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Jumpgate Evolution Previews: E3 2010: Hands-On Impressions
MMORPG.com's Bill Murphy got some hands-on time with NetDevil's Jumpgate Evolution at this year's E3 and delivers his report.
By William Murphy on June 18, 2010
The silence was officially broken last week when Lance Robertson came out on Jumpgate Evolution’s official forums. For nearly a year the offices of NetDevil have been quiet and with good reason, for what you may remember of JGE before the dead spell is long gone. What’s come out on the other end is a game focused and poised to deliver truly massive space battles on the backdrop of a three-faction war for the fate of humanity. It’s about faction pride, hi-speed dogfights, and dynamic PvE and PvP content on an epic scale… oh, and the instancing is a thing of the past. I had a chance to sit down with the developers at this year’s E3 and get some hands-on time with the game’s newbie experience. I came away impressed and reinvigorated with hope for a title I wasn’t sure would see the light of day.
The developers were keen to tell us that Jumpgate is about showing the story, not telling it. In other words, they want players to feel like they’ve participated in Pearl Harbor rather than just heard about it from the history books. Right from the very start, players will feel like a somebody in their chosen faction. In other MMOs you tend to begin your heroic journey whacking away at rats, but in Jumpgate this whole trend is sidestepped by making players a part of a larger army with the enemies being the members of the other factions.
The natural progression of the game will begin with players being shown the ropes of gameplay, flight mechanics, and the combat. The early missions and PvE content will lay out the story and help you become familiar with the lore and show you why you should be loyal to your chosen nation and filled with hatred for the other two. And then as you move along further up the ladder, you’ll be gently ushered out into the game’s expansive PvP system… the battle to control the universe.
There are three factions players will choose from: Solrain (a sort of corporate entity that’s all about money and efficiency), Quantar (reminiscent of the Klingons in that they’re about glory and tradition), and Octavious (think Roman Empire in space and you’ve pretty much got it). For the purposes of E3, Octavious was the featured nation playable at the booth. By now you’ve probably watched the trailer, and that literally is how the game begins upon creation of your Octavious pilot. When those manufactured ships make their way out of dock and into space, that’s when you’ll take control of the stick and begin your military career in the aid of the Octavian Empire.
The developers then took us through a sort of ongoing scenario where the Octavious are invading a Solrain outpost called Night’s Crossing. The entire area around this conflict is PvE-driven, and plays very much like one large and involved public quest (NetDevil refers to these areas as Event Sectors). The whole game is divided in many different sectors, somewhat like EVE Online in a sense, and it’s important to note like I said before that the previous iteration’s reliance on instancing is a thing of the past. It’s all open space and divided into sector’s these days.
Large and incredibly detailed with different set pieces and a multitude of lighting effects, it’s plain to see that space is not boring in JGE. The sectors can support hundreds of both players and AI-controlled ships, and that’s exactly the goal of a place like Knight’s Crossing. Like a public quest, but on a much larger and complex scale, there is a list of objectives that must be met to progress the events and as you do you’ll find yourself moving about doing anything from taking out turret defense systems or destroying innocent bystanders in housing bays of an enemy space station. It’s all in the name of national pride though, so don’t feel too remorseful when you’re first asked to slaughter escape pods by the dozen.
The developers were sure to mention that these systems can and will be used in a PvP fashion as well, where each nation will have its own sense of objectives with the winners being granted the spoils from success in the way of unlocking more content in that specific sector for a time. In the title’s endgame PvP content, the competitive nature of these objectives can lend themselves very well towards giving real weight and purpose to the sector-capture mechanics.
We watched for a while more while one of the developers continued to progress through Knight’s Crossing many different objectives, but the real fun began when I got to sit down behind the controls for myself. I got to sit down with the newbie experience of the Octavious nation and start taking orders as a member of the Regiment: the Emperor’s personal guard. It’s worth noting right here that we didn’t get too in depth with the skills and spells form of character progression that’s in place for Jumpgate Evolution. More than anything we got to see how the revamped mission content works, how the combat plays out, and if it all comes together to make an exciting experience that hearkens back to the days of Wing Commander and Elite.
