Monthly Archives: April 2009

Khan Wars Review: Super Strategic

By Rick Charbs (Jammart), Onrpg writer

Overview

Khan Wars is a browser based strategy game developed by XS Software. Recently upgraded to Khan Wars 2.0, many updates have been added to the game, as well as a general revamp of the overall gameplay (which can all be viewed in the help section on their website). Heavily based on medieval history with elements of fantasy, this MMO attracts many. It introduces the Middle Ages of Europe setting, where you may choose from one of nine nations to build up in order to lead them to victory. The nine nations are as follows: the Bulgarians, the Franks, the Germans, the Goths, the Byzantine, the Brittan, the Arabs, the Lithuanians, and the Russians. Each nation has its own infantry, buildings, and offer different gameplay experiences to a certain extent. The variety is a huge plus for a strategy game with so many players playing simultaneously (you’ll end up having to surpass thousands if you dedicate yourself to this game!).

You begin playing the game by creating a hero (registering) and then choosing a race from one of the nine nations. You are then transported to your kingdom, and you are prompted to create a few buildings to aid you in collecting resources. You will have to wait a while for your building queue to finish until you are able to build more things, this also applies to combat. This tactical gameplay is basically the jist of the game, though you will always bump in to larger and more complex challenges the more you play.

The hero aspect of the game allows you to customize your avatar and build up his skills with skill points you receive based on your experience in game. This allows you to build up an even stronger army and defeat your opponents much more easily, but beware of their own hero!

Khan Wars is also a comprehensive social unit. With a friends list, many statistics, guilds, and more, this strategy game really relies on player cooperation. These features will also often relieve you of boredom whilst waiting for your in game quests to end (its like one huge chat room)!

Graphics and Sound

With a strictly 2D atmosphere, I have to admit Khan Wars did a great job. The concept art is very appropriate, and the user interface is very simple and very smoothly done. There are no sounds as far as I’ve experienced, though, but that can easily be replaced by your own media library any day.

Personal Recommendation

Firstly, if you do not enjoy strategy/tactical games, do not even think of playing this game—it will bore you silly. However, if you are somewhat interested in this type of MMO, it is a great one to try. The concept is simple with loads of hours of gameplay, and the game was done right. There are hundreds of new players every day, so be sure to join forces with others to spice things up! One major downfall I discovered was their VIP status, though, as you have to pay to have a certain advantage over others. On the other hand, they did not overdo it and everyone is given VIP status for their first few days in the game to try it out. Nonetheless, even if strategy games highly bore me, I was really impressed with this browser based game. Happy Gaming!

Pros

– Browser based

– Simple and entertaining

– Great concept art and user interface

Cons

– Vip status

– Not much content

World of Cars

The World of Cars Online is a 3D online world based on the hit movie, CARS. Get ready for an amazing ride into this wacky world of fun and adventure. The only difference is – YOU are the Car! Design your car, become a racing legend, or just make new friends. Play tons of mini-games with Lightning McQueen and the awesome cast of CARS.

DDO: Module 9 in test phase

Turbine is reporting the following news about its MMORPG Dungeons & Dragons Online:


Risia Retires, Lamannia Is Born!

The Risia server is being retired! If you currently have a Risia client installed, please uninstall it. We have an all new Preview Server for new content: Lamannia! Lamannia is taking Risia’s place as the server for checking out upcoming game features and releases!


Mod 9 On Lamannia!

Next, some more exciting news: next week we will begin the first previews of Mod 9: The Plane of Battle on Lamannia! But that’s not the only thing new coming to DDO…


A New Way To Get In Game!

Mod 9 and Lamannia come packaged with technology designed to streamline downloads for new players and make patching easier than ever for our current players!

The Turbine Download Manager makes it easier to get into our games and start playing, whether you’re a new player or a current player ready for new content. The Turbine Download Manager offers new players the opportunity to start playing the game before they have completed the entire download and installation of the game. Future versions of the Turbine Download Manager will offer current players the ability to automatically download patches through a process called “forward patching,” enabling them to play as soon as the servers open with new content!

