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League of Legends previews Gnar without a word
Who is Gnar? An upcoming champion for League of Legends. How does he or she play? We don't know. All we know is a little bit of what Gnar is all about, and that is shown in a quick teaser site that manages to convey a story without using a single word other than Gnar's name. Gnar seems like a pretty happy sort at first, but when a calamity befell Gnar's family, Gnar didn't handle it too well. Gnar can be seen breaking out of an ice tomb and setting forth on what we can only assume will be a rampage filled with enemy champions. Take a glance at the preview page to watch the whole thing play out, and keep your eyes peeled for more information on how Gnar will play. (Speculation has him focused on crowd control and area denial.)
Riot Games promises to increase diversity in League of Legends
League of Legends features a lot of diversity among its male champions, but the female champions all feature a fairly uniform body type. That's something the developers at Riot Games are keen on changing. In response to a fan question at SDCC, producer Omar Kendall said that the company has been introducing new ways of looking at body types and shapes, with the end goal of making female champions who don't look like the others. Kendall went on to specify that the call for more diversity is one that players should see represented soon in a new character coming out. He also noted that diversity is being strongly considered with further character designs and any new champions. Game designer Brian Feeney noted that it would be a net boon to the game as a whole -- as Riot is very concerned with distinctive silhouettes, a more robust selection of body types makes it easier to tell champions apart.
Transformers Universe MOBA now has motorbikes
Jagex's Transformers Universe MOBA has added Swagger and Diabla to its roster of playable bots, the first such addition since the free-to-play title transitioned into open beta. Swagger is an Interceptor-class Autobot who uses his cloaking device to enable hit-and-run gameplay that Jagex says will decimate Decepticon players with reduced defenses. Diabla, on the other hand, is a damage-focused Decepticon who roams the map hunting for single targets and "takes them offline without a second thought." You can read Jagex's full PR spiel after the break. [Source: Jagex press release]
League of Legends unveils A New Dawn cinematic
Did you know that a game of League of Legends involves your team fighting another team? It's true! And you can watch a dramatized version of exactly that in the game's latest cinematic trailer, A New Dawn, embedded just past the cut. Spoiler warning: There is blood, people die, and it would all be very dramatic if not for the fact that most of them will respawn in the not-too-distant future. Want a peek behind the scenes? You can get more than that; Riot Games has also released a full making-of featurette that shows exactly how the newest cinematic went from concept to completion. And you can also check that out past the cut. Consider it the bonus feature. [Source: Riot Games press release]
The Daily Grind: Do you play MOBAs?
We joke a lot on Massively about how there's a new MOBA released every day, but let's be fair: It's more like every other day. The first MOBA I ever played was Demigod, and that was back before the term had really become popular, before League of Legends had launched, and long before the deluge of MOBA clones had hit us. I had fun, but I pretty much knew the genre wasn't for me. I like a bit more persistence to my PvP, and I really prefer larger-scale battles and worlds. This is why I play MMOs. But the MOBA genre is young and evolving. Some MOBAs even seem to be trying to attract MMORPG players with cosmetic gear and first-person perspectives and even something that still looks a bit like personal housing. So here's the question for today: Do you, as an MMORPG gamer, play MOBAs? What would it take to get you to play them? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
Dota 2's 10 million dollar e-sports tourney will stream on ESPN
Whether or not you believe e-sports are real sports, Dota 2 is at least big enough for sports TV. Valve today publicized a deal that will bring streaming coverage of its MOBA's The International tournament to ESPN. Well, ESPN3, which is sort of like ESPN in the same way Dota 2 is like a sport. We're kidding. ESPN3 will broadcast matches live, and come Sunday, "viewers can tune in to ESPN2 for an exclusive preview of the tournament's final match, featuring highlights from the games, expert analysis, plus interviews with the players and Valve's Gabe Newell." The International championships begin tomorrow in Seattle with a prize pool worth over $10 million. It turns out your mom was wrong: You can get rich and famous playing video games. [With thanks to tipster Mike!]
Heroes of the Storm's Garden of Terror swaps between night and day
It's the gimmick, the hook that makes a well-designed MOBA battleground truly memorable, and Heroes of the Storm's Garden of Terror thinks it has its hook: a night-and-day sequence. Unlike the mostly cosmetic lighting filters in MMO day/night cycles, Garden of Terror's transition between the two will change the fundamental rules of the match. While during the daytime players can check out mercenary camps, the nighttime is a whole different story. The camps go away when the sun goes down, and out pops nighttime horrors as players' visibility decreases. The daytime only comes back when all of the horrors are killed, giving players control over how long the dark lasts. One of the Garden of Terror's objectives is gathering up seeds to plant so that a huge player-controlled mob can be summoned. Learning when and how to use the summon will be a key to dominating the match.
