Yearly Archives: 2010

Audition Online Throws a Halloween Party with New Songs, Features and In-game Items

Audition Online Throws a Halloween Party with New Songs, Features and In-game Items

 

Audition Online, the leading online multiplayer dance-themed rhythm game with over 300 million registered accounts worldwide, unleashed a slew of new features and content in celebration of Halloween. The update includes 11 new tracks from various popular artists, over 100 new items added to the Fashion Mall, various new features improving the user experience, and a GM-managed Halloween event for a costume party like you’ve never seen before. Jump into Audition Online and experience the new update that’ll have you costumed and grooving to the sounds of the latest pop hits!

What’s new:

– New Songs: 11 new songs, including “Fireflies” by Owl City & “When Love Takes Over” (featuring Kelly Rowland) by David Guetta
100 new items added to the Fashion Mall: Clothes, new faces and Halloween costumes
Background Music (BGM) selector: Create and listen to your own playlist whenever you’re not competing on the dance floor
My Album feature: Create your own set list of favorite songs for quick and easy access whenever you DJ a game room
User Catalog: Quickly reserve or buy outfits you see on other players without having to look around in the Fashion Mall
Halloween Event: The GMs will be running a Halloween themed event over the weekends (Oct. 29-31 and Nov. 5-7)
– Convenience Chat Commands: Chat commands that put more information at your fingertips, such as player rank or couple’s info.

 

Audition

 

In addition to the exciting game updates, dancers are encouraged to check out the Audition Spotlight app on Facebook, which allows you to show off your hottest moves, connect with other players, and compare avatar profiles with your Facebook friends. For more information on the update and to play Audition Online, please visit the official website.

 

Closed Beta Testing Starts for Gamigo’s Loong

Closed Beta Testing Starts for Gamigo’s Loong

 

Today gamigo will be starting closed beta testing for Loong, the most successful new MMORPG released this year in China. Loong, the role-playing blockbuster, is now available for select players in North America and Europe.

 

Thanks to its incredibly detailed graphics and innovative character development, Loong has taken millions of Chinese players by storm. Ten skill trees allow players to develop their character freely – there are no limits based on character class in Loong! The qing gong feature allows players to jump incredibly high and run along walls. Epic battles with hundreds of players and up to 50 different types of pets that can be raised to become mounts are just a few of the game’s key features. Players can sign up to participate in closed beta testing on the game’s official website.

 

Loong

 

Features at a glance:

– Highly-detailed 3D graphics
– No restrictions on character class: every player can learn every skill
– More than 50 different pets
– Qing gong allows players to leap incredibly high and run through the air
– PvP battles and guild warfare
– Player matchmaking for PvP combat.

Champions Online Becomes Free-to-Play

Champions Online Becomes Free-to-Play

 

Atari and Cryptic Studio’s superhero MMO Champions Online will be free-to-download and play from Q1 2011, with the game adopting a freemium approach to content and item unlocking. The MMO is the latest in a string of properties to take the move, joining Turbine’s Dungeons and Dragons Online and Lord of the Rings Online as free to play. Just last month it was announced that nautical MMO Pirates of the Burning Sea would also adopt the payment model. 

 

It’s commonly seen as a way of lessening the burden of commitment on players, enticing new users into investing time in a game and encouraging them to make smaller payments for in-game items, areas and special abilities. It’s also proven to be very successful with revenues from Dungeon and Dragons Online skyrocketing by 500 per cent after the switch.

 

Champions Online

 

“Transitioning Champions Online to the free-to-play model is a great opportunity to reach a whole new audience of PC gamers that view subscription fees as a barrier to entry,” said Cryptic CEO John Needham. “By taking care of our current subscription-based community and welcoming the addition of new players through free-to-play, Champions Online is poised to build upon its success and to establish a new leadership position as the first free-to-play superhero MMO.”

 

The Champions Online model will offer unlimited play with no time limits or level caps – with the beta for the new model beginning on November 9, 2010. F2P breakdown of who gets what.

Flyff V16: Rise of the Muran – Open Beta Announcement

Flyff V16: Rise of the Muran – Open Beta Announcement

 

Leading free-to-play online game publisher Gala-Net is pleased to invite players to participate in Flyff’s V16 Open Beta, starting today! Open Beta will run from October 22nd to October 29th, and will showcase eight new class evolutions, a new end-level instanced dungeon, new monsters to battle,  a new region and city to explore, and a new premium spot for grinding.

 

Flyff

 

Roam the lands of Kaillun to battle the hostile Lykan tribe or stay safe Eillun, the city of cat-like Muran people.  Find new powerful weapons in the Catacombs of Anguish and in Ankou’s Asylum.  With so much to do in the world of Madrigal, there has never been a better time to Fly For Fun!

