Vivox Voice Chat Coming To Cryptic Studios Titles


Cryptic Studios

Vivox is a company you may be familiar with, even if you don’t fully recognize the name. The company provides voice chat to a wide range of MMOs and services, from Sony Online Entertainment (Everquest/Star Wars Galaxies), Fallen Earth, Eve Online, and even All Points…moving on. Vivox also hosts for titles like IMVU, D&D Insider, NCsoft, and more.

The company has taken the MMO industry by storm, and if your MMO has voice chat (Combat Arms, Global Agenda, RoM, I could go on), the chat is likely provided via partnership with Vivox. So, unsurprisingly, in addition to Vivox’s continued Skynet-esque approach to inserting itself into every MMO on the market, Cryptic announced on the Champions Online and Star Trek Online websites that the two will be receiving voice chat.

Vivox, Inc., the number one integrated voice platform for the Social Web, and Cryptic Studios, a leading developer of massively-multiplayer online role playing games (MMORPG) and a subsidiary of Atari, Inc., today announced a platform agreement that will integrate Vivox Voice services into all Cryptic titles.

The announcement does note that the chat function is coming to “all Cryptic titles,” and given the reliance on teamwork in Neverwinter Online, it is safe to assume that Vivox will also be providing support for that game as well.

Mortal Online: Revolutionizing Mounts In MMOs!


Seeing Henrik Nystrom post on the Mortal Online always reminds me of watching a kid describing his favorite super hero, just because I can’t read Henrik’s description of an impending update and not think “and then Superman flies and, and everyone is like ‘whoa,’ and then he grabs a car with his super strength and he smashes the bad guy like POW, BAM, POW!”

Today’s post comes from the Mortal Online forums, where Henrik has an announcement about an upcoming mount update:

Revolutionize mounts in MMOs you say? Why, that would be even better than an update that was just like Mortal Online 2, or as one deleted post put it:

Technically, MasterCrafter (if that is your real username), you left out the part where Henrik blames Epic Games. Although, if the update is as revolutionary to Mortal Online as Henrik says it is, the mounts may have the power to keep the server running online for more than ten concurrent hours without crashing.

More on Mortal Online, and what is and is not the fault of Epic China, as it appears.

Age of Empires Online: Your Mom's Video Blog


Ya ever had a corn sandwich? The wounds from Ensemble Studios’ closure may still be fresh, but the guys over at Gas Powered Games want you to know that they are putting their full attention into Age of Empires Online. Hopefully this studio, known for their Dungeon Siege and Supreme Commander games, will be able to make the transition to MMORTS.

Age of Empires Online is currently in beta.

Age of Empires Online: Your Mom’s Video Blog


Ya ever had a corn sandwich? The wounds from Ensemble Studios’ closure may still be fresh, but the guys over at Gas Powered Games want you to know that they are putting their full attention into Age of Empires Online. Hopefully this studio, known for their Dungeon Siege and Supreme Commander games, will be able to make the transition to MMORTS.

Age of Empires Online is currently in beta.

Ryzom Going Freemium


Ryzom is one of those titles that may have slipped under your radar. Originally launched in 2004 by Nevrax, Ryzom is a science-fantasy MMO. The game aims to create a living breathing world, offering features such as animals that hunt one another, resources that become unavailable at certain seasons, and more. The game operates on a skill-based system. After Nevrax was acquired, and the game went bankrupt, Ryzom was picked up by Winch Gate, who currently publishes and develops the game.

Starting March 9th, Ryzom is opening up the trial to include the first 125 levels (out of a maximum 250), with no time or area limitations. There are other limitations on inventory, apartment, and guilds that apply.

And as Yumeroh put it:

Despite the freedom of this new system, we would like to remind you that Ryzom can only live on through your paid subscriptions. Thank you for the confidence you have in us.

Holy Charm! Charms Are Free in Allods Online


Why So battered?

Previously on MMO Fallout:

In the July 7th patch, Fear of Death is going to be removed and replaced with item curses. When a player dies now, there is the chance that a curse will land on a slot in their inventory. If the item is rare (Rare, epic, or legendary only) the curse will invert the stats of the item. More importantly, bosses now have a chance of dropping rare items in an already cursed form. So, as one Allod Online’er put it, Astrum Nival essentially took a temporary grievance that can be waited out, and turned it into a permanent grievance that must, without exception, be fixed with a cash shop item or heavy gold in the auction house.

