Black Desert Online Available January 7 For Pre-Order


Pearl Abyss today announced that Black Desert Online will be available for pre-order on the Microsoft Store starting January 7, 2019. Following the success of the game on PC with more than ten million registered users, Black Desert on Xbox will feature a new story, remastered graphics and audio, as well as 4k HDR, and an optimized user interface for consoles and controllers.

While you wait, check out the Black Desert E3 2018 trailer below. Black Desert Online is currently available on Steam for $10.

Project Stream Sweetens Deal: Free Assassin’s Creed Odyssey For One Hour Of Your Time


Back in October, Google offered a pretty sweet deal to get people beta testing its service Project Stream: Test the service, and we’ll let you play the very new Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey until the test ends in January. We’ll even give you 1000 helix credits (cash shop currency) to get you going. Unfortunately your save won’t transfer and you’re going to lose access to the game, but you’ll have the option to play it to your heart’s content for the next three months.

Well the deal just got better. For those who put at least an hour into Project Stream, you’ll be able to keep your copy of Odyssey after January 15 when the test ends, as a permanent addition to your Ubisoft account. The test is still by invitation only, to the best of our understanding, so you might be in for a wait if you’re not already in the test. For those who can have access or gain access, you’ll have until January 15 to clock in your hour.

Instructions for how to redeem the game will be sent after January 15. This offer is only valid in the United States as Project Stream is unavailable elsewhere.

Source: Eurogamer

[Video] Magnificent 5 Exclusive 105 Minute Game Preview


Here at MMO Fallout, we strive to constantly bring you the most exciting content we can find on the internet. In lieu of that, today we have for you nearly an hour and forty five minutes of exclusive gameplay footage from Magnificent 5, the award winning battle royale spinoff title from the award winning Wild West Online.

Strap into your seats and have your secretary hold all calls, because you’re going to want to leave.

Editorial: Wild West Online Doesn’t Care, Can’t Even Be Bothered Cleaning Its Forums


Wild West Online, the latest racket supported by the industry’s lead fraudster Sergey Titov, has landed itself in a shallow grave along with all of Titov’s other half-baked products. Given Titov’s modus operandi when it comes to releasing games, Wild West Online has been abandoned not even half-finished and plans are already underway to launch a spin off! Yes, everyone’s favorite Wild West shooter will be made free to play and fired back onto the internet in the form of Frontiers, the base game, and Magnificent 5, the battle royale title.

As of this writing, Wild West Online has one player online on Steam. As for WWO Partners Ltd, or whatever new shell company Titov has set up to continue this game’s existence, they’ve stopped keeping up a facade of caring. The forums have descended into a mess of spam and scam links, and of the six staff members listed on the forums, nobody has bothered posting in nearly two months while most haven’t even logged in since May or earlier.

Which is all par for the course for Wild West Online and its predecessors.

Otherwise I have no opinion on the matter.

Editorial: And It Only Cost Perjury and Your Community’s Respect


I can’t imagine that Battlestate Games thinks there is any possibility of them coming out of this on top.

It must be the end of the year, because everyone’s favorite “Worst Developer of 2018” awards are coming up on your choice Youtube channels and Battlestate Games has decided to make a last minute entry. The Russian developer behind Escape from Tarkov, a tactical first person shooter, recently issued at least 47 DMCA takedown notices against a Youtuber named Eroktic for spreading false information regarding a data leak and due to his criticisms of the game itself.

As part of an effort to dig its grave deeper, Battlestate Games has made several posts confirming that it had in fact filed the spurious DMCA takedowns against Eroktic to silence what they call “negative hype” and because Eroktic had supported people who took a “hostile” position toward BSG, with hostile translating to “critical.”

“Lately Eroktic decided to settle on the concept of negative hype and started ardently supporting people who obviously designate their position as hostile to us. Eroctic released a video in which he, in a tendentious manner, accused us of incompetence that allegedly led to a leak of two million profile credentials. The video was based on someone else’s document which described the process of obtaining basic information about profile through rating tables (a nickname, ID, statistics from the rating). Nevertheless, after our check we were convinced that no leaks have ever happened. Eroktic began to spread rumor that cheaters can steal your account and get you banned for cheating. All of this was and remains false.”

