Yearly Archives: 2012

Age of Conan Releases New End-Game Content: House of Crom

Age of Conan Releases New End-Game Content: House of Crom

 

 

Funcom, developers of the hit mature Freemium MMORPG, Age of Conan, today released a hefty update focusing on end-game content known as the House of Crom! Hidden beneath the scarred mountains of the Cimmerian north, this epic location brings with it many new dynamic encounters, new loot, and a new social dungeon for multiple groups to enjoy!

 

 

Before you rush into thinking this is just another dungeon, wait until you see the scope of these halls. Multiple storylines will take you deeper into the abandoned ruins of the House of Crom where epic loot, buried secrets, and horrible creatures await you. To better describe the scale, let’s break down these halls into two sections:

 

 

The Threshold of Divinity: This is an epic raid dungeon in which four groups of six players each are tasked with aiding the Cimmerians in driving out the Vanir desecrators. With your legion of allies backing you, you’ll have to tackle more challenging encounters (9 in total) and some new puzzle systems only possible due to the social nature of the dungeon.

 

 

The Vile Nativity: In the long forgotten library of the House of Crom lays many historic texts key to discovering the mysteries of Atlantis. Players will have to undergo this challenge in a team of 6 to take on 7 encounters in all, with 2 encounters being optional hidden discoveries! By learning the language of the Atlantean scholars, players will be able to unlock the full secrets this library has hidden away for so many years. Of course you’ll have to dodge explosions, work with unexpected allies, and face some of the most massive bosses yet released in the Age of Conan universe!

 

 

Of course the House of Crom wouldn’t be a true ancient ruin without having its share of rare bounty for players to plunder! Expect many new armor sets and even some quite fashionable capes as your reward for unlocking the mysteries of the Atlanteans. Take a look at the screenshot section of our profile page for a preview of these armor sets!

Digimon Masters Announces Keenan and Falcomon

Digimon Masters Announces The Arrival of Keenan And Falcomon

 

 

Digimon Masters Keenan and Falcomon

 

 

Joymax, leading online game developer and publisher, announced today the anticipated addition of two new Mercenary Digimon for their online massive multiplayer title, Digimon Masters. A fantastic universe where our world and the Digital World are closer than anyone would have imagined is about to change in ways never expected! Digimon Masters continues the story and heightened sense of urgency found in the Digimon anime. Now joining the cast of available Trainers is the hotly anticipated duo of Keenan and Falcomon!

 

 

Introducing Keenan Crier: lost in the Digital World as an infant, he was raised by a kind Frigimon; upon her death during a terrible crisis, he continued his childhood with Merukimon. Keenan considers himself a Digimon and not a human, creating a conflict within his heart he has yet to settle, as humans are jeopardizing his beloved Digital World. Keenan’s Partner Digimon is Falcomon, a wise bird who can Digivolve into Peckmon, Crowmon, and beyond.

 

 

 

 

The new arrival of Keenan coincides with the start Joymax’s “New Tamers” event. New to the game? Welcome! When your Partner Digimon reaches level 41, players will receive a Mystery Mercenary Digi-Egg, 3 Evoluters, and a 7-day Smart School Uniform. Returning Tamers will receive a 30-day EXP Equipment Set, Jump Boosters for the Yokohama and Western areas, 50 million gold, AND a randomly reinforced Mercenary Digi-Egg! This is in addition to the New Year event – log on every day during the celebration period and receive a Dracomon Mercenary Digi-Egg.

 

 

Digimon Tamers are hard at work training their Digimon to the new max level of 75. It’s a great time to acquire one of the three new Mercenary Eggs – V-mon, Patamon, Dokunemon and Salamon can now all be discovered by a skilled trainer with true mercenary skills. Five new maps will also be available for players to romp on, including Snowstorm Village, the terrifying Frozen Ground, cheerful Snowman Village, the ominous Distorted Data Village, and the Infinite Ice Wall. Discover a variety of new Digimon in these expanded zones as well as additional quests and secrets to discover.

