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PAX South 2015: Pox Nora is the coolest online card game you've never heard of
Pox Nora is a game that's hard to categorize. It's like Hearthstone, you see, because it's an online card game. But it's also like Civilization because it uses turn-based combat on a variety of maps with terrain that affects the battle. And maybe it's like Minecraft as well because it was built by a tiny team and developed incrementally through the feedback of a passionate fan base. Pox Nora was free-to-play before free-to-play was a thing. It's gone from tiny little indie to SOE-backed product and back again. And through its eight years, it's managed to fly quietly under the radar while its developers continually churn out content, implement community ideas, and expand its possibilities. At PAX South over the weekend, I sat down with Arthur Griffith, CEO of Desert Owl Games and co-creator of Pox Nora, to learn more about the game and its latest content additions.
Star Trek Online starts its fifth anniversary celebration
It was five years ago February 2nd that Star Trek Online came mewing into the MMO world, bringing with it final frontiers, infinite diversity, and canon-approved lockboxes. Cryptic's so excited to share this milestone that it's starting the celebrations a little early with a daily giveaway from today through Thursday, beginning with a free research and development pack. The real special treat is more than just casual freebies, however. The team's introducing a brand-new featured episode, Dust to Dust, starring Garrett Wang as Harry Kim. Q is also returning with his annual events, although this time around he's adding an Omega Particle minigame to the mix. Completing both the featured episode and Q events will earn tokens to spend on various rewards (including a Kobali Samsar Cruiser) and fragments that can be assembled for an Omega upgrade kits.
PAX South 2015: Moonrise and State of Decay shine at the Undead Labs booth
Most media appointments at an event like PAX South 2015 work like this: You meet the person you're supposed to meet, that person shows you the game her studio is working on, and then you rush off to the next booth on your list while cursing yourself for not scheduling time for a snack. Undead Labs handled my PAX appointment a bit differently, sitting me down for back-to-back play sessions with brand-new tablet game Moonrise and a remastered version of State of Decay, the zombie survival game that put the studio on the map. It was a little jarring to go from adorable pet battles to being torn in half by a zombie, but the two-for-one session provided a nice glimpse of where Undead Labs has been and where it intends to go.
PAX South 2015: Slaying giants in Motiga's Gigantic
Motiga's Gigantic is one part Team Fortress, one part Dota, and one part Monster Hunter. The basic match structure will sound familiar to MOBA lovers -- two teams of five slug it out for superiority by controlling resources, leveling up, and killing one another -- but the skill-based mechanics, multiple maps, and shifting strategy priorities make the game more than a three-lane farm fest. Gigantic isn't about last-hitting or memorizing meta. Instead, it's about slaying giants and aiming true. I hopped in on a quick Gigantic match with some other press folks this afternoon at PAX South 2015, and in the midst of delivering an absolute drubbing to the scrubs (kidding!) on the other side of the table, I was able to get a feel for the game's combat system, characters, and the way its massive guardians change the way battles play out.
Norrathian Notebook: Five reasons to support EQ Next and Landmark
I like Landmark and am looking forward to EverQuest Next. There, I said it. It should be no surprise. And as such, I certainly have a vested interest in how these games fare throughout their development and launch. I want to see them succeed. But the thing is, so should you -- whether or not you actually want to play them. Unfortunately, it seems all too fashionable lately for folks to tear something down instead of build it up. So often when I'm following the discussions about EQ Next and Landmark, I hear plenty of reasons why folks don't like the games, and the reasons frequently have nothing to do with the games themselves. Detractors are going on about longstanding gripes and grudges instead of judging the games on their own merits (a practice that the whole world could certainly do without). Amid all the scathing comments I've heard directed at SOE for slights real and imagined, one recently gave me pause and made me reflect on the reasons that supporting these two MMO endeavors is worthwhile.
PAX South 2015: SWTOR reveals its plans for this year
When Eric Musco, the Star Wars: The Old Republic community manager, took the stage at the Community cantina last night at PAX South, he revealed that in 2015 the team wants to do something a bit different with this and future cantina crawl events. In the past, it has been policy not to reveal anything at the cantinas; they were intended to be social events where players could get some face-time with the developers of the game that they both enjoyed. However, going forward, the community and development teams have decided that each cantina will reveal that had not been mentioned before. The reveal at this weekend's cantina came in the form of the yet-to-be-published producer's letter by Bruce Maclean. The completely made-up story is that it was stolen from his computer while he wasn't looking and printed out to share with us at the cantina. After the break, you'll find a copy of that letter as it was dictated to cantina goers. The caveat, of course, is that this is not the final version of the letter that will appear on the official site in two weeks, so everything is subject to change.
