What is EverQuest II Extended? Good fucking question.

Everquest II is going free 2 play.  No, I'm not kidding.  Go read the FAQ.

Extended provides access to premium subscription-quality content through free and optional paid membership levels. Powered by an all-new web-based download application, new and veteran players alike can experience all the excitement and depth of EQII's content without a daunting installation or a massive download. Players can register within minutes, download the client to join other people in an epic journey, and launch into adventure in a fantastical online 3D world. Extended is the ultimate MMORPG experience. Excitement with every breath and adventure around every turn is now available for free!

Basically, its a new game that is free 2 play, but will offer premium payment options. It somehow ties into the subscription based Everquest 2.

This takes me to my pet peeve with free 2 play games: they are too fucking hard to understand. A chief example is Dungeons and Dragons Online. I spent more time trying to figure out what I could or could not achieve without paying instead of just playing the game. Everquest II is sounding about the same and players are likely to be confused, especially when they try to wrap their head around how it ties into the subscription game (now known as Everquest II Live).

I like the idea and the direction SOE is taking this whole free 2 play thing, but I'm not sure tacking it onto all of their current franchises and games is the way to go. As always, SOE will be interesting to watch.

Scratch that, this is going to be a fucking riot.  Just read their proposed plans for providing support to players:

The self help knowledge base will be accessible to all players regardless of their Extended membership status. As clearly outlined in the membership benefits matrix, customer service is only provided to players who have made a real money transaction in EQII Extended or at least have a Gold membership.

More than a one-day story

First, see this post on Reddit.
Next, read the news story.
Last, when you are playing Starcraft 2 tonight, remember this guy and his friend who will now be playing alone.

matdevdug, your friend is more than a one-day story.

Amalur is a failure

First, watch this:



Next, read this: Amalur? 38 Studios, you just failed.

Look, I want to give 38 Studios the benefit of the doubt.  I want to believe they've assembled this great team and haven't squandered this opportunity.  However, I just can't do anything but laugh after seeing a video as terrible as the one posted above.

The setting is so generic fantasy that it makes Star Wars look like science fiction.

Brooding dark voice?  Check.
Too much plate armor?  Check.
Oversized, unrealistic weapons?  Check.
Skeletons? Check.
Over-sized boss character incoming at end of video? Check.

What a fucking disaster this video is.  Not only is it highly disappointing to watch, but it fails to say a single thing about the game itself.  Plus it doesn't even bother to explain a single thing about the world of Amular.

This was 38 Studios big reveal and it failed; hard.  Amalur, just another generic fantasy setting that fails to impress.

Pro-tip: if the majority of a video game trailer features bylines with "John Doe, X, from game Y" , people may perceive that as the current game being unable to stand on it's own merits.

Further evidence abounds, check out the comments over at Rock, Paper, Shotgun.

Choca says:
July 23, 2010 at 11:25 am

The trailer looks bad.

Guild Wars 2 Will Succeed

For a primer, read my Guild Wars 2 Will Fail post from yesterday.

Guild Wars 2 (GW2) starts with some strikes against it, but it also starts with some potential.  First and foremost is GW2's business model.  The game will be free to play after purchasing a retail copy similar to the first Guild Wars.  This alone separates the game from the throng of games that will be dependent upon monthly subscriptions when GW2 comes to the market.

Secondly, GW2 is changing up some of the foundations of the Diku model.  The biggest change here is the removal of dedicated healing in the game.  Each individual player will be given self-healing skills that will account for the majority of healing in the game, both in solo and group play.

Next, GW2 is easing the limits on how a class defines a player's characters. The various classes will have a core mechanic, but their available skills will be based on equipment, race, and a set of personal healing abilities.  For example, a warrior wielding a 2-handed axe will be played much differently than one wielding a 1-handed sword and a shield.

