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Elite: Dangerous' third beta is now live with new systems, ships, and interdiction mechanics
After a brief technical delay, Elite: Dangerous' "Beta 3.00 is now available," declares a post on the official Frontier forums. The patch notes are extra long; new and updated features include new ships, player-driven interdiction, fuel scooping from stars, asteroid mining, visual overhauls to planets, philanthropy missions, and an expanded game map with now over 2400 systems. Frontier has also added hundreds of audio tweaks and bug fixes. Players have continued reporting stability issues with the new patch. This episode of beta, like the phases before it, is exclusive to those who've pre-purchased the game and beta access. Massively's Mike Foster spent September playing the game in beta 1 and had enough fun to say that he "would happily recommend it" but for the beta price tag. We've included the new beta 3 trailer below.
Play Trove for free this weekend
If you've been itching to playtest Trion Worlds' voxel-based sandbox Trove but haven't wanted to pony up cash for the beta, then you're going to love the next three days. Trion has announced a free weekend event starting today at 2:00 p.m. EDT; everyone is invited to dip in and give the game a look.The only catch? You'll have to play through Trion's Glyph client. "Trove will automagically appear in your Library game list this weekend!" says the studio. The freebie weekend is timed perfectly to coincide with Trove's ongoing Shadow's Eve Halloween event, which offers bizarre prizes like piñata mounts and Smashing Pumpkin recliners. The free play period ends at 2:00 p.m. EDT on Monday, October 27th. Shadow's Eve ends November 2nd.
Pathfinder Online's latest alpha patch is live
After no small amount of hand-wringing, the latest alpha patch is live for Pathfinder Online, with the intent of eventually cracking open the servers for stress testing. It's a pretty important patch even without the aim of a stress test, though, as it expands the map size to its full early access scope and fixes a variety of issues with advancement and the game's overall systems. Even if you didn't get to play recently, the development is humming along. Obviously those who didn't get to play also didn't get to experiment with the game's recent auction house functionality, which is explained in depth on the official site. Setting up an auction requires a starting price and a minimum price. Over the auction's duration, the price slowly decreases from the starting price down to the minimum; if no buyers are found at that discount rate, the auction ends unsuccessfully. Check out the full development blog for more details.
Choose My Adventure: Basically Han Solo in Elite: Dangerous
When Frontier Developments' Elite: Dangerous eventually launches, I'm guessing there will be two primary types of pilots cruising its vast expanses: quiet, peaceful types who enjoy exploring and courier-ing, and destructive, violent types who prefer interacting with NPCs and other players via pulse lasers. Elite's loose structure has room for other archetypes, though, such as the savvy trader working the marketplace and the under-the-radar smuggler who lives on the wrong side of the law but avoids drawing attention to himself. Being peaceful doesn't mean you have to be lawful. Last week's Choose My Adventure poll set me on the path of the smuggler, challenging me to secure illegal goods and to sneak those goods by the feds to net a healthy profit. Results were mixed.
Let the cuteness of MapleStory 2 woo you
We've got another video preview of the upcoming MapleStory 2 for you to check out today, albeit with the standard "it's not in English, so either get really good at Korean fast or just pretend that you know what's happening" disclaimer. So what do you think about the blocky landscape? Is it perfect for the MapleStory setting or too reminiscent of the Minecraft crowd? Also, how has this entire population not killed itself for a lack of handrails next to bottomless drops into the sunshiney abyss? [Thanks to Lunian and Dystopiq for the tip!]
Choose My Adventure: Exploring exploration via Elite: Dangerous
Being an explorer is overrated. Sure, Lewis and Clark are remembered as bold adventurers who set out across the untamed American west, charting charts and mapping maps and becoming famous along the way. It's less memorable that the expedition frequently feasted on dogs, slept with more locals than a touring indie rock band, and included at least one accidental butt shooting. In other words, between an explorer and fame there lies a whole lot of gristle. Last week, Choose My Adventure voters set me on the exploration path in Frontier Development's Elite: Dangerous. While exploration hasn't yet been implemented as a viable career, it's still a thing you can do just because you feel like doing it. It's also a pretty great way to see your life end in a cacophony of flames and shrapnel or to find yourself staring at a map in complete and utter confusion. Still, it beats roasting a Labrador and passing it around the campfire.
