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The Repopulation drops its first patch for the new build
It's more possible to play The Repopulation now than it has ever been, and that means the design team is shaking up how it handles updates. Instead of the monthly recaps of the past, the team is putting forth notes for each individual patch, such as the first major one to hit the current testing build. It's focused on improving several areas of the game, starting with a polishing of textures and performance in Plymouth City and a few other smaller points. Several combat improvements have also been rolled out, although the next patch will hit most of the major combat issues players have brought up. Skill gain rates have also been adjusted, as have the Auction and Work Order systems in hopes of keeping the economy lively. If a few lingering issues had kept you from fully enjoying The Repopulation or you just want a picture of all the changes that have come down the pipe, check out the full walkthrough of the latest patch.
New ArcheAge producer promises communication, game improvements
There's someone new at the head of ArcheAge, producer Marv Lee Kwai. Kwai posted a lengthy letter to the players on the forums recently outlining the major standing issues that the team still sees in the game along with several of the changes and additions set for the game over the next year. He stresses that the developers are well aware of unusual market fluctuations, sieges being too costly and difficult, and the balance of top-end rewards; moving forward, the team means to see them all tweaked and improved. The letter goes on to mention that the team is planning to add a global trade channel to reduce faction chat spam. Also en route is The Diamond Shores, a new area in southern Auroria that accompanies a bump in the level cap to level 55. It's a little past the start of the new year, but Kwai's tone is hopeful that the game can rise above its somewhat buggy and controversial launch.
EVE Evolved: Features coming in Oceanus and beyond
It's been almost four months since EVE Online switched from publishing two major expansions per year to releasing ten smaller updates, and so far it looks like the new schedule has been a huge success. Rather than forcing the industry overhaul out the door in Kronos before it was ready, CCP was able to push it forward to the Crius release window seven weeks later and the extra development time meant the feature launched in a very polished state. It may be too early to tell if the new schedule's success can be seen in the concurrent player graph for Tranquility, but the numbers have remained steady for the past few months in what is typically the annual low-point for player activity. The Oceanus update is scheduled to go live in just two day's time, adding several graphical upgrades, more difficult burner missions, an experimental new notification feature, and other small improvements. The scale of the update seems to be on par with the recent Hyperion release, consisting of mostly small features and minor iterations on gameplay. While we're told that CCP is still working on large projects behind the scenes, the new release schedule means they won't be rushed out the door and so we may not see them for some time. In this edition of EVE Evolved, I summarise everything we know about Tuesday's Oceanus update, and take a look at what's to come in further releases.
EVE Online: Kronos brings the fight to uppity pirates
EVE Online: Kronos is on deck for next Tuesday's release, which means that CCP Games is going into overdrive to inform the community as to what to expect with the newest expansion. As such, today we have a pair of lengthy posts talking about new exploration sites and ship/module balancing. In the expansion, players will be tasked with hunting down a particular sect of pirates, the Guristas, by hunting through a null-sec system for the prized data. CCP will be dangling eight new ship skins as potential rewards for a successful search. Kronos will also include a rebalance of 38 ships, a "heap" of modules, and a total overhaul of the drone weapon system. CCP stated that the two themes of the expansion's balancing are the ascendancy of pirates and mercenaries and advancements in industrial technology. CCP also just posted the patch notes from Kronos, so give them a look!
Ultra Street Fighter 4 change log: new mechanics, character tweaks
There isn't a single character who won't undergo some tweaking in Ultra Street Fighter 4. Capcom posted a massive change log over on Capcom-Unity, revealing not only individual character balances, but also some more detail on how the new Red Focus attacks and Ultra Combo Doubles will work. Red Focus attacks, charged strikes that allow the user to absorb an infinite barrage of hits while they wind up and deliver a focused attack, are performed by hitting the light punch, medium punch and medium kick buttons all at the same time. Red Focus takes up two meters from a fighter's Super gauge, but you can also perform an EX version of that same move using three meters. Capcom also broke down the damage output for characters who choose to employ the Ultra Combo Double, which lets fighters go into a match having both of their character-specific Ultra Combo moves equipped; however, going this route sacrifices some of the potency. Zangief, Cammy, Fei Long, T.Hawk, Makoto, Hakan, Dhalsim, Rose, Akuma, E. Honda and Hugo will all do 60% of their usual damage when utilizing the Ultra Combo Double, while every other fighter in Ultra Street Fighter 4 will do 75 percent of their Ultra's usual damage. As for individual character changes, a lot of folks are having certain standing attacks and special moves sped up, while a few others like Chun Li and Evil Ryu will be given extra life in Ultra Street Fighter 4. For the full breakdown on character-specific changes, hit up Capcom-Unity.
