Yearly Archives: 2013

Rise of Mythos

Rise of Mythos is a card-based MMORPG that also features a kingdom building element to it. Players take the role of a ruler whose kingdom is being invaded by evil forces. You can build a deck full of creatures and heroes to drive them back, and use your kingdom’s resources to gain new, more powerful cards along the way. There are also three different arena modes for PvP play: 1v1, 2v2, and 4v4.

 

 

 

Features

Gripping Storyline: Rise of Mythos features an epic campaign, full of peril. Experience the storyline through gripping battles, as you seek to uncover the mystery behind the evil besieging your lands.

 

Customizable Decks: Choose from several different creatures and heroes to round out your forces. Equip your hero with various items to make them even more powerful!

 

Kingdom Development: Manage your resources carefully, and develop new and powerful cards. Form alliances with other players, and trade for goods and cards that way too!

 

PvP Arenas: Take a break from the quest, and challenge other players in arena combat. Face off in 1v1, 2v2, and 4v4 modes, taking down opponents for glory!

Soldiers Inc. Full Trailer

It’s 2019. You and your mercenaries have been recruited to claim as much of Zandia as possible. Foreign powers, multinational companies and shadowy underground criminal organizations are all after the biggest mineral find of the century. Your job is to shut out your competitors, and make your client rich. In this future, war is a business… and business is good.

Soldiers Inc.

The year is 2019, and the discovery of the largest deposit of mineral wealth in the world has turned the former Republic of Zandia into an all-out corporate war zone – a new kind of conflict waged by a new breed of mercenary.

Get Lost – Immerse yourself in deep MMORTS gameplay, AAA-quality artwork, voiceovers, and an original score by Jesper Kyd.

Dig In – Build up from a desolate outpost to a sprawling private military base. Fortify your position with automated turrets, tank traps, artillery, and more.

Take Command – Deploy the latest military hardware and tactical units from the world’s most elite private military contractors.

Pick Your Battle – Fight shadowy NPC enemies, rival teams, or go head-to-head in a massive community of live opponents.

Take It All – Use trade, treachery, teamwork, and firepower to rise from corporate pawn to rogue warlord.

Grab your kit, bring your friends, pack plenty of ammo, and trust no one. In Zandia, war is big business… and business is good.

Swordsman Online – A VERY Early Look

By Jordan Hall (ApocaRUFF), OnRPG Journalist

 

 

A while ago DizzyPW asked me to do a write-up on Swordsman Online. I had heard the game compared to Age of Wushu quite frequently and so I was interested in giving it ago. Of course, Swordsman Online is only available in China at the moment, so I had to call in a favor and get an account made for me by someone I knew from Age of Wushu. And then there was the whole issue with getting the client to work on my computer… But that’s not what you guys want to read about. Anyways, here is my write-up from my time playing Swordsman Online.

 

 

The Customization

Usually, one of the most important aspects to a gamer when he’s deciding to play a game or not is the customization options he gets for his character. Most often, this mostly pertains to the looks of the character, but also means the skills, stats, and other ways to make your character more unique and tailored to your play style. In Swordsman Online, you can certainly make your character look unique, but that is quickly hampered due to areas of the game that do not allow (or fail to promote) uniqueness. Seeing as the game is in Open Beta, though, I feel that these issues will probably be resolved before released (or at least shortly after).

 

At least in the first twenty or so levels, progression seems to be very linear. I didn’t notice the ability to learn any new ability through my own choices. I only had to follow quests (which I will get to later) and I got what I needed. This isn’t necessarily bad, especially in the beginning of the game, but I am hoping that this isn’t foreshadowing how much choice we’ll have in our character development later on. I’ve honestly had enough of linear character progression from this industry.

 

Swordsman Online Skills

 

As for the character creation, there are a lot of options for customizing your face. You can either choose from a bunch of presets for each part of your face (nose, eyes, lips, etc…), or you can make use of sliders that will allow you to change just about every dimension you could want to. This means you can create a true beauty, or a horrible monster. This caused a dilemma for me because whenever I’m given this much freedom with character creation tools, I tend to lean heavily towards monster rather than beauty. Fortunately I was able to push off my urges and went with a female character and used presets for everything but the nose (it seemed like just about every nose preset was hooked, which I didn’t like).

 

Swordsman Online Character Creation

 

I didn’t notice any options for changing my body, but it’s very possible that I just missed them. However, needless to say, I was quite happy with my characters massive breasts that went very well with the physics engine. There’s no doubt in my mind that this game was designed to cater to the taste of young men. Oh, and the hair uses cloth simulation (as well as your clothes), which really brings the characters to life in ways that most MMOs just can’t. Which brings me to the graphics…

 

 

How Does the Game Look?

