Yearly Archives: 2011

GetAmped 2 Review – Crazy Crossover Fighting

GetAmped 2 Review – Crazy Crossover Fighting
By Michael Sagoe (mikedot), OnRPG Journalist

 

Back in 2000, a little company named CyberStep created GetAmped (GA), a crazy, over the top fighting game with strong emphasis on near limitless customization. With hundreds of accessories, weapons and a skin editor, you could play as anyone you ever wanted. Despite having such an amazing concept, the experience was bogged down with sketchy gameplay, along with visuals that were a complete eyesore. Several changes to the game were made down the line, but it still felt shallow and dated.

 

Several years later, CyberStep released a direct sequel that attempts to change the gameplay up while addressing the issues of the first game. Did CyberStep finally get it right this time, or will they have to head back to the drawing board with this one?

 

From the get go, you have a choice between several character classes, each with distinct fighting styles. After a tutorial here and a training mission there, you’re free to carve your path as a GAT fighter any way you’d like. Most fighting games would be satisfied with a couple of versus modes and nothing else, but GA2 comes complete with several PvP and PvE modes to keep players busy. Even if you’re not into fighting all the time, there’s also a social aspect to the game where each area has a lobby for players to meet up, chat and perform silly emotes for hours on end.

 

 

Get Amped 2 Free MMORPG Group Shot

 

The biggest issue with GA 1 was with how sloppy the flow of combat was. While GA2 attempts to remedy this with more fast and fluid action, combat feels just as sketchy as before due to lack animations with most attacks. If your perception and anticipation skills are decent, you’ll probably get used to it after a few matches.

 

While the game supports both keyboard and gamepads, after many sessions I came to the conclusion that controls flat out suck for keyboard use.  The control scheme may be simple, but mix it with sketchy combat and you’ll quickly realize that it’s not up to the task.  Playing on a gamepad, however, feels much more responsive. If you’re ever fixing to get a few rounds in, don’t ever play this on with Keyboard. This game was MEANT to be played with a gamepad.

 

After mastering the control scheme, you’ll still have to deal with the game’s awkward guard and counter system. You have a choice between playing with auto and manual guarding: Auto guard will block all attacks in front of you, and manual guard makes you do all the work by pressing weak and strong attack buttons together in order to block. Countering attacks while guarding requires you to tap the attack buttons as soon as you take a hit, but here’s the thing: there’s only around three to six frames of animation per attack, so making heads or tails out of your opponent’s next move feels more like an advanced version of hand-slap.

 

 

Get Amped 6 Hit Combo

The amount of accessories and weapons you can choose boarders on the insane: Yoyos, baseball bats, pistols, needles, swords, staffs and anything you can think of…

 

 

Get Amped 2 Free MMORPG Preview

 

…but with tons of weapons comes tons of balancing issues. A lot of accessories are too weak to be used in certain situations, and several more are flat out useless unless they’re upgraded.  Then you have the super “OP” accessories that are so powerful, they’re nearly impossible to beat unless you have an OP accessory yourself. Of course, winning with any accessory takes considerable amounts of effort, but some less than others. (*cough cough*Twin Blades*cough*)

 

Overall: The core gameplay isn’t perfect, but it certainly gets the job done. There’s tons of ways for players to battle all pro-like with advanced combos and techniques, while anyone on the ground level can jump in and have a good time. Most of the battles WILL be a clustering mess, but it’s an enjoy mess, for sure. The feeling you get when jumping head first into a mob of opponents, and then taking them out with a completely outrageous attack is just fantastic.

 

 

Get Amped 2 Barbed Fence

 

While GA2’s PvP shines, GA2’s PvE feels unpolished and tacked on.  Many of the game’s later PvE and solo challenges, such as rival duels against Jacky Noboru, are guaranteed to make you pull your hair out.  Enemy NPCs can block and counter most of your attacks with ease, and don’t get me started on Bon Segal’s “I can chain every special attack into a combo” nonsense.” It sure seems that CyberStep doesn’t realize that a cheap difficulty isn’t the same as a challenging one.

 

But the really stupid thing about the game’s PvP difficulty is that most NPCs can be defeated by simply attacking their backs until they’re groggy and tapping the weak attack button until they die. Don’t you just love games with completely sporadic and unbalanced difficulties?

 

Visual presentation here isn’t particularly special, but definitely a step up from the original, because instead of characters looking like cheaply made origami figures, they now look like a bunch of poseable toy action figures… Or something that came out of Super Mario 64. Environments look decent enough with average looking textures and a moderate amount of interactivity with each one.

