Author: Admin

Allods Online: The Caviar of Item Malls


I can see the tunnel leading directly into my bank.

Allods Online is a quirky little WoW clone. On one hand, the developers have a clear passion for making the title the best it can be. On the other hand, they’ve been making some ridiculous updates to the game that make us ask the question: Which now-fired staff member thought this was a good idea?

See…Russia! A handy ally in the development of Allods Online, mainly because the Russian version of the title seems to get everything before we do over in North America and Europe. The Russian version allowed us a glimpse into the perfume scandal, an item in-game that boosts health 50%, among other bonuses it also gets rid of “fear of death,” a debuff of 25% on all stats that stacks (up to 100%) when you die, on a timer that increases as you level up. According to my sources, at end-game this timer can reach 45 minutes, and the timer activates when you die in player vs player combat.  gPotato launched the open beta not even a week ago, and with it came the first incarnation of the cash shop, the item mall, the extortion clinic, whatever you call it. What is riling up players, however, is the price:

For one character, it costs $20 USD to increase your bag size by six slots. Yes, for the cost of one month’s subscription to a paid MMO, plus a meal at Mcdonald’s, you could increase your bag slot size by six. According to the Russian Allod Online’ers, there was approximately an astounding 1,000%  increase in price, across the board, for every item. A $2 item (converted from rubles) in the Russian version came out to $20 USD.

I was hesitant to write this article up because my own concerns that this was a bug were echoed by a few (a numerical error resulting in the decimal point placed too far to the right), but according to today’s announcement, the price appears to be not only intentional, but quite out of touch on gPotato’s part. They will be evaluating the item mall, not to change price, but (as they put it) to add more items to increase the user experience.

The community, thankfully, appears to be all ears to a compromise by gPotato. Although 95% (as of this writing) believe the prices are not reasonable, less than a third (as of this writing) were willing, in another poll, to quit over the fiasco. If gPotato acts quickly, we may see this event being left in the dust on the road to Allods Online’s future.

Allods Online is currently in open beta. More news as it appears.

Cheyenne ME: Bankrupt, Whiting Sued


The gold image is much more fitting.

Back in December, I referenced to three outcomes of the release of Stargate Resistance, the “replacement” for Stargate Worlds, with the former being released to fund the latter. Those three outcomes were:

  1. This is the “everything went perfectly” outcome: Stargate Resistance launches, does well, and is used to fund Stargate Worlds and pay the employees. Stargate Worlds launches late 2010/Early 2011.
  2. Going further down to earth: Stargate Resistance launches, does well, and Cheyenne takes a heavy look at Stargate Worlds and says “you know, this just isn’t working out.” Aside from a few more shooters, Cheyenne branches the Stargate brand to other forms of games, including real time strategy, console, and other areas of entertainment. Stargate Worlds is put on the back burner and is left there for eternity.
  3. Hitting the pavement without a parachute: Stargate Resistance is either delayed to oblivion or launches to a less than stellar performance. Considering these losses, Cheyenne Mountain Entertainment either closes for good, is acquired by another company, or continues the same path it has been on for the past two years: perpetual delay.

Consider Cheyenne to have just pulled the chute only to find an ACME anvil in its place, as the company today filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Now, Chapter 11, as would be pointed out if I didn’t explain it, does not guarantee that a company is going under, just that they are restructuring in a way that will allow their debt to be paid back in a much more manageable way. This is a pretty standard procedure, and although it doesn’t absolve CME of its debt, it does offer them a chance at a brighter future.

Granted, Chapter 11 bankruptcy is usually akin to rearranging the cement tied to your legs, as you struggle to stay afloat. Although Cheyenne ME will live on for now, there is still no better outlook towards the future.

As for the company itself, I for one am glad to see Cheyenne doing everything it can to distance itself from Gary Whiting. Whiting, a chair-member of Cheyenne, is also the founder of MMOGULS, a controversial and of questionable legality, pyramid scheme that fronts itself as a website to connect MMOs. Currently MMOGULS offers nothing, for a price of $250 up front and $50 a month, with promised commission that hasn’t been paid in several months, according to investors. When investors sued Whiting earlier last year, this is what they were suing over.

