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Aeria Games launches Crystal Saga and Roll n Rock in North America
Aeria Games has been a busy little bee. The free-to-play company has just announced the release of not one but two new browser-based MMOs to the North American market. Crystal Saga is an open-world game built for competitive PvP. There are five different PvP modes plus an array of traditional fantasy classes like the Rogue, Priest, and Mage. The game also allows players to tame a variety of pets, unlock special soul abilities, and "equip their character with elaborate wings." For an in-depth look at Crystal Saga, check out our impressions in Rise and Shiny. Roll n Rock is an altogether different experience. For one thing, the title features a huge number of clothing and customization options. In fact, Aeria says that no two characters will ever look alike. For another, "players will find a fully-realized world of weddings, malls, game halls, and more," according to a company press release. Roll n Rock also boasts multiplayer puzzles, quests, guilds, crafting, and combat. More info on both titles is available via the links below. [Source: Aeria Games press release]
Rise and Shiny: Zandagort
Zandagort, a very independent browser-based MMORTS by Zanda Games, really holds a lot of promise. I want to get that out of the way first. Potential, unfortunately, has nothing to do with a player's current experience with the game. No one sits at his PC or laptop and says, "Man, I sure am excited about what this game could be, so I'll keep playing." But that very potential often makes me a little depressed. Potential for good also means potential for bad; if a game is unfinished and has the chance to grow, there's likewise a very real possibility that the game could fester, lose development love, or worse yet, die on the vine. There's no guarantee that even a "AAA" massive-budget game like Star Wars: The Old Republic or RIFT will last forever or even a good amount of time. Who knows? Usually with an indie game, if it isn't shining and picking up an audience relatively quickly, it just might be in trouble. Zandagort has an audience; I can see players in the outer reaches of space. I am not going to pass judgment on the number of players simply because indie budgets are often easily supported by a smaller playerbase, but I wonder what type of audience it is. I am open-minded and enjoy the occasional slog through an intense "spreadsheets-in-space"-style game, but Zandagort really wore down my patience.
MMObility: Reaching the MMORTS sweet-spot, slowly
As a player of many MMORTS titles, I have grown to understand that patience is not only a virtue but a necessity. Many titles from the genre are designed to make you spend real time to do anything. It's not that they are boring or tedious; instead, they are representing what it might be like to actually grow an army or trade hub and to explore the often massive world around you. The pacing is meant to be slow. These are not games of instant leveling or non-stop quest grinding. They're meant to be played in as little as a few minutes per day. This explains a lot of their success -- just imagine how popular they are with time-strapped players. There is a time, however, after months of toiling away at building up various structures, growing a small army, or finally getting to the maxed out level in a certain area, when you can finally settle down for some real gameplay. It might sound silly to have to wait that long for glory, but come on... this is city-building we are talking about. It takes time.
MMO Family: Do kids belong in guilds?
In my regular columns at Massively, I enjoy taking a look at various topics surrounding family-friendly MMOs and common issues in guild management. So it seemed natural to take the two subjects and combine them for this week's MMO Family. Gamers are growing older, and we're seeing an increasing presence of younger players, even in the more serious "adult" games like Lord of the Rings Online and EverQuest II. For those who play MMOs with their children, it might seem reasonable to seek a guild tag for them, but that might not sit well with your guild peers. Should kids be allowed in guilds? Are there any benefits to sharing a tag with your children, or are they better off staying unguilded?
The Soapbox: Casual is as casual does
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. It's time to put an overused MMO term to bed, and by "put to bed," I of course mean that it should be executed with great prejudice. Actually, there are lots of terms that I'd like to see retired permanently. "Toon" can go, for instance, as can "mob" for single enemies. And people have really worn out "nerf" beyond belief. But those are all issues of personal preference. No, the term I'm talking about is "casual." As in "casual player," a creature as rare and mythical as the Loch Ness monster. Also like the Loch Ness monster, it doesn't actually exist. In the case of the latter, it exists only through a handful of doctored photos and a lot of people who really want to see a pleisiosaur in Scotland; in the case of the former, it's a strawman concept that no longer has any purpose in our collective lexicon.
MMO Family: Is free-to-play bad for kid-friendly MMOs?