It’s been eight months since I talked about Allods Online, and the update that added in item curses. After my post, gPotato implemented a cash shop item called the Holy Charm, which is the cash shop item described above. Also in that eight months, I believe that the holy charm has far outweighed its presence, because gPotato appears to be gearing up to remove the item, and possibly the curse mechanic altogether.

In a news post on the Allods Online website, PioPico has announced that Holy Charms are now completely free! There are no limits to how many you can buy (aside from how many you can hold), and the post does not specify if this sale is permanent or only temporary. If you do play Allods Online, there isn’t much of a reason not to stockpile these. Otherwise, if gPotato does keep the mechanic in and the sale ends, at least the prices should come down heavily in the game’s auction house (albeit, doing that they may as well rename Allods Online to Zimbabwe Online, with how high inflation would be).

More on Allods Online as it appears.

Thirty More Rift Servers Today


Just enough time to watch the Lord of the Rings Extended Director's Cut Trilogy

Less than a week ago, I mentioned that Trion was opening up over twenty new servers for Rift’s head start, after population built up into fifteen hour long lines just to log in. Of course it is worth pointing out that, with any MMO launch, a few of these servers will be going the way of the Dodo a few months out when the game has settled down to its base population.

Not content with adding twenty three new servers, Trion is looking to throw even more realms onto the pile, with the announcement of another 31 servers that will be added in March 1st (today) for launch. The official list contains 19 US servers, with 12 in Europe divided into 9 EN, 2 DE, and 1 French. The resulting count leaves server figures at 58 North American servers and 41 European servers.

When the time does come to it, hopefully Trion will be able to merge servers quickly and efficiently. You can check out the full server list here, or by ordering Rift from one of the many MMO Fallout-trusted retailers, and then log in.

Runes of Magic Coming To A Browser Near You!


of Magic

Back in the day, you may remember that Dungeon Runners was set to receive a transfer to the web browser shortly before death. Due to the nature of MMOs being the opera singers (read: fat) of the gaming genre, free to play titles have a harder time gaining new customers when that means convincing someone who is jumping from title to title to sit down for another multi-gigabyte game they may hate after five minutes. Now, games like Runescape and Battlestar Galactica and FusionFall work with small downloads, through the browser. Turbine, Sony, and Blizzard attempted to fix this as well by offering streaming downloads, where you only download a portion of the game, and the rest downloads as it is needed.

Last year in October, Frogster released a 3.5gig client for Runes of Magic, carrying the same functionality at a smaller size than its 7gig counterpart, as well as carrying higher optimization and better performance. Apparently this wasn’t far enough, as Frogster has announced through press email that Facebook and browser based versions of Runes of Magic are coming, fully functional. Expected to be arrive in Q2 2011, Runes of Magic browser edition will open up a legion of untapped customers.

I can only hope that Frogster will invite me to swim in their money jacuzzi after this update goes live.

Rift: **** Your One Additional Server!


Just enough time to kill a FFXI boss.

Rift’s head start launched out the door yesterday, and almost immediately the title was punched in the throat, dragged into a back alleyway, and beaten with a metal club for all of its bandwidth. Of course, those of you familiar with MMO launches will be well aware of the launch-day queue lines, matched and surpassed only by lines for new rides at Disney Land. Everquest added one new progression server due to the overwhelming demand. Trion, on the other hand, has added over 20.

At the start of the day, Trion had added in 13 servers, comprising of seven US servers. Over the course of the day, ten more servers were added to continue alleviating stress on existing shards. Depending on how the game goes at the true launch, more servers may have to be added to compensate for the additional, additional load.

Being who I am, I have to add my voice of pessimism. Once the pre-launch hype wears down and the post-free-month community settles in, the excess servers will likely be merged. Of course, Rift could continue growing after launch, in which case you are free to take this article, sharpen the edges, and use it to murder me in my own apartment.

http://forums.riftgame.com/showthread.php?87152-New-Servers-for-Head-Start-(Updated-5-00-pm-PST)

Community Concerns #3: The Revival


I'm legally required to remind you to game responsibly.

Today’s “Absolutely Brilliant!” comes from user Gnatbug on the MMORPG.com forums. Gnatbug has a list of rules for how to go about buying an MMO, and although he may be a little too selective (#4), he hits right on the money.

Rule #1) Never Pre-Order unless you have played in the open beta of a game!

Rule#2) Never buy a lifetime subscription before you have played a game!

Rule#3) Always google the game to find out what others think, then make up you mind.

Rule#4) If Cryptic is developing…a game WAIT 5days before buying it …Just to make sure it has content!

Rule#5) HE WHO HAS GAS …Travels at the back of the line!

#5 couldn’t be more true.