Tag: Hellgate

Hellgate Global’s Word Filter Is Amusing


Word filters are amusing, sometimes. In the olden days of Runescape, for example, the filter would turn bad words into cabbage, so someone might say “that’s cabbage’d up.” Just a history lesson, in case you Runescape players were wondering why Jagex has historically had such an odd fascination with cabbage and things cabbage related.

Hellgate’s filter, on the other hand, is just strange. You can find the full filter list on Google, but here are some of the…not so vulgar words that are filtered:

  • Ash
  • Audition
  • bloodyhell
  • bugs
  • goddam
  • irak
  • iraq
  • sadam
  • saddam
  • wigger
I also noticed that resbian is censored, along with about twenty misspellings of fcuk. You guys thought of everything.

Hellgate Global's Word Filter Is Amusing


Word filters are amusing, sometimes. In the olden days of Runescape, for example, the filter would turn bad words into cabbage, so someone might say “that’s cabbage’d up.” Just a history lesson, in case you Runescape players were wondering why Jagex has historically had such an odd fascination with cabbage and things cabbage related.

Hellgate’s filter, on the other hand, is just strange. You can find the full filter list on Google, but here are some of the…not so vulgar words that are filtered:

  • Ash
  • Audition
  • bloodyhell
  • bugs
  • goddam
  • irak
  • iraq
  • sadam
  • saddam
  • wigger
I also noticed that resbian is censored, along with about twenty misspellings of fcuk. You guys thought of everything.

What Happened This Week: That’s Not Linguine Edition


Here’s a question for this week: If you could sit down and talk to anyone in the gaming industry, who would you talk to and what would you ask them? Over here at MMO Fallout, I came upon that decision rather easily. The Who: Free to play/cash shop developers. The What: Their business model. Thanks to the saturation by games in the East, the cash shop model was tainted long ago with the idea that any game bearing such a tag would be free to download, pay to win, and buy to compete. With the crowding of the market, the games that do wind up being buy to win are quickly shunned in the west (although they are still great money makers in Korea, China, etc) and have a habit of shutting down only a year or two outside of launch.

I’ll have more details in the weeks to come on that note, but let’s talk about what happened this week.

1. Go To Hell-Gate In a Handbasket

The Hellgate closed beta launched late Friday, and the resulting server implosion was exactly what you would expect with a 50-50 chance of being approved along with major giveaways from 3rd party websites. In fact, I’m not entirely sure that you could call the beta “limited,” given how many keys were being thrown around. Once again, however, a closed beta has gone up and every other video game must have closed doors, because the Hellgate forums are filled with whining about the servers being down, and an apparent lack of anything else to do with your time.

I’ll remind you: The servers for a free beta test for a free game are down, and people are already calling the game a “failure.” Well if the game is a failure, no sense sitting on the forums flailing your arms like toddlers in a WalMart parking lot, right? I’m sure it’s not worth noting, but I’m continually amazed by the amount of people who will (allegedly) call in sick, take the day off, skip school, to get opening day at a video game. Forgetting the obvious lack of priorities, you are guaranteed to be disappointed when the game’s servers are down due to the amount of other people who did the exact same thing.

I rarely suggest people preorder MMOs, because almost none of them have the mentality that accepts the inevitably broken/delayed features, laggy servers, and game breaking bugs. Forgoing income for the sake of playing a video game is just ridiculous in and of itself.

2. Perpetuum Online Mass Ban

Nothing says loving like a mass ban in the oveng. The guys over at Avatar want you to know that cheaters are being dealt with by the mighty banhammer. In a blog post, the team threw up this graph and briefly talked about a game mechanic being exploited in a way no one could mistake for legitimate gameplay, allowing for a massive amount of resource collection.

Good for Perpetuum. A smaller game with a smaller community has to work extra hard to get rid of cheaters.

3. You Remind Me Of Another MMO

Dear MMO,

I’ve had this odd feeling about you over the past year or so, and it wasn’t until just recently that I figured out why. That strange feeling not that I’ve played you before, but that I covered your company, despite being the first game your company has developed. You don’t share any names with this other game, but in spirit you are almost one in the same.

Then it hit me like a ton of bricks, sweeping me back into a series of waking nightmares I hadn’t experienced for around six years: Mourning. The name, its company…Colton Burgess’ cronies sending me harassing emails and private messages. Sending beta versions of the game on unlabeled Memorex CD’s. Refusing refunds, possible fraud, wiping the forums, administrators telling me to run away as fast as I can! Virtually the only MMO de-listed from MMORPG for harassment from the company-MOMMY!

