Good news, Phantasy Star Universe! The long-awaited MAG+ update will be going live January 29th and will be running through March 12th. This event brings players together to compete for prizes, medals, and more, offering current subscribers on the Xbox360 to enjoy the rewards for plenty of time to come. MAG+, or MAXIMUM ATTACK G+ as Sega calls it, introduces new levels of difficulty and new rewards. The event will also feature live leaderboards, reward information, with the best prizes going to the gold, silver, and bronze.
Oh and Phantasy Star Universe will be shut down on the Ps2 and PC, while 360 servers will remain online for the time being. The shut down is expected to take place on March 31st. The move is, of course, due to low subscriber numbers.
But do not fret, PSUsers!
“this server / service closure is helping to pave the way for bigger and better things for the Phantasy Star franchise in the very near future!”
Yes, the Phantasy Star Online line of MMOs may have a life expectancy of two to three years, and have had every title crash and burn due to low sales and even lower subscriber numbers, but rest assured Sega will be there to make another Phantasy Star Online that will also have a lower life span than your average bottle of water.
More on Phantasy Star seven through thirty as it appears.
The Atari of old was a great company that brought gaming to the home platform, with Pong and later consoles. Between the Pong box, the Atari 2600, Atari defined the industry, and was responsible for the classic games before the games we now consider classic, not to mention a console that spawned thousands of shovelware titles.
When the discussion comes to the new Atari, there is a different story. I believe I referred to Atari on a website that is not MMO Fallout, as an empty shell of a company that not only couldn’t keep itself on the NASDAQ stock listing, had a failed European branch, and has undergone more cosmetic surgery to change face than any other company in the business. Despite being relegated to the position of publisher for any notable title over the past decade, Atari has been downsized to the elderly man who keeps talking about his youth, and he buys up the younger crowd so he can live through them, even though his limbs are falling off from years of mistreatment.
I usually don’t talk about publishers, but since Cryptic Studios is obligated to use Atari as their publisher (being a subsidiary and all), I’ll make an exception. If you are considering buying a title that was published by Atari, it is in your best interest not to buy them directly from Atari’s store, especially if you may need to use any factor of their customer service.
Granted...
As a rule of thumb, I always do research to confirm a story before I write up about it. In this case, several players informed me that Atari has “purposely” broken their customer service in order to stop any cancellations of Star Trek Online before the game is released. Naturally, I went directly to Atari’s customer support page to investigate. What I found was that, when not busy formulating plots against Turbine (allegedly), Atari is busy not fixing their customer support contact page.
When attempting to contact customer support, one must first include a purchase number or email address, and choose from the drop boxes which category they are looking for. I filled out the first drop box with no issue, but then the problem hit me: The second drop box does not load, making it impossible to fill out the form. Having tried this with every major browser, on several computers through multiple networks, I can now say it is impossible to contact Atari’s customer support for their online store. Not only is it impossible to get refunds, but it is impossible to cancel orders, get support of any kind, or even contact the company to let them know that their support is broken.
If Atari is unaware of this problem, they must be feeling very proud of themselves that they must be making such great products that not a single person is emailing in with a problem. If they are aware of the issue, and if what the players are telling me is true about how long it has been broken, then this is just a drop in the bucket of Atari’s long history over the past decade of increasingly poor customer support.
I can’t say how Atari’s support is for download games, but if at all possible consider buying from another digital download service. Just remember that if something goes wrong, your only avenue will be dealing with your bank in the form of a charge back, because Atari (for all intent and purpose) is sitting in the corner with its fingers in its ears shouting “la la la la, I can’t hear you!”
The Atari of old was a great company that brought gaming to the home platform, with Pong and later consoles. Between the Pong box, the Atari 2600, Atari defined the industry, and was responsible for the classic games before the games we now consider classic, not to mention a console that spawned thousands of shovelware titles.