If you've ever gone shopping with kids, you know how much of a nightmare-inducing proposition it can be. Everywhere from toy stores to department stores to seemingly innocuous grocery stores, there's a battle raging between parents and their children, which usually ends with tears, grey hairs, and the infamous word, "Pleeeeeease??" (Pleeeeeease should actually have its own entry in the Oxford Dictionary because it has a completely different meaning from its polite cousin, "please"). The only thing that helps parents get through it is the knowledge that they get a respite once they get home. Not so anymore, though, because there's a second front that's opened, and the new battleground is taking place on our computer screens. Those high-pitched appeals that echo throughout the store aisles are now filling our family rooms, kitchens, and dining rooms. And while many people are singing the praises of the free-to-play model in MMO games, it's actually the biggest contributor to the begging-battles at home. Let's take a look at why free-to-play and kids MMOs are not a match made in heaven.
Gameloft bringing Order & Chaos Online to your Mac
It's been nearly a year since Gameloft released Order & Chaos Online to iOS and Android devices. The mobile fantasy MMORPG migrated to Facebook later in the summer of 2011, and now it's coming to a full-scale Mac near you. Gameloft has just published a new trailer heralding Order & Chaos as "the MMORPG for Mac," and the video says that the client will be available for downloading in the Mac App store before the end of the month. Order & Chaos features two playable factions and four classes, and you can get a glimpse of the promotional clip after the cut. [Source: Gameloft press release]
Command & Conquer browser MMO enters open beta
Another beloved IP, another browser-based MMO. This time it's not the gritty fantasy of George R.R. Martin but the sci-fi battlefield of Command & Conquer that is receiving the MMO-lite treatment. Gamasutra reports that Command & Conquer Tiberium Alliances "is not a Facebook game" like previous Electronic Arts browser titles, which include Lord of Ultima and Tiger Woods PGA Tour Online. Command & Conquer is "hosted on a stand-alone site," marking the first time the storied franchise has tried its hand at the free-to-play model. The game has been in closed beta since December and is now available to a global audience via its public open beta.
Big Fish Games scores a hit with Fairway Solitaire
My meeting with Big Fish Games' Patrick Wylie was one of my last meetings at GDC, but it was also one of my most satisfying. It turns out I'm not alone in my esteem for the great Fairway Solitaire app this company has put together; "This game is growing our audience," Wylie told me. That's quite a big statement. Big Fish has been around for a while making PC titles designed for a very casual audience, usually hidden object games and other casual time management fare. It's been trying to break out in the iOS market for about the past year and a half. Before Fairway Solitaire, the company hadn't really had a hit on this level, and I'd argue it was because the company was playing around with its standard casual titles rather than digging in deep. It makes sense when you consider this game's rocky past. Back in 2008, Wylie says Big Fish Games had one of its biggest PC hits with a hidden object game, and one of the developers got the idea to do a solitaire game with a golf framing on it. However, the decision was that Big Fish should catch a wave with hidden object titles and ride that trend for all it was worth. Fairway Solitaire got put on the back burner, and Big Fish went on to build its reputation on casual gaming. Last year, as the company was trying to gain ground on iOS, Fairway Solitaire showed up in development again, and I actually saw a very early version of it at GDC 2011. But while the game was technically complete last October, Wylie and company decided to go back to the drawing board and spent five months "tuning a game that was already done, just trying to get the experience as exactly right as possible." All that work apparently paid off; Fairway Solitaire has huge conversion rates for Big Fish, and its players are among the most engaged players on the whole App Store. Wylie says he would have liked to see this success sooner, but he doesn't really regret all of the work done on the game before release. "I'm glad we actually did wait," he told me. Big Fish is very excited about the success of Fairway Solitaire, and just like its earlier hidden object games, Big Fish plans to take full advantage of that popularity. Up first on the iOS game, there's a spring update coming with a brand new pack of maps for players to play through. Big Fish has another Fairway Solitaire-based title planned, and we can expect a summer pack as well, with lots more content and features to come. "We're going to service this forever," says Wylie, or at least as long as the game's players are willing to play. "I don't know where it's going to stop," he says of Fairway's rising sales. Big Fish's next game will be called Lifequest, a freemium RPG title designed around performing real-life tasks like getting a job, working, or even eating out or buying a pet. Lifequest has been Big Fish's "best performing non-hidden object adventure game" on the PC and Mac according to Wylie, so he has big hopes for how it will do on Apple's touchscreen platforms. Another big title due soon is Plunder, a pirate-based puzzle game in which you guide a set of pirate ships through dangerous watery grids by propelling them forward in the right order and at the right time. Plunder's been under development on iOS for awhile, and it's not quite as complicated as Fairway Solitaire, which itself isn't all that hard. Big Fish isn't giving up on hidden object games; the company is also releasing the latest version of the popular Mystery Case Files series, called the 13th Skull. It's jam-packed with full motion video, letting players interact with live action characters as they explore a haunted house and have to find all sorts of items and solve simple adventure-style puzzles. These games tend to appeal to a very specific audience more than anyone else, but Big Fish hopes the production values make it stand out in an already very packed market. Big Fish is very excited about Fairway Solitaire, and we can expect to see much more of that game coming in the future. I've always been a proponent of more complicated games, even for casual players. While many developers on the App Store are racing for a lowest-common denominator style of super casual freemium gameplay, Fairway Solitaire shows that with a quality, compelling gaming experience, you can attract engaged gamers from all over.
