Apex Legends is a battle royale game set in the Titanfall universe. Squads of 3 Players, using characters with unique abilities, land on an island and fight to be the last team standing.
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Publisher: Electronic Arts Playerbase: High Type: Battle Royale Release Date: February 04, 2019 Pros: +Large, vibrant map. +Variety of weapons & items. +Cosmetics & account levels add replay value. Cons: -Repetitive Gameplay. -Single game mode/map. -Only Supports Squads of 3. +Max 60 players per match.
Ragnarok M: Eternal Love, a mobile remake inspired by the classic Ragnarok Online PC MMORPG, is almost ready for a global release. Gravity has partnered with X.D. Global to create what they promise to be a faithful mobile adaptation of the much beloved Ragnarok Online, first released back in 2002.
Ragnarok M: Eternal Love has been available in parts of Asia for some time now, where it has achieved success on both the iOS App Store and various Android platforms. Veterans of the original RO should find many of the game's over 40 maps familiar as they explore the world of Midgard all over again. Classes like the Knight, Priest, and Hunter also make a comeback. An enhanced pet system means every player will have a chance to explore Midgard with a pet companion by their side.
Ragnarok Mobile Gameplay First Look - MMOs.com
Social features are also included including a picnic and cooking system. Players can also unlock a variety of poses and emotes as they explore. The official website includes more details, including what bonuses will be available upon release depending on the number of pre-registrations. Check out the official anime trailer and Omer's first look for the Chinese version from last year!
Ragnarok M: Eternal Love Key Features:
Adventure freely across over 40 maps in the classic cities of Midgard
Form a guild with friends to embark on adventures
Showcase your guild’s achievements with the customized guild wall
Choose from a variety of classes such as Knights, Priests, and Hunters
Record your adventures, items, and conversations in the Adventure Handboook
Explore Midgard with a lovable pet companion
Picnic with your friends with the cooking system
Express your love hand-holding mode and unlock poses and emojis
With NetEase making the news thanks to the Diablo Immortal reveal at Blizzcon, we thought we'd give you an update on another NetEase developed MMORPG. Revelation Online, a fantasy MMORPG for the PC platform published in the West by My.com, has just published their Mythical Conflict update.
The update primarily adds a new standalone 5v5 PvP mode to the game. Titled Legends of Nuanor, this game mode operates as a typical 5v5 player MOBA where players chose from a rooster of heroes and do battle on a single map containing 3 lanes. The task is to destroy the other team's Crystal and defend yours.
Offering something of a distraction from the workaday realms of Revelation Online, Mythical Conflict debuts an exciting new PvP game mode that allows you to park your veteran characters for a while and enjoy the carefree pleasures of MOBA-style gameplay. [emphasis added]
The official site includes a lengthy description of how exactly Legends of Nuanor works. The set up should be similar to anyone familiar with Dota 2 and especially League of Legends:
Just as important as what you’ll be doing is where you’ll be. It should be clear from the outset which players will be covering the top, middle and bottom lanes, as well as the jungle area. Generally, the top lane is regarded as a solo lane, where you should have a tank hero to oppose the enemy. The middle lane is another solo lane where an AP-type (Ability Power) hero with great nuking abilities should be assigned. The bottom lane should be a two-person lane. Since AD-type (Attack Damage) heroes have poorer stats (attack, attack speed, crit, and crit damage) in the beginning, such heroes should be paired up with a support. The jungle, on the other hand, requires a hero with great mobility or crowd control skills to kill neutral monsters efficiently while supporting activities across all three lanes.
It should be noted that Legends of Nuanor players cannot use their Revelation Online character in this mode, all players must chose from the same rooster of in-game heroes. Those interested in learning more should check out the official announcement on My.com.
PC gaming may have been overshadowed by mobile at this year's G-Star in Korea, but Nexon offered us a few bright spots. Of the three PC titles Nexon's showcased, Dragon Hound is the newest and perhaps most exciting.
A Korean language interview with the game's director last week gave us the first details on this upcoming title, and thank's to a detailed write up by MMOCulture, we can get a glimpse of what Dragon Hound has to offer:
Dragon Hound is being developed by devCat, of Mabinogi and Vindictus fame.
The game engine is Unreal Engine 4 with PC as the target platform. The game will be free to play.
The game was originally pitched as a mobile side-scroller where players shot arrows whiling riding horses, but switched to a PC title incorporating guns, vehicles, steampunk, and diesel punk elements.
