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Not So Massively: Eurogamer Expo 2011 edition

Brendan Drain — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 20:00:00 EST

Filed under: Fantasy, Video, Events (Real-World), Game Mechanics, New Titles, Previews, PvP, News Items, PvE, Hands-On, Consoles, Not So Massively

Welcome to Not So Massively, our weekly roundup of the top news from popular multiplayer online battle arenas (MOBAs) and other multiplayer online games that aren't quite MMOs. Published every Monday, the column covers games such as League of Legends, Heroes of Newerth, Rise of Immortals, Bloodline Champions and more.

It's been just over a week since Eurogamer Expo 2011, where countless upcoming and released games were demonstrated to attendees and made playable on the show floor. While some of them neatly fell into singleplayer or MMO categories, action adventure Dark Souls and the beautifully zen Journey sought to blur the line between those categories more than any game I've seen to date. Both are singleplayer games in which other players can seamlessly enter your world during play, a fascinating concept that I'm now dying to dig into.

Red 5 resolved its dispute with Webzen this week, allowing Firefall to continue development unhindered by legal drama. Brawl Busters enters a new phase of closed beta, and we have a dump truck full of beta keys to give away. League of Legends reveals details of upcoming champions Xerath and The Nine Tail Fox, in addition to a new livestreaming site designed to collect money for gaming charity Child's Play. Rise of Immortals launched on Steam this week and released its first post-launch Immortal Trovoc, the Last Dragon. Finally, hints at a console version for Diablo III or console controls for the PC version have surfaced this week due to some cryptic forum responses by Blizzard staff.

In this week's Not So Massively, I give some first impressions of Dark Souls and Journey from Eurogamer Expo 2011 and delve into all the latest news from games that aren't quite MMOs.

Continue reading Not So Massively: Eurogamer Expo 2011 edition

Not So Massively: Eurogamer Expo 2011 edition originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 03 Oct 2011 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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MMO impressions from Eurogamer Expo 2011

Brendan Drain — Sat, 01 Oct 2011 13:00:00 EST

Filed under: Betas, Fantasy, Sci-Fi, Galleries, Culture, Events (Real-World), Game Mechanics, New Titles, PvE, Opinion, Guild Wars 2, Hands-On, Star Wars: The Old Republic

Some of the industry's biggest names were at Eurogamer Expo last week, including BioWare, NCsoft and Trion Worlds. I was on the floor at the expo to get some hands-on experience with several upcoming MMOs and countless singleplayer games. Guild Wars 2 and Star Wars: The Old Republic stole the show, with hands-on gameplay sessions and in-depth developer talks. BioWare also made the bold move of announcing SWTOR's official release date during its talk at the convention. In addition to promoting the heck out of RIFT, Trion showed off upcoming MMORTS End of Nations with a hands-on demo and encouraged attendees to sign up to the End of Nations newsletter.

RIFT and World of Tanks were both playable on the show floor for the entire weekend, but nothing new was being shown. Hack-and-slash adventure RPG Dark Souls and the beautifully zen Journey both demonstrated incredibly innovative multiplayer aspects that I'll likely cover in my weekly Not So Massively column, but neither falls neatly into the MMO box. OnLive had a spectacular showing at the expo, giving away free home consoles to every attendee and demonstrating the system's surprisingly lag-free gameplay on the floor. We discovered that although there are no MMOs in OnLive's current lineup, this isn't due to technical infeasibility, so we may yet see MMOs launched on the service.

Skip past the cut for my in-depth hands-on impressions of Guild Wars 2, Star Wars: The Old Republic and End of Nations from Eurogamer Expo 2011.

Continue reading MMO impressions from Eurogamer Expo 2011

MMO impressions from Eurogamer Expo 2011 originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 01 Oct 2011 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Guild Wars 2 wins Eurogamer's Game of the Show

Justin Olivetti — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 13:00:00 EST

Filed under: Fantasy, Events (Real-World), Guild Wars 2, Events (Massively's Coverage)

Not many games can claim that they stood up to Batman and prevailed, but Guild Wars 2 fought off the Dark Knight and more to win the Editors' Game of the Show at this past weekend's Eurogamer Expo.

