A mixture of hope and apathy

At the moment I’m kind of adrift on an uninspiring sea of MMORPGs. There’s no siren call strong enough to tempt me into paying a subscription fee, I’m just not finding anything particularly alluring. Too much of the same old same old I suppose. So instead I’m just fiddling about with single player and F2P stuff, whilst I wait for one of the more interesting online games on the horizon.

As always I am tempted to return to EVE, but also as always, it’s just not life style friendly enough for me and my regular AFKing. Alas, I can’t see me being able to play EVE the way I would like to anytime soon. Though it’s probably a positive thing that real life prevents me from doing so, as I know EVE can devour you like a Sarlacc with the munchies. For now I’m mainly playing Star Trek Online. Just nipping on for an hour here and there to play through episodes or missions and set my next batch of Duty Officer assignments running. It’s free to play, quite engaging and I’ve always had a soft spot for STO. That said, the game won’t ever be my long term MMO love affair, but is more of a regular casual flirtation, perhaps with the occasional tongue. Flashing eyes across the office, the odd late night drinking session, but not quite worth a divorce.

Oh, I've downloaded RIFT again and will dick about the free 1-20 bit. Not logged in yet.
The only other online game I’m playing at the moment is Tribes: Ascend. It’s free to play, the cash shop is not essential and most importantly, it’s fun. This reimagining of the classic Tribes 1 and 2 is getting better and better and I recommend people try it out. Just be warned that it is not like your normal online shooters. It’s MUCH faster and you have to learn to lead your shots a lot more than normal. It’s all about predicting people’s movement and it can take some getting used to. Anyway, it’s a good game and recommended.

At some point soon I will be making use of my 2 weeks free in both WAR and DAoC, but I doubt very much I would subscribe to either in the near future. Obviously I’m a fan of both games, or at least what they once were, it’s just that WAR would really need to do quite a lot to make up for the Wrath of Heroes disappointment. The less said about that the better. Actually, as I write this I’m changing my mind slightly regarding DAoC. There is a bit more chance that DAoC could persuade me to take up a month’s subscription. It did grab me last year, surprising me how well so many things still played and looked. I swear if that game had a decent UI update it could see a reasonable resurgence.

Aside from those retro distractions, for me it’s all about the upcoming games; Planetside 2 and Mechwarrior Online. There’s a load more Planetside 2 news appeared in the last couple of days, which I’ll gather up and post about soon. Mechwarrior is continuing to drip feed news at a slow steady rate, though we’re still waiting to see some in-game footage. I hear we may see something soon however. Mechwarrior isn’t a MMO of course, but this blog is about stuff that interest me, so meh whatever. Oh and Hawken looks great. Me like mechs.

Elsewhere, I’m not totally writing off Funcom’s “The Secret World”, yet I don’t find myself particularly caring about it either way. To be honest I’m not quite sure why. Despite my many misgivings regarding Funcom, I do like what they try to do and certainly TSW has many features that tick my boxes. My apathy confuses me slightly. If I don’t get on the beta then I doubt I will try it until well after launch.

And on the subject of apathy… If for a moment I take off my Hat of Trolling+3, yes Guild Wars 2 has much potential and does look like some serious PvP goodness. That doesn’t change the fact that it will never be a game I get excited about and I still find it hard to motivate myself to write about it, but it’s certainly one I would like to see realise its PvP potential. Obviously Kill Frenzy and I will try it out.

Hopefully sometime soon we’ll start to get more news on Dark Millennium Online and World of Darkness. Both games are perceived as being on rather rough seas, what with the challenges faced by THQ and CCP, but I guess we just have to wait and see what news arrives. I still have high hopes for both games, purely due to their settings. Actually that’s not true. I have some confidence in CCP to deliver something interesting and hopefully sandboxy. Plus THQ have some excellent 40k games in their stable, so we know they’ll do the 40k universe credit when it comes to atmosphere at least.

I think that’s it for major MMOs of interest to me, can’t think of anything else. There are a few small games I have an eye on, but they’ll get posts of their own at some point. Oh and for the record, Diablo 3 I’m indifferent to and World of Warcraft Panda bear stuff just doesn’t work for me. Sorry Blizzard, as if you care lol :D

Dark Millenium cancelled? Nope says THQ

First Kotaku and other sites reported Dark Millenium Online was no more, after Kevin Dent, a games industry type chap, tweeted  that THQ had canceled an MMO it was developing under license from Games Workshop. However this was quickly followed up by THQ giving out this statement:

"THQ has not cancelled its 2014 line-up, and has not made any decisions regarding the planned MMO. As part of the ongoing review of our business, we have made decisions to ensure that the company is strategically addressing the most attractive markets. As we have previously announced, we have dramatically reduced our commitment to the kids’ boxed games sector which leads to a significantly more focused release schedule moving forward. Our slate for calendar 2012 and beyond is focused on high-quality core games and continues to build our digital platform and business. We are excited for our pipeline of original and high-quality content along with our relationships with some of the best talent in the industry.


