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Originally posted by zymurgeist
"Now, if I can only figure out how to cover the show without having to write up a bunch of reports on individual game presentations."
 
Isn't that the whole point? To hobnob with the developers, develop a feel for what's new, and seek opportunities for in depth interviews on individual games later?  If you're not going to cover games why go to gaming conventions?

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The problem is not covering.

The problem is HAVING to look at E3 as shards of fallen glass mosaic, instead of being able to talk about THE BIG PICTURE it was.

You cover one thing, you miss out(or get a biased opinion on) another. Ask ~10 different journalists about E3 and you will get stories as if its ten entirely different events.

E3 coverup(especially on mmorpg.com) has been SERIOUSLY subjective, with constant hype of certain games(*cough*tor*cough) and total neglect of other. That's the problem. None of websites give you THE BIG picture, only the shards after it was broken.

p2p?

Pass.

P2p+rmt?

Pass + FAIL stamp.

Oh so they continue to sound cocky in their interviews?...

In a sense I trust Bioware. I am sure that they will create some sort of "omg great" storyline, but thats not the problem with TOR.

The problem is with them jumping the gun into mmo market. Let's face it, they don't have any experience in that field. They will most likely copy whatever is known best(that being WoW) and add their "omg story" into it. Thats all.

But they are doing it by sacrifficing KOTOR franchise.

They could have spent a year more gathering info for TOR and finally releasing KOTOR III, bu their decided to rush everything forward, dropping III part, spitting fans in face by making derogatory statements to the fans(with an intent to belitle the franchise).

Then they decided to make TOR story in such a way that makes previous two games completely pointless ("ha ha those characters you cared and wanted to know what happened? Well, they died, here go grind in this game").

Most of franchise fans expected "true sith" to be some sort of badasses, who look and feel unique and DIFFERENT from traditional, washed up "present day" Sith we have seen in the first two parts. Fans expected something new, frightening, something more in style with how Marka Ragnos was portrayed in Jedi Academy.

Fans expected seeing Exile and Revan stop the threat. What did the fans get instead? A storyline set on intent to belittle two best characters of star wars game franchise. A storyline where "true sith" is nothing more than just yet another name for "sith" wielding the same lightsabers and playing Malak-cosplay.

Suddenly everything we lived and experienced in two most awesome bioware games did not matter anymore. Suddenly the fantastic universe did not matter. Suddenly some random Jedi player named "XxxEdwardxxX" will be able to do something that EVEN Revan and Exile could not - organize a raid against "the true sith lord" and win~

TOR so far lacks the emotion, the atmosphere and feels like a half-assed attempt to milk more money from franchise. Instead of giving us the conclusion to KOTOR storyline, they are jumping the gun and trashing away KOTOR III in favor of this game.

From all the videos TOR does NOT feel like bioware. It feels as if some company took KOTOR lore and decided to create a fan-game on it.

Hopefully Bioware will turn out ok, TOR will actually live up to all the hype(i doubt this will happen) and Bioware will still have a decent share of customers even after all their hard work of alienating and destroying their KOTOR fanbase...

Bioware, please, stop this senseless hype. I am sure that it will decent game with some sort of decent story, but it won't be "omg the best thing ever" like the devs are talking about it. Getting off your high horse IS healthy when you are treading into new grounds like Bioware is now....

So....liek....simple point'n'click mmorpg without any "life" and "feeling" of NORMAL bioware games? :<

Eh, I find it surprising on how biased most of gaming websites sound when writing about TOR("So we will talk about TOR, which is the next best thing ever, and how tor, which is the next best thing ever, will affect mmorpg marked because its the next best thing ever"). Do they pay you guys to increase the hype?

At least the review at Massively was way more honest, accepting the fact that its just a cheap standard mmorpg themepark cash-in :<

Eh. I miss old good days of kotor where me would stumble around the ship talking to characters :<

Too bad TOR won't have any characters...just "quest npcs" who will offer you an awesome task of killing stuff and collecting.....stuff....

I miss KOTOR, I miss the old good bioware that did not try to cash in on their best games by releasing a simplified wow-clone mmorpg versions of the aforementioned games :<

Awww, whats next? :<

News that my lvl1454524152 Human Jedi Mage, won't be able to party with that prety lvl245524 twilek rogue because twileks are sith-only class and we won't be able to go raid Tombs of The Doooooooom instance to complete that quest that requires to kill Sith Lord Evilius THe Unspeakeable and 35 rats? :<

Its seriously fun to see on how this whole hype on tor begins to end and people start to talk honestly about the game and how bland it is.

I say, let tor die and bring back good old KOTOR III, which should look awesome in the new engine bioware used for their last two games.

