Monthly Archives: May 2013

Neverwinter: Nights and Days

Even though I haven’t necessarily been playing Neverwinter every day recently, I have been in Neverwinter everyday.

 

They have their hooks into me….and I can’t find it in my heart to be annoyed at that.

 

Join up, join in. Neverwinter’s nights and days are waiting to entertain you.

 Neverwinter Zero Barriers to Entry

 

Zero Barriers to Entry

It’s been said before but I am going to say it again because it is something that should be repeated often, maybe with a touch of bemusement or reverence. Neverwinter is free. You don’t pay a box cost, you don’t pay for the download or the patcher. You don’t even pay a subscription. Nothing. There is literally no cost barrier to people hopping in and giving Cryptics go at the 4th edition Dungeons and Dragons Neverwinter setting their all.

 

Want a little sweetener on top of that? OnRPG has put a guild together. Hop into the forums and join us. There are some little barriers left around the place naturally enough. Setting up your own guild needs everyone on the team to be a founder, a zen purchaser or level 15. Professions come in the early teens as does the first dungeon and the invocation system. Still, getting up in levels is remarkably easy.

 

So the two biggest hurdles to any new game, money to buy it with and people to play it with…. they’re taken care of. That just leaves us with the most irritating of barriers. Time.

 

Except… Neverwinter will follow you anywhere you want.

 Neverwinter Gateway

 

Gateway To Gameplay

My now level 15 Control Wizard Maloran is sporting some nice sleeves. I made them myself don’t you know. Only having unlocked the professions system, I haven’t actually spent any play time working on my crafting. Crafting, your character mail, your guild, your armor and stats… they’re all available on http://gateway.playneverwinter.com. So even though I have been busy, even though I haven’t been at my computer to play Neverwinter, I’ve never really disconnected from it. 16 hour timer on a crafting item? Not a problem, I can queue that up on my browser before bed and check it in the morning when I get to work. Do I want to manage the guild, check events and see what we have in the way of people and character classes on the roster? That’s there too.

In one fell and clever swoop Cryptic and Perfect World have both given us an incredibly handy tool and set a hook in our hearts and minds. I don’t have to waste any precious time that I otherwise would playing on Guild management. I can do that whenever I have a few minutes and a browser window. I don’t need to wait around for crafting to resolve itself when I could be out freeze raying things into oblivion. I can set this all up from anywhere I am. I can’t really stress enough how nice it is to log on after a day or two break to find that I not only have made myself some nice gear to add to my armor but also made some coin, xp and astral diamonds with little to no effort.

 

The Gateway is one way they’ve caught me. The other is most certainly the Foundry.

 

Founding Principles

I am literally writing this on the back of running a foundry mission. Anyone in Neverwinter looking for a quick enjoyable something to do? Hit up the Draconis Pub.

 

Why?

 Neverwinter Wench

I could tell you it’s fun, which it is. I could tell you of the sweet loot that drops, which I got plenty. I could even mention the fact that there was a bonus for completing a Foundry mission during that particular hour. All of these things are true, but none of them really tell you just how important the foundry is.

 

A single user who invested the time and energy gave me a story worth playing. I didn’t have to wait for Cryptic to throw together a subplot that deals with a small guild and its drunken Kobold. I didn’t have to wander far across the Protectors Enclave to get into a bar with patrons, stories and dancing wenches. One user, for the joy of it amongst other motivations, created a story to catch my eye and keep me furiously pounding on marauding pirates. Even better, the story isn’t done yet and he’ll be back next week with a new part.

Neverwinter Foundry

The Foundry is freedom from a lack of content. Not everything you play will be Shakespeare. Heck there’ll probably be a vast wasteland of poorly thought out and even more poorly executed attempts at foundry content. That’s the risk you take with user generated content. Some people are just bad at it. That’s life in a nutshell.

Neverwinter Foundry 2

Though for the gems you find, gems who you can tip with your hard won astral diamonds for their good work, you’ll have people who are happy to work on their own time and own dime to bring you even more content.

 

I can easily see myself having star authors whose tales I will follow. In fact if anyone here reading OnRPG wants to give the Foundry a whirl, drop me a line in the game and I would be more than happy to check out what you’ve put together. Who knows, we may even end up showcasing what you have right here.

