2011年12月28日星期三

League of Legends Every Day I'm Scuttlin'

,防近视笔

By Jason Harper (Hhean), OnRPG DotA ReporterWelcome summoners, to the patch v1.0.0.123 article for League of Legends, the game that shows us what happens when a Taric and a Cho’Gath love each other very much. This patch includes a rework to Pantheon, a massive heap of bug fixes and Skarner,防近视眼笔, The Crystal Vanguard.Skarner is a tank/assassin hybrid, focusing on murdering the enemy carry while still maintaining a very strong team fight presence. He fits in line with characters like Rammus and Singed,预防近视笔, both all of whom focus on screwing up enemy positioning while remaining hyper mobile.When I first saw Skarner, I was eager to finally get my hands on a new jungler. None of the recently released melee characters have been able to get out of a lane, and the idea of being able to write one of these articles without screwing up my regular team’s composition got me really excited. Unfortunately, his jungling ability is lacklustre compared to nearly anyone you’d want to put in the jungle, and is extremely rune reliant. However, this is mitigated by the fact that he’s a great solo top lane, with strong sustain and an ultimate that’ll make your enemies fear your tower.Skarner doesn’t truly come alive until hitting level 6, which unlocks possibly the best positional ultimate Riot has included in the game. Impale suppresses an enemy target before tethering them to Skarner as he scuttles away with his unfortunate victim in tow. This works very similarly to Rampage’s ultimate, The Chains That Bind, in Heroes of Newerth, except that there are no means of breaking this ability through range. Flashing at the last moment? Nope! If Skarner hits you with this, you’ll get dragged through a wall if it means you get back in line with his tether range. Unless you’re packing a Quicksilver Sash, Skarner can run off and do whatever he wants with you. While this ability in itself doesn’t do much damage, it all but guarantees a kill as you deliver the gift of a crystallized enemy right to the feet of your allies.This would be a good ability on its own, but combined with his Crystalline Exoskeleton [W] he can do some truly horrible things to his foes. This thing is one tough shield, a fast movement speed boost and an attack speed steroid all rolled into one ridiculous ability. It lets him charge into the enemy team at mach 10, grab someone, then shoot off again while laughing at the puny attacks bouncing off his impenetrable hide. Combine this with assistance from Janna or Orianna for added trolling potential.Outside of just using his terrifying ultimate though, Skarner has plenty of clever interactions between his abilities. His passive, Energize, allows his abilities to cooldown quicker the more he attacks, which is great with the aforementioned attack speed boost on Crystalline Exoskeleton. This lets you spam his bread and butter ability, Crystal Slash [Q] near enough every second for next to no mana cost. Standing near Skarner, especially in large groups can be a very dangerous affair as a result, since this lets him pump out an enormous amount of sustained AoE damage over a very long period of time. This gets nastier when Crystal Slash not only gets better after its initial cast, but also returns health when combined with Fracture [E], allowing Skarner to remain protected inside his crystal shell while also getting his health back when being surrounded by enemies.At level 1, Fracture is a good choice if you’re in the lane for early harass and sustain. Crystal Slash on the other hand is a better pick in the jungle, despite its bugs there. Crystalline Exoskeleton is a great second level choice. Follow this up with whatever ability you didn’t pick at the start at level 3 so he can begin getting his combos going. From there, focusing on Crystal Slash will increase your damage output greatly, though I’d highly recommend getting a second level of Crystalline Exoskeleton early if you’re taking a good deal of damage from the enemy. Crystalline Exoskeleton is your best second pick, with Fracture being your last stop.Start out with a regrowth pendant and a health potion. Philosopher’s Stone. Trinity Force. Tank it up. Pretty standard stuff, item-wise. One thing that can be a good offensive pick on him though, if you are crushing your opposition, is a Rylai’s Crystal Sceptre, which turns his Crystal Slash into a non-stop slow, though combining with the slow already gained from Phage can be a bit redundant.For his Masteries, roll with either 0/21/9 or 0/13/17, depending on if you want to soak more damage, or are going for that precious move speed and faster flash cooldown. For Runes, you can roll out that standard burly melee page again - Armour penetration Marks, armour Seals, magic resistance Glyphs and whatever you prefer in Quintessences. However, if you want to optimize a bit, putting six attack speed and three armour penetration marks with armour penetration quintessences will up his damage output nicely. Be warned though that this does sacrifice his defenses, and being an unkillable jet engine of death is his main trick.Skarner is not what I was expecting. I thought his damage was going to be greater, but I had no idea just how impossible he would be to kill. In the games I played as him, a single death was unusual, and going above a single death was usually only when suffering a crushing defeat. I barely got any kills either, but his assists shoot through the roof as he spams his area of effect damage everywhere while dragging people around. While his duelling potential is limited, when grouping with some teammates, his threat level sky rockets.While I thought some of the recent characters were entertaining but flawed, Skarner actually has a place on a team, and works both for picking out a victim as an initiation and for dragging stragglers into his team’s area of effect spam. While it’s a shame his jungling isn’t great, this hopefully will get addressed when his Crystal Slash jungle bug gets sorted out, and he’s still a very good solo laner.I’ve been enjoying him a lot. He presses my own particular joy button - screwing with enemy positioning. The character I learned LoL with initally was Singed, and I still cackle with glee after a well executed Fling to this day. Impale is the reason to play this character, and it never disappoints. It’s such a nasty ability that allows for plenty of tricks, most of them involving the other guy dying. If you have need of something on your team lineup that can drag people into horrible death traps, then he’s always going to be a good pick.The reworked Pantheon is looking a good deal more powerful. He now has significantly more burst damage, with lower cooldowns to let him burst more often. The new critical change on his spear shot can be very satisfying to grab a last minute kill, and the reduced channel time on his ultimate means it can actually be used as an escape as well as an initiation.The rest of this patch has been minor tweaks and a whole lot of bug fixes. The QA department has been working overtime on this one.To discuss some of the changes yourselves, post in the massive League of Legends thread in the free to play MMOs section. If you haven't tried League of Legends yet, you're missing out.

Assassin's Creed Revelations Gameplay Fe

Assassin's Creed: RevelationsNews (18)Previews (6)ReviewVideos (18)Screenshots (6)Cheats and WalkthroughsAssassin's Creed: RevelationsNews (18)Previews (6)ReviewVideos (18)Screenshots (6)Cheats and WalkthroughsAssassin's Creed: RevelationsNews (16)Previews (6)ReviewVideos (18)Screenshots (6)Cheats and Walkthroughs We got the chance to chat with Alex Amancio, the Creative Director of Assassin's Creed: Revelations, about the historical title's gameplay and what we can expect this time around. Amancio discusses bomb crafting, traps, the story behind AC: R, and how his team has managed to bring Constantinople to life. Assassin's Creed: Revelations Gameplay Preview » Assassin's Creed:Revelations is coming out for the PC, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360 on November 15.

Namco Bandai responds to Pac-Man perma-sa

Namco Bandai has sought to calm the fan flames over its decision to include the same permanent save feature into Pac-Man & Galaga Dimensions that had Resident Evil: The Mercenaries fans foaming at the mouth. "There is no way to erase the save from within the game itself without misusing the hardware,福州担保公司, causing corruption," it said, without actually explaining why this was the case, although it explains that all the games in the bundle save to a single save file. The publisher plays down the importance of a need to delete the game's memory in saying it would take the average player a long time to max out everything in all the included games."It takes a very long time to get high scores on all the games to fill up the rankings as each game is a stand-alone title," it told Shacknews, adding that bundle contains multiple games and each one "would take an average person 8-10 hours depending on skill level to max out. With 6 games, that's 60+ hours to fill up everything with good high scores."So it's saying you're not likely to max everything out so you shouldn't need to want to delete your progress. That doesn't really address the issue faced by second-hand buyers who want to start fresh. NB went on to say that it "could not comment" on the decision to restrict the game bundle to use a single save file because it's unaware of the specifics that "contributed to the decision".

2011年12月27日星期二

GoldenEye Reloaded Multiplayer Video

GoldenEye 007: ReloadedNews (5)Previews (4)ReviewVideos (8)Screenshots (13)Cheats and WalkthroughsGoldenEye 007: ReloadedNews (5)Previews (4)ReviewVideos (8)Screenshots (13)Cheats and Walkthroughs Anyone above a certain age remembers GoldenEye for the N64. Eating pizza and fragging friends in split-screen back in the days is my favorite gaming memory of all time, so I'm down for anything GoldenEye. Idon't know if the multiplayer for GoldenEye: Reloaded is going to help me relive my misspent youth, but I'll give anything a try. It will be out for the 360 and PS3 this fall.Check out the multiplayer trailer below. GoldenEye 007: Reloaded Multiplayer Trailer »

Twisted Metal gets new release date

Eat Sleep Play founder David Jaffe has revealed that Twisted Metal will launch on Valentine's Day in the US next year. The February 14 launch date announcement comes shortly after Sony delayed the PS3 exclusive's release from October 4, 2011 to apply some "extra time, polish, and love".The EU PS Blog followed up to confirm a February release in Europe too, "exact date TBC".Jaffe said in a video posted on the PlayStation Blog that the extra development time is "totally paying off". His message also included a teaser of a new gameplay trailer. Tom Ivan