I’m pleased to say that my brief time with the title did just that and more.
The first thing players will notice is just how smooth and effortless flying feels in JGE. There are several different setups players can choose from, including the traditional joystick method, but we stuck with the mouse and keyboard for our preview. Thrusters are handled with the W and S keys, for former increasing speed and the latter reducing it. A and D will allow you to pan laterally left and right, while Q and E engage your ship in a barrel roll. The mouse reticule doubles as your crosshairs, and the further away from the nose of your ship you drag it the sharper you’ll turn or move in that direction. There’s also a cockpit view in place, but I like to see my pretty ship while I fight, so I stuck with the third-person view.
Combat is very much akin to classic games like Wing Commander, as opposed to what a traditional MMO might have in store. Meaning it’s all about your ability to lead your target and track your enemy with the reticule. This isn’t a highlight and forget it experience, and I’m not exactly known in the gaming community for my shooting ability, but I still found the controls easy to pick up and get used to after just a little time in the pilot seat. JGE does some truly helpful things with the targeting system, putting brackets around nearby bogies and when your guns are in range you’ll see a red icon appear over the enemy which will also serve as your lead on the target. If they’re moving in one direction and you’ve got to lead the ship with your fire, this little red icon will show you exactly where you should be aiming to make contact.
I did my fair share of missions and spent some time hanging out an Octavian docking bay where you can check up on your stats, switch out your ship and its gear, get new quests and all manner of other secondary features that you would expect in a game of this nature. The whole UI for this portion was very work in progress I was told, but essentially the docking bays will work as a sort of “rest and relaxation” part of the game. Life in a war-torn universe can be very intense and the docking bays will be your chance to just breathe and decompress between dogfights.
In all, I feel like I’ve just barely scratched the surface of what NetDevil has in store for JGE. The game’s undergone some amazing transformations since we last saw it. The overall look is the same, but the focus is clear: NetDevil wants you to pick a side, declare your allegiance, and take the fight to the other bastards who might stands in your way. The whole game is built around the sense that these three nations are at war for the control of space. There’s a heavy endgame focus on PvP, but there’s also plenty of PvE to go around as well and it all ties into the greater focus on intergalactic war. It’s sort like what would happen if Wing Commander and Dark Age of Camelot had a baby, to be perfectly honest. Jumpgate Evolution is back, folks. It’s alive and kicking and the future of the title looks bright indeed.
SAWEET!!!!
Want this game very very much :D!
The move away from being heavily reliant on instancing can be a good and bad thing. It depends on the missions and how accessible the content is for those missions.
A problem that all space based MMO's may have to face is the very element that makes them unique compared to other MMOs: freedom in space. The lack of inherent restrictions in a space environment (for instance, the fact that you have unrestricted access to the 3rd dimension) can possibly create issues in terms of how entertaining the game is. When you can go anywhere and do anything with little restriction, then a game may lose its entertainment value pretty fast. And thus, space based MMO game designers may be forced to implement more obvious hard restrictions in order to regulate gameplay and create progression.
For the moment, I'm reserving judgement on the game. We don't know enough yet to get a good idea as to whether NetDevil created the right formula or not.
Sounds very interesting - definitely worth following.
Sounds a lot more Wing Commander than Elite. In Elite you did whatever you wanted - rather like the open universe of EVE, actually. In Wing Commander you were "on rails" to a degree - but your choices and success in the battles established a path among several options (since that was a story-driven single-player game).
Going to be a real interesting matchup between this game and Black Prophecy. They both seem to be going for the same core space-dogfight gameplay. It's nice to see some real alternatives appearing for spaceflight and space-fight fans.
The preview sounds very interesting and I am looking forward to hearing more about this title, although I have to agree with Lobotomist in that I hope there is more to it than non-stop pvp pew-pew...Hopefully there will be some form of crafting and exploration as well...
