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Ultima, WAR, DaoC vets form Citadel Studios, announce player-driven Shards title
What do you get when you combine the dev talents of Derek Brinkmann, Chris Ondrus and Tim Cotten? Apparently you get a new firm called Citadel Studios which is building an Ultima Online-inspired "game that will enable players to customize their experience and change the face of player collaboration forever." The project is codenamed Shards, and it draws on the dev trio's experiences building Dark Age of Camelot, Warhammer Online, UO, and classic Elder Scrolls RPGs. "We left our soul-crushing, corporate jobs to make the games we'd actually play," says Brinkmann, founder and CEO of Citadel Studios. "Ultimately the community will dictate what Shards becomes, because we're not just providing a game but also a platform for players to express their creativity." Citadel's press release is light on game-specific details, but it states that the company is "ignoring the modern online gaming imperative to squeeze every last cent from every player." Shards will "give players more power than ever before, without constantly asking them to take out their wallets." The firm has released a brief teaser trailer which you can watch by clicking past the cut. [Source: Citadel press release]
Star Citizen passes $40 million, details player-driven Galactapedia
Star Citizen has officially cracked the $40 million crowdfunding mark. Cloud Imperium boss Chris Roberts penned another celebratory letter, which details the two backer-voted star systems unlocked as a result of surpassing the magic number. Roberts also unveiled the newest stretch goal, which features multiple rewards including a Gladius fighter craft, a mobiGlas rig, and an updated Observist portion of Star Citizen's Galactapedia. The Galactapedia is arguably the most interesting development, as it will "integrate directly into the game universe and respond in real time as players steer the course of SC's world." "We envision making the news with an impressive feat in the Galactapedia as a major goal for many players," Roberts writes. "If you're the one who finally defeats the Dread Pirate Roberts, charts a new Jump Point or makes the Advocacy's Most Wanted list, your actions will become memorialized for all time in the Galactapedia! What's more, the Galactapedia will be available both inside Star Citizen and through the RSI website."
War Thunder Golden Battles event starts March 9
If you haven't played Gaijin's War Thunder World War II combat simulator in a while, it's a good time to return and check out some of the changes implemented over the last couple of months. Beginning Sunday, March 9th, players may receive up to 600 pieces of premium in-game currency per day as part of the Golden Battles promotion. Your second, fifth, and seventh victory over opposing players will each count for 100 golden eagles, and the event takes place twice per day. Gaijin has also released its plans for the next update, including a huge upgrade to the game's player generated content capabilities. If you're new to War Thunder, click past the cut to view a video detailing the game's 1.37 update.
Some Assembly Required: An anniversary look at Darkfall's fifth year
Gimme five! Five years that is, in honor of Darkfall's anniversary. This week the PvP-centric sandbox celebrated its fifth year of bringing murder, mayhem, and fun to friends and foes alike in the brutal world of Agon. And while it may seem as though you could pretty much sum up the entirety of Darkfall's last 12 months in two words (Unholy Wars) and call it a day, there's actually been much more to the game than just the reboot's long-awaited release. In fact, that was only the beginning. The game has continued to expand and develop even after the initial launch of Unholy Wars, shaping it into the experience that it is today. That's precisely what we're here to toast together -- the ups and down of 52 weeks in Aventurine's hardcore sandbox. Be sure to leave your favorite memories from the past year in Agon before you go!