3DS holds top spot in Japan

3DS was the bestselling system in Japan during the week ended September 4, while VanillaWare's Grand Knights History debuted at the top of the software chart. It's the fourth straight week Nintendo's handheld has taken the top spot since its August 11 price cut, although sales dropped about ten percent to 54,744 units, according to Media Create's latest figures (via Andriasang).PS3 came in second place with 33,831 sales and PSP third with 30,192.PSP action RPG Grand Knights History took the No.1 spot on the software chart ahead of former bestsellers Monster Hunter Portable 3rd HD and Everyone's Rhythm Heaven.There were two other new entries in the top ten - Devil Survivor Over Clock for 3DS at No.5 and Corpse Party Book Of Shadows for PSP at No.7.Weekly hardware sales (previous week)3DS: 54,744 (60,781)PS3: 33,831 (33,141)PSP: 30,192 (31,310)Wii: 11,606 (11,342)DSi LL: 3,177 (3,235)DSi: 2,453 (2,384)PS2: 1,394 (1,580)X360: 1,228 (1,393)DS Lite: 80 (110)PSP go: 7 (20)Weekly software sales (lifetime)01. Grand Knights History (PSP, Marvelous): 64,630 (New)02. Monster Hunter Portable 3rd HD (PS3, Capcom): 52,792 (340,621) 03. Everyone's Rhythm Heaven (Wii, Nintendo): 22,762 (422,314) 04. Samurai Warriors 3 Empires (PS3, Tecmo Koei): 21,604 (91,858) 05. Devil Survivor Over Clock (3DS, Atlus): 20,809 (New)06. Atsumete! Kirby (DS, Nintendo): 15,804 (197,028) 07. Corpse Party Book of Shadows (PSP, 5pb): 15,249 (New)08. Mobile Suit Gundam New Gihren's Ambition (PSP, Namco Bandai): 14,656 (90,267) 09. Monster Hunter Diary Poka Poka Felyne Village G (PSP, Capcom): 12,924 (175,340) 10. Dynasty Warriors 7 Special (PSP, Tecmo Koei): 12,209 (37,516) Tom Ivan

2011年12月26日星期一

New Halo toys arrive in time for 10th ann

Halo is ten years old and, to mark the occasion, a new line of Halo action figures and toys will be hitting shelves this month. Before the end of September toy firm Mega Bloks will be releasing Series 3 Micro Action Figures, along with 'brick-style' vehicles and structures. Prices will range from pocket change (£1.99 Hero Figure Packs) up to more sizable offerings (£169.99 Halo UNSC Firebase) for the more Halo-obsessed of us. These arrive just ahead of Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, an Xbox 360 update of the original Halo, which goes on sale September 15. Extra goodies are on offer to those who pre-order it, so don't faff. Mike Jackson

Chubby Ryu & More On Around The Net 10.14

Around The Net 10.13.11 » GreatScott!It's KevinPereira andCandaceBailey with Around theNet, and they bring you the best of the best with videos of drunk people trying to accomplish simple tasks, an overweight StreetFighter, one of the craziest BASEjumps around, a stage mishap and an awesome retro commercial.Find the direct video links from Around the Net on Attack of the Show after the jump. Drunk Guy Tries to Cross the Street Base Jumpers in Spain Great Balls O’ Comfort Commercial Students Fall During Play Chubby Ryu

Black Ops Rezurrection DLC out now

Rezurrection, the new Zombies-focused Call of Duty: Black Ops map pack, is now available to download from the Xbox Live Marketplace. Announced earlier this month and due for release on PS3 and PC at a later date, the DLC features five Zombies levels. Four are remastered versions of CoD: World at War maps Nacht der Untoten, Verruckt, Shi No Numa and Der Riese, while the fifth is the all-new Moon.It'll cost 1200 MS Points (£10.28), but will be free to Black Ops Hardened and Prestige owners, "as a thank-you to the hardcore fans for their support from the start". You should be able to go into your download history and re-download the classic pack you already own, and the fresh download will include the new Moon map.There are some new screens of the DLC on this page, and you can check out a Rezurrection video preview here.Mark Lamia, studio head at developer Treyarch, said of the DLC: "Our Zombies fans are so incredibly engaged with us in the ongoing development of the franchise, and we're excited to deliver them our first all-Zombies content package. Rezurrection is Zombies nirvana, with four of our best Zombies experiences, topped off with the awesome, all-new level Moon." Tom Ivan

Force Unleashed dev making open-world RPG

A job ad tweeted by Clint Hocking, formerly of Ubisoft and currently creative director at LucasArts, has revealed the company is working on a new open-world RPG. The job listing doesn't give much away other than the genre of the game, although it asks for console development experience so a PlayStation and Xbox release is a safe bet.The last game to be released from LucasArts' game development team was Star Wars: The Force Unleashed 2, which was met with less than stellar review scores.Hocking previously served as Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory and Far Cry 2 creative director before leaving the company for LucasArts last April. Tamoor Hussain

Rambo The Video Game coming to PS3, 360

,福州贷款

"God didn't make Rambo. I made him." That might be true,福州担保公司, Trautman. But now a video game developer's getting in on the act. According to trade bible MCV,福州担保公司, a Rambo game will be coming to Xbox 360,福州担保, PC and PS3 next year from UK publisher Reef Entertainment.The firm has secured the rights from movie company StudioCanal, and includes the option to develop and release a series of titles based on the Sly Stallone films.The first game, Rambo - which will be based on the first Rambo trilogy - is scheduled for release in the fourth quarter of 2012. A long wait for a hero."With the success of the most recent Rambo film, and an international appetite for action movies with Expendables 2 scheduled for release next summer, we felt now was a good time to do something special with this licence," said Reef Entertainment CEO Peter Rezon.Craig Lewis, commercial director at Reef added: "We have big ambitions for Reef and the Rambo IP is the first step in establishing us as a worldwide player."Rambo will be a triple-A title on PS3, Xbox 360 and PC and will capture the gritty atmosphere and full-on action which made the Rambo movies so successful." Tim Ingham

Steam offers From Dust refunds

,福州贷款

Valve has reportedly begun offering refunds to customers who purchased From Dust following complaints over publisher Ubisoft's online DRM. According to Rock Paper Shotgun,福州担保公司, customers were originally informed that the god game would only require a one-off online activation,福州担保公司, before Ubisoft changed its mind and started demanding an always active internet connection to launch the title.Ubisoft subsequently apologised for the "misunderstanding" by announcing plans to launch a patch for the game that that will remove online authentication DRM entirely, but it now appears to have gone a step further by asking Steam to offer refunds. If true, it's a big move by Steam, which doesn't usually offer refunds unless they're requested prior to a game's release.A couple of readers forwarded emails from Steam to RPS. They read: "Ubisoft has just announced that they are working on a patch that will eliminate the need for any online authentication for From Dust. The patch will release in approximately two weeks. If you don't want to wait for the patch or if you haven't played the game, per Ubisoft's request, we will issue refunds for this title. If you would still like your purchase of From Dust refunded, please reply to this ticket." Tom Ivan

2011年12月22日星期四

Skyrim Manual Reveals That You Can Punch

The Elder Scrolls 5: SkyrimNews (37)Previews (16)ReviewVideos (22)Screenshots (27)Cheats and WalkthroughsThe Elder Scrolls 5: SkyrimNews (37)Previews (16)ReviewVideos (22)Screenshots (27)Cheats and WalkthroughsThe Elder Scrolls 5: SkyrimNews (37)Previews (16)ReviewVideos (22)Screenshots (27)Cheats and Walkthroughs Yesterday you got to take a first look at the world map for The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim, which Bethesda Softworks will release on November 11. That was pretty cool, but a just-leaked copy of the game manual offers a bit more substance in terms of what we can expect from the game.Screen caps of the booklet can be found at imgur (via CVG). It's pretty standard-issue stuff for the most part; minor changes to the rules and UI here and there, but overall the rules in Skyrim are largely the same as they were in Oblivion and Morrowind. One thing did catch my eye though, a new element to the game's dialogue system: brawling.In addition to being able to persuade, intimidate and bribe the people of Skyrim, you'll also have the option of just throwing your head back in disgust and throw down with your fists. These unarmed battles are always non-lethal as long as weapons remain sheathed; as soon as lethal force is used, your friendly brawl turns into a full-blown crime. Sort of places new value on the game's unarmed combat skill in the social realm, doesn't it?Also revealed is the fact that you'll be able to interact with cooking pots to prepare various food items. You'll need the appropriate ingredients in order to complete the task, of course. Sounds like a good way to earn some extra scratch though, especially if your Skyrim hero, like the previous ones from Oblivion and Morrowind, doesn't require food in order to survive.Source: imgur

Ratchet & Clank All 4 One trailer shows

Sony has released the first in what it says is a series of Ratchet & Clank: All 4 One trailers focusing on the game's quirky selection of weapons. "The Insomniac Games team has always prided themselves on delivering over-the-top weaponry that gives you all kinds of ingenious ways to turn your enemies into space dust," said SCEE product manager, Ross Alexander. Sony confirmed in May that All 4 One will launch in the US on October 18 and across PAL regions from October 19, along with details on pre-order bonuses available at select retailers.

