(Disclosure: I received a copy of Path of Fire for the purpose of writing about. As always, this has no bearing on my opinion on the game)
Guild Wars 2 has been my on-again off-again MMO for the past few years (five, it’s been five years since Guild Wars 2 launched. Crazy, right?) The past year or two, it’s been more off again as I found my interest waning as Arenanet seemed to be confused as to where they wanted the game to go. Still, Guild Wars 2 has gone down in my books as one of the most polished MMOs on the market.
Path of Fire ditches the jungle atmosphere of Heart of Thorns and heads straight into the desert, in a world that is just stunning to look at. Head off in any direction in the multiple zones and you’ll see that there is much more to the world than just sand and stone. In fact, your first real taste of the world sets the tone for what is ahead, as you come across massive, sprawling, crumbling pyramids.
Similarly, the main city of Anmoon is beautiful, a massive city with giant pyramid buildings and tons of activities going on. The first moment I set foot in Anmoon, I ignored the story quest and started to check out what the city had to offer. The major events takes place around the casino, with players collecting coins while also taking care of some seedier troublemakers. I found myself in a race around the desert on the game’s mounts, which was fun even though I was clearly outmatched by my fellow racers.
And speaking of mounts, it looks like Path of Fire is all about the mounts. Very early on in the story, you get your hands on a raptor mount that is capable of jumping farther distances, allowing you to get to previously inaccessible areas. The mounts are great not just because they add a new mechanic, but by how well built they are in terms of usefulness and animation.
As you travel throughout the lands and complete activities, you’ll gain mastery points to make your mount even more useful. They’ll jump higher, leap farther, and just generally do things better. Mounts have been a long time coming for Guild Wars 2, and it’s great to see that they serve more of a purpose than simply boosting your speed.
There is plenty more to do in Guild Wars 2, so I’ll be getting back to it. Expect more detailed coverage in Part 2.
The Autumn Deadman tournament survivor has been disqualified after it was discovered that they were cheating. In a post on the official website, Jagex discussed criticism surrounding the latest Deadman final regarding certain disqualifications. What isn’t in question, however, is that the latest winner was cheating by using a bot farm to boost their account.
The last survivor of the final has been disqualified. A standard subsequent investigation into the winner of the tournament took place and the winner was responsible for the creation of a bot farm. Naturally all accounts linked to this botting activity have now been banned. This then raises the question of what to do with the prize money. At the moment we’re discussing what to do with it. A few ideas we have at the moment are another charitable donation, dispersing the money among the finalists, or carrying it over to the next season (or a combination of all of these).
In the same post, Jagex has promised to provide guides for players to avoid DDoS attacks which have become more common in Deadman mode, as well as tackling issues of cheating that naturally crop up in an event where $10,000+ of real money is on the line.
Deadman is a hardcore mode for Old School RuneScape that trades higher experience rates for open pvp and higher loot risk on death. Deadman Seasonal is a time-limited event where players race to level their accounts, with the 2,000 highest level players going on to a last man standing tournament, with the winner taking home $10,000 in prizes. The latest Deadman Seasonal tournament ended at Runefest 2017 this month.
Warner Bros. put out an announcement today in regards to the upcoming Forthog Orc-Slayer DLC for Shadow of War, and has decided not to sell the item as paid content.
Earlier this month, Warner Bros. announced that it would be releasing a piece of DLC content in memoriam of a deceased employee who had worked on the game. The download would introduce Forthog Orc-Slayer, an NPC who would show up to help the player when he is most needed, was a tribute to Michael Forgey who passed during development. According to Monolith’s announcement, all proceeds from the DLC sales would go to Forgey’s family.
But criticism quickly sprang up after people noticed that the donations came with an apparent caveat, as according to the official trailer, only purchases in the states would be donated and even then, select states would not be included. Monolith has apologized for the confusion and announced that the DLC will be free and instead Warner Bros. will make a donation to the family. Everyone who preordered the DLC will get a refund.
We now recognize that tying our donation to sales of the DLC was not the best way to achieve our goal of offering financial support to the family and creating a lasting memorial to Michael Forgey. We sincerely apologize to the fans and to the Forgey family for the confusion we created.
