Monthly Archives: May 2012

The Pride of Taern

The Pride of Taern is a browser-based MMORPG. Set in the fantasy world of Taern, players must fight to survive by questing to gain money and items. Players will also build up their guild with various buildings, and then set out to conquer their opponents. Battles are turn based, and your enemies and your parties each use various skills, attacks, and tactics to try and overcome.

 

 

Features

Unique characters: Pick from one of seven classes, and customize your character’s looks. It’s your choice to look like a fierce battle maiden, or a suave swashbuckler.

 

Party based combat: Engage in fierce battles with your party against a variety of foes. Battle vicious monsters, devious demons, and crafty human foes, and drive them away.

 

Guild system: Build your guild from modest beginnings to a world power. The buildings you construct shape how your guild will develop and grow.

 

Various PvP modes: Will you set out on a path to conquer the lands of Taern? Or perhaps your goal is to become a renowned gladiator? Both are possible within The Pride of Taern!

 

Cooperative gameplay: Explore and adventure with your friends. Communicate and conquer opponents together, using your combined strength and skills.

 

Riot Game’s President Tryndamere Takes on Reddit

Riot Game’s President Tryndamere Takes on Reddit

 

 

As I write this article, Riot Games President Marc “Tryndamere” Merill is putting on his game face and enduring endless rage as he does what most online gaming companies in this industry would never dare do, face the Reddit community in an open community interview. In it he discusses the connection between his wife Ashley and champion Ashe, as well as the origins of Tryndamere. He also comments on the stealth reworks, plans for the 100th champion event, and hints that some major changes are coming to the ‘back-end’ that keeps League of Legends running.

 

 

For the full discussion check out his Reddit page HERE.

WoT Throws Charity Event for NA Veterans

World of Tanks Throws Charity Event for NA Veterans

 

 

To recognize and honor North American veterans and troops during National Military Appreciation Month (NMAM), Wargaming America, the North American publisher and service center of the award-winning videogame developer and publisher, today announced its “World of Thanks” giving program in partnership with top veteran organizations. Wargaming America has chosen four non-profit organizations for the four weeks in May to receive proceeds from sales within its award-winning game, World of Tanks: AMVETS, Homes for our Troops, Military Families Fund and Paralyzed Veterans of America.

 

 

Each week in May, one of the veteran organizations will receive ten percent of the proceeds from the $14.95 and $49.95 gold packages purchased from the North American cluster. In addition, 75 percent of the proceeds of the $8.99 T14 tank packages (T14 + garage slot + 1000 gold) purchased during May will be divided between the four organizations.

 

 

“Beyond being a military-themed game, one of our core audiences of gamers in World of Tanks is active military and veterans – and we feel it’s important we show our gratitude and appreciation,” said Wargaming American General Manager Jeremy Monroe. “The organizations that we’ve chosen to work with provide amazing services and support to troops in U.S. and Canada and we’re excited to in turn support them.”

 

 

Weeks for donation:

 

AMVETS – May 3-9, 2012

 

Military Families Fund – May 10-16, 2012

 

Homes for Our Troops – May 17-23, 2012

 

Paralyzed Veterans of America – May 24-30, 2012

 

 

 

Last year Wargaming America ran a Veteran’s Day campaign to support and donate to the Paralyzed Veterans of America, raising more than $27,000 in one day for the organization.

 

 

May 2012 marks the 14th NMAM, a month designated by Congress to educate on both the history and recognition of our armed services with an in-depth look at the diversity of its individuals and achievements.  It allows Americans to educate each generation on the historical impact of our military through the participation of the community with those who serve their country.

Jagged Alliance Online gets Comprehensive Update

Jagged Alliance Online gets Comprehensive Update

 

Jagged Alliance Online

 

The latest milestone of the turn-based strategy game Jagged Alliance Online brings with it a reworked PvP system, an improved world map and adjustments to the difficulty of the game. As a result, the mercenaries that players know and love can be hired much earlier on and are no longer only available to high-level players.

 

 

The changes to the PvP system apply mostly to matchmaking, which now finds equal opponents more quickly. A new global ranking list, which shows the best PvP players in all game modes, has also been added. The world map now has a centralized PvP area that connects the PvP missions, which were previously separate. To provide a better overview and help players find a suitable mission more quickly, the difficulty of a mission is now shown on the world map.