Final wave of War Thunder Ground Forces beta begins, massive content update announced
The third and final wave of War Thunder's closed beta for its Ground Forces expansion has begun. Eager tank drivers who have completed the November challenges or have purchased the game's starter packs can now join the battle. Open beta will then commence right after this closed beta concludes, with starter pack owners getting a head start as well as rare tanks. But that's not all the War Thunder news today. Gaijin Entertainment announced that the biggest game update to date will go live this spring with a plethora of goodies planned for players to enjoy. Update 1.39 will introduce user-generated content tools that will enable players to not only create their own planes and unique camouflage patterns but locations and missions as well. On top of that, there will be 18 new planes to choose from, new squadron features (like Squadron vs. Squadron battles), the ability for planes to overheat, and an improved UI. Check out images of the new planes and more in the gallery below. [Source: Gaijin Entertainment press release]
Norrathian Notebook: EQN Landmark sets new standard for player creativity
Yes, it's alpha. And yes, there are bugs. Heck, there are still many systems that aren't even in-game yet. But despite all that, EverQuest Next Landmark has already raised the bar when it comes to player creativity. In fact, the creativity is flowing freely during this alpha even before water does! You may recall that I mused last December how EQNL might just redefine player-generated content, comments based my own short personal experience and perusing developer concoctions. However, now that alpha is going strong, I can say with surety what I only postulated before: Landmark has set a new standard for supporting and showcasing creativity. And players have really stepped up to the challenge. Just exactly how much creativity are we talking about? Have you seen some of the stuff folks are coming up with? It's not just about houses (though I've certainly seen some amazing abodes); players are taking the tools and raw materials and sculpting impressive statues, designing mazes, and more. During my own wanderings and my two Massively TV tours, I've come across creations that leave me wavering between speechless and gush-central. And that's barely scratching the surface of what's out there! Add in the posted pics on Twitter and the official forums and that still doesn't cover it all. My mind boggles to think what will happen when everyone can lay hands on these tools at launch.
EVE Evolved: Consequences and conflict
I've always considered EVE Online to be the model sandbox MMO and a template that could theoretically be applied to other titles. Whether you believe it's by careful design or a happy accident, EVE has stumbled on a formula that clearly works and has helped the game stay popular for over a decade. I've written before about the many interconnected parts that make EVE's sandbox model work and how pulling out essential features such as item loss on death or adding foreign mechanics like global banking could cause the whole game to fall apart. But there's one aspect I didn't really cover in depth: consequences for negative behaviour. In his latest Some Assembly Required column, Massively's Jef Reahard argued that EVE can't be considered the quintessential sandbox MMO because it lacks consequences for bad behaviour. While I would argue that EVE is as close to the ideal model of the genre as exists at the moment, I'm forced to agree with Jef's assessment. Almost all of the major events in EVE's recent history that have hit the gaming media have been about theft or war, with tales of massive scams and alliance warfare painting New Eden in a dark and violent light. The ultimate sandbox would be equally capable of birthing incredible stories of exploration and players working together to build magnificent things, not just chaos and death in the gloomy depths of interstellar space. In this week's EVE Evolved, I look at the lack of consequence for negative actions in EVE Online, whether it causes negative behaviour, and why sandboxes need to be about more than just destruction.
Some Assembly Required: Is this really the sandbox renaissance?
It's funny, but this whole sandbox renaissance feeling has got me a little worried. I'm of course ecstatic at the number of sandbox MMOs currently in development, and I'm even happier that one triple-A outfit has finally acknowledged that MMOs are supposed to be sandboxes. EverQuest Next and Landmark aren't the only reasons to be amped, either, as games like Star Citizen, Elite: Dangerous, and The Repopulation are all putting their own spin on emergent virtual worlds and standing on the shoulders of genre giants. It's not all roses, though, and amidst the cautious optimism on display from starving sandbox fans, I feel the need to remind myself of the various personal pitfalls that still need to be addressed.
EQN Landmark livestream highlights new building mats, hints at co-op harvesting
In a fortuitous bit of timing, last night's EverQuest Next Landmark livestream highlighted some of the very changes that players saw right after the latest alpha patch went live. Besides a notable list of bug fixes, the patch introduced a separate loot chat tab, eight new prop recipes, and 12 new building materials, including various sandstones, stucco, plaster, and even sand. On top of that, players who have fallen victim to the clever traps of others will be glad to know that the evac to safety feature is now fully operational. During the stream, Senior Producer Terry Michaels also mentioned upcoming features currently in development, such as cooperative harvesting, attached claims, caves, permissions, and groups. The show then wrapped up with the announcement that these official streams, newly christened Landmark Live, will be a weekly occurrence from here on out. Watch the full livestream below, and read up on the latest alpha additions in the patch notes.
