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Storyboard: Dark past of infinite darkness
There's no reason in the world that the idea of a dark past needed to become a cliché. I mean, it has; there's no denying that. Do a shot every time you find a character with a dark past and you'll have alcohol poisoning inside of half an hour. (Do two for every character whose past is dark and mysterious and you can just call an ambulance before you start.) But it's one of those things that's been cast into the realm of the cliché before its time -- it's a legitimate element to constructing a character that's become overused. Of course, it's been sent to the horrid land of the cliché by people using it poorly and overzealously. You can still make an interesting and nuanced character with a dark past, but you have to do so with a gentle hand. You need just enough dark past that it's interesting but not so much dark past that it gets obnoxious or silly.
Scarlet Witch joins the Marvel Heroes roster
Marvel Heroes got a little more magical today as developer Gazillion Entertainment announced the addition of the Scarlet Witch as a playable character. This heroine/villainess is perhaps most famous for depowering 90% of the mutant population in House of M (spoiler alert!), and her reality-altering powers are certainly not to be scoffed at. Scarlet Witch is the first character to be announced since the game's first official trailer was unveiled last month, but hopefully we can look forward to quite a few more in the coming weeks. For more details on newcomer Scarlet Witch and the other playable characters of Marvel Heroes, head on over to the game's official site.
The Daily Grind: Who is your main character?
This morning's topic should be applicable to everyone: Who is your main character? No, no, you misunderstand me. I'm not asking what your main character is. I don't want to hear that he, she, or it is some level 59 Froggington Bladespitter with a minor in Interpretive Dance. That's what the character is. I'm asking who your main character is. My main character in Lord of the Rings Online grew up on the outskirts of the Shire in Bree, having more in common with the introspective Hobbits than the brash Men around her. Her armor and sword were bequeathed to her by her Uncle Malcolm, who was a drunken failure of a guard but a kind enough soul otherwise. She is a cheerful if sardonic adventurer who doesn't have anything better to do than to run the errands of others -- and make a profit on it. While the weight of the world presses on the shoulders of those she meets, she feels carefree knowing that what will happen, will happen. So she does what is right (mostly) but avoids being saddled with a legacy. And, oh, she likes roast rabbit but detests fish. Who is your main character? 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!
E3 2012: The Elder Scrolls Online previews characters, more in new trailers [Update]
We're expecting big things out of The Elder Scrolls Online during this year's E3, and to kick things off, Bethesda and ZeniMax have unveiled a new teaser trailer that shows off a small sampling of the characters players can look forward to taking control of when they get their hands on the game. While it's not exactly gameplay footage, perhaps the new video will assuage fans who are uncertain about the game's art direction. That, or it will enrage them further. At any rate, the sample characters run the gamut of what you would expect from The Elder Scrolls: big bearded dude with an axe, sultry elven spellcaster, cloaked assassin -- you get the idea. The video's short and doesn't serve as much except for eye-candy, but if you're voracious for new TESO tidbits, it's definitely worth a look. Just head past the cut for the full trailer, and be sure to check back later this week for a chat with the folks behind the upcoming title. [Update: We've also added another video, this one an interview of TESO's game director discussing and showing off the game, and the official site has updated with a new look and FAQ. Thanks to Paul for the tips!]
Know Your Lore: The role of characters in WoW lore
The World of Warcraft is an expansive universe. You're playing the game, you're fighting the bosses, you know the how -- but do you know the why? Each week, Matthew Rossi and Anne Stickney make sure you Know Your Lore by covering the history of the story behind World of Warcraft. One of the interesting aspects of the Warcraft setting is which characters have achieved a kind of iconic status. The lore of the game is the unfolding story, and the story is ultimately shaped and defined by its characters. The story is what happened to, and because of, these people be they orc, human, troll, night elf, gnome, tauren or pandaren. Take Rexxar, for instance. He's one of my favorite characters in Warcraft. Why? Why do I love Rexxar? Well, in part I enjoy that his mixed heritage makes him an outcast in a faction of outcasts, that he was one of the few to see how twisted and warped the old Horde was in time to step away from it before it began its campaign of atrocity across Azeroth. I like his simple faith in the ideals Thrall represented for the Horde in Durotar, his willingness to fight to preserve them, and the lengths he went while at the same time knowing exactly when to finally stop. Rexxar knew that defeating Theramore and Admiral Proudmoore was enough; he didn't have to destroy it.