Marvel Heroes hands out free cows and plans team-up revamp
The Cow King is on the move in Marvel Heroes, and a call is going out for all supers to join the most ridiculous battle in the universe. During the weekend Cowtastrophe event, players will get an 40% XP bonus and a portal to the game's bovine levels, where they can slaughter beef for better loot. Marvel Heroes is even giving out a free mini-cow pet for any players who log in on Saturday. In other Marvel Heroes news, one of the next big projects for Gazillion is a revamp of the team-up system. While all of the details of this revamp are not clear as of yet, we do know that the revamp will allow players to customize team-up's power pools much like main characters.
RuneScape's sub fee hike goes into effect March 1st
Jagex announced a sub rate hike for long-running sandbox RuneScape back in November, and this week, the studio has declared that the new fees will go into effect beginning March 1st. While the game is still free-to-play, the optional sub will increase from $8 US to $9.49 US; the official site includes a conversion chart for the international community and multi-month subbers. For existing Premier Club customers, Jagex posted a reminder about grandfathering in the old rates as long as the sub is maintained: Don't forget - as long as you're a member and don't lapse out for more than 14 days, you're eligible to keep your current rate of membership. Subscribe now to secure access to all of RuneScape's members' content at current prices. The studio is also talking up its inbound ports expansion; there's a fresh trailer on the mechanic after the cut.
RIFT's 3.1 Storm at Sea arrives next week -- with capes
There's a preview of RIFT's new Tyrant's Throne content on the game's official website. On January 28th, Trion says, players will see some "titanic zone events" as well as a new 20-player raid, a 2-player chronicle, and more. The journey into RIFT 3.1 Storm at Sea is nearly at hand. On January 28, players will make landfall at the harbor of Tyrant's Throne – just in time for titanic zone events that bring ancient akvan lumbering out of the abyss! Ascended will have one week to wipe them from the island before the opening of Tyrant's Forge, a new 20-player raid pitting the strongest Guardians and Defiant against the Dragon Queen of Air. The most important bit, of course, is capes. Yes, capes. "New capes debut for all," says the studio.
Red 5 tweaking Firefall's reputation system
Firefall's latest news blurb concerns reputation. It's not all about grind and 20 different currencies that will clog up your inventory, though. In fact, Red 5 says that the work-in-progress rep system will ultimately feature reputation points that function like experience. Which, OK, is still about grind. But yay for inventory space! The devs are also enthused about the future of the rep system, which they say will make use of Firefall's NPC corporations that "aren't much more than flavor" in the current build. You can read all about rep at the official Firefall website.
Echo of Soul unveils new NA website
Echo of Soul is quickly becoming known around these parts as a title that is talking big talk prior to its North American debut, and now the Korean fantasy game has a new website to match these boasts. The US version of the website has now gone live, with information, art, community hub, and the vitally important beta sign-up button. It also has a short section on the game's mobile app that will feature access to chat and trading. Echo of Soul's North American beta test is planned for sometime this spring. [Source: Aeria Games press release]
Take a tour of DCUO's Amazon Fury raid with the devs
Coming soon to DC Universe Online is the Amazon Fury Part II DLC, because Amazons are not known to be timid, quiet souls. All about the fury, they are. Anyway, part of this upcoming patch is the new Halls of Hades raid, and the devs are inviting you to go along with them on a tour of this intimidating experience. We've got a 43-minute video of the Halls of Hades with devs and test center players after the break if you want to get a good feel for what's going to be faceplanting your heroes in the near future.
Pre-orders for Marvel Heroes' Winter Soldier are now open
After years of being mostly notable for being supposedly dead, Bucky Barnes turns out to have actually been kept alive as an elite assassin known as the Winter Soldier. You know, as comics do. The important things to note about the character for our purposes are the fact that he's coming to Marvel Heroes and you can pre-order him right now. You can also hear David Hayter voicing him as a closely related cousin of Solid Snake in the video past the cut, but that probably shouldn't influence your purchase. The hero pack is at a 10% discount before the character is released and includes the character himself, two costumes for Bucky (comic and MCU incarnations), an extra hero-specific inventory, six Fortune cards, and a retcon token. With the discount, it's just a hair over $16; if that sounds like a bargain for playing a mildly psychotic unfrozen Hydra assassin, you can pick it up now.
