MMO Fallout

Everquest Next Wasn’t Fun, Development Ceases

Development on Everquest Next has ceased, leaving gamers wondering about the health of Daybreak Game Company and the future of Landmark. Daybreak President Russ Shanks took to the official website to announce the unfortunate reality that during development the team came to the harsh conclusion that the game just wasn’t coming together. As a result, the blip that was Everquest Next will fade into the what could have been pile in the ever growing timeline of MMO development.

Russ Shanks was also interviewed today by MMORPG.com, which you can read here.

For those familiar with the internals of game development, you know that cancellations are a reality we must face from time to time. Inherent to the creative process are dreaming big, pushing hard and being brutally honest with where you land. In the case of EverQuest Next, we accomplished incredible feats that astonished industry insiders. Unfortunately, as we put together the pieces, we found that it wasn’t fun.

The announcement comes with the vague promise that the world of Everquest has not yet stopped growing. The announcement of Everquest Next’s cancellation may not come as such a surprise to gamers who have been waiting a long time since any newsworthy information was released. The layoffs and financial issues over at Daybreak since the company spun off of Sony haven’t helped matters either.

(Source: Daybreak)

Nab TERA Elite, Lock In Your Subscription Price

If you were gearing up to subscribe to TERA, now may just be the best time to do so. En Masse Entertainment has announced that subscription prices for the action MMO will be coming down to a mere $10.99 for the next twelve days. To sweeten the deal, anyone who signs on while the sale is active will be locked in at that price so long as they remain an active subscriber, including anyone who is currently already paying full price.

To better incentivize players to dole out, En Masse is offering two 30-day items to boost your character’s power.

All Elite players will receive one of each of these items the first time they log into TERA between Thursday, March 10 and Tuesday, March 22. The items will be delivered via item claim.

Existing subscribers just need to log into the account management page and lock in their new rate. The sale runs until the 22nd.

(Source: TERA)

Xsyon Announces Month of Events

This Sunday, March 12th, marks the start of the 2016 Xsyon event season. Players of the sandbox MMO will be able to take part in a series of 16 events run by Xsyon staff and other members of the community, from fishing competitions to capture the flag and Hunger Games battles, among others. Most of the events appear to be on Fridays at 2pm EST and can be found on the Xsyon event calendar.

This year boasts Xsyon’s most unique and rewarding event season to date with many never held before events! Several events will be run by player tribes and hosted at player built arenas, dungeons and staging areas. We are also rewarding players this year with Event Tokens for winning, placing in and participation in events. These Tokens can be collected and traded. Starting mid-season, players will be able to exchange their hoarded Tokens for rare and valuable in game prizes!

Xsyon is available for a one time fee on the official website and via Steam.

(Source: Notorious Games Press Release)

Trion Worlds Promises Bans For Cheaters, Even Tenured Players

(Editor’s Note: Trion World’s PR reps got in touch to clarify a few points to the story which have been noted below. A total of 983 accounts have been banned right away. In addition, they have stated that while money spent is taken into account to discern real players from throwaway/bot accounts, that it is only one factor and that time invested into the account also goes a long way to proving that the player is invested in the game. We thank them for getting in touch to clarify these points.)

ArcheAge’s new bot detection program has been enabled for a few weeks, with 983 accounts banned right off the bat and a number of other accounts put on notice. Trion Worlds has taken to the forums once again to claim that it will not tolerate anyone who cheats in ArcheAge…providing you don’t stop after this last warning. In addition, Trion Worlds will no longer take tenure (how much time and money has been invested) into account when banning for bots and hacks:

After this warning, anyone who continues to run the detected hack or bot programs will be subject to a permanent ban, regardless of their tenure in ArcheAge. Please note that we can also see when alternate accounts are associated with other main accounts, so making use of these tools on a throwaway account will lead to disciplinary action on your main.

Users who are casual botters will receive a warning by email.

Those players who appear to be mostly legitimate community members will receive an email warning them about this policy and informing them to stop immediately.

Trion’s previously light stance on casual bot usage stands in stark contrast to the company’s heavy handed punishment just a month ago when the company banned an entire raid of 53 accounts for using a glitch to defeat a world boss. It also contradicts the numerous times that the company has claimed to be taking a zero tolerance policy on botting in ArcheAge.

The good news is that the new software aims to increase the rate at which cheaters are caught and banned while simultaneously reducing the number of false positives.

