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Mythic employees shocked at Mark Jacobs' departure
Mythic employees were surprised by their boss' departure, sources told me today. I spoke with a former employee, who asked to remain anonymous, about what they and their old co-workers thought regarding today's announcement that Mark Jacobs, the vice president and general manager of EA Mythic, will be leaving the company due to a new partnership with BioWare."People are shocked and in disbelief about Mark leaving," said the former staffer. "But they're also excited to be working with BioWare. I can't even fathom Mark leaving a company he loved so much, it was his life. Personally, I can't see that this is voluntary in any shape or form."
Mythic's Mark Jacobs leaves EA
Mark Jacobs, the former General Manager of Mythic Entertainment and Lead Designer of Warhammer Online, has left EA on 23rd June, the company announced today. This comes as part of restructuring plans within EA which includes both Mythic and BioWare and have culminated in the formation of a new, as-yet-unnamed, studio which will focus on RPGs and MMOs. The new studio will be led by BioWare co-founder and General Manager Ray Muzyka, who will become Group General Manager. BioWare's other co-founder Greg Zeschuk will become Group Creative Officer while Rob Denton will succeed Jacobs as General Manager.You can certainly expect more from us as this story develops.[Via The Examiner]
Jeff Hickman, FAQ, and Grab Bag are all about Land of the Dead
The Land of the Dead must be coming soon because Mythic has gone into marketing overdrive these past few days. Jeff Hickman just addressed the WAR community in an open Executive Producer's letter and we've seen the new RvR mega-zone featured in both an official FAQ and community Grab Bag.It's a bit strange seeing Jeff Hickman in print since he's usually on the front-lines doing live interviews. Also, WAR fans have gotten used to seeing Mythic GM, Mark Jacobs, deliver these kinds of letters in the past. Actually, Mark has been remarkably silent since March when he delivered his 6-month State of the Game and 1.21 patch highlight announcements.At any rate, you can find out pretty much everything there is to know about The Land of the Dead in these three recent articles. Want to know the ward requirements for the PQs, lairs, and dungeons? Curious about lockout timers? Wondering what the heck a "Vessel" is? Head on over and check these resources out!
Beckett Massive Online Gamer names Top 20 individuals in the MMO industry
In what's now become an annual event, gaming magazine Beckett Massive Online Gamer has put together a list of the most influential people in the MMO industry. Blizzard's Rob Pardo has taken the #1 spot, as he did in 2008, which should come as no surprise to anyone, really. But Beckett has named Hilmar Pétursson of CCP Games as the second most influential figure in the MMO industry (up from #4 last year), with SOE's John Smedley, Jack Emmert from Cryptic Studios, and Mark Jacobs from Mythic Entertainment rounding out the top 5. In addition to the major, established industry names you'd expect to see on the list, there are 10 newcomers this year, including Todd Coleman from KingsIsle Entertainment, studio director for Wizard101 which recently hit the milestone of 2 million unique users.While Beckett Massive Online Gamer makes the list available online, the magazine offers background on each individual and how they've influenced the future of the industry.
Warhammer holds its ground with 300k subs
A minor note in EA's most recent earnings report revealed that as of March 31, 2009, Warhammer Online had over 300,000 subscribers, which is right about where it was at in December 2008. What's that we hear in the distance? I do believe it's the sound of thousands of haters and fanboys doing glorious forum battle.Three hundred thousand players is actually a pretty good number these days. In fact, CCP was extremely happy to announce hitting the 300k+ mark today, on EVE's 6th birthday. Most MMO analysts would probably say WAR is one of the top 5 subscription MMOs in Europe/North America.On the other hand, EA and Mythic can't be too happy about the current population situation since Mark Jacobs has made a couple famous remarks about population numbers in the past. The first is that WAR would be successful if it had north of 500k subscribers. The second is that 250k subscribers doesn't look too good to investors when you've made an initial investment of over $50M and have high maintenance costs. You might also want to factor in that Mythic started a recruit-a-friend program, free trial, and launched in Russia all during the period of the quarter being reported on.With Aion set for release in fall 2009, WAR may soon face some stiff competition on the PvP/RvR front. A lot may be riding on Mythic's new live expansion, The Land of the Dead set for release this summer.