Our thoughts: I’ll go back to what I said in the original controversy, that the disclaimer that only certain areas would be eligible was to protect Warner Bros from state/foreign laws regarding gifts/donations, and that the company would figure out a way to “Pachinko” the money to the right places by funneling the money down the right channels. It’s not a donation if you don’t call it one!
(In all likelihood, we will never be told exactly how Warner Bros is going to make not donating and not profiting work, but if MMO Fallout had to throw in its two cents, I recommend looking at how Pachinko parlors in Japan. You can bypass just about any payout law by adding more steps and calling it something different.)
RuneFest 2017 at Battersea Evolution – David Portass/iEventMedia
Runefest has come and gone, and Jagex has laid out the plans for the next year of content in both variations of their popular MMORPG.
Attendees were able to get their hands on RuneScape mobile to test the game out this weekend. While compatibility information will be rolling out within the next couple of months, Old School RuneScape is expected to hit mobile devices this winter with RuneScape 3 coming in 2018. On a more current front, RuneScape 3 will be seeing a PvE update in October called Dimension of the Damned. Adventurers will travel to another dimension where all of RuneScape has died, and battle a zombie hoard in return for unique cosmetics, achievements, and other rewards.
The entire list of RuneScape updates coming is massive, and since the game updates weekly this just covers some of the major stuff.
“Every year it gets more and more difficult to top the previous RuneFest, but I think with 2017’s convention we’ve managed to do it. We were thrilled to see so many of our hardcore players try out both RuneScape and Old School RuneScape on mobile devices for the very first time, as well as experience the tension of a Deadman Invitational live at RuneFest,” said Mark Ogilvie, Design Director, RuneScape. “Exciting new content, together with new ways to play, will delight and entice players to the world of Gielinor like never before, and in addition to our millions of active players we’ll be here ready to welcome our old friends back from being ‘AFK’.”
Over on the Old School side, players can expect to see a new 5-man raid called Theatre of Blood coming in June 2018. For questers, January 2018 will see the launch of Dragon Slayer II, a brand new Grandmaster quest. The fall Deadman tournament came to a close with one player (5PLUS50K12) walking away with the grand total of twenty thousand dollars. An additional ten grand was donated to Make a Wish by the winners of the team Deadman tournament, #TeamLUL.
The livestream of upcoming Old School updates can be found below.
Wild West Online might be the worst game of 2017, and its alpha weekend rollout might be the worst pitch to buy a game that I have seen since The WarZ did it years ago, but I have to give some kudos to the team. Let’s talk.
This weekend marked the second alpha test weekend for Wild West Online, a game that I have not shown much mercy to. The first weekend was written off as a technical test, an idea that I fully rejected at the time and will continue to do so. Once again, it doesn’t matter what WWO Partners calls the weekend. From the perspective of a customer, I don’t really care that all you were hoping to do was test server capacity and various other bugs. WWO offered two weekends to test the game before the guaranteed refund period passed, after which you’re out of luck and stuck with whatever the game gives you.
This is, regardless of what you or the community call the weekend, a trial period for the product, where you’re trying to convince people that the game will be worth their money. To present the offer of two whole alpha tests to figure out of the game is worth keeping your pre-order, and then to turn around and showcase that with much of the game’s content turned off, is at the very least mildly insulting. It’s like a restaurant offering free samples on its soup, but the sample itself is an uncooked piece of an onion that was part of the recipe. It’s a poor indicator of the full product and you start to wonder who in the kitchen decided to use this to gauge consumer interest.
The second alpha weekend did some polishing on the first, but didn’t really add anything new. As a result, I once again have to conclude that there isn’t enough in the game to warrant buying it at this stage, and that the preview weekend wasn’t enough to convince me that the game can’t go entirely south before launch.
I will give kudos to the team for holding up their end of the bargain this time. After seeing how little progress had been made with the second weekend, I submitted an email to Xsolla’s support with a simple message with my receipt code and game key and asked for a refund. I received it, barely a half hour later. I’ve offered my doubts on Xsolla and Wild West Online, especially after how the refund policy for WarZ was botched, but I will give credit where credit is due: They held up their end of the bargain and gave me my refund with no questions asked. Looking at the forums, it appears that other users also aren’t having an issue getting refunds as well and most are receiving responses within a half hour as well.