Right, except this isn’t a copyright claim and you filed a copyright claim to bring the videos down. Youtube, incidentally, has defamation claims you can file against channels that can be used in cases of defamation. Instead of going down that road, BSG decided to abuse the copyright process and commit perjury in the process. Now their chances of being punished? Slim, I would even argue nonexistent especially since they’re a Russian developer.

Thankfully we don’t have to look far to show that Battlestate Games is flat out lying about not being receptive to criticism because they admit to filing the takedown notices due to Eroktic’s “hatred” in the same message. How does one dodge the claim that they are silencing criticism? Refuse to acknowledge the criticism as valid criticism, that’s how.

“The decision to address YouTube concerning video on the Eroktic’s channel had to be made in order to stop misinformation and hatred. Moreover – we did not want and we do not want this person to be associated with our game in the first place. His purposefully destructive actions cannot be considered “criticism” no matter how you look at it. Eroktic has a long history of negative attitude towards our project, the company and players, and with the recent actions he crossed the line.”

The backlash to BSG’s conduct has prompted content creators to begin dropping their coverage of Escape From Tarkov, including the resignation of one Emissary (affiliated content creator), as well as several other Youtubers. Meanwhile, the news revolving around BSG’s conduct has spread all over the web, including to websites that hadn’t previously covered Escape From Tarkov. The result? In its heavy handed attempt to silence criticism, BSG has ensured that more people than ever will see not just the accusation that the game’s data was leaked, but that BSG is willing to abuse the copyright law in order to silence people for criticizing them.

So Battlestate Games took down two videos, and it only cost them their public relations, the good will of their community, an avalanche of negative press coverage, business relations with content creators, and the long term trust of their customers. Hope it was worth it.

 

Maplestory M Launches Dragon Master Class


Maplestory M today has launched its latest update, introducing the new Dragon Master class Evan as well as minigames and seasonal events. In addition to the new quest, Maplestory M is also introducing the minigame station along with four new minigames. Players will be able to gain coins through the minigame station and use those coins for rewards from the in-game shop.

Events following today’s update are as follows:

  • Evan Burning Event  – Through January 17, Evan characters between levels 3 – 75 will be given 2 bonus levels each time they level up 1 level
  • Evan update celebration– Through January 2, all players will receive special rewards including Buff Pets to help playing the game
  • Evan Growth Support Event– Through January 24, Special Growth Support Boxes, which include 3 stages of “Dragon Mount,” Evan exclusive chair and medal are given as players level up the new Evan class
  • Christmas Tree Decoration Event– Between December 24 to January 5, players can decorate Christmas trees with ornaments to earn Tree EXP for rewards
  • New Year’s Attendance Event– Between January 1 to January 24, players who log-in for 14 days anytime during the event period will receive Unique Accessory Draw Ticket, Equipment Support Box, pets and various rewards
  • Golden Pig Dice Event– Between January 10 to January 24, players can celebrate Golden Pig Year by obtaining special rewards from the board by rolling dice

Maplestory M has reached 10 million downloads in its first 100 days following launch. More information can be found at the official website.

Sony Accidentally Leaks Game Stats For Top PS4 Titles


Like most digital storefronts, Sony likes to keep its actual sales numbers hidden from the general public. That task became a bit harder this week when a promotion meant to celebrate player achievements in their games accidentally made public more data than was intended.

Sony’s My PS4 Life is a fun way of showing off your achievements on Playstation, it tells you how many hours you’ve invested, your top games, and even your rarest achievement and how many other players have it, among other details. What it also made public, however, was the number of players who had earned certain achievements. Coupled with the factor that Playstation displays the percentage of players who have earned said achievement, and it’s pretty easy to get a rough estimate on the number of people who have purchased/played said game.

