All Posts by Szark

Game-Masters.com has announced that they will be adding a new payment option to Cabal Online, which will give players a number of payment options that do not require a credit card.

Games-Masters.com are pleased to announce the introduction of the PayByCash payment method for its hit game CABAL Online www.cabalonline.com. With payment options for players in most European countries, users will finally be able to take advantage of the great offers found in the CABAL Online item shop, without having to worry about how they will pay.

PayByCash offers a vast range of payment options, many of which do not require a credit card and can be used by players under the age of eighteen. With so many options, never before has it been so easy to buy CABAL Online services. For a full list of payment options visit www.paybycash.com.

Read more here.

Last week staff writer Carolyn Koh attended Pax where she had the chance to talk to the folks over at EA Mythic, where they discussed PvP, RvR, and Chicken v Chicken in Warhammer Online.

"You can head out to the war camps at any level. That's the way we've designed RvR," said Ryan Bernard, RvR Designer at EA Mythic. "It's open warfare on the frontier." Armed with years of refining large scale online Realm vs. Realm warfare in Dark Ages of Camelot, Realm vs. Realm warfare in Warhammer Online promises to be a fun and challenging experience.

"Most PvP in MMOGs are an afterthought," said Associate Producer Carrie Gouskos. "Or else it's a pure PvP world," chimed in Product Manager Eric Correll as we sat in a circle, on the 4th floor of the Seattle Convention Center on the last day of PAX 2007, tucked away from the madding crowd. "But we're designing Warhammer for both PvE and PvP and have balanced it from the beginning for that." Ryan Bernard concluded.

Read the article here.

The Lord of the Rings Online Official site has been updated with another look at some of the creatures that populate Middle Earth. This time around it's the degenerate half-orcs, whose origins are unknown and open to speculation.

There are few tales more frightening in all of Eriador than those of the Orcs and Goblins that strike from the shadows against the Free Peoples of Middle-earth. Many believe these are simply tales of fancy, spun by storytellers to keep children safely within their homes at night for fear of being gobbled up in the darkness.

Those who have travelled to distant lands do not dismiss such tales, however, for Orcs and their cruel deeds are not the stuff of children's tales; they are all too real, and recent news from places north and east tell of vast armies of these horrifying creatures preparing once again for an assault on the good people of the land.

Even more disturbing, however, are rumours of the Half-orcs: creatures with the blood of both Man and Orc, capable of walking nearly unnoticed among the Free Peoples, looking like a Man of the South, with features that only hint at their monstrous blood. In addition, these half-breeds can travel in full sunlight with no ill effects. It is said that these Half-orcs are within the borders of Eriador even now, living amongst the folk of Bree-land and even wandering in the peaceful Shire.

Read more here.

The Chronicles of Spellborn official site has been updated with another edition of their weekly developer diary series which focuses on the artistic development of the game.

This week I'm going to write a bit about the first phase of the Art production pipeline. I will try to give you a bit insight in how we translate a design provided by the Gamedesign department into final concept art.

The Art production pipeline basically starts with a document that we call an FD, which stands for Functional Design. It's written by the gamedesigners and it contains lore, background information, motivation, design specifications, quest and/or game assets etc etc. It gives us their brilliant vision on the matter. It is in essence a manual with the details how it should be build. It's the blueprint. We think more of it as... a guideline.

The most (arguably the only) interesting part of FD's are the sketches of the layouts and/or visual references. This is where Gamedesigners go creative. This is also where it gets nasty. This is the reason why we hire concept artists.

Read the full developer diary here.

IGG has released new information about their PK, or PvP System, in Zu Online.

IGG has announced a new PK system of Zu Online (http://zu.igg.com ) recently, let's take a quick look.

PK is short for Player Kill?which is usually used to name the fight between players. The player whose level is below 31 is protected from being killed; also he cannot PK others and cannot be PKed by others. Players can PK in all areas except the safe areas (such as all main cities, and all transfer points of scenes). No matter what their level, if there is a discrepancy of more than 90 between 2 players' levels they may not attack each other. When your level is above 30, please pay attention to your PK Mode. There are Whole, Peace, Group, Guild and Camp Modes. After adjusting PK Mode, left click the target player and use the Spell to attack or restore.