 

And to kick things off with a bang, Flyff has a stellar line-up of events, including the chance to win an Ancient Weapon of your choice!  For more details on V16 and all the upcoming launch events, please go to the Flyff Official Website.

Two Grand Fiesta Events in Angels Online

Two Grand Fiesta Events in Angels Online


Angels Online: Grand Fiesta Events


Since the Candy Land updated to Angels Online, the number of players has reached an all-time high. With Halloween just around the corner, the forums are abuzz as angels wonder what tasty treats the AO team has in store for the game’s loyal fans. If it’s cool items and mounts you want, then you’re in luck during the Halloween Grand Fiesta! Here’s a sneak peek at two events no Angels Online player will want to miss.

 

Event 1: Halloween Amulet Lucky Bags


After this week’s server maintenance, all players who have successfully leveled their characters past Level 20 will receive a free Halloween Amulet Lucky Bag. Even better, this bag of surprises can be opened once every four hours. Every time you remain online for four full hours, you’ll earn a new shot at the treats hidden in your Lucky Bag. There is even a small chance of scoring a Deepwater Bomb, a brand new underwater mount with jaw-dropping stats!

 

Two Grand Fiesta Events in Angels Online

 

Event 2: Angel Egg Machine


Many players will have noticed the new Egg Exchange Angel NPC and the Angel Egg Machine. This machine is ready to satisfy players’ cravings for raw power, offering a variety of items and mounts suitable for any situation. Trade the corresponding voucher to receive the item you most desire. What could be simpler?

 

Don’t miss out on all the latest Halloween events and activities. Visit the official site to stay up-to-date with everything that’s going on in Angels Online.

Hero: 108 Online Tour – Cartoon heroes come to life!

Hero: 108 Online Tour – Cartoon Heroes Come to Life!
By Michael Sagoe (mikedot), OnRPG Journalist
Tour guide: Kevin Crawford, Product Director for Gamania Digital Entertainment

 

Cartoon heroes come alive in a brand new action MMO for gamers of all ages. Hero: 108 Online is based on a cartoon series with the same name shown on Cartoon Network. Hero: 108 Online lets users play as the main characters straight from the cartoon series as well as some side characters, too. Hero: 108 Online uses simple arcade style controls for all types of gamers to pick up and play, as well as supporting all the features you’d come to expect from MMOs such as quests, guild support, PvP and more.

 

I joined up with Kevin Crawford, Product Director for Gamania to give me the ins and outs on Hero: 108 Online and a little bit of insight on the cartoon series it’s based on.

 

Hero: 108 backstory

For those that don’t know the story of Hero 108, it goes like this: In a distant land called The Hidden Kingdom, animals and humans lived together in peace. Then an evil dude name HighRoller came along and convinced the animals that humans were their enemies. HighRoller made humans and animals go against each other to spark a never ending conflict between them until a rebel force of young heroes showed up to end that conflict. These heroes live on a giant abandoned turtle shell called “Big Green” and do battle against HighRoller and his minions to restore peace in the Hidden Kingdom.

 

It is based loosely from a 14th century Chinese novel called “The Water Margin” which details the trials and tribulations of 108 warriors, which explains why the cartoon and game is called Hero 108.

 

At the character selection screen, I was given some insight on all the playable characters and their back stories. You can play as all the characters from first squad and second squad straight from the cartoon series. Each character has different strengths and weakness as well as personalities such as Mighty Raw, a straight forward attacker that can shoot lighting bolts from his eyes whenever he eats bananas (which he hates eating, by the way,) and Mr. No Hands, a cleric type character that actually does have hands, but locks them away in a box in order to prevent tickling himself to death (No, I’m not making this up!) I didn’t really have a favorite character since I’m not a fan of the cartoon, but I went with Ling Chung, a balanced melee and ranged fighter since he looked pretty awesome.

 

H108
Character selection screen

 

After I selected Ling Chung as my character, the tutorial started right away. The controls were pretty basic: WASD for movement, space to jump, J key to attack, L key to dash, K key for skills and 1-9 keys as hotkeys for skills and items. There’s a good amount of control customization allowing players to change their keyboard setup any way they like or allow the use of gamepads.

 

H108

 

After getting familiar with the controls, the tutorial shows you how to use the quest system.

 

The quest system was very easy to understand and use. Whenever you have an active quest, you can bring up your quest log and select the button next to your objective to bring up a red arrow that will point you in the direction of that objective. Not only that, the game features a “Quest Path” menu that shows each and every quest available while listing which quest you’re currently on. The quest tracker and quest paths are great systems that make losing track of quests nearly impossible.