Last night I put out a piece regarding Bluehole Studio and Playerunknown’s Battlegrounds regarding the implied threat of legal action from Bluehole against Epic over similarities between the latter’s Battle Royale mode in Fortnite, and the former’s aforementioned PUBG title. I recommend reading it, it’s a short piece, but the crux of the matter is that neither Bluehole or Brendan Greene own the concept of Battle Royale, nor did either create the genre, and that Bluehole doesn’t have a moral leg to stand on when its own employees were actually criminally convicted of stealing from another developer just eight years ago.
Today, PC Gamer released an interview with Bluehole VP Changhan Kim, in which Kim claims that the press release wasn’t clear and that the issue is about Epic and not the game mode itself. You can read the interview here and make your own conclusion, but many of the questions seem to be avoided or outright contradicted in the same interview. For instance, Kim states that Bluehole isn’t claiming ownership.
So, battle royale is just about last man standing, it’s a simple game mode, and we’re not claiming any kind of ownership over the game mode or genre itself, it’s not for us to even comment.
Despite claiming no ownership over the game mode, Kim makes it pretty clear by using H1Z1 and itself as an example, their belief that Epic Games had an obligation to pay a license to use the concept.
You know that Daybreak Games actually licensed this idea and worked with him to develop their game mode and [Bluehole] did license his idea as well. Not only [did we bring] him to Korea to hire him as the creative director, we licensed his idea to develop PUBG.
Kim never explicitly says that Epic should have licensed the game mode, but does state that they should have had to come to Bluehole before developing Fortnite’s Battle Royale mode.
What I think is, they should have at least came to us before making it and had a discussion with us.
He also goes on convey concerns over Epic’s ownership of the Unreal engine, that if Bluehole modifies the engine to create new features, that they could be leaked or “other things.”
We could be afraid when we make new features in the engine by modifying it internally, that is not already available and public, that feature could be leaked, or other things could happen.
Despite all of this, Bluehole admits that it has not actually been in contact with Epic regarding its concerns over Fortnite, however the stated reason for concern does change at the end of the interview to include confusion by the community as to whether or not PUBG was involved in any official capacity with the development of Fortnite Battle Royale. You can check out the entirety of the interview at the link below.
Playerunknown’s Battlegrounds is currently the most popular game on Steam, nearly doubling the number 2 spot held by Dota 2.
Arenanet today launched the second expansion to Guild Wars 2, titled Path of Fire, now available in digital and retail stores. The expansion launches just in time for Guild Wars 2’s fifth anniversary. Players must unite against the god Balthazar as his Forged legion descends upon the kingdom in a hunt for the elder gods.
“We’re thrilled to be bringing players back to the Elonian desert region, the setting for the Guild Wars: Nightfall campaign, after 250 years and dispatch them on their most daring adventure yet,” said Mike O’Brien, co-founder and president of ArenaNet. “We have packed Path of Fire full of exciting features and immersive content that gives players alternative ways to experience Guild Wars 2, including new mounts and elite specializations for each of the classes.”
Path of Fire introduces mounts to Guild Wars 2 as well as nine new elite specializations, new zones, and more.
Bluehole Studios this week decided to release a press release stating that it is considering “further action” against Epic Games over the Battle Royale mode recently added to Fortnite. According to the release, Bluehole is concerned over similarities between the two games, and how Epic uses Playerunknown’s Battlegrounds in conversations with the community and press in comparison to Fortnite.
“We’ve had an ongoing relationship with Epic Games throughout PUBG’s development as they are the creators of UE4, the engine we licensed for the game. After listening to the growing feedback from our community and reviewing the gameplay for ourselves, we are concerned that Fortnite may be replicating the experience for which PUBG is known.”