 

 

Changes also include some game rebalancing, particularly with the damage from SMGs. PvP has also added new rewards along with healing and repair options to help players get into (and out of) matches quickly and safely. The entire update comes with an account reset to level the playing field.

TERA EU Officially Launches

TERA EU Officially Launches

 

 

The Berlin-based publisher Frogster is pleased to announce the successful launch of its long-anticipated MMO game TERA, developed by Bluehole Studio. Players have been invading the 10 servers set up for the launch since midday today (CEST).

 

 

New players will begin their adventure in TERA by creating a highly customized character from seven races and eight classes. They will join forces with thousands of allies to save an endangered universe. They will vie for power and set their own rules through an advanced political system. TERA players will discover a one-of-a-kind experience, giving them an MMO game setting combined with the thrill of action games.

 

 

To celebrate this launch, Frogster is releasing a new episode of its video series “Inside TERA”. In this installment, the TERA team gives more details about the action combat system, one of the most exciting features of the game, offering a gaming experience most veteran MMO players have never enjoyed before.

 

 

The famous BAMs, the big ass monsters players have to face as they progress through the game, will also join the fray and demonstrate how their very advanced intelligence makes every fight in the game different. Players will need to use a different strategy to defeat each unique BAM, but there are some tips that can be applied to all of them: stay alert, don’t let your guard down, keep moving and hit them harder than they hit you.

 

 

Although the time for pre-orders is now over, TERA is available in most retail shops from €49.99 (suggested retail price) for the standard edition. Ubisoft is managing the European retail distribution, while Frogster is taking care of the digital distribution of the game in Europe. Additionally, a monthly subscription will be necessary to keep playing TERA once the first playtime period included free with all versions of the game is over. Prices start at €12.95 a month, with tapering fees for longer time periods.

Elderscrolls MMO to Become Reality

Elderscrolls MMO to Become Reality

 

This Pleases the Dragonborn Greatly

 

I’ve been saying for a while that 2012 would be the year to change the way we look at MMOs. Now I’m starting to feel like this is just the tip of the iceberg as Bethesda and Zenimax have come out to officially announce their next upcoming title, Elderscrolls the MMO. This isn’t just a gimmick as it has made the cover of Game Informer Magazine’s June cover. Details are limited but we will list what we have so far.

 

 

Developed by Zenimax Online Studios.


Includes the entire continent of Tamriel (all provinces).


Takes place a millennium before the events of Skyrim, where daedric prince Molag Bal is screwing with the world.


Features solo questing, public dungeons.


PVP with three player factions that can engage in “open-world warfare.”


Developed for PC & Mac.

 

 

Stay tuned as major gaming sites are claiming an official trailer will be launched tomorrow. If this game is done right and not messed up by a wonky business model, we may see a next-gen MMO of the caliber gamers truly wish for.

Guild Wars 2: First Impressions Part 2

Guild Wars 2: First Impressions Part 2

By Jason Harper (Hhean), OnRPG Journalist

 

 

 

Sometimes bashing on computer controlled balls of experience simply isn’t entertaining, and you go out in search of the challenge only a real human mind can provide. Well, Guild Wars 2 provides handsomely in this area. The first game’s PvP was exceptional, and ArenaNet hasn’t forgotten its legacy.

 

 

The game’s PvP comes in two flavours: Structured PvP, and World vs World vs World (WvWvW). All characters in PvP are immediately powered up to the level cap of 80, and their gear is brought in line with equipment of that level as well, to provide as even a playing field as possible for everyone involved.

 

 

Structured PvP consists of standard point capture battlegrounds, but with each map having a small twist. On one map a trebuchet is usable by each team, ready to blow apart the small town that hosts the players’ conflict. On another, giant boss monsters offer rewards to those brave enough to challenge them, provided they don’t lose hold of the map’s central keep in the process. Players can freely select from a browser of Structured PvP matches at any time, giving it a ‘drop in, drop out’ feel. It’s good fun, but it isn’t anything remarkably different from what can be found elsewhere.

 

 

WvWvW PvP, on the other hand, is the game’s equivalent to the open world PvP found in other MMOs. Here you will find big castles, roaring siege engines and massive stretches of land to butcher your fellow man. Rather than fighting against another in-game faction though, you’re instead locked in a three way fight with players from other servers.