Whiting will definitely be a blight on Cheyenne’s sheet, one that appears to be coming to an end, fast.

More on answering the question of “what the hell’s going on at Cheyenne” as it appears. I personally believe Stargate Worlds will have made its way to the defunct category by the end of this year.

MMO Vs Non-MMO: Online Life Expectancy


It's in the game!

The great part of MMOs that feature some sort of offline mode (Cities XL) is that even if the servers no longer become sustainable, the game doesn’t become a fifty dollar doorstop (I use Tabula Rasa to house my loose change, and Auto Assault became a great coaster for my tasty Starbucks drinks). Being the MMO enthusiast that I am, I often find myself getting into discussions with friends as to the benefits and downsides of MMOs, versus that of non-MMOs, and the major issue that pops up is life expectancy of the title, with said “friends” claiming that non-MMO games last longer because you don’t have to worry about the servers going offline.

That argument is half true, and for the sake of argument we are going to throw the single player aspect screaming out the window and focus on the online, multiplayer portion. Although it was once a normality for games to be run solely through dedicated servers, an increasing amount of Digital Rights Management software ends up requiring players to use some form of online authentication system to play the game’s multiplayer.

Although this system sounds great, it presents a lot of problems down the road. Fast forward two years after a game has been released, and you will understand what I mean: Apart from game sales, that spike at release and generally fade fast, the servers have nothing but the company’s coffers paying for their upkeep. Whatever profit the company made on the game is probably dwindling fast just to keep the servers up, and the game has to be shut down. Garbage in, garbage out.

Every year, Electronic Arts brings the cart around and announces which games it will be shutting down online access to.

  1. Def Jam, PS3/360 (March 2007) [3 years]
  2. The Godfather, PS3/360 (2006/2007) [4/3 years]
  3. Lord of the Rings: Conquest, PC/PS3/360 (Jan. 2009) [1 year]
  4. Mercenaries 2, PC (2008) [2 years]
  5. Need for Speed: Carbon, PSP (2006) [4 years]
  6. Need for Speed: Prostreet , PSP (2007) [3 years]
  7. The Simpsons, PS3/360 (2007) [3 years]

Whereas the following will be taken offline in April:

  1. Burnout 3: Takedown, PS2 (2004) [6 years]

I removed several titles from the April list that were for the original Xbox, because Xbox Live is shutting down in April, making the April 15th shutdown announcement moot. Although there are some that stray further up and down the road, the general life span of an EA Games game is approximately two to four years. The previous line of EA’s games shutting down included a considerable number of the sports franchise 09 titles, including Madden 09, NBA 09, and NHL 09. The most ridiculous sounding takedown on the board is Lord of the Rings: Conquest, which was just released slightly over a year ago.

I’m not questioning the morality of EA Game’s decision in taking these servers down, as a lot of these games are quite unpopulated this far down the line, but if you are picking a game out of the bargain bin, take a look at how old it is and who made it, especially if you are planning on using the online mode. For example, you may pick up a copy of Madden 08 for a cheap online fix, only to come home and find out that the servers have been shut down a long time ago.

I walked into a local F.Y.E store recently to take a look at what sales the store had going on. That particular location was closing down, and had everything on sale. I located a boxed copy of the Sony Station Pass, that was dated 2006, and still advertised The Matrix Online. Further down the shelf I found, what else, Dungeon Runners. It was only ten dollars, but a ten dollar coaster is not appropriate for an electronics store. I later pointed out to a father and son who were there to find Madden 09 on the Wii (“because I can play it online.”) that they were better off finding Madden 10, because the online for Madden 09 shut down earlier this month.

Medal of Honor: Allied Assault and Battlefield 1942 are two games that are still up and running, have outlived most of their successors, and do not run on EA’s online service, despite being EA Games games. In several years, even big hits like Modern Warfare will eventually shut down their service. While games like Ultima Online stay alive for a decade or more despite a smaller community than they once had, they can be assured that the game will stay live as long as it is breaking a profit, whereas non-MMO titles have to worry about how long the publisher “feels like” keeping the title online.

Gamespot Vs Hi-Rez: What Journalistic Integrity?


When it pays to have an intelligent community.