Additionally, we are thrilled with the great performance of Saints Row: The Third, which on a like for like period in North America has tripled in sell-through from Saints Row 2. In addition, WWE ’12’s worldwide sell-through sales are up almost 40% year-over-year for the same sales period with fewer platforms. According to NPD, for the month of December and the 2011 year, THQ was the #5 publisher overall, #4 third party, with reported sell through growing over 18% in a market that was down almost 6%. And coming up next, we have two great titles for the first half of the year including UFC Undisputed 3 and Darksiders 2."

Fairly comprehensive, though you could argue that "has not made any decisions regarding the planned MMO" (emphasis mine) is not quite as concrete a statement as folks may want to see. Probably just nitpicking though.

The MMO I most look forward to is... (fairly obvious)

There's not a huge amount coming out in MMO land to excite me over the next year. SWTOR I'm keen on, but not hyped for as such, Guild War 2 (as people are probably tired of hearing me say) I don't care about, Secret World I have low expectations for, WoW and it's expansion are sooooooo 3 years ago, Prime BFD is a gamble and other than that, it's only Planetside 2 I've got real hopes for.

2013 however is a different kettle of fish entirely. Dark Millennium Online is the game I'm expecting to be my next true MMO obsession. Regardless of anything to do with the whole MMO bit and the many concerns I have about how this will work out, it has 3 massive selling points for me:

1. It's Warhammer.
2. It's made by people that know how to translate Warhammer into excellent computer games.
3. Its set in the 40k universe, which is my favourite setting of all Gameworkshop's gaming pantheon of awesome.

Nothing else matters.



Yeah I know, supposedly they're making the same stupid mistake as Mythic did with WAR and only going with 2 factions (so by default world PvP will suck), but whilst I'm able to be pretty objective, critical and overly picky with most games, I'm more than willing to ignore that epic cock up just for the chance to run around shouting DEATH TO THE FALSE EMPEROR! or PURGE THE HERETIC! and not look like a total fruit loop.

A whole sodding year away... Damn it.

DMO details are bollocks, apparently...

So today Destructoid post this. Important bit pasted below:

"It has come to THQ’s attention that some media are reporting that we’ve announced game details and a release date for our upcoming Massively Multiplayer Online project, Warhammer 40,000: Dark Millennium Online," stated the company. "At this time THQ has not officially announced a release date and any reported features are pure speculation.  THQ will announce confirmed game features and an official release date at a later time."


So who the hell knows?

LOTS of new Dark Millenium Online news

The original post on Destructoid can be found here, including a release date planned for March 2013. Or if you cba to click the link merely read my copy pasted version below:

Game Design Notes:

* Relic is lending a very small hand in the overall development of dmo. Winking, a chinese based developer is also on board. They helped with Space Marine as well.
* Vigil is doing 90% of the work. Most of the shared work load is art, and animation.
* Spacemarine is built on the same engine as darksiders (and darksiders 2 respectively)
* Dmo is using the same engine, with gameplay (at least combat) akin to Spacemarine.
* Contrary to what I was told, the art style is NOT like Spacemarine, rather the whole game is more like darksiders (1 & 2), very stylized. The videos released at the last E3 are fairly accurate to the current state of the art style. Less realistic.
* Revision to what I was told by the rep, is that Spring 2012 is unlikely… maybe for more announcements on the game’s progress. Though a Darsiders 2 release in spring is likely, Vigil is working on both.

Class related notes:

* Races broadly put into forces of “Order” and “Disorder” similar to 40K World-wide campaigns.
* The “spacemarine” is a class, with a chaos counterpart.
* Tactical, heavy, assault as specialties.
* Each class starts as something familiar, and through progression changes.Ie. Scout to Marine
* Other classes include: psyker, techpriest, and assassin
* The assassin starts as a guardsman-esque character.
* Chaos have similar counterparts, cultist themed.
* Instead of an assassin, think demon host.
* Orks are with Chaos (disorder), Eldar are with the Imperium of man (order)
* Ork class rundown: Nob, mekboy, runt herda, mad dok
* Eldar class rundown: Scorpion, Avenger, Warlock, Reaper
* Expect Tau & Dark Eldar later, likely an expansion, though dark eldar npcs will be present on release, as well as Necron, and Tyranids. (Interesting idea, going for the ‘faceless’ races as NPCs, though I suspect you won’t be getting quests from the Swarmlord!)
* 60 character levels.

