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Emperor Status Isn't For You

With Elder Scrolls Online just a few months away, Zenimax has been throwing information as fast as they can in the form of Q&A’s and interviews. If there is any feature that has been dramatically overhyped and probably deserves to be talked about as little as possible and probably ran its PR course the same day it was revealed, it would be the ability for players to ascend to Emperor. Official Xbox Magazine posted details on just what a player can expect to receive upon being crowned, chief among which is a permanent skill set unavailable to you dirty lower class peasants. You can read the article at the link above, I will continue treating the feature as low on the totem pole in terms of importance.

Why? Let’s face it, neither you nor I are ever going to be crowned Emperor. The way that the system will work is that the player with the most Alliance Points on the faction that wins over the other two will be crowned Emperor for a period. That means competing against your entire faction to rack up points. Ask yourself, can you compete against the guy who never leaves his house? What about the people who share a single character and are able to keep it playing twenty four hours a day? The guy who sets up multiple accounts on separate factions to farm points? The guilds who farm points? I suppose that if you can’t beat them, join them, but do you have the dedication? Or are you more likely to simply get frustrated in the effort and probably face early burnout from the game entirely.

Frankly I love the idea of games that include rewards that only a select portion of the community will ever see, giving the hardcore base something to strive for other than mindlessly grinding end-game raids for ever-increasing equipment with bigger numbers attached, and Zenimax is going a step further by giving the entire faction some nice buffs to enjoy while they have control of the empire. I would like to see some other method of crowning than simply picking the guy who has the privilege of never having to leave his computer, but I’ve gracefully acknowledged that this specific portion of the game is out of reach, and honestly was never intended for myself and 98% of the community to achieve in the first place.

And I am fine with that. There will inevitably be those who refuse to play on the principle of not having access to 100% of the content, no exceptions, but I think that the majority of the community will have an attitude similar to my own.

Emperor Status Isn’t For You

Square Enix Invites Former FFXIV Subscribers Back

Final Fantasy XIV has been out for quite a while now and, most assuredly, there are bound to be many of you among the crowd who have unsubscribed for one reason or another. With the launch of 2.1: A Realm Awoken, Square Enix would like to reintroduce you to the wonders of Eorzea, or more specifically the new content. Starting January 11th and going into the 13th, players with inactive accounts will be welcomed back for a free login weekend. After that, you’re on your own.

Check out the details at the lodestone link below.

(Source: Lodestone)

Defiance Third DLC Coming February

Trion Worlds has announced the next set of DLC for Defiance will be coming this February. No details have been released other than the following snippet and the name of the DLC: The 7th Legion.

When the world fell apart, one group kept their courage. Guided by the teachings of the Code of Bushido, the soldiers of the 7th Legion marched across Canada gathering survivors as they went. From one outpost to another they marched until finally they found a city which did not fall: Manhattan. There, they made their stand against the darkness, and Commander Yoshida Hiro called an end to their long journey. Now they have come to Paradise. What dread news could this herald?

(Source: Defiance)

Eldevin Launches Greenlight Campaign

We love Eldevin here at MMO Fallout, so any chance to see the game reach a wider audience is just dandy. I think I talked about this back in our quick look, but the browser based MMO is hoping to expand its reach to the Steam platform with a downloadable microclient. If you haven’t had a chance to check out Eldevin, you can already play it through your browser here. If you like it, or even if you’d just like to support the community, throw a thumbs up at the Greenlight link below.

(Source: Steam)

Marvel Heroes Has Ten Year License

Gamers who follow the news are understandably concerned over the state of Marvel Heroes. The new year brought with it a purge of Marvel titles from digital stores, games sold by Activision, Capcom, and others were unceremoniously removed and it appears are not coming back. Granted, not that many of them were good, but that’s not the point. Marvel’s track record on digital games is one wrought with arbitrary license limits, a factor that will no doubt come into play for Marvel Heroes.

The good news is that, according to Gazillion Creative Director Jeff Donais, the license with Marvel is good for at least ten years.

“Gazillion will always be the Marvel Heroes studio. There may be additional Marvel games – there’s a kid’s game as well, but it’s public information that we have a ten year license with Marvel, and we have many years of content planned for Marvel Heroes.”

