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Player mounts in Battle of the Immortals explained
The developers at Battle of the Immortals are continuing to work on their game to prepare it for the planned closed beta in mid-April. Between now and then, the Perfect World Entertainment blog offers glimpses into what they're up to. The latest entry for Battle of the Immortals delves deeper into mounts in the game, something that we've touched on before. The focus is on the system of leveling and progression of your mount, as well as offering screenshots of several of the available mounts (someone's been watching Ghost Rider!) As your mount progresses from level one to level five, it receives various improvements, both cosmetic and functional. Visual upgrades are accompanied by more practical things such as a default skill and customizable skills that become available to your mount as it levels. From the looks of things, mounts in BoI go way beyond what we've grown used to in so many games. Check out the full blog entry for more screenshots and information on what's to come!
Perfect World Entertainment talks about delay on Battle of the Immortals
We recently brought you the news that the closed beta for Battle of the Immortals has been delayed until mid-April. Several reasons were cited, including details such as Windows 7 support, revising the item shop and the AI behavior, and so on. The Perfect World Entertainment team took some time to expand on those reasons for us this week.
Meet Ether Saga Online's "My Little Pony from Hell"
Letting fans design mounts is always an interesting idea, but here's a mount that really leaves a burning mark on the land -- Ether Saga Online's new "Dark Noturno" mount. Dark Noturno, originally named Nocturne, is the fan-made creation of ESO player Monaka. She submitted her designs for Nocturne during their "create a mount" contest and her designs made it to the official ESO artists in China. After a few tweaks here and there to her designs, Dark Noturno finally came to life and Monaka was the first player to recieve the devilish new mount. Perfect World recently caught up with Monaka to ask her about the experience, so check out their interview with her over at their official company blog. Nice mount, Monaka!
Kung Foo! Announces Closed Beta Reboot
Kung Foo!, the much talked about free-to-play MMO from Perfect World Entertainment, has been moving through the beta phases, and now they are ready to announce: no Foo for you! While it won't be one year, rather than move forward when they feel the game isn't ready to do so, they've opted to "reboot" the closed beta phase of the game later this year with better localization and a new expansion. While it's a bit of a disappointment by fans who are more than ready for launch, keep in mind that a rushed game full of problems is often more frustrating in the long run than a delayed game that has had most of the wrinkles ironed out. The closed beta servers will come down Tuesday, February 16th, and the Kung Foo! team will begin working to implement player feedback and preparing for the reboot to come, and they intend to go out with a bang -- take a look at the full announcement here.
Battle of the Immortals closed beta delayed until April
If you've been waiting to play the closed beta for Battle of the Immortals, it looks like you're going to be waiting a bit longer. According to a blog post by Perfect World Entertainment, Battle of the Immortals isn't just quite ready for it's debut. Instead of rushing it out the door, the company wishes to take some more time to iron out the finer details of the game, namely native support for Windows 7, 64-bit OS support, revised shop structure, revised AI behavior, and much more. Because of all of this, the closed beta has been delayed until April, a full two months away from the original CB date, which was today. However, as their blog post says, "A late game is only late once. A bad game is a bad game forever."
Battle of the Immortals explains mounts and pets
The pace of information released about the upcoming Battle of the Immortals is increasing, no doubt to raise anticipation for the game's swift-approaching beta. The most recent post on the official Perfect World Entertainment blog offers more details on the game's mounts and pets, which look to be an integral part of the game's structure and offer a few interesting twists on the features. Mounts, for instance, can be upgraded for increased speed... but each upgrade also allows the mount to learn new skills. The example given was of a mount that learned to teleport short distances as well as running, a helpful trick to be sure. Pets, on the other hand, can be almost any monster encountered in Battle of the Immortals. Players will have the opportunity to turn a defeated enemy into a pet "every now and then," which is a bit light on details but suggests either a long cooldown or a limited-supply item. Each pet can apparently have their skills slotted for a variety of roles, allowing them to be viable in both PvP and PvE combat. There's a week left before the closed beta begins, so if you're interested, take a look at our closed beta key giveaway to start out early.