Gameplay related notes:

* A crashed space hulk will be one of the zones.
* Another zone will take place on an Imperial Cruiser, and Chaos Cruiser.
* Expect several instanced missions much like WoW, as well as open world.
* It will include instanced & open world pvp.
* Players will be able to dual weild things like pistols and melee weapons… yes that means two chain swords.
* The featured chapter is Black Templars. (As evidenced by the banner art)
* The featured chaos god is Khorne, at least for playable
* Word Bearers will also take a major role in the Playable chaos faction
* Nurgle & Fabius Bile will have a big Chaos NPC presence. (I suspect not Nurgle himself, but perhaps Typhus?)
* Possible shooter/RPG mode controls, like StarTrek Online.
* Third person action, plays like Gears of War/Space Marine mixed together for shooting.
Melee is more like Space Marine/Darksiders, with the target lock on.
Blocking melee attacks is a maybe, sheilds may be NPC only.
* NPC creatures vary from: Necromunda like humans, Chaos Cultists, Dark Eldar; from Grotesques to Warriors, Chaos Daemons and beasts, Orks, Grots, Guardsmen, defected Guardsmen, most of the minor Demons, Dreadnoughts, Tyranid Warriors, Genestealers and more.
* Forgeworld things may be present. Thunderhawk, terrain sets, Aquila landers, FW-esque equipment on vehicles.
* Environments range from snowy mountains, to the innards of a crashed space hulk… from cities destroyed, and orkified, to ancient eldar cities, overgrown with nids… from ancient battlefields, littered with the carcases of Titans and tanks, to a hive city, nostalgic with necromunda…. from the halls of Imperial Cruisers, to tge desecrated throne rooms of Chaos.
* Everything is large, beefy, and sticks to 40k very well. People already invested in the background and game will progress at a snails pace, as we will be distracted by everything.
* Left mouse uses the weapon in your character’s left hand, Right mouse uses the weapon in your character’s right hand. Rather cool mechanic.
* All abilities have a cooldown… No spamming your “3″ key like most MMOs. This will likely annoy WoW diehards. This pleases me.
* Melee combos – dual wielding gives new moves
* There is sprinting.
* “Guilds” will be present.
* Team/party/squad size is 5
* “Raid” size is 50… subject to change.
* Ranged weapons have infinite ammo, but there is reloading, overheating, venting, and reloading.
* Weapons rarely get to take full advantage of their range when inside… lots of cover and turning corners, it’s very dynamic.
* Hero classes are possible, unlocked once you get a character high enoigh level.
o Imperium: Grey Knight
o Chaos: Chaos Sorcerer
o Ork: ‘Ard boy or Weird boy
o Eldar: Farseer
* Hero classes will begin at higher level…
* Likely 40.

A player progressing as a marine will do so as follows:

Lv. 0: an adept, think a marine wearing just carapace armor.
Lv. 10: more or less a scout.
Lv. 20: equipped like the marine character in th sm codex… forgot his name.
Lv. 30: a standard marine
Lv. 40 honor guard or Sergeant, some decoration
Lv. 50 sternguard, maybe captain.
Lv. 60 artificer armor, iron halos, the whole sha-bang.

Grey knight fits in fairly well at around 40.

Other classes progress similarly.

Misc. Notes

* Tech priest are very, very pure adeptus mechamicus themed…Backpacks with a robot arm.
* A cover system is implemented.Waist high cover and standing cover.
* Cross platform is very possible.
* Shooting mechanics will have aim assist
* Similarly, melee attacks will lock on.
* Abilities work similar to Warhammer Online. A common resource, then each class has a unique resource used with abilities.
* Weapons inxrease in “coolness” as far as progression is concerned.
* A lv. 1 autogun may be it’s familiar form in necromunda and early IG… by lv 60, sone autoguns look cool enough for inquisitors to be using, lathered in fancy trim, aquilas, etc.
* Same goes for other weapons…. think Call of Duty, as you unlock the various weapon upgrades, you guns start looking cooler.

Each class has 3 specialties.

* Marine: Tactical, Devastator, Assault
* Assassin/guardsman: the major assassin type, callidus, vindicare, eversor (however you spell it)
* The Marine is by far the most flushed out.
* most abilities are still very WIP.
* Jump packs- not sure how they’ll work.

Found that poster at mydicehateme :)

Needless to say, I will be playing this and I will be taking KF there on the Destruction faction. Regardless of anything we will be trying this game out. In 2013....

Dark Millenium Online and Space Marine vids from E3

While everyone goes batshit crazy for the WiiU, which does look very interesting indeed, there was a couple of Warhammer 40k related game videos.

Dark Millenium Online. A touch brief this video :/


Not a bloody patch on last years E3 trailer for DMO mind you...



And Relic's single player console style Space Marine action game.


Oh and here's the WiiU controller advert thing. I like it, potential there.