Fury
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Auran wants to make you their bitch
John Romero and Mike Wilson might be indulging in increasingly childish verbal fisticuffs over the famous "John Romero's about to make you his bitch!" advertisement, but all of that testosterone-laden scuffling kind of glosses over the fact that antagonizing and belittling your players is not a great way to gain a solid following. Especially if your players are over ten years old. Well, according to Signe at F13, Auran (or whoever's really in back of the game Fury these days - funnily enough it appears to be Mike Wilson's Gamecock) wants you to suck it down and stop being such a shameful girly loser in what has to be one of the outright worst MMO incentive emails I've seen so far, endearingly titled "LOSER! LOSER! LLLOOOOSSSSEEEERRRRR!"
Dungeons and Dragons Online PvP video
Shot in-game by a guild called The Black Plague, this video is sure to change some impressions people might have about Dungeons and Dragons Online. I have to admit, because my last interaction with D&D at all was the original sit-down-and-roll-some-dodecahedral-dice version, I was totally unprepared for the level of action inherent in DDO PvP.This is sheer lunacy. Watching this video gives the impression you're actually watching an Unreal Tournament mod -- this is the PvP that Fury wanted to be. The meleé combat alone is worth the price of admisison; it's fast, it's hectic, it's sloppy, just like real life! Except with CTF elements thrown in. Check it out after the jump -- it's DivX, so make sure you have the plugin installed.[Thanks, Schad!]
Fury still being sold in retail outlets, but who's buying it?
There's a forum post at atomicmpc.com that involves itself with the fact that Fury is still being sold in retail outlets (Electronics Boutique specifically named, though apparently there are others), when the game is free to download and free to play. As written here, though, it's not quite so cut-and-dried, as there is a slight benefit to owning the physical disc. My question, however, is this: given the depth of negative press Auran has gotten for Fury, is it worth paying for at all? Across the board, Fury's gotten nothing but horrible reviews, and I'm surprised the game exists at all. This is an industry story on the level of Duke Nukem Forever, or Daikatana. Is the disc worth owning for any reason other than a White Elephant gift?
Second Life ranked 8th Most Effective Placement on TV in 2007
According to hollywoodreporter.com, Second Life enjoys the 8th Most Effective Placement on TV this year, behind Nexxus on the show 'Shear Genius', and in front of Visa on the show 'What Not to Wear'. Interestingly, according to the graphic, this is the public's response to SL's appearance on The Office, even though said appearance was virtually 1% of the entire content of the show, as opposed to the CSI: NY episode, in which SL is the subject of the plot.Now, what this means to you and me is probably not a whole lot. As I understand it, this measures how the product is perceived by John Q. Public, and in this case, being on The Office means that SL has gained some respect by merely rubbing shoulders with that popular sitcom. Perhaps if Fury had been able to swing a mention ... nah, some things you just can't save. [Thanks, Neptune!]
The Care and Feeding of Warriors: Heresies
The Care and Feeding of Warriors is all tired after a long night stabbing things in Kara. Matthew Rossi finally actually got a drop out of that instance. which, after several months now he was beginning to think didn't actually have loot, just badges. And they just put the badges in, so for a while, he didn't think anything dropped in there.There are aspects to every class that are hard to explain to someone else, things you just learn as you play and which you incorporate into your playstyle through intuition. One of the reasons I am so unmitigatedly awful at playing a rogue and leave it to the talented rogues I know like Voi and Vizz is that I simply don't understand how to make use of those intuitives. I'm awful at understanding how to make use of things like combo points, for example.Last night I respecced to bring my warrior into Kara as an offtank/DPS. Part of the reason was that I wanted to try out a 5/41/15 build that I thought would work well for offtanking. It seemed to do fairly well, I died once on a bad pull, but I also managed to grab agg on another bad pull when Vish, our MT, went down and saved a wipe, so I give the build a cautious 8 out of 10 stars. (I may tweak it more to be a more dedicated DW build, as right now it lacks talents in that area.) One of the things I noticed was that I have at this point entirely unlearned the process of both DPSing and tanking as a warrior. Not that I don't know how, but that I don't consciously think about them at all. I've even memorized specific patterns based on what my spec is, and when I have certain spec specific abilities like Shield Slam or Revenge, I don't even have to consider where on my bars to put them or when to use them, it's entirely ingrained.