Pretty amazing, actually. The shadowing is decent, and the cloth/hair simulation makes everything feel more “real.” The art style is pretty bright with a slight lean towards cartoon-y, but still keeping a realistic overtone. Of course, as with all good things, this comes at a price. The optimization isn’t very good. You will probably have no issue with the game when you’re in a zone that doesn’t have to many people, but if you enter a major town during launch week (like I did), you will see an immediate FPS drop. Thankfully there are only a few places where this is an issue and I imagine that in the NA servers there won’t be so many people playing as there are on the Chinese servers. The other issue is that the maps are pretty small, which is a personal gripe and most people probably won’t mind it.

 

Swordsman Online Graphics

 

 

How About Questing?

Oh boy, I really do not want to discuss this part of the game. Why? Because I was so disappointed. I had high hopes for Swordsman Online when I started hearing people hyping about it. I was devastated when I found out it was just another quest grinder. If there’s one thing I hate about an MMO it’s crappy, generic quest to get experience and loot. It’s the bane of MMOs, as far as I am concerned. Unfortunately, at least for the first twenty levels (and it seems like there is no end in sight), you will be mindlessly grinding quest.

 

Swordsman Online AutoPathing

 

The devs did have the decency to implement extremely lazy questing, though. All you need to do is talk to NPCs and then click on the quest in the quest tracker and the quest will auto-path you there. It will even begin interacting with whatever NPC or object the quest requires. And, if it’s a kill quest, which most of them are, the game will even start killing the NPCs for you. It honestly would not be hard at all to create a macro or script that would play the game for you. You would only need to be there for the story-line quest that has mini-instanced boss fights or something along those lines. I didn’t want to say it, but I am severely disappointed in this aspect of the game.

 

Another gripe with the questing that I had was that it uses the archaic “first come first serve” system. That is, if you hit an NPC first, it’s your kill no matter what. However, if someone hits a mob before you, you can’t get credit for the kill even if you do most of the damage to kill it. This system promotes kill stealing and spawn hogging, something I ran into very frequently during my time in the game. With games like GW2 having come out, it has almost become the norm to promote cooperation among players by giving full credit to everyone that had a hand in a creature’s downfall. It’s sad to see such a good-looking game with a lot of potential go down this route and I hope they decide to change it before the open beta ends.

 

NPCClaiming

 

Even if the system used is one that has been with MMOs since the start of World of Warcraft and has been done to death, I have got to say that the quest can be pretty fun at times. The game world has a rich and detailed lore thanks to the several different series of books that have been written in the Wuxia setting. The game makes great use of this and has some incredible cinematics that it uses for cut-scenes, and just questing in general. When you go to a new zone, it’s very possible that you’ll go to a grey-scale flashback with some nostalgic music playing in the background while you explore, before coming back to reality to do quests. The familiar and deep story, combined with the creative use of cinematics, and the quest that have you interact with the world can make for a compelling questing experience.

 

Swordsman Online Monkey

 

Well, How’s the Combat?

The combat is the one redeeming feature about Swordsman Online so far. While a majority of the game is a generic quest grinder with very few choices in your character’s progression, the combat is certainly action-packed and gives an epic feeling. While you may be one of a thousand dopplegangers that is dressed in the same exact outfit as the other guys that are leveling up, you can at least feel like a true badass as you unleash your Kung Fu onto your foes. And speaking of Kung Fu, there are currently ten different schools to choose from when you start the game. They ranged from the Shaolin Monk types, to the evil assassin types.

 

Swordsman Online Fighting

 

Combat can be done either using traditional point-and-click, or you can switch to an “Action” mode that uses an aiming reticle. Combat is smooth for the most part, but there are one or two things that took a bit to get used to. First was that whenever you use an ability, unless the ability itself moves you, you will stop wherever you are to attack. This was a bit annoying at first because the atmosphere of the game made you feel like you should be able to run around and jump, all while throwing epic punches, kicks and whatnot. But after a while you forget all about it and the combat becomes natural.

 

Swordsman Online Reticle

 

The fighting seems to have a lot of AOEs, leaps, and other epic moves. Similar to the Age of Wushu combat system (and this is about where the similarities end), there is a sort of “rage” bar that, once filled up, will allow you to do epic moves. By default you have the ability to do double jumps that can allow you to get pretty high. There is also a mechanic in place that gives you the chance to recover from a knock-up by quickly choosing a location to leap towards. Overall, I would say that the combat feels and looks more impressive than Age of Wushu, but it’s still too early for me to tell if the combat is more balanced, or even more fun, than skill-and-timing based Age of Wushu combat.

 

Swordsman Online Leap

 

Does it Compare?