Beginning with Mod 9 on Lamannia, new players will experience a “tiered” download; meaning that after a relatively small initial download, they can jump right into character creation. While they’re creating their characters, the new player (Beach / Grotto) tutorial instance will download in the background; while they’re playing the tutorial instance, the public portion of Korthos Village will download, and while they’re playing through those first few Village quests, the Korthos Wilderness will download in the background, and then the full game. There may be brief periods of waiting while the next tier is downloading, particularly for new players with slower internet connections, but the wait time has been significantly reduced from the days when the entire game had to be downloaded and installed before a new player ever reached character creation!

The Turbine Download Manager also offers the following features:

  • Peer-to-peer downloading, allowing you to download files even faster
  • More control over your download experience
  • Set overall capacity and speed limits
  • Schedule downloads by time of day and day of week
  • Set limits based on what other applications you are running
  • Pause and have the download automatically resume at a later time
  • UPnP support (if your router and firewall support it and are configured correctly).

We encourage everyone to try creating a new character to help provide feedback on the incremental download, so we can polish this experience for new players!


A few important things to note:

Lamannia will contain all recently played characters which existed on the DDO servers as of December 29, 2008.
While Turbine will remain the primary provider of bandwidth, the Download Manager will also use optional peer-to-peer file sharing to speed up the downloads. The peer-to-peer portion only acts as a subsidizer.

Ready to get started? Watch for the announcement for the Turbine Download Manager Beta, which will provide a link so you can get started on Lamannia! Release Notes for Lamannia will be available on Monday in the Compendium!

TOP :New High Level BOSSes Added

The most successful MMORPG under the IGG banner, Tales of Pirates has been swashbuckling its way into players hearts for 2 years now. Thanks to the developers’ constant innovation, more band new monsters have been added to the new version. Some high level BOSSes which not only have eye-catching appearance but also own top-grade epic drops, appear in Aurora Area and Dark Area. If players want to have a sneak peek, the following instruction can not be missed.


Aurora Area BOSSes:

1. Firm Guard
Level 130 BOSS, will do anything to protect the Aurora Area!
Drops: Robot Wheel, Metal Funnel, Rune of Courtesy, Sealed Aurora Sword, The Box of Prowess

2. Furious Kara
Level 135 BOSS, used to be wife of North Ville. She’s gone crazy since
North Ville left.
Drops: Sealed Crusaders Shield, Sealed Bane Bow, Rune of Justness, Sealed
Judgment Shot, The Box of Hornor, The Box of Sacrifice

Dark Area BOSSes:
1. Vicious Relic Protector
Level 130 BOSS, was cursed by an infinite dark seal and became a monster. Nobody yet knows how to clear the curse…

Drops: Robot Wheel, Metal Funnel, Rune of Pity, Sealed Dreadful Dagger,
The Box of Justice

2. Morpheus Abyss Demon
Level 135 BOSS, able to control the power of evil, as well as being arrogant and conceited.
Drops: Devil Gem, Sealed Aegis Sword, Rune of Courage, Sealed RedemptionStaff, Sealed Amulet Staff, The Box of Empathy, The Box of Inspiration

How hard are these new BOSSes to defeat? How powerful are they’re spells and attacks? Only those who have enough courage can find out and get the chance to claim their valuable drops!

LOTRO: The Leaves of Lórien out now!

Codemasters Online is proud to announce that the latest major free content update to The Lord of the Rings Online: Mines of Moria is now live and ready to play!

Free to subscribers, Book 7: The Leaves of Lórien is a huge new update with a whole host of new features. These include the continuation of the Epic storyline, a new 12-man raid and the enhanced new player experience.

The Spring Festival Returns!

Starting 3rd April and ending 17th April, the Spring Festival will be open for all to enjoy.