Players must select which weapon types to bring to hunts, each with different strengths and weaknesses. Both melee and ranged weapons are supported, and players will often have to switch between them to accomplish different tasks. No class restricts on weapon use are planned.
While comparisons between Monster Hunter World and Dauntless are obvious, developers also drew inspiration from World of Tanks. Unlike other Hunting games, players remain mounted during intense fights where they must chase down giant dragons and other enemies across vast environments.
Aiming at specific organs such as eyes, heart, lung, etc will deal more damage, but is not required to defeat monsters on casual difficulties. Many quests will require players to harvest certain organs rather than simply killing the beasts off.
There are no plans for PvP - end game content consists of very difficult monster hunts involving large groups of players.
Average monster take down time is planned at between 10-15 minutes.
NCSoft announced a rather interesting class for their fantasy MMORPG Aion this week. While we only have the official Korean name of 채화성 so far, English sources have unofficially translated the class name as 'Graffiti Artist'. It's certainly a fitting name based on the trailers! The new class is modeled after the Bard template so will be a powerful support class that best shines in a group setting.
Unlike the Bard, however, the Graffiti Artist has a decidedly alternative/punk ascetic. Armed with two magical bracelets that shoot paint, the new class is sure to make a splash when it arrives on the Korean servers on November 28. NCSoft has whipped up a official page for the new class which includes both a cinematic and gameplay trailer. The update should make its way to the European and American servers soon!
G-Star, Korea’s marquee gaming trade show kicks off on November 15 in the port city of Buson. While most of the announcements made at G-Star only immediately effect the Korean market, the out sized influence Korea exerts in global PC & mobile gaming market makes the trade show well worth following for gamers across the world. Odds are the games announced this week will eventually find their way to the West, even if does sometimes take several years.
Here's a quick run down of some of the biggest names at G-Star. Often big studios will hold seperate media events prior to G-Star's start date, for the sake of brevity we've included games announced at such events here as well.
[G-STAR 2018] 지스타 홍보영상
Nexon: 11 Mobile / 3 PC PC - Dragon Hound, Astellia, Ascendant One Mobile - Four Towers, Dave, Running Man Heroes, Lyn: The Light Bringer, Mabinogi Mobile, Country of the Wind: Yan (N:TK), Spirit Wish, Counter-Side, Crazy Arcade BnB M, Tales Weaver M, TRAHA
G-Star 2018 - Nexon Trailer Compilation - KR
NCSoft: All Mobile Mobile - Aion 2, Blade & Soul 2, Blade & Soul M, Blade & Soul S, Lineage 2M PC - Project TL not mentioned at media conference. No updates.
2018 NC Media Day - L2 M - B&S 2 - Aion2 - B&S S - B&S M - Trailer Compilation - KR
Netmarble
Mobile - A3: Still Alive
WeMade
Icarus M, Mir 4, Mir Mobile, Legend of Mir 2 Reboot (licensed game)
Lost Ark deserves a special mention as it released into open beta this week (Nov 7) in Korea after spending 7+ years in development and with a budget of over $88 million so far. Its also very likely we in the West will be getting Lost Ark before China, largely due to China's ongoing game approval freeze.
Are you following G-Star? What games are you most interested in, and how do you feel about the growing prominence of mobile games in the industry? Let us know below!
It has been a productive year for Grinding Gear Games and their free to play action-RPG Path of Exile. In May, Tencent took a majority stake of 80% in the New Zealand based studio. We've also seen three leagues so far: The Bestiary, Incursion, and current Delve league. GGG has decided to round out the year by bringing the unique features from all 3 of these leagues back as part of the Betrayal expansion which is set to launch on December 7.
In Betrayal, the Bestiary, Incursion, and Delve features will each be accessible via NPC 'masters', with these new masters replacing the existing ones (besides the map master Zana who will remain) who have been around since 2014. Player housing (the hideout) will also get a much needed upgrade with the Betrayal expansion.
The new expansion isn't just a consolidation of the year's new content. A new gameplay feature tasks players with investigating a criminal cartel called the Immortal Syndicate. By interrogating, killing, and otherwise cajoling Syndicate members, players will eventually gather enough information to unlock safehouses which act as boss encounters. The trailer reveals little about how this system will actually play out, but combined with the Bestiary, Incursion, and Delve features it sure makes for an impressive free expansion! Oh, and player housing will finally be persistent across leagues so players won't have to start from scratch each and every league. Hideouts can be saved as templates which can be swapped between. These templates can even be traded between players! A very welcome change for those who have largely ignored expanding and decorating our hideouts precisely because of the wipes every 3 months.
