Featured – Page 11 – MMO Fallout

Trion Controls ArcheAge Prices

Anytime you have separation point between a publisher and a developer, the question is inevitably raised as to just how much control the publisher has in the relationship. We have seen publishers take over development of a game from its developers all the way down to publishers only capable of forwarding bug reports to the developers for them to fix. The ultimate answer we seek in judging where the scale tips is so we know who to blame when the things hit the fan and players want to know who is responsible for mucking things up.

In the case of ArcheAge, at least we know that Trion is in full control of the cash shop. As Community Manager Scapes posted, Trion controls the content and the pricing.

“We decide what’s in it and at what price, simple as that.”

You can check out the entire Q&A at the link below.

(Source: ArcheAge Q&A)

Eldevin Launching First Expansion

Hunted Cow Studios has announced the first expansion for Eldevin, titled A Tale of Sands and Shards, is set for release on April 3rd. Sands and Shards increases the level cap and skill cap to 45, bringing with it new recipes, abilities, and more. The expansion will also see the launch of five new zones and forty five dungeons featuring seven new challenging bosses. Players will also be able to enjoy brand new class-specific weapon sets.

A Tale of Sands and Shards launches April 3rd and will be available for free.

(Source: Hunted Cow)

Neverwinter Infographic

Perfect World Entertainment has sent us over an infographic on Neverwinter since the launch of Shadowmantle. Over 2.2 million characters have been created and 3.5 million have died in PvP battles. Check out the entire infographic below.

Arktech Revolution DLC Announced

Trion Worlds has announced the fifth DLC pack for Defiance, Arktech Revolution, which seems to be aimed at improving quality of life features in the MMO shooter. Set for release this April, Arktech Revolution will see an increase to both the EGO rank cap and point cap, as well as the introduction of new perks to invest those extra points in. In addition to the increased level cap, players will also find that higher EGO rating makes a big difference on your abilities including damage, health, and shield functionality. To keep the game balanced, the population of NPCs are similarly seeing an overhaul with new abilities and designs. Events will scale dynamically based on the number of players present, with the promise that new players will not be left out.

Finally, some long awaited improvements to damage output and grenades. With DLC #5, weapon types will become more pronounced in their abilities, such as incendiary weapons being more effective against flesh or radiation being able to penetrate armor. There is also a new damage-mitigating buff called armor which does not recharge passively and must be recharged at an extraction point. And finally grenades, stims, and spikes will be receiving an overhaul to hopefully be less tedious to obtain. Enemies will now drop universal “charges” that refill specified items.

You can check out the entire announcement at the link below.

(Source: Defiance)

Mail.ru Punishes 57,955 Accounts

Mail.ru has announced that nearly fifty eight thousand accounts have been punished for destructive behavior on ArcheAge Russia, for activity including spamming and using bot programs. In addition, the publisher noted that two thousand accounts had been banned for taking advantage of exploits, with the players in the first category receiving chat blocks.

Among the list of exploits that were patched and banned include “counterfeiting of information transmitted from the client to the server,” packet spoofing to obtain items that players should not have access to, exploiting a bug to increase the maximum amount of potions one can carry, killing bosses via packet spoofing, and more. Mail.ru asks players to submit any bugs or exploits that they find.

(Source: ArcheAge)

Darkfall Welcomes Players Back For March Update

Aventurine recently launched its March update, bringing with it weather effects, masks, clan markets, and more. To give players more of an incentive to join back up, Aventurine has invited beta players for two weeks of free game time. Eligible gamers should have already received an email by the time this article is published, so make sure you check your inbox/spam folder. To take part in the beta, simply send an email or support ticket with your username and “Returning Beta Player” in the subject line. We managed to have our account enabled around fifteen minutes after sending in the ticket.

The two week offer expires April 4th. Current subscribers can sign up for a six month package at 45% off.

Naoki Yoshida Not Against Free To Play

One of the memes floating around the internet in regards to Final Fantasy XIV is that the company would rather shut the game down before ever considering a switch to free to play. As Naoki Yoshida confirmed in a recent interview with Dengeki Online, this isn’t so much the case:

As far as the monthly billing goes, people are becoming more pragmatic and they’re only willing to pay for the things that they want to use. What that means to monthly billing is that there are players who would rather pay based on the amount of time they play in a particular month, after they’ve played. There used to be no debate about this, since monthly billing was the only standard for MMORPGs, but now F2P is a consideration. We see this desire for players who would rather buy items especially in North America.

Yoshida goes on to say that free to play isn’t necessarily a bad thing, and can be a beneficial move when done so based on the needs of the users rather than trying to turn around an unprofitable game. Check out the entire interview below, it dives into free to play, upcoming updates, expansion into new regions, and more. Is Final Fantasy XIV going free to play? Not with six figures of active players it isn’t.

(Source: Translated Interview)

Xsyon Expands With Launch of PvE Server

The post-apocalyptic world of Xsyon has become a lot more friendly recently as Notorious Games has announced that the game will be split between War and Peace, a PvP and PvE server respectively. Players will be able to maintain characters on both servers, and data will be copied on to both worlds from the original main world.

As of today, the apocalyptic fantasy sandbox MMORPG, Xsyon is available on two servers: War and Peace! (PvP and PvE) With this highly requested and anticipated move, Xsyon reaches out to wider audience catering to players who enjoy fantasy sandbox games both with and without player conflict.

Xsyon launched in 2011 under Notorious Games.

(Source: Notorious Games Press Release)

Perpetuum Dropping Subscription Fee

Perpetuum Online has announced that it will be dropping its subscription fee on April 2nd. Rather than asking for a subscription, Perpetuum will adopt a buy to play model with an in-game cash shop for cosmetics and services.

The subscription model will be dropped in favor of a single purchase when players join the world of Perpetuum, and augmented with optional in-game purchases of previously unavailable services and cosmetic upgrades. The price of the single and final purchase of the game will be comparable to 3 months of subscription time in the past: 28.99 USD/EUR (VAT included).

Players with at least three months of subscription accumulated will receive a copy of the new game for free, while those with less time accumulated will be deactivated and will be required to purchase the $30 client. There is a lot more information at the official news post below.

(Source: Perpetuum Online)

ArcheAge Launching 2014, Trion Confirms

The question of the year for 2014 has finally been answered: When is ArcheAge coming to the west? Trion’s own Evan “Scapes” Berman appeared on ArcheAge Source to confirm that ArcheAge will be heading into beta and launch later this year.

While the tech work continues, the team is also finalizing plans for “early supporter” pre-launch packages slated to be introduced during this timeframe and available for the duration of closed beta, leading into launch later this year.

Scapes went on to confirm that ArcheAge will be free to play while avoiding some of the pitfalls in other territories.

Allow me to say this here and now: both Trion Worlds and XLGames want ArcheAge to be a free-to-play sandbox that fits our “No Tricks, No Traps” vision and will make development decisions for to achieve that goal in Trion’s territories. There are a couple of important recent examples we’d love to share: XLGames has agreed to our request that racial quests grant experience (which had been removed) and that mounts/gliders purchased from the cash shop provide solid value and fun, while earned and crafted items are objectively superior.

A new website for the western ArcheAge release is on its way, with more news coming in the future.

(Source: ArcheAge)

Spread It:

Like this:

Spread It:

Like this:

Spread It:

Like this:

Spread It:

Like this:

Spread It:

Like this:

Spread It:

Like this:

Spread It:

Like this:

Spread It:

Like this:

Spread It:

Like this:

Spread It:

Like this: