Back in October, City of Heroes players got a treat in the form of three arcs created by high-profile creative minds. The Guest Author program used the Mission Architect system and gave players the enjoyment of working through missions scripted by authors known outside of the realm of Paragon City. We haven’t heard much about the program since then, and so it might have seemed as if the feature had been forgotten, but it turns out it was simply in brief hibernation, as the official site has announced the next group of writers.
Mercedes Lackey (known for her series of fantasy novels set in Valdemar), Troy Hickman (known for the meta-superhero series Common Grounds), and Austin Grossman (longtime writer of video games and author of Soon I Will Be Invincible) make up the next batch of guest writers crafting their own arcs in City of Heroes. Two of the arcs should be live today (assuming you’re reading this on January 26th), according to a small supplementary piece which includes a few words from Sean McCann. It’s good to see the game continuing to emphasize and enhance the experience of user-created content, and players should look forward to some high-profile names continuing to take their swing at it.
gmaxwell Uncategorized
One of the things many people love about Guild Wars is the tremendous imagination and feel of the artwork in the games. While we didn’t get a description to go with this interesting screenshot taken by Logen, it reminds me of a gorgeous piece of art from Guild Wars. The work in question won a prize at the Into The Pixel showing at E3 2008. Thankfully, the artwork is available on the Into The Pixel site for everyone to enjoy. Check out today’s great One Shots full size, and then look at the ITP gallery piece from artist Tyler West. We think you’ll see the connection too.
Are you one of the people who really love the artwork in Guild Wars? We’d love to show off more, but we need your screenshots to make that happen. Send your best screenshots (all MMOs welcome) to us here at oneshots AT massively DOT com along with your name, a description of the area, and the name of the game. We’ll post them out here for everyone to enjoy and give you the credit.
Castres Uncategorized
See, this is what happens when we let Seccia write titles for us. Ughs… sorry about that readers. We don’t proclaim any victory, nor do we have any rage towards the citizens of Norrath or EverQuest II. We are, as always, unbiased in our viewpoints… unlike some new Dark Elven interns.
However, Seccia has noted that we’ve received a package today from a member of her elven bretheren, a certain community management elf by the name of Kiara. Enclosed were two pieces of a shattered tablet, one named “Victory” while the other was entitled “Rage.” We’re not sure what this whole thing will form once it’s put together, but we do know that other fansites have more pieces of the tablet. (Oh, Dark Elves and their puzzles.)
We’ve put the pictures of victory and rage after the break, so good luck with assembling the tablet and we can’t wait to see what it reveals!
MMOvalue Uncategorized
If you’re a fan of The Chronicles of Spellborn, Beau Turkey at Spouse Aggro found something today that will make you very happy. There have been rumors floating around lately about a restructuring of the game, and those rumors were recently confirmed on the official forums by Howard Marks, the CEO of Acclaim Games: “The rumors are true! Spellborn Version Two is on the way.”
Marks went on to explain that the new version has already been released in Japan to great success. They’ve been fine tuning it, and plans for the English version are underway. If you are a current player of The Chronicles of Spellborn, be sure you have a valid email address on file with Acclaim, because everyone playing the current version will be invited to beta test the new version via email.
While details are minimal at this point, it’s great news for players to know that more is on the way. You can take a look at the forum announcement here, and Beau’s take from a fan point of view here.
Castillans Uncategorized
We’re always on the lookout for more info about Earthrise, an upcoming sandbox MMO with a far future, post-apocalyptic setting. The latest interview updating on the game’s status is a Ten Ton Hammer Q&A with Masthead Studios CEO Atanas Atanasov. The studio head explains a bit about the combat system revamp, aimed at keeping Earthrise’s combat dynamic and fast-paced, with a more intuitive interface as well.
The interview also hits upon how they’re fine tuning the game’s economic systems as well as balancing rewards as players progress, plus Atanasov talks a bit about Earthrise’s “exploration mode” (which imparts faster movement but greater vulnerability to damage) and specialized crafting. Check out Ten Ton Hammer’s Q&A with Atanas Atanasov for an update on the state of Earthrise.