Warrior Epic gets new trailer
Our Chris Chester first posted about the upcoming Warrior Epic here, and Possibility Space's Brice Lucas has sent along word of WE's new trailer, available here. I have to say I'm excited by the artwork on display at WE's website -- there's a wide variety of creatures and characters, and as a whole the game looks unique. I could have used a bit more depth in the trailer, but these days we know enough not to go by marketing material in judging a game, don't we?[Thanks, Brice!]
Former Auran producer defends staff, management
The entire Auran staff may have been let go earlier this week, but former Producer David Gillespie has a post up on his personal blog that defends Auran's staff, and the decisions made by management. This is the "Game flopped and the entire team was laid off, but the staff were the best!" law -- a far too frequent occurrence in the gaming industry. This law works in opposites, too. Sid Meier eats babies.David Gillespie left Auran long before it went into administration, but he obviously had a lot of respect for everyone there. I didn't know Auran were the same developers responsible for 90's RTS classic Dark Reign, though. And there's an industry lesson to learn from this -- no matter how talented your team, how great your working environment, how successful your studio has been up till now -- if you make a commercial MMO that's a failure, you're in a whole world of trouble.Maybe now that Fury is free, I should download it just to see what it was really like-- but on second thoughts, I think I'll pass for now.[Via warcry.com]
The Daily Grind: I'll take one box of fug, please
Yesterday, Games Radar ran a piece on the ugliest video game box art of 2007, which got me to thinking about some of the MMO boxes sitting up on the shelf next to my desk. Now, one of the earliest things that ever drew my best friend into EverQuest so long ago was the presence of a hottie blond elf babe on the cover. Being a dutiful friend, I joined him -- and I have to admit, she's definitely not hard on the eyes. Since then we've seen a lot of box art across the genre; some truly excellent, some utterly pathetic. This morning, we'd like to ask what your personal choices for best and worst MMO box art are? For me, best would be hard to pick because I really love fantasy art and I think there are some talented artists doing MMO boxes on that side. That said, I can pick worst out pretty easily. My personal worst would have to go to the person who did the box for Fury. I'm probably going to get some hate for kicking them when they're down, but to be honest, the box design was poor from any standpoint other than being prophetic. For those of you who haven't seen it, take a gander at it above. It looks like it borrowed heavily from the Lord of the Rings Online in it's fire-on-brown theme, but whereas the LotRO box has the ring any fan knows and loves, and the helm faded into the background. The Fury box art has a great big flaming F on the cover, the title, a quote, and some overall blah elements. As far as generating excitement that makes one think of PvP butt-kicking, that certainly isn't it. So what do you think? Are you equally as fond of hottie elf chicks, or do you prefer the stark name only on your game box? Perhaps you think the hot chick on the cover is overdone and would rather see something new altogether for MMO box art?
Fury developer Auran shuts down
Fury developer Auran has reportedly entered voluntary administration after closing shop and laying employees off yesterday afternoon. Gamespot AU reports via an insider that the company will meet with creditors in a month to decide whether it will fully liquidate or restructure. Fury, which allegedly cost $13.2 million USD to make, has met with weak sales and reviews. Just yesterday, Auran announced the game would become free to download and play through an overhauled subscription model. Expect an official statement statement to be made in the near future.Auran seems to be a classic example of what happens when a small developer dreams big and delivers a product that gets lost in the shuffle. Even if Auran does get dismantled, Gamespot's source claims Fury will live on and that the servers won't be shut down.
