beau-hindman
Latest
Domain of Heroes donates half of proceeds to help ugliest orc
What do you do when one of the most vocal and active members of your community falls on hard times? You help him out by raising money. It seems as though Ugs, the "Ugliest Orc" (we're not sure what he had to go through to get that title), has become ill. We all know how a single trip to the E.R. can set you back a house or two, so his bills are piling up. The issues have put a stress on his life that many of us have never known, even forcing him to tell the baby orcs that there will be no Christmas! Other players heard about his plight and suggested an "Ugs Appreciation Day" to raise funds, similar to an event we covered in the past. They discussed it on the forums, and the date was set to the 21st of November. The creator of the game then upped the amount to 50% of all in-game profits going to the ugly one! The game features a robust text-based system that can run in any browser and features 30 races, 27 classes and tons of skills. Sign up if it sounds interesting, donate on that special day by purchasing in-game wishes and other items, or go to the shop and stock up on other goods. Good luck, Ugs!
Class abilities come to light in Faxion Online announcement
It looks like players of the highly anticipated PvP-centric free-to-play MMORPG Faxion Online will use a wide variety of abilities and powers to experience the core of the game. While someone will raise those levels and sharpen those skills the old fashioned way, she can also improve on those abilities using queued, offline skill training similar to EVE Online's. Abilities include Shockwave, a wave of force that will knock back enemies and deal damage; Legion, an ability that only Hell players will get (because Hell is the cooler side) that releases spirits into the bodies of its victims (hopefully while Raining Blood plays in the background;) and Tribunal, which allows players to flourish a weapon, causing all sorts of bodily damage to nearby enemies. That's not all: there are 50 abilities per class available at launch, allowing multi-class cleverness or single-specialization accuracy. All of the abilities grow normally with time, but their advancement can be sped up using microtransactions. Some abilities will be level-limited, however, to ensure that no one player has such an advantage. We visited UTV True Games during GDC Online, so check out that tour here. The game seems to be in great hands -- its developers harken from the lands of Ultima Online, Shadowbane, and many other popular titles. Keep an eye out because the game is expected to hit beta stages later this year. That means you still have time to download some Dio. Or, if you're on the Heaven side, here's something more your speed. %Gallery-113832%
Free for All: Lessons from the world of indie and free-to-play
I'm no expert at anything. I'm sort of like the Mario of gaming -- not an ace in one particular area, but relatively experienced in all. Luckily, this has worked out for me. Name a title; I either have played it or know about it. Name a developer, and I can probably tell you something about it that sticks out. Granted, this ability might not come in handy when Twitter is exploding in the usual "Hey, we all love football" Sunday chatter, but look where you're reading this now. On this turf, being a well-rounded gamer has its advantages. Over the last 11 years, I've noticed quite a few trends and picked up on some unique ways that developers do business. I would never say that the information I have is 100 percent accurate, but it does come from a very open mind. I'll also not pretend that all these lessons will lead to massive piles of cash and free booze. Some of them are examples of what not to do. In fact, stop listening to me. Go read the examples right now, after the jump.
Lime Odyssey to be published by Aeria Games
For those fans of all things citrus, Lime Odyssey will set you on a quest for pieces of LIME: key items used for the restoration of a ravaged realm. Don't worry, there's always the ever-present search for guts and glory with classes like Knight or Magician. You can also pursue wealth and fame as a Chef, Tailor, or other non-combat professions. Not only that, but the game will feature a farming system and other rich social tools. Roleplayers will be happy to know that there is also promise of rich roleplaying "features" combined with robust gameplay. We're not sure how exactly these features will be implemented, but it sounds inviting. You can sign up for the closed beta on the game's teaser site -- just make sure to make an Aeria Games account first. The closed beta is scheduled to start in late Q2 of 2011. %Gallery-107553%
Rise and Shiny recap: Dark Age of Camelot
I wanted to start this week's first impressions of Dark Age of Camelot with a clarification. I want to make sure that everyone knows exactly what I mean when I say, "I did a first impressions on that game." You'll notice that most (if not all) of the time I use the words "first impressions" instead of "in-depth review." We don't do those here on Massively; even our weeks-long Choose My Adventure series isn't a traditional review. We don't assign numbers or use any sort of scale. And from the very beginning of this column, I have maintained that premise -- I take a look at a game for a week and report on what I experienced, not on what I read about or was pressured into experiencing. I'm keeping that premise alive with Dark Age of Camelot. Yes, I know about the RvR. Yes, I'm aware that it's crazy good and it's what the game is "all about" according to readers. Did I experience it during my week in the game? No. While I'm sorry to disappoint already-familiar fans of the game, my job is to cover the initial experiences of the game for those who have not experienced it. This is not a trip down memory lane as much as a request for players to try the game out. So, what did I think? Let's take a look.
