Monthly Archives: March 2016

TERA Dawnfall Update Arrives

TERA Dawnfall Update Arrives

En Masse Entertainment, a player-driven publisher focused on delivering great games and great service, announces the launch of the Dawnfall update for its popular action MMORPG, TERA. Available now on PC, Dawnfall adds a variety of exciting new content to TERA, ranging from a hard-mode dungeon, to the return of a high-level challenge mode, and more.

 

TERA continues to be a benchmark MMORPG with its signature action combat and stunning visuals. It also remains a popular MMORPG on Steam. The Dawnfall update reinforces the company’s ongoing commitment to serving its robust community with high-quality content and entertaining adventures to discover.

 

The Island of Dawn, an area familiar to all TERA veterans, now lays burning—a wasteland ridden with foul creatures—after the destruction of the World Tree. It’s up to players to rid the once-idyllic starting zone of invading BAMs (big-ass monsters). Featuring an all-new storyline, plus daily quests, the Island of Dawn will reward players with tokens exchangeable for tier 7 and 8 gear, accessories, and crafting components.

 

In addition to the transformation of the Island of Dawn into a max-level hunting ground, the Dawnfall update sees the return of a fan-favorite, Dreadspire. This challenge-based dungeon pits groups of players against classic dungeon bosses with updated skills and powers to obtain tier 9 weapons and armor, and a chance to own Smolder— a fiery black-lion mount.

 

Players brave enough to venture into TERA’s current top-level dungeon, Forsaken Island, will find deadlier challenges that await in the new hard-mode version of dungeon. Prepare for the worst because Forsaken Island (Hard) will pit players against even more lethal versions of three of the toughest bosses ever seen in TERA. But the rewards are worth the challenge.

Dungeons & Robots

Dungeons & Robots is a top-down action shooter by Glow Games Studio. While combing shooter action with RPG elements, players will explore futuristic dungeons and collaborate using weaponized robots to fight, conquer and dominate.

Features:

Co-op action: Find your posse, explore massive dungeons, complete missions and lay claim to your territory.

Unique experiences with every game: Procedurally generated levels force you to stay alert and hope your team has your back.

Customization: Modular approach allows you to customize your Character, Armour and Weapons.

Guild conquest: Join a Guild to upgrade your character quicker, conquer and control your territory, and compete agains other Guilds.

Chromatic Souls

Chromatic Souls is a mobile turn-based RPG developed by GAMEVIL. Players must journey across Maldrago and discover the cause of the rising unrest caused by the fall of the Chromatic Dragon.

Features:

Classic RPG: Enjoy a traditional RPG experience with stunning modern visual effects.

Heroes Galore: Train your heroes with over 80 different skills

Customization: Customize your team with equipment and enhancements.

Mulitplayer Co-op: oin others and defeat the Raid monsters.

Vainglory Launches Update 1.15

Vainglory Launches Update 1.15 header

Vainglory has pushed its newest update, Update 1.15, live. This is the final update of the Vainglory Winter Season.

The update includes three new skins: Stormlord Ardan Tier III, Star Queen Celeste Tier II, and the limited edition Night Shadow Taka.

A few balance changes have been put into place, reducing the respawn timer refund for killing turrets and changing jungle monsters to scale with team gold instead of game time. All heroes have also had minor tweaks to their skills.

For the full details, check out the patch notes.

Dark Souls III Press Preview Event

By Mike Tang

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February 23rd 2016 – San Francisco’s The Chapel, located in the heart of the Mission district, was ground zero for Bandai Namco’s preview event featuring the highly anticipated Dark Souls III. The venue, historically, acted as a mortuary in 1914 and has since been renovated into a hotspot for live music, restaurant, and a popular local tavern. Within, the press junkies and famed Soul players alike all enjoyed drinks, a night of chilling surprises, a couple cool announcements from the publishers, and finally: a lengthy hands-on demo with Dark Souls III.

Dark Souls III Press Preview Event 2Go on and touch her darkness – you’ll like it.