Sounds like SWG's addon Jump to Lightspeed which IMO is the single greatest space flight sim to date (and kept me in SWG for 3 years longer than I ever should have been), jump in and fun right off the bat with extremely twitch gameplay and epic space dogfights and all with tactics dependent upon what your flying and what the enemy is flying.
when its finished then i'll beleave it. at this point i dont beleave anything from JGE untill i see it released.
Lords of the Dead (LotD) is actively following this game, and some of our folks attended E3 this year to check it out. We look forward to its release, and hope to see some of you all there.
What happens when your ship is blown up in PVP and even PVE?
Sounds truly awesome. Hope they add heavier ships though as I am not so fond in twitch gaming.
If you want "sandbox flying , trading , pirating ..etc" then it sounds like you want to play Eve, not JGE. I very much hope JGE is nothing like Eve.
Yea, all that action would bore me to death... yawn.
You can please some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time, but some people are never f*cking happy with anything.
It's starting to look nice .. Graphics look good, combat seems to be nice and smooth, and very flight-simmy.
And what's even better is we are getting a choice in available playstyles ..
With
all heading in different directions.
I call it a win-win scenario for us space fans :D
You see, the fact that EVE has all that stuff is marvelous, but it's ultimately point-and-click. So for those who really like space sims, that's a bit underwhelming. I myself play it and like it, but often I find myself wishing we had a game that played like a space combat sim and had all those other EVE features to boot.
Anyway, JGE sounds pretty good to me right now - I sure will at least try a game that's "sort of like what would happen if Wing Commander and Dark Age of Camelot had a baby". :)
>sigh<
I guess I need to clarify a bit:
I love factional pvp as much as anyone else and 'epic battles' give me goosebumps, but I do like a bit of depth to the games that I play like crafting cool gear, an economy for trading, exploring new areas and finding cool stuff. You know, the things that make immersive gameplay.
I think we all know that games that limit themselves to JUST pvp don't do very well subscription-wise and if you offer enough diversity to get people to try a game, then even non-pvpers will get sucked into it and become pvpers. Kind of like what happened to me :)
Looking better and better, can't wait for this gem. EVE is good, but the click flight system will always hold it back, it's nowhere near as fun as traditional space sims with ducking, weaving and dodging enemy fire/space debris etc. This game will provide good volumes of adrenaline.
I do believe there's plenty of trading, crafting, etc. in the game as well. But for the purposes of E3 the focus was on the Event Sectors and the Newbie Experience. There's a lot more to be unveiled over the next few months I'm sure. Hopefully we'll see even more at PAX.
I am LOVING the sounds of this game! I have been checking the JGE forums since January and for the most part they are like a ghost town with nothing but the wind and an occasional tumbleweed blowing past. I haven't been on them since E3 yet, but they have to be seeing some activity, finally.
Okay, what I am loving about this game is that it is not like most other MMOs out there and that it is twitch based instead of leveling based by the sounds of it. I tried Eve when I was getting really sick of WoW for something different, but the learning curve was so steep that I felt like I needed a textbook and homework assignments to be able to even attempt to start playing. From the sounds of JGE you get into the action faster and hopefully the learning curve won't be a sheer cliff.
All I can say is I am stoked to see the game is finally back in business and I can't wait to try it out.
They gave up trying to make a full game, and are going for the simple "PvP will be the end game content" approach.
Doing "public" quests to "progess events". Hmm. Tell me how the "story" works out; I might want to read it.
Sounds promising. I think they did a good job, for what they had to work with, before. But I have long enjoyed dogfighting-type games, and a good high-speed space game would be something the MMO world could use. More new and exciting things is always a good thing in my book.
Flight mechanics and fighting sound promising. Graphics look suitably spiffy, too. Still a great deal left to find out but looks like JGE's off to a good start.
At this rate they should be able to release it in time for the return of Halleys Comet, too, which will give it all a nice synchronicity.
