Yearly Archives: 2013

Taikodom

Taikodom is a free to play 3D Space Action MMO that both looks and plays like Eve Online,Taikodom features guilds called ‘Corporations’, a vast open universe to explore and surprisingly good graphics.

Features:

Career Progression: Advance in one of three careers, and gain access to unique abilities and ships for each. Cloak yourself and launch surprise attacks as a sneaky Suppressor, charge head-on into battle as a hulking Vanguard, or employ a careful balance of offense and defense as an Assault.

Crafting: Find project blueprint to turn raw resources into whatever anything under the sun, from weapons to warships, or apply modifications to turn that dusty old cannon into a bleeding-edge blaster.

Corporations: Gather your friends and lead your corporation to galactic prominence using shrewd business tactics, or simply crush the competition with sheer martial prowess.

Territory Conquest: Take part in the strategic conquest of the universe, with massive warships capable of occupying entire regions of space, and monopolizing it’s resources until opposing corporations muster the firepower to unseat those in power.

Early Access: Prime World Combat and Final Thoughts

By Darren Henderson (DizzyPW), OnRPG Editor-in-Chief

Prime World MOBA Combat

For MOBA Players… and Luxor Fans?

Now that you have a feel for the unusual non-MOBA elements that set this game apart (Write-up Part 1), it’s time to talk how it still fits into the MOBA realm. For starters, you can expect your typical 5v5 3 lane map to battle with the ultimate goal destroying your enemy’s HQ. Yup you’ve got shops selling teleport scrolls and potions, a central untouchable part of your base that offers a full heal, and three lines of minions pushing down separate lanes. At first glance you won’t notice much of a difference here than other MOBAs.

Prime World Jungle Power-Ups

In the rare occasions you walk between lanes to gank, you can snag power-ups in the river.

 

Last hitting minions offers extra prime. No denying feature. Plenty of Prime infected monsters lurking in the ‘jungle,’ i.e. the span of space between lanes that makes a bit of a winding maze to confuse and lose pursuers in. You’ll see elevation akin to Heroes of Newerth that can be used to block enemy vision and set up ambushes. Turrets that autoattack enemies that attack their allied heroes are present (and quite tanky!) Inhibitor like buildings within the enemy base. Blah blah blah let’s move on to what’s different now!

 Prime World Queue System

One of the first major changes you’ll run into is the selection of your hero prior to queuing. It has the nice benefit of making sure that you get to play who you want to play every time while matching you with appropriate archetypes to create a balanced team. I can see the counter-argument that it takes away some of the cooperation element of deciding a team as a whole but given the current state of communities in other western mobas… let’s just say I expect this to resolve a ton of toxic attitude problems in one fell sweep.

 Prime World Skill Animations

First this map is huge! That’s key in a moba as it impacts a team’s tactics greatly. You’re going to have to be careful about ganking other lanes as it’s a long walk between them. That said spotting a jungler on top lane when you’re on bottom means it’s highly unlikely that he’ll be appearing near you any time soon. Warding also becomes a bit more challenging as there are just so many routes you can sneak between lanes that it’s much harder to get early warning of a gank incoming, resulting in MIA calls going way up in value.

Prime World Raising Terrain Flags

Native Terrain is a unique feature in Prime World. Basically flags set-up at various points of the map can be captured to push your team’s terrain forward like some kind of glorified zerg creep. While on your terrain you tend to have skill benefits that make you slightly more powerful. This offers some interesting dynamics such as making it more dangerous to counter-jungle your enemy on his terrain as well as giving you a bit of an incentive to over overextend in the laning phase to try to maintain control of the flag in the center of the two outer turrets on each lane. Combined with the river creation elevation advantage for the team being pushed, you get a pretty cool set-up where you might want to consider if it’s in your advantage to get pushed to your tower and use the elevation to your advantage, or clear enemy minions quickly to maintain control of the lane terrain for your side to bolster your skills’ powers.

Prime World Teleport Skill

Next is the return to base skill. Like League of Legends, you have one. But now it’s on a 3 minute cooldown. Beyond teleporting back to base though, it can teleport you to anywhere on your native terrain. This offers some cool options such as speeding up jungle clear by teleporting directly to your jungle mob location, suddenly appearing in a major laning phase team fight, or split-pushing and ducking out to immediately push a different lane after taking down an objective. It’s also another hindrance to counter-jungling.