Picaroon Interview - RTS Meets MMO

By Bryan King (Bryan), OnRPG JournalistPicaroon is a brand new MMORTS that prides itself on mixing time-based rounds based on player preference, such as rounds being able to last anywhere from 90 minutes to four weeks. Today, I got the chance to sit down with Paul Baker of Nice Technology to discuss Picaroon.Nice Technology was formed in 2009 to commercialise the company’s unique MMOG engine (AliceServer), develop the software further and self publish games made with it. Nice Technology has developed two titles: Tronji, a children’s MMOG created for BBCW and Ragdoll and Picaroon, both of which are in open beta.Picaroon, has been produced by a small but dedicated team: Toby Simpson, creator of AliceServer, designer and producer; Mark Ashton, designer, producer and lead programmer; Greg Brown, lead artist; Gavin Rudd client, web and database programmer; Gary Wood IT network and support manager; and Paul Baker, general manager.The credit here goes to Mark Ashton the co-designer, producer and lead client programmer on Picaroon. We knew that the game had a swashbuckling theme, but title ideas with the word pirate in it just didn't feel right. Then Mark came up with Picaroon which means the same thing and it sounds much nicer as all words with two 'o's in do. Of course there's also the issue that if we mention pirates in the title, it sets people's expectations to a historic setting whereas we've deliberately based Picaroon in some suitably grim future to allow us to pick and choose what technology we wish to use and not be limited to cannons, swords and parrots.Picaroon is played out in the future where all that remains of the Earth’s surface are thousands and thousands of small tropical islands – most of them volcanic in nature. Now tidally locked, half of the planet is in perpetual darkness and no-one knows what is there (yet!). The remaining people battle it out for control of the land that’s available to feed the power of a few massive warlords descended from empires of times long past. At least that’s the story as told around camp fires these days! What we really wanted was an excuse to mix old and new and apply a little odd styling of our own. If we based a pirate sea game in the past we’d not have been able to have super submarines, dirigibles and weapons of mass destruction. We wanted some familiarity and the ability to continue to uncover cool new things in future games: the tidally locked thing is part of that—there’s a whole half of the world that is dark and unexplored…Picaroon is a RTS: a genre that is traditionally very hard to transplant into the MMOG arena. Part of this is that it is technically quite difficult to manage hundreds of thousands of units owned by different players on a single server and game instance. We have created some exciting new technology that lets us do this and we wished to show it off as best as we could! Also, of course, because it's a technical and design challenge, we were aware that any large-scale MMOG real-time strategy game would be unique, and we would be providing something to the market that was not already present.Picaroon is also unique for a couple of reasons. Firstly it’s got this end-game phase where players who tribute a threshold amount of resources to the warlords get access to some pretty amazing extra weaponry at the end of the game which is designed to encourage some pretty vast wars. Secondly, we have worked very hard to establish a path of development that lets us introduce new game types that allow the game to appeal to more and more people. Obviously we’re also in a situation where unlike RPGs, RTSs tend to have a single winner. That can make for a lot of losers – so it’s vital that we have many, many ways to win, both small and large. We’re proud of the results of that work and we’ve yet to scratch the surface.So far, so good! The reaction we have had has been excellent. We have worked very hard during beta to listen carefully to what our players say and respond accordingly when producing updates. The open beta has given us the opportunity to listen to a wider audience and to learn what our game feels like to play for the first time. We want Picaroon to be successful and the only way we will achieve that is through keeping our ears more open than our mouths!We have received many suggestions from testers about the balance of units, the structure of alliances, the scoring of points, and specials! During beta we have made many changes to each of these areas as well as introducing some cool new features such as the airship and the technology centre. In addition, we’ve made progress to releasing a beta version of Persistent Picaroon.In a large scale MMORTS such as Picaroon where players can control hundreds of units in real time, one of the biggest challenges is to balance the gameplay between paying players, free players, individual players, alliances and then particular units. This has been meticulously undertaken over a period of beta testing.The biggest technical challenge was to update the graphics engine so that it can display the hundreds of ships of alliances members in a shared scene without performance degradation in the heat of vast battles!Picaroon's end-game is something that we're very pleased with. It's a feature where towards the end of any game, the rules change a little and the players that have given away the most resources through a tribute system get some powerful new units and specials that are only valid for the duration of that game. We have found that this encourages everyone to go to war and that is entertaining and engaging for all the players.Plus we really like the newer units, the airship and technology centre, plus our original favourite the super submarine!Well the longest game we’ve had to date is approximately four weeks but we do have Persistent Picaroon up our sleeves!We spent a lot of time balancing the game and created rules so that cash players cannot ‘buy’ a win by using very powerful specials. The intention is to trade time for money but not necessarily a place on the leader board. We also offer vanity specials such as banners and in the future stylish character models for paying customers.To underline what we were saying above, some of the most powerful specials cannot be purchased with cash but can only rarely be found or bought with in game gold!We hope that by presenting the game in as simple a way as possible we will encourage all game players to try the game. We have kept the barriers low: the game is free-to-play which should help encourage maximum trial and, in addition, it’s only a 60MB client download, incredibly light weight for a game of this genre.To support this we are also presenting Picaroon in a variety of flavours: Skirmish Picaroon can be played out over an hour; Classic Picaroon can be played over a week or weeks; Persistent Picaroon which is in closed beta will invite players to retain a foothold in the game for as long as they can. There’s something there for everybody whether they are familiar with RTSs, MMOs or not.We hope that the game will have broad appeal! We've added features such as overnight build-queues and automatic building upgrade plans as well as specials that will protect your islands for several days. Hopefully this will help balance the game for those that have lots of time versus those that do not.Having said that, we recognise that it is difficult to get this sort of balance perfect and it is something that we have spent a lot of time attempting to perfect! We continue to experiment with lots of game configurations. We'll have to see what our players suggest!During development we have gradually introduced achievements, friend get friend schemes as well as the ability to share some accomplishments on Facebook. We will continue to add features for alliances and are also considering implementing an overarching faction structure above alliances. Further work is also planned to promote and share alliance achievements.Our immediate plans are to maximise the creative possibilities of the Picaroon concept. We are just about to test the persistent version of Picaroon.We also have plans for new PvE features such as weather, monster octopuses, pirate owned islands and giant squid, and we want to develop a super alliance (the factions mentioned above) concept and other new units.We also want to give a quick spring clean to the UI so that we can simplify and make things even more intuitive.After Picaroon we plan to develop a commercial version of Tronji and then also another project which we hope will be really innovative and fully exploit the possibilities of our technology: think of ever changing organic worlds teeming with artificial life, a world where players can shape the game experience and environment– we are getting really excited and hope OnRPG’s readers might be too!Yes, we’ve always harboured plans to create some mobile applications so that players can stay in touch with critical aspects of their empire, as Picaroon never sleeps.Absolutely! Come and help us make this a great game. We know that we need to keep our ears open and we are aware that the game has only progressed as far as it has because we’ve listened hard to what our players are telling us. We’re always open to advice and if any of your community feels that Picaroon is the game for them, then we’d be delighted to have them and to hear what they have to say!

2011年12月20日星期二

EA 'hopes to find a way' to keep its game

EA has released a statement claiming it hopes to work out an agreement to keep its games on Steam following the removal of a number of its titles in recent months. Yesterday Dragon Age 2 followed Crysis 2 in being removed from Steam, reportedly because the title's latest DLC is being made available to customers in-game rather than directly through Valve's digital store."At EA, we offer our games and content to all major download services including GameStop, Amazon, Direct2Drive and Steam," David DeMartini, EA's senior VP of global e-commerce, told IGN."Unfortunately, Steam has adopted a set of restrictive terms of service which limit how developers interact with customers to sell downloadable content. No other download service has adopted this practice. Consequently some of our games have been removed by Steam. "We hope to work out an agreement to keep our games on Steam," he added.

Daily Wrap-Up 8.02.11

The Daily Feed with Sara Underwood 8.02.11 » Here are today's news stories covering video games, gadgets, and pop culture. Sony announces the acquisition of Sucker Punch Productions, the developer of the inFamous and Sly Cooper series' of games. Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment confirms a November 1 release for The Lord of the Rings: War in the North. Headstrong Games reveals that the House of the Dead: Overkill Extended Cut bonus level Naked Terror is set in a strip club. Electronic Arts details the bonuses available from select US retailers with Battlefield 3 pre-orders. EA Sports launches Season Ticket, an annual subscription program that offers early access to select games, discounted DLC and premium Check out our preview of id's Rage! Is Borderlands 2 in development at Gearbox? Has an Australian tech company invented an engine that will change gaming forever? Catherine has only been released in America for a week and it's already breaking records. The recent Netflix price has left some people out in the cold. So what are the alternatives? Kickstarter is a huge help to indie game developers, but what's in it for you? X-Play went to the source, ArenaNet, to find out how Guild Wars 2's combat will work. Adam discusses the good and bad sides of Blizzard introducing a real money auction house into Diablo 3. Morgan Webb has details about Gears of War 3 from Comic-Con she'd like to share. It's time to get hype with G4's top 10 EVO 2011 moments.

DC Universe Online Free-To-Play Impressio

DC Universe OnlineNews (61)Previews (14)ReviewVideos (78)Screenshots (228)Cheats and WalkthroughsDC Universe OnlineNews (61)Previews (12)ReviewVideos (76)Screenshots (228)Cheats and Walkthroughs DC Universe Online Free-To-Play Preview » Even though it's just barely a year old, DCUniverse Online is about to go through some major changes. The biggest change is easily that the game will be offereing a Free-To-Play option for players. X-Play's Blair Herter sat down with DCComics' Geoff Johns to talk about the upcoming shift and what it means for gamers.Free-To-Play super heroes certainly sounds like a no-brainer to me, but what are you guys thinking?

2011年12月18日星期日

Renegade Ops Review -- This Game's Gone R

Renegade OpsNewsPreviews (1)ReviewVideos (1)ScreenshotsCheats and WalkthroughsRenegade OpsNewsPreviews (1)ReviewVideos (1)ScreenshotsCheats and WalkthroughsRenegade OpsNewsPreviews (1)ReviewVideos (1)ScreenshotsCheats and Walkthroughs Renegade Ops is the new twin stick vehicle shooter from Just Cause developer Avalanche Studios (SE). Players control a variety of vehicles and unleash a variety of weapons in this uninspired shooter."The story is so bare bones it's hardly worth mentioning. An unknown superpower named Inferno has suddenly sprung up with aspirations of world domination, so it's up to a rag-tag crew of renegades to put a stop to it. The script doesn't take itself seriously, but it's rarely tongue-in-cheek enough to be entertaining either."Head over to read the rest of our Renegade Ops review.