In Zu Mountain training world, although there is no written commandment to standardize the behaviour of all trainers, when trainer violates the Good and wilfully injures the members of his own guild, he will bear Dishonor Points. However, in the disaster happening every sixty years, the only trainers who have satisfactory and enough merits and virtues and have no evil can challenge calamity and then be promoted to the rank of immortal. Of course, trainers themselves can't see their own Dishonor Points. They can only know whether they have born the Dishonor Points from the color of their name. Such as White Name, Blue Name, Grey Name and Red Name. The player who is Pked by others first will not be punished when the opponents are killed no matter what colour of the name is. Dishonor Points will be gradually eliminated along with the online time. The Reputation Points that is gained by completing tasks can also dispel the Dishonor Points.

Read more here.

Dr. Eyjo Gudmundsson, the economist hired by CCP to oversee economic activities in EVE Online has penned his first developer blog, detailing the evolution of EVE's minerals market.

Introduction

This is the first Econ Dev blog on the economics of EVE. We are heading into unknown territory since there exists no standardized measures on how to describe and analyze an online universe, or if indeed there is a need to have new tools to describe virtual reality. Trade and industrial activities are an important part of EVE and therefore descriptive analysis of trend in quantity traded, price fluctuations and regional differences are always of interest to those participating in that business. In order to fulfill the expectations of pilots we need your comments on this dev blog and which parts are most interesting. Selected sections of this dev blog could be updated on a regular basis if the demand is there.

Minerals are the basis of everything in EVE. Most things built in EVE require one or more minerals; some easy to get, others not so much. Minerals provide income for professional miners and newbies alike and no war can be won without having a good supply with which to build and equip an armada. The constant demand for minerals makes the market one of the most effective in the EVE Universe with huge volumes and thousands of trades on a daily basis. That is why examining the mineral market in some depth has been chosen as the topic for the first Econ Dev Blog (EDB).

Historical overview

When referring to the mineral market we refer to all trade of minerals through the market system of EVE Online. This does not take into account trade through the contract system or direct transactions between pilots. On all commodities market throughout history only a fraction of the traded volume actually goes through central auction markets. The majority of trade in commodities and other goods is most often a transaction between two entities but the price is based on the price at the open exchange.

Read the full dev blog here.

The Chronicles of Spellborn official site has been updated with their latest dev journal from the design department. This time around the focus is on the history of the high houses.

Hi and welcome to another journal on game content and design. Previous journals have been about the Athenaeum and the different factions currently active within The Chronicles of Spellborn and this week we'd like to cover something different.

This time we'd like to tell you a bit about the five different High Houses that are currently making up the Enclave of the Five Sacrifices.

History of the Eight

I'd like to start off with a little bit of history where the context of the Houses is explained. In the years after the Awakening, some 600 years ago, there were eight High Houses, Pale, Onyx, Void, Maul, Torque, Rune, Silver and Shroud, that vied for power and control over the combined might of the Human and Daevi survivors. The indifferences from before the Great Collapse, the destruction of the Ancestral World, had not diminished in the slightest and the struggle for dominance continued. But as time progressed it became clear that some of the Houses had similar goals and as such started to form allegiances. Pale, Onyx, and Void became what history refers to as the Traitor Houses whilst Shroud, Maul, Torque and Silver opposed their ideas with such vehemence that war was inevitable.

Read more here.

In early August Funcom took questions from the Age of Conan community and they have now released the first installment of their Age of Conan Community Q&A.

At the beginning of August, we took questions from our community, and today, we bring answers.

Due to the quantity of submitted questions, and some have been answered, but may appear in a later installment. Please keep in mind the answers to these questions may changed based on feedback from our beta testers.

Note that all of this is subject to change - Age of Conan is still in development!

Bloodz: How many battlekeeps will be available in the Border Kingdoms?

Based on our current estimates for server population, there will be a maximum of three Battlekeeps per region, with a total of nine possible on each server.

Entaro: Are there any differences in consequence that results from a PvE death versus a PvP death?

