Conquer Online has officially released their Pirate Class.
Monthly Archives: January 2012
Brawl Busters: Casual Beatdown
Brawl Busters: Casual Beatdown
By Michael Sagoe (Mikedot), OnRPG Journalist
Rock Hippo Productions’ latest free-to-play title is primed and ready for action. Brawl Busters is a multiplayer online action game that mixes class-based combat with simple and intuitive controls, creating a game where everyone can have a ball (or in this case, a brawl.)
Customization
Making your character standout is easy thanks to the game’s character customization. Players can choose from eight different body types, three face styles and five skin tones, along with a handful of weapons, costumes and accessories. There are enough options available to make your character stand out, but the amount of costume choices could be just a tad larger.
However, making your character look good is only half the battle. You can also upgrade your weapons and costumes with additional stats. The process of upgrading these items, however, is a bit flaky: Item upgrading has a 1 out of 4 chance of being successful. Unsuccessful upgrades result in having the item level unchanged, the item level dropped or even have the entire item completely destroyed. The only way to prevent most unsuccessful upgrades is by coughing up a few bucks for RT (Rock Tokens). Fortunately, item upgrades aren’t completely necessary, as players can make do with base level equipment as long as they’re skilled enough.
Features
The available gameplay modes offer up a decent amount of variety, including old standbys such as Team Deathmatch and Free-For-All, popular favorites such as zombie mode and boss battle, and a unique spin on Team Deathmatch called Glow Rush.
Brawl Busters is all about easy combat mixed with chaotic gameplay, and the five different classes available help create said chaos: Sluggers can mix things up between melee and moderate range attacks, Fire Fighters use their giant water cannons to defend and cause interference from a distance, Boxers can chase down and beat down enemies mano-a-mano, Blitzers serve as crowd control while taking on multiple offenders at once and Rockers can do a little bit of everything. Classes are very well balanced, offering various strengths and weaknesses.
Gameplay in Brawl Busters is pretty simple to get into, but perhaps it sometimes feels a little too simple. While the overall gameplay is fast and chaotic, the core combat mechanics doesn’t have a lot going for it. Elements such as dashing, dodging, jumping, attacking, breaking objects and using items can be learned and mastered within a couple of hours. Core combat mechanics have a severe lack of depth which affects the game’s lasting appeal. Casual or avid types may enjoy the game in short bursts, but hardcore types may lose interest quickly.
Controls
Although Brawl Busters is a beat ‘em up style game, its control scheme is structured similar to a third person shooter. Using the basic WSAD setup, anyone that has ever played a shooting game will know just what to do. For those that don’t: the beginner’s tutorial does a nice job of explaining the controls in less than two minutes. Gamepad support would have been nice, but the game’s chaotic gameplay just wouldn’t allow for it. Overall the controls feel solid and functional, and you’ll never feel like your character is flailing outside of your control.
Graphics and Presentation
At first glance, many would suspect Brawl Busters’ visual style to be a rip-off of Team Fortress 2. While they both share a similar visual aesthetic, Brawl Busters’ visuals are far more bright and colorful. Despite the game’s development team hailing from the East, the game was made with western audiences in mind, and it shows. Environments come to life during battle and characters present themselves with a vibe that comes straight out of a Saturday morning cartoon. Character models all have zany proportions to them, also fitting in with the cartoon vibe (not to mention the female character models having some ridiculous awesome jiggle boob physics… *Boi-oi-oi-oi-oing*)
In the audio department: Brawl Busters has lively music that’s fun to listen to. Music is a bit scarce during combat, but the quick tunes that play during kiosk boosts help spark some energy. Sound effects are great overall, but the horn effect that blares whenever you land a hit may get on some people’s nerves.
Community
Community functions for Brawl Busters are incredibly lacking in certain aspects and are non-existent in others. While the leaderboard options are nice, the friend list system is too simple and there’s no clan support, which makes gathering friends up to be more tedious than it should be.
Brawl Busters’ community is filled with a lively bunch of local and international players. It’s easy to find active rooms for just about any game mode, but beware as level stacking in team versus modes happens frequently.
As with any team-based multiplayer game, lack of communication among teammates is sure to result in defeat, and with the game’s chaotic pacing, bare minimum chat functions simply aren’t up to the task. This could easily be remedied by including chat macros or in-game microphone support. With these features unavailable, trying to coordinate with your team in the middle of a heated battle isn’t such a good idea (unless, of course, you and the rest of your team have fast typing fingers.)