 

 

Most of the intense fighting takes place in the Endless Battlefield, a triangular map with a massive fortress in the centre. It has a variety of neutral towns in it that have inhabitants that can aid your cause by raiding nearby supply depots, provided you perform a dynamic event to help them. Each team also has their own homeworld, which contains their main fortress and an orb that gives their side some statistical bonuses if it remains in their possession. They’re frequently raided by enemy players hungry to steal that bonus away from their foes and give it to their own side. The war in WvWvW is, therefore, fought over four separate instances, with many battles going on in each, and all of them contributing to the larger war effort.

 

 

While a good deal of the game mode is about bashing on castle gates, it is nowhere near as simple as the dismal affair found in Warhammer Online. In order to make the siege equipment to defend or attack your castle, you’re going to need supplies. In order to get those supplies you’ll need to have control of supply depots dotted around the maps. Those depots, in turn, send out caravans with your supplies on them to your castles, where they can stockpile them for when a siege comes, or the supply depot is lost. Both the depots and the caravans can be very poorly defended unless players have invested in upgrading them, making them very prone for small groups of raiders to pick them off. This gives something for small groups of friends to do outside of the main hordes (Who always go for pounding on the nearest available castle), and also gives smaller, easier to achieve objectives for those who want to contribute to the war effort in a meaningful way without having to sink a massive amount of time into it.

 

 

While the movement-centric combat makes for some frantic and fun times, it does have some problems when dealing with other players and not NPCs. Due to a quirk in the game’s level adjustments for PvP, damage is extremely low right now. While the PvE combat is quick and deadly, the PvP feels like a pair of sumo wrestlers tapping one another with nerf bats. Killing another player in a straight duel can be very difficult, and you’ll usually need a group of people just to kill a single player, especially if you’re lacking in crowd control. Due to this low damage output, ranged characters feel far more powerful than melee, since a melee will risk it all for a few good hits, only to find their ‘squishy’ victim has been barely hurt. Cue the Benny Hill music while the ranged attacker simply kites the melee guy for a few minutes as their health bar is whittled away.

 

 

The game features a few issues at the moment, but most are balance or polish issues, not problems with the core product. The range/melee balance issue I’ve brought up needs to be addressed. There’s quite a few typos found all over the game, and quite a few points in the personal stories where a character will have the wrong voice, or won’t speak at all. The mesmer class is in dire need of some quality of life changes. Most of these aren’t core issues though, and can be tweaked when ArenaNet get to fixing them. There’s really only two main problems I have with the game as it is right now. One is likely going to be fixed when launch comes around, the other is… less likely to be fixed.

 

 

The game’s servers presented a real uphill battle during this first beta weekend. Servers became flooded with enthusiastic new players who wanted to catch their first glimpse of the game, and the servers didn’t take the strain very well. Most servers were running at maximum capacity, chugging under the weight of people making use of them, as people were shunted into overflow servers. The overflow system is a good idea to prevent the usual queues that can crop up during peak hours, but it did mean that grouping or finding friends was completely impossible as people were scattered to the four winds. Since server issues are so common in the early stages of a game’s life cycle, I suspect that we’ll be seeing improvements in this area before launch, but launch day itself might see some of these issues. The quickest way to make all this bouncing around less painful would be to allow the overflow system to keep groups of people together when they get bounced around, but currently that functionality doesn’t exist.

 

 

The only thing in the game that left a bad taste in my mouth was the ingame store. It’s shoved at players in a way that is as intrusive as many free to play titles. One way that this is done is with little boxes that drop from enemies, prompting you to buy keys for them from ArenaNet with your own money. This reminded me of the infuriating crates in Team Fortress 2, and remained a black mark on my experience with the game. I’m aware that the game needs some form of prolonged revenue stream to sustain it beyond the initial release, but come on. When a company is asking far more than the norm at retail, then immediately starts begging for handouts, it just reeks of greed.

 

(Editor’s Note: Been brought to my attention that keys for these boxes also drop from monsters and aren’t exclusively available through the cash shop)

 

 

Another example of this price gouging impacts a core part of the experience. You start with a mere five character slots across all servers, which won’t be enough to make a character of each profession, coming up three short. You can buy more of these slots using real money, of course, so this limitation feels deliberate rather than an oversight. If this was a nice extra on top of a good number of slots, charging older player who just love to make a stream of alternate characters, then sure, make them pay for luxury characters on their account. While I’m not opposed to this model, not giving players access to the bare minimum of one of each profession feels like a planned means of restricting the player’s options to force them to pony up more cash if they want to get the most out of a game they’ve already paid a premium for. I am really, really hoping Arena Net reconsider this design choice before launch, but this store system looks to have its greasy tendrils far too deep into the rest of the game right now for that to be likely.