LotD attends E3 JGE, a few more details:
http://www.lotd.org/showthread.php?s=ca64713cb507d13c418e1a56905d5417&t=29356
Looks interesting, will be one to keep an eye on. I'd all but written it off as dead so good to see it making a come back.
Now I think JGE is in the right track. Many people are demanding a twitch based, fast action space sim game, 1st person pov, with epic battles of hundreds of players. Traditional MMO adds are NOT needed, like grinding (aka mining), heavy crafting (aka grinding for components), super extensive open space (aka gate camping - aka I am so alone and bored), deep clan politics/dictatorship (aka my clan/federation owns all these sectors, bow to me, clean my shoes and I will let you mine this little rock for an hour)...
The ones that love EVE "exciting" things like mining, gate camping, super-deep-politics-economy-whatever, "exciting" point and click fights, "exciting" fleet battles.... please stick with EVE and stop trying to persuade the world how wonderful EVE is. In fact, if you are looking for other games to come, that means that you are not satisfied with EVE. Do no try to turn all the space games being developed into "your" game, as we do not want it to happen.
I hope JGE will be more like Black Prophecy, and we will see which one will be the next revolutionary multiplayer space game.
At this point I'm reserving judgement. It sounds like it has the potential to turn into an eastern style gankfest. If so, I'll not remain playing for very long. I must say that the earlier version sounded more entertaining than this new PvP centric one does.
I am excited for this game. Good luck to the Devs and glad to see its an active title.
This will be my game for ever and ever.
Q & E are not barrel roll buttons. That implies BP trick arcade move fuctionality. Q & E are simple roll buttons without the barrrel.
seems like this might even be better than EvE!
i dont even like Space MMo and im really interested to get my hands on JGE
not gonna be my Main MMO though
Err where did this come from?
So far i have yet to see any confirmed EvE fans do this?
Anyway on topic i feel pretty good to see another space based game that actually looks likeit might be fun! Looking foward to hearing more about it.
Its not whether or not its in space that matters to me as much as whether or not it allows for EVE-like capture mechanics while controlling the ship with a keyboard and mouse.
The game I would want most is a game like EVE where the ships are controlled. Hopefully this is similar to what I want. And as few levels as possible would also be great.
To me a great MMO is one constructed of choice. Choice of the player in question. I hope they will work towards this, as I don't like a game to hold my hand and tell me what to do. I use singleplayer games for that, if need be. But to each his own, and games should be for everyones flavor, and not copies of one another.
Could be fun to test, but I doubt it will make me stay as I get fatigued too fast in my old age, with fast paced combat all the time. Time will tell. Good to see it is going places none-the-less. There is room for more sci-fi MMOs of different kinds.
Flight mechanics, what are you talking about? From the latest vids all I have seen is basically the absence of any decent flight mechanics. This title will be a great success cause it serves all you sissy fan-boys-in-advance. Has absolutely nothing todo with his great ancestor anymore. Big fail, not for me.
After reading the article I'm now picturing PlanetSide in space with a little PvE and missions/quests. If this is the case then I am really looking forward to this title.
Well it will be interesting to see how this stacks up against EvE
That's really unimpressive graphics for space game, remind me of 10-15 years old games which would probably still beat it graphics wise.
Depends. EVE has some of the best space graphics I've seen so far, but unless you have a really good system, you are going to have problems(unless you crank it down a bit). Perhaps JGE is going for a wider install base as WoW does. WoW will run on just about anything, which is one of the reasons they picked that graphics style.
I'm much more interested in how the game plays. If it turns into a gankfest, I'm not going to be playing for very long. I was a lot more interested in the earlier dynamics(before all of the current changes). It looks like they are going much more PvP centric with this one.
Absolutelly great news! :)
I love the way NetDevil was able to shift direction based on early Fan feedback and come up with something really improved based on that to deliver the expressed experience!
Cheers!
My coworker and I have been waiting to hear about this for over a year! It's great that they're moving forward and didn't turn into vaporware. Though I would still like to see more. :)