Dynasty Warriors Online launches, thousands of NPCs die
Do you enjoy mowing down hordes of angry enemies? Perhaps you like to spend your afternoons destroying the hopes and dreams of scores of minions? If so, you might be excited to hear that Dynasty Warriors Online has launched! Join up with the Wu, Wei or Shu factions to battle it out during China's famous "Three Kingdoms" period. This "action-oriented tactical combat" MMO will also pit you against your best friend from high school, if you happen to play MMORPGs with your best friend from high school. He was always a smart alec, anyway -- so chop him up! An arsenal of new features has been added to the game like twin battle fans, scimitars, pirate swords and other chopping utensils. Visit new maps and locations, and take advantage of the seven new upgrade systems for weapons, items and gear. Once you make up with your best friend from high school, you can even form a guild with him or her and participate in guild mock battles and melee! No hard feelings? Join up with the Aeria Games community site and log in. Those NPCs won't chop themselves!
Free for All: You know what they say about magnets...
Have you ever been trying to get to sleep, only to have a neighbor honk his horn or bang on the wall? At first, it's the startling volume or unusual nature of the sound that keeps you from sleeping. He quiets down, however, and you begin to doze off again. The next time the noise you hear is much, much quieter -- but he's still making noise. From then on, every noise you hear will keep you from getting to sleep, despite the fact that the volume of your fan or the crickets' chirping is much louder. Claims of access to information set me off the same way. When I hear someone say that "free-to-play gamers spend more than the average subscription player," I am at first confused by the layers of non-information in the sentence, then angry that someone else might read that and take it as fact, then a little saddened as I realize that some people literally do take things they read on the internet as fact. Anyway, this will make sense in the end, I hope. Want to read the rest? I won't tell you how -- it's the first conversational hurdle for you to jump over.
Battlestar Galactica Online goes closed beta, releases new screens
It looks like Bigpoint is stepping closer and closer to launching the browser-based Battlestar Galactica MMO. Open beta is due this December with launch exclusively on SyFy.com this fall. (Sci-fi on SyFy? Yes!) Fans will be happy to know that the game will be firmly set in the popular television show's universe complete with warring factions, exploration, mission-based PvE and lots of player-obliterates-player combat! Ah, the joys of exploring the unique sights and ships of the Battlestar universe. Right now, closed beta players are being asked to finish a tutorial mission -- as either human or cylon -- then are sent off to freely explore the universe. They can experiment with mining, PvE or PvP content, or even exploring the Battlestar, space outposts, planet bases or a Cylon basestar! We all know that Cylons rule and humans drool, so this is good news. Read on!
Rise and Shiny recap: Priston Tale 2
In continuing with the theme from the last few weeks, I examined another "grinder" -- this time, Priston Tale 2. I have to admit to being a little overwhelmed with the grind at this point. I cannot fathom how a player can grind after gear, levels or whatever the item is, for months, if not years, of his life. Normally, the free-to-play games I am looking at or enjoying while "off the clock" are not such a grind. Yes, there is some element of that to almost every single game I have ever played, but my favorite games give me a choice or a way to avoid the grind. It should be noted that even in the worst example of a grindy game there is the possibility of social interaction. Social interactions, in their many forms, are possible any time you have multiple players and a way to communicate. This is no small accomplishment, but it is often ignored as a very basic, important gaming possibility. Still, we're here to talk about what Priston Tale 2 might offer that is different than any number of good-looking free-to-play grinders. So, let's get to it. %Gallery-106874%
Zentia releases new content, new ways to get beat up
Are you enjoying the Zentia open beta so far? Judging by the response we've received here on Massively, it seems a lot of people are discovering this "charmingly hardcore" game. Well, ChangYou has gone and done it now by introducing four new playable characters, tons of new content to explore and new high-level instances to conquer. What's in store for you as you approach the elder levels of the game? If PvP is your thing, you could always attend the Survival Event where between 10 and 40 players will be on each side, battling it out with mounts and cannons. Check the in-game events calendar for more information. Or, maybe exploring Serene City at night sounds more like your speed. In this instance-after-dark, ghosts, goblins and haunted suits of armor have taken everyone hostage. Find the secret artifact before they do! Want to hear more? I think you know what to do -- follow me after the jump!