Scott Jennings on how to make PvP not suck
Just in case any of us design a PvP ruleset for a massively multiplayer online game, Scott Jennings has helpfully posted a 13-step guide to "PvP done right" on his personal blog, BrokenToys.org.It's a potent mixture of common sense, personal opinion, and thousands upon thousands disagreeing that classes are needed. It's a great primer, aphorisms or not, and written wonderfully. Put simply, PvP in a game needs to work -- if it's an impossible concept or impossible to implement, nothing else matters. Personally, I'd go as far as to say the simpler the concept, the better the execution -- of course, that's a huge sweeping statement, but be it Team Fortress 2 or World of Warcraft or Chess, the depth doesn't come from the rules, it comes from the implementation. Except Cricket.All decisions will upset someone. It's just about having a realistic, well-defined goal for PvP in your game and going from there -- and accepting that there will always be an awful lot of criticism, rage, and Fury.
Fury not dead, just on life-support
Last week we reported on a widespread rumor that, due to Fury's commercial flop, Australian developer Auran was going to be the subject of a big lay-off, and that a significant chunk of Fury's development going forward was going to be out-sourced to China. Auran CEO Tony Hilliam recently addressed these concerns, and his comments were posted on Auran's official forum.While promising to revolutionize the way PvP in MMOs works, critics have lampooned the game for its muddled combat, and the fact that it only loosely qualifies as an MMO in the strictest sense. Interestingly, though Hilliam tries to take an upbeat tone in his remarks, he really doesn't deny any of rumors he claims to be debunking, saying, "The future will focus on a smaller, more agile core team of Fury developers." That's fairly transparent executive speak for "all non-essential personnel are being laid off." He also confirmed rumors that much of the future development is being out-sourced to China.Perhaps the only solace for these non-essential Auran developers is that neighboring Aussie developer Tantalus is looking to snatch a few of them up to help develop DS and Wii titles. That's at least one bit oh holiday kindness, amidst a pile of bad news.
Rumor Mill: Fury bombed - Massive layoffs at Auran imminent [updated]
[updated: 11:55PM PST] The rumors regarding the layoffs have beenconfirmed by IGN in this interview with the CEO of Auran Games. Another one bites the dust? Angry Gamer reports that a reliable anonymous source close to Australian based Auran has told them staff layoffs are imminent and that Fury may be outsourced to China. "Fury was a financial disaster, it lost Auran a lot of money." No kidding. This news is not in the least-bit surprising considering Fury is in-the-running for worst MMOG of the year. Fury is more proof that not all RMT (real money trade -- micro transactions) based MMOs in the Western market strike it big as some developers so often pronounce. I believe Fury is dying, maybe you want to check the game out in case it does take a final dirt-nap. If you are interested in the last update to the game you can find the details over on the official Fury website. Any Fury players here disappointed over the news or good riddance?
Wearable MoCap suits to put animators out of a job
Well, not really. One always goes for the sensational headline. This New Scientist Tech article describes a new method of capturing motion that doesn't require a huge room, a team of software engineers, and a marked ability to refrain from feeling silly about wearing the little balls all over oneself. Instead, this system is vastly more portable, captures a wider range of motion, and doesn't make the wearer feel like too much of a feeb (presumably). There's even a video to see.Okay, that's great and all, but why is this story on Massively? Because someday I envision this suit, or a modified version of it, being worn by a Second Life resident to more accurately portray her avatar's movement in-world. Or maybe a shirt-only version that allows an elaborate system of hand and arm gestures to simulate the casting of spells in Fury. The possibilities are astounding, and probably inevitable. And honestly, from the look of many of us, I'd say that anything requiring us to exercise our bodies while playing is a welcome invention.[Via Slashdot]
Fury announces Age of the Chosen content update
Just this morning we discussed the latest Fury newsletter, and Auran's plans to save their new but ailing game. They've now announced even more ambitious plans - the first free content update to the game, a patch they're calling Age of the Chosen. This update appears to be a formal package for some of the bullet points discussed in the game's first newsletter, but there are a few new concepts to this update: New Abilities New, update-specific Equipment NPC consolidations An Improved Interface A new 1v1 duel type The 'Carnage' game type, pitting two teams of players vs. a bot team.