Treyarch gears up for Call of Duty 9

In news that will surprise absolutely nobody, Black Ops developer Treyarch appears to be ramping up for development on the next Call of Duty game. A multiplayer level designer job ad posted on the studio's official website and Gamasutra calls for "an expert understanding of the Call of Duty game universe". Treyarch says it's also looking for an "expert on recent first person shooters and the trends of the genre" to serve as game designer/scripter. The interview process may involve "a design test utilizing Call of Duty mod tools".Treyarch has traditionally developed Call of Duty games in alternate years to series creator Infinity Ward, with franchise entries like Call of Duty 3, World at War and Black Ops already under its belt.New instalment Modern Warfare 3's set to release on November 8 alongside subscription service Call of Duty Elite, which will offer "exclusive episodic entertainment built just for the community", created by the likes of Ridley and Tony Scott. Andy Robinson

Catherine sells 200k copies in a week

Bizarre Japanese drama adventure game, Catherine, has sold 200,000 copies in its first week on sale in US. Atlus confirmed the news with a picture of a Catherine-themed cake with the message: Congratulations: 200,000 sold in the first week".The firm has since replied to request for more info saying, "We don't comment on numbers. We just eat cake". Fair enough. The firm's VP of sales and marketing, Tim Pivnicny, did however tell IGN yesterday, "Catherine has exceeded our highest expectations.""Catherine can boast the largest launch in the 20-year history of Atlus, and continues to see strong sales at retail," he added.The game launch in US on July 26 on PS3 and Xbox. After a long wait for UK gamers, Deep Silver has signed a deal to publish it here later this year.Can we haz cake? Mike Jackson

2011年12月15日星期四

First Deus Ex Human Revolution Xbox revi

The UK's Official Xbox Magazine has awarded Deus Ex: Human Revolution a 10/10 review score. The write-up appears in the mag's new edition (issue 76), which will go on general sale next week.As you'd expect, the look, control and characters in the game all come in for flawless praise.The news comes after PC Gamer's world first review, which landed with subscribers yesterday.The UK mag gave the game an extremely rare 94%.Deus Ex: Human Revolution will be released on Xbox 360, PS3 and PC next month.

US Nintendo downloads Let's Golf 3D

This week's US Nintendo downloads list is out and at the top of the menu is a mean game of golf. Gameloft's Let's Golf is clearly a shot at Camelot Software and Sony's Hot Shots Golf (aka Everybody's Golf) - a cartoony, anime-style golf game with over 100 courses and plenty of charm - and it's actually pretty good. Nothing else leaps out at us, but the full list is below. Hit the source link for more info and trailers.Nintendo eShopLet's Golf 3D - Choose from eight customizable characters and play in exotic locations, including the Mayan jungle and a winter wonderland. The 3D visuals will let you view your ball's trajectory like never before. (For Nintendo 3DS)Virtual ConsoleBrawl Brothers - Rick and Doug know all the moves, from martial arts to pro wrestling throws, and they don't hesitate to use them. You really don't want to mess with them! (For Wii)WiiWareBurn the Rope - Try to burn as much of the rope as possible in each level. But there's a catch: The fire only burns upward, so you must rotate the levels to keep your flame alive. (For Wii) Also new this week:GO Series: Portable Shrine Wars (Nintendo eShop / Nintendo DSiWare)Oscar's World Tour (Nintendo eShop / Nintendo DSiWare)My Australian Farm (Nintendo eShop / Nintendo DSiWare)

Modern Warfare 3 gets folding scopes, bra

Modern Warfare 3 stars alongside Battlefield 3 on the cover of the latest issue of OXM UK, with the mag's main feature revealing plenty of new info on the Infinity Ward shooter. Modern Warfare 3 will introduce foldable scopes, enabling you to mix up your play style without switching weapons, the studio's creative strategist Robert Bowling told the mag."Say you're picking guys in windows out long range in Manhattan, but then kick through a door and start clearing a building. You can now fold down your magnifying scope and already have a close-range optic on your gun - so now you're engaging guys close-target without having to change weapon," he said.Bowling also revealed a new weapon, the XM25 air burst grenade launcher or "Punisher"."It's great for when you're fighting in an urban environment. If a guy is behind a concrete barrier, you can laser-tag that cover point, fire over it and it will then programme the round to explode one metre past it. Anyone hiding behind it will be showered down."Plenty more details can be found in OXM issue 77, which hits store shelves on September 2.Check out the Modern Warfare 3 Survival mode trailer here. Tom Ivan

2011年12月14日星期三

Modern Warfare 3 art shows new locations

Activision has released a new batch of Modern Warfare 3 artwork ahead of the game's big multiplayer reveal at the Call of Duty XP event this weekend. The nine shots show a range of locations, from the now familiar New York harbour battle scene to new shanty town and jungle locations.Earlier this week it was confirmed that Modern Warfare 3 will make use of Valve's full Steamworks feature set.Check out everything you missed from the trailer for the game's new multiplayer mode in this Modern Warfare 3 Spec-Ops under the microscope video feature. Tom Ivan

Final Fantasy XIII-2's English voice reco

The English-language voice recording for Final Fantasy XIII-2 is complete. That's according to Ali Hillis, who lends her voice to FFXIII's leading lady, Lightning Farron. "Well... it seems that we have wrapped recording on FFXIII-2," she said on Facebook last night. She went on to add, meanwhile, that recording for BioWare's Mass Effect 3 is still in progress, along with multiple other titles she "can't talk about". Square recently release two new FFXIII-2 videos, one a narrative trailer and the other a developer commentary video from producer Kitase Yoshinori - see both of them through here.The game is targeting a January release in US, with the EU date still a vague 'early 2012'. Mike Jackson

New PlayStation UK boss named

Fergal Gara is to be confirmed as the new VP and managing director of Sony Computer Entertainment UK and Ireland later today, according to MCV. The former Asda entertainment boss, who has also worked for EMI and the BBC, will fill the shoes of former SCE UK boss Ray Maguire, who stepped down in April after 17 years with the company.Sony has also appointed entertainment market veteran Philippe Cardon as the new MD and VP for the PlayStation business in France and Switzerland. Recently appointed European PlayStation boss Jim Ryan claimed last month that PS3 is comfortably outselling its rivals in mainland Europe, but that isn't the case in Britain. "UK is one of the territories where we have to do better," he said. Tom Ivan

2011年12月13日星期二

Crysis 2, Portal 2 and Dead Space 2 are m

EA has announced impressive sales figures for a number of sequels released this year. Portal 2, Dead Space 2 and Dragon Age 2 have all surpassed two million sales, while Crysis 2 has hit three million.Meanwhile, FIFA 11 sales, including digital and mobile downloads, are closing in on 15 million units, while Battlefield: Bad Company 2 has sold over nine million copies.EA said last night that it has seen record pre-orders for upcoming titles Battlefield 3 and Star Wars: The Old Republic.

Assassin's Creed Revelations gameplay - 1

Ubisoft has released 10 minutes of Assassin's Creed Revelations gameplay footage from the demo that was available at GamesCom last week. We got screenshots of Ezio using new devices such as traps and bombs during Cologne's expo but now you can see the master assassin put those explosive to use.There's also a developer commentary running throughout to highlight all the finer details.Have a look: Watch in HD No comments yet, be the first! The last Assassin's Creed Revelations trailer showed Ezio and Altair getting their kill on together. Go and have a butcher's. Tom Pakinkis

Early Access Dream Drops

By Darren Henderson (DizzyPW), OnRPG Editor-In-ChiefYesterday marked the first day of Gamania's Taiwan Game Show and the beginning of their spectacular line up was Dream Drops. For those familiar with Lucent Heart, you will find yourself right at home as Dream Drops is developed by the same team and takes Gamania's usual style and pushes it to the next generation.In Dream Drops you take on the role of a 'sleepwalker' aka a human who is temporarily transported into the world of dreams to help bring some clarity to the chaos befalling the world of After Dream. Apparently Time Thieves have stolen the Time from children's classic fairy tales, resulting in bizarre alterations to Fairy Tales. Most notably, the Queen of Hearts has gone from savage and maniacal to focused and goal driven, leading the Elder Board in a hunt to catch the Time Thieves. Meanwhile Snow White has gone Barbie and is attempting to seize control of all of After Dream the only way a Barbie Girl knows how, creating a seductive clothing line called Silver Waltz!Although the Queen of Hearts has summoned you to the world of After Dreams, don't let your guard down. She is still vicious and ready to turn on you as soon as you no longer serve her purposes. The story line and cast of characters in Dream Drops is twisted, full of appearances like Hook, betrayal, and mystery.In terms of gameplay, Dream Drops takes the classic 4 class model and reimagines it with the tank becoming a Nutcracker, the mage becoming a Dream Painter, the cleric becoming a Pasty Chef, and the summoner as an Indian Warrior. While they serve these rolls in a familiar way, their skills are nothing but imaginative. For instance the Pasty Chef (pictured below as Pedo Bear) attacks enemies with giant ice cream cones, heals allies with candy, and spills milk on people for the pure joy of being Pedo Bear. As a side note, it seems each class will have a different starting area, so expect some replayability should you choose to sample the 4 classes.Guild Cities also play a very important role in Dream Drops. Guilds will be able to collect materials and rare blueprints in order to construct buildings in their town, offering useful buffs and rare crafting locations. The town construction itself is quite detailed, to the point that you can literally spell out words from an aerial view of your city with trees, fountains, crafting houses, and other buildings. As your guild grows, so too does the amount of land available for you to build upon.Of course it would be sad if this joy was limited to only the Guild Leader (as it is in most games), but the 5 tiered guild member ranking system in Dream Drops can be used to give limited access to the town builder to your closest guildies. This way you can come together and work in unison to build the perfect Guild Town for your group of friends.Now one of the major problems in the past with Guild Towns is that smaller guilds often lack the number of members to effectively run quests, gather materials, and build a prosperous guild town. Dream Drops partially alleviates this problem by allowing Guild Leaders to post player generated quests on a billboard in their Guild Town. Non-guildies can accept these quests, and work to fetch materials for the guild like little mercenaries. This does come at the cost of Guild Leaders having to fit the bill on the quest reward but it's a step in the right direction when players can generate their own quests for any purpose.In true Lucent Heart fashion, Dream Drops offers plenty of ways to customize your character without limiting your viability. Gem stones can be placed in a cross pattern on the character screen (with the horizontal bar focusing on physical and the vertical focusing on magical) to bolster your character's stats beyond their base level stats. This is entirely different from the fashion sets that can be obtained from the cash shop as well as various quests, offering you incredibly detailed character customization without having any impact on your character stats. Level requirements are also placed on the fashion, reserving the best looking items for players dedicated enough to reach endgame. Approximately 9 slots for fashion exist as well, so it shouldn't be too difficult if you try to reserve a unique look for yourself.As you level up, you gain access to new class promotions (2nd tier classes not yet announced!) as well as new skills to master, most consisting of 10 levels of upgrading. In fact so many diverse skills are available to you that it will take a good amount of time to eventually master all of the skills, and players will be forced to specialize themselves while leveling to maximize their power. This comes with a nice aesthetic bonus however as skills actually change in animation the closer they are to maximum level. This can range from some added sparkly particles to the Nutcracker charging on a glorious steed instead of wooden rocking horse.To keep things interesting, various events and minigames occur daily and change daily in Dream Drops. Players will be given a handy in-game calendar to keep track of these events and can even edit it to ignore certain events or send reminders to themselves and guildies for important calendar events. Speaking of convenient features, you can actually access both your mailbox and auction house from anywhere in the world! These even includes accepting mail attachments while out grinding mobs. The true Time Thieves are MMO companies that have forced players to return to town for these mundane tasks and Dream Drops is out to rectify this injustice.Though the game isn't even slated for release yet, the developers promise that the feud between Snow White and The Queen of Hearts is only the beginning. Expect an infusion of Asian fairy tales to join the roster of American and European stories in a post launch expansion!