 

The game’s original soundtrack hits all the right notes using lots of Jazz and DnB tunes, which is always a good thing in my book. Even if you don’t like the OST, you can replace every song in the game with your own tunes using .ogg files. (One time, I changed some of the songs in the game with songs from “The World Ends With You” and it was AWESOME.)

 

Skin editing has always been the highlight feature for all of CyberStep’s games, and GA2 is no exception. The game comes with a relatively easy to use skin editor that lets you to tweak your characters and accessories with detail. Even if you can’t deal with GA2’s built-in skin editor, you can export and import your skins into adobe photoshop files (.psd) and work with more powerful tools.

 

If the idea of playing as your favorite character or as your own original character intrigues you, you’re going to love fooling around with the skin editor feature, especially when you can show off your skin while knowing that you are the only “you”. Even if you’re not artistic enough to make your own skins, you’re free to download skins created by other players.

 

 

Get Amped 2 Free MMORPG Social

 

Biggest gripe I had with the game: The translation effort that CyberStep put into it. GA2’s filled to the brim with “Engrish”, misspellings and grammar errors. It’s clear that this game is in desperate need of localization and not just a straight up translation, because it looks like every bit of text from the Japanese version of GA2 was simply copied and pasted into babelfish or something.

 

Get Amped 2 Character Information

 

 

I know it’s not right to discount the enjoyment of an online game based on the community that plays it, but GA2’s community really makes me relive some bad memories. The community is filled with some bitter players that will taunt and swear at any given moment, so I sure hope you have some friends to play with or can be thick skinned enough to deal with them (It’s like I’m really playing Rumble Fighter again!)

 

To conclude: GetAmped 2 is everything that GetAmped 1 should have been. The ridiculous action mixed in with tons of modes will give players something new to do every time they log in. Despite its flaky combat system, the game is nothing like any other fighting game out there and can sometimes be incredibly addictive…

 

 

Get Amped 2 Free MMORPG

 

…and I should know, because even as I wrote this review up, I was playing the game between matches.

 

Pros:

Fast and frantic action

Tons of accessories and weapons for near limitless customization

Tons of PvP/PvE game modes

Full blown skin editor lets you play as anyone (and I mean ANYONE.)

Pumping OST filled with Jazz and DnB

 

Cons:

Sketchy combat

Average/dated visuals

“Engrish” and poor translations

Bitter community

The Mummy Online

In The Mummy Online, a free-to-play Action-RPG MMO game with adventure elements inspired by the films, players will take on heroic roles as adventure seekers with various talents and skills that will allow their characters to be unique within the MMO virtual world.

Set in Egypt during the first half of the twentieth century, gamers will experience familiar environments and key characters from the film franchises as they battle against each other and ancient evil.

Salem Online

Salem is a free to play, browser-based sandbox MMO. Set in the old days of colonial America where pilgrims and witches dwelled, players can make their own settlements and rules!

Features:

Permadeath: Play wisely! Your character only lives once – seems resurrection wasn’t perfected in the days of Salem.

In-Depth Character Customization: No classes, no roles: choose your skills as you see fit to suit your playstyle.

A World Built By Players: Only one city exists as a safe-zone: Providence. Outside this city, players can build their own settlements and set their own rules.

Born to be Wild in City of Heroes

Born to be Wild in City of Heroes

 

Ever wanted to run like a cat? Fly like an eagle? Sniff… uh… like a dog?

 

If so?  That’s very strange and the OnRPG staff will be with you soon to settle you down. If you’ve ever wanted to do all that in a game… well then this is your lucky day.

 

NCSoft and City of Heroes have announced the Animal Pack. Available for purchase from the 23rd of this month, now you will be able to embrace your wild side and run wild.

 

Some highlights include:

Over 60 New Costume Parts and Patterns: Mix and match between a series of new Feline, Avian, Minotaur Wolf costume pieces to create fierce mythological beasts or noble guardians of nature.

6 New Emotes: Allowing players to activate new Savage, Hiss and Sniff emotes along with a series of animal- themed costume change emotes including Feather Burst, Fur Bust, Fur Fly and Feather Fly.

 

2 New Auras: Choose between two new tint able auras, Flea and Beastly Rage, that can be enabled for combat or always be active.

1 New Travel Power – Beast Run: Available at level 4, characters can now run like a savage beast with the new Beast Run travel power, pouncing through the concrete jungles known as the Rogue Isles, Paragon City and Praetoria while stealthily stalking and attacking their prey at every turn.

