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Rise and Shiny: Arcane Saga Online
I sat down on Monday with NetMarble Producer Jon-Enee Merriex to discuss Arcane Saga Online, a remake/re-release/re-launch of the defunct Prius Online. I was actually very excited for Prius Online at one point, but the game fell flat once I got my hands on it. With this re-launch, would the publisher NetMarble be able to capture an audience -- and keep it -- this time? I jumped into the first hour of the game with a bit of an unfair advantage, having Jon-Enee with me to explain many of the ideas and thought processes behind the re-launch. It all makes sense when you hear it from a developer's mouth, but how does the game translate when you just log in and start playing? It turns out that it has many issues but is quite fun a lot of the time.
Massively Interview: Re-launching Prius Online as Arcane Saga
Prius Online, a free-to-play, fantasy MMO published by gPotato, launched in North America in 2011. Roughly a year later, the MMO was shut down. Now, another year later, the game's original developer is re-branding, re-visiting and re-launching Prius Online under a new moniker: Arcane Saga. Curious about how, when, and why a company would choose to re-open a shuttered game, we sat down with Netmarble's Jon-Enée Merriex to ask. Merriex walked us through what it takes to restart a game, why good MMOs sometimes go by the wayside, and how his company plans to iterate and improve on the Prius Online experience that the title's original players enjoyed.
District 187 pulls the trigger and launches
PlanetSide 2 isn't the only MMOFPS to launch today, as CJ Games' District 187 decided to pop out of the digital womb on the same date. The free-to-play shooter included a large day one patch with the launch, including its cash shop, new maps and weapons, and additional game modes. Producer Jon-Enée Merriex hopes that trigger-happy players will give this title a chance: "This update is a testament to our global team's dedication to making District 187: Sin Streets the most robust, original and fun shooter on the market. Whether players have just started playing PC games or are old farts like me, there is something for everyone to love in this game!" District 187 takes place in a dystopian future when SWAT players take on gang members on the street. CJ Games says that it's planning to focus heavily on the game's budding e-sports nature with tournaments coming next year. [Source: CJ Games press release]
Gamescom 2012: District 187, Hounds, and Monarch
During this year's Gamescom, we met with the folks of CJ Games for a coffee near Cologne's central station, away from the hectic crowds of the show floors, to talk about what the Korean giant has in store for us in the near future. Earlier this year, CJ Games opened its North American subsidiary, which is tasked with bringing some of the company's most popular games to western audiences, and we were curious as to what it's got cooking. Jon-Enée Merriex, producer at CJ Games, talked us through three of the studio's upcoming titles: District 187: Sin Streets, Monarch, and Hounds.
PAX 2011: On the (re)starting line with APB: Reloaded
There's nothing like a car crash to slow down traffic as everyone rubbernecks at someone else's misfortune. Likewise, gamers and media alike were fascinated with the premature demise of last year's All Points Bulletin, craning their heads to see how extensive the damage was. But out of the wreck a new and improved version of the game was born, and now the crowds are equally taking notice of this resurrection. Not every canceled MMO gets a second chance at life, after all. This is why we were glad to sit down with GamersFirst's Jon-Enee Merriex at PAX to discuss how APB's reloading is going, what the devs have planned between now and launch, and what other projects they're tackling. Put the pedal to the metal and hit that jump -- this interview can't drive 55!
E3 2011: GamersFirst talks APB Reloaded's new features and player politics
We told you earlier today about GamersFirst's involvement with Fallen Earth. The company is, of course, more renowned for its All Points Bulletin resurrection project, and we sat down with both Darek Connole and Jon-Enee Merriex at E3 this week to discuss APB Reloaded's open beta as well as the progress that's been made through the extensive closed testing process. Follow along after the cut as we find out about what's new and what's coming, including a nifty iteration on the original title's witnessing system and an interesting player political experiment that evokes comparisons to EVE Online's Council of Stellar Management.
GamersFirst shows off new APB Reloaded driving footage
News of San Paro is coming at a fast and furious clip now that APB Reloaded is officially toodling around in closed beta mode. Last week we hung out with GamersFirst at GDC and got the low-down on how the team is overhauling APB for its new free-to-play incarnation. Over the weekend, GamersFirst uploaded a new gameplay video to its YouTube portal, and the footage offers a glimpse of the driving tweaks that producer Jon-Enee Merriex told us about at GDC. The footage focuses on the Macchina Calabria vehicle in a hair-raising romp through the streets of San Paro. While this is still a beta build, APB's driving controls already seem to be quite a bit more refined than they were at release, and there's also the requisite mayhem on display in the form of collisions (both vehicle and pedestrian) and a tiny bit of shooting at the clip's conclusion. Check it out after the break and let us know what you think in the comments. [Thanks to Connor for the tip!]
GDC 2011: GamersFirst on resurrecting San Paro with APB Reloaded
It's not often that interesting game concepts are given a second chance after an ugly crash and burn, so naturally we jumped at the opportunity to talk to GamersFirst about its APB Reloaded reclamation project. If you're new to the MMO scene, or simply haven't been paying attention over the past year: Realtime Worlds' All Points Bulletin looked poised to bring a gritty, ultra-customizable cops-and-robbers shooter to MMO players everywhere. To say that a lot of people were looking forward to APB is something of an understatement (Massively even heralded it as our most anticipated title of 2010). The reality of the game was something of a downer, though, and while our own first impressions were disappointedly optimistic, other reviewers weren't as kind as the game went belly up along with its parent studio. Enter GamersFirst, a free-to-play outfit bent on salvaging the considerable potential of San Paro and transforming it from a buggy mess into a playable AAA MMO. Join us after the cut as we talk with producer Jon-Enee Merriex at GDC 2011 regarding the challenges inherent in the resurrection as well as some of the new (and newly functional) features APB fans can expect.
GDC10: Sword of the New World changes detailed
GamersFirst's Sword of the New World is primed for several interesting game play additions. We spoke with Jon-Enee Merriex at GDC 2010 to get the scoop on what's in store for the MMORTS that first launched in 2007. Perhaps most interesting among the list of tweaks are plans to allow players to teleport between colonies controlled by their faction under the game's Political PVP system. If you're a Royalist, for example, you can look forward to jumping between Royalist-owned colonies, thereby saving considerable travel time. The teleportation is one of several mechanics intended to allow players new and old to dive right into what the developer considers the game's primary focus. "The true focal point of Sword of the New World is all about the Political PvP system. It's all about running for office, controlling the colonies, and being a tyrant," Merriex said.