 Neverwinter Pitfalls

 

Pitfalls

There is of course a thing or two that bothers me in Neverwinter. There’s a ton of different currencies which I am still coming to terms with. There is the really annoying, personally to me, way your character leans into any turn. In fact I also hate running because it looks stupid.

 

Fortunately, any gripes or issues I have with the game really don’t matter for me in the long run. The powers are gorgeous, the classes I’ve really tried are enjoyable and with a few more Foundry adventures as well as the games own story, soon enough I’ll be on a mount and won’t need to worry about that leaning as I turn problem anymore.

 Neverwinter Frozen In Time

If you’re on the fence or even if you’re just hearing about a game other people seem to be playing a bunch and wonder why…. Neverwinter is most certainly something you should check out. Also be sure to catch Hhean’s full review next week to get a second opinion on this momentous title.

Dragon Pals

Dragon Pals is an MMORPG focusing on the development of pet dragons. Each dragon has different abilities depending on your character class, and there are dragons more powerful than others. The game offers several different daily and special activities to perform, offering plenty to do. With a colorful world to explore, and cute dragons to raise, Dragon Pals is a whimsical title.

Features

Three Character Classes: Choose to be an archer, a warrior, or a mage. Each class has their own set of abilities, all of which complement your dragon companion.

Dragon Pets: Hatch and train your dragon to be the most powerful, useful pet it can be. Use Dragon Orbs to further increase their power and unlock their potential!

Alchemy and Farming: Transmute gold into amethysts or into dragon souls through alchemy! Build a farm and develop crops to gain experience, and a chance at more amethysts.

Daily events: Something is always going on in the world of Dragon Pals. Take part in various daily events to grow stronger, and develop your companions further.

Dragon Pals Trailer

Dragon Pals is a multi-faceted, adventure based massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG). It combines multiple game genres and various manners of gameplay to create a uniquely styled MMORPG which is published by R2games.com.

Infinity Wars

Infinity Wars should feel familiar to all trading card game players while drastically upgrading the game systems to bring ease of use to a whole new level. Infinity Wars keeps the best parts of TCG’s, scrapping the annoying bits, and doing incredible evolutions in the trading card genre thanks to the digital platforms most of us have in our pockets.

 

Features

“Merged Deck” Mode – Tired of the player with the better deck walking away with free wins? Test your opponent’s ability to adapt in a mode where you can both build a deck out of any combination of your deck and theirs.

 

Fully Animated Deck – The playing field comes alive with cards offering detailed animations and environment cards that completely change the background of the battle.

 

Hardcore Strategy – While getting into Infinity Wars is simple, learning the nuances of combat flow and various counter strategy will take plenty of trial and error to master. Experts will have a distinct advantage over new players once they master the strengths of their deck.

 

Weekly Updates – New quests and new cards are added constantly with plans to build support extending into German and Chinese regions.

Infinity Wars – First Look

By Jordan Hall (ApocaRUFF), OnRPG Journalists

 

 

Infinity Wars is an up-and-coming computer-based animated trading card game. Lightmare Studios, the developers, originally set up a Kickstarter to gain five-thousand dollars in funding, but ended up receiving almost eighteen-thousand. The game is set apart from other TCGs by the animated card graphics and gaming board, which brings the game to life. With great art combined with the interesting gameplay, this should make for a fantastic card game experience. Let’s take a first look at the game and see if that holds true.

 

 

The Cards

As I mentioned, the cards in Infinity Wars are animated. This means that when you click on a card, it will begin looping a short animation that plays in the card art. To me, this made the cards much more interesting, as you try to understand the story behind the art. There are multiple factions in the game, each with their own unique theme to set them apart from the others. I cannot say enough to praise how awesome these cards are.

 

Infinity Wars Card Art

 

Not only do the cards have beautiful animated art, but the playing area looks great too. Your side of the table changes depending on what factions, such as turrets on either side of you. If you play a location card, it will change the playing area to reflect that location. It makes you want to play location cards not only for the benefits they can give you, but just because you want to see how the play area changes. It’s stuff like this that catches your interest in the game, and I wish it were possible for this kind of stuff to happen in real life.