Star Wars The Old Republic: Journey of a Sith

Star Wars The Old Republic: Journey of A Sith Inquisitor

By Remko Molenaar (Proxzor), OnRPG Journalist

 

(Editors Note: This column contains spoilers for the Sith Inquisitor storyline)

 

The Wait is Finally Over.


Finally the wait was over and early access was live, and since I preordered in the first few days I was hoping to get in on day 1. Unfortunately since I wasn’t the only one preordering SWTOR when it became available I got my access the second day of the early access which was still ahead of a lot of players. Since I have played the game in beta I knew what I wanted to make when the game was ready for launch. I started my first character as a Sith Inquisitor which ended up being one of the most popular classes. I made the character characteristics the same as I have been using in the beta which was basically very similar to Darth Maul, known from the Star Wars films. After landing my shuttle on the first planet Korriban I saw I wasn’t the only one with the idea of making the same looks as Darth Maul. I should have anticipated this, but rather than remake my character I just made a mental note to pick up a hoody and mask to cover my face later.

 

‘I was a slave’

 

Since I like playing the bad boy I decided to go for the cocky answers in conversations to build my character personality to my liking. I also decided to fully go for the Dark Side points because I liked the idea of characteristic detailed changes when going far into to the dark side (this however I soon came to regret when my Darth Maul turned pink themed…). As a slave I had to do everything that my new master Overseer Harkun required and wanted of me, unfortunately he already had a favorite student called Ffon Althe and he saw the rest of us pupils as useless scum and treated us like such. It didn’t take long to notice that my new Master liked to pick on me and tried everything to annoy me by sending me on stupid missions. Since I was a slave and still required much training with the force I decided to obey and do as my new master commanded. There were around 10 pupils there with me in the room when I got my first real mission, and we were told that our performance would determine who among us would be selected as the apprentice of the almighty Lord Zash.

 

 

After doing a couple of missions and growing more with the natural feel of the force I noticed my powers were becoming noticeably stronger. Meanwhile my fellow pupils had to stop the training or were simply killed by my new master as he pushed us to our limits to find the best among us. After a while only a small group of us was left, and unfortunately the teacher’s pet was still in the running. Thankfully my performance in a few near impossible missions had focused the eyes of Lord Zash solely on me. She quickly found out about the competition between me and Overseer Harkun’s favorite and began to take subtle steps to improve my odds.

 

 

Everyone should know that MMORPGs tend to have boring quests that require you to kill an x amount of monsters in order to complete the quest or to gather around some objects for the quest giver. In SWTOR however there are a lot of different quests that feel much more unique. For example I had been given a quest to interrogate a person and had to make him tell me who committed some crime the Inquisitors weren’t so fond off. I was instructed to squeeze this information from them at any cost and could use all my abilities if needed. So as evil as I decided to be I immediately decided to start off with a bang! After unleashing a lot of force lightning on my victim I got him to tell me the person who did the crime. Honestly intimidation tactics always work well for villains.

 

 

After completing all of the quests on Korriban it was time to do the final trial which was to retrieve an ancient map in a tomb untouched by civilization in a thousand of years. There could only be one winner… only one survivor. Since this was the battle between me and Ffon I felt pumped to defeat him. Unfortunately Overseer Harkun, as big of an ass he was, already sent Ffon on this mission ahead of me so I had no time to lose until… Lord Zash came in and gave me some precious advice that would benefit me greatly.

 

‘Success!’


After finishing the last trial, freeing a Dashade named Khem Val, and seeing Ffon Althe fall to the ground, I left the tomb with a satisfied grin on my face. I had progressed further than I ever imagined and was rewarded with Lord Vash’s old Lightsaber that she was given as an apprentice! She told me to meet her in her chambers in the capital of the Sith Empire in Kaas City which was located on Dromund Kaas. Oh, and I could keep Khem Val as my first companion which would help me a lot with crew skills and tanking monsters.