SOE's Smedley: Sandbox gaming is 'at the core of everything we're doing'
John Smedley's got a new blog, and he's kicked it off with an explanation of SOE's decision to make sandbox MMOs going forward. If you're already a sandbox fan, much of what he says is restating the obvious, from the belief that content-driven themepark models are unsustainable to the notion that MMOs should be showcasing player-generated content tools like Star Wars Galaxies' storytelling suite or Lord of the Rings Online's music system. Even if you're not a sandbox fan, it's still worth a read if only to understand why the company that created the ultimate grindpark is turning its back on content treadmills in favor of emergent, player-driven worlds. "We're going to take the idea of sandbox gaming and we're putting it at the core of everything we're doing," Smedley says. "We'll obviously still be making awesome stuff for players to do, but we're going to aim very high in terms of letting players be a part of the game systems. The more emergent sandbox style content we can make the less predictable the experience will be."
Some Assembly Required: Your home is your castle on Vanguard's Thestra
In a painful twist of fate, this week's scheduled Some Assembly Required wraps up the trilogy on Vanguard: Saga of Heroes housing that began with my first piece for this column highlighting Kojani homes way back in 2011. I say painful because we now know that Vanguard will be closing its doors forever come July 31st. But that leaves us six more months to enjoy what's there, and since we've already seen the oriental homes of Kojan and the desert dwellings of Qalia, it's time to take a tour of Thestra. The European-flavored continent was the final of the three to visit not because it is somehow less than the other two but because it is more -- as in more land to cover! The main reason I left Thestra for last is because of the sheer size of the continent. The amount of time required to visit just a fraction of the housing settlements scattered throughout this land is daunting. The other reason is that I wanted to end on a bang with my favorite style of guild housing: the castles!
Some Assembly Required: Pre-NGE SWG's proper sandbox PvP
A few weeks ago I ranted at indie sandbox devs who continue pumping out poorly conceived FFA PvP games. I didn't have any wordcount left at the end of that novella to propose any solutions, so I'm going to do that today. And hey, it's pretty simple, at least conceptually. All a dev team needs to do is iterate on Star Wars: Galaxies' pre-NGE PvP system.
Some Assembly Required: Virtual world roundup for 2014 and beyond
Just over two years ago there was a great disturbance, as if millions (or so) of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced. Yes, something terrible had happened: a beloved virtual world was destroyed. And that left a number of sandbox refugees looking for a new place to call home. At that time, Some Assembly Required offered a roundup of the then available virtual worlds that could possibly offer accommodation, depending on what qualities players most desired in their games. But as things are wont to, they changed; a lot can happen in the MMOverse in 24 months, from additional features in existing games to new games to the loss of more worlds. So it's time to update this list of virtual worlds to reflect 2014 and beyond. Take a look and see what titles or titles-to-be have the sandbox features that best make a game a home for you.
Field Journal: Floundering in Neverwinter's Foundry
Given that I'm a roleplayer, you might think that I find Neverwinter's Foundry an amazing expressive tool that I relish wholeheartedly. To that I respond with a resounding sort of! I love that it exists and seeing all the neat, even mind-blowing creations of others. Actually using it to make something of my own, though? That's pretty daunting, and I'm not talking about the interface. I am a very creative person, but there are many kinds of creativity. I've long since given up trying to be the game master in tabletop games given how painful it is for me to prepare and how I bring so much more to the table as a player. I'm the expressive sort, coming up with great ideas on the fly that make things more fun for everyone, drawing everyone's characters, that sort of thing. I'm not the constructive sort, so I have a hard time building worlds compared to inhabiting them. That might be why I had to stick a cameo from my own Trickster Rogue in the quest I designed.
Some Assembly Required: Yet another FFA PvP sandbox
I dabbled in yet another alpha-state indie sandbox game this week. As you'd expect, the title is rough around the edges. Also as you'd expect, it boasts FFA PvP and the correspondingly godawful community for whom the game's "do whatever you want" mechanics immediately translate to "kill everything that moves first and ask questions later, if at all." Since it's still alpha, there's plenty of time for the devs to correct this unfortunate bit of business and separate this particular game from the legions of crappy FFA-PvP-with-zero-consequences titles clumping together in the vast litterbox of bad MMO ideas. Will they do that? Probably not, but at least I'll get a good rant out of it.