When the discussion comes to the new Atari, there is a different story. I believe I referred to Atari on a website that is not MMO Fallout, as an empty shell of a company that not only couldn’t keep itself on the NASDAQ stock listing, had a failed European branch, and has undergone more cosmetic surgery to change face than any other company in the business. Despite being relegated to the position of publisher for any notable title over the past decade, Atari has been downsized to the elderly man who keeps talking about his youth, and he buys up the younger crowd so he can live through them, even though his limbs are falling off from years of mistreatment.
I usually don’t talk about publishers, but since Cryptic Studios is obligated to use Atari as their publisher (being a subsidiary and all), I’ll make an exception. If you are considering buying a title that was published by Atari, it is in your best interest not to buy them directly from Atari’s store, especially if you may need to use any factor of their customer service.
Granted...
As a rule of thumb, I always do research to confirm a story before I write up about it. In this case, several players informed me that Atari has “purposely” broken their customer service in order to stop any cancellations of Star Trek Online before the game is released. Naturally, I went directly to Atari’s customer support page to investigate. What I found was that, when not busy formulating plots against Turbine (allegedly), Atari is busy not fixing their customer support contact page.
When attempting to contact customer support, one must first include a purchase number or email address, and choose from the drop boxes which category they are looking for. I filled out the first drop box with no issue, but then the problem hit me: The second drop box does not load, making it impossible to fill out the form. Having tried this with every major browser, on several computers through multiple networks, I can now say it is impossible to contact Atari’s customer support for their online store. Not only is it impossible to get refunds, but it is impossible to cancel orders, get support of any kind, or even contact the company to let them know that their support is broken.
If Atari is unaware of this problem, they must be feeling very proud of themselves that they must be making such great products that not a single person is emailing in with a problem. If they are aware of the issue, and if what the players are telling me is true about how long it has been broken, then this is just a drop in the bucket of Atari’s long history over the past decade of increasingly poor customer support.
I can’t say how Atari’s support is for download games, but if at all possible consider buying from another digital download service. Just remember that if something goes wrong, your only avenue will be dealing with your bank in the form of a charge back, because Atari (for all intent and purpose) is sitting in the corner with its fingers in its ears shouting “la la la la, I can’t hear you!”
I have good news and bad news. The good news is that Project V13, the fabled Fallout MMO and namesake for this blog, is trucking along and will be hitting beta soon. The bad news is that by soon, I mean soon in Valve Time, and it may be likely that the beta will trigger the end of the world as we know it.
In a recent posting over at Interplay’s website, the company has announced that they have been working with Masthead Studios to bring their vision of Fallout to life, with all of the vaults, irradiated beverages, and super mutants that you know and love. Even more descriptively was the note that Project V13 will be using the same proprietary tools as Earthrise.
“Masthead joined the project in early 2009 and development continues under Interplay’s direction and control. Project: V13 will utilize the proprietary tools and MMOG technology Masthead developed for its “Earthrise” project.”
How soon is this beta, you say, Omali? Not soon enough that you shouldn’t put off buying anything. We’re looking at mid to late 2012.
“This MMOG will have many unique features that we will disclose before launch of the public Beta in 2012.”
But it isn’t all bad. Tell me, Interplay, will Project V13 be innovative, or will it be just a sad re-skinning of functions and mechanics we have already seen before?
“Project: V13 incorporates many creative and technological innovations. We believe it will be a unique experience. Our technology will continue to evolve in order to realize all the extraordinary content and features Interplay has designed.”
Good enough for me. More on Project V13 when we get closer to the beta in two years.
Lord of the Rings Online uses this room as well...
Hey there ex-Fallen Earth and Lord of the Rings Online players! I know what you’ve been thinking, “I’d like to get back into [insert game here], but I just don’t have the cash right now to foot the fee for a game I don’t even know I will still enjoy!” Boy do I have a surprise for you. Both Fallen Earth and Lord of the Rings Online are running welcome back campaigns!