Battlefield 4 PC update tweaks stealth jets, addresses stability
An update for the PC version of Battlefield 4 was issued this morning, bringing with it some stability, balancing and player spawning fixes. Among the more tangible differences players will notice are tweaks to the stealth jets in the game, which see a 25 percent damage increase to their cannons and some changes in their handling attributes. DICE also fixed an issue where the friendly marker didn't always show when it was supposed to, which resulted in players shooting their teammates. Looks like you're all out of excuses for shooting at your team, Doug. Head past the break for the full update notes.
The Daily Grind: How stat-heavy do you like your game mechanics?
Playing Allods Online, you will not find yourself simply raising one stat even if all you do is swing a weapon at something. See, there's one stat that increases your overall damage, another stat that improves the range of that damage (so you're more likely to hit for a higher number rather than a lower one), and a few other stats that also affect something as simple as "how hard do I hit." It's not simple by any means, but it does provide an interesting dynamic wherein your primary stat isn't all that high, and you hit for astonishingly consistent amounts. Is that a good thing? Well, some players will be quick to point out that the game is doing with four stats what could really be done with one. Others like to have that amount of fine control over a character. So today we ask: How stat-heavy do you like your game mechanics? Do you want even the simplest character to be looking at seven or eight different numbers at all times, or are you happiest when you've got a choice between three stats at most? 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!
DCUO's producer recaps power retooling
It's tough enough to balance an MMO for a single platform, but DC Universe Online's team has the unenviable task of doing so for both the PC and PlayStation 3. Due to the latter's "strict limitations," Executive Producer Larry Liberty and his team had to prioritize performance and balance over visual oomph. In a new producer's letter, Liberty recaps the changes that the team has done to four of the game's powersets -- Mental, Gadgets, Fire, and Ice -- and explains why the devs did what they did. Sorcery and Nature powers are next on the retooling table, and he said that SOE will try to get feedback even earlier than before for these changes. "In short, we want to make sure that powers are balanced, defects are resolved, and ensure that things that cause slow-down or gameplay issues are remedied," said Liberty.
EVE Evolved: Fitting Amarr cruisers for PvP in Retribution
EVE Online's recent Retribution expansion overhauled many of the game's old PvP mechanics and rebalanced all of the tech 1 frigates and cruisers. These are the first ships new players get into when they start playing, and many found they just couldn't compete with more expensive ships in combat. In Retribution, the basic tech 1 cruisers have been buffed beyond all recognition and now stand a serious chance against battlecruisers and tech 2 ships. New players and veterans alike have found the updated tech 1 cruisers to be a lot more fun to fly and more effective in solo PvP and small fleet warfare. Two weeks ago, I started a new series of ship fitting guides with effective PvP setups for each of the four Gallente tech 1 cruisers. In between hilarious sessions of baiting gankers with my ECM Vexor, I've recently been been getting to grips with the updated Amarr cruisers. The Omen is now a fast tackler that can project damage over 25km, the Maller is a fantastic support DPS platform for fleet warfare, and the Arbitrator has become a great anti-frigate platform. Even the humble Augoror should now be a welcome sight in PvP fleets, repairing almost as much as a Guardian at only a fraction of the cost. In this week's EVE Evolved, I give new PvP ship setups for EVE's recently buffed Amarr tech 1 cruisers.
EVE Online prepares to roll out Retribution ship rebalancing
With EVE Online's newest expansion, Retribution, only a couple of weeks away, the devs are all abuzz over the features and changes coming with it. One of the biggest of these is a widespread effort to rebalance ships and put them in line with each other. CCP Fozzie reports that 40 new and existing spaceships are slated for the expansion overhaul, with more on the way after that. Even though change can be a scary prospect, Fozzie sees the rebalancing as a boon to the community: "Every time EVE's balance changes, it creates new opportunities for clever players to demonstrate their creativity and separate themselves from the pack. We know that our customers are amazingly creative with ship fittings and tactics and that if we give them a new set of tools they'll do things better than we could have imagined with them." The post goes on to detail the changes being made to frigates, destroyers, cruisers, weapons, and mods when Retribution goes live.