One other point of note is this offers a bit of a balancing factor when two heroes clash in the laning phase as the losing side will have a free teleport back to lane while the winning side will likely need to use their skill to return to base for a heal, followed by spending some of their hard earned prime to buy a tele scroll back to the lane.

Prime World Luxor

Vampire is frustrated with the difficulty. Just look at that portrait.

 

So what about the Luxor players I mentioned? Well unlike nearly every MOBA I’ve dealt with before that forces one lane to be shared by 2 of the 5 members of a team, this game offers a fifth Prime source so you can essentially have a dedicated Prime stream coming in to every member of your team early game. This comes from a Luxor style mini-game situated within the safety of your base in which players compete to beat rounds of Luxor to level themselves with Prime while also earning scrolls that they can immediately send to any of their teammates to give them an advantage.

Prime World Scroll Creation

It has some boosted challenge though as when you burst paint combos, occasionally Prime crystals will drop that must be caught with your cursor or lost into oblivion. Also you can spend your Prime to activate powerful skills like an AoE paint burst if you’re having trouble winning a map, but the question is always on your mind of ‘was it worth it?’ The scrolls are incredibly impactful on a match and offer the following benefits:

Birds= Area to increase strength and intellect of allies. Decrease of enemies

Sign of Priestess= Restore heroes health over length of time

Starfall Scroll= Deals Great Damage to Enemies Around Hero

Light Scroll= Blinds enemies around hero

Gemini= Creates Double of Hero

In other words, if you assume the Luxor player is less skilled than those out in lane fighting, you’re underestimating the reaction time, skill shots, and overall map awareness required to successfully play this role. Not to mention knowing when to drop the mini-game and join the battle is vital and may depend on the skill level of the player since post Hero level 11, the Luxor mini-game becomes intensely hard and if you can’t keep up, you’ll only be hindering your team by not joining the fight. A truly map aware player might even drop a Luxor challenge in mid-game and teleport to lane to help their team win a close battle! Yea you’ll see a lot of random teleports altering fights for that matter. This game is seriously unpredictable.

Continue to Page 2

Early Access: Prime World Tactics and Strategy

By Darren Henderson (DizzyPW), OnRPG Editor-in-Chief

 Prime World Early Access @OnRPG

Times they are a changing. Online games that were all the rage in 2006 are closing down faster than we can even keep track of. And with the fall of the WoW clones a new breed of title seems to be emerging in the wake of League of Legends surprise success, introducing the MOBA genre to the masses. However while multiple companies are now rushing into the action to try to get their share, a lesser known Russian developer saw the future a long time ago and has been quietly building up and polishing content on a MOBA of their own.

Perhaps some of our older viewers might have caught wind of it during my first convention coverage at E3 in 2011. I’m of course talking about Nival and their Russian Game of the Year 2012, Prime World. Now Prime World’s devs seem brighter than the average MOBA enthusiasts. It’s quite apparent at this point that people aren’t going to compete with League of Legends of DotA 2 blow for blow and come out on top. Instead Nival seems focused on capturing an audience that’s not quite down with the hypercompetitive MOBA eSports scene developing, but recognizes an ever growing market niche of jaded MMORPG veterans looking for something casual like a MOBA but maintaining the addictive sense of progression and community offered in an MMORPG. Well ladies and gentlemen, Prime World offers exactly that. Let’s dive in!

 

Prime World Keepers Town

For Lore Fiends and Empire Builders

Voice acted cutscenes. MOBA. Let that combo sink in for a moment because to be blunt I didn’t get where they were going with this game at first either. Rather than just offering some generic unfeasible backstory such as summoners and warring factions like a certain MOBA, Prime World strives to pull you in and make you feel like you’re an important part of this world.

PrimeWorld Horatio VO

How? Well for starters I suggest if you identified with either segment of players in the above title, you get a good read in on their history page so you understand the various factions, why you’re fighting, and why you live in a giant heavily fortified castle with a bunch of freaky mutants freeloading in the courtyard. (http://en.playpw.com/world-history/world.html) Now that you’re ready to continue, your quest in this game is to prove yourself to your chosen faction by holding down the borderlands while extracting vast amounts of Prime, a poisonous mysterious resource that falls somewhere between the limitless energy producing Unobtainium from Avatar and the mutant gene in X-Men. As such it’s also the key to your collection of heroes growing into ever more powerful assets but more on that later.