MMO Family: A parent's look at Ether Saga Online
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. Next in our look at kids' MMOs is Ether Saga Online, winner of a 2009 National Parenting Publications Award for tweens and teens video games. Compared with the freewheeling, open-ended approach of Free Realms, ESO presents a more traditional MMO face. Even so, you probably weren't expecting a work of classic literature -- but that's in fact what you'll get. ESO, which was first developed for Chinese players, is based on Journey to the West (often known in the West as Monkey), considered one of the four great classical novels of Chinese literature. All that, and it's free to play, too.
Kung Foo! offers up new trailer and beta
As if a world promised to be "100% rat-free" wasn't enough to make you want to visit this strange new land, the folks at Perfect World Entertainment have released a shiny new trailer very much in the keeping of Kung Foo! This new commercial video shows off all manner of crazy things that you can look forward to when stepping into the world of Foo. That's right -- it's just chock full of Foo, and all for you! If you haven't taken the time to find out more about Kung Foo!, then be sure to check out the trailer after the break. With the recent death of Dungeon Runners, we're really glad to see another light-hearted MMO that doesn't take itself too seriously.
Battle of the Immortals reveals classes
Perfect World Entertainment has spent a fair amount of time talking up their upcoming PvP-focused game, Battle of the Immortals. The game certainly looks gorgeous, but we've only heard bits and pieces about how it will actually play. The most recent update, however, certainly provides a fair bit more information on how the game, as it details the game's classes -- Berzerker, Heretic, Magus, Slayer, and Champion. Each class is given a brief writeup of their strengths, weaknesses, and preferred opponents. In no particular order, Slayers deal a mix of physical and magical damage at close range but have next to no defensive abilities. Heretics are a combination of priests with more sinister magics, dealing damage and healing as well as inviting a few obious comparisons. Magi (or maguses, if you prefer) are... well, okay, they're kind of obvious. Berzerkers have an errant "z" in their name and focus on dealing out physical damage at the cost of some defense, and Champions wield a weapon and shield to be all but indestructible. The classes seem set to provide a fair mix of the usual "holy trinity" mechanics and PvP skills, so take a look at the official preview to get a clearer picture of what you might want to play once the game goes live.
Battle of the Immortals beta key giveaway
Perfect World Entertainment is taking over the world! Or at least in the MMO world, it seems that way. The publisher and/or developer of games like Ether Saga Online, Jade Dynasty, Kung Foo! and of course, Torchlight, PWE has announced the closed beta for yet another title: Battle of the Immortals. If PWE's name isn't reason enough to raise interest in this "2.5D MMO", we thought we'd help with 10,000 beta keys to give out to the Massively readers. Simply head on over to our giveaway page and grab yourself a key. Follow the directions there to get ready for the closed beta, which doesn't start until February 10th. Want to know more about the game before spending your time in their beta? Check out their main site or read a handy bullet-point list of features after the jump.
Kung Foo! closed beta event
If you've been involved in a beta over the last several weeks and haven't been boldly going where no gender-neutral-pronoun has gone before, you've probably been taking a look at Kung Foo!. Statistically speaking. Maybe you're in on the Hello Kitty Online: Rise of Cthulhu beta testing, we're not sure. Anyway. If you have been testing Kung Foo! recently, you'll be familiar with the volume and intensity of events that the community team has been organizing to keep the beta tests as engaging as possible. In preparation for Closed Beta 2 next week, they've announced another testing event... and the rewards are cold, hard cash. Well, cold, hard, item-mall cash. Which is still a nice freebie. The servers will go live for Closed Beta 2 on January 26th, 4 PM PST (7 PM for those of us running on EST), and the event will start an hour later at 5 PM PST on Realm 4. The official blog for Perfect World Entertainment will update this blog entry with a screenshot hinting at where the GM is hiding. Be the first to find him, and you win $50 worth of Zen currency. Easy money, isn't it? And a perfect way to get more excited about the game's launch when testing starts.