 

Infinity Wars Play Field

 

The User Interface is spectacular. I had no issues manipulating my cards, and there was nothing confusing about it. It was simple, straight forward, and pleasing to the eye. Everything I clicked was responsive immediately, and I never noticed a bit of lag. This is pretty good for a game that is in beta. I can’t wait to see how things work out when the game is more polished and released.

 

 

Collecting and Trading

Infinity Wars is called a Trading card game for a reason. Just like other TCGs, collecting cards either by buying booster packs or trading with other players is a big thing. Part of the fun, maybe all of the fun if that’s what you like about the game, comes from interacting with your collection and watching it grow. I have to admit that I do not know how well this concept will work with virtual items, but it will be interesting to see how it works out. I can surely understand why people would want to collect Infinity War’s cards.

 

You can buy Booster Packs that range in size and cost. You can get a cheap three card pack, or a more expensive fifteen card pack. It is also possible to purchase starter decks that will provide you with a full deck to help get you started. These are all familiar to those of us that have played TCGs in the past.

 

Infinity Wars Card Pack

 

 

How It’s Played

Infinity Wars is actually a pretty easy game to pick up, which is nice. Unfortunately, in the past, there have been similar attempts at online TCGs that tried to be different by making their game over complicated. That’s not to say that it is a simple game, because it isn’t. There is enough room for strategy that I feel you could spend a long time trying to refine your play style and deck. Of course, being a TCG that is played with a shuffled deck, a bit of luck is apparent in the game which spices things up.

 

Infinity Wars Game

 

The decks are made up of character cards, spell cards, and location cards. Character cards are the ones that fight and defend, while spell cards can give your character cards buffs, allow you to draw more cards, damage your opponent’s fortress, or anything else along those lines. Location cards have the unique effect of changing the looks of the playing field and giving certain types of cards bonuses. I don’t think there is a limit on how many cards you can have, but there is a minimum requirement of forty cards.

 

Infinity Wars Deck Builder

 

Three of those forty cards will need to be commanders. These are pre-picked character cards that go into the ‘commander zone’ portion of the play field. These cards may be played directly into the defense or attack zones for their resource cost. Most cards must first spend a turn in the support zone before they may be put into the battlefield. You can see why picking the right commander cards can be important.

 

Infinity Wars Commander Cards

 

Speaking of zones, there are four. The commander zone, which I already explained. The assault zone, where you put cards that you want to attack enemy cards or the opponent’s fortress. The defense zone, which is where you put cards you want to defend your fortress. And the support zone, where cards stay while they wait to be played. The fighting takes place in the assault and defense zone, with your assault zone being across from your opponent’s defense zone and vice versa for you.

 

Infinity Wars Battlefield

 

In order to damage your opponent’s fortress, you must first destroy all the cards blocking your way in your opponent’s defense zone. You will need to be careful, however, as the defending card has a chance at retaliating against the card that hit it. And while the first card may not kill your card, the next could as your card retains any damage it takes. I like this, as it allows you to take down very powerful cards even if luck hasn’t been on your side and you have nothing that can compare. But then again, this has been the bane of my play time, as my opponent always ends up taking out that card I spent a quarter of the game cultivating.

 

Infinity Wars Fighting

 

To summon a card from your hand you need to spend resources. You generate one resource per turn and your maximum resource available goes up once per turn. You can use resources for more than just summoning cards. Some cards have special abilities that require resources to activate, or you can trade with the trading post using resources to do things like permanently increase your maximum resources or draw three cards. This aspect of the game adds in a lot of strategy as you will need to manage your resources expertly if you want to win.

 

Infinity Wars Playing Card

 

One last thing I want to mention is the health and moral. Health is the health of your fortress that enemy cards are aiming to whittle down. It begins at forty health. Moral, like health, starts at forty and goes down as your cards are destroyed. If either of these goes completely down, you lose the game and your fortress explodes. This is just a quick look at how the game is played, but you can see why there is room for strategy.

 

Infinity Wars Explosion

 

 

Conclusion

Infinity Wars seems to have all the elements that are needed for a great TCG. It has great card art and animations, the game works very well in a beta state, and it has the trading and collecting aspect that makes TCGs so fun. The actual gameplay is simple to learn, yet hard to master and luck is ever present with each card you draw. After getting to look at the game, I have a lot of hope for its future. And if I haven’t made it clear yet – I liked the game!