 

Keep an eye out on Metas Verse as I am sure she’ll have something to say about it soon.

FTL Drives Ready: Battlestar Galactica Enters Open Beta

FTL Drives Ready: Battlestar Galactica Enters Open Beta
Prepare FTL drives; it’s time for an emergency jump!

 

battlestar online mmorpg starbuck on your wing

 

Battlestar Galactica Online has now entered the orbit of planet Open Beta allowing citizens of the world to enter the free-to-play browser based MMORPG set in the universe of the widely successful Syfy tv show.

 

If you are looking to join the conflict between the ragtag fleet of Galactica and the merciless Cylon forces you only need to register at the games official website and hit the play button.

 

See you in-game for the end of the human race.

Metropolis Now: I’ll Get By With A Little Help From My (Super) Friends

Metropolis Now: I’ll Get By With A Little Help From My (Super) Friends

By Stephen Boyd, OnRPG Journalist

 

Sometimes, when the forces of evil are rallied against you, one hero is not enough. From the Justice Society of America and the Seven Soldiers of Victory in the 1940’s through to the Teen Titans of today, hero teams have been an institution in comics.

 

And DC Universe Online has not ignored this tradition.

 

Now, it may not come as a surprise, being that this is a Massively MULTIPLAYER Game that group content is a part of the DCUO experience, but how much fun is it? What is it all about? And, perhaps most importantly, how successful is it?

 

There are both PvE and PvP servers for DC Universe Online. As you would expect, PvP is one huge battle of Good versus Evil all the time, so I will be focusing on the Mutiplayer, both competitive and Cooperative available on the PvE servers in this feature.

 

From the very earliest levels in DCUO your character will be given multiple opportunities to team with allies against NPCs and enemy players. Let’s break it down to see what your options are.

 

Legends PvP

In Legends mode, you get to shed the skin of your character and fill some of the most recognisable boots in the DC Universe. Here you will team with up to 3 other players in King of the Hill type matches. Currently there are three locations available for these battles; The Batcave, Arkham Asylum and Ace Chemicals, birthplace of the Joker.

 

In these matches you get to play as Nightwing, Robin and the Huntress from the Hero side and the Joker, Bane and Harley Quinn from the villainous side of the fence.

DCUO Harely Quinn MMORPG Review

Batman is available to play as well, but unfortunately only to those that pre-ordered the game. This seems a trifle unfair to have one of DC’s most iconic characters permanently unavailable to new players, and I would hope that SOE rectify this situation in the future. All of the above mentioned characters are available to both factions, can have multiples in each match and are not exactly balanced. Bane, for instance, has a devastating AOE attack that will suck away half your health bar. So if you are in combat against two Banes? Well, you can see what I’m getting at.

 

In last week’s press release regarding the February Issue of new content, game director Chris Cao indicated that Catwoman would be made available as a playable character in this mode. While it is nice to see a new character, it would be even nicer to see the developers stray from the Batman Universe a little. A Superman or Doomsday in these matches would be fun, and may cure the problem of all Bane, all the time that seems to be taking over this mode.

 

Arena PvP

In the Arena you have straight up Death Matches and Capture the Flag style contests. In the Moonbase Arena, players score time bonuses for taking down opponents or capturing the Kryptonite samples in their enemy’s base. In my experience, the Capture the Flag element is pretty much ignored and this is basically Deathmatch Mode.

 

In the S.T.A.R Labs Arena, King of the Hill rules apply. Capture and hold one of the three nodes and points are removed from your opponents’ total. When the total hits zero, your team wins.

 

The rewards for both of these modes come in the form of Marks. These tokens can be used to by powerful Armour from the vendors in your respective faction’s safehouse. It takes a LOT of these Marks to purchase your gear, but the full sets do offer bonuses specific to your chosen class, and are themed upon the big guns of both the Justice League and their villainous counterparts in the Legion of Doom.

 

DCUO Legends PvP Review

The DC Universe Wiki lists the full explanation of these tokens here.

Alerts

Instances in DCUO are known as Alerts. In these four player missions, you and your team will go up against some of the biggest names in the DC Universe.

 

Area 51 is the first Alert unlocked by players. Here you will be tasked with stopping Braniac’s forces mining Kryptonite deposits in the Nevada desert. It is in these Alert missions that your class choice will really come into play. Teams that are made up of pure DPS characters will have a tough time getting through these. 