Breaking down Guild Wars 2's character creator
The second Guild Wars 2 press beta weekend has come and gone, and Massively was there every step of the way. Stay tuned throughout the day today for even more guides, impressions, videos, and Q&As to get you ready for the highly anticipated sequel to Guild Wars. In just the few minutes that it takes to traverse the 10 screens of Guild Wars 2's character creation process, I'm left with one overriding thought: This game looks ridiculously good. Ludicrously so, even. And I didn't even enter the game world yet! I always love a good, in-depth character creation system, as there's a joy in spending a good amount of time making exactly the sort of character you want to play. Unfortunately, most MMOs have stripped this process down to the bare basics, which is why I'm pleased to announce that it's actually a mini-journey in and of itself in Guild Wars 2. The point of this process isn't just to make a character but help you grow attached to this person and get to know him or her through it. What are this character's motivations? What branch of his or her profession is the most appealing? How did you become a hero? What obstacles do you have to overcome? Instead of playing the game itself, I took some time over this beta testing weekend to dissect every step of the character creation system and bring my findings back to those of you who want to start building your character in your mind.
The Daily Grind: Are MMO players tired of beefcake?
A few months ago, The Mary Sue published an intriguing article about why men play female characters in MMOs, and the answer might surprise you. While some men surveyed wanted to play lady toons for immersion reasons or eyecandy reasons, many of them had a much simpler motive: They were sick of beefcake. They were willing to play men, but they just couldn't relate to big hulking dudes with huge muscles and tiny heads, and those are often the types of male characters offered in video games. MMOs like Star Wars: The Old Republic and Guild Wars and City of Heroes offer "huge" male characters as options, while World of Warcraft is a serial offender. We usually focus on gender issues as they pertain to the portrayal of women in MMOs, so today I want to turn the tables and ask you about the portrayal of men. Are you annoyed when male characters MMOs look like they're hitting the steroids a bit too hard, and do you find such characters relatable or offensive? In other words, are you tired of beefcake in MMOs? 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!
Double is Skullgirls' final, grossest character
You didn't think the entire Skullgirls character roster was going to be comprised exclusively of buxom cartoon vixens, did you? Reverge Labs had to do something to balance this stuff out, so what better way to show that it's what's on the inside that counts than to add a character whose insides are on her outsides?Double, the terrible, moist hand/mouth creature above, is actually much more disgusting in motion, as you'll see in the walkthrough videos after the break. A shapeshifter, Double's fighting style is an amalgamation of the other styles in the game: She morphs into other characters to perform tweaked versions of their normals, and most of her specials are moves that didn't make it into their respective character's final moves list.She's got some really original stuff as well, like a level-5 super that transforms her into an Easter Island head that spews bullet-hell projectiles from its mouth. We're intrigued, but also a little nauseous.%Gallery-147971%
Rumor: Kilik and Elysium added to Soulcalibur 5
SoulCalibur 5's character roster has, historically, been chock-full of leaks. Clandestine screenshots were responsible for revealing Ezio and Raphael, and now it looks as though three new fighters may have been uncovered in an extremely similar fashion. Two images, culled from NeoGAF's depths, show the most hated man in the world fan-favorite Kilik (sporting a shiny new bird hat), as well as newcomer Elysium, an angelic female of some kind who sports very little of anything. Speculation suggests that both characters will be "mimic characters" who are able to emulate the fighting styles of any other character, but at this point that appears to be unfounded. Considering SC5's track record with character selection screenshots, however, we're cautiously optimistic regarding the validity of these photos. Check out the gallery below for high-resolution versions.%Gallery-145027%
Pew pew more: A sneak peek at Vindictus' newest archer
The website Steparu.com has a hands-on preview with the latest character coming to Mabinogi Heroes -- also known as Vindictus to NA and EU players. His name is Kai, and he's a flashy archer with more than a few surprises up his pretty sleeves. As an archer, Kai's tactics largely revolve around kiting and long-ranged assaults, so keeping one's distance is essential in most fights. Kai can transform his bow into a long or short variant, with the long doing more powerful (but slower) attacks and the short one pew-pewing much quicker at closer range. He can also unleash an attack that hits multiple targets at once, making him ideal for some burst AoE damage. One of Kai's more unique skills is the ability to place a marker on the battlefield and then quickly grapple his way back to it on a moment's notice. While he's traveling back to his marker, he's immune to all damage, making this a strategic move for pitched fights. Kai is coming to Mabinogi Heroes in Korea tomorrow, although it will be some time before he lands in the States or Europe. [Thanks to Justatip for the tip!]