 

 

Despite my grievances with the cash shop, the rest of the game is simply remarkable. This is such a good year for MMOs and yet Guild Wars 2 still stands tall against some of the fiercest competition since World of Warcraft’s launch. Many people seem to think this is the landmark title that will completely change the way we see MMOs, and I’m not really sure this is that mythical game. What it is though is a very good step forward for the genre as a whole. The whole industry isn’t going to change overnight as a result of its release, but it sure is something new, different and definitely worth your time and money.

 

 

It’s also big. Really, really big.

Guild Wars 2: First Impressions Part 1

Guild Wars 2: First Impressions Part 1

By Jason Harper (Hhean), OnRPG Journalist

 

 

Guild Wars 2 is massively massive. It swells with gianty ginormitude. Its biggishness can only truly be expressed with made up words. It’s a game so huge I’ve had to break my first impressions, the shortest glimpse of the game made available to me, into two articles simply because of how much there is to write about. Not only is the world itself big, but so are the many interconnected systems at play within the bowels of its underlying mechanics. The sheer amount of things that a player is able to do dwarfs nearly all other titles on the market, and a player can simply switch between any of the game’s options at a whim. Very little in the game limits your actions, sidestepping or fixing many issues found in most modern MMOs. Hell, even your character can be massive.

 

Divinity’s Reach, It’s That Big

 

The biggest race out there is the Norn, a bunch of giant nordic barbarians with a love of adventure. Humans are tiny by comparison, but their city is anything but small. Divinity’s Reach is the closest thing to Minas Tirith I’ve ever encountered in a video game, dominating the landscape for miles around. The ferocious Charr are a race of cat-like industrialists so harsh and unforgiving they killed their own gods. Each of their areas have clear antagonists, with the Humans defending against Centaur incursions and bandit raids, Norn battling dragon worshipping traitors, and the Charr battling their former oppressors, along with the ghostly former inhabitants of their new land. The Charr areas in particular are so full of bombastic over the top nonsense that makes the small Conan wannabe in me jump for joy.

 

 

The game’s remaining two races, the Sylvari and Asura, aren’t available for public use yet. For completeness, I’ll mention that they’re the midget inventors and youthful plant people, respectively. They’re both small, so clearly weren’t worth putting into the beta.

 

Poor Little Fellas

 

Professions/Classes are very broad, not filling the tight pigeon holes found in other MMOs. While the list of professions isn’t large (Warrior, Guardian, Necromancer, Elementalist, Mesmer, Ranger, Engineer, and Thief), the list of options available to each profession certainly is. What weapons your character uses can completely change the way you fight, as the weapons you’re using determine what abilities your character can use. However, each class does keep to some broad themes, and can’t do everything. For example, a guardian can be a tank, melee damage dealer, healer or AoE nuker. They always are better at playing with (and against) groups of people rather than being great duelists, and are limited to close range attacks even when not outright wading into melee. In contrast, while the thief does have some ranged capabilities with the short bow, most of their weapon load outs are about getting in, murdering a single target and running off as quickly as possible.

 

 

Combat is a halfway house between the hotbar based combat of other MMORPGs and something more action orientated like that found in Tera. Movement and positioning are key to survival, with limited access to rolls that evade incoming attacks. Unlike Tera, you can attack and move at the same time, with few skills that root you in place. This swings the advantage in the game heavily in favour of ranged attackers, as they can constantly kite their foes while melee fighters can struggle to keep up. Melee combat is deadly at the moment, with death coming very swiftly if you don’t dodge or block incoming attacks effectively. One lag spike and your character is going face down in the dirt.