Eurogamer! To many gamers, Eurogamer is a great source for gaming news, reviews, and other editorials. To Darkfall fans, on the other hand, Eurogamer is just another shady “unbiased” review website that backs up writers with questionable journalistic integrity. It feels like only a year ago that Eurogamer was launched into a controversy regarding the then-recently launched Darkfall. A contributor by the name of Ed Zitron wrote a scathing review of the title, scoring a 2/10 (Or a “Don’t touch this game”), and causing quite a stirrup at the Darkfall community. Aventurine, the title’s developers, shot back quickly: Publicly revealing logs from the accounts that revealed not only did the reviewer spend less than two hours in-game, but the majority of that time was spent in the character creation screen, with only a few minutes of login time each session. Tom Bramwell of Eurogamer did nothing to fan out the flames when he announced that Eurogamer was backing up Zitron. Of course, it was Zitron’s word (And who wouldn’t trust a man who laid out in writing his complete inability to do the most basic tasks in Darkfall?) versus Aventurine’s log files. Eventually, Eurogamer had another reviewer take a look.

Like water down the Niagara, the slip ups just keep flowing. This time, Gamespot is in some hot water after a review giving the recently launched Global Agenda a 5.5/10. Being as loyal to the title as one would expect a community, the Global Agenda community quickly did some dirt digging on the reviewer, and found quite a dearth in play time. The reviewer’s account, fittingly named DoofusJones, clocked in less than six hours of gameplay, making it to level 13 and wholly ignoring the subscription areas of the game.

I don’t get paid to write for MMO Fallout, but I often get the idea that I have more integrity than some of those who do get paid. Although Ed Zitron was not paid for his review of Darkfall, the Gamespot reviewer was, even though the review has since been removed. Myself, along with a legion of millions of other gamers, would kill to have the opportunity to be paid to write reviews for MMOs. Hell, if MMO Fallout paid my college tuition, you’d see me here every waking minute I wasn’t at my regular job or at classes! Alas, my future is in political talk, but the legion of millions still stand.

As if Gamespot needs to hand out more stakes to the people who are still angry over the Kane and Lynch fiasco several years back. I vet my own articles before I publish them, and I do my own fact checking in-house, but I still do fact-checking. For the companies that actually pay people to be “main editors,” do your jobs and make sure the person doing the review isn’t skimming off the top and putting out a half-assed piece of work.

More importantly, and I regularly reinforce this, if you are looking for a source to base your purchase on, don’t read a review. Don’t listen to what Gamespot tells you, or any other review website. I even tell people not to listen to what I say in the “month in review” articles, foremost because MMO Fallout is not in the business of reviewing titles, and secondly because I don’t want people basing their purchases of a genre where enjoyment comes out of the player’s own experience, to come from a piece of text no matter the size. The Month In Review is meant to be an, albeit morbid, comedic article about my own failed attempts to reign in spending.

So I’ll say what I always say when it comes to choosing your MMO: Go window shopping, almost every MMO on the market has some form of demo available, and in cases of Champions Online and Warhammer Online, you can try entire sections of the game for absolutely free, without limits. You may go through a large number of MMOs before you find the one that suits you, but look at it this way: You’re not spending thirty dollars a pop for each title that eventually ends up gathering dust. And if a title doesn’t have a demo, that is their loss, not your own.

What Does the Better Business Bureau Say?


If Funcom's money was gold-backed...
No Accredation, no gold!

The triple-B, or Better Business Bureau, is quite an interesting outfit. One one hand, the organization has absolutely no authority over any business anywhere at any time, ever. On the other hand, its advice is taken very seriously by many consumers, by some as gospel, and by others who believe that the BBB actually has the above authority. The method that the Bureau uses to make grade is quite lenient on the business, if they are willing to respond to complaints. If someone complains to the BBB, they try to contact the company and the response determines the grade.

For example, the company I’m employed at while I trudge my way through College (Target) has received almost 1,500 complaints to the BBB in the past 36 months. However, due to the response by the company in most of the complaints, and the nature of the complaints in other cases, Target holds an A rating. Really the only way to get a bad score by the BBB is to not respond at all, which you will see below.