(Source: ArcheAge)

38 Studios Lenders Hit With Fraud Charges

The Securities and Exchange Commission is now involving the Rhode Island Commerce Corporation and Wells Fargo Securities, levying fraud charges against both groups in relation to the bankruptcy of former game developer 38 Studios. In its complaint, the SEC is alleging that both groups knew that the $75 million loan that brought 38 Studios to the state would be insufficient to cover their costs and withheld that information. In addition, it is alleged that Wells Fargo had a conflict of interest with 38 Studios that it should have disclosed during the loan period.

“We allege that the RIEDC and Wells Fargo knew that 38 Studios needed an additional $25 million to fund the project yet failed to pass that material information along to bond investors, who were denied a complete financial picture.”
-SEC Enforcement Division Director Andrew Ceresney

The SEC joins the Rhode Island Economic Development Corporation alleging fraudulent dealings in the $75 million loan given to 38 Studios for the now-defunct game Project Copernicus. 38 Studios went bankrupt in 2012 after releasing their game Kingdoms of Amalur, leaving state taxpayers on the hook for $115 million in unpaid principal, interest, and fees associated with the loan.

(Source: Providence Journal)

Kickstarter Fraudsters: Free MMORPG By Vermeulen Peter

Kickstarter Fraudsters is a new column here at MMO Fallout where we look at the worst of crowdfunding, particularly in gaming, with people who expect public funding for projects that they have absolutely no qualifications to reasonably create. I use the term fraudster because it fits like a glove. Many of these creators have never worked in the industry and likely barely handle the budgeting of their own personal expenses let alone having the knowledge to plan a multi-year development cycle for a massive video game project.

You’ll find throughout this series that a lot of these projects fall into essentially the same pits in terms of making the project look good, and

The first campaign we are going to discuss is Free MMORPG by creator Vermeulen Peter. Now this guy wants over sixteen grand to fund an MMO that has no title, no screenshots, or artwork to speak of. It does have a low resolution screenshot from a Dark Age of Camelot video that he pulled off of Youtube. Just in case the campaign lacking in the most basic of details isn’t sketchy enough, we’re going to show you a screenshot from another game and say “ours is going to be like that.”

Hopefully Vermeulen isn’t one of those gamers that thinks creating video games is easy because he’s played a bunch of them and thinks he can do the same thing but with none of those filthy capitalist ideas.

So i love gaming, and i know a lot of people do. But i hate the pay to win concept that’s been going on more and more these days. But also the pay to play. Thats only good if u can play all the time u get.

This is a statement that tends to come out of the most deluded sections of the gaming community, those who not only demand their media completely free but who regard content creators as effectively indentured servants here for our enjoyment and perhaps a smidgen of ad revenue if we feel generous and shut off our ad blockers. Perhaps Vermeulen should look up the numerous indie developers who thought that they could release their game for free and rely on ad revenue only to find out that it doesn’t pay a living wage let alone enough to sustain the servers.

I want to create an MMORPG based on Dark age of camelot (hence the foto) that is 100% free to play. No advantages can be bought, not even looks ingame.

You have to wonder at what point Vermeulen looked at the Kickstarter draft and said to himself “this makes complete sense.” The idea here is that he is going to crowdfund a game that is completely free and has no in-game monetization system. Even if you back the Kickstarter campaign, you get absolutely nothing. Not even a poorly made T-Shirt or wristband. If you back at one hundred Euros, you get alpha access to a game that has no more details than “it’s like DAoC.” Can I pay by check?

So what is the incentive to pledge? You can spend money and get nothing, or not pay anything and wait for the game to release after which everything will be free anyway. This is the problem with Kickstarters that treat the system like it’s a charity: They think anyone will care about a project that wants something in return for nothing. If you’re going to give everything away for free, good luck convincing people to pay you. Either your project releases anyway or it fails and they lose nothing, there are certainly enough free games available that your absence will not be missed.

Generally you want to give people a reason to pledge to your campaign, like a discount or swag. Everyone loves swag, you’d be surprised how many college students you can convince to sign up for a credit card by offering them a free beer cozy.

The more I read this, the more convinced I am that this campaign is funding a Dark Age of Camelot private server, and I’m not just saying that because none of the money is going toward actual game development:

All money is to get the hardware, startup the internet connection, and get legal software. Afterwards i will get my income with selling add space on my website.