Happy thoughts. Luckily I managed to close my notes before my brain was Shish Kebab’d by my wine opener. For those of you who weren’t around when Mourning was up (2005), do some Google research on Mourning, Throne of Chaos, Colton Burgess, and Loud Ant Software. Just in case you need a good laugh, or a horrifying night of no sleep.

4. Does Jagex Need Two Evony-Style MMOs?

Jagex are most known for their MMO Runescape, but did you know that the company has several products live right at this moment? Only two of which they developed in-house. Currently live, Jagex has Runescape (the Fantasy MMO) and FunOrb (mini-game collection) developed in house, while the company publishes War of Legends (Cash shop flash city builder). Upcoming, Jagex is developing Stellar Dawn, a sci-fi MMO, an unnamed fantasy MMO (not a sequel to Runescape), Transformers Online (a Transformers MMO, go figure) and 8Realms, an HTML based city builder.

I’m not saying Jagex can’t maintain two MMORTS games, given all they do with War of Legends is publish it, but you’d think much like the Pizza Hut having a problem with my local Target opening a Pizza Hut in-store and being just down the street, that the War of Legends guys would have an issue with Jagex opening up a direct competitor to their game. Of course, that may just be my speculation.

5. More Stellar Dawn, Less Transformers Online

While we’re on the subject of Jagex, let’s talk Transformers Online. Jagex had the character creator on display at Botcon 11, with some information on the upcoming MMO. The game is set in the Prime continuity, but the team is working with Hasbro to integrate as many characters as possible. The game will feature hundreds of customization options for each part of your bot, and you will indeed create your own transformers robot, on the side you choose. Further down the line, players will be able to create and upload their own parts, decals, and art to make their bots truly unique (or to just upload crudely drawn penis/swastika decals, I’m sure).

Only question remaining is: Why can’t Stellar Dawn get this kind of love? For a game that is reportedly going into beta this year, Jagex has been rather hush on the game. Why the lack of love, Jagex?

And on that note, I’m heading back into the Hellgate Global beta. Sure my character is going to be deleted, but listening to Russians spamming chat is just too good to pass up.

What Happened This Week: That's Not Linguine Edition


Here’s a question for this week: If you could sit down and talk to anyone in the gaming industry, who would you talk to and what would you ask them? Over here at MMO Fallout, I came upon that decision rather easily. The Who: Free to play/cash shop developers. The What: Their business model. Thanks to the saturation by games in the East, the cash shop model was tainted long ago with the idea that any game bearing such a tag would be free to download, pay to win, and buy to compete. With the crowding of the market, the games that do wind up being buy to win are quickly shunned in the west (although they are still great money makers in Korea, China, etc) and have a habit of shutting down only a year or two outside of launch.

I’ll have more details in the weeks to come on that note, but let’s talk about what happened this week.

1. Go To Hell-Gate In a Handbasket

The Hellgate closed beta launched late Friday, and the resulting server implosion was exactly what you would expect with a 50-50 chance of being approved along with major giveaways from 3rd party websites. In fact, I’m not entirely sure that you could call the beta “limited,” given how many keys were being thrown around. Once again, however, a closed beta has gone up and every other video game must have closed doors, because the Hellgate forums are filled with whining about the servers being down, and an apparent lack of anything else to do with your time.

I’ll remind you: The servers for a free beta test for a free game are down, and people are already calling the game a “failure.” Well if the game is a failure, no sense sitting on the forums flailing your arms like toddlers in a WalMart parking lot, right? I’m sure it’s not worth noting, but I’m continually amazed by the amount of people who will (allegedly) call in sick, take the day off, skip school, to get opening day at a video game. Forgetting the obvious lack of priorities, you are guaranteed to be disappointed when the game’s servers are down due to the amount of other people who did the exact same thing.

I rarely suggest people preorder MMOs, because almost none of them have the mentality that accepts the inevitably broken/delayed features, laggy servers, and game breaking bugs. Forgoing income for the sake of playing a video game is just ridiculous in and of itself.

2. Perpetuum Online Mass Ban

Nothing says loving like a mass ban in the oveng. The guys over at Avatar want you to know that cheaters are being dealt with by the mighty banhammer. In a blog post, the team threw up this graph and briefly talked about a game mechanic being exploited in a way no one could mistake for legitimate gameplay, allowing for a massive amount of resource collection.