The Daily Grind: Do you play in self-enforced hardcore mode?
The permadeath-in-MMOs issue has been debated to death. Most of us have probably either played in a Diablo-esque hardcore mode or gaped at the stones required to publish a true MMORPG with permadeath (hi, Salem). But who says you need game mechanics to make permadeath a reality? I've gamed with roleplayers who took their characters deadly seriously and would delete their characters if they were killed off within the context of the game. (So much for the idea that roleplayers are casuals, eh?) Their web of self-inflicted rules is so complex (maiming? dice rolls? emote-combat?) that playing with such RPers can actually become stressful, especially if you don't want to be responsible for their having to delete and reroll. What about you folks? Do you play or roleplay in a self-enforced hardcore mode? Do you do it because it's fun, because it makes gameplay more intense, or because you like a good challenge? 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!
Xiaoyu and M. Bison leaked for Street Fighter X Tekken
The cross-over character cavalcade of fun that is Street Fighter X Tekken continues to hemorrhage new fighters, albeit this time the announcement is somewhat less flashy (and far more unintentional) than previous roster reveals. A new screenshot uploaded to SFXT's Xbox Live Marketplace page, upon close inspection, shows the portraits of Iron Fist veteran Ling Xiaoyu and Shadowloo head honcho M. Bison, as seen in the zoomed and enhanced image above. This brings the game's character stable to an even 30 fighters, PS3/Vita exclusive peeps not included. We're excited about the prospect of psycho-crushing our foes once again, but we also can't help but be disappointed by SFXT's severe lack of snake-arm minotaurs and farting dinosaurs.
Google Translate app update adds handwriting recognition, breaks barriers
The Google Translate app for Android received a pretty significant update yesterday, bringing handwriting recognition to its bullpen of functionalities. The app, which added voice recognition back in October, can now recognize handwriting in seven different languages, including English, French, Italian, German, and Spanish. It's probably most important, however, for Chinese- and Japanese-speaking contingents, who can now use their handsets to translate characters that aren't typically featured on English keypads. The update to version 2.3 is available now, at the source link below.
Breakfast Topic: How did you create your first character?
This Breakfast Topic has been brought to you by Seed, the AOL guest writer program that brings your words to WoW Insider's pages. When a buddy asked me to consider coming back to Warcraft after a failed attempt shortly after the original release, I reluctantly decided to create a new account. When he asked me what faction and class I wanted to play, I settled on an Alliance paladin after researching classes online. I wasn't entirely sure what exactly a tank, healer and DPS meant in practice, but the paladin could do all three, so that's what I'd be. Plus, they sounded like defenders of all that was right and true. It turns out, that was the easy part of creating my character. Next, I spent time agonizing over the name. I'd look for ones I liked from the randomly generated suggestions. Then I'd try combining elements of one name with another. I tried using simple words from foreign languages. Finally, I found the perfect name that would define my character for life, a Greek word representing one of the core values of a paladin: Truth. Having picked a class and name, it was finally time to tinker with the races that could be paladins and see which ones fit the new name. After probably about 100 permutations across classes, from random appearances to manually matching features, I settled on a human, and my journey began. How did you create your first character? Did someone recommend a class for you? Did the flavor text on the creation screen influence you? Or have you always known what you'd be?
The Daily Grind: Do you prefer pre-made class characters?