It sucks having to compare this game against another one, but there is no denying that Age of Wushu will be a direct competitor of Swordsman Online. They are both set in the same Wuxia lore, and both will attract almost the same crowd of players. The main difference between the two are the ways they are meant to be played. Age of Wushu is a sandbox-themepark hybrid, the focuses on giving you freedom to create your own story while having a fairly weak story itself. Swordsman Online is almost purely themepark and strives for a deep and interesting story by using lots of cutscenes, voice acting and beautiful graphics. When it comes down to it, both games have something to offer people and when you are trying to decide which to play, you will need to ask yourself what it is you really want from a game.

 

Swordsman Online Wukong

 

Conclusion

I’ve got mixed feelings about Swordsman Online. It uses very linear character progression that makes you feel like just another cog in the machine. One that can be replaced at anytime by any number of other players. On the other hand, the game looks great and some of the clan features look very promising. Clan bases, with the choice of either becoming the good-guy cargo escorts or the evil bad-guy raiders, should help propel epic player driven tales. Though the concept itself is also linear and generic, with the awesome combat that I experienced, it should be pretty fun. Honestly, though, if I do end up playing the game, I will probably get bored of it fairly quickly unless PWE makes some major changes and content updates.

 

 

I livestreamed my first two hours of my time in Swordsman Online. If you need help figuring out if you want to look into the game or not, feel free to check it out here:

New World of Warplanes Tutorial Video Goes to Class

World of Warplanes

 

Wargaming, the leading free-to-play developer and publisher, today released the latest tutorial video for World of Warplanes, taking a deeper dive into the specific traits and combat objects of each specialized warbird class in the game.

Whether zipping through the skies in a nimble fighter, bombarding enemy ground targets in a ground-attack aircraft, or taking damage and dishing it out as a heavy fighter, newcomers to World of Warplanes will get further insight into strengths, weaknesses, and combat specifics of each of these classes.

 

 

The tutorial video also delves into the basics of cooperation within a flight unit, ensuring that no matter what class you choose, you’ll know the tactics necessary for success up in the clouds.

Tank Ranger First Look

Tank Ranger is a new tank-themed lobby-based game, hoping to ride on the success of World of Tanks. It is brought to us by Olive Games, and this is the first title I have seen from them. The premise of the game is simple enough – you join a game, choose a tank, and then blast away at your enemies. The game seems to be much more casual than World of Tanks, and is your typical lobby-based shooter experience. But with tanks. YAY.

 

Customization

To be honest, customization seems heavily restricted. The most prominent form it appears in is skins and paint for the tanks. You can get a red camo tank, or something like pitch black. Other than that, there really isn’t anything else to do in terms of customization. A few years ago I would not have blinked an eye at this, but it has become an industry standard to push as much customization as possible on your players – even in a shooter-type game like this.

 

Graphics

I was a bit in awe when I first began to mess with the graphics settings in Tank Ranger. I wish I could say this was a good kind of awe, but it wasn’t. I literally gaped when I found out that the maximum resolution supported is 1400×900. At first I shrugged and hopefully thought that perhaps the game is meant to be played in window mode. It would explain the low resolution support. Once I found out that the game does not (currently) support the ability to play in windowed mode, I almost gave up on the spot.

 

Tank Ranger Graphics Settings

 

Because of the low resolution and the lack of windowed mode, Tank Ranger has some pretty bad graphics. Similar to what I would expect to find in a decade-old FPS. Normally I do not put too much weight in graphics quality when I play a game, but when I’m playing a game like this that only has simple “kill the enemy” type gameplay I cannot be as forgiving. However, I toughed it out and continued reviewing the game.

 

Tank Ranger Graphics

 

Controls

Controls in Tank Ranger are simple enough to learn. WASD movement, right click to zoom and left click to shoot. You can press shift to make use of the “drift” feature – which really isn’t a drift as far as I could tell, just a sharp turn. For the most part the controls were smooth and quite responsive. Overall I was pleased with how well the controls worked.

 

Community

This is the sad part of the review. In my time trying to review the game, I could only find one person playing the game besides myself. Even after logging on multiple times a day for several days. So far he has been my only contact with the community of Tank Ranger players. I am thinking, based on a few guesses, that a majority of the players may not be based in North America. So, the already small community probably wasn’t likely to be present during my waking hours. In short, the community is small – you could almost say it doesn’t exist.

 

Gameplay

Take your average 2006-or-later FPS and then add in tanks instead of people. That is Tank Ranger. You join a lobby and then choose a game. You will be put head-to-head against enemy players – or enemy AI if not enough enemy players are present. There really isn’t much diversity in the games tank selection yet. As far as I can see, you are stuck with five different tanks that each fill certain archetypes.