As someone who has been following actual cases for years, I’ll give this as simply as I know how: Bluehole Studio doesn’t have a leg to stand on, either legally in court or morally in the court of public opinion. And since PUBG is running on Epic’s Unreal Engine, any action taken by the former against the latter would accomplish little more than a self-inflicted gunshot to the leg, just ask Silicon Knights how that worked out.
So let’s take this piece by piece.
1. (Legal) Bluehole Studios Doesn’t Own The Mechanic
You can’t copyright game mechanics, it is not within the purview of United States and UK law, and the EU has not weighed in on the matter yet. It is, however, possible to protect your game mechanics through trademark, however the process is extremely time and resource intensive, and I can say by simply pulling up a list of patents owned by Bluehole (a list of one) that they do not own the patent for a Battle Royale game mechanic. In short, Bluehole Studios has no legal standing because they don’t own the concept. Neither does Brendan Greene.
For legal precedent, we can look at exactly the kind of company devious enough to patent a game mechanic, and of course I am talking about Namco Ltd. Back in the 90’s, Namco patented the concept of having a mini-game that can be played during a game’s loading screen. The patent didn’t actually have the chance to be legitimized in court, as Namco never used it to sue another developer, and it expired in 2015. There are heavy doubts as to whether or not Namco would have won such a lawsuit, but the threat was enough to keep some developers from taking the risk.
Namco’s patent very likely would have failed because patent law stipulates that your patented item can’t have existed, and there are verifiable records of games with mini-game loading screens existing before Namco patented the idea in Ridge Racer. Likewise, the existence of numerous Battle Royale style games ensures that, even if Bluehole decided to head over to the patent office and absorb that cost, that they would ultimately fail in their attempt at ownership.
2. (Moral) That Time Bluehole Tried to Steal Lineage III
Out of the two parties involved in this dispute, incidentally Bluehole is the one most acquainted with criminal theft, a matter that MMO Fallout covered heavily back in its infancy. Back in 2009, civil and criminal charges were brought against multiple Bluehole Studios employees alleging that they had stolen trade secrets and assets while employed at NCSoft and used those assets in creating the action MMO Tera. Six employees were found guilty, with jail sentences being handed out as part of the criminal proceedings, however Bluehole as a corporate entity was found to not be guilty. Those employees, as you might expect, haven’t been working at Bluehole since then.
But still, there is a certain level of hypocrisy for a company with an established record of employees going to jail for stealing from another developer, to start pointing figures and making threats, over a mechanic that it doesn’t own, against other developers. Bluehole didn’t start the genre, even if it does have the most popular game in it as of present, and it doesn’t own the genre. If Bluehole does take the threat further, they open themselves up to a world of hurt from Epic’s legal team. Let’s not forget what happened to the last developer that tried to take Epic down in a frivolous lawsuit.
Destiny 1 was a pretty earth shattering game, not in the sense that it broke new ground but in how many people it managed to snare in its repetitive yet addictive gameplay. While the title was a bust in many minds thanks to broken promises and features that seemed obviously slashed for time, Destiny carried a certain I don’t know what that kept people engaged for a long time after launch. Where other titles sell seven figures and watch their communities quickly die off, Destiny’s users were still logging in crazy hours two years after launch, hunting down all of the game’s exotic gear.
Destiny 2 feels like someone took an MMO and sheared off the leveling experience, leaving only the end-game gear grind and some bits and pieces left over. Those of you who played through Destiny will be familiar with most of the mechanics from this sequel, and as many will already know or quickly realize, the “true game” as some would call it doesn’t really start until you’re level 20 and beat the campaign.
Neither of which take a particularly long time to complete, but the story and world seem far more fleshed out an interesting than they did in the previous title, in which a great portion of the game’s lore was locked away off-game on the Bungie website. All you really need to know going into this game is that you are a Guardian, a special person who literally can’t die as you are gifted powers by the Traveler, a construct that came to Earth and then died, bequeathing humans with its powers of light. As a Guardian of the light, your job is to protect the light, all of those people who can die, and fight off the coming darkness.
Destiny 2 starts off with an invasion of the tower by the Red Legion, led by the big baddie of the campaign Dominus Ghaul. Seeking to claim the Traveler’s gift for himself, Ghaul destroys the last remaining human city, captures the Traveler, and nearly kills you (the player). The ensuing campaign is all about taking back what was once yours, and reclaiming the Tower and driving off Ghaul and his forces.