 

 

Upon arriving in Dromund Kaas I first had to take a shuttle to the Imperial Fleet where I could pick an advanced class. Since my goal was to get an assassin all along I didn’t hesitate when offering my decision. After equipping my new dual bladed lightsaber and skills I hopped on the next shuttle to Dromund Kaas. I had the choice to go with a normal shuttle or with the Black Talon. The only difference was that it would go faster with the Black Talon but it required a party since it was the first flashpoint that I could do. I decided to do my first flashpoint gathered around the entrance with a few other players ready to board the Black Talon…

 

 

Thanks for reading part 1 of my Star Wars the Old Republic column! Can’t handle the suspense? I’ll be back this time next week to continue the tale in the world of The Old Republic.

Abubakr’s Predictions for 2012

Abubakr’s Predictions for 2012

By Mohammad Abubakr, OnRPG Journalist

 

 

 

2011 has been a great year for the gaming world with MMO releases such as Dragon Nest and Star Wars: Knight of the Old Republic. As time goes on you can always expect to receive better content as consumers. Developers will continue to innovate and try to bring something new to the scene to attract customers.

 

 

The point and click model of MMOs works great but is starting to get overused. While this model may not completely disappear through 2012, I feel that more action oriented games not utilizing point and click will make their appearance.

 

 

The Pay to Play and Buy to Play models will also begin to be replaced by the Free to Play model. This is great for most gamers due to being able to play for free, but leads to the possible Pay to Win model.

 

Team Fortress 2


This would mean that cash users would gain significant advantages over free players. I feel it is ok to reward paying users but there has to be a limit. As stated by Mikedot last week, the ability to purchase all items using in-game currency is a must and the economy should not get inflated because of cash items. Publishers have proof on correctly done free to play models such as Team Fortress 2 so they do not need to overpower paying customers fearing that they will not be able to keep the game running.

 

 

I do not think the B2P (buy to play) model will die out for online games. I personally prefer B2P over F2P as once you paid the initial amount you do not need to worry about anything. On the other hand, F2P games will always tempt you to spend more. I personally end up spending more on F2P games than I would have on a standard $60 B2P game.

 

 

The biggest issue I have with newer games is difficulty. I am a very competitive player and enjoy playing games with high learning curves because of the sense of reward. The majority of the gaming community consists of casual gamers that do not play games for long hours. It would make sense for developers and publishers to target the majority of the audience.

 

 

Casual gamers want games that can be played without too much dedication, are easy to get into and are fun at all stages. The majority of MMORPG’s do not worry about difficulty because point and click is already easy to learn. To appeal to casual players, the ‘grind’ in MMOs has been and will continue to be cut down.  Lowering EXP required to level up and advance classes is alright with me because I know how time consuming leveling can be. However, I feel that obtaining rare items and equips should still be challenging.

 

 

Maplestory EXP


The change in difficulty affects MOBA, RTS and FPS games the most. More complex mechanics are slowly being eliminated to accommodate a wider range of players. For example, League of Legends has removed or simplified a lot of the gameplay mechanics from Dota such as denying, gold loss on death, low mana pools and activatable items (some are present in LoL but most are passive items).

 

 

These changes clearly show success to Riot Games as League of Legends is now huge but games such as HoN which kept the more complex mechanics are not as popular (keep in mind difficulty is not the only reason LoL is so big).

 

 

Gaming is becoming more and more popular in the world. As time goes on we may see E-Sports grow as big as physical sports like soccer. A lot of progress has been seen throughout 2011 with the main highlights being the massive growth of Starcraft II and the $1,600,000 Dota 2 tournament. Kluey went into great detail on this in his 2012 article so be sure to check it out.

 

 

To conclude, throughout 2012 games will begin to innovate and eventually ditch the point and click model, P2P will be replaced by F2P or B2P, overall difficulties of games will be reduced and E-Sports will continue to grow.

DC Universe Online Introduces R&D System

DC Universe Online Introduces Research & Development System

 

 

DC Universe Online R & D

 

 

WHAT: Every hero (and villain) needs a finely-tuned arsenal to succeed, and now DC Universe Online has just the right system! All DCUO players now have access to the all-new Research & Development (R&D) system. This new system allows players to create new and powerful items.