Good for Perpetuum. A smaller game with a smaller community has to work extra hard to get rid of cheaters.

3. You Remind Me Of Another MMO

Dear MMO,

I’ve had this odd feeling about you over the past year or so, and it wasn’t until just recently that I figured out why. That strange feeling not that I’ve played you before, but that I covered your company, despite being the first game your company has developed. You don’t share any names with this other game, but in spirit you are almost one in the same.

Then it hit me like a ton of bricks, sweeping me back into a series of waking nightmares I hadn’t experienced for around six years: Mourning. The name, its company…Colton Burgess’ cronies sending me harassing emails and private messages. Sending beta versions of the game on unlabeled Memorex CD’s. Refusing refunds, possible fraud, wiping the forums, administrators telling me to run away as fast as I can! Virtually the only MMO de-listed from MMORPG for harassment from the company-MOMMY!

Happy thoughts. Luckily I managed to close my notes before my brain was Shish Kebab’d by my wine opener. For those of you who weren’t around when Mourning was up (2005), do some Google research on Mourning, Throne of Chaos, Colton Burgess, and Loud Ant Software. Just in case you need a good laugh, or a horrifying night of no sleep.

4. Does Jagex Need Two Evony-Style MMOs?

Jagex are most known for their MMO Runescape, but did you know that the company has several products live right at this moment? Only two of which they developed in-house. Currently live, Jagex has Runescape (the Fantasy MMO) and FunOrb (mini-game collection) developed in house, while the company publishes War of Legends (Cash shop flash city builder). Upcoming, Jagex is developing Stellar Dawn, a sci-fi MMO, an unnamed fantasy MMO (not a sequel to Runescape), Transformers Online (a Transformers MMO, go figure) and 8Realms, an HTML based city builder.

I’m not saying Jagex can’t maintain two MMORTS games, given all they do with War of Legends is publish it, but you’d think much like the Pizza Hut having a problem with my local Target opening a Pizza Hut in-store and being just down the street, that the War of Legends guys would have an issue with Jagex opening up a direct competitor to their game. Of course, that may just be my speculation.

5. More Stellar Dawn, Less Transformers Online

While we’re on the subject of Jagex, let’s talk Transformers Online. Jagex had the character creator on display at Botcon 11, with some information on the upcoming MMO. The game is set in the Prime continuity, but the team is working with Hasbro to integrate as many characters as possible. The game will feature hundreds of customization options for each part of your bot, and you will indeed create your own transformers robot, on the side you choose. Further down the line, players will be able to create and upload their own parts, decals, and art to make their bots truly unique (or to just upload crudely drawn penis/swastika decals, I’m sure).

Only question remaining is: Why can’t Stellar Dawn get this kind of love? For a game that is reportedly going into beta this year, Jagex has been rather hush on the game. Why the lack of love, Jagex?

And on that note, I’m heading back into the Hellgate Global beta. Sure my character is going to be deleted, but listening to Russians spamming chat is just too good to pass up.

What Happened This Week: 4/15-4/21 Edition


This weeks question is for those of you who have quit an MMO (so virtually all of you). What level of interaction do you keep with your estranged title? Do you forget all about it and move on to your next title of choice, or are you one of those people who turns on jihad mode and begins a crusade to bring the game and company down because they did something that caused you to quit? Do you keep watch to see if they improve upon what made you quit to begin with, or is it a matter of once they lose your interest, it’s gone forever?

I can’t explain my interest in Hellgate Global. When I played the game at launch, I wasn’t too interested in it. In a way, I had the same reaction to Hellgate as I did with All Points Bulletin, in that it was a shooter/sword/RPG that tried to combine the best of both worlds, but ended up not doing either in a unique way. Essentially, it was Diablo, but played from a different perspective, and I lost interest in the same fashion I lost interest in Diablo: Going through similar looking dungeons (often the same dungeon several times for different missions) over and over again. And yet, I’m signed up for the beta. I could not give a single valid explanation why, other than that I paid the money for the boxed copy.

1. Yoshi’s Cookie: I Admire the Final Fantasy XIV Team

Say what you want about Final Fantasy XIV and odds are your complaints are very valid. What you can’t say is that the current development team, lead by Naoki “Yoshi” Yoshida, lacks motivation. Reading the producer’s letters, I can’t help but admire the devotion and passion that Yoshi and his team have put into Final Fantasy XIV in the past few months. Development has been steaming forward, with a ton of needed updates to turn Final Fantasy XIV into a viable product. FFXIV is functionally a great game, but it needs content and direction so players are doing something other than grinding exp and taking up the same leves over and over again.