God, this article just reminded me on how much i miss the kotor series.

Well, hopefully since now it was finally revealed that TOR is nothing more than wow-style point and click themepark grind with cartoon character designs, bioware will be able to at least start working on KOTOR III, once tor goes down from its hype and dies.

Originally posted by AkumaDaimyo

Cry moar Yuui. A SW MMO that isn't headed up by craptastic Sony is a great idea.

 

Oh I agree.

a great SW mmorpg would be great.

That is if it was not built by killing one of the greatest rpg trilogies of all time and one of greatest sw games of all time...

TOR is a huge slap to all bioware fans:

its like "you remember the badass guys you created in previous two games? Well they failed, died and got forgotten. Now create this random sith/jedi and go get a raid party against sith lord no one knew or cared about"

The half-assed high-horse comments from develiopers do not help. comments like "bah who needs kotor III, this willhave III, IV, V, VI and whatever you want~".

Oh? what is this ? Another failed attempt to overhype a lame cash in made on the corpse of awesomeness of KOTORI and II?

NO thank you, Bioware. Hopeflly you will see that your fans do not need a half-assed sw milk-cow mmo and just want to finally get a normal and great KOTOR III.

Introduction:

Ever since the ascension expansion was released, every new player would get a "Treasure Box" the moment they log in to the game for the first time. The box would give out various precious stuff every five levels, including weapons, potions, pets, various temporary stuff and various permanent stuff, including a refinery sigil at lvl 140.

However what many of people do not know yet is that there's a second box you can obtain - its called "Brocade Box" and only given to the so called "inductee accounts".

The Importance of Brocade Box:
It, just like "Treasure Chest", gives out various stuff every five levels. However the latter-level stuff is way mkore precious than the one you get in the "Treasure Chest".

While Treasure Chest gives out you new weapons(according to requirment levels that is 1, 15, 30, 45, 60, 75, 90, 105, 120 and 135), that are a bit more powerful than normal ones, "Brocade Box" gives out armors for the same level range that are a bit more powerful than the casual ones.

It also gives out a second temporary 30Day skyblade and 30Day mount - so if you open it up wisely, you can live for total of two months without even buying the 1000g skyblade from the Wind Fairy NPC.

Another important thing The "Brocade Box" gives is Chi Bottle Esper. Its LVL75 esper that is a bit more powerful than faction lvl75 espers. The esper itself sells for about ~150-300g depending on stats.

Brocade box also gives out jewelry, various small stuff like universal coins, star dust, potion stacks of 999potions and etc.

The main worth of the Brocade box is in the endgame levels - at lvl 140-150, Brocade box gives out +8 Refinery Sigil (worth about ~2,400-4,000 gold) and 999 Affinity Beads( worth about ~3,000gold total and hard to obtain), making sure have everything you need for ascension.

Having both boxes makes sure that you won't need to buy potions for a long long long time.

The Inductee Status:
Inductee status is like "referral". People who you refer to the game, are your "inductees" and can obtain "Brocade Box" from Induction Agent when they log into the game.

Inductor Status:
The one who refers you becomes your "Inductor". Inductor gets a small percentage of exp for each level you reach and has a small chance to get small amounts of BonusJaden when you level. He can also monitor your leveling progress. No other benefits.


Becoming an Inductee:
For that you need:
- An empty perfectworld.com account.
- Jade Dynasty Ascension game client.
- An Induction Code for the server you want to play in. (for example my induction ID for Shura(Europe) server is : "0020067X010604082005000Z15d21f"(without brackets)

1. Start up your Jade Dynasty Ascension game client.
2. Log into the correct server with your empty perfectworld.com account.
3 Click Character Create Button:

4. Choose your Race:

5. Select the appearance, gender, etc. Enter the Induction code as shown in screenshot. enter desired character name:

6. Click Done. You will Log in into the game.
6.5. Inside of the game, the first thing you will be asked to do is to add your inductor into your friends list.If you chose me as your inductor feel free to do so and ask any questions about the game.
7. When in game, you should already have a quest in your quest log(Press Q). Just auto-route to the location of npc, select it, click Quest Related and finish the quest, getting your very own and awesome "Brocade Box".
8. Now you are free to continue playing the game, going through tutorial, main quests etc. through the 150 levels of the game now you will have TWO chests to give free stuff to you.


Becoming an Inductor:
You need:
- LVL60+ character.