To take part in the various spring festivities which include new antics from the Tavern League, flower picking, dancing, fence running and other fun mini-quests, head to the Festival Grounds in the home lands.

Don’t forget to get lost in the new Hedge Maze in the Horsefields. There’s much fun to be had amongst the foliage there!

Square Enix’ Next MMORPG

by Joshua Temblett, Onrpg writer

Final Fantasy XI was not only a fantastic MMO, but it also gave birth to a lot of features which are now commonly used within the genre. Despite the game’s rising success in 2005 Square Enix announced that they were working on a successor to Final Fantasy XI, and that’s when the buzz began. In fact just recently Square Enix Boss, Yoichi Wada admitted that the developers of FFXI are preparing to take the title into its final years and move onto their next game. Will Square completely phase out Final Fantasy XI? I doubt it, as other reports by Square (and FFXI producers) have stated that they want the two games to co-aside with each other, and that the new MMO will be a much different experience from its much older brother.

There’s only one thing we know for sure: Square is working on another MMO and its code name is Rapture. We can also assume that they have been working on the title for a fairly long time and that the game is certainly very close to launch (or pre-launch). Rumours have been circulating that Square Enix will announce the game at this year’s E3 and to be honest, I wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t. Square Enix’s video games sales have seen a fall across all regions last year (despite this though their profit surprisingly raised by a slight hair) and this could be something to do with the quality in their recent titles dropping below what it used to be. I know what you’re thinking, “Blah Blah Blah, but what does it mean?” It could mean that Square Enix might find itself in trouble at some point along the line and that the company will certainly be looking for something to boost up its sales. Looking at the sales and the games released will help us get closer to finding out just what type of game Square Enix’s new MMORPG will be.

Japan’s video gaming market isn’t doing so well at all and is definitely not stable when compared to America’s and Europe’s market (with the United Kingdom being the second biggest gaming market in terms of purchases). This has had a huge impact on Japanese developers, especially on how they approach not only these markets, but the games they create. Japanese devs are finding a need to “Westernise” their games, so that their games can appeal to a wider audience and earn more profits worldwide. Square Enix has been greatly affected, as the company hasn’t really changed the way they create games (and what demographic they’re aimed at) since the first Final Fantasy and this is a major problem in a more fast paced western and casual orientated market. If we assume for a moment that the sequel to Final Fantasy began production in 2005, when the Japanese market had already started suffering, one could come to the conclusion that the next title will be slightly more westernised and will definitely aim to cater to a much larger audience.

In this economic climate, Square needs to approach the market differently, or else they’ll fail. World of Warcraft (a Western MMORPG) kicked through the doors of conventional MMO’s and produced a title that was easy to access, so that the emerging casual audience could get into it easier. It had features that were, at the time, original and mind blowing, and would of course appeal to a hardcore audience. WoW had another strong factor that put it in first place though, and that was the way it created an addictive and interesting experience, proudly made by the community Blizzard built up, which has attracted millions of normal people into the game’s unique world. People wouldn’t stop talking about the game (mainly due to their addiction to it), and this meant that if you had friends who wouldn’t shut up about the title, like I did, you’d either have to join them or leave them. Unfortunately the human race has a need for social acceptance among their friends/peers so most of them joined in the action.

Square needs to create a game that is unique, easy to access (they need to get rid of the stressful Play Online), fun to play and above all else addictive. If we take a look at some of the company’s recent MMO inspired releases, we might be able to piece together just how the game will play. There is one game that comes to mind when thinking about titles that would work as an MMORPG and that is Final Fantasy XII.

Final Fantasy XII was released in 2006 in the US and Japan, which was then followed by a 2007 release of the title in the Pal Regions. The title had suffered through a lot of problems, one of the main ones being that developers and designers were constantly coming and going, thus the game’s central focus got ruined which made it the weakest title in the series. FFXII was originally rumoured (and I fully believe designed) to be online or at least contain some online features. You can easily see that the game was meant to have some online aspect, and this is apparent from the open approach the game took and the battle system. The battle system put together the best parts of the previous Final Fantasy ATM system and mixed them with a more “Point and Click” MMORPG approach. This created a slightly boring but very in-depth system that you could just imagine playing in an online RPG. Not only this, but the game didn’t feel slow like Final Fantasy XI but rather fast paced. I would consider Final Fantasy XII an evolution of Square Enix’s online MMO battle system.