It’s best to gather up some friends or make new ones in-game if you want to form a functioning team.
Overall
While the hardcore gaming crowd may not fall head over heels, Brawl Busters is a terrific multiplayer action title that is as charming as it is unique. The western cartoon style is highly appealing, along with fast and easy gameplay that’s sure to be a hit with casual and avid gamers alike.
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Graphics and Presentation – 5
Controls – 4
Features – 3
Customization -3
Community – 3
SWTOR Rise of the Rakghouls Trailer
An entire civilized world destroyed, and now in SWTOR you must investigate the horrifying truth behind it.
TERA Online Announces First CB Test of 2012
Both TERA EU and TERA NA are taking sign-ups today and tomorrow for their first CB test of 2012!
Star Wars: The Old Republic Unveils Rise of the Rakghouls
Star Wars: The Old Republic Unveils Rise of the Rakghouls
Just one month after launching the fastest growing subscription MMO in history, EA, BioWare and LucasArts are prepared to release the first game update for the critically-acclaimed Star Wars: The Old Republic. Launching next week on Tuesday, January 17, Rise of the Rakghouls will introduce new, higher level group content, game feature additions and continued balancing and bug fixes. As part of the commitment to the community, BioWare will continue to release game updates to subscribers throughout the year on a regular cadence. The next update is planned for March 2012 and will include new Flashpoints, Operations, WarZones and new game systems.
“A month ago when we launched the Early Game Access program for Star Wars: The Old Republic, we promised our fans that this would just be the beginning of our journey together,” said Dr. Greg Zeschuk, General Manager of the BioWare Label’s MMO Business Unit and Co-Founder of BioWare. “Rise of the Rakghouls adds a lot of the things our community has been asking for – additional higher level group content, features like anti-aliasing, PvP bracketing and more. In the future, game updates will be even more substantial, as we promise to continue to not only add to The Old Republic, but to also improve and refine the experience with the full Legacy System and new Guild features.”
Rise of the Rakghouls features a new Flashpoint and a new Operation as well as a number of changes made throughout the entire game, including level 50 bracketing for PvP WarZones, the addition of anti-aliasing and changes to Open World PvP on Ilum.
Flashpoint: Kaon Under Siege is a completely new and unique group combat experience located on Kaon, a planet in the Tion Hegemony, a strategically important sector of the galaxy that has remained neutral, groups of up to four Republic or Imperial players must race to Kaon to eliminate the Rakghouls outbreak, securing the allegiance of the Tion Hegemony for their respective sides. This Flashpoint will be available for level 50 characters only and will feature Normal and Heroic modes.
Operation: Karagga’s Palace is a continuation of the game’s second launch Operation. In the Operation, teams of 8 or 16 players will face off against Karagga and the Hutt Cartel after the Hutts abandon their famous neutrality and breach agreements with both the Republic and Empire. Concerned by the threat of another combatant in the war for galactic control, both factions send teams of their most powerful heroes to confront Karagga and determine his intentions. This Operation will feature Normal, Heroic and Nightmare difficulty modes.
TERA Online gets Serious with Closed Beta Sign-Ups!
TERA Online gets Serious with Closed Beta Sign-Ups!
Today marks a glorious day for action combat lovers across the western world as Frogster and EnMasse have both announced official sign-ups have begun for TERA Online’s first beta test since the community play events!
Powered by the Unreal 3 engine and fine-tuned and balanced on the Korea servers for over a year, TERA Online is set to shake the MMO genre with breathtaking worlds, an expansive story of political intrigue and warring races joining together in a shaky alliance for survival, and an action combat system more solid than anything I’ve ever played. TERA EU has promised to draw 1,000 names to give complete access for the duration of the testing phase leading up to launch! Although an officially launch date is not confirmed, Frogster and EnMasse still hold on to their claim of a Spring 2012 release date, so being a winner of this first batch ensures you at least a few months of free gaming time in one of the premier action MMORPGs of 2012. But hurry as you must be registered by Friday the 13th to qualify for the first selection process.
A few things to note:
Unique Invitations: Access to the closed beta requires a unique invitation. Each invitation will indicated which closed beta test it is valid for. Submitting your email address more than once won’t increase your chances of receiving an invitation.
Random Selection: Invitations to TERA’s CB test will be distributed before each event based on random selection.