WAR 1.21 patch hitting the public test server this week
Mark Jacobs stopped by the official Warhammer forums to give players a list of highlights from the 1.21 patch hitting the public test server later this week. While the patch number suggests this won't be a major patch, the highlights suggest otherwise.Most people agree the biggest issue on Mythic's plate right now is combat responsiveness. Currently, players experience a sigificant "stretch" or "pause" when executing longer duration abilities (animation glitches don't help matters either). Mark says this issue will be fixed in under "normal" gameplay conditions, but may still exist to a degree under high server load.Other items of note are improvements to the keep siege system that will allow guilds who claim keeps to upgrade their defenses, a Beyond the Sands live event, more bug fixes, and special versions of the Gates of Ekrund and Nordenwatch scenarios.The balance issue with stacked ground target area of effect damage spells introduced in the previous patch is not touched upon in Mark's highlights, but Adam Gershowitz made a post on the Ranged Damage Dealers forum detailing the changes coming in 1.21. Overall, this is looking like a solid patch as fans await 1.3.
Massively re-arms for WAR: State of the opinion address
Mark Jacobs just released his WAR State of the Game announcement. I think this is a pretty important one because next week marks WAR's 6-month anniversary. Here are my thoughts about it.I found the intro paragraphs to be pretty standard for this type of announcement. On the plus side he's admitting that WAR isn't where they'd like it to be but he balances that by patting his own back. I realize he needs to say these things for shareholders, but comments like this always make me roll my eyes: "Given the proximity of these two releases, I think it is pretty safe to say that these represent one of the largest (if not the largest) amount of new content, tweaks, adjustments, etc. to any MMO over the course of several months." I simply love how someone can spin nearly 1,000 bug and polish fixes into a good thing (especially at the six-month point in the game's life cycle). It is and it isn't, y'know?Anyway, on to the meat and potatoes of the SotG. Mark mentioned 11 key areas of focus for the next few months. Here are my impressions of these sections (find his original text in the official SotG letter).
Mark Jacobs on WAR 6-month state of the game
Mythic VP/GM/CEO, Mark Jacobs just delivered his highly anticipated State of the Game announcement for Warhammer Online one week before the six-month anniversary of its release. Mythic is currently in the midst of Call to Arms, their first live expansion, and recently delivered a whopping patch that fixed over 500 bugs and introduced two new careers (the Slayer and Choppa). Mark states that the next iteration in this series of patches (1.21) will fix 400+ more bugs, attempt to balance the careers even further, and deliver more new content. The 1.21 patch will launch next month. Details on their 1.3 patch are a bit foggy, but they may deal with items from the following list, which Mark calls the "Eleven Enticing Enhancements" list for WAR: Client/Server performance in RvR Bug & Polish Open RvR in general Keeps in general Keep Defense Battlefield Objectives Zone Capture Zone Capture rewards City Raiding for fun and profit Career Balancing Scenarios Finally, Mark touches upon the progress being made with the new Tomb Kings themed dungeon. Fans of Dark Age of Camelot will not only find it reminiscent of Darkness Falls, they will also find some new and exhilarating experiences. If any of these things pique your interest, you could always give the game a try with WAR's 10-day free trial.
Warhammer's 1.2 patch to go live March 3, 2009
The 1.2 patch for Warhammer Online is going to be huge. Mark Jacobs gave fans a highlight reel of what it will deliver back in early February, which includes fixes to over 500 bugs, two new careers, class balance, and much more. Since that time, Mythic put 1.2 up on the public test server for everyone to give feedback on. Here is a summary of some blog feedback we found (because not everyone can view the beta forums atm): Keen shared his thoughts on the new Choppa career. Book of Grudges has a good review of Slayers. Part 1 of Garrison of WAR's review (map improvements, realm status changes, and new mounts). Part 2 of Garrison of WAR's review (rage mechanic and how it performed in both PvE and RvR). Part 3 of Garrison of WAR's review [additional map improvements (more accurate group and warband dots), the new parties and warbands window, potions persisting through death, and how all MDPS careers will receive a pick lock skill that lets them enter postern keep doors]. Stunty Stomper and Obsessive Focus talk a bit about crafting changes. Arbitrary of the Book of Grudges is also reporting that the latest US WAR newsletter in her inbox says patch 1.2 will go live March 3, 2009. The Bitter Rivals live event will start March 4, 2009.