Although it's not a new trend, the practice of making pre-made playable characters to represent each class in an MMO is becoming more and more popular. In games like Rusty Hearts, Vindictus, Diablo, Torchlight, Aika and a few others, you pick from an assortment of pre-made characters to play the game. Customization is non-existent or minimal, but you're not really playing those types of games for a deeply customizable character. Without worrying about getting your hair and eye color just right, you can grab a character and just start playing. So is this a feature you prefer over heavy customization? Do you accept it for certain games, based on their style, or is it a complete turn-off for you across the board? Let us know in the comments below! 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!
Where's my Water creator goes from QA to hit game designer at Disney Mobile
Tim FitzRandolph joined Disney Mobile's gaming team from the lowest rung possible: The Quality Assurance department. Game testers often work long hours on early versions of unfinished games, and FitzRandolph's first job was no exception. "I studied film studies and nothing to do with games, and also studied the Japanese language. And I had lived in Japan for a couple of years, so I was fluent in Japanese," he remembers in a recent interview with TUAW. "I didn't know what to do, and I settled down on a job listing on Disney for QA testing on an upcoming game, and they wanted someone bilingual. That was actually my kind of thing, my way in the door. I got to work on this game called Spectrobes, which was a DS game that Disney created with a team in Japan, so they needed someone to help do the testing and translate the bugs and communicate with the dev team." But FitzRandolph was also working on his own titles, continually trying to get into actual game design at Disney. When the App Store was announced, FitzRandolph decided to try and make his own iPhone games. One of those games was eventually picked up by Disney and became the very popular Jelly Car series. And FitzRandolph's second, original game for Disney Mobile, in the position he eventually earned as Game Design Director, is the critically acclaimed and top grossing puzzler Where's My Water. It took a little while for FitzRandolph to join Disney's mobile gaming department, however. From his position as a go-between for the US and Japanese devs on Spectrobes, he first got offered to go work on the console version of the Toy Story 3 game in Salt Lake City. He says that position taught him a lot, but Salt Lake City didn't turn out to be the place for him. "I didn't really enjoy living in Salt Lake very much, so I came back to California," he says. "And somewhere in that timeline I had also pitched the idea of doing a sequel to Jelly Car, which I had made on my own time as like a hobby project." FitzRandolph had been working on Jelly Car on his own for a while, and says it was first concieved as a project in Microsoft's XNA development system for the Xbox. "I was like, maybe I can try making a physics system that would sort of create a custom car, just experiment. When I got it working, I just did a lot of experiments with it, but I didn't really have an idea for a game. Except for making a little test for a car, create a little object to do the physics work. So I thought you might have a little object and you can make obstacles and get across gaps and stuff like that." When the App Store finally opened up on the iPhone, FitzRandolph says he felt it might fit the system that he'd made, so he went out and bought an iPod touch to develop on. "I got it working on the iPod touch, and it worked well enough." He then showed it around Disney, and when he pitched the idea of a sequel to the mobile division, which was looking for games to make at the time, Disney agreed to make and publish the title with him. FitzRandolph says it was exciting to have a famous company like Disney working on something he'd created himself, but that it was a little overwhelming as well. "I had never thought about what was Jelly Car, like what are the rules or style or whatever. In the first round of assets, I'd look at it and say that doesn't look like Jelly Car, and they'd ask what it was supposed to look like. I'd not really thought about that stuff, because it had always been this really personal thing. But it was really exciting, and it's really cool to be a part of that." FitzRandolph's team not only finished up Jelly Car 2, but then went on to make Jelly Car 3, both of which did well for Disney. And after that, he and the team (which they call "Creature Feep," after a problem many devs will find familiar called "feature creep") started thinking about what to make next. They wanted to make a physics puzzler, given how popular those have been on the App Store, but coming up with the actual gameplay involved a lot of brainstorming and iteration, says FitzRandolph. "We had a whole bunch of ideas, and at some point along the line, it kept coming back that water, water was very fresh and people hadn't done a lot of physics around water," he remembers. "But it was also really successful in that we all know how water splashes and flows and it might be fun to make a puzzle game around that." The team