Free for All: The camera control blues (or how I judge thee, F2P grinder)
This week, I wanted to cover something that must be discussed before I move any further into my career as "The Only Guy Who Liked That Game." Before I worked here at Massively, I used to work for Ablegamers.com, a site for disabled gamers. Although my job was a volunteer position, I learned enough to make it very much worth my while. One of the most interesting facts I learned was that many, many Americans are disabled, to varying degrees. Technically, my poor eyesight qualifies me as disabled, as do my chronic wrist issues due to 20 some-odd years of drumming and art. I've learned my limits but will never apologize for them. I do not expect every developer or game to allow for some of my special (yet common) circumstances, although I think that some of the fixes are so minor that they should have been in the game in the first place. Still, I have to find games that work for my particular set of issues. As I have begun to test and play more and more games, I have had to start enforcing a certain set of rules to pre-judge the games by, otherwise I am stuck with a game that I simply refuse to play. If not, the reviews at the end of the week would simply read: "I couldn't play this game because it asked me to hold down right-click the entire damn time." See whether any of these issues sound familiar. The fact is, if you're an average human being, at some point in your life you will have the same issues I am having. You might as well recognize them now in order to avoid the games that will cause you trouble.
Rise and Shiny recap: War of Angels
To continue my investigation into "imported grinders," I have moved on to check out War of Angels, a new game being published by gamigo. I have to say, I found plenty of good stuff and plenty of bad stuff in the game, as well as some of those obvious tiny fixes that will hopefully be undertaken after this open beta. Let's be honest -- an open beta is considered a release these days, and I don't think that's fair. Yes, many games use it (and I have heard developers admit to this) as a way to make money while continuing to roll out basic development, but I say we allow them to just drop the "beta" part and get on with it. As far as the background story: I do not log into a game to memorize the lore. I do not go to the website to write down notes on the lore in the hopes that I will get it right in my first impressions article. Just like any stranger in a strange land, I am not going to know everything right away. It should be no different for me in a game, and one of my litmus tests is to see whether the game will provide me with an understanding of who and where I am. It's not impossible; other games do it. I didn't find much lore in the quests at all, so I cannot comment on it much. But let's talk about how War of Angels plays.
How to celebrate Halloween with your local Global Agenda devs
Halloween is a special time of year -- a time of blood, gore, and amazing effects. It is, to many geeks, what Christmas is to your Grandmother. Instead of thick sweaters embroidered with stockings stuffed with kittens, however, we prefer belt clips loaded down with ammo. What better place to celebrate than in a favorite MMOFPS: Global Agenda. It warmed our hearts to coordinate with the developers from Hi-Rez Studios last night, and it thrilled us to hand out Halloween swag in exchange for trivia answers. Granted, some allowances had to be made (skipping questions when they were obviously not going to be answered), but overall the event ran smoothly. In fact, here are some good rules to follow when hosting your next Hi-Rez Global Agenda Trivia Contest (what? It could happen.). And raid -- let's not forget the Raid of DOOM!
Free for All: Thirteen spooky free-to-play Halloween events
Ah, Halloween. The dark Xmas. Around our house, Halloween is king. Despite the fact that we have no kids to dress up and parade around the neighborhood, we will still hand out tons of candy to all the trick-or-treaters. Until that spooky night, however, we love to spend the time exploring different Halloween events in our favorite MMORPGs. MMOs are perfect for such events -- they have the players to fill them out, the ability to host whatever kind of event they want, and a lot of optional blood and gore. Some of the events fit perfectly in their game-world, and some stick out like a stock broker on D&D night. Either way, there is always a lot of fun to be had, and sometimes very cool loot to snag! (Like that sweet ride pictured above -- got it on my first try.) Read on for some of my favorite events -- none of them costing a dime.
