Lineage 2: Revolution is an upcoming 3D MMORPG and a mobile spin-off from Lineage 2. It features high quality graphics, three classes, and four races to roll through the game's dungeons.
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Publisher: Netmarble Playerbase: Medium Type: Mobile MMORPG Release Date: November 15th, 2017 (Global) Pros: +Lineage 2 game world. +Top notch production value (Audio/Visuals). +Fair class / race variety. +Persistent world. Cons: -P2W elements. -Automated combat.
Heavy Metal Machines is an action racing game that mixes a heavy metal soundtrack with an action-packed Mad Max-inspired world. Two teams compete in frantic battles to deliver the bomb to the opposing side's base.
Omega Zodiac is a free-to-play browser MMORPG where players must assist the goddess Athena in fighting against the forces of evil. Choose to play as a Mage, Knight, or Archer and acquire rare gear to become unstoppable.
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Publisher: Proficient City Playerbase: Medium Type: MMORPG Release Date: August 25, 2016 Pros: +Combo combat system. +Guild support and features. +Extensive gear and loot system. +Free-to-play. Cons: -Auto-battle/auto-play makes gameplay monotonous. -Pay-to-win aspects. -Limited settings options (i.e. no full screen). -Latency issues make combat difficult.
Firefly Studios announced today that, in an upcoming update called The Final Age, Stronghold Kingdoms players will soon be able to end the game worlds in which their kingdoms reside. This option will be given exclusively to a single player per world, "the Marshall of a winning House."
Firefly Studios Lead Designer Simon Bradbury explains the reasoning behind adding such a feature as follows.
From the very beginning we knew players would be involved in development, this is the ultimate expression of that. Players deserve a proper endgame and in the case of Kingdoms we believe this means letting the community decide whether or not to close their game worlds. This doesn’t mean Stronghold Kingdoms is coming to an end, far from it! For those worlds that players do decide to close new ones will open. We also have updates planned for the game, including our upcoming events system and redesigned iOS and Android versions.
The Final Age is scheduled to release "in the near future." In the meantime, the development team is working on a new in-game event system, as was requested by the community, and new world types.
Additionally, Stronghold Kingdoms is launching on Android and iOS in the near future. Those who are interested in playing on either platform can pre-register here.
Matt's Take:
This is a bold move on the part of Firefly Studios. While there is a sort of "win state" in Stronghold Kingdoms, this is the first time that players that don't win will have the option to continue playing on the server of their choice taken away from them, should the winning House's Marshall decide to end the game world. It's a neat feature in theory, but it will be interesting to see how the community responds to it in practice.
Stronghold Kingdoms: The Final Age - Launch Trailer
Developer ArtCraft Entertainment has released a new Crowfall FAQ to clear up any confusion after announcing modular components for Strongholds. Originally, players would purchase pre-fabricated buildings and place them on land, like those over-sized-bisected-homes you see on the back of trucks on I-80.
So now, defensive structures...
...can be created out of ‘snappable’ parts (much like Legos), and players can move them around to create any combination of defensive structures. Buildings, however, will have a set footprint and while we hope to include a high degree of customization, it won’t be to the same degree as the castle walls, gates and towers. (In other words, we aren’t providing floor and wall segments to allow players to build a house from the ground up.)
The FAQ also goes on to answer some community questions regarding redeemable items.
The banner image used for this post was created by the talented Dave Greco, lead artist at ArtCraft Entertainment. You can find more of his captivating work by visiting his ArtStation page.
In their continued quest to cover as much of Lost Ark's first Closed Beta as possible, Steparu has published new details about Lost Ark's endgame. So far, there appears to be quite a lot to do.
The activities listed are as follows.
Players can hunt World Bosses to obtain Legendary gear. These are not to be confused with Field Bosses, which drop Epic gear.
There are instances called Guardian Raids, in which players are required to search for the Guardian Boss, which spawns in a random location each time, and take it down.
Players can run hidden dungeons by using Hidden Dungeon Scrolls, which are drops that can be obtained from other high-level content.
There is the Cinematic Dungeon, which you may have seen before.
There are dungeons called the Tower of Infinity and the Cube Dungeon.
There is a PvP arena.
Additionally, at this point in time, there is no gear enchanting system that could lead to the game being pay-to-win. That being said, a system like that could always be added in the future.
Matt's Take:
Given the nature of Lost Ark, I've been fairly skeptical of how much content the endgame will have, but the amount of activities that are currently available has me feeling a bit more optimistic.
Lost Ark Online CBT Guardian Short Gameplay Chromanium
In a surprise move, THQ Nordic has remastered Titan Quest and its expansion and released them together as Titan Quest Anniversary Edition. Even more surprising, however, is the fact that those who own Titan Quest on Steam have been given the game completely free of charge. If you don't yet own the game, the Anniversary Edition is a mere $4.99 on both GOG and Steam for the next week, after which the price will rise to $19.99.
Titan Quest Anniversary Edition is described as follows.