Thankfully, unlike its predecessor, Destiny 2 treats its characters as though they are real people and not simply cardboard cutouts to vendor weapons to players. I honestly couldn’t tell you if any of the characters from Destiny 2 were in Destiny 1, and for all intent and purpose they might as well be completely new people. But with Zavala, Cayde-6, and other side characters like Failsafe help build a world that is interesting to learn more about.
Once you finish the campaign, the game opens up and everything becomes available. You have four planets, each of which has its own set of public events, missions, patrols, faction currency, and more. You’ll be able to embark on missions that offer varying challenges in return for powerful, game changing exotic equipment. I managed to get my hands rather early on a Sunshot, a hand cannon that carries explosive rounds and causes everything I shoot to explode and damage those around them.
Strikes are Destiny’s answer to MMO dungeons, these are three player instances that have you completing various objectives in return for glimmer and gear. While the standard strikes are open for matchmaking, the more difficult version does require communication and thus you’ll need to form your own fireteam. Same goes for Raids, high tier dungeons with gear requirements that require you to know who is doing what and when, and thus is not available for public matchmaking. Crucible is once again the place to go for player vs player matches.
But you’ll find plenty to do in Destiny 2 on your own as well. Public events dot the landscape on each planet, and each event has a secret trigger that unlocks its heroic version, increasing the difficulty while also increasing the rewards. You might be annoyed to find yourself in a zone where nobody else is farming events, but that can be pretty quickly fixed and more often than not you’ll find yourself surrounded by players who seem to know exactly what they’re doing.
Thankfully Destiny 2 continues its series staple of having some of the tightest gunplay in the genre. Just about every weapon has a satisfying kick as you blow off a Fallen’s head, shatter a Vex’s shield, or take down some big bad guy who is just asking for a shotgun blast to the face.
Destiny 2_20170913002506
In a lot of ways, Destiny 2 feels like Destiny 1 and Destiny 1 more like Destiny .5. While the maps are wholly new, the enemies you’ll face in them are virtually identical to those from the previous game. Rather than building on to the currencies of Destiny 1, Destiny 2 streamlines or outright removes them. And while customizing your character is much more in-depth thanks to shaders being per-body part, it’s hard not to see through the cynical cash grab that was making them single use and placing them as part of the cash shop. You can get a ton of shaders through gameplay, but they come in packs of three, for your four pieces of armor.
I don’t have many gripes with Destiny 2, but considering how the original improved greatly during its first two years, it only seems logical that Destiny 2 will continue to be improved upon post-launch.
Review bombing is an increasingly popular phenomena by which large scores of Steam users downvote a game for the purposes of protest, be it against the developer or against an idea that the developer supports/does not support. It is similar to metabombing, a similar tactic used to lower the Metacritic score of a piece of media, and is seen by some as an effective mob tactic.
While the actual effectiveness of review bombing has been held in serious debate, Valve has finally taken notice of it as a prevalent issue on Steam. On the official website, Valve talks about the numerous solutions that they debated implementing to stop said practice, including removing review scores, adding temporary locks on reviews, and changing the way that review scores are calculated.
Instead, reviews will now be shown on a graph, so that players can easily see if a title is suddenly hit with a lot of negative reviews.
"In the end, we decided not to change the ways that players can review games, and instead focused on how potential purchasers can explore the review data. Starting today, each game page now contains a histogram of the positive to negative ratio of reviews over the entire lifetime of the game, and by clicking on any part of the histogram you’re able to read a sample of the reviews from that time period. As a potential purchaser, it’s easy to spot temporary distortions in the reviews, to investigate why that distortion occurred, and decide for yourself whether it’s something you care about. This approach has the advantage of never preventing anyone from submitting a review, but does require slightly more effort on the part of potential purchasers."
As previously stated, the actual effect of review bombing on sales is in question, but Valve owns the store and believes that it is having a detrimental effect on the Steam storefront.
MMO Fallout 