I also have bad news for you, Vermeulen: Funding your game server through website ads is a failed proposition, not least of which because your intended audience who want everything for free and refuse to actively fund your game in any fashion? Those people are also likely using ad blockers. You also have to give people an incentive to visit the website, because once they have the client there isn’t much reason other than to check patch notes every now and then. Compare to a game like RuneScape where, out of the eighty thousand concurrent users logged in right now, forty five of them are using the forums.

The plus side of campaigns like this is that they are overwhelmingly likely to fail with maybe one or two backers total. If you’d like to waste your money and receive nothing in return, you have until the 23rd to back this campaign.

The Division Is Slamming Amazon’s Best Seller List

With The Division’s launch just a few days away, it shouldn’t be too surprising that the title is ranking high on Amazon’s best seller list. The Playstation 4 standard version is the second best selling game on the list so far, outranked only by the recently released Twilight Princess remake on Nintendo WiiU. The Xbox One version ranks in at #10 overall while also being the fourth best selling game under Fire Emblem Fates: Birthright on the Nintendo 3DS.

The gold versions of both games rank in at #33 and #56 on Playstation and Xbox respectively, with the PC version at #47. Naturally the list only covers sales through Amazon’s store and does not take into account other retailers. Overall mileage may vary. The Amazon best seller list is generally dominated by currency and subscription cards for Playstation, along with controllers and console bundles.

The Division launches March 8th on Playstation 4, Xbox One, and PC.

[Column] EA Access Is A Pretty Good Deal

EA Access is a side-service available for Xbox One that trades a subscription for access to numerous Electronic Arts titles. $5 monthly or $30 annually grants access to the EA Vault, a number of full games, and ten hour trials of games that recently released or in many cases haven’t been released yet. There are other perks that have shown up, like a 10% discount to EA titles when buying digitally, occasional sales, and more likely on the way.

As someone who doesn’t exactly play many of EA’s games, I bought into the annual subscription with some doubts. After a few months of using the service, I am confident that it has paid itself off between the free games and free trials, and I wanted to offer my experience because a cursory glance around the web shows numerous people having the same reaction I did: “A subscription to play EA games? What a ripoff!” As I’ve learned covering MMOs, the very presence of a subscription service tends to leave a bad taste in people’s mouths, especially when stacked on top of another subscription (in this case Xbox Live).

And let’s be clear about one thing, I’m not saying that this service is for everyone. For some, EA Access will objectively offer nothing of value, and I make that clear in my points below. For everyone else, it’s a matter of weighing costs and benefits, and I promise not to dive into the though processes of “at $2.50 a month, you can’t afford not to subscribe!” This article specifically covers the Xbox version of EA Access.

1. If You Like Sports Games…

Let’s be fair, the girth of sports titles in the EA Access vault is because Electronic Arts knows exactly how quickly sales drop after a new Madden or NHL game releases, but if you’re a sports fan on a budget then $30 a year to play all of the previous year’s sports titles isn’t a bad deal at all. Right now a subscription gets you access to Madden 16, FIFA 15, NBA Live 15, NHL 15, Madden 15, EA Sports UFC, Madden 25, and FIFA 14. Three football, two soccer, one basketball, hockey, and MMA fighting.

The inclusion of Madden NFL 16 to the list last month is probably a sign that you won’t have to wait until the next game in the series is out in order to keep up with your sports rosters, you’ll probably just have to wait for the sales to diminish to within the margin of error. If you consider pricing, $30 for a year to play a number of sports titles, so long as you’re willing to be six or seven months behind the latest release, isn’t a bad deal. If you do buy the current sports titles, EA Access gives 10% off of those Ultimate Team packs that sell so well according to EA’s reports.

In addition, you have UFC 2, NBA Live 16, FIFA 16, NHL 16, and Rory Mcilroy PGA tour available as ten hour trials, so in addition to the previous year’s sports titles you also have access to a fair amount of play on the current list of games to give you an idea on whether or not you want to buy up. And look at it this way, by the time Madden/NHL/FIFA 17 comes out, 16 will probably be playable in the vault for free.

2. 10 Hour Trials

I was surprised to see EA offering ten hour trials on some of their newest games, since it clashes with the push on opening day/week sales being the most crucial to a title’s success. Having some form of trial system makes sense, Playstation Plus offers full game trials in the realm of an hour or so to give a nugget of gameplay and then cut it off while the momentum is still going. And while you might assume that the trials are of older titles or EA Partner games, the list is populated by Star Wars Battlefront, Need for Speed, Unravel, and Plants Vs Zombies 2. In fact, many of these games are pushing ten hour trials before launch day.