 

In the Gorilla Island Alert, you and your team will go up against the finest soldiers Gorilla City has to offer, leading up to your final confrontation with the mad scientist in the giant ape body, the Ultra Humanite.

 

Bludhaven Alert sees the city devastated after the Injustice Society dropped the walking chemical bomb, Chemo on it in the classic Infinite Crisis storyline. You and your team must rescue valuable emergency supplies, fight mutated citizens and ultimately guide a team of HazMat troops into a final confrontation with Chemo. As befits an instance set in his former hometown, the former Robin, Nightwing will show up to help you take out one of the mini bosses in this mission.

 

DCUO PvP Arenas Review

More alerts will be made available to you as you progress through the game. As soon as you hit the level cap at 30, all new instances will be opened up to you including Smallville, where your team will have to take down Kansas citizens infected with the Doomsday virus and Arkham Asylum, where the inmates are running loose and you will face off against the Scarecrow, Mr. Freeze and Poison Ivy amongst others.

DC Universe Review

All of the modes I have talked about are accessible through your communicator by pressing Y.

 

The only other PvP option currently in the game is the Ring War PvP mission accessed through the recruiters in the Midtown area of Metropolis. This mission requires you to face off against your enemies while collecting Power Batteries that are scattered around the area, Green Lanterns for Heroes and the Yellow Lanterns of the Sinestro Corps for the villains. You will, of course have to work as a team if you want to complete this mission and rewards will be given for taking out enemy players.

 

While none of these multiplayer modes is hugely innovative, they are rewarding if a trifle grindy. The main problem is that without a solid base of Realm versus Realm, and the bragging rights that go with that, the missions tend toward the repetitive and having to score 400 Marks, of which you get two per alert, to get your PvP Helm can lean toward the tedious.

 

With so many little twists on the standard MMO formula in this game, it would have been good to see a slightly different currency system set in place in DC Universe Online.

 

Next week I will give my overview of the entire game and my opinions and feelings off what DCUO needs to do to survive and thrive in the MMO marketplace.

Blood Rites launches in English speaking Territories

Blood Rites, Born With Fancy 3D Graphic This Valentine

Created by Chinese game developer Kongzhong Corporation (NASDAQ: KONG) elaborately, the 3D MMORPG – Blood Rites is officially announced to be coming soon for players in Europe, America and other English speaking territories. With innovative graphic performance and widely imaginative game experience given, Blood Rites will lead you to a most fantastic virtual world.

Amazing Game Quality Created by Top-level Developing Team

Developed under Kongzhong’s high standard, Blood Rites gathered the art designers from China, South Korea and US, using picturized skill, to prove you this great sensorial performance.

No matter in game technology, graphic quality or even the in-game playing, unique originalities can be seen everywhere in Blood Rites. The new 3D gaming method, top graphic render tech, fresh physics engine, 4 transferable occupations and a full-time company-elf; all these features will be opened to public one after another.

The Unique Elf World

Blood Rites creates a mysterious world of elf’s. Planet of Pandora, Illusion woods, snowland…. This entire beautiful scenes will attract your eye while your first time playing.

 

Hundreds of Elves to Fit Your Own Favor

Being a featured element of Blood Rites, elf system is the part you can never miss. Those lovely elf beauties can be your in-game company, follow you through quests or adventures. More than that, the elf cultivation system can allow you to cultivate your own divine elf, bring you an exciting experience.

Plenty of Game Features Will Be on Stage Soon

In order to provide our beta testers better experience, Blood Rites prepared a lot gaming contents, smooth PVP, massive wild battles, moving combat style, divine gear etc.  All these will be uncovered soon.

Want get the firsthand news of Blood Rites? Want to be the first line to experience all the game features? Our first Flash website for Blood Rites is coming soon! The battle can’t stay without you!

War of Angels Trailers

War of Angels is gamigo´s new free-to-play 3D online role-playing game (MMORPG). There are no monthly subscription fees and no purchase is necessary to play. Register now and explore an exciting new fantasy world with a unique look.

Transformers Universe

The Transformers MMO was announced in July of 2010 by Netdragon and is said to be a large scale 3D Combat MMO set in the Transformers Universe.

We can’t wait to see Autobots such as Bumblebee, Jazz, Ironhide, Sideswipe and of course Optimus Prime square off against the Decepticons suck as Megatron, Soundwave and Starscream!

A recent announcement made clear that the company had changed direction and will be converting the game into a MOBA rather than a standard scifi MMORPG.