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TUAW preview: NimbleBit's Pocket Frogs
Since I got my new iPhone 4 a few weeks back, I've been playing more games than ever on Apple's little handheld. I just recently got back into Ngmoco's We Rule. It's probably the pinnacle of the "freemium" genre on the iPhone so far. It's free to play, very social, and very much based on timed "check-ins," where you set crops to grow and then come back in a few hours to harvest them. It puts in little blips of gameplay that move you towards a larger progress goal. The only problem is that We Rule isn't all that fun; it's a bunch of clicking and grinding. So, lately I've been wondering when someone would add a fun freemium game to the App Store. It would have to be something that was social and progressive and all that that entails, but it would also need to have a game component that was actually fun to play. Enter NimbleBit! They're following up on their great froggy platformer DizzyPad with Pocket Frogs, a freemium title that actually adds some fun to the equation and shows a lot of potential as well. %Gallery-102063%
The Daily Grind: EQ2X or LOTRO?
EverQuest II's free-flavored server has been available to the public for a few weeks now, and yours truly finally found the time to check it out several days ago. While last week's major MMO news centered around Turbine's Lord of the Rings Online going free-to-try (as well as its cleverly blasphemous use of Gandalf in a television ad), EQ2X beat the land of hobbits and Haradrim to market by the better part of a month. It's not much of a stretch to say that the two games compete for a similar audience, and while both focus on stellar PvE content, there are marked differences between them. One rides the coattails of the most renowned fantasy license in history, while the other owes its existence to one of the massive genre's granddaddy titles. One features fugly character models and beautiful environments, while the other is starting to act its age when it comes to visuals. There are more differences (and similarities) of course, and listing them all would take the better part of a feature column, so let's get to the meat of today's question. EQ2X or LOTRO? Or both?
MMO Family: A parent's look at World of Cars Online
MMO Family is your resource for leveling a gaming-specced family, from tips on balancing gaming with family life to finding age-appropriate online games for everyone in the family. How could you not fall in love with a Disney/Pixar movie? I'm not sure that's even possible. Cars revved up belly laughs in the theater back in 2006, earning two Oscar nominations and raking in more than a dozen other industry awards. Kids were captivated by the feisty little car characters, and grownups chuckled at voicing from such high-octane stars as Owen Wilson, Paul Newman and even Cheech Marin. The MMO version of the franchise, which officially launched last month, pulls away from the starting line without this full tank of charisma. World of Cars Online hits on all cylinders yet somehow fails to throttle up into the type of completely engaging world we've come to expect from a Disney/Pixar creation. It's a 2-D, minigame-centric experience with lots (and we do mean lots) of point-and-click racing. Still, if you've got a young boy around the house who's hankering to burn a little online rubber, World of Cars is an inexpensive, kid-friendly way to do it.
Rise and Shiny recap: Alganon
We have all heard of the controversy surrounding Alganon. Essentially, it breaks down into a few basic points: it is a "WoW clone," and it is being run by Derek Smart, a say-it-like-you-mean-it development bad-boy. Many claim he looks for negative attention and enjoys arguing with players. To be blunt, I don't care what people think about Derek Smart. I have said it before: I actually believe that he reacts to negative attention the way other developers wish they could. I don't keep track of his battles, though; I keep track of what he has done in gaming. All I know is that before he was with Alganon, I did not enjoy the game. After he became involved, the game got better. Concerning the "WoW-clone" issue: If I had a gold piece for every time I've heard that, I could afford that incredible level 50 mount! (*snort*) If I took a moment to break down all games that have similarities to WoW, this article would be much, much longer than it needs to be. WoW was successful, and the industry takes cues from success. WoW took its own cues from other games before that. Still, does Alganon take more from WoW than, say, Lord of the Rings Online? Read on, and let's discuss it.