Fallen Earth players should have received an invitation through email by now. The offer is for ten free days to check out all the new updates, from graphics enhancements to the new construction skill, optimizations, and more! All you have to do is log into your Fallen Earth account on Fallen Earth’s website and follow the instructions to activate your free ten days.
Lord of the Rings Online, on the other hand, is giving you a free weekend. Second to Valve for free weekends, Turbine is offering the game from today until Monday for absolutely free, plus benefits! Players who partake in this offering will find that stable-masters have lowered their price to absolutely free, not to mention a 5% experience buff that will stack on top of your rest experience.
I’m mentioning both Fallen Earth and Lord of the Rings Online not just because both happen to be running this offer concurrently, but because both companies are well known for treating their customers well. Fallen Earth continues to grow in subscribers, and Lord of the Rings Online is one of the sleepy giants of the MMO World. Anyone looking to get some free time with the updated version of either game should dive into it.
Unless you’re in Europe, in which case you can’t partake in the LOTRO free weekend. Sorry! Consider complaining to Codemasters, assuming you aren’t already.
The saga of NCsoft account security continues with the confirmation that an existent exploit in NCsoft’s systems. Not too long ago, I reported on Scayth, an Aion player whose account was compromised while it was inactive. The account was looted, and one or more of the characters may have been used for gold farming purposes.
Thanks to Scayth’s ongoing updates over at Aionsource, he was able to procure a reply (finally) from NCsoft over the account issues. The full image is below, but I will summarize:
The majority of accounts compromised have been through social engineering, viruses, fansites, and keyloggers.
The account was never hacked, the individual characters were. The account itself was not in any danger.
The hacker was able to use packet manipulation to access different characters at whim. The process is “very complicated” and did not give them full access.
Few characters can be accessed in this fashion, Scayth just happened to be one of the unlucky few, among 10 others who were also restored.
The process tricked the system into believing that the character belonged to that account.
The servers were hotfixed to prevent this that same day.
This will explain it all.
What will come next in the NCsoft security saga? MMO Fallout will certainly be here to cover the events.
The saga of NCsoft account security continues with the confirmation that an existent exploit in NCsoft’s systems. Not too long ago, I reported on Scayth, an Aion player whose account was compromised while it was inactive. The account was looted, and one or more of the characters may have been used for gold farming purposes.
Thanks to Scayth’s ongoing updates over at Aionsource, he was able to procure a reply (finally) from NCsoft over the account issues. The full image is below, but I will summarize:
The majority of accounts compromised have been through social engineering, viruses, fansites, and keyloggers.
The account was never hacked, the individual characters were. The account itself was not in any danger.
The hacker was able to use packet manipulation to access different characters at whim. The process is “very complicated” and did not give them full access.
Few characters can be accessed in this fashion, Scayth just happened to be one of the unlucky few, among 10 others who were also restored.
The process tricked the system into believing that the character belonged to that account.
The servers were hotfixed to prevent this that same day.
This will explain it all.
What will come next in the NCsoft security saga? MMO Fallout will certainly be here to cover the events.
Because you didn't look enough like a nerd before.
Ask someone who strays away from MMOs what their biggest fear about the genre is, and chances are one of those answers will be along the lines of “looking like a nerd.” Despite World of Warcraft, among other games, bringing MMOs into the mainstream audience, many MMOers (alongside video games as a whole) still fear the age old stereotype that we are all basement dwelling nerds with pale skin who live with our parents at the age of 30, dress up as female characters, and participate in LARPing. Now, I may not have a basement, and my Irish/Croatian/German mixture does leave me with mayonnaise-esque skin, and I am under all consideration a nerd, however I am at least ten years off of 30, and still in college.
But I’m getting off track here. Blizzard’s recent update (as with all updates) is causing quite an outrage among privacy advocates. The update to the Armory now broadcasts all of the player’s feats in real time, with the option to subscribe via RSS. Players are also unable to opt out of this feed, or keep it protected to friends and family, making it the bane of players who either shouldn’t be playing World of Warcraft, or those who happen to boot the game up at work.