Miracle fundraising finish for Gridiron Heroes' Kickstarter drive
Sports MMOs haven't gotten off the ground as of yet, and whether their lack of mainstream success is due to design challenges or some other factor, they remain obscure oddities for the most part. Somewhat less obscure is Tecmo's 1980s Nintendo series based on the National Football League. The aptly named Tecmo Bowl was a mainstay on Nintendo's first 8-bit console, and now a group of fans have helped assure that Gridiron Heroes, a new Facebook game inspired by the classic series, will in fact be made. Kotaku reports on the last-minute miracle finish to the project's Kickstarter drive, with the development team collecting $7,613 (measured against a goal of $7,500).
MMO Family: Kid-friendly MMO roundup, part 1
With all of the buzz centered around "grown-up" MMO titles like Star Wars: The Old Republic and Guild Wars 2, it's easy for the kid-friendly games to get lost in the shuffle. There may not be as many kid titles on the horizon, but for the games that are currently out there, there's been an amazing amount of activity going on in these virtual worlds. I decided to take a peek at some of my (and the kids') favorites, along with a few games that we've done first impressions on, to see what they've been up to lately. Since there are too many great kid-friendly MMOs out there to fit into one column, this will be the first of what will probably be many follow-up entries covering other games, so if you don't see your favorite family-friendly game here, fear not!
Super Hero Squad trading card game to feature bonus MMO content
For those of us who grew up as sports fans during the early 1990s, the name Upper Deck is synonymous with baseball cards. Nowadays, the firm has branched out into customizable trading card games, and the latest such is a tie-in to Gazillion's kid-friendly Super Hero Squad Online MMO. The Super Hero Squad TCG features a 300-card base set chock-full of the usual Marvel suspects. Alongside the Spider-Man, Wolverine, and Captain America cards are special loot inserts with reward codes that unlock bonus items and exclusive playable characters in SHSO. Look for booster packs at your favorite gaming retailer on April 24th. [Source: Marvel press release]
MMO Family: What kids MMOs can learn from markers, Jackpot, and Chutes and Ladders
Play is important. Whether you're a kid or a grown-up, play has an important role in our lives, and video games are taking an increasingly large percentage of our playtime these days. But for kids' play in particular, there's always a question about the quality of video game time and whether or not it's actually just a waste of time. Kid-friendly MMOs are a relatively new segment of the MMO industry, but it often feels like they're just grown-up MMOs with kid-friendly graphics. Sometimes, the games are even stripped of the grown-up features in an attempt to make them easier, but that often results in a less than compelling game. Here's a quest; do it. Here's a creature; zap it. Here's a pet; hug it. Here are some clothes and decorative items; buy them. I may sound a bit jaded, but that's only because I think kid-friendly MMOs can be so much better than they currently are. To do that, we have to step back and examine how kids play, and studios must concentrate game design around that. In this week's MMO Family, I'll be looking at three areas of kids' play and exploring why games should look to Magic Markers, Jackpot, and Chutes and Ladders for inspiration.
Gazillion shutting down Fortune Online
Gazillion's new Fortune Online title is headed for the scrap heap, according to our friends at Joystiq. The Diablo-style browser MMO was born of a desire to simplify dungeon crawling for casual gamers, but apparently it's taking too much time (and too many resources) away from Gazillion's Marvel projects. "We will continue delivering and refining content for Super Hero Squad Online, along with building and developing the Marvel Heroes game," a Gazillion spokesman told Joystiq. The firm also denied speculation that it is preparing for a Disney acquisition, and it declined to announce a timetable or job losses resulting from the Fortune closure. [Thanks to Space Cobra for the tip!]