So I decided to look up a few of our biggest names in the MMO biz (by looking at the poll on the web page) and check out their rating. Keep in mind that not being a BBB accredited business does not hurt your score.

Blizzard: A+

Cryptic Studios: F

Funcom: A+

Mythic Entertainment: F

NCsoft: C-

Sony Online Entertainment: A

Square Enix: A

An F for Cryptic and Mythic? In Mythic’s defense, their BBB rating is likely out of date, due to the whole Electronic Arts takeover (EA has a B rating), but an F for Cryptic? Looking more in-depth, I found it is because Cryptic wholly refuses to respond to any complaints forwarded to them by the BBB, forgetting the one rule of the BBB: Not responding kills your score!

And this list doesn’t even include Turbine, Aventurine, Jagex, and others that were not listed on the BBB website.

Dad’s Back! Richard Garriot Returns!


Get the canceled game, Dad's home!

Call him what you want, King Garriot, General Garriot, crazy, Richard Garriot is the big daddy of the MMORPG world, and has a special place in the hearts of many MMOers, whether you’ve played his version of Ultima Online (the old one) or Tabula Rasa. Ever since Tabula Rasa flew the coop and fell ten stories to its death, there’s been a lot of skepticism in the MMO world as to whether or not gaming genius Richard Garriot would make it back. He seemed busy with his new life flying the cosmos, and didn’t seem all that interested in the MMO landscape anymore.

Boy were we wrong, as Garriot himself is back with Portalarium!

“The Portalarium mission is exactly what I want to be doing next in games. This really takes me back to my roots in the game business – small development teams, low barriers to entry, affordable budgets for quality projects, and unlimited new interactive frontiers to explore together with our customers.”
-Richard Garriot

Interactive frontiers? Unlimited? Back to his roots? Excuse me if I glee. From my understanding, Portalarium will be starting out with a “portalarium player” that will act as a plugin to allow other gaming engines to work inside of social websites: Facebook, Myspace, etc. Where will Richard Garriot go from there?

Well that, my friends, will yet to be seen.

Unfortunately there is still no news on the $24 million lawsuit against NCsoft.

Dad's Back! Richard Garriot Returns!


Get the canceled game, Dad's home!

Call him what you want, King Garriot, General Garriot, crazy, Richard Garriot is the big daddy of the MMORPG world, and has a special place in the hearts of many MMOers, whether you’ve played his version of Ultima Online (the old one) or Tabula Rasa. Ever since Tabula Rasa flew the coop and fell ten stories to its death, there’s been a lot of skepticism in the MMO world as to whether or not gaming genius Richard Garriot would make it back. He seemed busy with his new life flying the cosmos, and didn’t seem all that interested in the MMO landscape anymore.

Boy were we wrong, as Garriot himself is back with Portalarium!

“The Portalarium mission is exactly what I want to be doing next in games. This really takes me back to my roots in the game business – small development teams, low barriers to entry, affordable budgets for quality projects, and unlimited new interactive frontiers to explore together with our customers.”
-Richard Garriot

Interactive frontiers? Unlimited? Back to his roots? Excuse me if I glee. From my understanding, Portalarium will be starting out with a “portalarium player” that will act as a plugin to allow other gaming engines to work inside of social websites: Facebook, Myspace, etc. Where will Richard Garriot go from there?

Well that, my friends, will yet to be seen.

Unfortunately there is still no news on the $24 million lawsuit against NCsoft.

Not So Much RP In The MMORPG


Yet No One Said Arrrr

There isn’t much more of a vestigial appendage on the server list for your favorite MMO than seeing “RP” as the label. Back when I first started playing World of Warcraft, the role playing servers were populated with a number of hardcore guilds, granted guilds that would quickly try to get you booted off of the server if you didn’t chat using the correct out-of-context code, but hardcore guilds nonetheless. Over time, it became apparent that those guilds were moving out, and players who really had no interest in role playing were coming in, to occasionally add a ‘th to the end of their words, and doth speak’th like yon medieval men, prithee, despite World of Warcraft not being set in Earth’s Middle Ages.