Mustapha Uncategorized
Patch 3.3.2, the next minor content patch, will include the much requested strength-based rings for melee DPS from the Ashen Verdict reputation. This should make warriors, paladins, and death knights quite happy. This afternoon Zarhym has released the stats for the different reputation levels (friendly, exalted, etc…), which we have for you after the break.
The minor content patch will also bring with it an influx of other small changes, as well as arena season 8. You can check out all the changes in the translated version of the patch notes that were discovered last night.
The rings after the break.
Read more…
Catalans Uncategorized
Every week, Shifting Perspectives explores issues affecting druids and those who group with them. This week, a quick and dirty guide to raising one’s tree from a young sapling to a mighty oak, or other suitably impressive arboreal species.
Whenever other columnists here write really good columns, I sit at my computer and swear a blue streak, for I am a jealous god. Sacco, damn him, turned out a great article on the basics of elemental shamans, and for a while I’ve been kicking around bits and pieces of 101-esque columns for all four druid specs. This was the last shove I needed to get that done. While I expect our new balance blogger (a.k.a. Murmurs, the person I will be forcing to do all my number-crunching in the future with bribes or, when necessary, threats) will address moonkin, I’ll cover bears, cats, and today, trees.
Read more…
Koeningsmark Uncategorized
Star Trek Online offers several levels of character customization beyond the visual aspects, and that first level the player is introduced to is character traits. You select these traits when creating your character, and the choices are numerous. In Massively’s guide to the character traits of Star Trek Online, we’ll look at the different classes of traits and suggest some builds to get you started.
Please remember a few things when reading this guide. First, the information was all obtained in the late closed beta — so it could have changed without notice at release. If that’s the case we’ll update the guide as soon as we know about the changes, but double check everything and don’t click blindly. Secondly, the traits are only a recommendation and should be adapted to your personal play style. If you’re one of those players who always needs that extra bit of health, get the Peak Health trait no matter what role you’re going to play. Finally, there is currently no way to retrain your traits (or skills), so be sure to select them carefully.
Read more…
gmaxwell Uncategorized
When it comes to player housing, we love to see creative and unusual things people have done with their spaces. Take for example, this idea cobbled together in Star Wars Galaxies, and sent in to us by Tiktik Deen of the Starhawk Conglomerate on the Starsider server. Tiktik sent in this fun image along with the following note to explain: This is a perfect example of why people loved Star Wars Galaxies. A guild member took the time and resources to create this chess board from in-game holographic models and crafted furniture pieces, then had the dedication and desire to fit everything together perfectly in one of their homes. ([This is an] old pic, the room is more decorated by now.)
Have you done something creative and fun in your MMO home space? We’d love a quick picture tour, if you’d like to share it. Just send the image in to us here at oneshots AT massively DOT com along with your name, the name of the game, and a quick description of what we’re seeing. (Server, guild, etc. welcome too!) We’ll post them out here for all to enjoy and give you the credit.
Castro Uncategorized
The Icecrown Citadel raid overview here on WoW.com has been updated with even more information on the bosses contained in the Plagueworks, which has opened this week. You’ll find summaries on the new bosses along with links to other resources like loot, videos and detailed strategy for Rotface, Festergut, and Professor Putricide. If you’re just setting foot in the instance now, don’t worry as there are resources for the first bosses in the Lower Spire.
Enjoy and good luck!
Kins Uncategorized
The launch of Cryptic’s Star Trek Online is less than a month away, and player feelings are mixed. Whether you can’t wait for launch, or are apprehensive that Cryptic is rolling it out so quickly, it’s safe to say that people are very interested to see how it turns out.
To help alleviate the wait, Cryptic has released a brand new trailer entitled Exploration. It’s a great look at…well, exploration in Star Trek Online, both on the ground and in space. There are some great looking landscapes — both familiar and unfamiliar — and a look at several different races throughout the trailer. As a little bonus, we get a peek at some battle scenes and weaponry, which seems to consist heavily of various types of phaser fire exchange. No actual hand-to-hand is seen, but Cryptic has assured us it exists, so we’ll keep our fingers crossed.