Competing against such high-profile titles like Battlefield 3 and Batman: Arkham City, Guild Wars 2 came out as the clear favorite of the editorial staff at Eurogamer. Guild Wars 2 was picked from a field of 10 nominees for its scope and ideas. Eurogamer's Tom Bramwell handed out the high praise: "It was almost impossible to choose between some of this year's nominees, but Guild Wars 2 eventually won us over with its incredible depth and intelligent new approach to MMO design."

Eurogamer Expo 2011 attracted over 34,500 attendees, who made up what the show runners claim is the largest audience for the convention yet.

[Source: Eurogamer Network press release]

Guild Wars 2 wins Eurogamer's Game of the Show originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 26 Sep 2011 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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End of Nations not launching in 2011, aiming for 2012

Justin Olivetti — Sun, 25 Sep 2011 23:00:00 EST

Filed under: Betas, Sci-Fi, Launches, Free-to-Play, MMORTS

If the end of the world happens in 2012, then End of Nations might be the cause. Or effect. Or just an innocent bystander. In any case, Trion Worlds' MMORTS has moved its projected release window from late 2011 to sometime next year.

The news came at this past weekend's Eurogamer Expo 2011, where Trion demoed the game live to an excited crowd. The studio also showed off some of the in-game store options that players have to pick from, including unit colors and skins. End of Nations will be free-to-play with these optional microtransactions, but Trion promises that there will be no way for players to "pay to win."

Trion was mum when asked about End of Nations' beta at the expo. The studio announced last month that the title would be going free-to-play from the get-go, a move that it hopes will draw in prospective armchair generals by the droves.

End of Nations not launching in 2011, aiming for 2012 originally appeared on Massively on Sun, 25 Sep 2011 23:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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BioWare announces launch date for Star Wars: The Old Republic

Shawn Schuster — Sat, 24 Sep 2011 08:00:00 EST

Filed under: Sci-Fi, Launches, MMO Industry, New Titles, News Items, Star Wars: The Old Republic

At the 2011 Eurogamer Expo keynote address, BioWare co-founders Dr. Ray Muzyka and Dr. Greg Zeschuk announced that Star Wars: The Old Republic will officially launch on December 20th, 2011 for North America and December 22, 2011 for Europe.

The retail copy will include 30 days of subscription time, with further pricing as follows:

1 Month Subscription: $14.99 (£8.99/€12.99)
3 Month Subscription: $13.99 per month (one-time charge of $41.97/£25.17/€35.97)
6 Month Subscription: $12.99 per month (one-time charge of $77.94/£46.14/€65.94)

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]

BioWare announces launch date for Star Wars: The Old Republic originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 24 Sep 2011 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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MMOs may be on the horizon for OnLive

Brendan Drain — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 22:00:00 EST

Filed under: Business Models, MMO Industry, News Items, Miscellaneous

The OnLive gaming platform officially launched in the US last year, bringing a new on-demand gaming service to homes with broadband internet connections. OnLive hosts and renders games on a computing cloud and delivers the resulting video feed over the internet. The potentially revolutionary system lets people play high-end games on low-end computers, but has a minimum bandwidth requirement of 2Mbit.

OnLive celebrated its UK release this week during Eurogamer Expo in London, and we were on the floor to ask the OnLive staff some questions about the service. Representatives were able to confirm that there are plans to bring MMOs to the OnLive service in the future but no solid deals had been made. The only thing keeping MMOs out of the game catalogue is the fact that no deals have been signed with MMO publishers.

OnLive representatives stated that it would be unlikely to see Activision-Blizzard's games like World of Warcraft on OnLive, but that Star Wars: The Old Republic and other MMOs could eventually be licensed to both the PC client and the home console. Talks are already underway with Electronic Arts, which released its first game on the system this week to coincide with the UK launch. When asked about latency issues, staff explained that the service already supports a large number of multiplayer titles with similar connectivity requirements to MMOs and latency is not a problem in those games.

MMOs may be on the horizon for OnLive originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 23 Sep 2011 22:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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