What Yoshi has proven is that the team is not above slashing content that doesn’t work, or making drastic changes to other content. Among the updates in the works are the complete removal of physical levels, reworking the battle system, changing the job titles to be more recognizable, introducing grand companies and an achievement system. You can read the list of planned and currently in-the-works updates here.

2. Omali, Why Do You Hate Gamersfirst So Much?

I don’t have a personal grudge against Gamersfirst, I just have very low confidence in the company’s ability to police their own games, mainly because the company has absolutely failed to police their own games. The titles they do maintain are filled to the brim, as I’ve said before, with cheaters and gold farmers. So although I’d like to believe Gamersfirst when they say they have the cheaters all figured out, that’s exactly what Jagex said about gold farmers in Runescape, and I have the feeling Jagex has better resources for catching cheaters than G1.

Those of you who frequent MMO Fallout are well aware that I refuse to join in on the “I hope ___ game fails because I hate ___ company” trash that populates video game forums, and that it’s rather rare that a game comes out that can be labeled purely garbage. Just to name a few examples, DC Universe is a game I harp on, and my issues are not in the gameplay, but its longevity. The original All Points Bulletin had a lot of promise, but needed a real identity as either a shooter or an MMO, but not both. Earth Eternal had less bugs than any other game I’ve ever played but had almost no content outside of kill quests.

I want All Points Bulletin to become Gamersfirst’s big title that will come out and virtually lobotomize all of the cheaters that Realtime Worlds never dealt with, that will inspire the company to run the gold farmers out of their other games. If they are unable to, hopefully Gamersfirst will be able to survive the disappointing reception. Realtime Worlds didn’t.

3. Let’s See Some More Games Revived.

Let’s go over some titles, shall we? Earth Eternal is being revived by a Japanese company, APB by G1, Star Trek Online was revived by Cryptic, Gods & Heroes is entering closed beta under Heatwave Interactive, T3fun is bringing back Hellgate London, and there are probably a few more I can’t think of right now. If The Mummy can get an MMO deal, I want to see some of these other defunct MMOs come back.

I want to see Tabula Rasa brought back, because with all the changes that the developers made in the two months before the game shut down, a lot of the community’s problems were fixed, albeit too late. Shadowbane should be brought back now that the existing version wouldn’t suffer the same problems of the original run (remember the Shadowbane reboot?), and would be run by a single, stable company. I want Dungeon Runners brought back as a free to play title with a cash shop, so the game can financially support more than three people. But above all, I want Tabula Rasa brought back, so I can shoot Richard Garriot in the face with a level 40 shotgun for allowing his team to screw the game two ways to Sunday.

4. I Don’t Have Autism.

The reason I set up MMO Fallout is because of my fascination with the business side of the genre. This is one of the few sections of the gaming industry where a company can’t just throw a game into the open, occasionally lower its price, and then get to work on the sequel. Currently, I feature over 70 MMOs on the category list, including news for games I don’t list (Guild Wars among them).

I noticed a surge in this after Minecraft really gathered steam, and that’s the amount of people who are equating what they see as hard work to autism, and I’ve had a few people asking me if I have autism. First of all that’s an incredibly offensive thing to ask someone, and as a random person on the internet it’s none of your damn business.

Next, I want to make something clear about MMO Fallout. I have a job, I work around generally between 25-30 hours a week at my retail job that I’m using to pay for my car and insurance. I subscribe to, at most, two MMOs, by virtue of my own wallet and time. Writing articles for MMO Fallout takes up a couple of hours of the day at most, spread out throughout my free time. So I wouldn’t call MMO Fallout my “second job.” More like a hobby I’m using to get myself trained for my ultimate end-game (as you’d see in my about page, talk radio).

5. Taking MMO Fallout To The Next Level

I’m going to start trying to get some interviews with different developers. When I call MMO Fallout a hobby, that doesn’t change how serious I am with expanding this website into something bigger. I have a lot of ideas on what I want to do with this blog, and simple text based articles aren’t going to cut it.

Hellgate Global: Are You Chosen?