When you die in PvE, you receive a debuff that lowers attack and defense rating. When you die in PvP, you do not get this debuff. However, in PvP, there is of course the chance you may have lost some coin, or, who knows, maybe even an item, but looting is not something we have fully addressed at this time.

Read more here.

The Grab Bag returns this week to once again answer a myriad of miscellaneous questions from the Dark Age of Camelot community. This week's Grab Bag also comes with a number of announcements, including their plans for the Austin Game Developers Conference, and the announcement that they have some TL openings, as well as a big announcement at the bottom of the bag.

Q. We've done the Green Knight encounter several times and have not gotten any loot to drop other then remains. Is this intentional, or does he still drop some of the nicer items that were associated with him?

A. The Bearded Wonder: Yes, he can still drop other items, but the only item that is set to drop all the time is the Remains. The others are set as a chance to drop, so it sounds like you just didn't beat the odds. Keep trying.

Q. When 1.90 goes live, are the Relics going to be reset?

A. The Keeper of the Devs assures us: Yes, we will need to reset all of the keeps and the relics when 1.90 goes live.

Read the Grab Bag here.

The folks over at EverQuest II have posted an overview of the features of Legends of Norrath, the online trading card game which will be released on September 5th.

Legends of Norrath™: Oathbound is releasing live in EverQuest® and EverQuest II® on September 5th, 2007!

Legends of Norrath is an online-only trading card game, based on the richly-detailed sword-and-sorcery world of Norrath from the massively multiplayer online role-playing games EverQuest and EverQuest II. Playable from within the two MMOs, Oathbound, the first set for Legends of Norrath features over 375 digital cards and is available in both a 55-card digital starter deck and 15-card digital booster packs. Play as one of many Oathbound avatars and decide your own fate as you choose between the paths of good or evil.

Features Include:

* EverQuest® and EverQuest®II Interactivity:Legends of Norrath works both with and within your existing EQ and EQ®II games. Launching directly from your in-game menu, players can challenge others from either game. Also included are randomly inserted reward cards from potions to mounts that will enhance your EQ and EQII MMO game.

* Complimentary Starter Packs: EQ and EQII players will be awarded a complimentary random Oathbound digital starter deck.

* Single-Player Campaigns or PVP: Test your skills against a sophisticated, re-playable AI system and earn special reward cards by completing campaigns... or challenge players all over the world in online game lobbies where you can play both casual games and high-level tournaments.

Get all the details here.

Blizzard has announced the latest iteration of their refer a friend program, where players can earn a month of game time if they get a friend to re-subscribe to World of Warcraft.

The Scroll of Resurrection is a new version of the Recruit-A-Friend program you can use to invite previous subscribers to return to World of Warcraft. Each invitation you email to a friend contains a link to download and try The Burning Crusade for 10 Days FREE. For every friend who returns to the game through your Scroll of Resurrection invitation and then re-subscribes to the game with a paid subscription, you will receive one FREE month of World of Warcraft game time. Click here to visit the Scroll of Resurrection page in Account Management and start resurrecting your friends!

Read more here.

The folks over at World of Pirates have announced that they have added a new update that brings a number of features to the game including allowing players to leave their home nations and set sail as pirates.

Ready to sail under black colors!

Another big update adds more new features to "World of Pirates" and opens new possibilities for all players. The time has come to set sails as a real Pirate with the black flag on the mast! Yes! The bad guys are now able to leave their home nation and sail as a Pirate, doing jobs as a Pirate and being hunted as a Pirate.

But be alert! The life as a buccaneer is burdensome. You are hunted by all nations and you have to watch out for safe harbors to restock your resources.

And now all hands on deck! Cast off! Your 1st Officer commands to raise the flag and set the sails. Your mate has set the course to the open sea! Come on!

Read more here.

Games-Masters.com has announced that they have launched a new server, which they have dubbed Jupiter.

Games-Masters.com has today announced the introduction of a brand new server for its popular Free-to-Play MMORPG CABAL Online. Due to the increasing popularity of the game, since its change of format, the new server has been opened to meet the rising demand of new players.

