Posts tagged Multiplayer Online Game
Exclusive: DC Universe Online’s early story line (DC Universe Online)
Jul 22nd
A year after unveiling "DC Universe Online" to fans at Comic Con, Sony Online Entertainment is beginning to talk about the game’s early story lines. Speaking exclusively to The Cut Scene, the company has unveiled the heroes and villains you’ll meet as you start the game – and what your first mission will be.
A little refresher first, though, for those who aren’t up to speed on the game:
"DC Universe Online" is a massively multiplayer online game for both the PC and PlayStation 3 that will blend action and role-playing elements. Players can choose to be a hero or villain in one of several cities, including Metropolis or Gotham City.
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‘Most influential’ Age of Conan update launches
Jun 25th
Gangs of Tarantia patch adds new area, makes fundamental changes to Funcom’s M-rated MMOG.
Funcom’s Age of Conan has been on a bit of a roller coaster ride since its debut last year. After initial shipments of the game topped 1 million in May 2008, Age of Conan’s player population took a decided turn for the worse. By August, Funcom said its subscriber base stood at 415,000. Soon thereafter, the Norwegian developer said that the massively multiplayer online game’s director had resigned, layoffs had occurred, and servers would see significant consolidation.
Still, Age of Conan appears to have made some headway in regaining ground, with Funcom saying last month after turning a quarterly profit that the game’s user base has seen significant stabilization. Catering to those players, Funcom today rolled out what it called the “biggest and most influential” update to Age of Conan yet. Titled Gangs of Tarantia, the update adds in a new area and implements fundamental changes to many of the MMOG’s core systems.
According to Funcom, the fifth title update is designed to rectify all remaining issues associated with the game’s launch, as identified by both players and developers. As such, the list of tweaks and changes is nothing short of ranging and can be found in full on the developer’s Web site. The update also introduces the Tarantia Commons district, a high-level area that offers new content for both solo and cooperative play.
For more on Age of Conan, check out GameSpot’s previous coverage.
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Need for Speed in Criterion’s garage
Jun 12th
While talking Project Natal, EA COO reveals Burnout developer is now under the hood of the publisher’s street-racing series; EA CEO says shop crafting “revolutionary” new entry in franchise–which may delay the next Burnout.
During the same investors conference presentation where he revealed Battlefield 3, Electronic Arts chief operating offering John Pleasants dropped another bombshell. Specifically, he blew the lid off one of EA’s historically most successful franchises, Need for Speed, which was
trifurcated into three subseries in January: Need for Speed: Shift (PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, PSP, and PC), Need for Speed: Nitro (Wii, DS), and the massively multiplayer online game Need for Speed: World Online (PC).
Initially, Pleasants discussed the three-way split, which will see independent shop Slightly Mad Studios develop Shift, EA Montreal work on Nitro, and EA Shanghai and the downsized EA Black Box craft Need for Speed World Online. “We’ve put a huge effort into reengineering the whole franchise,” explained the executive. “Different teams very much reengineered how we’re making this product; lots of good work went into that, and the product quality is totally going to show it.”
Then, Pleasants let slip a major literal shift for the franchise. “We’ve got staggered teams now, so we’re not in the 12-month cycle grind, which is really the biggest thing we had to break. We’ve taken the Burnout team and combined it into the Need for Speed franchise. Now we have that in our favor because Burnout is from probably one of the more online-centric and high-quality developers that we have, Criterion.” (Emphasis added.)
Almost simultaneously to Pleasants’ speech going up via webcast, gaming blog Kotaku posted highlights from an interview it did with EA CEO John Riccitiello during last week’s
Electronic Entertainment Expo. In it, the executive confirmed Criterion Games head Alex Ward is overseeing development of a new, unnamed Need for Speed game–and that the project has apparently taken precedence over the next Burnout title.
“I don’t think you can fold Burnout into Need for Speed because a lot of people like Burnout,” Riccitiello said. “[But] we don’t have a plan right now for a separate major launch on Burnout because the team doing it is working on a revolutionary take on Need for Speed.” (Emphasis added.)