If you’re like me, you already have a T3fun account thanks to Aika Online going global this past February and not wanting to deal with Gala-Net. If you do not have a T3fun account, now is a good time to get one. Registering your account (or logging in) and heading over to Hellgate Global’s website will net you a relatively easy access to the Hellgate closed beta. Clicking on the “Do you have what it takes button” and then applying for the beta nets you about a 50-5o chance of getting in instantly, otherwise T3 notes a list of websites that will be offering keys in the coming weeks.

There is no download link yet, the beta doesn’t start for another two weeks (June 3rd). Just enough time to forget you’ve been accepted into the beta.

Hellgate Global 12 Minute Trailer


Hellgate: London. It’s easy to forget that this game is still running in the east, and that T3Fun has been working to bring the title back at some point between now and the point where hell actually does take over earth. Over the past couple days, T3fun has been posting a ton of photos in preparation for what will be a June 3rd release date for the closed beta.

Hellgate: Global falls into the growing list of MMOs have that are being revived by new developers.

You can check out Hellgate Global’s Facebook page, or follow them on Twitter.

Hellgate Isn't Coming Back, Is It…


It's coming back...

You’ll remember that Hellgate: London, after the game’s launch and subsequent crash back to earth, was picked up in full by its Korean publisher Hanbitsoft. You may also remember that the game still runs to this day in Asia, under the aforementioned Hanbitsoft. In case this isn’t bringing up one single question, you may also remember that at one point Hanbitsoft announced that Hellgate: London would be returning to North America and Europe. Oh and that “plans are set to go in motion later this year…”

It was over one year ago that Hanbitsoft announced Hellgate: London was returning to the west, as a free to play title. One year of virtually no information or announcements from Hanbitsoft as to the status of this resurrection. Sure, people who purchased Hellgate can still play the single player, but who wants to play solo, a game that would be much more fun with someone to actually chat to?

Maybe I’m just being too optimistic when I say I’m still holding out for Hellgate Online to return, and I’m sure there are those with me who are inactively waiting it out. That being said, I can’t get this feeling out of my mind that Hanbitsoft has either forgotten about the game or has quietly shelved their resurrection idea in the west. I’d ask, but I need a Hanbitsoft account, and that requires a Korean SSID.

Hellgate Isn’t Coming Back, Is It…


It's coming back...

You’ll remember that Hellgate: London, after the game’s launch and subsequent crash back to earth, was picked up in full by its Korean publisher Hanbitsoft. You may also remember that the game still runs to this day in Asia, under the aforementioned Hanbitsoft. In case this isn’t bringing up one single question, you may also remember that at one point Hanbitsoft announced that Hellgate: London would be returning to North America and Europe. Oh and that “plans are set to go in motion later this year…”

It was over one year ago that Hanbitsoft announced Hellgate: London was returning to the west, as a free to play title. One year of virtually no information or announcements from Hanbitsoft as to the status of this resurrection. Sure, people who purchased Hellgate can still play the single player, but who wants to play solo, a game that would be much more fun with someone to actually chat to?

Maybe I’m just being too optimistic when I say I’m still holding out for Hellgate Online to return, and I’m sure there are those with me who are inactively waiting it out. That being said, I can’t get this feeling out of my mind that Hanbitsoft has either forgotten about the game or has quietly shelved their resurrection idea in the west. I’d ask, but I need a Hanbitsoft account, and that requires a Korean SSID.

Hellgate London: It's Coming Back


People often ask me, Omali, why haven’t you done a “what happened” for Hellgate: London? The answer is simple: The game never died. Despite shutting down in Western areas, Hellgate London has continued to thrive in the Asian markets. Although the new publisher Hanbitsoft has given distinct interest in opening the game back up in Western markets, they have been impeded by Namco-Bandai, who still owned the rights to publish the software on this side of the hemisphere.

“We are pleased to participate in the revitalization of Hellgate through this agreement and are deeply gratified to allow HanbitSoft to take the lead on this franchise and bring this game to the people who seek it”
-Namco-Bandai

Sure it translates to “we had no plans to do anything with this franchise so we got some money off of it,” on Namco’s part, but who cares? Hellgate: London is coming back! Technically the first true resurrection in MMO history, in the same sense of having your arm reattached years after it was lopped off for financial reasons, plans are set to go in motion later this year to bring Hellgate back to the North American and European markets.

Looks like we will be seeing Hellgate: Tokyo and any other planned expansions after all. And that means, Hellgate: London? Back in the list of games you go! Hopefully Hanbitsoft will be willing to run the title somewhere other than directly into the ground (I’m looking at you, Flagship Studios)