Kingsisle predicts Wizard 101 expansion release date
Much to the delight of their fans, Kingsisle posted a hopeful -- and specific -- message about their long-awaited Celestia expansion for Wizard 101: "Test Realm Last Chance! We're on the home stretch and what you see in the Test Realm is almost ready to be moved in to the Live Game! Please take the next 24 hours to madly test as much as you can in Celestia, and if all goes well, we'll be putting Celestia and all the other features up to the Live Game on Wednesday October 27th!" While "..if all goes well" seems pretty concrete, we all know how many things can not go well. Still, it's finally a solid date for those players that have been actively playing through the expansion on the test server. It looks like all their homework will be graded soon enough! Players can expect to see 10 additional levels, three new secondary schools of magic, new underwater zones to explore, game-changing mechanics like crit and block and more. And, oh yeah, turning into a gobbler. We wouldn't want to forget that.
Massively interviews the Bloodline Champions crew
Bloodline Champions is an exciting arena-based PvP game brought to us by Stunlock Studios -- pretty darned impressive stuff for such new developers, if we do say so ourselves! We took a quick look at it a while back, if you want to catch up first. While our abilities were nowhere near up-to-snuff, it was still obvious that many players were already enjoying the heck out of the game. In fact, if you look at the game's Facebook page, it's obvious that many gamers are enjoying it. But we wanted to know more, so we fired off some questions to the team. Luckily, they decided to answer our questions before hacking us to pieces. Read on!
Rise and Shiny recap: Legend of Edda
Legend of Edda is a bright and shiny new game from Games Campus. It pits your character against uncountable, endless hordes of all types of monsters and even other players. According to my on-again-off-again education about Anime (I consulted those weird teens that sit in the Barnes and Noble reading Manga) the artstyle of the game is called "Chibi," the Japanese word for "little people." I was sure to ask if the word could be offensive, in the same way that calling any little person a "midget" could be. I have been assured that it is not used in such ways. Still, I hesitate to say that the game is cute. It is, but not just cute. It speaks to that same area of us that enjoys Domo, or that relishes in YouTube videos of puppies barking in their sleep. It's not just cute -- it's something deeper than that. I love how tough everything seems, how every character has such a low center of gravity. The standard top-down view is perfect for such a world. But, what about the grind? How about the PvP?
Exclusive interview: Exploring the Forsaken World
Perfect World Entertainment is no slouch when it comes to big games. After all, they have Perfect World, Ether Saga Online, Jade Dynasty, Battle of the Immortals and more under their belt. It seems as though they have decided to one-up themselves, though, with their recent development on Forsaken World -- so named because it is practically the opposite of Perfect World. Forsaken World promises to be more stylistically blended and to be a little darker, as well. Most of the 3500 (yes, that's 35 hundred) Perfect World International developers have been working on the project over the last three years. Previous PWI games took closer to a year to release -- so that might give you some idea of the scale of the game. We've been handing out some nice chunks of information lately, but when I sat down with Jonathan Belliss, Director of Marketing, I found out there was a lot more to come.
Free for All: Everything I know I learned from Iris Online
OK, so the title is a little overly dramatic, and I should clarify. I meant to say: Everything I know about how I currently feel about the different types of MMOs coalesced once I downloaded and played Iris Online. I will admit to being extra-excited at first, since I had a great conversation with Tara from gPotato about the game, but my excitement has carried through so far. Iris Online comes from the same people that published Flyff and Rappelz all those years ago, so I was eager to see how similar games have evolved since that time. After all, everything in the industry has changed since even a few years ago, so why would imported "grinders" be any different? I would have to spend some time revisiting old games and downloading new ones. I had no idea that playing Iris would set off a chain reaction of realizations that I previously thought I already had. The game simply lit the spark under my foot and set me off on an even deeper exploration of this classically styled type of game.
Rise and Shiny recap: Pocket Legends
Over the last two weeks, I have been taking a look at Pocket Legends, a fully functioning MMO made for the mobile player. I did not publish a Rise and Shiny last week (I was busy writing up my GDCO coverage) but that is a good thing -- I had no real time to play the game anyway. I've jumped in and out, played through a few dungeons and scoured the cash shop. After hearing Cinco Barnes from Spacetime Studios -- the developer of Pocket Legends -- I really saw how well the company's design choices were working in practice. What I found is a game that works and is stable. While that isn't the most glamorous description, you would be hard-pressed to find a game that has succeeded without either of those traits. The key here is that it runs while in the palm of your hand (or lap, in the case of the iPad). But let me take you through a bit more of the game before I pass judgment.