2011年12月12日星期一

Project Blackout - Tactically Twitchy

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By Michael Sagoe (mikedot), OnRPG Journalist。

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SG Interactive is taking a departure from their usual bright and colorful online games to bring us a gritty and violent look at modern warfare with Project Blackout (PB). Released back in 2010, Project Blackout is a multiplayer online first-person shooter, which contains a mix between tactical and fast pacing. PB looks and plays very similar to many FPS games before it, but is it hiding something to make it worth the download?。

PB also features the option to change your character’s look with avatar items, but these items are restricted to head items such as face paint, masks and hats, and avatar sets that completely change the look of your player model altogether, and just like the weapons available, none of these can be tweaked.  For such a modern game, it’s pretty disappointing that you’re only given access to bare bones customization options, and to make things worse, most of the customization is locked away from non-paying players, only being obtainable using points (real currency). The only other bit of customization available to all players would be the mission system and ACT ranks (Advanced Combat Training) that lets you tweak your character in various ways to fit your playing style.。

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The community of players for Project Blackout seems to be pretty large and active. Lobbies for both the newbie and open channels are usually full during peak hours and there’s enough variety in interest for game types that you won’t have much of a problem find a room for a game type that you’re willing to play. Working with random public players is about as average as online gaming communities can get: Most players keep to themselves and seldom communicate with each other, but you will occasionally get some nice, supportive players here and there, as well as the occasionally trash talker/sore loser/troll.。

That’s right. You know how most multiplayer FPS games have the option for you to pick up someone else’s gun if you’re out of ammo? Well you can’t do it here, unless you pay for it. The game literally takes features that are common with FPS titles and then sell them back to you… That right there made me pull out the WTF card.。

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Battling out in PB also feels average at best: Run, shoot, stab, crouch and throw a grenade or two while cooperating with your teammates. No matter how much better or worse your weapon is compared to your enemy’s, one or two well-placed shots to the head can pretty much do you in, and with all the different weapons available, PB has a strange balance between luck and skill.。

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Controls for PB are typical of your standard first-person shooter. There isn’t even a tutorial at the start of the game, but if you’ve played just about any first person shooter title before this one, you’ll know exactly what to do: Use WSAD keys to move, mouse to aim and shoot, R key to reload, number keys to switch weapons, etc. The only slightly unique feature in PB’s control scheme is being able to trigger weapon functions using your MOUSE2 button, which lets you use various features of your weapon such as looking down the iron sights of your rifle, steadying your grip for increased accuracy while gimping your mobility, speeding up your ability to switch between two magazine cases, etc. All firearms seem somewhat accurate to their real life counterparts.。

In terms of cash shop balance, it’s WAY off. There are so many different boosters you can purchase to give yourself hefty advantage over non-paying players, such as quick reloading, extra grenades, faster/slower respawning and even (get this…) weapon pick up.。

The visuals of PB are simply not up to snuff in comparison to other modern shooters out there. They may look nice from a distance, but taking a closer look will reveal dank and blurry textures all over the place. Shadow effects, light reflections and all other effects simply look plain and dated. The only decent part with PB’s visuals comes from the wacky action ragdoll that makes dead bodies flail like crazy. As an added touch, every time you get killed in battle, there’s a deathcam attached to the head of your character, so you can watch every moment of your flailing dead body in glorious first person view, which adds a bit of shits-and-giggles value.。

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The core gameplay found in PB contains almost nothing out of the ordinary: Game modes available contain your standard matches including Team Deathmatch, Bomb Run, Elimination, etc. Nothing special or amazing regarding these modes since you can find them in just about every other multiplayer FPS game out there, but you can also play these modes with special conditions such as Sniper Rifle or Shotguns only. This adds a nice change of pace, but gets old quickly. There is one mode that I did manage to have a blast with, and that would be their recently added Dino Escape mode, where dinosaurs (controlled by live players) have to stop human players from escaping a Jurassic Park-Esque landscape, complete with a big ‘ol T-Rex.。

Overall, Project Blackout is a functional online multiplayer FPS title base on modern warfare and that’s about it. There’s nothing much here that sets it apart from the competition and has some wonky balance issues on the side. Give it a go if you need a quick fix, but there are far better alternatives out there.。

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When starting out, you’re not granted any customization options. You simply type in your desired player name and go. Once you check into the game’s item shop, you’ll find a hefty amount of different weapons, avatar models and other misc. items to choose from. The weapon selection is incredibly vast, but you can’t tweak or modify your weapons in any way, so if you were thinking about adding a nice little silencer or modified scope to that shiny new assault rifle you just bought, you can sort of forget that… unless, of course, the weapon you just purchased already has the features you were looking for.。

 

Disney survey reveals Epic Mickey 2 - rep

Development on Epic Mickey 2 is in full swing it seems, according to an anonymous tipster who says Disney is doing market research for the title now. The source has told Destructoid that the Disney pole asks users to pick from a selection of titles for the game, including Epic Mickey 2: Return of the Mad Doctor, Epic Mickey 2: The Power of Two, Epic Mickey 2: Mystery on Mean Street, and just Epic Mickey 2. This is backed up by a snapshot of one question that asks those polled to choose their favourite from a range of different box artworks for the game, which would suggest development on it is already pretty far along. According to the report, the game will have a two-player split-screen option with Mickey and his brother Oswald The Lucky Rabbit playable, while Mickey's paint and thinner powers make a return. It's being lined up for release on Wii, Xbox 360 and PS3, claims the source, making no mention of 3DS, Vita or Wii U. Warren Spector told press earlier this year that there was 'no shortage' of interesting challenges that could be tackled with a prospective sequel. And the original's 'strong' sales would certainly suggest a sequel is likely. Mike Jackson