The third change that comes to mind is the fact that death will not be immediate in GW2.  If a fight is winding down and a player is struck down, they become disabled.  During this disabled period if the player manages to kill a creature, they receive a second wind and can go on fighting.  Anyone that has played Borderlands will be familiar with this mechanic.  This lessens the sting of death and builds the perception that the player is a hero, not just some schmuck that was wiped out by a giant rat that added into a fight (a rat the player could cleave in two with a single blow!).

Guild Wars 2 is also aiming to shake up the game world with live events.  Think of this as Public Quests version 2.0.  Public Quests were easily the best feature of Warhammer Online and GW2 is taking them to another level by building the entire world around them.  If a player is in a village and see's all the villagers dieing due to poison that was dumped into their water supply, they can investigate and find the water pipeline into the city is being attacked and poisoned just outside of town. Beat the bandits causing the problem and save the village.  This is just an example of a couple stages of a "public quest" that will be featured in GW2.  This system has great potential and its only weakness is that the events will recycle themselves, so at some point it may feel like the players accomplished "nothing".

I've outlined some of the changes GW2 is attempting, but the game is still very much a traditional affair.  The core of the game will be familiar to anyone that has enjoyed MMOGs over the past several years.  Arena Net is being very careful to make this clear.  They talk a lot about changes, but also concentrate on making sure everyone knows they are not rewriting the book.  They don't want to rewrite the book and are being honest about that fact.  I wish other developers, creating very similar games, could follow Arena Net's lead in this regard.  Adding one new feature doesn't make a AAA MMOG "ground breaking". 

Looking at the reasons I've presented for failure and success, its interesting to note that they are in two very distinct categories.  The reasons for failure are all conjecture: its a 2, its making changes, and its got heavy competition in the fantasy setting.   The reasons for success are almost all related to the way the game will play: healing, death, and a living world.  I'll let you be the judge, but the reasons for success sound a lot more worthwhile than those of failure.

Guild Wars 2 Will Fail

There are plenty of examples that sequels do not work in the MMO market.  Ultima Online 2 was the original victim of what I like to call the terrible 2s.  Asheron's Call 2 shutdown on December 30, 2005 while the original Asheron's Call still thrives to this day.  AC2 never matched the original and in my opinion was actually a pretty good game.  The list continues with Everquest 2 which never matched the original Everquest and was thoroughly trumped by the monster that is World of Warcraft.

Everquest 2, out of all the 2s, should have been a right to print money.  Everquest was the undisupted champion of the early graphical MMOGs and Everquest 2 was the expected front runner of the "next generation".  How terribly wrong that general consensus was.  World of Warcraft taught everyone that the Everquest "idea" was wrong and that Everquest never was "right".

This all sets a stage where upon the new 2 in the neighberhood, Guild Wars 2 (GW2), is set to fail.

If being a 2 wasn't bad enough for GW2, it is also "a high fantasy world with multiple races" (like my new tagline?).  GW2 will have to compete with the Everquest 2 slaying World of Warcraft and it's record-breaking expansions.  Star Wars: The Old Republic will also be major competition for GW2 as they are the top two upcoming AAA titles in the MMO market (Star Wars being more fantasy than SciFi by miles).  Not to mention the plethora of free 2 play fantasy offerings that are quickly eating into the AAA marketplace. Fantasy is saturated!

There are other concerns as well.  GW2 is doing away with the holy trinity by removing the dedicated healer from group play, softening the blow of death by allowing second chances after a characters health is depleted, and moving towards a more action inspired combat system.  All of these may be equally positive things, but they are all "different" enough to cause concern in a genre that is averse to change.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not here to doom and gloom all of the upcoming MMOGs.  Specific to Guild Wars 2, come back tomorrow for the reasons why Guild Wars 2 will succeed.  Honestly, Guild Wars 2 is looking to be the only AAA competition coming any time soon.

Update: 23 July, 2010 - The Guild Wars 2 success post has been posted.