Super Hero Squad Online gets vocal with new all-star cast of talent
Voice-acting in MMOs seems to be all the rage these days, and Gazillion Entertainment, publisher of the free-to-play Super Hero Squad Online, seems to be jumping on the bandwagon. In a press release today, the company announced that each and every hero and villain in the game will be receiving a full vocal makeover, and many characters will be voiced by the same actors who provide voice work for the Super Hero Squad television series. Jay Minn, vice president of The Amazing Society -- the development studio behind the games -- is obviously quite pleased with the decision to give voice to the game's dozens of characters, stating that "the heroes and villains in Marvel Super Hero Squad Online have always had their own unique personalities and attitudes... We're excited and very proud to let our heroes and villains speak their minds!" The statement adds that the game currently includes over 3000 lines of spoken dialogue (with over 100 attributed to everyone's favorite Merc with a Mouth), so players can expect plenty of witty quips from their characters of choice. To get in the game and hear the new voiceovers for yourself, just click on through the link below to Super Hero Squad Online's official site. [Source: Gazillion Entertainment press release]
Bigpoint teases Battlestar Galactica Online carrier ships
Bigpoint has let us know that it's about to kick off what it calls "space trials" for some new carrier-class ships in Battlestar Galactica Online. The craft will be visible on the Kobol beta server today in both Colonial and Cylon variants. Carriers function as support and supply vessels and can also serve as mobile outposts with repair and recharge capabilities. What's that? You say you want to pilot one of these shiny new vessels? Well, this is Bigpoint, so you'll need to enter a lottery via the community forum for your chance to jump in the cockpit of BSGO's latest and greatest. If you're not up for that, the ships will be available to all players on all servers after the completion of the trial period at the end of this month. You'll need to be level 40 (and in possession of nearly 500,000 in-game cubits) to get one for yourself.
Spacetime's Dark Legends mobile vampire MMO available Q1 2012
We've reported previously on Spacetime Studios' new Dark Legends vampire MMO, but today we've got a launch window for you. The game will be available in the first quarter of 2012, and it represents the latest entry in the company's mobile Legends series which includes Pocket Legends and Star Legends. Dark Legends features new gameplay tweaks, including more action via charge attacks and the ability to drain foes. There's also more of a focus on narrative thanks to something Spacetime calls an "interactive storybook" made from both missions and cutscenes. More info will be released at this year's Game Developer's Conference in early March. [Source: Spacetime Studios press release]
Glitch wants to give you a free house
Massively went gaga for quirky Flash-based sandbox MMO Glitch when it launched last fall, so we were dismayed when it unlaunched just a few short months later. Who unlaunches a game? Tiny Speck, that's who. The company sent the game back into beta for systems overhauls, including more robust housing, as Tiny Speck's Stewart Butterfield told us back in December. This week, in a question-and-answer session on the official forums, Butterfield explains just how the new housing system will work. For starters, everyone will now begin the game as a homeowner. Existing players will be transitioned from their current, static homes into new base models, which can be upgraded (horizontally, vertically, and thematically) as players invest Imagination and undertake crafting projects. Players will even decide which types of gardens and animal pens will surround their abodes. There's a whole lot more to the Q&A, including bits about economy overhauls, player-generated content, and the end of Lord of the Rings Online-style neighborhoods, so sandbox aficionados should review it or the summary in person. [Thanks to Saucelah for the tip!]
Cave to put projects on hold, refocus on social gaming
It's easy to forget sometimes that video games are a business, as well as a means of artistic expression and recreation. Even developers like Cave, whose sterling reputation is due almost entirely to its long-time devotion to the incredibly esoteric bullet-hell genre, have to make tough decisions in order to continue existing. The Deathsmiles developer's fiscal outlook isn't shaping up to be quite what it had expected, and as a result the company will be placing unknown projects on hold in order to devote more resources to social gaming, Andriasang reports. Originally expecting to earn ¥1.4 billion ($18.9 million) in sales between June 1 and November 30 2011, the company now anticipates earnings of ¥1.3 billion ($16.8 million), which has prompted Cave to change its forecasted operating gain of ¥10 million to an operating loss of ¥31 million for the period. Operational earnings for the entire year were lowered from ¥310 million to ¥50 million. In a nutshell, people aren't buying as many infuriatingly difficult games as expected, which is surprising considering how popular masochism has become recently.
Raph Koster: Immersion is not a core game virtue
Yeah, you read that right, virtual world fans. One of the more celebrated sandbox MMORPG developers is apparently throwing in the towel when it comes to immersion. Raph Koster wrote what can only be termed a lament on his personal blog today, saying that "immersion does not make a lot of sense in a mobile, interruptable world." Koster characterizes immersion as a style whose time has come and gone, and he concludes that games are no longer for dreamers due to their far-reaching popularity. "I mourn the gradual loss of deep immersion and the trappings of geekery that I love," Koster writes. "I see the ways in which the worlds I once dove into headlong have become incredibly expensive endeavors, movies-with-button-presses far more invested in telling me their story, rather than letting me tell my own." Whether you agree with him or not, it's a sobering read coming from one of the chief creative forces behind Star Wars Galaxies and Ultima Online.