Motiga's new multiplayer game, Gigantic, is a MOBA
Are you ready to let another MOBA into your life? How about one with stylized cartoon art and a twist that some might call... large? Gigantic was formally announced by Motiga today, and it's got a couple of tricks the usual MOBA doesn't. For one thing, it's all about third-person play, and you'll be hopping about with your keyboard rather than by clicking your mouse. For another, players are aided by enormous Guardians, behemoths that use their own massive attacks and will force players to contend with an even more powerful force on the field. Players can get a sense of the game's style just past the break in the game's first announcement trailer and sign up for alpha testing on the official site. The game will be at PAX Prime, as well, which should be something for fans to keep a close watch on. It might just be big, you know.
SMITE showcases Serqet, Goddess of Venom
Hi-Rez Studios has just unveiled Serqet, Goddess of Venom, the latest playable deity to join SMITE's pantheon of characters. Serqet is based on the Egyptian goddess responsible for curing poisons, but this version of Serqet also dishes out venom with her nasty scorpion tail and then consumes those poison DoTs for additional damage and debuffs via her Catalyst passive. The new character joins the game tomorrow. Enjoy the lengthy character introduction video below!
Battleborn melds the MOBA with a first-person perspective
Challenging the notion that all MOBAs must be played from an omniscient isometric viewpoint, Gearbox revealed its own MOBA, Battleborn, that takes place from a first-person perspective. Battleborn promises a wide array of character variety as heroes battle on an alien planet, including Elvish archers, steampunk riflemen, and minigun-toting heavies. The lore hook is pretty solid, too, with the good guys fighting to protect the very last star in the universe against a faction called the Varelsi. The MOBA will feature both a co-op campaign and multiplayer PvP mode, and will be coming to the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC next year. You can check out the reveal trailer after the break.
Dota 2 embraces newcomers with International broadcast
Dota 2's world championship tournament, AKA: The International, will feature a "Newcomer's Broadcast" this year to help those unfamiliar with the game's extensive jargon acronyms keep up with the action. "New to Dota? Or maybe you play Dota but have never gotten interested in the professional side of the game," an overview page for The International reads. "Welcome to the Newcomer's Broadcast, an English stream happening alongside the main stream, featuring commentary aimed at easing people into understanding the exciting world of BKBs, tri-lanes, and counter-picks." In other words, if you just scratched your head at those last three concepts, the Newcomer Broadcast sounds like the place to be. For those who couldn't snatch tickets in time to attend The International 2014 in-person at the Seattle Key Arena on July 18 - 21 but don't need the difference between "bot" and "BoT" explained, Valve is also introducing DVR broadcasts and a multicast feature that recaps the tournament's highlights this year. [Image: Valve]
Rob Pardo leaves Blizzard
In a rather surprising move, Blizzard's Executive Producer Rob Pardo announced today that he is leaving the company. At this time he has announced no immediate career plans or subsequent goals, although he mentions a desire to spend the summer with his family and consider his next move. Pardo's forum announcement thanks the design teams for all of their hard work and notes that he has immensely enjoyed his time with the company; he expresses great satisfaction at the growth of the company and all of the changes that have come about during his tenure there. Pardo mentions that he began working with the studio during development of the original StarCraft, having since worked on titles including Diablo III, World of Warcraft, and Heroes of the Storm. He has promised fans that he will attempt to be communicative about his next move via Twitter. [Thanks to Dystopiq for the tip!]
SMITE announces world championships for 2015
Are you the best SMITE player in the world? Are you sure about that? If so, maybe you should go ahead and take part in the SMITE World Championships. The company has just announced that the championship tournament will take place January 9th to 11th, 2015, along with qualifier dates for North America and Europe, all of which can be found just past the break. Players will be competing for a grand prize of $600,000, a pool which is expected to grow over the next half-year in the lead-in to the event. You can check out the official e-sports site for the game to find out how to register your team and try to make it into the big leagues, or just check out the trailer below. Maybe you just like to spectate, after all. It's cool.