1. Go to Induction Agent.
2. Select "Get Induction Info".
3. Select "Copy My ID".
4. Spread the ID where allowed~

Additional Info:
- Once you enter the ID for first character, that ID "sticks" to all the characters you will create on that account, giving you the benefits to any character you will create in that account.
- "Brocade Chest" can be opened every Five Levels.
- My Induction ID on SHURA(europe) server is: 0020067X010604082005000Z15d21f.
- ID from one server won't work on other. For example if you have ID on european server, you won't be able to use it on USA server or PVP server and etc.
- The Inductor does not get a Brocade Box. The Inductee does.
- Inductees can still share their own codes and become inductors. The inductor who inducted you won't get any benefits from your inductees.
- The example of "how to become an inductee" above is done through HUMAN race character creation interface. Becoming an inductee with ATHAN race is mostly the same - find the field, enter the ID and bingo!~

Official Response by Max Schaefer posted on runic games forums:

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This development is the culmination of a long and well-planned partnership with Perfect World. We selected Perfect World among other partners, including major US Publishers, because they are exactly the right partner for Runic Games going into the future. As we move into developing multi-player games with more sophisticated communities, business models, and for a global market, it is vitally important for a company like us to forge a strong partnership with a publisher that is experienced and successful in operating large-scale PC games, managing communities, and basically handling all the crazy logistics that we are not experts in. From their perspective, we bring a fresh game design sensibility, and a western take on game design as they globalize their business. Most importantly, the guys at Perfect World are gamers and good people - we've been working with them for a long time now, and we feel our talents and goals mesh perfectly. So we're very happy at Runic Games to make this all official. This will do nothing but help our game development, and allow us to focus on what it is we do best.

Max Schaefer
CEO, Runic Games

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Originally posted by Wardrop

Enjoy defending a game that has a wanna-be identity complex.. Torchlight devs should stop riding diablos jock and get thier own style... whats wrong ? Cant hang with the big boys?
Comical

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OH but they do have their own style. The style that left Diablo franchise when the original makers left blizzard, which resulted in, ultimately, creation of World of Diablocraft III and the awesomeness known as Torchlight.

Oh wait....you were trollin' weren't you? Please don't mind me, go on, go on :)

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Originally posted by eyeswideopen
Diablo 3 will stomp this into the dirt anyways, so it doesn't really matter.

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Sure that would happen, but that's because its blizzard and not because its Diablo.

sure that would happen, if DIII would come out before torchmmo. However we won't be seeing world of diablocraft III in 2010 nor in 2011

Let's face it, there's more Diablo in torchlight than in worlf of diablocraft III where newbie developers base their classes around street fighter games and orc reskins and feathered clowns with bombs fight under the rainbow.

When people will finally realize just how wrong DIII is, torchmmo and its entire community will be waiting for them with open arms.

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Oh and Runic and PWE have been working together for quite some time.

They are currently helping with English version of Forsaken World and development of PWE's new mmo to come in 2011, Swordsman Online(which will be released at the same time as high-budget wuxia movie by the same novel)

For all the QQers, read this post by devs:
http://forums.runicgames.com/viewtopic.php?p=112827#p112827

This purchase has been planned from beginning as a way to make sure that Runic wont go down during development of TorchMMO and whatever else they will create.

TorchMMo was always intended to be published, run and managed by PWE.

Just like English team of BoI can do pretty much everything they want with game and how they run it, Runic will always have full(and even bigger than in example case) creative control over their games.

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Originally posted by DerWotan
I'm really getting sick of companies, investors getting even more involved in our industry. Its like every day another former independent studio becoming the victim of them, sucks another game to scratch from my list well..

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You do know this changes nothing, right?

PWE would have published this game anyway.

This game was always intended to be microtransaction-based, like how Mythos would have been.

Perfect World Entertainment would have ran, hosted servers and managed, admines, GM-ed Torchlight mmorpg anyway as that was the original project.

All that this investment does is tie PWE to Runic a bit more. Runic gets more money and increased stability and its PWE which takes bigger risk - if Runic projects fail, PWE gets to pay the bill.

All PWE did is invest 8 million dollars into project they would have ran, managed and published anyway

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Originally posted by Danubus
I feel sorry for Runic. PerfectWorld Ent is a terrible company. They put out trash games as quickly as they can and do not do real beta testing. I loved Torchlight, but this is a bad move for Runic.

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Guess who funded Torchlight release?

Guess who's official publisher of Torchlight?

Guess who was always intended to fund, run and manage Torchmmo?

Seriously, nothing has changed.

Oh and I would not call it terrible. PWE actually releases a good games and customer support and customer-developer interaction is one of the best I have ever seen lately.

IMO this changes nothing.

Torchmmorpg would still have been f2p mmorpg operated, mantained and published by PWE.

All this did is:
1) Torchmmo now has 8million $ more in development.
2) Considering sales of torchlight went way past 500 000, the company has gotten a lot of hype and that main source of income for Torchlight and torchmmo development has been PWE, it only makes sense for them to invest into the possibility of stocks going up even more, when details on torchlight-multiplayer and torchmmo are out.