Castillans Uncategorized
NCsoft hasn’t been having an easy start to the year, at least not in the eyes of security-minded players. The entire Guild Wars security question recently came to a head with suspicions and accusations that the flaw was something wrong with NCsoft’s account management, a black eye if ever there was one. Of course, that raises questions about not just Guild Wars, but any game under the company’s aegis, which includes City of Heroes. So it should come as little surprise that a reminder about account security has recently been posted on the official site.
The reminder itself is fairly standard boilerplate, reminding everyone to avoid giving out their account information to any other players, only log in from secure locations, and so forth. It also addresses the issue at hand in a roundabout fashion, mentioning that they found no malicious workarounds after investigating “current claims.” However, the very next line mentions that they have added more robust logging and security procedures, which can lead to the obvious conspiracy theories. With fewer items to be traded than many other games, City of Heroes has a smidge more built-in security — but a little extra reminder and caution never hurts.
Castille Uncategorized
One of the frequently-voiced concerns about Star Wars: The Old Republic is the possibility that the non-Force classes will wind up becoming almost irrelevant. Who’s going to pay attention to being a spy when you can wield an energy sword and fling lightning, right? As a matter of fact, the Imperial Agent would like very much if no one ever notices they exist. They’re quite happy to stand in the background and never be observed, because as the latest developer’s entry explains, that’s precisely what the Agent does best. They exist in the shadow, the man of many faces and a hundred names, a presence whose influence is strongest when it isn’t evident at all.
Star Wars: The Old Republic faces the difficult task of making the Sith — traditionally the villains of the franchise — into a playable and likable faction rather than monolithic evil. As the developer entry points out, the Imperial Agent is a major part of that, of giving the chance to look at someone who is quite possibly a proud citizen of the Empire and happy to serve in keeping the peace and bring down the Republic. It’s also a look at the parts between the lines of the films, the spies and intel operators whose role was important but whose faces were rarely seen. But you might decide not to look at the full discussion of the class anyway — and as we’ve mentioned, really, that’s what the agent would want.
Koeningsmark Uncategorized
When you are playing your favorite MMO, how much do you think about what goes on behind the scenes? If your interest goes beyond general gameplay and lies within the actual nuts and bolts of how it all works, Gamasutra has a feature that will fascinate you.
“Restless Entities Never Sleep” is a feature that takes a close look behind the scenes of Warhammer Online, exploring the multiple complicated processes that keep the game up and running. The feature explores the basics of how the servers keep the game up and running and what exactly they do, and continues with excerpts from a previous interview with Online Technical Director Andrew Mann. They also cover the challenges of trying to maintain the servers and minimize downtime, as well as improvements planned (or hoped for) down the road.
As a few readers noted, it’s an Intel-sponsored feature and it shows a bit, but that doesn’t make it any less interesting to the tech-minded out there. The full feature can be found here.
gmaxwell Uncategorized
Admit it — when you first saw the trailers for Star Trek Online, you started reading the opening monologue in your head. Or maybe that was just us. Either way, there’s a lot of cultural weight and expectation going into the game, as you’d expect for a series with thirty-four years of fandom and material. With the doors open and more information becoming available about the game, there’s a lot of space (pun intended) for you to start filling in the adventures of the USS Whatever. Not to mention that launch is less than a month away, which always makes it that much more exciting.
On the other hand, the evaluations have not been uniformly positive. Early previews might give you the impression that the game isn’t polished, or isn’t focusing on the areas you really want to see from the game. Perhaps you feel burned by Champions Online and worry that Cryptic isn’t going to be able to deliver a better experience this time. Or maybe you’re one of the people who just hates Star Trek for whatever reason. With a little less than a month to go, are you excited for Star Trek Online?
Castiglione Uncategorized