Unofficial forums sound off on WAR's official forums
Caught up in the hubbub of Mythic's Call to Arms announcement for Warhammer Online was the revelation that they would soon be launching an official forum (OF) for the game. Since release, the brunt of these responsibilities has fallen to unofficial forums like Warhammer Alliance (WHA) and IGN's Warhammer Vault. These forums/fansites are currently the place to go if you want to catch the attention of a developer or simply engage the WAR community in a healthy (and sometimes unhealthy) debate on the state of the game or feature X vs. feature Y.Obviously, there are benefits and drawbacks to having your community spread across several unofficial forums. Ryan Shwayder of Nerfbat recently came up with a list of three things official and unofficial forums can and can't do. One of the biggest questions people have right now is, "What will happen with the unofficial forums once Mythic launches OFs?" Will they remain relevant or fade away into obscurity?We here at Massively decided to get the official word from the unofficial sources on this matter and had a chance to interview Mithan, head admin for all VN boards and Frank "PhoenixRed" Sanchez, assistant site manager at WHA. Continue reading below the cut where they answer some pressing questions.
Unofficial forums sound off: Part 2 (PhoenixRed)
This is a continuation of our interview with Warhammer Online's unofficial forum administrators. In part 2, we put the same questions to and Frank "PhoenixRed" Sanchez of Warhammer Alliance...What was your immediate reaction to Mythic's announcement that they will be hosting official WAR forums and why?PhoenixRed: We actually learned about OFs for WAR back in December. There were some rumblings and some goings on within the company and we have a few connections over there that told us this might be coming down the pipe. My original reaction, one that still persists to this day, is curiosity. Those people that know Mark Jacobs and Mythic from back in the days of DAOC know that they've never had any kind of preference to have official forums for a variety of reasons. They are a huge cost and definitely a huge time sink. The other reaction I had was "Wow!" It's going to be insane. Speaking as someone who has moderated forums over the past decade or so, it's definitely a challenge. I wish the community team and moderators responsible for managing and herding the community nothing but the best. I sure hope the people they bring on board have prior experience with online communities.
Sneak peak: WAR's highly anticipated 1.2 patch
Mythic gave everyone something to look forward to with their recent Call to Arms live expansion announcement last week, but there was a very loud outcry from players asking when the real issues would be fixed. To address this, Mark Jacobs announced three big patches that would be landing shortly called 1.1.1, 1.2, and 1.3. Patch 1.1.1 was announced to little fanfare (although it did address some T4 concerns with fortresses) and it was noted that many of the fixes originally intended for 1.1.1 were bumped to 1.2 because they needed additional testing.Mark just made a post on VN giving everyone a sneak peak of what to expect in patch 1.2; a patch he has officially titled the Bugs, Careers, RvR, Bugs, Items and Bugs Patch. It seems like they're bringing out the electric fly-swatter for this one. Highlights from this patch include: over 16 pages of bug fixes, introduction of the Slayer and Choppa, tons of career balance tweaks, the Zone Domination System, improvements to keep siege, itemization, rewards, crafting, the UI, mail system, and client stability, easy PQs for the remaining tiers, the Bitter Rivals live event, and a new scenario.Dare we call this a "miracle patch?" 1.2 should be on the public test servers next week.
Mythic announces official forums for WAR (with a twist)
Having official forums for an MMORPG might not seem like big news to the average gamer, but it sure is when you're talking about Mythic Entertainment finally announcing official forums for Warhammer Online. You see, Mythic GM, Mark Jacobs has been very outspoken about his disdain for OFs. At one point he had this to say when questioned if WAR would ever have OFs. He hated the idea of them that much...There must have been some pretty good reasons to reverse such a staunch view on OFs and Mark was kind enough to elaborate in an open letter to the community. It simply comes down to being able to better support the players of WAR. Apparently, Mythic is also willing to invest in paid full and part-time moderators and a powerful forum platform to ensure these internal support boards don't become a cesspool of hate and discrimination.Here's Mythic's official twist. The forums will be very light-weight graphically. They will not run ads of any sort. There will be a strict code of conduct, but it won't hamper constructive negative feedback. Anyone familiar with the Warhammer Online beta boards should feel quite at home. Only active subscribers will be able to post. You can "level up" on these forums by contributing to intelligent discussion. This will give you access to special boards where Mark and the other devs will post frequently. More details on Mythic's official forums will be coming shortly, but you can expect to see them in action during February's public test of the 1.2 patch. I wonder what this will mean for the unofficial forums.