 

 

Research & Development brings Equipment Mods – a new type of item that will socket into players’ existing gear to give them a stat and combat rating increase. Players can use different Equipment Mods to increase various stats, allowing them to further customize their gear to suit their needs. In addition, players will be allowed to make superior consumables that not only restore health and power, but also provide a stat buff.

 

DC Universe Online Exobit Gathering

 

Upon reaching level 10, players will be directed to their respective faction’s R&D contact in the Watchtower or Hall of Doom for an introduction to the R&D system. R&D parts, Stations and Vendors can be found throughout the game so that no matter what players do, they will be able to make use of the new system.

 

There are four elements of this system, including:

Finding and Researching: Plans to create Equipment Mods to upgrade gear and consumables can be collected throughout the world.

Gathering: Throughout the open world (including Gotham City, Metropolis and Central City), players (1-30) can find exobytes and other items.

Salvaging: Players can turn unused, uncommon or rare items into crafting materials, and they can recover a rare item and create a useful piece of new equipment.

Collecting: Bosses will drop useful ingredients such as Focusing Elements and Plans throughout the game.

 

 

DC Universe Online Research & Development UI

 

 

More details about the R&D system can be found here: DC Universe Online Research & Development.

 

 

WHEN: The Research & Development game update is now available as a free download for players at all three access levels: Free, Premium and Legendary.

Kluey’s 2012 Predictions: A New Year in E-Sports

A New Year in E-Sports

By Umar Farooq (Kluey), OnRPG Journalist

 

For those uninformed on what E-Sports is, refer to this article: http://www.onrpg.com/MMO/Starcraft-II/review/What-is-E-Sports

 

 

 

2011 has been a great year for E-sports especially in the West. We’ve gone from two bleachers each being half empty and consisting of only men to small meet-ups organized on Twitter getting kicked out of malls because of the riot potential. We’ve gone from a 5,000 USD tournament hitting the front page of every gaming website to a million dollar tournament that was casually viewed. When you think about it, it’s hard to comprehend this massive change. Now that 2011 has come to an end, we think about this next year for E-Sports and the potential it has to change everything we know about sports. We might not have Monday night Football but rather, Saturday night Starcraft. We might not have the NBA lockout but rather the MLG lockout. Of course those are somewhat farfetched ideas to some but to others, it may seem like normal progression. Even if E-Sports doesn’t become so mainstream, 2012 will definitely change E-Sports.

 

 

Changing the Definition of a Gamer

Gaming in the West has always had a negative look to it. When an average bulky football fan pictured a gamer, the common stereotype was an overweight, socially excluded nerd with hygiene issues who spends 14 hours a day on his computer. In 2012, I expect that to change. A gamer should be known as a person with a favourite sport who loves to practice it. This is partially because of the revenue that is generated from gaming. In a recession, MLG generated some crazy numbers in terms of revenue. A crowd of 20,000 with most being from other countries/states showed up to fill the seats, much to the approval of nearby hotels. Many people will stay in a hotel for the 3 day period they are there and that’s some insane revenue generated from a branch of e-commerce. Of course don’t forget the local stadium food venders who are brimming with constant lines of 40 people during the 3 hour lunch period.

 

 

Before and After, Gamers do not disappoint.

 

The second reason for a change of the definition of a gamer in the West is simply the increased acceptance of technology in youthful circles. Everyone’s daughter or son will either play games or watch gamers play games. Even crazier than that, businesses will be afraid to criticize gamers as it will be similar to what happened to GoDaddy when they supported the SOPA bill. People will boycott them and destroy their business.

 

 

Games that will Become a Major E-Sport

 

Starcraft 2

Call me biased but, Starcraft 2 will be huge in 2012. The increase in sheer numbers from 2010 going into 2011 and now ending 2011 was insane and unpredictable. Prize money, crowd numbers, sponsorship money or even forum/blogger discussion posts related to tournaments have all shot up exponentially in this time period.