PC gamers with keyboard/mouse dominate console gamers with controllers

Filing this one away in the "no shit, Sherlock" category, Gizmodo has an interesting article up about why Microsoft aborted a project that would have allowed PC and Xbox gamers to play together on the same servers.  Basically, half-assed PC gamers easily dominated the constrained controllers that top-talent console gamers were using.

I've heard from reliable sources that during the development they brought together the best console gamers to play mediocre PC gamers at the same game... and guess what happened? They pitted console gamers with their "console" controller, against PC gamers with their keyboard and mouse.

The console players got destroyed every time. So much so that it would be embarrassing to the XBOX team in general had Microsoft launched this initiative.

I've had similar results with my old roommate with Halo. I couldn't win at Halo for shit playing on the Xbox, but once it was on the PC and we did a grand rematch with our normal Friday Halo group, I dominated as a PC gamer with mouse and keyboard. And I've never been very good at FPS games!

Just one more reason to be a proud PC gamer.

Amalur? 38 Studios, you just failed.

Update:  Obviously I missed the fact this article was about the single-player game, but my statements below stand as they are still releasing a fantasy MMOG.

---

USA Today's Game Hunters are running an article about Curt Schilling's 38 Studios and their upcoming MMO project.  In it, we get word from R.A. Salvatore (an accomplished author) on the lore for the game world:

Salvatore, who has written numerous books based in the Dungeons & Dragons universe, is tight-lipped about Amalur, but says that he has created a Tolkienesque 10,000-year-long back story: "I think we can say that we are talking about a high fantasy world with multiple races."

And with that statement, "we are talking about a high fantasy world with multiple races", 38 Studios has just fucking failed. Really? Another fantasy MMO? Seriously? Really? In a world where we have SW:ToR (Star Wars has always been more Fantasy than SciFi) and Guild Wars 2 and Tera and a hundred other fantasy worlds with multiple races?

Maybe this is a little harsh and premature, but I have this nagging feeling we aren't going to be as "blown away" as they are expecting. I will be amazed if this is received by the MMO blogosphere as anything more than "oh, another fantasy MMOG".

MMO websites are big business

MMO-Champion has been acquired by Curse.  With this acquisition, Curse is now the largeest MMO portal in the world and MMO-Champion will be adding some 7 million eyeballs to their readership (or so they claim).  My initial sneaking suspicion is that Curse won't gain that many new eyeballs, as a large portion of traffic to MMO-Champion probably already visits Curse on a regular basis, especially considering both are very heavy World of Warcraft portals.

Either way, I suspect a lot of money exchanged hands in this deal.  WoWhead.com sold for a reported $1 million and I would wager its traffic statistics were on par with MMO-Champion.  I would be interested to get the details of the sale.

Fortunately, Curse isn't some scum-sucking company like ZAM (who purchased WoWHead).  And all I know is that MMO websites are big business and I'm sad all the sites I've volunteered for and poured my sweat into over the years missed the money train.

Alright Valve, I see your free game. I raise you

... err wait, I can't raise against a FREE GAME!

Valve is releasing a free game on Monday via Steam. The game is Alien Swarm. Read about it here or see the blurb below:

Two years ago Valve hired the talented team behind the popular top down co-op mod Alien Swarm. Since then they have been busy working on the Left 4 Dead Series, and now Portal 2. However, we never forgot about Alien Swarm and the team has spent a lot of time bringing the game to Source in between their contributions to the other Valve projects.

On Monday, July 19th Alien Swarm is going to be released for free via Steam.

In addition to the game, Valve will also release the complete code base for Alien Swarm. This includes updates to the Source engine SDK and full Steamworks integration. If you’ve ever thought about developing a mod on the Source engine with Steamworks, this release provides more insight and examples for using Steamworks in game production.

Please visit www.alienswarm.com for more information.

Oh Valve, I love you.

Guild Wars 2: Ranger Pictures

PC Gamer has news on the next Guild Wars 2 class, the Ranger.  Included are some shinies:

Update: Videos available at the main site as well.