First Bloodborne alpha invites roll out to Europe
Alpha testing invites for Bloodborne are now appearing in select email inboxes. Joystiq's own Sinan Kubba received an invite to the "small-scale test," which features early access to the game and "a sample of its online features," according to the email. Those that would like to take part in the testing phase for From Software's next sort-of-like-Dark Souls game can apply on the PSN Beta page. The trial is for European players only, as invites are granted at SCEE's discretion. The enrollment period ends on Tuesday, September 23 at 11:59am BST (6:59am EST). Bloodborne will launch on February 5 in Japan and early 2015 in Europe. [Image: From Software]
HEX is not Hearthstone: A look at HEX's closed beta
It's been a while, HEX. Last time I saw you was E3 2013. I hadn't yet started to play Hearthstone, and truthfully, I doubted it could hold a candle to you. In a lot of ways, I was right. It's so much simpler, it's less complex, and at the time, it felt less imaginative. But my card game days are behind me. I don't have the kind of time I used to, so Hearthstone's faster games and accessible drafts (called "arenas" in HS) reminded me of the things I love about the genre while allowing me to keep my grown-up schedule intact and being easy on my wallet. Just the same, HEX, when I got the closed beta invite to see you again, my heart skipped a beat. I was ready to drop some big money on you, but I've been burned a few times. While I've been in betas and alphas for other games, there's been a trend of letting people pay to play unfinished products. I've been burned, and while I don't regret the experience, I do regret the purchases at the moment. I mean, when a game suddenly disappears from the market, it does make you question your decisions, so I decided we should go out a few times first before I really invest in you.
Warlords of Draenor: Tanaan stress test today at 3:00 p.m. Pacific
If you've got the free time and access to the Warlords beta, consider lending a hand to the development team and joining the Tanaan Jungle stress test, today, September 10th, at 3:00 pm Pacific time. The level 100 realms will be turned off for the duration of the test, and the Blues are encouraging us all to create new level 90s in order to test the server load on the Tanaan Jungle introductory quests. This is an important aspect of Warlords of Draenor, particularly because everyone will have to do these quests at the beginning of the expansion. The more accurate data Blizzard has on what their servers can handle, the better they can make the early expansion experience for all of us.
Landmark adds toilets, opens itself for potty jokes
We'll just come right out and say it: You can now create and install toilets in Landmark. This is a boon for both the incontinent and the internet comedian, although we suppose that it will be well-received by home builders who want to complete their bathroom set. The patch supposedly fixes individual claim permissions, optimizes the gallery, and improves the bundling interface for the marketplace. Also in the game with today's patch are chains, bathtubs, sinks, and a new "modular" tree.
Choose My Adventure: I am Elite: Dangerous
Space is not a very good place for people to hang out. Humans have a specific list of things that are needed for survival, and space is in a continual state of being fresh out of all of them. Thus, the space race isn't just about firing objects into the universe and seeing how far they can go but about building contraptions that deliver enough tender love and care to keep folks alive for the journey. Space travel is immensely expensive and complicated; humanity is still decades or even centuries away from easily accessible personal spacecraft. Space sims like Frontier Development's Elite: Dangerous let you skip ahead a bit to see what things might be like when launching yourself into space will come with all the grandiosity of running to the store for some bread. "Yeah, you have a spaceship," Elite says, "but what exactly do you intend to do with it?" In this, the second week of our Elite-focused Choose My Adventure, we'll be seeking an answer to that very question.
TUG updates metallurgy and multiplayer capabilities
TUG is about to get a lot more metal. It's about to be so metal that you won't be able to handle all of the metal. At least, you'll need to be skilled with forging to handle all of the metal, as the game's initial implementation for metallurgy is coming to a test client near your desktop. The game has posted an update for backers explaining that the first pass is nearly complete, and the next game update will allow players to build a forge, make simple bronze age tools, and mine for important minerals. But what's it all worth if you can't show off to your friends? Multiplayer support is currently high on the priority list, with no specific ETA provided beyond a promise of another update in the near future. For more details on the developing features, check out the full update on Kickstarter.
Camelot Unchained launches pre-alpha test checklist
Camelot Unchained is running a little bit behind, as we learned last week. It happens; it's the nature of development. But what, exactly, is the source of the delay? The team has launched a pre-alpha testing checklist to explain just that. No, it's not the things players have to do before testing; it's what the team has to get completed before the game is ready for its earliest tests. While there are no time estimates available on the unchecked entries, fans can get a good idea just from the chart how far along the development process is. Presumably, more entries will be filled in as they are completed without other fanfare. If you want to have a one-stop spot to see the state of the game in development, check it out for yourself.
Choose My Adventure: It's lonely out in Elite: Dangerous
In 1990, hurtling across the edge of our solar system at around 40,000 miles per hour, NASA's Voyager 1 space probe performed a quick rotation and snapped a parting photograph of the planet on which it had been conceived, built, and launched. The resulting image, known as the Pale Blue Dot photo, features a tiny Earth surrounded on all sides by an infinite blackness. It was this image, transmitted a distance of 3.7 billion miles at the speed of light, that inspired Carl Sagan to write, "There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world." In other words, space is big. Really big. And it is into this great unknown, this unimaginable void wrapped in darkness and silence, that Choose My Adventure now boldly goes via Elite: Dangerous, a crowdfunded space simulator (no, not that crowdfunded space simulator) from Frontier Developments. With 55 star systems and 38,000 cubic light-years of space to explore, Elite's Beta 1 release should offer us plenty of freedom to sate our interstellar cravings and to thrive or die as an independent pilot.