 

 

Although it is impossible to talk about all the reasons for this in one article (it would be more of a senior thesis), my primary guess is the rise of live streaming websites and star players utilizing them to build reputations outside of officially tournaments. I stumbled upon Starcraft 2 because of a stream and I know many other people have too. Any gaming stream website you go to, Starcraft 2 will most likely be on the front page. Streaming has also made the game much more enjoyable. I no longer think of Starcraft 2 as only what I have experienced from playing it but also by what the stream has shown me.

 

 

2012 for Starcraft 2 will be everything we have in 2011 minus the amateur mistakes caused by inexperienced organizers.

 

 

SlayerS’MMA being tossed into the air after winning Blizzard Cup 2011 in the best series of Starcraft 2


 

Counter Strike

Counter Strike is weird for me because it’s doing really good but, unless you play Counter Strike you most likely won’t be watching Counter Strike. I think with Counter Strike: Global Offensive being released, the community will get many new members. While they might be unskilled or not even play the game long-term, the tournaments will benefit greatly.

 

 

Like many games today, graphics matter. A parent looking for a game to buy as a gift will not look for how well made the game is. They will look for the popularity, shelf placement, and graphics. Counter Strike: Global Offensive fits both of these categories so theoretically, it should be the next big competitive FPS.

 

 

2012 for Counter Strike will be “make or break” in my opinion. If the game starts to decline in a business perspective, most likely there will be no future. If it starts to increase, we could see a new generation of FPS E-Sports.

 

 

League of Legends

I don’t know how or why but, this game just attracts such a huge crowd. This game is one of the prime success stories of E-Sports in the western hemisphere. Riot has promised 5 million dollars in tournaments for this next season and if that isn’t enough for you already, Korean’s have started playing this game too. The StarTale house has made a team (don’t know if this is public or not as of right now)

 

UpCloseGamers tour of the StarTale house in the League of Legends room.


Korean’s have been infamous for owning white dudes being the best at whichever game their country starts to play professionally. If League of Legends blows up in Korea, there will be no stopping it. The live crowds are always huge in Korea and the online EU and NA crowds are always ready.

 

 

DotA 2

A million dollar tournament was held before the game was even near release. I would be crazy to say that DotA 2 will not be a huge success with that type of support behind it. With Valve as the support, DotA 1 as the carry and League of Legends along with Heroes of Newerth as the feeders, DotA 2 will be a powerhouse in the 2012 E-Sports scene.  There isn’t much to say as this is one of those games that has been established already and can only go upwards.

 

 

Final Verdict

I could be very wrong about everything or spot on. If everything goes as planned, 2012 will be unpredictable. E-Sports’ growth in the West is what interests me most as gamers have always been rejected from the typical sporting scene. With the likes of ESPN and G4 hinting that we will see games on television soon, MLG hitting record high numbers, E-Sports getting talked about on the news and new gamers coming in from all directions, you cannot say that 2011 hasn’t set the stage for an E-Sports industry in 2012 that will be bigger, better and badder than ever before.

Mythos Global Open Beta Coming Soon; Now Available in EU.

Mythos Global Open Beta Coming Soon, Now Available for EU Players

 

 

Mythos Gremlin Fire

 

Hanbitsoft and T3Fun are happy to announce the open beta for their highly-anticipated online action RPG, Mythos Global. Beginning February 2, 2012, the fantasy world of Uld will be teeming with danger and adventure.

 

 

T3Fun has good news for European players. The OBT for Mythos Global will also be available to most of Europe. Mythos’ loyal supporters have been heard and now European fans will also be able to join in the action once the server opens for the open beta test.

 

Mythos Gadgeteer

 

To lead up to the launch of the open beta, the Mythos team has prepared a full month of activities for the fans. Every week in January, there will be new stories, exclusive interviews, mini-games, quizzes and more. Visit the Mythos Global website, forums, and fan page to take part in this month-long series of events. Keep checking back to discover what’s new each week before the open beta begins next month.