I’m not saying that just because FFXII featured MMORPG type gameplay that Square’s new MMO will be like it, I’m just pointing out what it could be like. If they want to appeal to a wider audience they need a faster and easier game. Things one needs to consider is SE’s approach to the new approaching market and the effect this has on their games. For example the company has recently set up a development team in America to approach the strong western market. Could this show that they’re moving to much more western influences for their games? Just something to think about.

One of the main questions I wish to answer is whether or not Squares’ new MMORPG will be a P2P or adopt a more open F2P (with an online market place) approach. SE is fairly renowned for taking their money up front, and can you blame them? Looking at the economic climate though would that be wise? It’s a well known fact that F2P games, on average, have much higher profit than P2P titles, but the amount of money made from Free to Play games can be unpredictable from month to month, whereas for Pay to Play games the developer is certain that every month they will get the same amount of money. This is the reason why P2P is much more popular with developers. If Square Enix released the title on a Buy to Play scheme though (much like Guild Wars) and gave the game some proper marketing, then it would no doubt sell. I personally think though that going for the free approach is much better as that way it will be more accessible (especially during the present economic climate) and you could end up gaining millions of gamers who are more than willing to pay for items and new clothing. Of course I know the game will be P2P as, after all, it is Square Enix.

So to wrap up, just how different will Rapture be? My answer: very different. The developers have learnt a lot from their experiences with Final Fantasy XI and from various other MMO titles about how to approach the market and just what you can achieve. I predict that the game will be slightly faster paced then its predecessor, and will be a lot easier to get into and play. Not only that but I think the game will certainly have a western appeal, whilst at the same time keeping Square’s well known injection of Japanese culture that they always put into their games. The big question is, will it be another Final Fantasy title? If they want the title to co-exist with Final Fantasy XI the answer is no, but if they wish the new game to replace it, yes. I can definitely guarantee you one thing though, it’ll kick rear.

Fallout MMO in the works?

Interplay has released the following announcement. It is rumored that the mysterious ‘Project: V13’ will be an MMO based on the popular Fallout brand.

Here’s the announcement:
Interplay Entertainment Corp. announced today that the company has signed a binding letter of intent with Masthead Studios to fund the development of a Massively Multiplayer Online Game (MMOG), code named “Project: V13.”

The game has been in design and development at Interplay since November 2007. Masthead and Interplay teams will work together under the direction and control of Interplay to complete development of the project.

As a part of the agreement, the game will utilize Masthead’s proprietary tools and MMOG technology developed for Masthead’s “Earthrise” project.

Commenting on the announcement, Interplay Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Herve Caen said, “We are looking forward to turning the vision of our game designers into a compelling online gaming experience. The planning and design completed for Project: V13 thus far, combined with Masthead’s resources, tools, and growing team of dedicated MMOG developers, will bring this unique game to reality.”


Masthead Studios President Atanas Atanasov said, “This arrangement is ideal because it leverages the technology our professionals have specifically built for advanced Massively Multiplayer Online Games into what we expect will be a groundbreaking Interplay gaming title.”

MechQuest

MechQuest is a Free browser-based giant destructive war machine battle game. It is heavily inspired by the art from every mecha & giant robot series ever created including magic and laser swords. Try out the ‘Anything Goes’ build and battle ‘Lunchbreak-sized’ gamea.

Game Features
Create your pilot and explore our ever expanding universe with new equipment, storylines, special events, and new planets as they are added in the regular updates. MechQuest is in ongoing development! On the game forums players can even offer suggestions for new releases!