Today’s MMOrning Shot comes to us from Skara: The Blade Remains. I had the opportunity to do a bit of sparring on a very early version of Skara, and while the game is still has a very long way to go, it already looks fantastic on the Unreal Engine 4. You can check out Skara’s Kickstarter page at the following link.
Check out MMOrning Shots every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
Today’s MMOrning Shot comes to us from Skara: The Blade Remains. I had the opportunity to do a bit of sparring on a very early version of Skara, and while the game is still has a very long way to go, it already looks fantastic on the Unreal Engine 4. You can check out Skara’s Kickstarter page at the following link.
Check out MMOrning Shots every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
Wildstar staff Cougar took to the forums to publicly respond to a player asking why his account ban hadn’t been dealt with ten days later.
I’m assuming that with your posting here that you don’t mind us talking about your account status in public. I have a spare moment before my next meeting and am doing this on a lark. I understand this opens me up to “oh oh oh my ticket” which I don’t intend to keep up with. I am a fickle beast. You, and your alts, were reported a number of time by players for AFK Botting. We found you afk botting in a PvP Match (which as you know, was a really big issue for us – which is now better thanks to AddOns no longer being able to join matches automatically, among other things). We did our secret stuff … okay afk bot confirmation doesn’t take much clandestine stuff once we are on top of you. We sent you tells over time and you never reacted and continued doing the same thing over and over.
We closed your account. You opened up a ticket in question, asking for us to give you your account back. In that opening salvo of asking us for getting your account back, you admited that you were afk botting while doing homework. You then added 5 replies in two days to the ticket with various stages of pleading/begging. Including internet meme pictures. (http://i2.kym-cdn.co…392/289/116.gif). A few agents have investigated it internally and found your account to be worthy of permanent closure. You are exactly the problem case players have been pleading for us to remove from our game. We agree with them.
Now, why we’ve taken some time to tell you that your ban will not be overturned I’m not sure. So thank you for bringing that to my attention, however you’ll forgive me if we don’t prioritize deserved-to-be-banned-customers over paying ones right now.
(Source: Wildstar)
ArcheAge is currently in alpha stage getting ready for its launch under Trion Worlds. Players are in-game thanks to a $150 package, where they are bug testing, balance testing, and apparently gold farming and spamming in massive quantities. How massive? Trion Worlds banned sixteen thousand accounts for spamming chat and botting gold. In an alpha.
We’re pleased to report that over 16,000 nasty, evil, foul, and most importantly misbehaving accounts have been reactively and proactively removed from Alpha. These accounts were purchased using ill-gotten funds and have been used to farm gold with bots and to spam chat channels, neither of which is allowed in ArcheAge.
Patch 1.2 arrives next week and gives Trion more power to rid the game of evil spammers and farmers.
(Source: ArcheAge)
Neverwinter is a game that I’ve had quite a bit of fun in lately. Between the game’s constant events, my slow progress of leveling up my character, and distractions of daily life preventing me from playing too much, I finally managed to nearly hit the game’s level cap. As I write this, I’m sitting at around 75% of the way between level 59 and 60, and I figured why not put some money down and buy a bundle of keys just to see what I can get. For the record, I’ve spent $20 bucks on Neverwinter altogether so far. I used it to buy a bag of holding and some profession packs about six months ago.
With that in mind, I have never bought keys for lockboxes in an MMO (not counting Team Fortress 2), and I’m actually pretty intrigued as to what I’ll get. Aside from a whole box of disappointment, I’m not expecting much. The bundle of ten keys cost $11 bucks.
So there you have it. A whole lot of nothing. I coulda had a V8.
Xsyon has released a massive update to the game’s terrain system. The goal of the update is to provide plenty of room to settle for new players, while facilitating travel for current players and allow them room to expand.