You can read the rest of Donais’ comments at the link below, but at the very least it looks like Marvel Heroes will be with us for a long time to come.

(Source: PCGamesN)

SOE Releases Revised List

Ask and you shall receive. Owing the massive amount of feedback regarding SOE’s recently announced changes, John Smedley has posted a revised list of coming changes to Sony All Access. In short, the “pick an item” system won’t be coming, however players will be forced to claim the stipend monthly.

We’re lowering the price of All Access to $14.99
We’re going to make it so every subscriber to all our PC games an all access member. Basically there will be one SOE membership for our PC games. Please note there are some minor restrictions around our kids titles (simply put – if you’re a 12 year old who signed up for FR you won’t have access to the adult games so we’ll likely leave the lower priced kids offerings as separate subscriptions for under 12 for the same low prices).
We’re keeping the 500 SC included with the subscription instead of going to the “pick an item” system. We heard you. You didn’t like the change. The only change we are making is that we’re now going to make you claim it monthly. You can still hoard it though I realize this is a bit of a pain but honestly it’s the best compromise we could come up with that solves the problems I mentioned in the other thread.
we are going to be giving our members a 10% discount in our marketplaces.
European players – we have an idea on how to include you in this but we need to discuss with our partners.We have a pretty good idea on this though. give us a bit of time to suss this out.
Nothing is changing with Player Studio items – you’ll still be able to buy them with your 500SC.
Console titles – you’ll notice I only mentioned the PC titles. Our goal is to include the PS3 and PS4 games that we have, but I want to be up front and say that isn’t a done deal.

So you can still hoard station cash, but you will have to claim it manually rather than allow it to accumulate automatically. I have a feeling that something is coming to alleviate SOE of the station cash hoarded on accounts that haven’t been used in years. While a few things have been reversed and cleared up, the details surrounding Sony’s plans for all access are undoubtedly not over yet.

(Source: Reddit)

Station All Access Could Become Cheaper

So not everyone is happy about the recent announcement that Sony Online Entertainment would be replacing the free five hundred Station Cash included with subscriptions and All Access passes, but John Smedley would like to explain a few things. In a Reddit Ask Me Anything, Smedley has explained that the change was for a few reasons. First to allow for larger items to be obtained more quickly, second to deal with the problematic accrual of Station Cash on accounts, third because gamers on SOE’s growing list of console games cannot use Station Cash, and finally because of a new plan for All Access:

We are considering (and are likely going to move forward with) a plan that means if you subscribe to one of our games you are a subscriber to all our games (this applies to PC titles only btw).. all for the current $14.99 a month. That’s a benefit most companies simply can’t offer because they don’t have our portfolio of games.

All Access for SOE’s library currently costs $20. So why is this accumulation of points an issue? User Israellopez explains it best:

In accounting something you owe someone (sc cash) is a liability. Its a benefit that we are given but some of us don’t use, and that’s a problem for accountants. Because on the books the business is saddled with a debt that is just virtual. Its not like it owes a webhosting company a six month Bill, but in accounting they are both liabilities. Its similar to gift cards at a small store, the money paid into a gift card is not income, it’s a liability until it is used … and typically the spend is more then the gc amount. I expect that if the 500sc was more often than not spent in 2 months the accountants wouldn’t care. However I expect that it was accumulating, and increasing on the number of memberships.

In the case of player studio items, Smedley says in the thread that Sony may allow users to buy the items with free station cash and simply eat the cost themselves in terms of providing royalties to the creator. The AMA is still in progress, so head on down.

(Source: Reddit)

Video of the Now: Skywind Development

Today’s video comes from a team of developers working on taking Morrowing and remaking it using the Skyrim engine. The mod team of more than 70 is looking to go further than a simple port, adding in voice acting and sprucing up an otherwise dated and barren game world with more scenery. Check out the entire development video above.

Blizzard Gives Parents More Control

Blizzard has announced that accounts with parental controls turned on will soon have the ability to make in-game purchases turned off by default. The decision likely comes from last year’s list of companies dealing with children racking up massive bills on their parent’s card using cash shops and mobile app stores, including Apple paying out $100 million for unauthorized purchases. With the threat of class action lawsuits and suggestions of litigation to deal with a lack of self-regulation, Blizzard is joining a group of companies implementing their own policies.

(Source: Blizzard)

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