Prime World Unobtanium Resource

Kill those borderland monsters and the savage faction to collect a super efficient fuel resource? This story rings a bell…

 

In order to build your empire, you’re going to need resources which come from buildings as well as completing missions (again in a MOBA. Weird!) and fighting battles. With the exception of vastly superior graphics, empire building fans should feel right at home constructing production buildings, decoration, population housing, wall expansions, resource storage units, and other prime processing plants to ever increase your wood, silver, ore, and prime acquisition rates. Once space starts to get tight within your castle walls you can even upgrade your existing buildings with your excess resource to further bolster your overall production. Facebook fans in particular will be fond of the forced servitude of adding in-game friends to your plants to up the rate of output per real-time based cycles. Though no worries, you won’t actually have to spend time working in your friend’s sweatshop smelting silver.

 Prime World Resource Production

One final piece of the system I think is a great idea is the way they are combining the clan system with the empire building elements. Rather than your typical MOBA clan of 5 to 10 people, Prime World encourages 30-50+ clans via a system that unlocks powerful buffs for your entire clan to use (whether it be boosts to resource production or in-battle bonuses) in exchange for mass excess resource donations to your clan. You’ll also be able to view your online clan members through the system and see what they’re currently up to and even chat with each other in a clan channel only chat. And of course you’ll get your nifty Clan Tag to accompany your name into battle for advertising purposes (and to strike fear into the hearts of your foes!)

 Prime World Clan 1

 Prime World Clan 2

So at this point if you’re like me you are thinking ‘that’s cool and all. But I came to play a MOBA. How is this remotely related?’ This is where the RPG element becomes apparent.

 

 Prime World MMORPG Elements

For Roleplayers – The MMORPG Element

The feeling of progression isn’t very prevalent in the MOBA realm thus far. DotA 2 offers a glimpse of item progression but for the most part you usually expect a slight power differentiator (ala League’s mastery system) and currency to unlock further characters. Heck in SMITE right now if you buy the all-gods pack, the only thing you can expect to use your unlocked currency for is future skins. Prime World seems to swing the pendulum in the opposite direction, including the near equivalent of dailies via missions and production building queues. But it’s where these features combine with the hero progression that the RPG elements get cool.

 Prime World Hero Acquisition

See heroes in Prime World aren’t your typical pool of static identical personalities with set kits waiting to be picked. They are your own. Once you unlock a hero either by reaching the appropriate Lord Level (your own personal level that grows as you do well.. anything really) or via the cash shop, they arrive at your castle as a novice with starter talents and bare minimum stats. As you use these heroes in battle they will gain levels that allow you to empower the hero permanently by bolstering their stats including health and energy (HP and MP related), strength and intellect (damage related), agility (attack speed), cunning (critical hits), and finally stamina and will (physical and magic defenses). And while certain stats are stronger for certain characters, there is no single right answer, allowing lords to customize a hero’s style to meet their own playing style. Still at this point I wasn’t won over as it just felt like League’s mastery system taken new form. But the talents.. well those just aren’t comparable to anything.

 

Remember all that resource gathering your castle has been doing? A huge portion of it revolves around creating Prime Crystals to forge new talents. Talents are basically your character’s kit, active items, passive items, and auras united into one wide chart. As you progress through a match you’ll use the in battle Prime (think experience and currency from a more standard moba combined) to unlock various pieces of this table to bolster your character’s power. As your power grows, your character will also level up and gain higher stats so that’s something to consider beyond just what the stats of the talents display. And anything outside of the core skills of your character are open for swapping in the Talent Field so you can really go wild experimenting. Heck during Nival’s stream they showcased a Vampire that utilizes his HP bar to cast spells equip an energy giving talent so that he could utilize energy based add-on active talents in a match. Unlocking entirely new skills to customize your character’s kit… it’s a big deal!