As a hardcore role player sans rear-implanted-stick, I had to come to the sad reality that my kind is scarce, despite half of the MMO name being Role Playing Game, the in-character role playing was something I would have to search wide and far in order to find an active guild that actually actively participated in role playing (rather than “You role play a tank, I’ll role play support, we’ll pretend…that dragon killed your family and we’re gonna take its loot.”). That’s why I’m drawn to sandbox games like Mortal Online. Considering the title is still in beta, there is a lot more to do in the spiritual sense of thinking, rather than physically quantifying. Yesterday I played cleanup, making sure that the loot from dead criminals was safely tucked away in my bank. Today, on the other hand, I actively hunted down miners who had left their keyboards with a macro set up to play for them (Don’t worry, I check for activity before I attack). More often than not, I play a crafter of some sort.

The latest information from Everquest II was just what I needed to remind me that it wasn’t just writing with my left-handed that made me a minority of sorts, with the finding that only 5% of the game’s population are hardcore role players. Among the 40 page report was other information, including that role players play less hours, are slightly younger, and have a higher percentage of female players.

I am the player who uses the biography section of the character creator, even though it has no physical impact on gameplay. I’ve spent quite a bit of time creating a backstory for not just my superhero, but my nemesis in Champions Online, as well as any other MMO I’ve played in recent years. I don’t consider myself better than those who don’t roleplay, and I am certainly not under the understanding that I am enjoying more of the game than they are. In fact, there are several cases I can mention where I end up limiting myself:

In the case of Champions Online, I ended up passing over several powers that, while powerful, did not conceivably fit my character. My hero is a telekinesis power set, so giving him guns or robot minions wouldn’t fit. Equally with Mortal Online, where my end goal is to be a well known armor-crafter, I will have to give up my combat skills to specialize in the various crafting techniques.

Or maybe I’m just being pessimistic. Are there any other role players out there that are in the same boat?

Warhammer Online: Here’s What You Wanted


Your Feedback To Good Use

In the last edition of Checking Up On Mythic, I talked about the developer’s latest spat with players, this time over how to deal with the over-encumbered and bloated scenario system. Mythic’s original idea, which consisted of removing 75% of the scenario maps, did not digest well with the community. In fact, from a PR point of view, Mythic’s platter of an announcement was infected with E.Coli. So being the official Developer That Could, Mythic went to the boards and asked the community, what would you do?

Well we have our answer, and Mythic has an idea of where they want to go with the upcoming scenario streamline: Foremost, Mythic hopes to decrease the amount of time waiting in scenario queues, based off of several factors that the company has been watching. Part of the update sees “always active” scenarios, maps that are (just that) always active, no matter what the progression of the campaign on either side. The game’s weekly event, Weekly Warfronts, will now not only contribute to the campaign, but all Warfronts will be open, rather than picking and choosing just one.

So Mythic does indeed listen. The reaction from the community has been mixed, but overall positive, and it’s good to see Mythic taking the medicinal approach rather than amputating the scenario system from the neck down.

More on Mythic and Warhammer Online as it appears. Dark Age of Camelot’s host change should be going live in just two days.

Warhammer Online: Here's What You Wanted


Your Feedback To Good Use

In the last edition of Checking Up On Mythic, I talked about the developer’s latest spat with players, this time over how to deal with the over-encumbered and bloated scenario system. Mythic’s original idea, which consisted of removing 75% of the scenario maps, did not digest well with the community. In fact, from a PR point of view, Mythic’s platter of an announcement was infected with E.Coli. So being the official Developer That Could, Mythic went to the boards and asked the community, what would you do?

Well we have our answer, and Mythic has an idea of where they want to go with the upcoming scenario streamline: Foremost, Mythic hopes to decrease the amount of time waiting in scenario queues, based off of several factors that the company has been watching. Part of the update sees “always active” scenarios, maps that are (just that) always active, no matter what the progression of the campaign on either side. The game’s weekly event, Weekly Warfronts, will now not only contribute to the campaign, but all Warfronts will be open, rather than picking and choosing just one.

So Mythic does indeed listen. The reaction from the community has been mixed, but overall positive, and it’s good to see Mythic taking the medicinal approach rather than amputating the scenario system from the neck down.

More on Mythic and Warhammer Online as it appears. Dark Age of Camelot’s host change should be going live in just two days.