A 10 hour trial is risky business; it’s more than enough time for many gamers to burn out on a title they would have bought and lost interest in the same time frame, with the only difference being EA loses on a $60 sale. The presence of very new titles showing up on EA Access can groom customers into putting off pre-ordering to wait for the demo, thus harming game sales even further. Finally, it means that the game has to engage the player on a level that, after the ten hours, they are still willing to go out and pay full price for the title.

I suppose in a way that the game trials could at least improve sales further down the line. Someone who plays the game through the end of the trial period must have liked something about it, otherwise they would have stopped playing by then, and that person might see the game months down the line at $30 and pick it up. It isn’t a full priced sale, but it is a sale nonetheless. Or they’ll just wait for it to hit the EA Access vault.

For me, this function saved me the money of buying Star Wars: Battlefront. After playing a good eight hours of the trial, I’m glad that I didn’t throw down any real money. Sure EA lost a sale, but they saved themselves a disgruntled, disappointed customer for future games.

3. The Vault

I’d be willing to put money down on Dragon Age: Inquisition being a big factor in many EA Access purchases, at least considering the game was added to the vault less than a year after its launch and happens to be the only game apart from Titanfall and Popcap’s games that isn’t part of an annual franchise. The list of titles in the EA Vault are games that the hardcore fans already picked up on day one, meaning the subscription is a way to pick up some revenue from the moderately interested.

Currently the vault includes Madden 16, Battlefield Hardline, Dragon Age: Inquisition, NBA Live 15, FIFA 15, NHL 15, Madden 15, UFC, Titanfall, Plants Vs Zombies: Garden Warfare, Peggle 2, Need for Speed Rivals, NFL 25, FIFA 14, Battlefield 4, and Plants Vs Zombies. Many of the games on the vault are showing up less than a year after launch, as low as six months and likely well before they hit $30 retail.

The downside is that EA’s vault happens to target a very specific demographic: Shooter and sports fans. If you have no interest in Battlefield/Titanfall or EA Sports, there is literally nothing here for you outside of a couple of Popcap games that can be bought cheap elsewhere and Dragon Age: Inquisition that can likely be picked up pre-owned on the cheap. Since many of the EA Sports titles abandoned the PC platform years ago, they’ve been replaced in the Vault library with the full Dragon Age and Dead Space series, as well as Sim City and This War of Mine. If it weren’t for the annual $30 price being unavailable on PC, I’d say it was a better deal than the Xbox One version.

On another hand, many of the games in EA’s vault play better with the knowledge that you didn’t pay (specifically) for them. No, I’m not technically playing Battlefield 4 for free, but as part of the bundle there isn’t a specific value to attach and say “I spent $x for this?”

4. Sales

I put this one low on the list because it targets a smaller, but growing audience if you read sales numbers: If you buy multiple EA games at launch every year and don’t mind buying digital, EA Access is a bargain. 10% off of digital orders means you’re paying off your annual subscription after five games, not considering any expansions or microtransactions you buy in between, and also not factoring in the free games added to the vault.

EA Origin Fraud Protection May Incur Delays

If you’re looking to make a purchase in the Origin store, you may find your order delayed by up to three days. In a post released today on the Dark Age of Camelot website, Broadsword Entertainment warns that new fraud detection tools may flag purchases depending on several variables including number of codes purchased, resulting in the buyer not receiving their code until the next day.

This timeframe is dependant on the number of codes purchased at once as well as other variables. Most players should still receive their codes within 24 hours, however, it would be a good idea to order any new game time codes 72 hours prior to your account subscription ending if you wish to guarantee no subscription downtime.

Any user whose code isn’t delivered after three days is asked to contact EA’s customer support with the phrase “I did not receive my code after making a purchase on the Origin store. My order# is #####.” The news post warns that any other message could cause the email to be diverted to the DAoC crew, who can’t help with such problems.

(Source: Dark Age of Camelot)

Learn About Guild Wars 2 Animations

Ever had any interest in what goes into animating your favorite characters and bosses? In the latest episode of Guild Chat, Arenanet’s game designers discuss concepts like reusing animation rigs, how to scale bosses up to a larger size, and dealing with animation speeds. The entire video is nearly an hour and has plenty of footage of in-game animations from start to finish.

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