 Prime World Hero Talent Assignment

Of course to capture that sense of RPG randomness you aren’t just going to have a pool filled with rare and unique talents set-up within your castle from the start. You’re going to have to work for them and get a little lucky either through missions or artificial creation from castle resources to find the best talents. I hear there might also be a trading system between players but with fewer US players in beta right now than I can count on both hands I haven’t had a chance to see it for myself. Even after you finally acquire a rare talent, you’ll have to choose wisely because these talents become locked to the Hero you assign them to and players will have to dish out some gold to free them up for a second use on someone else.

 Prime World Battle Talent Purchase

There’s also a bit of differentiating strategy in assigning talents as they have varying degrees of Prime Cost to unlock during battle as well as a tier level that determines how far your character must progress within a battle before becoming available for purchase. Thus you might want a mix of defensive bolstering talent with a snowballing talent in the earlier talent trees to give you options in case you’re getting shutdown and can’t reach your higher tier talents quickly. Some talents also impact other players near you and are likely better suited when playing in a group that will have you sharing a lane early on.

 

Finally some of the rarest talents will require a level 21 or higher hero to equip them, ensuring for some truly explosive matches when facing off with your most experienced heroes against others in later matches. Once your talent storage starts to fill up you can also sacrifice lesser useless talents to bolster the power of your favorite talents.

 Prime World Upgrading Individual Talents

 More interested in the actual MOBA action? Be sure to catch part 2 of my write-up!

Prime World MMOHuts First Look

And don’t miss JamesBl0nde’s MMOHuts First Look later today!

Fantasy MMORPG The Aurora World Unveils New Video Series

Aurora World

 

GBE Games, a global publisher and distributor of interactive online entertainment media today launched its first television show as part of a new series of videos intended to both entertain and educate players about its acclaimed fantasy MMORPG, The Aurora World.

 

Players can tune into the new web series now on You Tube. The Aurora World is live, and players can register now to become part of this adventurous fantasy world.

 

In its debut episode, players are introduced to Majinn and learn how to obtain and utilize these inimitable anomalies. Majinns are a unique hybrid pet/mount system that is designed to assist players in their journey through this lush fantasy world. Unique and beautiful creatures, Majinns come in many forms and if a player is lucky enough to obtain one, will become their ultimate guardian through their adventure! Players can obtain Majinns in three ways; through quests, by purchasing them in the item mall or by drops.

 

Majinns act as both mount, when a Majinn reaches level 20, and also a fierce battle companion. As a Majinn levels and gains experiences through battle, it will be able to learn attack skills to better assist its master. With its “soul capture” ability, a Majinn can absorb an enemy’s soul and increase its special skills.

 

Players can follow all the upcoming The Aurora World TV Channel videos which will feature not only basic game mechanics but more advanced videos such as how to build specific character classes plus a whole lot more!

 

OnRPG Shotgun News 4/19: Godsrule, STO, and Lost Saga

By Shannon Doyle (Leliah), OnRPG News Wench

 

Godsrule: War of Mortals Launches

Godsrule
The free to play browser build and battle game Godsrule has officially launched. Godsrule went into open beta late in February but little has been heard about it since. That’s because the development team has been busy collecting player feedback and making improvements based on what they heard. Godsrule will be available for iPad in select areas later this year.

 

Star Trek Online Releases Legacy of Romulus Pre-Order Information

You can pick up your copy of the upcoming STO expansion Legacy of Romulus on the official Star Trek Online site now. And you’ll even have a couple of options to get some extra things along with it. Pre-order the Starter pack and for $20 you can get two Romulan ships, a liberated Reman Bridge Officer, and a title. Or if you have $125 to spend you can get the Legacy Pack. It includes everything in the starter pack plus 6 more ships, the ability to play as a Reman, and a Reman Duty Officer Mini-Pack, 30 master keys, titles, and the Reman Nemesis uniform.

 

Lost Saga Begins Open Beta and Announces Launch

Lost Saga
WeMade Entertainment USA has announced that Lost Saga has entered open beta. The MMO Brawler is expected to relaunch on May 2nd. The open beta will include 15 new heroes, 2 new game modes, and 4 new maps.

Seven Seas Saga

Seven Seas Saga is a browser-based Pirate MMORPG that allows players to build their own pirate or trader ship and conquer the Seas with trading, pirate fights, and looting pirate treasure.  Players can choose to trade cargo, fight against other players, fight pirates through many of the quests available every day and try to become the King of the seas.