PAX Prime 2014: World of Warships balances historical accuracy with big boat fun
A warship is understandably larger and more complicated than a tank or plane, which is why Wargaming is diverging slightly with its third online title. At PAX Prime, I sat down with the dev team for World of Warships to see how the alpha is progressing and what a fleet of ships looks like with all guns blazing. There are four types of ships from which players can choose when they step into a match. Destroyers are smaller and faster with torpedoes, battleships are hulking gun platforms, and cruisers are straddling the line between the two. Then there are carriers (which we did not get to see) that eschew big guns for a squadron of planes to send out. Unfortunately, submarines aren't part of the mix, as the team decided that they wouldn't be fun for this type of game. Each ship is as historically accurate in its looks and is hideously detailed, with up to 500 parts and 270,000 polygons. This detail comes into play when ships are damaged in certain sections, disabling features and abilities. The team is planning on launching with around 75 ships between the starting nations of the United States and Japan.
PAX Prime 2014: I wonder as I Wander
We've been keeping our eyes on Wander for a year now, and during PAX Prime I caught up with Lead Developer Loki Davison to see how this collaborative exploration title's been going. For someone who only now got a first look at this game, it was a jarring shift from the adrenaline-fueled rides in booths all around. Instead, Wander is something akin to an interactive nature screensaver. You slowly move through the beautiful tropical setting to poke around looking for secrets and more scraps of the overarching story. There is no death. There are no other creatures, except for fellow players. And your top speed is capped at something like two miles per hour. Davison said that this style of game is meant to be both relaxing and rewarding to the inquisitive mind. Discovery and sharing those findings with other players to figure out the larger secrets is the driving force here, but if you simply want to walk around as a giant tree with hands or flutter about as a butterfly, nobody is going to stop you.
Gamescom 2014: Skyforge's crew narrates a 30-minute tour
Skyforge is a title that has caught my attention for several reasons, including its pretty graphics, its science-fiction bent, and its flexible class build system. Past that I'm a little ignorant, which is why I appreciated the following video from Gamescom. After Skyforge's trailer, the team delivers a crash course on the game's lore, features, and combat. One of the interesting aspects is how the game can zoom out to show you the entire world so that you can easily see where quests for your character are waiting. If Skyforge is on your radar, do yourself a favor and give the Gamescom panel a watch when you have a moment!
Take a virtual trip to Destiny's Mars
Mars is but one of the locales on which Guardians will be making planetfall in Destiny, but it is perhaps the most rust-colored and sandy of them all. In a new video released today, the mysteries and vistas of the Red Planet is, well, not exactly explained in great detail, but at least teased in a visually pleasing way. It looks as though mankind had made a previous stab at colonizing Mars, but now it's a desolate wasteland where dunes are reclaiming skyscrapers. If the video is to be believed, it's not exactly devoid of inhabitants, however. You can see it for yourself after the break.
ArcheAge adds three servers for next round of closed beta testing
Trion Worlds is anticipating a flood of new players for the third ArcheAge closed beta test, saying that it expects the weekend event will be "four times" the size of the first test. The studio is sending out "hundreds of thousands" of email invites, noting that players will need a new CB3 invitation to participate and cannot rely on an old CB2 key for access. The team is adding three new servers for CB3: two in North America and one in Europe. These servers will plug into the cross-server auction house that's shared by their associated regions. ArcheAge's beta will "pick up right where it left off," as the devs promise that progress made during CB2 will be retained and characters will not be wiped. The beta test begins on August 14th and continues through August 18th.
Gamescom 2014: Destiny's first expansion, The Dark Below, arrives in December
Bungie Director of Production Jonty Barnes just announced at Gamescom that Destiny's first expansion, The Dark Below, will arrive in December, just a few months after the game officially launches. Bungie also released a new competitive multiplayer trailer. Aliens are threatening our way of life and our very existence, but that doesn't mean that we can't take a break from combating this common threat and squabble amongst ourselves, right? Destiny will allow just that with its competitive multiplayer mode, also known as "PvP" if you're new to MMOs. This game mode will take place in the Crucible, a skirmish arena full of good hidey-holes and a ton of objectives for teams to accomplish. There will be special gear that can be attained by duking it out, so at least you have that justification when your commanding officer asks why you're not out there fighting the invaders. The video is below.