Titan Quest Anniversary Edition contains both Titan Quest and Titan Quest: Immortal Throne, which have been completely reworked in terms of multiplayer, stability, performance, balancing, AI and much more. In rough numbers, this translates to roughly 1,261 changes to the original version 10 years ago.
You can find the full set of "roughly 1,261 changes" here.
Matt's Take:
I'm not sure that there would have ever been a "good time" to rerelease Titan Quest, but half a year after the release of Grim Dawn, which makes use of the same engine, seems like it might be decent. It certainly doesn't hurt that previous owners got the new version for free and that it is 75% off for the week of release.
HeroWarz released a patch today that adds Event Missions, designed to be a new challenge offering new rewards. There are 4 mission modes to be completed daily and weekly. KOG plans to add more missions in the future, and will cater them based on player feedback (love communication).
Story Mode: a daily mission that tasks players with completing a story mission they "may have completed before," and is designed for players to earn gear as they level up.
Twilight Zone: daily mission where players defeat Kachinas on one of two maps, for Lucky Boxes and Golden Kachina Dolls.
Nightmare: daily mission that drop players in a random final story mission with steroid-injected monsters for Dream Fragments.
Heroic Mode: weekly mission where players defeat 2 random boss monsters across 3 rounds for an epic accessory.
A new sultry item shop NPC Rose will sell Epic and Wonder equipment, purchasable with Dream Fragments earned by completing Nightmare Event missions.
All characters were balanced, buffed, or nerfed in one—or multiple—ways. It was clear from when we played together that some heroes easily outperformed others, unless we the players were to blame for not using skill rotations properly.
The announcement that RIFT: Starfall Prophecy would be a paid expansion was rather surprising. RIFT is a free-to-play title that previously released a free-to-play expansion. Why are players suddenly going to have to pay for new content once again? According to a statement that Trion Worlds CEO Scott Hartsman sent to Polygon, this is what players want.
You see, when Trion Worlds was working on the Nightmare Tide expansion, it was "[...] trying to figure out how is the best way to do an expansion in a free-to-play game." As Hartsman put it, "the two concepts don’t necessarily fit. You still have all the investment of a development team spending a year-and-a-half on content." Eventually, the company decided that it would spread the cost of the expansion across several microtransactions, including the infamous earring slot microtransaction.
Hartsman then explained that the company's "[...] attempts to be very generous and more convenient were strongly not perceived that way." As he put it, "of course if I come in and my friend joins me, and we both do a dungeon, we both get loot from the dungeon, but I bought everything right off the bat, so I can equip it and my friend can’t. That doesn’t exactly feel good." So, with Starfall Prophecy, the company is "[...] returning to the most palatable way that people are interested in paying for expansions."
Furthermore, in response to concerns about the effect a paid expansion will have on free-to-play users, Hartsman stated that "the core audience actually did buy all of that stuff anyway. They were just irritated in how it was presented, so instead we’re putting it up front in what we hope is a vastly less irritating way."
Matt's Take:
I don't imagine that designing expansions in a way that makes them viable is easy. This may, in fact, be the reason that expansions in games that are free-to-play from the very beginning are often much more bite-sized than those of buy-to-play and pay-to-play games and why they are often loaded with new cash shop items. Somehow, the team has to recoup the costs of development the development of that expansion.
Given the response to Nightmare Tide's microtransactions, I'm not surprised that Trion Worlds decided to go back to paid expansions. In addition to the fact that it results in a disparity between players, it's not exactly clear when you look at it that those microtransactions are a replacement for the cost of the expansion. This way, it's presented in a clear manner and you get the expansion's essentials all in one purchase.
At long last, Black Desert Online's Valencia Part 2 update is here and the first of its twelve classes—the Warrior—has awakened. Valencia Part 2 adds Muiquun, "the Land of Outlaws" and Arehaza, a "safer" fishing community, as well as two "outdoor dungeons," Aakman Temple and Hystria Ruins, and the world boss, Karanda the Harpy Queen. Two more world bosses, "the colossal Desert Dragon Nouver and the massive sandworm Kutum," will be added sometime in September.
The Warrior Awakening allows Warriors of level 55 or higher to unlock the Greatsword. The press release explains the effects of the Awakening on Warriors' playstyle as follows: "The Greatsword will not replace the Warrior’s Sword and Shield, but instead introduce a more destructive aspect to their typically defensive fighting style, offering a seamless transition between the two."
You can find trailers for both releases embedded below.
Matt's Take:
While I'm still not sold on the idea of releasing Awakenings one by one, even if that's how they were released in other regions, it's great to see that one of them has actually made it into the NA/EU version of the game on its projected release date. It's a good sign that the rest of them will, in fact, be released in a timely manner.
Valencia Part 2 also looks quite nice and, if I were still playing, I would be quite excited to go up against the world bosses that are being added in September. A "colossal" desert dragon and a "massive" sandworm sound like quite the fearsome opponents. Then again, anything's better than watching dozens be repeatedly one-shot by a stronger version of one of the game's easiest scroll bosses, right?
(116 votes, average: 3.49 / 5)
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