Fallen Earth F2P Interview

By Bryan King (Bryan), OnRPG JournalistThe competition in the F2P MMO industry just got a little bit hotter (or should I say, deadlier? Haha.. ha… *clears throat*), with the F2P transition of Fallen Earth. Originally developed by a section of the Icarus Studios team (now incorporated under GamersFirst’s Reloaded Productions), Fallen Earth provides players with a post-apocalyptic world with a mass variety of weapons, vehicles, and powers under their control. I had the chance to sit down with Joseph Willmon, associate games director for GamersFirst and Marie Croall, lead designer of Fallen Earth to speak about Fallen Earth’s transition to F2P, upcoming content, and the state of the game past, present, and future. Marie Croall: I’m the Lead Designer for Reloaded Productions, Cary. I’ve been the Lead Designer for Fallen Earth since its days with Icarus, and continue to be in-charge of all game development, features, gameplay, and source materials.Joseph Willmon: I’m the Associate Game Director for GamersFirst, and among many other job duties I’m responsible for the smooth integration of Fallen Earth into our Free2Play game catalogue. I also work very closely Marie and her team on game balance, fair monetization, and community relations.Marie Croall: Sure. Fallen Earth is a post-apocalyptic sandbox MMO. Players take on the role of a clone in the year 2156 struggling to survive in a world ravaged by a global pandemic and nuclear war. The game features a class-free system and a completely open-world environment of more than 1,000 square kilometers. Because the game uses a skills rather than levels, there are near-infinite choices to mix skills, attributes, and mutations. More than 95 percent of the game’s items, armor, weapons and transportation are player-crafted. The game also has a unique FPS/MMO hybrid combat system that is one-of-a-kind in the MMO landscape.Joseph Willmon: The community response was pretty welcoming, actually. True, there was a brief moment of anxiety between the announcement of Free2Play and when we actually revealed the details of how the monetization would be handled, but that’s to be expected with such a large change. Once we put up the details of the new ways Premium Subscriptions would be handled, the conversation sort of moved on past the payment model and just got right back to talking about the game!Regarding how the change in business model came about, we’re always looking for opportunities to find gameplay-rich, community driven games like Fallen Earth. When we started talking to Icarus about a possible partnership to help off-load their overhead costs, we ended up diving deep into the game and really liked what we saw. The talks naturally progressed to acquisition, and evolving the business model to Free2Play, which we have a ton of experience with but which is only now starting to enjoy popularity.Marie Croall: Anyone who’s ever played Fallen Earth can tell you that it’s a unique and fun experience. And while the traditional MMO subscription model did get us a great, small hard-core audience, the facts are that we couldn’t get enough players past the cost of the game to populate the world. The world is so huge that the game really thrives with a large-volume audience. GamersFirst has the experience in the Free2Play market and wanted the title, so here we are!Joseph Willmon: Sure. The details of the Premium Subscriptions can be found at our website (http://www.gamersfirst.com/fallenearth/?q=premium-subscriptions,) but here’s the breakdown: We have one free rank (Scavenger) and three subscription ranks named Survivalist, Wastelander and Commander. As with all GamersFirst titles, free players are not restricted on content or levels; they can go everywhere and do everything, including joining and creating clans, trading, using the auction house and mail system, travel the whole map, do all quests, and run all instances. There is a limit on how much in-game currency (chips) a player who has never paid can amass (to limit gold farming; this goes away if you ever pay), and an eight hour per-day crafting limit. All three levels of the subscriptions open these up and provide quality of life upgrades, such as more character slots, faster experience gains, faster crafting, faster harvesting, more Veteran Reward Points, faction reputation gains and the like. The top subscription tier, the Commander, also comes with a cool feature call the Commander Aura.We’re also planning on mirroring items found in the marketplace on in-game Reward Merchants as well, so if you have a subscription you can pick some of these items up in the game without having to spend additional money.Marie Croall: Yeah, the Commander Aura is really cool. It extends some of the Commander’s in-game benefits to everyone in the Commander’s group, including free players. The Aura stacks with other Commanders in the group, so if you have, say, three Commanders in a group, then you’ll see a 15 percent increase on all the stats a Premium Subscription increases (EXP gain, faction gain, etc). This is especially beneficial to groups of players who have friends who can’t afford a subscription, since they can effectively subsidize their free friends’ experience.Joseph Willmon: Paying players support the game for everyone, and we wanted to find a literal way to project this into the game. The players that go for Commander are the ones who are going out of their way to take care of their friends and allies; these are the same players that pay for Vent servers, host websites, or rent clan-servers in FPSes. As we work to make the game successful and further development without resorting to selling things that trade on the gameplay value, it seemed obvious to allow these players the opportunity to help us and their friends out at the same time.Marie Croall: Kind of a lot, now that I think about it! We’ve updated the new player experience to reduce the sort of dizzying-confusion that can result in starting out in a sandbox MMO, guiding new players to important questlines and learning valuable skills to survive in the wasteland. With July’s Alpha County expansion we raised the level cap to 55, introduced new skill-lines and abilities, new enemies, quests, and added a whole new section for players to quest and discover. Then there’s Fast Travel – a way to unlock travel waypoints to help navigate Fallen Earth’s massive world—unlockable Wardrobe slots that let players customize their appearance, and Progress Towns, which are towns that players must capture and hold from waves of hostile NPCs, building up defenses and extending the passive benefits the towns offer. It’s sort of like bringing the raid to the player, rather than sending the player to the raid. Of course there’s the new Chopper and the upcoming World Event system.Marie Croall: More supportive than not! We are doing some pretty extensive updates to fundamental gameplay systems players have gotten used to, so there’s some apprehension, but they’re updates that ultimately make the game more awesome by several orders of magnitude. It’s fantastic watching the realization set in that these changes help make Fallen Earth more of a virtual world than a standard linear MMO, and seeing how excited players are getting about that.Marie Croall: The World Event system is us making good on our goal of making Fallen Earth the premiere Free2Play sandbox MMO. World Events are dynamically generated events that happen at random all around the world, offering players who participate the opportunity to not only experience more of the world of Fallen Earth, but learn helpful skills, earn chips, and gain valuable, rare resources. World Events come in all sorts of different flavors, so there’s stuff there for PvP players, PvE players, crafters, and roleplayers. We’re keeping sort of quiet about what the actual events are because we want everyone to feel that rush of exploring something new, but as they happen you’ll definitely start to hear about them! Joseph Willmon: I also want to point out that this system is not just for higher levels. By making the game more sandboxy, we’re adding in new systems that everyone can enjoy rather than just layering content onto the end of the game. There’s a lot of great stuff here, and when you see your first World Event pop up on the map, you should definitely go check it out!Marie Croall: The short answer is yes, absolutely; our core focus with the transition to Free2Play is introducing more reasons for players to both compete and cooperate. We are currently working on Faction Territory Control, geared specifically toward letting PvP players capture and hold territory, paving the way for PvE players to exploit the controlled territory. There’s more coming, of course, but this is a huge step in that direction.Marie Croall: We’re always looking for way to draw the RP fan base into every feature we do. We want every player to feel the same immersion that the RPers bring to the community. Part of the incentive behind releasing the new unlockable Wardrobe Slots was to allow players to customize their appearance to be in accord with the character they want to roleplay as, extending that feeling to everyone in the wasteland.Joseph Willmon: Like I mentioned before, we’re not segregating our free players from Premium subscribers, and we’re not limiting them with level caps. We looked carefully at what options we had available to us when creating the subscriptions, and ended-up focusing on things like crafting, leveling – things that make life easier for subscribers rather than just giving direct combat advantages. We’re not offering weapons, armor, resources, or crafted goods on our cash shop, so that’s the main pillar of our paid vs. unpaid balance. Additionally, as mentioned above, since players who opt for the Commander Premium Subscription route can project some of their benefits onto others, it’s still possible to get a leg up without having to pay anything.Marie Croall: Joe pretty much nailed it. We’ve worked every heard of the last two years to create a game where almost everything is put in the hands of the player, and we’re extremely careful not to mess that up with the change to Free2Play.Marie Croall: Rather than one or two single features, I think what separates fallen earth is how everything is put together. We have a large open world for players to truly find their niche in. Joseph Willmon: Man, so much! What other Free2Play game has twitch-based third-person combat in a massive seamless world with the ability to craft everything while giving you the opportunity to really define your character from stats to appearance? That was a mouthful, but you get the point!Marie Croall: It would be impossible for me to pick one! Although in game I do find myself harvesting and crafting more than anything else. I love being able to make everything I need to get by, from food to ammo. Joseph Willmon: As someone who has always been into the post-apocalypse setting, for all of Fallen Earth’s awesome systems, I’m a huge fan of the world and the writing. Marie’s team really nailed it here, and I get a huge kick out of making my way through the various settlements and towns, meeting these new personalities and getting caught up in their unique storylines. My favorite NPC is this military guy with a crew cut and armor who gives out Enforcer missions. When you talk to him he says out loud “I give out more missions before 9 am than most people do all day.” Then there was the time I accidentally ran into the Chupacabras…Joseph Willmon: If you’re a vet, definitely come back and check out your Chopper! The world feels so much more alive now than it ever has before, and if you, like me, appreciate Fallen Earth for the opportunity to participate in this living, breathing post-apocalypse, well…we’re waiting to welcome you home!Marie Croall: The chopper is really cool, but new players have so much to experience that you just don’t find in other games. Ever had a cockroach for a pet? Put an ATV together with your bare hands? Tested dangerous new medications on unwitting specimens? Protected a town from raiders with your group? Explored a junk castle? Strapped a bomb to an ATV and driven into the heart of the Hoover dam just to make a statement? All of this is and more is waiting for you to check it out!Marie Croall: Beyond Faction Territory Control, I can’t really get into specifics. I can say that we’ll look to make the crafting and harvesting of materials more interesting or…. industrial I guess. We also are planning more PvP content and continue on our idea of making PvP and factions affect the world in more dramatic ways. I really can’t get into details because PR has installed kill-switches into our collars if we say too much!Marie Croall: I suggest you try it out; it’s free after all! Joseph Willmon: What she said!OnRPG: Thank you so much for your time! If you want to find other players to join you in your wasteland trials, be sure to check out OnRPG's active forum thread to share your IGN and meet up with other members of our community.

2011年12月11日星期日

UK CHART Deus Ex holds off Driver, Bodyc

Deus Ex: Human Revolution holds the No.1 spot on the UK All Formats Chart for a second straight week despite a 46 percent drop in sales. The highest new release is Driver: San Francisco at No.2, with the Xbox 360 version accounting for 53 percent of sales.Long-time former chart-topper Zumba Fitness is at No.3, ahead of and Rugby World Cup 2011 and Lego Pirates of the Caribbean.Madden NFL 12 debuts at No.6, while Call of Duty: Black Ops, Cars 2, FIFA 11 and The Sims 3 round off the top ten.The only other new game to make the top 40 this week is Bodycount, which enters at a lowly No.36.GfK/Chart-Track Top 10 (week ending September 3):01. Deus Ex: Human Revolution (Square Enix)02. Driver: San Francisco (Ubisoft)03. Zumba Fitness (505 Games)04. Rugby World Cup 2011 (505 Games)05. Lego Pirates of the Caribbean (Disney)06. Madden NFL 12 (EA)07. Call of Duty: Black Ops (Activision)08. Cars 2 (Disney)09. FIFA 11 (EA)10. The Sims 3 (EA)Leisure software charts compiled by Chart Track, (C)2011 UKIE Ltd Tom Ivan

Limited Zelda Skyward Sword bundle has g

Nintendo has revealed a limited edition Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword bundle that will pack the game with a sweet-looking Zelda-themed gold Wii Remote Plus. The remote has a shiny gold body, gold d-pad and 'A' buttons and the Zelda royal crest printed over the speaker area of the remote. It includes Wii MotionPlus functionality built-in, and will come as part of the limited $70 bundle (pictured). Not bad for an extra $20. Nintendo is also giving away a free soundtrack CD with every copy of Skyward Sword in the initial production run - in both the limited edition bundle and the standalone game. As Nintendo explains: "As an additional 25th anniversary treat for fans who purchase the game early, every copy in the initial production, whether sold by itself or as a part of the limited-edition bundle, will come with a free CD featuring select orchestral arrangements of iconic music spanning the history of the franchise which will be performed at The Legend of Zelda 25th Anniversary Symphony Concert performances in October 2011."The bundle hits US shelves when the game launches there on November 20 - two days after UK's recently-confirmed November 18 release. The PR made no mention of a similar deal in UK. Mike Jackson

Need for Speed The Run video interview t

Need For Speed The Run is looking very exciting indeed. It's a racing game with a full-fat plot that sees racers charging across the United States. This is a video interview, courtesy of the official PS Blog, with Executive Producer Jason DeLong talking about how the plot ties the racing action together, the different types of events players have to look forward to and how it got the reference needed to make a race across the entire US. You can also check out the latest Need for Speed The Run trailers and screens that came out of Gamescom last week. Mike Jackson

