Dungeons and Dragons went free to play earlier this year, and ever since then Turbine has been on the hot streak with the title. Apart from opening up a new server, Turbine noted a 40% increase in paying subscribers as a result of this program. Players are enjoying the game, paying for content, and the game has turned into an even bigger cash cow for Turbine. So I know what you’re thinking, prospective Dungeons and Dragons Online Players: Omali, how can this deal get sweeter? Does Turbine have an update, let’s call it Update 3, coming out that will make Dungeons and Dragons Online even better, even if I don’t want to pay?
That is an extremely specific question, and good enough that I have an extremely specific answer! The answer of course is yes. Turbine has raised the bar once again, offering more to free players while at the same time not detracting from the subscriber experience.
Leveling sigils are no more, removing the limit on levels on free players.
New high level dungeons for all players.
Solo difficulty has been removed and replaced with “casual” difficulty. Essentially it is solo difficulty, but able to be used by groups.
And new items in the item mall.
While you’re at it, take part in two new events in celebration of the game’s upcoming 4 year anniversary (February 26th).
Dungeons and Dragons remains among the best free to play games on the market, and if you have not checked the title out, now is as good of a time as any. Dungeons and Dragons Online still receives regular major content updates every two to three months.
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!”
(Updated at bottom with response from Hasbro)
It’s been a while since I’ve updated you all on the ongoing Turbine Vs Atari lawsuit, so a recap is in the bill, Judge Judy style:
Plaintiff: Turbine is the developer of Dungeons and Dragons Online. They are suing Atari, the publisher, for not doing an efficient job of promoting the title. Turbine is also accusing Atari of purposely downplaying the game in order to, at a future date, cut the license with the intent of shutting down Dungeons and Dragons Online in favor of Atari’s own rumored upcoming MMO based on the same franchise.
Defendant: Atari is the license holder for Dungeons and Dragons and Advanced Dungeons and Dragons video games, and is also the publisher of Dungeons and Dragons Online. They are being sued for fraud.
The implications of a developer-publisher lawsuit are pretty clear. If Turbine wins, they get to keep the license until 2016, which will most likely be several years after DDO is six feet underground. If Turbine loses the lawsuit, you can certainly expect Atari to cut them off at the earliest opportunity, possibly shutting the game down along with them.
I’ve been trying to find a video version of this for a little while now, and for some odd reason it never occurred to me to search Youtube. So without further ado, one of the best MMO banner ads of 2009, from Dungeons and Dragons Online: Broccoli Vs The Beholder.
“The corollary to that is if you’ve seen a game consolidate servers, you know it’s in deep, deep trouble — that’s not a healthy sign for an MMO, It will be the same for ‘Warhammer.’ Look at us six months out. Look at us six weeks out. If we’re not adding servers, we’re not doing well.”
-Mark Jacobs, Mythic VP
Thank you, Mark. What Mark Jacobs, Vice President over at Mythic Entertainment is trying to say is that success in an MMO can usually be seen by looking at whether or not the company is adding servers. Earlier in September, as we all know by now, Turbine turbine’d Dungeons and Dragons Online into a free to play game, with pay to play subscriptions as well as a microtransaction system. After the game relaunched, Turbine noted a 40% increase in subscriptions.
Well, Mark Jacobs can eat his heart out. Turbine will be opening a new server to deal with the incoming flood of players.
Imagine this, gentlemen: You’re walking through the streets, and at the corner you come across a beautiful woman, clad in nothing but a frilly bra and underwear. As she looks at you seductively, using the hottest /dance emote available, she says “4g 4 l4p d4nc3.” All of a sudden, you notice something about her is wrong. The chin, the hairy arms, the Adam’s Apple. IT’S A MAN, BABY!
If you’re a player who enjoys the occasional pixelated groping, or you work as a GM on Age of Conan, you’ll be glad to hear that, at least on King of the World that you won’t have to worry about that woman actually being a man behind the screen. Taking the phrase “pics or it didn’t happen” literally, and requires players to submit webcam pictures of themselves, otherwise male players playing as female avatars will be banned.
I reported last week that Turbine is currently suing Atari over fraud and extortion claims. If you’ve forgotten the gist of the lawsuit, Turbine has sued Atari, claiming extortion and fraud. Atari is claiming owed royalty payments over the MMO Dungeons and Dragons Online, while Turbine is claiming that not only are royalties being paid in advance, but Atari has planned to set this situation up, in order to terminate Turbine as the developer, and to go further and possibly shut down Dungeons and Dragons Online to make way for a rumored Neverwinter Nights MMO.
Atari’s response, sent to Shacknews:
Last week, with no warning, Turbine filed what can only be viewed as a frivolous lawsuit against Atari. This action can ultimately do a great disservice to D&D fans and to the MMO community at large. Turbine�s actions also appear intended to divert attention from the contractual obligations that Turbine owes to Atari. In response, today Atari served a motion to dismiss the entirety of Turbine’s lawsuit. Atari also filed a separate complaint to recover monies owed to Atari resulting from an independent third party audit of Turbine. While Atari hopes for a quick and fair resolution, it remains fully committed to the D&D communities worldwide and will vigorously protect the franchise and its own integrity in this matter.
Lawsuits between publisher and developer never end well, anyone who remembers the problems Valve got into when Half Life 2 was released can attest to this (The publisher sued Valve claiming Steam was stealing sales). If Turbine wins this lawsuit, in addition to whatever monetary gain they will receive, they will also keep their recently renewed license for DDO, that lasts until 2016 (Most likely long after DDO shuts down). If Atari wins, you can probably expect Turbine to be axed at the first opportunity Atari gets. With a lawsuit like this, undoubtedly there is going to be bad blood between the companies.
I’ve seen a few websites on this recent lawsuit that Turbine has filed against their publisher, Atari, and the whole thing sounds like a James Bond film, albeit corporate instead of the world. All in all, I found the reporting somewhat confusing, as to who had what motives, and what exactly was going on. So I decided to set up a new section of MMO Fallout, “In Plain English”, where things can be spelled out clearly and in context the average user can understand.
MMO Fallout 