The website Gamstat has set up to turn those stats into general figures, and the results aren’t all that surprising. Top played games on the PS4 include Grand Theft Auto V along with the last four iterations of Fifa, Minecraft, Call of Duty, Rocket League, and Fortnite. Fallout 76 has pulled about 407,000 players on the console.

The data isn’t exact science, as PS4 trophy figures around up to the .1%, but it does give a good idea as to how each game sold.

(Source: Reddit)

Jeremy Soule More Than Five Years Late On Album, Starts Patreon Asking For More Money


Fraudster:
2a:  a person who is not what he or she pretends to be :impostor;

When it comes to fraudsters showcased here on MMO Fallout, Jeremy Soule may be the worst. The composer of famous soundtracks for numerous games including Skyrim, Guild Wars, and Baldur’s Gate, Jeremy Soule’s talent in composing music haven’t exactly translated into successful businesses.

In 2005, Soule founded the company DirectSong with the purpose of selling albums from his various creations. At best, the service was a wholly incompetent mess that delayed orders by months into years on end and couldn’t figure out digital distribution of simple MP3 files. At worse, it was a running scam and never had any intention of providing the products that Soule was selling at a premium cost. I brought this up in my initial Crowdfunding Fraudsters piece, but check out reviews of the service and you’ll see people who waited 3+ years for their soundtracks to be delivered, and others who had to wait upwards of a year for a response from DirectSong’s customer service about refunds.

The Northerner: Soule Symphony #1 was crowdfunded on Kickstarter back in 2013 with an estimated shipping date of September 2013. Five years later, it has still not released and all signs point towards the songs not even being fully written. But Jeremy needs money, so he’s started a Patreon account in order to solicit additional funding for his works. For $5 per month you’ll gain access to old and new music from Soule and for $10 per month you’ll have the rare opportunity where Soule will actually talk to you, about music product and business techniques. $10 for advice on business, you really get what you pay for.

Meanwhile if you check over at Kickstarter, you’ll see hundreds of comments from people discussing their horrible customer experience of dealing with Soule and the Max Steiner Agency, with refund requests taking close to a year, others not being responded to at all, emails bouncing from the company’s refund address, and more. Soule is more than five years late putting out an album that should have been out in September 2013, and he doesn’t seem to be anywhere near completion.

The Northerner Diaries, a sketch album released by Soule in lieu of the album that backers paid for, is available to listen to for free on Youtube.

Discord To Allow Self-Publishing AND 90/10 Revenue Split


If you thought Epic Games offering an 88/12 split along with a curated store was the pinnacle of digital distribution, think again. Discord today announced that as of 2019, not only will their service serve as a self-publishing platform where any developer can place their game, but that developers will enjoy a 90% revenue share to sweeten the deal.

So, starting in 2019, we are going to extend access to the Discord store and our extremely efficient game patcher by releasing a self-serve game publishing platform. No matter what size, from AAA to single person teams, developers will be able to self publish on the Discord store with 90% revenue share going to the developer. The remaining 10% covers our operating costs, and we’ll explore lowering it by optimizing our tech and making things more efficient.

Epic Games recently announced that its store would offer an 88/12 revenue split compared to Valve’s standard 70/30. Valve comparatively announced that it will offer better rates in an attempt to bring big name publishers back to the platform.

Source: Discord

Maplestory Begins Final Chapter in War Against Black Mage


Maplestory has launched the final chapter of the war with the game’s current big baddy, the Black Mage. Players level 200 or higher who have completed the 5th job advancement can access the Labyrinth of Suffering, Tenebris’ second area. At the end of the quest, players will find Verus Hilla, one of the Black Mage’s leading Commanders, ready to fight. Limina,  Tenebris’ final area, is also available as players must help the Tenebris expedition escape dangerous situations inside to complete the Journey of Destiny.

In addition, every class will receive a new 5th job skill to fight the Black Mage and once the Maple Alliance gathers enough Determination to power up the Spark of Determination, all out war breaks loose as the highly anticipated Black Mage Boss Battle will become available. With the Black Mage’s HP being shared across all worlds, MapleStory players across the world must work together in this epic battle to finally defeat the Black Mage.

More information can be found on the official website.