Age of Empires Online promises not to nickle-and-dime players
Love it, hate it or meeky accept it, the terms "freemium" and "free-to-play" come with a lot of baggage these days, sometimes to the point of overshadowing the game itself. When Age of Empires fans heard that Microsoft was going to be releasing an online version of the hit RTS series, some of the fans' enthusiasm was tempered by the word that it would adopt the popular freemium business model. Microsoft Game Studio's Dave Luehmann was on hand at Gamescom to assure players that the company isn't out to nickle-and-dime fans to skip parts of the game they don't like. Joystiq reports that they won't be adopting the same strategy as other F2P models. "I don't like to pay for things I don't like to do, that seems kind of backwards," Luehmann said. "So how about we produce things that people actually want?" Instead of purchasing a lot of little items, the studio will simply put up large chunks of content as one-time purchases. These might include a new civilization or an area containing a plethora of quests. Microsoft is still feeling out a fair price point for the additional content, but it pointed to the fact that Age of Empires Online will ship with more than 25 hours of completely free entertainment to enjoy.
Lost Pages of Taborea: What's $15 worth?
Hello everyone! This week, Jeremy Stratton (your usual Lost Pages of Taborea host) and I are swapping columns for variety -- so thanks to Jeremy for allowing me, Beau Hindman, to take over his column for the day! I have to admit that I am relatively new to the game, never having really given my character time to grow into a proper hero. Fortunately, the game's free-to-play status allows for this type of reckless avatar growth. But how free is it? Runes of Magic is not a "freemium" game, one that literally asks for payment at some point in order to level higher or to explore new content. It's my favorite type of free-to-play: the kind that gives you the client, gives you a free house, and even loans you a mount to make early level travel much easier. Critics of free-to-play will say that most free-to-play games trick, convince, or even force players to spend large amounts of money in the cash shop in order to "succeed," often without defining what "success" means. While I admit that I play at the speed of molasses, I do maintain a few titles in which I slowly, but surely, obtain higher levels. Runes of Magic isn't one of them, yet, so I want to take a look at how much I will get for a typical subscription amount: 15 US dollars. So, how much does it buy me?
MMO Family: Long-distance gaming with Grandma and Grandpa
MMO Family is your resource for leveling a gaming-specced family, from tips on balancing gaming with family life to finding age-appropriate online games for everyone in the family. Back in my day (eons before even that prehistoric era when we trudged five miles uphill through the lava to kill Lord Nagafen, after sitting in the server's text chat room so our buff timers wouldn't tick down while the rest of the group was getting prepped), kids wrote letters to keep in touch with long-distance grandparents. We struggled almost as hard to read our elders' spidery, old-fashioned cursive as we did to figure out something relevant to say to these relative strangers. Then once a month, we'd be herded into the kitchen or hall (where most people's phones were back then) for the Dreaded Phone Call of Doom, during which we'd self-consciously mumble responses to people who couldn't remember which grade we were in or which of us kids was the swimmer and which was the ballet dancer. Talk about awkward... Today, cell phones and email make it much easier to keep a family in touch when its members are separated by miles. Still, it's hard for kids to develop a relationship of any depth with people they meet infrequently at best and with whom they share nothing in common beyond a few genetic jots and tittles. Until gaming came along.
The Daily Grind: Which game will receive the F2P treatment next?
Two years ago, if you'd have told many people that large Western-based developers would be shifting their games to the free-to-play model, your response might well have come in the form of a great deal of laughter. However, as we've seen in the last while, the market is changing. Turbine shifted Dungeons and Dragons Online to a F2P model and have had great success with it. So much so, that they're now working to shift Lord of the Rings Online to a F2P model as well. Sony Online Entertainment dipped their toes into the water with Free Realms, and have found the response to be overwhelming. Now, they're working on bringing EverQuest II over to a F2P model as well by spawning entirely new servers for an EverQuest II - Extended version. Even Age of Conan and Warhammer Online have offered up a modified freemium model -- unlimited "trials" giving players a certain number of levels to play for as long as they'd like. Meanwhile, we're all left wondering: With the recent shifts into the F2P market we're seeing, what game do you think will make the jump next? Will SOE garner excellent profits from the planned EQ2E servers, thereby setting off a chain reaction whereby they shift their older titles like Vanguard, Star Wars Galaxies, EverQuest, and the rest, to that model? (Might we even see them reviving The Matrix Online as a F2P if the profits are really good?) Do you think Turbine will finally turn its eye towards Asheron's Call once LotRO takes off under its new model? Will NCsoft jump into the fray with one of the games from their stable? In the world of guesses, anything is possible -- so tell us: What game do you think will make the jump to free-to-play next?
The Road to Mordor: Gated communities
This past week, many of us were shaken out of our self-absorption with LotRO's F2P switch as we were suddenly joined by -- of all things -- the good folks at EverQuest II. I don't think anyone could've predicted two such high-profile MMORPGs moving to a subscription/free-to-play hybrid model this year, which makes LotRO and EQII comrades-in-arms for the time being. Both titles are currently in testing, with their F2P release coming this fall. Other than the mutual surprise of two game communities that were taken off guard (except for that one guy who, y'know, totally called it and won't stop crowing about it), there are a number of similarities as both SOE and Turbine look to replicate DDO's F2P success and bolster both the number of players and number of dollars coming in to both games. However, there's certainly a major difference in how the freebie players will be handled: LotRO is integrating them with subscribers on normal servers, whereas EverQuest II Expanded will segregate the free players on their own unique servers. So I thought that this would be an excellent time to talk about one of the crucial factors of F2P switches, which is the potential growth and/or fracturing of the game's community. Which MMO has the better idea, LotRO or EQII? Hit the jump for my thoughts.
MMO Family: A parent's look at Fantage
MMO Family is your resource for leveling a gaming-specced family, from tips on balancing gaming with family life to finding age-appropriate online games for everyone in the family. Now that we've established that kids aren't gaming snobs and will dig into a good Flash game with as much relish as we grownups attack any top-rung MMO title, let's look at another up-and-coming Flash title for kids. Fantage (short for "Fantastic Age") has attracted nearly 7 million users since April 2008 almost entirely by word of mouth -- how's that for kid power? I suspect the reason Fantage tickles my 9-year-old playtester's fancy is tied to the advancements she's been making with her real-life character this summer. The achievements are flowing: she's figured out how to use the Page Up and Page Down buttons to snag [Swimming in the Deep End], she's acquired her first epic mount [Big Brother's Hand-Me-Down Bike] and she's become fascinated with the possibilities of /dance... We're even breaking away from class-specific gear sets to farm all the mats for her [Tier 4 School Supplies] individually via hotly contested minigames all over town. So while she's still utterly captivated by the sparkling magic of a game like Pixie Hollow, this evolving little personality is hooked on Fantage's opportunities to show off her own style and personality via her avatar and accessories. Different game, different flavor -- so let's investigate the attractions.
Company of Heroes Online seeking beta recruits
Company of Heroes Online, Relic's freemium real-time strategy title, has opened up registration for its upcoming closed beta. To receive a code, applicants will have to make sure to check both "Receive News" and "Receive Offers" when making their account, as beta keys will be sent out using the opt-in mailing list. A post on the CoHO site states that a limited number of keys will go out in the first phase but that they'll "soon be announcing a partnership" to expand the beta. For those uninterested in helping with the process of finding entrenched bugs, the full free-to-play title should be released this autumn.
Captain's Log: The C-Store and the perils of going freemium
Welcome to another installment of Captain's Log, in which we explore -- and sometimes complain about -- the uncharted depths of Star Trek Online. This is your captain speaking from behind a rickety card table in a basement somewhere in the murky New Jersey Nebula. Isn't moving the worst? Last week, we learned a little bit about Daniel Stahl, the brand new executive producer on STO. But not enough to prepare us for the crazy truth bomb with which he torpedoed the official forums. On Sunday, Stahl suggested that he could see STO going free-to-play. Seriously. I had planned to discuss the Cryptic Store this week anyway, and this fits in nicely, given micro-transactions' importance to the free-to-play model. Would Cryptic Studios' switching STO from subscriptions to an F2P model be a godsend or a hellish nightmare? (Hint: It would wind up somewhere in the middle.)