 

 

Death in GW2 draws more inspiration from shooters like Left 4 Dead than its peers. When you run out of health, rather than dying immediately you are given the ability to fight for your survival. If you can kill a nearby enemy using a limited suite of abilities specific to your class, you’ll get back to your feet with a third of your health, ready to fight. This is great in PvE, where you can kill something that just downed you to make a last minute comeback, or kill creatures your downed friends are attacking to help them up. In PvP though, enemy players can choose to finish you off, at the expense of leaving themselves vulnerable for a few seconds. This vulnerability can result in some very weird situations. You can down someone while on low health, they then finish you off in their downed state while you’re trying to finish them, get up with far more health than you had, and then execute you while you’re trying to get up yourself. Nothing is more frustrating than being punished for winning a close fight, and leads to a weird metagame when two people get extremely low, and try to get their enemy to kill them. The only upside to this is that the times when both players are near death is a rare occurrence, so you’re not likely to encounter this problem often.

 

Much Like with Fighting Zombies, in Guild Wars 2 Always Double-Tap

 

Another way of getting back on your feet is having someone else help you up, which will grant them a little bit of experience. This is time consuming and risky, but can be done by your fellow player even after you’re beyond the point of being able to use your abilities while downed. This isn’t class restricted at all, so anyone can help anyone else get back on their feet and back into the fight.

 

 

A good deal of Guild Wars 2 is built to encourage altruistic behaviour, in much the same way as Firefall. Players can help one another out freely, gaining an experience bonus when others contribute to a kill, rather than a minus, or only one person getting credit. Grouping isn’t necessary, being more of a tool for communication and coordination than a necessary requirement for all forms of cooperation. This is driven home even further by the open nature of the questing system, dubbed ‘dynamic events’.

 

Courtesy of PvPOnline.com

 

Dynamic events are an evolution on the public quests first pioneered by Warhammer Online. While other games have flirted with this idea, all others have had it as extra seasoning on the World of Warcraft quest structure. Guild Wars 2, on the other hand, uses them as a player’s primary means of advancement. Towns can come under attack, which can lead to someone needing to be rescued, which can then lead to an escort mission, which may then lead to a boss fight. Not all dynamic quests are linked, but all of them tie into the central themes of their respective areas, making the world feel both coherent and alive. The most impressive thing about the system is that the world really feels like it can go on without you; it’s a place that exists with or without your involvement. Failed events can lead to new events just as much as completed ones, so if you fail to defend a town from a bandit raid, a new dynamic event might appear to retake the town, or to defend the refugees as they flee from their former home.

 

 

When not on a dynamic event, there are smaller tasks that can be completed in an area, where you earn the loyalty of a person in a specific region. This is usually simpler stuff like killing some enemies, retrieving certain objects or interacting with placeables. All of these actions will feed into a loyalty bar for the NPC in question, and when filled will allow you to buy goods from them with Karma, the resource earned from completing the dynamic events. While it’s usually favourable to complete dynamic events near these NPCs so you can both earn and spend your Karma in the same place, these are good stopgap tasks to complete when no dynamic events are going on in the area.

 

 

The only traditional quests that you’ll receive in guild wars are those relating to your character’s personal story. At character creation, you can select from a variety of character defining traits. One of these will allow you to select one of three plotlines for your character. For example, for Charr you will choose your character’s Legion (Blood, Iron or Ash), which will tell how your character rises in power through the ranks of their respective clan, each with different themes and ideas. The entire story in these quests is handled with fully voiced dialogue, and feature important choices at key junctures that branch the story. These decisions are rarely “Be the nice guy” or “Be a dick”, but usually more grey things like “Do the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few?” While these story quests are nice, they can be a bit lonely, given that they are far more of a pain for others to get involved in compared to the rest of the game’s content.

 

 

Outside of these personal stories, you rarely feel like you’re being directed down a narrow corridor. No piece of a dynamic event chain requires you to have completed anything before it, so you can wander around the world and do whatever you like at your leisure. If you got an extra level or two from PvP, personal quests or crafting (yes, you can get experience from crafting, though it’s not fully implemented yet) you can simply skip over things you don’t want to do.

 

 

If you’re a completionist though, don’t worry. Guild Wars has level caps in its areas, so you’ll immediately be leveled down in an area you’re too high for. This lets you take a look at content you missed while leveling elsewhere, and still allow you to contribute experience to your ‘real’ level. You can also freely team up with your low level friends and help them out in their areas, without stomping everything around you, and still getting experience for assisting them. The game will still challenge you, regardless of where you decide to travel, and you never need to fear that the leveling system will get in the way of being with the people you want to spend time with.

 

 

Tune in for part 2 where I go into the game’s PvP, and a few of its problems.