Other than to repeatedly say that Need for Speed and Burnout would remain distinct series, Riccitiello didn’t elaborate much. Pleasants, though, expounded on EA’s determination to make the former series a top seller once again. “Look, Need for Speed is one of the great franchises,” he said. “I believe it’s a top-10 seller in game-industry history. It’s a backbone brand for EA, and it’s one that has sold to 10 million units, now selling about 5 million units as the quality has eroded. So what’s new in Need for Speed is a deep commitment to getting that title and that franchise back to its glory days.”
Pleasants also touched on the Project Natal-optimized version of Criterion’s last game, Burnout Paradise, which was shown off both at Microsoft’s E3 Press Conference and on last night’s episode of Late Night with Jimmy Fallon.
Pleasants said that EA had known about the project “for some time…we didn’t learn about it at E3. We’ve known about it for months. I think you saw that Burnout was one of the products that was tested there, so we’ve had access to that software long enough to take a project like Burnout and make it Natal-ized.”
“If I were in Microsoft’s shoes, I would think of Natal like a new console,” he continued. “If it is deployed correctly and we as third parties can leverage it correctly, then there’s a lot of innovation that will feel innovative like another round of a console [would]. For us, that’s positive because, yes, we have to do new dev for another controller, but we don’t have to do new dev for a new platform. It’s a different level of investment. [But] that doesn’t take any of the onus off the innovation. We still have to figure out the hit-making sauce for Natal versus a non-Natal 360. They’re probably going to be different.”
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Dungeons & Dragons Online going free-to-play
Jun 10th
Turbine reveals that upcoming expansion will introduce a free-to-play subscription system this summer.
When Turbine Inc. announced the start of the beta for Dungeons & Dragons Online’s newest major upgrade, Eberron Unlimited, the developer also dropped a bombshell: The massively multiplayer online game will receive a free-to-play option for all its current and future players.
The upgrade, slated for this summer, will allow players to download and play the game free of charge, with revenue coming from microtransactions. Current subscribers will automatically be enrolled in its VIP program, which includes exclusive access to additional races, adventure packs, locales, and the upcoming monk class.
Moreover, current subscribers will get “priority access” in the closed beta of the new DDO Unlimited upgrade, which began today.
Players who choose the free-to-play plan are encouraged to buy additional content, such as potions, equipment, and adventure packs via the new DDO Store, which coincides with the release of the Eberron Unlimited upgrade. VIP customers will accrue Turbine points each month, which can be used at the store to purchase virtual goods.
DDO Unlimited will offer more than 100 updates, skills, quests, feats, and enhancements. It will also raise the level cap to 20, introduce the monk class, and add more than a dozen new dungeons.
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Atari CEO: The worst is behind us
May 30th
Q&A: David Gardner lays out publisher’s path to profitability, including online gaming and licensing out its IP.
In the past three decades, Atari has seen some of the highest highs and lowest lows in the gaming industry. Though the company bearing the name today bears little resemblance to the one that became synonymous with gaming in the 1970s, it has continued a tradition of turmoil. That history may indeed be a thing of the past now, given that Atari Worldwide CEO David Gardner told GameSpot today that the publisher is “most definitely through the worst and the hard patch” of its most recent turnaround story.
Today it was revealed that former Sony Worldwide Studios head Phil Harrison stepped down from his position as president of Atari Worldwide, and the publisher posted more than $319 million in losses for its most recent fiscal year. However, Gardner said that the personnel change and losses (most of which Atari brushed aside as one-time expenses related to the restructuring) aren’t keeping the publisher from making headway on its turnaround plan.
“I don’t want to pick on any franchises because it hurts people’s feelings, but we had a lot of products that needed to be canceled, a lot of franchises written down,” Gardner said. “It’s like moving house; you throw away the stuff you don’t use and don’t really need. You figure out how you want to live and what you want in your new place, and that’s what you focus on.”
For Atari, that means focusing on taking its franchises online, whether it’s a massively multiplayer online game sold at retail and built on monthly subscription fees, a digitally distributed game, or traditional retail games with online components.
One thing likely to change in the publisher’s future is its reliance on licensed properties. In recent years, Atari has leaned heavily on its licensed Dragon Ball Z and Dungeons & Dragons games to bring in sales. Although Gardner said that the company will continue investing in long-term licenses such as the one it holds for D&D, it needs to strike a balance between working with its own intellectual properties and those of others.