League of Legends public chat rooms disabled by Riot
What's the fastest and easiest way to deal with the problems in League of Legends chat channels? Apparently, just shutting them down completely. Riot Games has removed several of the public chat rooms until the company finds a way to turn them into something "useful and accessible." The company is aware that there are great communities in the game, but it's too easy for toxic individuals to mask that. Not only were the public chat channels problematic, but even the private channels lacked effective moderation tools outside of an ignore button. The development team is starting over from a new foundation, hoping to make the chat rooms a place to hang out with friends and more easily organize matches instead of being... well, what they were before. Feedback is welcome, so chime in on the official forums if you know what you want to see when the chats finally return.
The Witcher: Battle Arena MOBA due out Q4 2014
CD Projekt Red's first foray into multiplayer Witcher territory isn't an MMORPG but rather a MOBA. Not only is The Witcher: Battle Arena a MOBA, but it's a mobile MOBA that's due for Android, iOS, and Windows tablets and phones sometime during Q4 2014. "There will be a monster-hunting mode, kind of an isometric multiplayer [in the future]," explains project manager Tadek Zielinski. "There will be a boss mode, where you will be able to fight the bosses -- that will be purely a (player verses enemy) experience. And we are thinking of other competitive modes. We have a classic one-lane MOBA experience with towers, but we have a different approach because we don't want to have minions, we don't want to have farming."
Witcher mobile MOBA cast on tablets later this year
The Witcher Battle Arena is the best parts of what happens when a company like CD Projekt Red, developer of ambitious RPGs like The Witcher series, gets outside its comfort zone and thinks about making something as ubiquitous as another MOBA. A saturated genre that is so easily dismissed with an eye-roll and a yawn, but what the hardcore RPG studio is doing with the genre was actually quite intuitive when I recently got some hands-on time with it. Designed by CD Projekt Red and developed by Fuero Games, the tablet MOBA is a fast-paced 3v3 arena combat game that takes less than 10 minutes per match. As one developer acknowledged: a match had to fit within acceptable toilet time.
SMITE claims four million players since launch
In a new interview with RedBull.com this week, Hi-Rez Studios COO Todd Harris revealed that since SMITE's launch last March, both the MOBA's dev team and its player population are on the rise. In fact, he says, the game has become so profitable that Hi-Rez has "double[d] the size of [its] studio." At the game's release in late March, we were at three million players, and we are now well over four million. We are not on Steam, but comparing to Steam stats, SMITE would sit around number 10 to 12 in terms of popularity and daily players. Most importantly to us, the playing population has increased every month since the start of the Beta. [...] Our players are currently 45 percent Europe, 40 percent North America, 10 percent South America and five percent other. Harris drops a few other bits of trivia, including the fact that SMITE's original sci-fi IP was based on the studio's MMOFPS Global Agenda, but the mythology theme was deemed more "compelling." [With thanks to keen-eyed tipster Sorenthaz!]
Snail Games reveals King of Wushu MOBA based on Age of Wushu
Snail Games has unveiled the website for its upcoming martial arts MOBA King of Wushu. As you could probably guess, King of Wushu is based on Snail's Age of Wushu MMO, and is said to feature both RPG and TPS elements. This new teaser site already includes forums and a point system for interested players. According to gaming site 2P.com, King of Wushu is likely to be shown at ChinaJoy 2014 in Shanghai later this year.
Dead Island: Epidemic mutates the MOBA genre
Dead Island: Epidemic is a twisted take on the MOBA genre, allowing players to use WASD and a clicky trigger finger to move and shoot. As the narrator puts it: "Unlike other titles in the genre, you'll have direct control over your character – no last-hitting, click-to-move nonsense here." [Image: Deep Silver]
SMITE virtually incarnates Rama and updates Ra for the 4th of July
Hi-Rez Studios has today revealed the latest playable deity in its MOBA SMITE: Rama, The 7th Avatar of the Hindu god Vishnu. True to legend, Rama is an archer whose magical bow and arrows combine for skills like Astral Quiver, Astral Strike, Pick Me Up, Rolling Assault, and Astral Barrage. But that isn't why you clicked on this article. You clicked because of the eagle. Yes, the team has also implemented new skins for characters, including one for Ra, who can now be skinned as the patriotic, firework-wielding bald eagle Ra'merica because why not? "For each sale of this skin, $2 will be donated to the American Red Cross," noted Hi-Rez blandly, as if that obviated the insanity. We've included Rama's and Ra's videos below. [With thanks to tipster Sorenthaz!]