Battle of the Immortals offers details, screens, and concept art
With three F2Ps up and running, and Kung Foo and Torchlight underway, you'd think that the folks at Perfect World Entertainment would be content to rest on their laurels. But no, it appears that they've got yet another game in the wings called Battle of the Immortals, which will blend little bits of Eastern and Western mythology together as the old gods play for power against one another. According to the Perfect World Entertainment site, Battle of the Immortals will be a "2.5D MMORPG" that will feature things such as 5 different playable classes; PvP including Territory War; PvE content with both an auto-quest-navigation system and high-end raids; pets; mounted combat; and more. The story is said to cover everything from Norse mythology to the Qin Empire, which should be interesting to see. If your curiosity is piqued, why not pop on over to the PWI site and check out the story & concept art. Alternately, you could just skip to the meatier features or gear screenshot post if story-lines aren't your thing. They also hint that they'll be posting about the beta for Battle of the Immortals soon, which we'll be keeping an eye out for.
Perfect World Entertainment announces Battle of the Immortals
Perfect World Entertainment is working overtime. Not content with their current stable of games or the positive press that's been getting drummed up for their upcoming comedy game, Kung Foo!, they've just announced a new addition to their lineup. The official developer blog for the company announced that Battle of the Immortals is on its way, complete with a number of screenshots of characters decked out to the nines in epic armor. So, what will the game actually play like? Well... that's an excellent question, one that the announcement largely sidesteps altogether. We know that the game is being developed by Perfect World Entertainment's Shanghai studio instead of their more conventional Beijing studio, and that it's supposed to play very differently than their eponymous flagship title. However, no actual gameplay elements are discussed beyond a statement that implies the game may well have a strong PvP focus, and the frequently restated factor that the game promises to be high-energy. On the flip side, the screenshots look excellent (unless you really don't care for the more exaggerated Eastern aesthetic) and PWE certainly has a solid track record for its free-to-play games.
Foo for you: We have Kung Foo closed beta keys
Remember last week, when we persuaded you to be a hero by tweeting some Kung Foo puns that could make the baby Jesus cry? Well good news, Massively.com readers! Our bribery with Muse tickets has paid off! By the powers invested in us by Jason Varden and the rest of the Perfect World Entertainment team, we declare you all to be heroes just for reading our site! Huzzah! So what does getting to be a hero get you? Well it gets you one of 4,000 closed beta keys for Kung Foo, the only MMO not afraid to make fun of itself (and your sister.) All you have to do to claim your key is follow this link to our key site, press the button to get a key, and voila! A key will be delivered to your eyeballs, where it must be taken to the Perfect World closed beta key site for activation. Log in with your Perfect World account, stick in your key, and you'll be fooing it up in no time flat. Massively.com and Kung Foo. Making you a hero every step of the way (while simultaneously making fun of your sister.)
Don't be a foo, tweet to be a hero (and get closed beta keys for Kung Foo!)
Do you want to be a cool hero? As cool of a hero as the guy in the picture above? Or, even better, do you want to be cooler and more heroic than that guy? Yeah, we know you do. Well, you have two options. One of those options involves investing more money in rhinestones than the dude above, which is close to impossible. The other option, the more feasible option, if you ask us, is to get a hold of your tweety page and try to get the attention of Perfect World Entertainment's Kung Foo! twitter account. You know, the MMO that puts the FU in FUN? (We can't take the credit for that one. That was all Perfect World.) What the staff from the new kung-fu parody game is looking for are catchy one-liners/puns involving the #FOO hashtag. You know, things like "Give me #FOO or give me death" (not that funny) or "Get #FOO or get out!" (more funny.) Get their attention with an awesome one-liner, and you get to be a hero! Totally better than that guy! And if you're a hero, then you're totally heroic enough to deserve a closed beta key for Kung Foo! It's like a two-for-one deal! Or, hey, you could always go over and register for the Kung Foo! closed beta like a mundaneinite. We'd do that, but we've been told if we pass some Muse tickets to Perfect World's Jason Varden, we get to skip the closed beta scrutiny line. So excuse us, suckahs, we're skippin' 'da line!