2011年12月9日星期五

ArcheAge What We Know So Far Pt. 1

By Darren Henderson (DizzyPW), OnRPG JournalistArcheAge, for those unfamiliar to the name, is among a special club that veteran MMO gamers either love or loath. That club is the ‘Next Gen MMO’ club and its membership seems to be growing larger each month. ArcheAge in particular seems to be taking a rather gigantic leap over its predecessors and, if successful, may provide one of the most fulfilling experiences on the MMO market today. Of course with ridiculous titles comes epic fail potential and the pessimists of the Internet are watching with great anticipation to see this one flop like all the others. Let’s talk about some of the features that make this game worth all this pre-launch hype.8 Races: Out of the eight races in Archeage, six have been confirmed with actual screenshots. They are the Dwarves, Elves, Ferres, Hariharan, Nuians, and Warborn. Although unconfirmed, the other two races seem to be visible on the game back story page as a type of undead mystic and a human sized fairy. Luckily the English page and interviews has given us the important hint that each race carries specific traits so let’s explore the Ferres, Elves, and Nuians in greater detail.Ferres: This race is quite beast-like and looks like a mix between humans and jungle cats. As a nomadic race they have perfected their skill at hunting and specialize in defeating their prey with swords and bows. They are best known for the grand snow lions they ride into combat. Elves: Don’t expect anything out of the ordinary with this race. They are the stereotypical elves perfected from generations of lore. Isolated? Check. Forest dwellers? Check. Oh they primarily use bows and magic? Go figure. Their appearance is generally fairer skinned than the human-like Nuians and their bodies appear much slimmer as well.Nuians: The Nuians seem well rounded but most trailers and screenshots I have seen portray them as a race valuing tradition and strength (and swords, big ass swords). They hold their religious faith in Goddess Nui in the highest regard and are known to only break from their harmonious nature when their beliefs are threatened by outsiders.Beyond the racial inherent bonuses, your character can learn up to three of ten ability sets to determine your overall character build. Think of this as a more concise version of RIFT’s skill system in that it gives you freedom to design your own class but not so much freedom that the prospect of balancing the game for PvP becomes a development nightmare.Combat: This archetype is the core on which the warrior builds his entire strategy. Combat symbolizes Kyrios, god of destruction. Kyrios ensures victory to those who have faith in him, but is cruel and destructive to enemies. You can use destructive attack skills in a rage to various surrounding enemies at the same time and your attack speed can be temporarily increased to a great extent through haste. Fortification: Much like combat, fortification is vital to any true warrior. You can’t dish out tons of damage if you die from focus fire by the time you reach your enemy. Fortification symbolizes Shatigon, god of wealth. Shatigon has the power to bring wealth and creates impregnable fortresses. You can use skills to increase your health and defense or to temporarily become invincible, and sometimes protect your allies by switching the surrounding enemy’s aggro to yourself.Will: This archetype grants incredible support power and mobility. You will likely see it commonly on both warriors and priests. Will symbolizes Sal, god of portal and sealing. Using the power of Sal, players can heal allies, protect allies from damage, seal enemy skills, and even teleport around the battlefield.Artistry: This archetype is needed for full support priests. Artistry symbolizes Lucius, the wanderer who has greatest wisdom, but always hides it in his jokes. Using the power of music, you can increase the recovery rates of your allies and bolster movement speed on the battlefield.Devotion: Represented by Kyprosa, the gatekeeper of dreamworld, Devotion is an archetype trained completely in the arts of defensive magic. Not only will you unlock the strongest healing skills in the game, you will also be able to control the veil between life and death.Death: The death archetype is an incredibly dangerous art to master that only the most wise (or foolhardy) mage should attempt. By utilizing the Goddess Nui, overlord of the underworld, you can deal immense damage to your foes and break their will with raw fear of your might. The ability to detach your soul from your body also comes in handy for playing a trick or two.Magic: The magic archetype is represented by Aranzeb, a mage who remains calm no matter what storm of war brews around him. This is the more stable tree of magic that contains a well balanced mix of fire magic and defensive shields.Conjury: Conjury is an archetype with much utility that is useful for both wizards and chasers. Goddess Dahuta, master of the sea and change, grants her followers the ability to seep deep into the minds of your foes. This archetype focuses on disables and summoning evil spirits to haunt your crippled opponent.Wild: This archetype is the calling card of chasers. Not only does it provide you with excellent ranged bow skills, it also gives you the ability to tame wild beasts to protect you at melee range.Calling: This archetype is extremely important for chasers and essentially represents the rogue build from standard MMOs. It represents Melisara, who dared to try killing a god. Just like Melisara, you will train in stealth arts to overcome foes much stronger than yourself through sneak attacks, long range strikes, and some of the fastest dashing ability in the game.As mentioned before, classes are not set in stone, and you are free to experiment with any combination of the above abilities to create a hybrid class that works for you. Personally I think an assassin that utilizes Calling and Will would make an incredible force on the battlefield. Teleportation, fast dashing abilities, and clutch heals to protect allies all in one class sounds pretty fun. Perhaps combine it with death to gain some insurance against fatal mistakes and you have a class that will drive your foes mad.Unfortunately I'm running late for a meeting but I plan to continue this discussion of ArcheAge tomorrow with a look at the basic features that make up the game world such as castle construction, territory control, and the evolving debate on an open PK system.

Sonic CD coming to XBLA, claims Microsoft

According to Microsoft mouthpiece Larry 'Major Nelson' Hryb, Sonic fans can look forward to playing a port of Sega Mega-CD platformer Sonic CD on Xbox Live Arcade soon. The news comes via a list of games that will be on shown at PAX this weekend. Along with Mass Effect 3, Trials Evolution and Skulls of the Shogun Microsoft's Xbox 360 Booth #412 will also house Sonic CD, says the Major. Pretty cool.Although Major Nelson has seemingly let the cat out of the bag Sega is still being coy, saying only that it will be sharing some more information soon.Sega has confirmed two more Sonic games, one of which is a 'storybook' game which will follow Sonic and the Black Knight. Tamoor Hussain

Assassin's Creed Revelations Multiplayer

Assassin's Creed: RevelationsNews (30)Previews (10)ReviewVideos (29)Screenshots (6)Cheats and WalkthroughsAssassin's Creed: RevelationsNews (31)Previews (10)ReviewVideos (29)Screenshots (6)Cheats and WalkthroughsAssassin's Creed: RevelationsNews (28)Previews (10)ReviewVideos (29)Screenshots (6)Cheats and Walkthroughs Assassin's Creed:Revelations will be upon us in just a few short weeks, and while we wait, X-Play's Morgan Webb got the chance to talk with Ubisoft Live Team's Andreane Meunier about the ways multiplayer is going to be even better than before. Get the scoop on the new modes you'll be playing. Assassin's Creed: Revelations Multiplayer Preview »

2011年12月8日星期四

Stephen Merchant 'I'm not sure I can fac

Comedian Stephen Merchant has said he doesn't know if he can face voicing Portal 2 star Wheatley again in the future, because the Valve voice work was "one of the most tiring things I've ever done." Speaking in an interview with FMV, the Office writer said he really wanted to do a good job for the acclaimed puzzle sequel and so he was shouting and leaping about "for hours at a time.""It seemed like a fun thing to do, but in actual fact it was one of the most tiring things I've ever done," he explained. "I was standing in a recording booth shouting down imaginary corridors and falling out of make-believe ceilings. For hours at a time. "And I really wanted to do a good job so I was shouting and screaming and leaping about. The thought of doing it again seems so daunting I'm not sure I can face it."Merchant concluded that despite the negative points he's "thrilled people have enjoyed the game so much."One Portal voice star who will be continuing a career in games is GlaDOS actress Ellen McLain, who is now working on a mysterious new game with Valve. Andy Robinson

Burnout Crash dated for PSN XBLA

Burnout Crash will be out on Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Network for PS3 on September 20. So confirmed the game's creative director Richard Franke to press during a recent preview session of the game. Burnout Crash is a spin-off of the series, ditching the 'racing' part and instead focusing on some top-down arcade crash action. As shown in this recently released trailer, your sole purpose is to cause an absolute disaster.It'll set you back 800 MS Points on XBLA and $9.99 on PSN. Mike Jackson

PSN Extends Registration for Free ID Prot

The time to collect your PlayStation Network welcome-back freebies has come and gone — twice, even — but Sony has extended one component. Registration for identity-theft protection will run through July 31, the company's top spokesman said on PlayStation's official blog.AllClear ID Plus, a service of identity protection firm Debix, Inc. is available to PSN subscribers free for a year beginning from the date of their registration. Originally, June 28 was the deadline for ID protection registration.AllClear ID Plus is one of a package of free incentives, courtesies and gestures made to more than 77 million PlayStation Network account holders who went without the online service for 23 days in April and May, following a massive cyberattack and data breach."AllClear ID Plus" Identity Theft Protection Offer Extended Through July 31st [PlayStation Blog]

2011年12月7日星期三

Rambo The Video Game coming to PS3, 360

"God didn't make Rambo. I made him." That might be true, Trautman. But now a video game developer's getting in on the act. According to trade bible MCV, a Rambo game will be coming to Xbox 360, PC and PS3 next year from UK publisher Reef Entertainment.The firm has secured the rights from movie company StudioCanal, and includes the option to develop and release a series of titles based on the Sly Stallone films.The first game, Rambo - which will be based on the first Rambo trilogy - is scheduled for release in the fourth quarter of 2012. A long wait for a hero."With the success of the most recent Rambo film, and an international appetite for action movies with Expendables 2 scheduled for release next summer, we felt now was a good time to do something special with this licence," said Reef Entertainment CEO Peter Rezon.Craig Lewis, commercial director at Reef added: "We have big ambitions for Reef and the Rambo IP is the first step in establishing us as a worldwide player."Rambo will be a triple-A title on PS3, Xbox 360 and PC and will capture the gritty atmosphere and full-on action which made the Rambo movies so successful." Tim Ingham

EA on $1 billion lawsuit 'meteor hit wou

A California District Court judge has denied EA's motion to dismiss a potentially costly class action lawsuit over player likenesses. The case in question was brought against the publisher and sports association NCAA two years ago by former Nebraska and Arizona State quarterback Sam Keller and ex-UCLA basketball player Ed O'Bannon, who allege EA unlawfully used athletes' likenesses in its games without their consent.According to USA today, based on the potential number of athletes that could be attached to the lawsuit, were EA to lose it would be hit with $334.5 million in damages. However, the Indiana publicity rights statute says the award could be trebled if EA's violation was "knowing, wilful or intentional".EA's not stressing about the case though, with spokesperson Jeff Brown offering the following statement: "We could lose billions more if a giant meteor hits the earth. We're not planning for either outcome."Last year, approximately 6,000 retired NFL players brought a lawsuit against EA over the "unlawful" use of their likenesses in Madden NFL 09's historic teams. Tom Ivan