Fury's one month newsletter, preview of new content
The brand-spanking-new PvP title Fury is going to be seeing a massive update sometime in December. Auran previews that upcoming content in their one-month newsletter. They also go over some recent updates to the game that will hopefully deal with player retention and game enjoyment.Newsletter author Bossman wastes no time getting down to brass tacks: We investigated some of the match statistics for the journalists who gave FURY poor scores. They all lost and lost badly - none of the guys we checked on had a winning record. Stopping this pwnage is certainly the biggest hurdle we must overcome.The rest of the newsletter details ways they're going to try to overcome negative press and current criticisms. Some of these elements include: Improving the new player experience. Reducing the number of abilities, and increasing the differentiation between them. Slowing things down just a touch to improve understanding of combat. Squashing bugs and improving performance. It's great to see Auran is sticking to their guns; while their launch vision is obviously flawed I still maintain that the idea behind Fury is a good one. Here's hoping they find their way.
Fury drops in price, still sucks
As a final humiliation to what might be, according to the reviews, the worst MMO of the year, WarCry reports that EB Games is now selling Fury for only $29.99. Yes, for only $30, you too can play the game that reviewers said "fails on literally every front."Poor Fury. They tried so hard, and failed so, so badly. The devs over there are still holding on as hard as they can-- they promise that things will get better and that things will get fixed soon. But when retailers drop your game's price by $20 in the first month of release, the writing is on the wall. Better luck next time, Auran.
Build Shop: Warrior 41/20/0
Welcome back to Build Shop! This time we're checking out an Arms Warrior Poleaxe build (41/20/0), and what a good time to do it, thanks to the newly implemented changes to the talent trees in patch 2.3. The Arms tree for warriors has a long and illustrious PvP history, and it's just gotten even stronger. Moving Death Wish out of the Fury tree clears Warriors up to go deeper into Arms to pick up those last few talents and is a very welcome change for me.This is an Arms build mostly focusing on PvP using a Polearm or Axe, but shift those 5 specialization points around depending on what weapon you're using.
The opening art of Fury
Fury seems to be getting a drubbing in the game critics press lately; I've just started the 10-day trial, so I'll know for myself how it all pans out, but one of the things that struck me most about starting up was the introductory story sequence. I'm one of those people who finds 'behind the scenes' footage sometimes more interesting than the finished product, so I'm always checking out 'making of' bits in the media.The artwork on display for the opening intro for Fury looks like the kind of artwork I'm talking about; the rendering is about mood and color, and in the concept art style, where it's not necessarily detail-driven, but has that soft-focus quality that I find far more evocative. Whether or not I find lasting value in gameplay, I appreciated the graphics here so much I wanted to share them with you. Enjoy!%Gallery-10074%
Auran foists ten day Fury trial
For those simply too curious to stay away - Auran has announced a new ten day free trial for their recently-released PvP-centric MMO, Fury. All you have to do is follow the link, enter your email address in the given prompt, and you'll be well on your way to "unleashing your fury."Normally we would balk at leading you down so dark a road, but we're confident that you won't even have to play the demo for terribly long before you figure out what a buggy black hole of fun it is. You don't have to take our word for it, all you have to do is take a look around the community and you'll find that this game was almost universally panned.If anything, we're doing you a service by helping you jump on the demo -- this way you won't ever be tempted to make an impulse purchase when you see it on store shelves!
Gamespot rips Fury with scathing review
Gamespot is one of the most professional & conservative gaming websites you can find -- which is why seeing them emerge to tear Fury to shreds in their review is so deliciously ironic.Fury is just one of a trio of MMO titles released last week; Tabula Rasa and Hellgate: London being the other two."True to its title, this fantasy action game will make you furious" is the opening headline. It just gets better (or worse, if you're a Fury fan) from there on in. Unless being a fat Speedy Gonzales addicted to amphetamines is a good thing. And still it goes on: there's too much text, there's not enough game modes, the "world instance setup" is contrived -- the game just sounds plain broke.I've been in two minds over whether to give Fury a try, but this convinces me to steer clear for now. Tabula Rasa and Hellgate: London must be hoping for a kinder reviews than the one doled out to Fury. Auran can't have enjoyed this one.