Some Assembly Required: How EverQuest Next Landmark could redefine PGC
PGC means Players Got Creativity! OK, no it doesn't really, but it could (and it's better than Pungent Goat Cheese!). As you know, in our MMOverse, the acronym stands for Player-Generated Content, which is not only the backbone of Some Assembly Required but easily my favorite part of gaming. And what is player-generated content if not a demonstration of player creativity? Unfortunately, for several years, my favorite part of games seemed to be the least important focus for MMO developers. PGC, if it is brought in at all, is relegated to the back seat (or locked away in the trunk). Luckily, times are a-changing. Just a glance over the past year shows that the aversion-to-PGC attitude is shifting; more sandboxes have gone into development with more and more features than in the last few years. But one game, above them all, is going beyond adding a few features. EverQuest Next Landmark is not just letting PGC into the car; it's plunking it in the driver's seat and handing over the keys, and in doing so could potentially redefine PGC as we know it. And that's a good thing! Instead of being treated as non-essential fluff, PGC could be seen as a vital ingredient to any MMO.
Choose My Adventure: Neverending Neverwinter story
Of all the things this trip to Neverwinter has shown me, the ability to continue a character's story beyond the quest that Cryptic provides stands as the greatest thing I think any online game can give us. Although I don't believe that Neverwinter (or any other game, for that matter) gives me everything that I ever hoped for, the Foundry does allow those who enjoy dungeon mastering in the classic Dungeons and Dragons sense a chance to test out their skills at creating a story within a realistic development environment. Most writers would love to have a blank slate, a platform to do whatever they want to do, but realistically, that never happens. Every development environment contains its own limits and challenges content creators have to overcome. Sometimes the engine doesn't allow writers to do what they would like. Sometimes budgetary limits constrain the creative process. Sometimes writers forget that they are making a game and not a novel, so "fun" adds its own limits. As a writer and a gamer, I have been given a taste of what it takes to make an enjoyable quest for a gaming community.
The Repopulation's housing video offers decorating tips
Location. location, location. It applies to in-game real estate, too! The Repopulation has three locations players can enjoy housing: in NPC cities, player cities, and instanced. To give players an idea of what housing is about, Above and Beyond Technologies has released a video discussing housing options and touring the instanced housing. The nearly 10-minute tour showcases the housing interface, complete with new structure placement bar, and the actual decorating. Some highlights gleaned from the demonstration include the abilities to lock structures/items in place so they aren't accidentally moved, to scale placed items larger or smaller (as well as a reset button), to rotate items, and to raise and lower items. Get all your decorating tips in the video below. [Source: Above and Beyond Technologies press release]
Choose My Adventure: Neverwinter wonderland
When I think about what separates a good Neverwinter Foundry mission from a great Foundry mission, I have to say that it's the ambiance. Ambiance ranges from sounds to lighting to special effects. I could create the best mission ever, write the best story, but if I don't create the best ambiance for the quest, my design could fall flat. What are some of the best ways to create ambiance? Which ones should I put into this Choose My Adventure? In my limited time in the Neverwinter Foundry, I have barely been able to scratch the surface of everything that the design tool has to offer. Of course, decorations such as a dining table in a dining room add to the atmosphere of the setting, but so does the sun shining through the window or the NPCs clapping in the next room. Today, I need your assistance in choosing the different types of ambiance for different parts of our adventure.
Choose My Adventure: On such a Neverwinter's day
This past weekend, I believe I've worked out all the mechanics I will need to complete our Neverwinter Foundry quest. It contains a total of three boss fights. I don't want to give any spoilers at this point, but I'll say that one of them has a very cool mechanic that I made using the Foundry story tree. I admit that at first I saw only the limitations of the Foundry, but after diving in full-steam this weekend, I've realized that some of the tools are quite robust. One of my favorite tools is the dialogue tree. There are a few limitations on what dialogue can affect, but if you think outside the box as some creators have, you can actually make varying levels of difficulty for your dungeons or even allow players to bypass some content. Today's Choose My Adventure is a bit different from the norm. I've included the first half of my script for the quest after the break. There is no poll this time, but that doesn't mean that I don't want your input. After all, we are making this Neverwinter quest together. After you've read through the script, give your suggestions on possible changes in the comments -- I will certainly consider all of them. Enjoy!