After downing some Estus Elixirs, mingling with other Souls survivors, and trying out a new Soul-inspired game called Slashy Souls, we made our way to the main hall featuring a 40 foot arched ceiling fully decorated in Dark Souls imagery. At the front, a life size model of the Red Knight and a recreation of Artorias’s Greatsword ominously guarded the multiple rows of gaming stations. After a couple of announcements, Bandai Namco debuted a new trailer showcasing the horror that awaits players with awesome visuals and haunting vocals, available to watch here.

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The Game

The demo we played was running on Xbox One and each station was equipped with a different character class. I ended up with a warrior class for my journey through the two new areas and the Wall of Lodeleth, which many of you will have probably seen from previous trailers and network tests.

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The current state of gameplay in Dark Souls III parallels the most recent Bloodborne DLC, the Old Hunter. In The Old Hunter, players were rewarded for highly aggressive playstyles and shields, ironically, left players vulnerable to attacks because they were heavy and slow. Likewise, Dark Souls III has you focusing more on rolling tactics and up-close staredowns with enemies – the dodging and parry setups will remain at the fundamental core of combat as as result.

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Dark Souls III Press Preview Event 6Concept for Character Classes

The demo featured four locations, and three (probably all four) of which were taken from the very beginning of the game. Each area was chalk full of content, both familiar and new, and most featured large areas, interesting enemies, and gorgeous vistas. For the Demons Souls player there’s the occasional reference or nod, but more importantly, returning characters and the familiar Fire Link Shrine were very welcome and heart-warming.

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New Game Mechanics

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From what I’ve experienced, the new Weapon Art amps up the combat system and adds a new level of depth to how to attack enemies and how to defend yourself. Weapon arts, depending on the weapon being used, help heighten your damage output, give you different movesets, or enable you to soak up damage better. We can’t wait to see what PVP looks like with so many different abilities at the disposal of players.

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Players now have the option to allot their Estus between health and/or magic replenishing pools. The ability to go all-in on magic restoration somewhat a game changer, but we’re sure most players will dump all their Estus into heath replenishment instead.

Enemies

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The new enemies come in all shapes and sizes, and are often mixed together in different groupings around an area. This gives another level of depth in combat and challenge, where players will have to deal with multiple types of enemies with unique fighting styles.

Sprinting is still a very viable strategy for evading groups of enemies, but take note where you want to go because you can easily end up at a dead end and become quickly surrounded with the upped enemy count and variety.

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The boss fights have vastly improved. Both the bosses and their environments now transform as the fight progress. Players will have to deal with new movesets and adapt to their surroundings quickly to stay alive. One of the bosses in the demo was originally fought in an open field, but as the boss progressed down to half health the arena shrank and the fight became an close-up affair. Somewhat a failing, these bosses will probably only show up once so you’ll need to start a new game to experience each one again.

Visuals & Level Designs

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Everything was wickedly detailed with awe-inspiring backdrops. The graphical quality is probably the biggest jump between any of the Souls entries. Running on the same engine as Bloodborne, there were moments that I thought I was back in Yharnam with wandering dogs and Hunter like-enemies. Besides some frame drops in the third area and a very rare bug that only my station experienced, there were no noticeable defects. It feels like every corner of the game was meticulous and painstakingly fleshed out such that players will endlessly search and find beautiful sights and secret story elements hidden away.

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Returning to form, the areas feel massive and classically mad architectural maze-like designs return to disorient overeager players. By the time I had reached the third area and have scaled to the highest tower, I can see the previous path over the course of two levels to get there – truly a sight to behold. The landscape reminded me of Avatar or Skyrim, where everything is very vertical; if you see it, you can probably go there. The level design is so intricate where it is easy to lose one’s bearings and at the same time be delighted to discover new areas and hidden paths.

Multiplayer

We didn’t partake in any of the PvP experiences as we were too busy with the solo-stations, however, staged invasions are back so you can’t ever truly escape PvP.

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Closing Thoughts

It is truly amazing how quickly Fromsoft has been pumping out these games, especially with such a short time table between Bloodborne and Dark Souls III, not to mention they are all top notch products. Mr. Miyazaki must have a pack with the actual Devil to create all these sinfully good games that leaves players wanting more and more. I have no doubt that Dark Souls III will be another incredibly brutal entry in the souls series and April cannot come sooner.

Dark Souls III Press Preview Event 15PRAISE. THE. SUN.