Commander, Privateer, and X-Wing, all of them of course indebted to the space trading flight sim thing that David Braben and Ian Bell published a decade earlier. For all intents and purposes, then, I'm an Elite virgin despite a lifetime of playing nearly everything in the genre it inspired. And if the Elite: Dangerous alpha client is an accurate barometer, gosh have I missed out.
Trion Worlds confirms that End of Nations is on hold in favor of MMO titles
Trion Worlds has today confirmed that its MMORTS-turned-MOBA End of Nations is officially on hold. A spokesperson for the studio sent the following statement to Polygon: As we informed EON's community last fall, internal development on End of Nations was put on hold in late 2013 while we evaluated potential paths forward for the title. We're currently focusing the company's energy and creativity on Rift, Defiance, Trove, ArcheAge and some new projects that we will be revealing soon. Last summer, Trion reclaimed the game from developer Petroglyph with the intent to retool it as a MOBA. After Trion's layoffs and restructuring in August, CEO Scott Hartsman told Massively that the team was still working on and evaluating the title. The official website is no longer functioning.
Nether adds crafting, creature mode, and tribes
The mean streets of Nether are easing up a bit on players, as Phosphor Games has patched in a slew of helpful systems for its February update. The trio of new features includes crafting, a creature mode, and tribes. Crafting encourages players to scavenge from their adventures and fashion gear and weapons to use and trade. If being a bad guy is your thing, then the new creature mode allows users to step into the twisted role of a nether to stalk victims. And tribes, Nether's version of guilds, are now in the game with bases, a skill tree, and special objectives to be patched in later in the month. Players who join a tribe from now through February 15th will earn special bonuses including currency and a free uniform. We've got a video showing some of the February update features after the jump, so get a move on, little doggy! [Source: Phosphor Games press release]
The Soapbox: Enough with selling alpha tests already!
The dam has burst, restraint has been cast off, and caution has been thrown to the wind. Seemingly overnight, game studios all over the place have thrown the doors open to the general public to get in on alpha testing, usually as a reward for loyalty and financing. Steam has an entire Early Access section that's dominating the sales charts, offering players a chance to hop right into an anticipated game while it's still in the middle of development. Kickstarter games routinely offer alpha and beta access to their financers as part of their reward structure. Trove, Elite: Dangerous, Shroud of the Avatar, Star Citizen, and EverQuest Next Landmark are among the vanguard of upcoming MMOs that have promised alpha or early access to players willing to shell out a few bucks right now. It's not enough to covet and chase after a beta key these days; all of the cool kids are in the alpha, apparently. The willingness of developers to wield alpha access as a reward and the enthusiastic acceptance by gamers to literally buy into it has me very concerned that this could poison the industry, the community, and the future of our games.
Albion Online dishes out details on the game's mechanics
Albion Online has some pretty ambitious design goals as a top-down multi-platform MMORPG with free-for-all PvP. A few players have gotten a chance to try the earliest testing build out, and there were some obvious questions, enough for the development team to post several answers. While the game is still early in alpha testing, it's an interesting look at the design philosophy and how harsh the environment really will be. The core of Albion Online is that characters don't have specific levels or stats raised via levels; instead, everything comes down to what you can craft, which is increased as you gain more fame. According to the answers, unarmored characters will all have about 1000 life points. Items constantly degrade and can be looted by other players in combat, which means that there's always a drive to get more items, but finding more valuable materials will require a trek to more dangerous parts of the world. Check out the full list of answers for more details on how the designers look to keep the game lively and interesting. [Source: Sandbox Interactive press release]
Some Assembly Required: Virtual world roundup for 2014 and beyond
Just over two years ago there was a great disturbance, as if millions (or so) of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced. Yes, something terrible had happened: a beloved virtual world was destroyed. And that left a number of sandbox refugees looking for a new place to call home. At that time, Some Assembly Required offered a roundup of the then available virtual worlds that could possibly offer accommodation, depending on what qualities players most desired in their games. But as things are wont to, they changed; a lot can happen in the MMOverse in 24 months, from additional features in existing games to new games to the loss of more worlds. So it's time to update this list of virtual worlds to reflect 2014 and beyond. Take a look and see what titles or titles-to-be have the sandbox features that best make a game a home for you.
DayZ moves 172,000 copies in first 24 hours of early access
The standalone version of Arma II zombie survival mod DayZ, which stealthily went live via Steam's early access program earlier this week, has generated $5.1 million in its first 24 hours of availability. According to Bohemia Interactive's Maruk Spanel, DayZ moved 172,500 copies on launch day and 142,403 players were online at the time of his last update. Creator Dean Hall has been celebrating the successful launch with regular tweets on the game's sales and performance, but he took a moment to remind possible buyers that this version of DayZ is still very much a work in progress: Please do not just buy the game because you heard it was cool. Many streamers are now streaming. Visit this and view the (many) bugs first. Early access to DayZ will run you $29.99.
Trove starts alpha testing, sells supporter packs
Trion Worlds has sent out its first wave of Trove alpha invites today as the game moved into its latest phase of testing. On Reddit, Trion devs addressed how players may gain access to the alpha: "We will be inviting people both at random from the pool of everyone who has signed up as well as directly inviting strong Trove supporters: community contributors, streamers, and so on." If you're not content to wait for an alpha or beta invite, you can cut the wait with a few bucks by purchasing one of Trove's new supporter packs. These start at $5 and go up to $2,500, with perks such as testing spots, in-game credits, in-game items, the soundtrack, and even the ability to help create a biome. Basically, $5 gets you the beta and $20 (on up) gets you the alpha, if that's what you're seeking. Additionally, the more that the community chips in for these packs, the more additional rewards will be unlocked for everyone in the form of "bonus milestones."