Perfect World International hosts new contest for in-game prizes
Perfect World International fans had quite a few reasons to celebrate with the release of the recent expansion, Rising Tide, but it did bring one slight downside with it. After all, the new race included with the expansion is quite appealing, but that means players need to go through the whole leveling process again. However, that slight downside should be easily negated for anyone who chooses to take part in the game's new contest -- and we do mean anyone. Because the contest requires only one thing to win a prize, and that's participation. The game's developers have laid down the gauntlet -- they want 50,000 fans on Facebook by the end of January next year. To help give the game's fans an incentive, they're making it a contest, and the main prize will be given to each and every Facebook fan if they reach that goal. That prize is two solid weeks of doubled experience, drops, and spirit. Plus, five lucky fans among that number will also receive five levels for free! Take a look at the official announcement, and if you're a Perfect World International fan, time to start working your way toward that fifty thousand mark.
Perfect World Entertainment asks you to "find the hero in foo" with upcoming MMO
Perfect World Entertainment has announced an upcoming free-to-play MMO, and it looks to be crafted by a team with a delightful sense of humor. (This is almost certainly thanks in part to guest writer Devin Grayson) Kung Foo! describes itself as "a fun MMO that parodies everything from Kung-Fu movies to game shows." and urges you to "embrace the foo in you." We'll skip the "I pity the foo" jokes and just say that this game does not look like your standard hastily-churned-out, manga-style free-to-play MMO. With promises of things like "needy and ungrateful NPCs by the truck load" and "100% rat reduction in lowbie zones," Kung Foo! seems to offer a game that offers all of the standard MMO fare with a humorous twist. Whether it be PvP, mounts, crafting, pets, or extensive character customization, Kung Foo! seems to have covered all the bases at first glance. Take a look at the teaser trailer after the jump and see if you agree that Kung Foo! is worth a look.
Perfect World International gets a brand new expansion pack, "Rising Tide"
If you're a Perfect World International player, then it's time to visit the seas and flirt with mermaids! The game has recently unveiled their next expansion, Rising Tide, and it's set to unlock the mysteries of the depths. But who needs mystery when you're getting a brand new race and public quests?As the seas of the game have become corrupted by dark forces, the remaining members of the newest player race, the Tideborn, have turned to the land to request assistance in their fight. Tideborn players will find themselves accessing two new classes -- the Assassin and the Psychic -- to utilize in their fight against the darkness. (Yes, we hear you snickering, Dead Alewives fans.)
Ether Saga Online and Wizard 101 take home parenting awards
Many congratulations go out today to both Wizard 101 and Ether Saga Online, as the two online games have both claimed themselves a National Parenting Publication Award (NAPPA) from Parenthood.com.What does this mean exactly? Well it means that parents can rest easy knowing that these two games are fun, informative, and free of questionable content. If your kid plays either of these two games, you don't have to look over their shoulder to police what they're doing. The game takes steps to keep your kids safe and to make sure they'll have a good time too!Other recipients that weren't from the online MMO category included EA's Spore, and Guitar Hero On Tour, so it certainly speaks to the quality of these two titles for kids when they're put in that sort of company.
Massively Interviews: A look into Jade Dynasty's Ascension expansion with Andrew Brown
As we mentioned on Friday, Jade Dynasty is getting a brand new expansion and we the inside scoop for you. This Thursday is the release of the free update, but you don't have to wait that long to find out the story on the game's new Ascension system, brand new race, and new pet features. We sat down with Jade Dynasty's American product manager, Andrew Brown, and talked with him about the update. Not only did we find out exactly what's in the expansion, but we also got a glimpse into how the game is made and how much control American audiences have over the features in a Chinese MMO.