EVE Online maps out 2013 balance changes
With changes to Retribution ships scheduled to land in EVE Online on December 4th, the dev team is already casting its sights to 2013 for additional tweaks to other tiers of ships. In a new dev blog, CCP lays out its detailed plans for ship balancing come the new year. According to the team, battlecruisers are next in line for adjustments, followed by battleships. While the devs have a lot of changes in mind for the former, they're largely happy with the state of the latter and plan only small shifts in their current role. The post includes a handy chart which shows how all of the tech 1 ships will relate to each other when these changes are finalized. The post also elaborates on new skill requirements when all of this is said and done, as well as eventual plans to tackle tier 2 and 3 ships.
This Too Shall Pass: Balance and imbalance in World of Warcraft
First off, we know that game balance is an eternal goal. As the game evolves and becomes more complex (as it does every expansion, because new abilities are introduced and new classes or races make their debut), balancing them all for every role they can fill and every aspect of the game (Arena PvP, BGs, 5-man instances, raiding) becomes ever more complicated. Abilities that seem minor in impact can mushroom in importance due to synergy with other talents or abilities. As an example, Vengeance in PvP became important enough to cause it to be turned off, as gear improved and health pools rose. This has been the case in World of Warcraft since its debut. Heck, thanks to Indalamar, warriors got nerfed before the game went live. Balance is ephemeral. Your class may be on top one day, but your day will end. Anyone who's tanked for the past six years can attest to the roller coaster of which class is best at which aspect of the role. There was a time where paladins were the undisputed kings of AoE tanking, a time before Death and Decay or Blood and Thunder.
EVE Evolved: Rebalancing EVE's ships
Recently we heard the glorious news that CCP will be overhauling EVE Online's entire roster of tech 1 ships as part of the Inferno expansion. The overhaul will start with changes to the skill requirements for destroyers and battlecruisers and culminate in the complete removal of ship tiers and the introduction of new structured ship lines. Countless new ship types have been released since EVE launched in 2003, but there has never really been a unifying design policy on ship skills and combat roles. Now, eight years down the line, adding new ships has become a struggle in avoiding making older ones obsolete. Drastic change is needed, and when the Inferno expansion hits, that's exactly what we'll get. When a new EVE player is ready to get into something larger than a frigate, he's currently faced with the choice of training for a destroyer or skipping it and heading straight to cruisers. Similarly, players often skip from cruisers straight to slow, bulky battleships even though battlecruisers are probably the most effective ship class for new pilots. A new system is on the way this summer, one that aims to fix this problem by introducing new racial versions of the destroyer and battlecruiser skills that must be trained on the way to bigger ships. This change should make training progression much clearer for new pilots and is just the tip of the iceberg of awesome plans in the works for the summer expansion. In this week's EVE Evolved, I examine EVE Online's upcoming ship revamp and tell you how you may be able to get free skillpoints when the patch goes live.
The Soapbox: The illusion of balance
Disclaimer: The Soapbox column is entirely the opinion of this week's writer and does not necessarily reflect the views of Massively as a whole. If you're afraid of opinions other than your own, you might want to skip this column. Somewhere, on a lone computer in a lonely room, sits the archetype for a balanced MMO, one in which every set of abilities in a skill-based MMO is just as useful as every other set of abilities and every class in a class-based game is just as potent as every other class. There are no disparities in terms of power level, no massive gaps in gearing, and no issues with the specific fights. It is an entirely balanced machine. And as long as we're creating a myth with no place in reality, let's assume that it's being guarded by unicorns. That's the problem with balance -- it's an idea that doesn't actually work in a real environment. We talk a lot about wanting games to have balanced systems, and there are players devoted to declaring with great fervor that classes aren't balanced against one another, but balance is such a hazy concept that no matter how much you want a balanced game, it doesn't really exist.
Anarchy Online's new game director details early 2012 plans
We haven't heard a whole lot from Funcom's old-school sci-fi MMO Anarchy Online since mid-December when the game's producer bowed out. Today, however, the new game director, Fia "Lindelu" Tjernberg, stopped by the game's official forums to give players a bit of an update on what they can expect from the first months of the new year. For starters, Tjernberg gives players a progress report on the game's upcoming shiny new graphics engine. She goes on to explain that "[Funcom's] artists have been preparing a couple of playfields to a standard that is very close to what we're aiming for," and adds that the first video of the new engine should hit sometime in February. Another large priority for the team for early 2012 is the new player experience, but perhaps most importantly of all is the "balancing act," as Tjernberg puts it, which (predictably) aims to bring the game's professions into balance "a little bit at a time." For the full details on Anarchy Online's plans for the next couple of months, just click on through the link below.