Block by block: Hands-on with the Cube World alpha
From an outsider's perspective, Picroma's Cube World might look like yet another Minecraft clone. It has the same blocky appearance and voxel design of Mojang's money-printing sandbox, and though the color palette is brighter and the graphics more crisp, it would be easy to dismiss the title as a "me-too" copycat. "If you've played one cube-based game," says the veteran gamer who lives in your brain, "you've played them all." Despite the visual similarities, however, Cube World and Minecraft are extremely different games. Minecraft is a crafter's paradise, a world where you can build anything you can imagine. Cube World is an adventure game, and fans of MMOs will find it far closer to World of Warcraft or Guild Wars 2 than it is to the game that threatens huts with Creepers and allows you to build full-scale replicas of pretend spaceships. Cube World is unique, and even in alpha, it's something quite special.
New TUG video gives lesson in physics and crafting
If you dropped a ton of rocks and a ton of feathers from the top of Nerd Kingdom's office, which would hit the ground first? It doesn't matter; the fun is in watching them fall! And you can watch a variety of things falling in TUG's newest video, from stools to rocks to torches -- even trees! The video gives a visual lesson on the physics of the world, with items rotating naturally in the air then bouncing and rolling around once they hit the ground or each other. Add to that some horizontal velocity as things are hurled through the air and the whole things feels very organic. The gameplay display continues with a course in resource acquisition and combination; the natural elements gathered nearby are crafted into a simple weapon/tool. Study these new elements for yourself in the video below, then class dismissed!
Cube World developer confirms development continues
In July earlier this year, indie developer Picorama's part-Minecraft, part-Diablo sandbox title Cube World made its way into a paid alpha stage of development, granting players access to the game's alpha in exchange for an early purchase. Despite some missteps, there were plenty of eager fans willing to surrender their cash for some hands-on time with Cube World. Many of those fans, however, became a bit worried when updates from the developers on the game's future grew silent. So of course, they took to the internet and bombarded developer Wollay's Twitter in search of an answer. And an answer is what they got. Wollay updated his Twitter for the first time since August 19th with the short message, "Don't be concerned, we're still working on Cube World. We just have a lot of additional work to do at the moment." Wollay elaborated to Kotaku, "At the moment there's just a lot of work going on behind the scenes, like customer support, server/website development, and [Picorama is] currently moving to a new [apartment] with more space for our development studio." He goes on to say that "the new update is coming along nicely," adding that the update is aiming to add "an option for a smaller user interface," plus reconfigurable controls and "a few new creatures." The team will also be making some balance adjustments to "make it easier at lower levels and harder at higher levels." Finally, he states that the team is "experimenting with some major changes," although he's unsure which will be included in the next patch. If you want all the details on Cube World's ongoing development, click through the link below for the full piece.
TUG prepares Survival Games servers
TUG's hardcore survival mode will get its first iteration of testing with the so-called "Survival Games" coming to the beta in January 2014. The team is preparing limited, focused matches on special servers to experiment, refine, and polish its PvP systems. The Survival Games servers are a prelude to TUG's survival mode in which players are thrown onto a map and challenged to be the last man or woman standing. In addition to straight-up combat, these maps contain enemy NPCs and crafting resources. The shrewd survivalist might be able to fashion a weapon or trap on the fly to help gain an edge. As players engage in the Survival Games, the TUG team will be changing the rules constantly and allowing players to implement their own mods in order to develop the best final product. "No name handles, no global chat, and dead is dead," the team described the servers. "Expect some serious trolling from us in these matches... FOR SCIENCE!"
TUG alpha moves closer to multiplayer, terraforming
It's been a little while since we've heard from TUG, the crowdfunded sandbox that moved from Kickstarter campaign to alpha testing in record time. But that doesn't mean that work hasn't been moving forward on The Untitled Game; in fact, there has been plenty of progress on the tech side of things. Devs released an update outlining the current systems being worked on -- namely, networking and multiplayer, a scripting sub-system, character and AI systems, and terrain modification tools. If everything goes smoothly, TUG alpha testers can look forward to playing together in creative mode in two patch cycles. Additionally, devs are "working on a host of fancy terrain modification tools, which will include things like chiseling, sculpting, odd shape blocks, etc." that will help TUG to lose that cube-only feeling. Hear all the details about these systems and more in the full progress notes.
Battle and usability being improved in The Repopulation
Someone always wants to play a melee character. You could give everyone in an MMO the ability to shoot something dead from two zones over and there would be at least one player rushing into melee range to smack at it. Hence why The Repopulation has made a point of upping melee's viability by improving its ability to hit a moving target; if someone's going to do it anyway, it may as well be viable. Medical abilities have also been improved, and the game's crosshairs and aiming assistance have both received an upgrade. The other two major areas of improvement for the game's past month of development has been the addition of new content near Plymouth (including a truly massive cave network) and improvements to missions and mission templates to make the game easier to jump into. The inquiry system also allows players to collect data on the game world, and the Surveying skill allows players to figure out where harvestable resources are located. Take a look at the full patch notes for an in-depth look at how the game has changed as it moves ever closer to its beta test phase.