Battlefield Heroes celebrates first birthday with free in-game items
Wow, has it already been a year since DICE's freemium version of its popular Battlefield FPS series, Battlefield Heroes, launched on the PC? Sure enough, that's the case and EA is looking to celebrate by hooking up players with a free $5 voucher for use in-game, which can be redeemed here to unlock a two-day XP boost, a two-day VP boost and 25 bandages. You'll have to act fast, as the code below is only valid until tomorrow: 49TP-ZJB7-NVTR-P8AE Other than free in-game items, EA also offers some stats on the first year of the game. Turns out, more than 4.8 million players have registered for play and the community as a whole has managed to commit 1.2 billion heinous murders in a total of 29 million hours of gameplay -- equal to 3,724 years, you monsters.
Canabalt now universal, Godfinger now available
Here's two big updates to big games on the App Store lately -- first up, the much-loved Canabalt has now gone universal, so if you have an iPhone and an iPad and have already purchased the app, you can now play it in full resolution on your iPad. Of course, if you haven't bought the app yet, what are you waiting for? It's a classic one-button app, dripping with ambience, that's just $2.99 for both platforms. Ngmoco has released their second big freemium title worldwide -- Godfinger is now available on the App Store for both iPhone and iPad. I got to play an early build of the app at GDC, and it basically combines Ngmoco's We Rule social and persistent functionality with some Pocket God-style gameplay. In other words, it'll likely be popular. I'm a little surprised the app didn't come out sooner -- Ngmoco is supposedly planning to release twenty new titles this year. If that's still true, they better get a move on.
Free for All: New changes call for new terms
As a writer for a large gaming website, I have learned to accept debate and discussion going off in quite a few directions, even if the original idea behind the article was not being talked about. This is a good thing, in my book, and will often demonstrate the concerns of the day better than requesting feedback more directly. If they can comment about certain subjects even in a comment section about opposite subjects, then you know that the issue is a really hot one. There are two subjects that can almost always pop up in any article's comment section, and these are: The NGE: Star Wars Galaxies' infamous game-altering changes are still talked about, despite the fact that the game now is able to stand on its own two feet quite well. It's as though the notorious series of tweaks and changes were so traumatic to some players that no amount of time will ever lessen the burn, even if the game were to fade away entirely. Free-to-play versus pay-to-play: I'm not confused about the appearance of the words; I'm concerned about the statements that pit the two payment models against each other, like the opposing sides of a presidential race. While I am all for comparing the two and do all the time, it has to be taken with a bit of humor in order to feel balanced. Even then, the discussions are soon pointless, being that both terms are slowly holding hands behind our backs. It turns out that free-to-play and subscriptions are smitten with each other.
Company of Heroes Online reports to North America for duty this fall
click to drop into our gallery Relic's freemium real-time strategy game, Company of Heroes Online, will launch in North America this Fall, THQ has announced. The adaptation of PC exclusive Company of Heroes was previously announced for South Korea and is currently in beta in the Chinese market. Company of Heroes Online features a persistent online world and, while being free to play, offers player customization through micro transactions. If you're unfamiliar with the franchise, you might want to check out an earlier version of the acclaimed WWII strategy title on Steam. Find the trailer after the break. %Gallery-94329%
PSP RPG adopts 'freemium' model in Japan
Acquire and Zero Div are working on a new PSP RPG -- and it'll be completely free. Bakumatsu Revolution will be free to download via PlayStation Network and will feature a full ten-hour quest, which can be played solo or cooperatively with up to three others (Monster Hunter style). According to IGN, players will even be able to freely distribute the game through PSP-to-PSP wireless connectivity. Of course, there's always a catch. While the core game will be free, for-pay add-ons, such as downloadable items and quests, will be available after release. Essentially, this is the "freemium" model that's been successfully utilized by many PC MMOs and casual titles, especially in Asian markets. Bakumatsu Revolution will be available on June 25 in Japan; but no plans for a North American release are currently in the works.