It all depends on which aspect of pvp you are talking about.

- free-pk (in pvp realms) is quite gear-dependant as its more about backstabbing and stumbling onto unaware players or getting "shot in the back" by someone else. Although even there, gear is not really the main point as a lot of situational skills can quickly change the situation. Overall you won't be able to compete purely by spending cash in this aspect, as you would neeed to spend thousands of $$ to outweigh others purely by cash shop advantage. And even then its not guaranteed.

- Fort wars - its all about teamwork and preventing the opponents from reaching their goal. Its more strategical than other pvp aspects as both deffending and attacking side has various perks that can change the flow of game. Kill count does not matter in any way, except if you want to brag.

- (upcomming in next expansion in somewhere in between start of june and mid of august) - Territorial Wars - 30+ conquerable territories with air, land and sea siege equipment, destructible environment and etc.

- (currently in progress of being implemented through game storyline) - Racial wars. Most of stuff in free-pk still applies to this, except that it has no punishment system.

- battlegrounds - various levels of difficulties and map specifics. The main goal is similar to that of fort wars.

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Compared to the "old" players, who started only with their overall common kno0wledge, newer players enjoy a tutorial system, 2(!) different newbie rewards systems that award player various cash shop items for free and etc.

While you would not possibly get into overall top5 or top10, its entirely possible to reach the top if you have enough patience and smarts.

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The game is pay to be in the very top
The game is free otherwise but requires patience and smarts to get near the very top.
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IMO its impossible to survive ONLY by cash shop in this game and everything that can be found in cash shop can be acquired through other means inside of the game.

There's a lot of content, although it might get a little bit repetitive when you try to reach the top, bu that does not involve grind as overall gameplay mechanics make sure that you do not feel the grind itself. Not to mention that as your level grows, the grind goes less and less efficient and non-grinding stuff gets more and more efficient.

Overall game has a lot of great and unique ideas and has managed to keep me interested for year and half already.

As for other games - IMO there are no really worthwhile mmorpg games in market currently(with exception of, maybe, EVE and AOC). be it p2p or f2p. I suggest you keep eyes out on upcoming games like Kingdom Heroes (which boasts an extensive pvp content and realistic siege battles), Torchlight mmorpg and The Secret World (which is centered round pvp content and overall is level-less and class-less game.

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Originally posted by zigmund
Like we honestly need another one of these mmo's?

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Please name another mmorpg with "pilotable-ship battles + realistic sieges where you actually control catapults and stuff + ability to build entire cities + controlling actual npc armies(overlord/brutal_legend style)+actual rts-city-management-gameplay+ability to actually besiege cities from land and sea" and i'll eat my socks.

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Originally posted by Archeminos
I don't know what OP was expecting when they played the game, and it's kind of clear they never or very briefly touched a HOMM game, regardless of what they claim. They most likely wanted a carbon copy of the HOMM series which, I hate to break it to you, is not possible in an mmo format unless you want it very slow and dull (i.e. Heroes of Gaia).
As far as graphics, HOMM has never been about looking pretty, it's been about good gameplay, which the Online version has.  There is nothing wrong with the animation or movement that some slight tweaking wont fix, it's not like they are stuttering around. Everything I have seen has been smooth.
It has its issues. There are bugs and translations issues, which is norm for a port from a foreign country.  A little polish would be nice as well. And the exploration/battle maps feel kind of sparse, at least in chapter 1. But all in all it's a fun game so far, even with its flaws. But I suppose, if looks are everything, it won't be your cup of tea.

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Congratulations, sir. Your post is first unbiased non-elitist post in this thread with actual arguments.

As for difficulty of quests - latter on it gets harder. Even Chapter2 already has some different quests (like the ones with turn limits, or the "dig up the treasure" one).

Latter on, together with map size and difficulty, more creatures are added in a way that you actually need to think and re-arrange yoru army to succeed(as there are creatures resistant to meele or range attacks, creatures only harmed by certain magic type and etc).

Chapter1 is "sort-of" tutorial, teaching you on what various map stuff does.

Latter on they will seemingly introduce Player-VS-Player HoMMIII-like "raze their castles" maps

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Originally posted by bugse82
http://mightandmagicheroeskingdoms.ubi.com/en/

this will be better!
im from bulgaria and it sais: "M&M Heroes Kingdoms™ has not been launched in your country yet!"
anyone outside europe manage to play it already?

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Its browser-based heroes, so I expect it to suck.

sadly not many people were able to try it as Ubisoft seemingly totally forgot about that game.