SWTOR Q&A mentions 12x, soloable flashpoints
Werit has posted a Q&A with Star Wars: The Old Republic's community team. It touches on the well-received 12x experience boost, which BioWare says it will be discussing "later this year." There's also a bit about making older flashpoints soloable and while BioWare says it doesn't want to make all group content accessible to single players, it does have "some major story moments that [it] would like every player to see."
APB: Reloaded coming to PS4 and Xbox One in Q2 2015
Last fall we heard that APB: Reloaded was reportedly working on bringing the crime spree MMO to consoles but was struggling with the companies to make that happen. Fortunately, it seems as though all of the details have been paved out, as APB is gearing up for its console debut in the latter part of the second quarter of this year. APB: Reloaded will be coming to both the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One as a free-to-play title, although it will require Xbox owners to be part of the Xbox Live Gold service. The console adaptation is being handled by a joint effort between Reloaded Games, Deep Silver, and The Workshop. The Workshop CEO Peter Akemann says that the title will shine on the new hardware: "Because APB is such a technically complex game, featuring thousands of destructible objects and heavily customized players and vehicles in every scene, we are thrilled to help make APB a reality on these brand new high performance hardware platforms." To date, APB has had five million PC downloads since 2011. [Source: Reloaded Games press release]
RuneScape opens RuneLabs for player suggestions
If you have a terrific idea that you'd like to get implemented into an MMO, then RuneScape's your best bet these days. The ever-creative MMO recently launched RuneLabs as a formal structured suggestion process that will take the best player ideas and make them an in-game feature. RuneLabs works like this: Players will make a pitch to that month's studio-assigned criteria. If it gets enough community support, it will be reviewed by Jagex and (barring a studio veto) voted on by fellow players. The winner of the poll will go from concept to reality. You can watch an amusing video explaining RuneLabs after the break!
Skyforge unveils the Gunner
The Beatles once opined that happiness is a warm gun. Skyforge's Gunner class has a warm gun that also transforms into different modes and allows the class to call down orbital strikes, so one can only conclude that it is a very happy class indeed. Its opponents are somewhat less so. You can see the class in action in the video just past the break, or you can read through the reveal page to get a better idea of how this multi-mode class will play. The cannon has three main modes as well as a variety of sub-firing options, allowing gunners to mow down targets at long range with missile barrages or take out hardened targets with bursts of plasma. Since it's meant to stay at range, the class also sports a variety of defensive tricks like teleporting back and forth. It's exactly the sort of class for you if you like having a big gun, even more so if you want that big gun to shoot all sorts of different stuff.
DDO trumpets the start of its Winter Games
Just because we're in the heart of winter in the northern hemisphere doesn't mean that we can't enjoy snow-themed festivities! That's the attitude of Dungeons and Dragons Online, which has started a slew of activities under its Winter Games umbrella. For starters, there's the Midwinter Festival in the Forgotten Realms which includes speed skating, snowflake collecting, and vole smashing. Meanwhile in Eberron, the ever-popular Risia Ice Games are back with more ice sliding action. Then there's an ice skating rink in the harbor, an ice jump off a cliff, and a frozen half-pipe in the Bogwater Tavern. Participation in all of these activities will not only result in embarassing fun, but rewards from the various tokens won.
Forsaken World's Freedom Falls expansion coming February 4
Forsaken World's upcoming expansion is called Freedom Falls. When, exactly, is it upcoming? That would be February 4th, according to a Perfect World press release. Said release also tells us that Freedom Falls features a new playable race and class as well as a new high-level progression path called Apotheosis which allows players to "join the ranks of the gods of Forsaken World." New zones include the Land of Origination and the Polar Borderlands region. [Source: Perfect World press release]
Firefall is prepping an all-new crafting system
Good news for those disillusioned with the state of crafting in Firefall: Red 5 is preparing an "all-new crafting system" to replace the current setup. New crafting dev Gortok spoke a little to this on the forums over the past month, saying that as a person who's designed four such systems for MMOs, he finds Firefall's crafting both pointless and grindy. Fortunately, Gortok has ideas to make it all much, much better: "It will take some time, and my plan is to actually rip out the existing recipes and research, replace the entire thing from scratch, and implement an entirely new system for the actual act of crafting. There are a lot of great things that we lost, and I want to bring some of those feelings back without the complication and confusion" Some of the changes include restructuring research, consolidating recipes, crafting in batches, and making thumping "more desirable" again. [Thanks to Eri for the tip!]