Plenty of gems in virtual tour video of Mythic Entertainment offices
The WAR Vault was lucky enough to get an exclusive sneak peek behind the walls of Mythic Entertainment and they captured it on video for all Warhammer Online fans to see. The tour goes way beyond the well-known paper mache squigs and walls of concept art. They actually chat with staff members from many of of the teams including community, combat and careers, RvR, art, design, and even speak with general manager, Mark Jacobs.Staff members are more than happy to answer fluffy questions like: What got you into gaming? and What has been your favourite MMO experience so far? They also field more pressing questions like: How is the RvR/PvE balance? How will the Slayer differ from the table top game? What's changed about the Choppa since he was pulled from beta? What's next for RvR? and How do you attempt to balance 24 careers?Mark Jacobs even fields questions on the most difficult challenge a developer faces making an MMO (expectations) and when we can expect to see a official WAR expansion (they won't be following the old one-expansion-per-year model).Finally, there are even two tiny teasers: 1) a massive pendulum is swinging back and forth in-game, while two developers discuss how the players will interact with it in an RvR setting and 2) Mark Davis talks about some of the interesting mechanics behind the Twisting Tower scenario (bring a barf bag if you experience motion sickness).
Mark Jacobs elaborates on Call to Arms and Warhammer's future
Warhammer Online GM, Mark Jacobs, paid a visit to the Warhammer Vault message boards to elaborate on the new Call to Arms live expansion and future incoming changes. While he believes this live expansion is one of the largest subscription-based content upgrades/addons done by any MMO developer, he wants to assure everyone that this is only a part of their development plans for the next several months of WAR.The first part of his letter deals with the Call to Arms expansion and hits on topics such as the new careers, the live events, and the Tomb Kings themed RvR dungeon. The second part talks about some of the major game improvements fans can expect to see over this expansion arc, including: bug fixes, better fortress performance, RvR changes and improvements (e.g., keep upgrades, zone domination system, additional rewards, etc.), career balancing, and increased polish (e.g., armour and mount diversity, mail system improvements, enhanced guild rewards, etc.). All of these latter improvements will be coming in the 1.2 patch, which should hit the public test server in early February. While not giving us details on the content or a timeframe, Mark stated that even more game improvements will be coming in a 1.3 patch.It seems many players were expecting specific details about these upcoming changes. Mark responded by saying he is unwilling to post official patch notes until they have been thoroughly tested on the public test server. You can keep up with Mark's comments on this subject in the Warhammer Alliance dev post tracker.
Mark Jacobs details future Fortress changes
As was hinted at in a video featuring Mythic's Jeff Hickman not so long ago, the latest update to Warhammer Online's Fortress gameplay was only the beginning of a larger plan to improve the playability of this important aspect of the game. Mark Jacobs has now elaborated on these future plans, at the same time as giving a report on how the new update has been going on the live servers -- on the night of Jacobs' post, there were no Fortress-related crashes, and general performance was better but not quite where they want it yet.There are three initiatives that the dev team hope to put their focus on in the coming weeks. One of these is simply to see how the new population threshold is working, to determine if and how it should be tweaked with respect to balance and design issues. At the same time, they will be keeping an eye on the Fortress Lords to make sure that their difficulty aligns with the number of players attending a siege. The third change will involve optimizing the code that deals with large-scale battles, in the hopes of being able to open up the population threshold some more. Let's hope they succeed with this last effort, as some fans already have their torches and pitchforks out due to the reduced scale of these end-game encounters.
The winner of the Mark Jacobs Award for Corporate Community Achievement is...