Path of Exile will also be coming to PlayStation 4 in December and will be current with the PC version!
7 years and 100 billion Won (~$88 million USD) later, Lost Ark finally entered Open Beta Testing in South Korea on November 7, 2018. Smilegate, the company behind Lost Ark, has announced that they are targeting 'more developed countries' such as North America and Europe for their next launch phase.
Usually China proves to be a more alluring next-step for Korean MMORPG developers, but the recent gaming approval freeze in China means that the world's biggest gaming market is currently off limits. To give a sense of China's importance to SmileGate, 80% of their total sales last year came from the Chinese version of their tactical shooter Crossfire.
China's loss is our gain. With these Chinese market closed to them, SmileGate has chosen instead to focus its attention on an English/International version of Lost Ark. Lostk Ark seems a good fit for the Western audience as the action-RPG oriented gameplay is well established here. Lost Ark will compete with other Korean titles like Mu Legend, but also with established action RPG franchises like Diablo 3 and Path of Exile. But unlike the latter two, Lost Ark boasts a persistent world and many more MMORPG features.
How many hours a day did you spend playing video games when you were a kid? If Tencent's new policy is any guide towards China's emerging gaming regulations, the likely answer to that question for future generations will be precisely '2 hours.'
Earlier this week Tencent, China's largest gaming company and the owner of international hits like League of Legends, Path of Exile, Clash of Clans, and Arena of Valor, announced via social media platform Weibo that they would be expanding their age-verification system across their entire games library by 2019. Until now, it was only the mobile MOBA title Honor of Kings (known as Arena of Valor in the West) that implemented this system.
With Honor of Kings, users 12 and under are restricted to a single hour of playtime per day while those 13-18 get 2 hours of playtime per day. Tencent has not revealed whether the other games in its library will use the same hourly caps or whether playtime will be game-specific or shared across their entire portfolio of games.
Its clear that the Chinese government's game approval freeze and increased interest in the unhealthy side effects of gaming served as Tencent's motivation for the ramped up age verification measures. It remains to be seen whether Tencent's plans are part of broader regulatory measures being written by the government or whether other major companies like NetEase will implement differing standards.
While the game time of adults will not be restricted, a consequence of the age verification process will mean every user's account details will be tied to their real world ID via the government's official police database. Besides raising privacy issues, this will make it much easier for authorities to crack down on hackers and other illegal activity taking place inside these virtual worlds.
BlizzCon 2018 took place last week, and boy was it one for the history books. The game announcements were nice, Destiny 2 is free to keep if you claim it by Nov 18, and a remastered version of Warcraft 3 titled Warcraft 3: Reforged is coming out next year. But the real story this year was how badly Blizzard bungled the announcement of Diablo: Immortal, a mobile-only game being developed by NetEase.
When the game was first announced, the audience's disappointment was palpable, but the real fun started during the Q&A session. My personal favorite clip is the Blizzard representative's answer when asked whether Diablo: Immortals would be coming to the PC platform:
[Blizzcon 2018 Highlights] Diablo Immortal Q&A - Do you guys not have phones?!
While an impulsive hatred towards mobile gaming by Blizzard's primarily PC-centric playerbase explains some of the story, I think it goes a bit deeper. Blizzard's Hearthstone is available on mobile after all, yet it continues to enjoy enormous success. The real issue, I think, stems from the fact that Blizzard couldn't even be bothered to develop them game themselves. Instead, they are taking the audience for one of their primary IPs for granted by offering them a licensed reskin of a Chinese developed knockoff. Reddit quickly uncovered evidence that Diablo: Immortal looks a lot like another NetEase developed mobile MMORPG, titled Crusader of Light. Major sites like Polygon covered the story, though there's another NetEase game that's even more similar: Endless of God.
Diablo Immortal Gameplay Trailer
Given Blizzard's reputation for quality, it took many fans by surprise that they would license their IP to a third party. Worse still, it wasn't just any third party. It was NetEase, a Chinese chop shop that has been making knock off mobile games for years. Blizzard teaming up with such a company almost reads like a capitulation and strikes many fans as a deliberate decision to dilute the quality and value of the Diablo franchise. What do you think of the Diablo: Immortal mess? Let us know!
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