3DS Yoshi, Ace Attorney reveals next week

As well as the rather ugly looking Expansion Slide Pad, a new attachment which adds a second circle pad and set of trigger buttons to 3DS, Nintendo's expected to use its pre-TGS conference next week to announce a new batch of 3DS software. Famitsu has already outed Monster Hunter for 3DS, but according to rumours picked up and translated by Gematsu there are plenty more announcements in store.A new Yoshi side-scroller is apparently in the works at Kirby's Epic Yarn developer Good-Feel, a fifth Ace Attorney featuring Miles Edgeworth is on the way, as is a multiplatform God Eater title for 3DS and Vita, plus a new Etrian Odyssey for 3DS.Nintendo's also expected to announce plans to release a Super Mario Land 3D demo, and to date The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords for eShop. Tom Ivan

2011年12月6日星期二

Little King's Story gets PlayStation Vita

Marvelous Entertainment is making a Little King's Story sequel for Sony's PlayStation Vita. That's according to Japanese gaming bible Famitsu (via Andriasang), which says the follow-up is titled 'The King, The Demon King and the Seven Princesses: New King Story.' We're guessing they won't be using the literal translation if it gets a western release.Details are scant, but the game's said to have a new visual style, a 'love' dynamic and it will be published by Konami instead of Rising Star Games.The original Little King's Story didn't make as big a splash as it deserved. We reckon it's one of the top Wii games and hope the sequel lives up to it. Tamoor Hussain

Home Scheduled maintenance before zombie

More zombie hordes are on their way to Home, but not before the service goes offline tomorrow for maintenance. EU users won't be able to log into the service from 8am BST tomorrow, when it will go down for an unspecified duration. But once it comes back online, Sony says a zombie attack will be imminent. "We have unconfirmed reports of a second wave of zombies ravaging the once peaceful island resort of Banoi this week as the undead virus continues to thrive," says the PS Blog. "It is as yet unknown how far the virus has spread throughout PlayStation Home and authorities advise stocking up on the weaponry now available at the local store before leaving the area."Elsewhere in the update, you'll find a new Sodium-themed Silicon Lounge in the Lockwood Publishing store, new Alice Cooper items in the AAA store, paintball outfits and more. Hit up the PS Blog (link below) for loads more info on that. But don't expect anything on Sony's EU plans for the Home overhaul it announced for US earlier this week. That update goes sadly unmentioned. Mike Jackson

Nintendo 3DS conference to feature 'new p

Following confirmation of a pre-TGS 3DS show last week, Nintendo has dated the event and confirmed that it will be streamed online. The Nintendo 3DS Conference 2011 will be held at Tokyo Big Site on September 13 at 12:00 noon (Japanese Standard Time) and be streamed via live broadcast on Nico Nico and Ustream.The event is described as a "Nintendo 3DS new product announcement conference," which probably refers to new game reveals for the handheld but may also boost the creditability of a recent report claiming Nintendo's set to launch redesigned 3DS hardware, complete with a second analogue stick and "radically toned down" 3D visuals. Tom Pakinkis

2011年12月5日星期一

Epic Not Working On Another Unreal Tourna

Unreal TournamentNews (1)PreviewsReviewVideos (2)ScreenshotsCheats and Walkthroughs The game series that put Epic Games on the map, Unreal Tournament, won't be be getting another installment anytime soon. During an interview with Forbes, Mike Capps, the president of Epic, confirmed Unreal Tournament was not on Epic's slate."Unreal and Unreal Tournament continue to have a huge influence on the studio here, even though we’re not currently working on an Unreal IP project."This doesn't mean we won't see another Unreal game ever, of course. But I doubt we'll see another one until we're on the next generation of consoles and have a new engine, Unreal Engine 4.Do you want another Unreal Tournament? I'd personally like to see Epic make something brand new and unexpected before they take on UT.Source: Forbes

New Halo toys arrive in time for 10th ann

Halo is ten years old and, to mark the occasion, a new line of Halo action figures and toys will be hitting shelves this month. Before the end of September toy firm Mega Bloks will be releasing Series 3 Micro Action Figures, along with 'brick-style' vehicles and structures. Prices will range from pocket change (£1.99 Hero Figure Packs) up to more sizable offerings (£169.99 Halo UNSC Firebase) for the more Halo-obsessed of us. These arrive just ahead of Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, an Xbox 360 update of the original Halo, which goes on sale September 15. Extra goodies are on offer to those who pre-order it, so don't faff. Mike Jackson

Argo Online Steampunk VS Hippies

By Remko Molenaar (Proxzor), OnRPG journalistA world shattered by Seperstis, the World War 4 in the 23rd century. Not only complete cities and landscapes have been destroyed, even whole continents have been reformed. But two races rise in these ashes and rebuild their civilization in this post-apocalyptical world according to their different philosophies of life. Now the battle for control of Earth rests in the hands of the steampunk Noblian and the mystical tribe Floresslah. Which one would you chose? Do you see the future of mankind in the evolution of technologies or in the symbiosis with nature? It is one of the most important decisions a human has to make. Enter the next generation MMORPG, ARGO Online, and fight for your belief. When I first got into the game I was amazed by the story. Unlike other MMORPG’s that tell/show the story, Argo offers you a cinematic about what happened in the past between the two factions. This helped immerse me into the reality of cataclysm of the Seperstis War. After seeing this beautiful cinematic it was time to choose the faction I wanted to play for and to create my character. I chose Floresslah. After this I could choose my class and customize my character. There are a lot of options to choose from; you can change the default setting such as your hair, skin color and your eye color. But there is also an advanced customizations tab where you can customize every part of your character.Unfortunately the class is race bound which is kind of disappointing, I chose to play to play as a Sagittarius. This class is a male class but I refused to look like a guy and decided to create my own female version. Isn’t she err… he a beauty? The Floresslah are a nature loving nation who evolved and adapted to fit the barren ground environment. Their bodies have evolved to survive in the contaminated environment. They are highly intelligent and highly sensitive to nature which has influenced their development and arts. Floresslah has given the attributes of the elemental spirits to Earthdium, which is used to cleanse power sources and nature. The Floresslah believe that nature is the Mother of All Life and they have an obligation to take care of it, causing an inevitable confrontation against the Noblian, who they believe are destroying nature in pursuit of comfort.The Noblian are a nation who escaped to the underground, then returned to look for Earthdium. Noblians excels in academia and have a strong desire to learn. They are always curious about new environments. They are committed to utilizing nature for convenient living by developing mechanical engineering, alternative engineering, and natural sciences. Noblians use Earthdium in commonly used items such as lighting, power sources, water purification, fuel, medicine and even weapons and mechanical devices. Noblians believe that they are the chosen nation, possessing rational souls and intelligence. They have been fighting a fierce battle with Floresslah, who believe everything has a soul, for control of Earthdium. ARGO Online is a game based on steampunk and fantasy. The environment shows this off and every class has its unique style of gameplay. Every faction has 8 unique classes ranging from melee to support. I chose to play as a range class; the Sagittarius uses guns to fight monsters from a distance. After messing with the controls I found a special ‘Aiming mode’, this mode activates a crosshair in the middle of your screen and lets you shoot manually. If you prefer to be lazy and just let it automatically shoot I recommend you avoid this option. The aiming mode is an unique feature in a MMORPG that not many games use. It adds challenge and fun in a way that most MMOs don’t dare to try.The controls in this game are well polished and there are two different options to move your character. You can use the WASD keys to move your character or you can point to click which can be quite handy if you have to walk far distances. The controls offer quite a bit of freedom and you can even perform acrobatic flip jumps to get around! The skills you gain by leveling can be put on the action bar on the bottom of the screen. There are no other buttons such as your inventory, character info, etc.These menus can be opened using the corresponding keys on your keyboard. You can view and change every hotkey in the options and even assign new ones. Unfortunately the world doesn’t feel finished or really like an open space. For example, I tried walking up little hills and mountains and you just can’t get far up. Even small objects tend to block your path and make the game feel too much like a theme park on rails than a living breathing battleground world. But at least the combat in the game is fast and intuitive, making you glad you went along for the ride.Now I am not really a person to compare games because of their features but I must show the map textures in ARGO do look a little familiar. I recognize the map style as being straight from WoW but I can’t say I don’t like it. I have always been a fan of the textures, and we here in Holland have a nice expression. ‘It’s better to steal something good than create something bad’. And I must say the maps blend flawlessly into the game’s overall feel.The graphics in this game is really beautiful for a free to play MMORPG. The environment is really well made and people that are playing on high graphics can view the well-polished surroundings in great detail. To play this game you need to have a really good processor, the website says you need an Intel Core2 Duo Core i5) processor as minimum. If you have no idea how good your processor is then visit your control panel> system and security> system and take a look. Luckily only the processor requirement is high. Memory requirements are relatively low and the minimum video card is about 4 years old as well.As most of the free MMORPGs, ARGO Online has a Cash Shop. In the Cash Shop you are able to buy bag expansions, experience bonuses, gold bonuses, skill boosts, and costumes with stats. These items that can be bought will benefit you mostly in acquiring experience and gold.ARGO Online has far too many features to cover in depth in a single article. Player versus player, battlefields, loads of class variety, and unique looking vehicles are just some of the features I didn’t have enough time to check into. I really like the steampunk atmosphere and some creatures look superb. I’d say this game might be a huge success with a bit of fine tuning and more public awareness. The website isn’t finished and some text in the game has a few grammatical errors. Nonetheless this game is a really well polished compared to the bulk of its competition. I’d advise every player to try this game out because it defies the standard MMORPG mould and has enough potential to rival any F2P MMORPG on the market.

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