 

H108
Quest path menu

 

After picking up my quest, we headed into an instanced area for beginners. We took down a couple of HighRoller’s soldiers and even got to see HighRoller out in the open. Unfortunately, HighRoller parried all of my attacks so I couldn’t take him down (Although, it would have been kind of funny if I could have battled and defeated HighRoller early on in the game.)

 

During our run though in the instanced area, a small math quiz popped up on screen. Kevin explains that the math quiz is used to detect if players are using bots. If you select the correct answer during these pop quizzes, your character will be healed with a considerable amount of HP. If you don’t pass the quiz, however, you won’t immediately be branded as a botter. The folks at Gamania can check whoever is passing or failing their quizzes before they take action on player accounts. It’s a neat little feature that not only helps prevent botting, but also helps kids with their math skills!

 

H108
Quiz Time!

 

After trying out a few more quests, I was shown more of Hero: 108 Online’s additional features. The game features tons of different mounts for players to choose from. These mounts are primarily used for transportation, allowing players to move at constant speeds while absorbing attacks from aggressive enemies. You can’t perform any attacks while on mounts, but they are very useful for moving around uninterrupted.

 

There are also special transformation items called “makeover candies” which players can use to transform into special characters for a limited amount of time, such as the popular “Jumpy Ghostface”

 

H108

 

With the up coming cash shop, players will be able to purchase costume items to make their character look cool and unique, like shown in the picture below:

 

H108
Kowloon character decked out in a special outfit

 

Players will also be able to purchase consumable items like HP and MP potions that work better than normal potions. The costume items are mostly for cosmetics, so it keeps the game fair and balanced. Players, of course, do not have to purchase these cash items to enjoy the game.

 

After Kevin showed off some special mounts and makeovers, we then went off to check out some of the boss raid areas. Boss raids are a fairly common in MMOs, and Hero: 108 Online is no exception. Boss monsters typically spawn in specific spots in these areas with high stats and will take skilled high level players to take down. Defeated bosses in raid areas will drop oodles of goodies such as equipment, potions and enchantment materials for your characters.

 

H108

 

My impression I got from touring Hero: 108 online is that the game is very tailored towards fans of the cartoon series and casual gamers everywhere, as the controllers were very easy to grasp and the pacing of leveling up was moderately quick. I didn’t get to try out any of the player versus player content featured in the game for players at LV25 and up, but I did get to try out every other feature the game has to offer. Gamania is working closely with the game developers to keep content fresh and update to date with the ongoing cartoon series as well as the player community for new ideas on features, events, and everything else in between.

Continuum Trench Wars

SSCU Trench Wars is an exciting team-based game platform. Trench Wars has become the most versatile and well known zone in all of Continuum. Primarily conceived as a team based flagging game, Trench Wars has evolved into a multi-faceted zone offering endless hours of entertainment. Upon entering Trench Wars, you will find yourself amidst the chaos of our public arena, where you can choose your objectives. The main goal is to assist your team in any way you can to capture and defend the base where the flag is housed. Holding the flag for 3 minutes consecutively will earn you and your team the win!

While each of the 8 ships have a specifically designed set of functions created to promote a balanced and skill oriented flagging match, our newest feature in the zone has a system where you can earn currency we call “Pub Bucks”! You can spend this currency for special upgrades on your ship, or perform devastating attacks on the opposition! For those who want to prove their worth amongst the best, you can challenge other players to a 1 on 1 duel using the money you have earned, and eventually become the richest and most renowned player in the arena!

Trench Wars also has two very competitive squad based League gaming systems, Trench Wars Leagues (TWL) and the ladder-based Trench Wars Division (TWD). TWL is now in its 14th season, and continues to be the battlegrounds for the best of the best in Dueling, Javelins and Basing. Squads compete each weekend during a regular season in order to make their way to the playoffs, for a chance at winning their respective TWL-Cups! TWD is a more versatile league system, where games can be played at any time and all squads can compete! All of these games are hosted automatically by bots called MatchBots, who handle all score reporting, game setup, and referee decisions.

In addition to our public arena and leagues, we also boast more than 700 sub-arenas, or “Events” which are hosted periodically by the staff members that hold the zone together. Some of these events include; Deathmatch style dueling, uniquely styled and customized Flagging games, several Elimination style games in addition to our 24 hour Elims, specially themed holiday maps, ship specific maps that play on 1 specific ships specialty, racing, ball games (such as Hockey/Soccer/Golf), and our very own “Zombies” game where the humans have a limited time to survive and escape the wrath of the zombies before they are hunted down and eaten alive! Our sub-arenas are always expanding, as they are created mostly by you, the community.

There are also weekend events hosted each Saturday and Sunday that offer special prizes, and even cash tournaments where you can play for and win real money!