“What we’ve all realized in the senior management team is that we should be doing more to develop and promote our fantastic catalog,” Gardner said.
The IP exchange will flow both ways for Atari. Atari Inc. CEO Jim Wilson told GameSpot that the company’s own stable of brands might be available for other developers to work with. Though Wilson didn’t specify any brands in particular, the publisher holds a wide-ranging catalog of games, from arcade classics such as Pong and Asteroids to more modern fare such as Baldur’s Gate.
“You’ll see us developing titles based upon our core IPs, and you could see some licensing activities from IPs that we don’t consider core at this time,” Wilson said. “We have a stable of at least 80 IPs, and we’re going to put some focus on the ones we consider important to the company. Others, we may license off.”
Gardner likened the approach to one used by movie studios, who commonly develop projects in-house as well as externally.
“There’s a more commercial sensibility around that, and we need to do a better job with it,” Gardner said. “Frankly, the whole industry could be a lot smarter about that, I think. It’s one of the things we see a big opportunity around.”
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38 Studios makes Big Huge acquisition
May 28th
Curt Schilling-led MMO outfit buys Big Huge Games from THQ, averting potential closure of Maryland-based developer.
Curt Schilling might have been a starter in his Hall of Fame-worthy career as a major league baseball pitcher, but the ace added a rare save to his resume today. Schilling’s 38 Studios today announced the acquisition of Big Huge Games from THQ, which in March put the strategy-role-playing game developer on notice that it would be closed if a buyer didn’t surface in short order.
A representative for 38 Studios told GameSpot that Big Huge Games is continuing work on all the projects it had underway at the time of its acquisition, including an unnamed role-playing game for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC. That project was originally revealed in 2007 and tied to high-profile Big Huge Games hire Ken Rolston, lead designer on The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. However, 38 Studios’ plans for the developer extend to its own projects, specifically the massively multiplayer online game project code-named Copernicus.
“Big Huge Games’ cross-platform [real-time strategy and RPG] engine will accelerate the realization of our ‘Online Entertainment Experience’ for the Copernicus IP,” said 38 CEO and president Brett Close. “The acquisition enables us to develop and deliver top-quality games in multiple genres that are based in a shared world, ultimately maximizing the value of our Copernicus MMOG and the intellectual property as a whole.”
Big Huge Games was founded in 2000 by a quartet of PC strategy-game developers whose credits included Alpha Centauri, Civilization, Civilization II, and Gettysburg. The developer is best known for its work on Rise of Nations and the fantasy follow-up Rise of Nations: Rise of Legends. More recently, the studio was responsible for the downloadable board game Catan.
Big Huge Games will continue working out of its Maryland studios. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
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Lineage II anniversary event runs into snag, now extended to May 12 (Lineage II: The Chaotic Chronicle)
May 11th
Massively:
"5 years of operation for a massively multiplayer online game is cause for celebration. The sad fact is that many games never live that long, and not all titles that run for 5 years have a lot of steam left by that point. This doesn’t seem to be the case with Lineage II which still appears to be going strong in both Korea and in the West. Massively recently interviewed the Lineage II developers about the 5-year milestone they’ve just hit with the game, and we also mentioned the anniversary celebration was about to get underway."
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Eve Online turns 6, subs hit 300,000
May 7th
In a genre dominated by Blizzard Entertainment's World of Warcraft, CCP Games' Eve Online is the poster child of hanging on in the massively multiplayer online game genre. In celebrating the game's six-year anniversary today, CCP Games announced that Eve Online has now surpassed 300,000 global users.
;)
CCP noted that Eve Online's subscriber base has grown by 22 percent this year alone, having begun the year with 244,000 paying players. The Icelandic developer also said that it has broken its peak concurrent user record three times this year, with the current high mark sitting at 53,850 users playing in the same realm at the same time.
Late last year, CCP and Atari teamed to offer Eve Online bundled with all of its expansion packs and 60 days of play at reatil. As part of an online games research study released in March, Screen Digest found that Eve Online was the fourth most popular subscription game in terms of spending, ranked behind World of Warcraft, Club Penguin, and RuneScape.
For more information, check out GameSpot's previous coverage of Eve Online.
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