The Xsyon landscape is shaped and molded by players. Over the years many unsightly mounds and ruins of abandoned sites have built up across the land. The terrain reversion update gradually restores this neglected land to its original state. Felled tree stumps and logs that have littered the landscape also decay over time.
You can check out Xsyon for free at the official website.
(Source: Notorious Games Press Release)
So, it turns out Games For Windows Live isn’t shutting down next week. According to a statement by Microsoft, you will still be able to download titles from the Games for Windows Live client as usual, however customers will not be able to purchase games or receive title updates.
“As previously announced, as part of the retirement of Microsoft Points the Xbox.com PC marketplace was closed. Although customers are unable to purchase new games from the marketplace or receive title updates, they can continue to enjoy previously purchased content by downloading them through the Games for Windows Live client as usual. We remain committed to investing in PC gaming in the years ahead, and look forward to sharing more in the future.”
Presumably features like achievements will continue to function as well, online play may be dependent on the game.
(Source: Eurogamer)
Today’s MMOrning Shots comes to us from Lego Minifigures Online, currently in open beta. Check it out at http://www.playminifigures.com/en
Click up MMOrning Shots every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
Bandai Namco has announced that Ridge Racer Driftopia will shut down its servers on August 15th. The free to play racing game launched September 9th on the Steam Early Access with the hopes of launching on the Playstation 3 down the line. Players are able to purchase vehicles, experience, and other items via the in-game cash shop, and the game is still available on Steam for the time being.
“The leading developer and publisher wanted to take this opportunity to thank all its players for their permanent support and dedication! All the feedbacks will be taken into account for the upcoming projects.”
Bugbear Entertainment’s next car game, appropriately titled Next Car Game, is also on Steam Early Access albeit at a price of $30 for admission.
(Source: Gamespot)
Evolution of Combat was introduced to RuneScape on November 20th, 2012. A massive undertaking and equally dramatic shift in gameplay for the eleven year old MMO, Evolution of Combat introduced abilities, a hotbar, dual wielding, new equipment, and altered how creatures in the world needed to be fought. New items were introduced and many spells and other items were removed entirely or rendered useless by changes to how the game balanced combat. As one might expect when a game implements such a radical change, an indeterminate number of players up and quit.
Nearly two years have passed and Jagex has slowly working to bring those players back. Old School RuneScape was introduced at the end of February, a snapshot version of RuneScape culled from 2007, long before the introduction of features such as the Evolution of Combat, Grand Exchange auction house, or microtransactions. To move even further, Jagex announced that further content on Old School would be sourced directly from the community and put up to a vote before it would be implemented.
On the RuneScape 3 front, Jagex implemented a combat mode called “momentum” which was meant to replace abilities in regular encounters with monsters, by boosting offensive and defensive stats. Revolution was later added that is similar to momentum, however this mode automatically activates abilities, allowing the player to play somewhat like they did prior to Evolution of Combat.
The latest update to bring back players from pre-Evolution of Combat is Legacy Mode, but Legacy does more than simply automate a player’s combat. Legacy Mode was voted in with an 81% (200 thousand votes) majority. The mode reintroduces the old user interface and completely removes the abilities for people who choose it (unlike Revolution/Momentum which automates or ignores abilities). For all players, the maximum combat level has been reconfigured to its old cap of 138 (as opposed to 200), and weapon-specific special attacks are being reintroduced. Damage output and experience rates are supposed to be lower on Legacy Mode, but “near optimum” in comparison according to Jagex.
A few people have emailed me asking if I think that Jagex will remove Evolution of Combat altogether, and my prediction is to wait and see on legacy mode. 81% of the community wanted legacy mode introduced, and that doesn’t count those who quit due to Evolution of Combat and didn’t vote. I think what Jagex will do is iterate on legacy mode to become just as viable as using abilities and, should the time ever come where not enough people are using Evolution of Combat to justify the resources spent on updating both systems, it might be removed entirely.
For right now, however, Jagex wants to appeal to both crowds.
MMO Fallout 