Now, these players may just be wearing their +10 armor tinfoil hat, but there is something to be said about not wanting your activities broadcast for all to see. Chances are, most of you have had marathons that you wouldn’t want broadcast, staying up that extra half hour that turned into a 3am raid, and by the time you got to sleep the sun was coming back up. But I digress.
One of the MMO Fallout Scouters in WoW reported that this is in fact a useful tool to guilds. Using the RSS feed for raids, Guild Leaders could consolidate the members of the raid to a feed, where they could monitor what the players are looting to ensure that no one is breaking the guild’s rules secretly.
I’m not going to bother going into the legality that people are bringing up, because the move is legal. Blizzard does still have full ownership over everyone’s account, and this is in the terms of service and EULA. Whether or not Blizzard adds an opt-out for this feature comes down to how many players are willing to vote with their wallets and leave over this. Other than that, this all comes down to player’s prerogative.
If you are reading this and have not heeded my own, Funcom’s, and other’s warnings to save your inactive, low level characters from deletion, you are too late. As of earlier this morning, Age of Conan’s servers went offline for what will be a twelve hour downtime. Characters that have been inactive for at least seven months prior to today, and are under level 20 (and still in the tutorial) will be deleted as part of an effort to consolidate data, and in preparation for upcoming server mergers.
Naturally there will be players who will complain over this idea, and I did mention in the past article that this would end up being perceived as a grab for money by some, and a threat to others. However, in Funcom’s defense, setting up a separate database with unused characters is not worth the resources it would take to port them back into the game at a future date, especially considering it would likely cost the user money, at a price not worth spending on a character that has yet to make way out of the tutorial. I also noted that a lot of the criticism was coming from players who had no intention of playing either way, a group I have noted several times in the past whose feedback should be ignored at all opportunities.
More on Age of Conan, such as the upcoming server mergers, as it appears.
Although I regularly bring up my disdain for writing about rumors here on MMO Fallout, I regularly report on MMOs that fall within the levels of not completely confirmed, but at the same time not confirmed to be false either. Although I intended the Upcoming category to be used for MMOs that are in development, eventually it got to the point where there are so many titles flying in and out of each state: Rumor, confirmed, not confirmed, confirmed, still a rumor, not going to happen, and back again.
So I created a new category to deal with those MMOs that aren’t quite confirmed, the Rumor Mill. Rumor Mill games fit under one of the following categories:
Confirmed, but unnamed: Blizzard’s MMO is an example of this. We know Blizzard is working on an MMO, but we have no name and no other information. When Blizzard names this title, it will find its place in the Upcoming category.
Unconfirmed: MMO ideas rise and fall like flies, every 24 hours. The prospect of a Harry Potter MMO was born and died practically overnight, not to mention a Halo MMO, and other ideas. This is the main meat of the Rumor Mill, titles that have been hinted at but not officially confirmed.
Uncertain Of Release: If an MMO’s release is in question, I will also place it in the Rumor Mill. Naturally, the Fallout MMO and Stargate Worlds qualified for this category. This is one of the rarer cases, and if a title is confirmed to not be coming out, the category will simply be deleted, rather than moved over to defunct.
I have received a few emails, both joking and serious, calling the way I treat categories “elitist,” but in all honesty it is simply to keep the website organized. There are slightly over 40 games with their own category, and as cluttered as the “live” section is, will be growing over time, and yet I still don’t hold a candle to mmorpg.com, that follows every MMO and currently has over 400 titles listed.
So in order to remove the strain from the “live” section, I set up a new category to move the more popular titles over to. Hot Titles is where you’ll find the most discussed games on MMO Fallout. Not necessarily the most popular player-wise, but that have the most news coverage. For example, Age of Conan is actually the hottest topic on MMO Fallout, although “Age of Conan nude” comes under less than 1% of those search terms.
MMO Fallout 