 

Tank Ranger Tank Select

 

There is a tank for up-close and mid-range fighting that has decent protection. Also available is a tank that is great for long-ranged fighting, but can quickly be dispatched if an enemy gets close to it. Then there is a very weak tank with a machine gun that is extremely fast compared to the other choices – more of an APC than a tank. As I said, right now there are only these three options available, but I imagine more will be coming out later on.

 

Tank Ranger APC

 

The combat is very arcade-ish. More so than similar games such as World of Tanks. As far as I could tell through my time playing, there is no individual damaging of components such as treads or gas tanks. Essentially, you just have to hit an enemy three-to-four times anywhere on the tank and then it will explode. I’m not a very big fan of this, but I know there are people out there that will appreciate this.

 

Tank Ranger Combat

 

The game does offer tank upgrades, such as extra weapons or speed boost, which can add variety and uniqueness to your tactics. A lot of people worry about pay-to-win cash shops. From what I see, Tank Rangers has a pretty fair cash shop as almost everything available can be bought with the in-game currency you gain from playing, as well as the cash shop money. The only things I saw that could not be bought with game points were convenience items such as experience boost. I did notice that the cash shop does have a lot of seemingly over-powered upgrades that will require you to use the cash shop if you want to stay on top.

 

Tank Ranger Cash Shop

 

There are five gamemodes covering the traditional modes you will find in most lobby-based games. Eight maps have been released so far to play these gamemodes on. The only gamemode I was actually able to find people playing is the AI-versus mode. And while they had good aim, the AI weren’t very bright and would just follow predictable paths. Using the fact that hiding behind a building very quickly will stop all damage from hitting you, camping the AI is an easy way to advance. I really wish there were more people playing this game as it would have been a lot more fun.

 

Tank Ranger Empty Lobby

 

Conclusion

In short, Tank Ranger is an MMO with a tank theme which is quite shallow in the gameplay area. There is no depth to it. However, we shouldn’t mistake this as a negative thing right off the bat. I know there are people out there that will like that you can just log in, pick a tank, and then go head-to-head with other players. As long as the developers can add a bit more content and improve the graphics options, this should make for a decent gaming experience. For now, however, I was disappointed with what I saw.

OnRPG Shotgun News 7/31: Aion and The Secret World

Aion Introduces Player Designed Weapons

aionplayerweapon

Late last year Aion held weapon design contests, and now that the contests are over, the designs have been made, they can finally be seen in game. There is one new skin for each class. The winners of the competition will receive the weapons for free while everyone else can get these weapons on the Black Cloud Marketplace.

 

The Secret World July Director Letter Looks Ahead

 

The end of the month means a letter of love from TSW Game Director Joel Bylos. This month Joel has announced that the development team is being split in two. One team to focus on updates for Issue 8, while the other works on Tokyo for Issue 9. Issue 8 will begin at the Council of Venice where players will be able to access the new Scenario system and earn certification to enter the Tokyo playfield coming in Issue 9.

New Night Watcher Class to Descend on Elsword

Elsword

 

Kill3rCombo, publisher of the hit free-to-play action MMORPG Elsword, revealed the next in a line of transformation Evolution classes, the Night Watcher.  As Elsword’s first female swordsman, she wields her legendary blade with grace and poise.  No longer just an elite Trapping Ranger, Rena has evolved to become a leader in battle.  With a lighter magical sword, she is able to execute faster melee attacks than ever before. By combining her swordsmanship with her trapping and archery skills, she is a truly terrifying figure on the battlefield.

The Night Watcher’s story begins with a mission for the elite elven force, the Night Savers.  This group, which focuses on assassination and intrigue, had recently recruited Rena as a Trapping Ranger.  While investigating a kidnapping in Altera, Rena found herself locked in combat with the ruthless and gargantuan King Nasod. Though Rena’s blade was shattered in the fight, she managed to defeat the evil King.  After the battle, her blade was reforged not as an assassin’s dagger, but as a long and powerful sword. With Rena’s new strength, she emerged as a great leader and the stalwart guardian of Elrios.

 

Divines of the East

Divines of the East is a side-scrolling action MMORPG from NGames. Featuring a unique art style reminiscent of Okami, the game offers multiple PvE and PvP systems, along with a servant system, herb garden, and more.

Features:

Regular Events: Daily rewards and regular events keep each server a busy place with tons of rare and useful prizes.

Servants: Collect seven different types of servants to do your bidding: Beast, Spirit Beast, Half-demon, Ghost, Mythical Beast, Immortal and Soul.

Second Classes: Once you have experience under your belt, train yourself in a new class to become even more powerful and versatile in combat.