put together a prototype based around diverting the flow of water with touch controls, and of course that eventually became Where's My Water. "People liked it, really loved the prototype, and then we got enough response on that that we started making the actual game." The other elements of the game, involving a cute backstory about underground alligators who need water to take a shower and stay clean, came later on. "We basically realized that this stuff was directly connected to earth and dirt, and there were a lot of little gameplay cues that we felt like were going to be hard to explain," FitzRandolph says, "so we stopped and brainstormed about the story and what the visual elements could indicate." The team wanted to use the water to fill something underground, perhaps to a certain line, but struggled to figure out what logically would need water in that way. "What kind of things could we fill up underground? A bathtub would be cool but that doesn't make any sense underground. Well maybe it does," laughs FitzRandolph, "What about alligators living under the city? And it sort of snowballed from that." Where's My Water has done really well for Disney, so much so that the company says it has found a new official Disney character in Swampy the Alligator, probably the first time Walt Disney's legendary studio has taken IP directly from an iOS game, instead of the other way around. FitzRandolph says coming up with a strong character was part of development, but not just because Disney wanted IP. "We wanted to come up with a really good character that had a lot of personality -- it brings a lot of life to the puzzles. But also hopefully will have a big enough world that we might want to do a story about it that's not just our game, also in another format." "We were concerned," he adds, "that maybe alligators in general are not the most cuddly animals, but we felt like hopefully it will work out." And so far, it has, as the game still continues to do well on the App Store. What's next for FitzRandolph and his team at Disney? He says they're still working hard on new content for Where's My Water. The game has just recently gotten a big new update, "and we have plans for several more of those, so we're all coming up with new gameplay, new levels, and things like that. Especially as the game continues to do well," he says, "we want to continue to support it." Presumably he will eventually release another title, but right now it's all followup on the current release. As for FitzRandolph, he says he's happy to be doing what he's doing. Disney Mobile obviously appreciates having him around these days, making hit games for them, even if he did first get his foot just inside the door of the QA department.
Marvel Universe Online reveals Thing as newest playable character
Watch out, Marvel Universe Online fans. It's clobberin' time! The Fantastic Four's Ben Grimm has been announced as the latest addition to the MUO cast. For those of you who are keeping count, Thing's arrival brings the total playable character count up to five. So keep the guesses comin', folks. Whom do you want to see next?
GuildOx shares the most popular WoW character names by class
GuildOx, one of the premier services that ranks, tracks, and parses the top guilds and their progression in WoW, has been using Blizzard's new character APIs to some pretty hilarious ends. After mining out 11 million character names, GuildOx has sent us the most popular character names by class in World of Warcraft. As you'd expect, the pun meter is off the charts. You'll laugh. You'll cry. Your immersion will be broken. Let's have a look at the most popular names in World of Warcraft. Warriors Glitterstorm Cleaveland Ragebar Brostorm Cleaveage Ragestarved Sunderwear Executie Skillstorm Sunderpants Warrior characters love using skill names or the rage mechanic in their names. I'm actually a culprit of this phenomenon, except I like to think I was clever about it. My Night Elf warrior, for the brief time that I was raiding on the Alliance side of things, was named Rageleaf. It was awesome. Stop judging me.
Rusty Hearts introduces the gunslinging Natasha
Perfect World Entertainment has announced the newest addition to the Rusty Hearts cast, and her name is Natasha. This scantily clad, gun-toting heroine joins the Rusty Hearts roster in hopes of avenging the death of her brother. She's capable of dual-wielding pistols or blowing her enemies away with muskets, making her the perfect character for the player who just wants to make things go boom. For more information on the game's newest playable character, jump past the cut for a dev diary video or head on over to the Rusty Hearts official site.
Cable joins the Marvel Universe Online roster
Marvel Universe Online's roster keeps growing steadily, with newcomer Cable being announced as the latest playable character at New York Comic Con this weekend. The gun-wielding, telepathic, telekinetic son of Cyclops joins Wolverine and Deadpool as the game's third announced character. Also teased is another hero whose silhouette should be distinctive to any comics fan (or anyone who went to the movies anytime this summer). Who could this mysterious avenger possibly be? Follow on past the cut and find out for yourself.