EVE Evolved: Gallente and hybrid balance
It's been another week filled with announcements and positive news for EVE Online, with CCP showing off EVE's new nebulae and revealing the Amarr and Caldari tier 3 battlecruisers. For Gallente pilots, no news was celebrated more than the rebalancing of hybrid weapons and ships that specialise in their use. Short-range blasters can technically deliver the highest damage output of any turret, but their extremely short optimal range means they deal a smaller fraction of their maximum damage in most fights than other ships. Blaster ships have to spend valuable travel time closing into weapons range, and once up close, targets are hard to track. Although railguns were designed by the Caldari, they're hybrid weapons just like blasters, and so they are the long-range weapon of choice for Gallente sniping and mission-running ships. They have good range and tracking speed but have always suffered from slightly worse damage output and alpha strike than beam lasers and artillery cannons of the same size. Countless suggestions for fixes to blasters and railguns have appeared on the forum over the years, but until now they've remained unchanged. As a Gallente pilot and avid Thorax and Dominix fan, I'm very excited by the hybrid balance changes coming this winter. In this week's EVE Evolved, I take a break from the new player experience experiment to take a look at the impact of the upcoming hybrid balance patch and why the announced changes are needed.
Latest EVE dev video talks ship balance and features coming this winter
Several weeks ago, EVE Online developer CCP Games restructured its company and announced a new laser focus on in-space features for EVE Online. Since then we've seen an absolute deluge of news updates and devblogs on features due for release in the winter expansion. In the first two of CCP's new In Development video series, CCP Guard explored the art department and showed off the new nebula effects, EVE's sharpened shadows and the new tier 3 battlecruisers. In the latest In Development video, Guard talks to the EVE feature teams about the absolutely massive list of balance changes and features coming with the winter expansion. CCP Soundwave admits that developers have "probably done more rebalancing in the past month than we have in the past two years," before rattling off an impressive list of changes and new features. Skip past the cut for a brief summary of the changes and to watch the video in HD.
League of Legends patch preview describes Dominion balance changes
Last week, Riot Games gave League of Legends players a sneak peek at upcoming ranged damage-dealing champion Graves. In a new patch preview video this week, Riot explains all of the balance changes and updates that will be released alongside the new champion. Skarner's crystal slash ability is having its mana costs reduced to ensure it remains a viable attack in late game, his autoattack speed will be increased and his ultimate will now last longer. Champion Corki's gatling gun is also being redesigned to give it more consistent damage output. A series of changes are heading our way for LoL's new Dominion game mode. Popular item Hextech Gunblade turned out to be far too powerful in Dominion games, and is due for a nerf. In addition to tweaking the item's stats, Riot is removing the ability to stack several of the item to multiply its spell vamp. The personal score system is being modified to better reward players for team-based accomplishments rather than just kills, assists and attacking points. Due to the popularity of late-game carries in Dominion, developers are adjusting the rate of XP gain to make late-game dominance of those champions less inevitable. Skip past the cut to check out the video and find out the full details of all the changes coming to League of Legends in the next patch.
Lost Pages of Taborea: Content needs to meet the versatility of gear-upgrading
Last week I compared looting and class-bending in Runes of Magic with similar features found in RIFT. RoM's system of gear customization was a part of that article. This week, I want to talk business. Don't worry, I'm not a business major about to sling pie charts at you or talk about quarterly earnings. I want to talk a bit about business, specifically about how it might relate to decisions developers make concerning what kind of balance to put into an MMO. RoM's gear system is extremely flexible on the outside, but inside there are some restrictions. Some of these restrictions are imposed by the game, but some are imposed by players. In this week's Lost Pages of Taborea, let's take a look at how the flexibility and choice of RoM's gear system -- and other systems -- are in opposition to the game's content and some desires players have.
Runes of Magic starts official video podcast [Updated]
Don't change that dial! Frogster is hitting the airwaves with its very first official podcast dedicated to all things Runes of Magic, and you are in danger of being transmogrified into a frog if you ignore it. RoMCast, as it's titled, is hosted by Runes of Magic CMs Mike Kiefer and Matthew Rider. The duo is dedicated to talking about all of the exciting -- and controversial -- subjects surrounding this free-to-play title. The podcast is accepting player questions for possible future discussions. To appeal to as wide of an audience as possible, RoMCast is filmed in English but subtitled in German, Spanish, Polish and French. You can catch the first episode of RoMCast after the jump as Kiefer and Rider talk about the Chapter IV: Lands of Despair update, zombies, the new box version of the game, and the tricky topic of balancing! [Update: Our RoM columnist Jeremy Stratton points out that the U.S. division of Frogster has also recently launched a video cast, this one called RoM Nation. Now RoM fans have double the aural fun!]