Yes, you didn't blink when you read the title. Of course, the award was made by Alex Litel of "Bell, Game, and Candle" at GameSetWatch and it's meant to be tongue-in-cheek, but it really shows how connected Jacobs is with all of the Warhammer Online hype.Litel's article showcases the many press release quotes that just make you tilt your head in confusion and wonder why exactly someone wrote that for marketing purposes. Quotes such as Cliffy B calling the original Gears of War "...just a tease, an appetizer to Gears of War characters and new style of gameplay" just to ramp up marketing for Gears of War 2.Litel inserted the Mark Jacobs award because he thought it would be unfair to include Mark Jacob's quotes in with the other quotes he gathered. With all of the passion Mark puts behind his marketing promises, including Jacobs's quotes would turn the article into a countdown of Mark Jacobs moments. So, the quotes were left out, but the spirit of Jacobs remained alive and well.If you want to see all 50 quotes, and which quote got the coveted award, head on over to GameSetWatch and check out Litel's article. We certainly got a few chuckles out of it.
WAR's Mark Jacobs on fixes and holiday experience bonuses
Fans of Warhammer Online will have noted a great deal of patching over the past few weeks. In fact, even the patches needed some patching. Some major issues Mythic Entertainment has been working to fix are the frequent crashes-to-desktop and other lockups players have been reporting. The latest word from Mythic's Mark Jacobs is that the client crashes have been drastically reduced, down by 75% (in North America). In fact, client crashes are now at their lowest point ever, either in development or since Warhammer Online went live, Jacobs said. But he wasn't writing to the Warhammer Online player base just to talk about patches and crash fixes. Jacobs also announced a holiday gift for all WAR players that doesn't involve dwarves and debauchery. Warhammer Online players now enjoy an experience bonus, as of December 18th. Jacobs stated Mythic decided to increase the rest experience multiplier bonus, while "...reducing the time that it takes you to earn rested xp while logged out of the game, especially in Tiers 3 and 4. This will result in players' time to level being approximately 10% faster in Tier 2 and 20% faster in Tiers 3 and 4." Jacobs didn't state how long this revved up leveling curve will last, but stated it would be for "a few weeks." WAR has gone 1.1! Check out our full coverage of the 1.1a patch, along with our interviews exploring upcoming content and the open RvR changes. Plus, don't miss any of our ongoing coverage as Massively goes to WAR!
Mythic delaying work on Warhammer expansion to improve live game
As the recently released expansion for World of Warcraft clearly displayed with its mind-boggling sales figures, add-ons for MMOs (particularly ones with a large player base) can be lucrative undertakings. Despite this fact, Mythic developer Mark Jacobs recently issued a surprising statement on a Warhammer Online forum thread in which commenters were discussing features they'd like to see in the title's first expansion. According to Jacobs, Mythic won't be developing a WAR expansion until the kinks have been worked out of the core game.Jacobs explained Mythic's reasoning, stating that they have no interest in "pushing an XPack out the door at the expense of WAR." While this may have come as a disappointment to the posters on the thread in question, we're sure the game's player base is appreciative of Mythic's continuing siege on gameplay snafus.
Mythic putting off Warhammer expansion work to focus on live game
In a lengthy thread over at the VN boards, players began offering up a number of thoughts about what they'd like to see in the first expansion to Mythic Entertainment's Warhammer Online. They had a couple of great ideas, too, with thread-starter DiscipleofWar suggesting it focus on the fabled Land of the Dead. That would allow players to come up against the forces of the Tomb Kings, fun objective-based gameplay for each faction, and even the introduction of a new third 'Dogs of War' army that will allow players to play ruthless mercenaries.Surprisingly, Mark Jacobs dropped in to add his own view on the conversation. Mr. Jacobs states that they are actually not working on the expansion at all right now, other than in theoretical design work. The reason is very straightforward: "We are not pushing an XPack out the door at the expense of WAR. And once we begin work on an XPack, it's going to take us quite a while to do it." They don't want to take away from the tuning problems and issues that Warhammer currently has just to push on to an expansion. Good on you, Mythic! Music to the players' ears, we imagine. Did you enjoy this? Make sure to check out our Warhammer guides: Massively's Character Creation Guide and our WoW Player's Guide to Warhammer. Plus, don't miss any of our ongoing coverage as Massively goes to WAR!