MMO Family: A parent's look at Pixie Hollow
MMO Family is your resource for leveling a gaming-specced family ... From tips on balancing gaming with family life to finding age-appropriate niches for every family member, MMO Family offers you advice on MMO gaming of the family, by the family and for the family. I wasn't planning to include a 2-D Flash game in MMO Family's initial sweep of children's games -- but then my daughter tried Disney's Pixie Hollow. Initially dismissive of the idea of slumming it in 2-D, she found herself utterly captivated by its magpie collection quests and friendly community of players. In the eyes of this 8-year-old road tester, Pixie Hollow delivers an enjoyable, social experience in an online world ... And I was forced to admit that this world suits her own interests as well as deeply immersive MMO worlds hold mine. We're not going to get into gender wars here. Obviously, some girls won't like the fairies theme, and we're sure grownups will continue their snarky debates over the game's recently added male characters ("sparrow men"). Beyond that, what's most apparent is that Pixie Hollow successfully snares both kids who are enthralled with the Disney Fairies franchise and those who simply enjoy a glittery, web-based spot to flutter and chatter.
We Rule content update, server fixes incoming
Ngmoco CEO Neil Young posted another update last week about We Rule. That game is probably the biggest hit Ngmoco has come across yet with its freemium model, but unfortunately, the title has been plagued with service outages since the release. Young says that they simply underestimated the amount of people who want to play the game, and that they're working as quickly as possible to scale the server infrastructure on both the We Rule and Plus+ systems. The game is free-to-play, but in-game purchases still seem to be doing well for the company, as the app currently sits at number 40 on the Top Grossing list in the App Store, above a few $0.99 apps and even much more expensive fare. Young says the company is also pushing out content updates for the game -- there are new crops to grow and new buildings to buy and build on the farms. I'm playing We Rule (if a little reluctantly), and it seems like Ngmoco is playing around with the variations on crops and reward times -- some crops seem designed to bring people back to the app in as quickly as a few hours, while some promise a large reward daily (as if they're trying to at least drive people back in every day). I've experienced a few more bugs as well, like not seeing any of my friends' kingdoms on the main screen. Despite the bugs and the issues, it certainly seems like people are playing (and paying), and clearly Ngmoco is dedicated to support and producing content (Young says they're planning more updates for players who've reached level 25 already). Other freemium games like Godfinger haven't quite taken off as quickly, but as a flagship title for Ngmoco and a learning experience for their future releases, We Rule seems to be working well.
Kingsisle spills the beans about advanced Wizard 101 pets system
You can already feel the buzz in the Wizard 101 community, Tweets firing off that give details about test realm goodies, questions being asked about naming, and general cries of "SQUEEE!" sounding from every corner of the Wizard 101 fanbase. Kingsisle Entertainment today released more details about their upcoming "advanced pet system." Here are some of the cool things you will be able to do once you've reached level 7 and entered the Pet Pavillion. Allow your pets to roam (and dirty) your Castles & Lands. Clean up duty optional. Buy or craft delicious things to make them happy (or pouty when they don't get more.) No one wants unhealthy pets! So get them some exercise in the Derby. Want something new and unique? Create brand new pets using the hatching system! Pet's like mini-games too, you know. So let 'em play them. Of course, you keep the prizes. These pets have a bite that is worse than their bark. Watch as they kick some tail in battle with you. Be sure to keep them well fed and happy, because after each match they are going to be hungry! Wouldn't you be? Well, you actually will be once you take control of your pet in a fun filled race of skill and speed. It sounds a lot like a Kart racing type game, but near one hundred times cuter. You can try out the new pets in the Wizard 101 test realm, and popular fancast Ravenwood Radio is giving away 5 Gobbler pets for you to love! Get the details here.