Named after the planet Jupiter, the server offers a chance to all players wishing to try CABAL to start off on an even footing. With the opening of a new server, players will be able for the first time to play on a fresh world, without having to pay any monthly costs. Now is the perfect time for players wishing to try the game to give it a go, with the opportunity open to all to rise to the top and become the champion of Nevareth.

So why not give it a go? Enter the world of Nevareth, a land full of destruction, war and excitement and be one of the first to play on the brand new server. Bring along your friends, family and even foes and join thousands of others in the experience that is CABAL Online.

Read more here.

The Station.com's August newsletter has gone out, with information about Legends of Norrath, the in-game mini-game playable in EverQuest, the Stargate Online TCG, and more.

Legends of Norrath

From the fantastical worlds of EverQuest® and EverQuest® II comes a new online strategy game like no other! Playable from within either MMO, simply launch Legends of Norrath from either in-game menu. Coming Sept. 2007, players can use the stand-alone client along with a Station.com account to challenge opponents across EQ and EQII servers.

Stargate Online Trading Card Game

Gating just got a lot more dangerous! System Lords, the exciting second set for Stargate TCG is invading your world this summer. Featuring more than 200 new cards and unleashing 4 new starter decks, encounter scores of new Goa'uld System Lords; including Apophis, Baal, Osiris and Yu and their Jaffa henchmen. This expansion is one that you won't want to miss!

Visit Station.com for more.

The latest edition of Game/On, MMORPG.com's weekly podcast is now available for your listening pleasure.

This week on Game/On, MMORPG.com's weekly podcast, co-hosts Jon Wood and Keith Cross talk about Jon's recent trip to the Games Convention in Leipzig, Germany, and discuss differences in how sex and violence in games are treated in different cultures.

You can listen to the Podcast here.

Today is the last day in the life of Auto Assault, and they have posted a few parting words for the game's remaining fans, including word of "parting gifts" for those who stuck with the game to the end. Goodbye Auto Assault, and may you have a million subs in the MMO afterlife.

With Auto Assault closing down tonight, we wanted to thank all of you for creating a tremendously cool and dedicated community of Wastelanders. We just didn't want to give you guys a wild, crazy event tonight, but something else that may be just as fun. In the coming days those that are eligible will be receiving a "Parting Gift" message in your e-mail inboxes, with opportunities to take a part in some of our other products, including Richard Garriott's Tabula Rasa and City of Heroes. It's our way of saying "Thank You" to the diehard Auto Assault fan base and we hope to see you in are other virtual worlds.

Read more about Auto Assault here.

Codemasters has announced that earlier this week the first two Archlords have won their crowns. Congratulations to Icecube of Genesis and Hellmaster of EyesofWar.

It was a tough evening of battle for all those involved, as players on both servers gathered to take part in the biggest fight of their MMO lives.

Without further adieu Codemasters Online is pleased to announced Icecube of Genesis and Hellmaster of EyesofWar, as the two new ArchLords.

All the guilds involved were well drilled, and the organisation of those taking part was phenomenal.

Let's hope they enjoy their reign, and look forward to defending the ArchLord crown again in a few weeks.

We shall be announcing the winner of the ArchLord suit of Armour in the next couple of days, but it was a close one!

Once again, congratulations to the new ArchLords.

Read more here.

Age of Armor's second closed beta begins today, and Snailgame has added several new links where players can download the new client.

2nd Close Beta of Age of Armor is going to start on 6:00pm (GMT- 5) August 31.

By the time there will be many wonderful events for the players. More surprise, more fun, all are in Age of Armor. Are you ready?!

Please note that the account and the client used in 1st CB is USELESS now. You can get an account by the following link: http://www.aoaus.com/news/up_news/getcode.html

To download the NEW client for 2nd CB, please refer to:

1. http://files.filefront.com/AOAEngBetaTest2ndexe/;8436461;;/fileinfo.html
2. http://www.gamershell.com/download_19679.shtml
3. http://www.spawnpoint.com/games/profile/downloads/file/6031/878/Age_of_Armor_ 2nd_Beta_English/

Read more about Age of Armor here.