Open Beta Selection: Anyone who signs up will be ensured access to open beta when the time comes.
Alpha Testers: All alpha testers will be ensured access throughout the beta tests.
Contests and Giveaways: Although nothing is confirmed yet, you can expect to see some official contests and giveaways on many MMO news sites in the coming months!
To register your email address for the North American servers, please visit This Link.
To register your email address for the European servers, please visit This Link.
Also be sure to check out the new teaser trailer released by Frogster today!
Everquest 2: Wings Over Norrath Trailer
Everquest 2 brings flight to its players in this dazzling new trailer.
Riot Games and OnRPG Encourage You to Stand Against SOPA/PIPA
Riot Games and OnRPG Encourage You to Stand Against SOPA/PIPA
This is a special notice to our reader base and Internet users worldwide. The United States Congress is set to vote on two proposed bills when they return to session later this month. These terrible bills are known as SOPA/PIPA and would place heavy restrictions on Internet sharing practices such as linking copyrighted material on forums, creating artwork depicting characters owned by another entity, or showing pieces of copyrighted material on livestreams, such as playing your favorite music in the background while gaming on stream. Needless to say, this is incredibly harmful to artistic people worldwide as well as innovation in the ever growing Internet industry and OnRPG has a vested interest in protecting its content creation and especially our forums that have made this website so great for so many years.
But we are not alone in this stance. Many major website including Reddit, 4chan, Google, Amazon, Facebook, Twitter, and our neighbors across the street, Riot Games (developers and publishers of hit MOBA League of Legends), have joined together in opposition of this bill. The following statement was made earlier today by Ryze, CEO and co-founder of Riot Games:
Summoners,
We’re not usually inclined to comment on politics. We’re a game company, and making games is just a whole lot more fun.
But there is legislation under consideration today by the United States Congress that gives us serious concern.
Called the “Stop Online Piracy Act” (SOPA) in the House of Representatives and the “PROTECT IP Act” (PIPA) in the Senate, these bills are a misguided attempt to curb the illegal piracy of copyrighted content (like movies, music and games). Preventing piracy of copyrighted content is a laudable goal, and Riot supports legitimate efforts to combat these activities and protect content creators (like us).
However, SOPA/PIPA goes far beyond simply addressing piracy. This proposed legislation actually threatens any website that features user-generated content. In effect, any copyright holder could file a claim that a streaming website is hosting unauthorized content (such as a song in the background of a League of Legends stream). Under the law, ad networks, payment providers and internet service providers are now potentially liable for their user’s infringement. These services could then be compelled to immediately remove support for a streaming website or face a costly legal battle – at a minimum cutting off financial means, and likely shutting off the site entirely.
How would SOPA/PIPA impact League of Legends players?
Kills streaming. If any single streamer plays copyrighted music (or alt tabs into a movie or other owned content) on their stream, there is a significant risk of the entire streaming service being taken down. In some cases, it could even result in criminal penalties for the streamer.
Threatens independent content creation. Services we all use to create and share League of Legends related content, such as YouTube, Reddit, DeviantArt, streaming websites such as Own3d and Twitch, and more would be at risk of shutting down or greatly restricting the scope of legitimate content allowed on their sites.
Attacks our community. Aspects of our service such as the official forums and potentially even in-game chat, could be taken down or have their features reduced based on user behavior.
Other harmful effects. SOPA/PIPA undermine established intellectual property legislation like the DMCA, raise serious constitutional free speech issues, and could even compromise the basic security infrastructure of the internet.
Congress will reconvene at the end of January, and with a long roster of supporters on both sides of the aisle, SOPA/PIPA could actually pass. The likelihood is so great that technology giants including Google, Amazon, Facebook and Twitter have gone so far as to publicly consider a simultaneous blackout in protest.
Riot Games is opposed to SOPA/PIPA in their present form. While we do support efforts to prevent online piracy, the current form of this legislation comes at far too high a cost for us, our players, and online communities across the internet.
Help us take a stand. Write your congressperson today and voice your opposition to this misguided and harmful legislation: https://action.eff.org/o/9042/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=8173
EDIT: Riot Games Attorney RiotLomar is currently doing an AMAA on Reddit. Have a question? Check it out!
OnRPG also suggests you further educate yourself on who stands for and against this issue by looking into OpenCongress.org and sopatracker.com!
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
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.














