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Scarlet Legacy prepping mammoth beta update for September 1st

Justin Olivetti — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 14:00:00 EST

Filed under: Betas, Fantasy, Patches, Free-to-play

The open beta MMO that's not afraid to bribe players to come give it a try is gearing up for one of its biggest updates yet. Scarlet Legacy is counting down the hours until it uploads an elephant's worth of content onto the servers for testers to enjoy (and, hopefully, thoroughly vet).

This September 1st content update includes, but is not limited to, an increase in level cap to 45, dozens of new skills, 12 additional stances, three more maps, 68 quests, 46 crafting recipes, 154 weapons and pieces of armor, eight pets, high-level events, and a partridge in a pear tree. Well, maybe not the partridge.

It's hard to say which part of the content update is most enticing, although our money is on the three new maps with intriguing names like Hidden Evil Island and Ancient Grave. There's also a virgin dungeon that's ready to be plundered for its goodies: Soul Trapping Matrix. For story lovers, the tale of Princess Scarlet will be extended up through level 45 to match the level cap increase.

GamesCampus vows to release similarly large updates "at least once a month" from here on out.

Scarlet Legacy prepping mammoth beta update for September 1st originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 29 Aug 2011 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The Road to Mordor: Just around the bend

Justin Olivetti — Fri, 11 Feb 2011 14:30:00 EST

Filed under: Fantasy, Lord of the Rings Online, Previews, Opinion, Free-to-play, The Road to Mordor

It's been a few months since the November Update in Lord of the Rings Online, and the natives are restless -- as usual. Some folks are despairing the long wait until Rise of Isengard while others are itching for more challenges to their currently level-capped characters. Then there are the players who are hopelessly lost in Moria and would give their eye teeth for a flashlight.

Happily, a new update is just around the bend, code-named Echoes of the Dead. The actual name is Echoes of the Dead too, so I guess that's not such a great code. Over the past couple of weeks, we've started to get a feel for just how large this update is, and after reading through the Bullroarer test notes on Wednesday, I think we're in for a tsunami of a patch.

Of course, these patch notes come in the middle of Turbine's carefully spaced dev diaries dealing with each major change or addition, which means that we're a little in the dark as to the specifics of half of this update. That's not going to stop me -- or any of you -- from analyzing, speculating and gesturing excitedly to no one in particular.

So let's dig in to this hearty meal of mushrooms and patch notes to see just how deep LotRO's rabbit hole goes!

Continue reading The Road to Mordor: Just around the bend

The Road to Mordor: Just around the bend originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 11 Feb 2011 14:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Massively Hands-on: Creating superheroes in Champions Online

Kyle Horner — Mon, 04 May 2009 09:00:00 EST

Filed under: Super-hero, New titles, News items, Opinion, Massively Hands-on, Champions Online

This last weekend, press had the opportunity to spend my time within the Champions Online beta. After playing more than I would safely recommend, I bring you my personal takeaway in an effort to get out as much crunchy information goodness on the upcoming MMO as possible.

Do you like options? I really hope you love options, because you're going to get smacked upside the head with so many options when you first encounter Champions Online's character creation, that your mind -- much like my own -- is going to be reeling with all the possibilities.

Each and every time I made a thematically new hero, the creation process ate up more time than I ever thought possible. Let me explain why this happens, and what you can expect when you first sit down to make your very own creations.

Continue reading Massively Hands-on: Creating superheroes in Champions Online

Massively Hands-on: Creating superheroes in Champions Online originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 04 May 2009 09:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Earthrise videos show game mechanics and zones

James Egan — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 18:00:00 EST

Filed under: Sci-fi, Earthrise

The post-apocalyptic MMO title Earthrise from Masthead Studios has caught our attention, perhaps even moreso since we heard of their involvement with the much-rumored Fallout MMO. Massively ran a fairly comprehensive look at Earthrise from our meeting with them at GDC 2009 and the game seems to be coming along rather well in terms of development. We came across something else interesting today over at MMORPG.com that might interest our readers. Masthead Studios CEO Atanas Atanasov gave MMORPG.com a demo of Earthrise which they captured in video in two parts.

The first video introduces some of the core aspects of playing Earthrise, with the system of skills, abilities, tactics, and stances explained briefly while moving about in a starter zone. The second bit of in-game footage focuses on Earthrise's zones. It shows off the contrast between the utopian Eastern Gardens and a devastated region, once a city and now a buffer between the game's civilized areas and the wasteland. Both videos are worth checking out over at MMORPG.com.

Earthrise videos show game mechanics and zones originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 09 Apr 2009 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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GDC09: Massively previews Earthrise

James Egan — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 16:00:00 EST

Filed under: Sci-fi, New titles, Previews, Massively Interviews, Massively Event Coverage, Earthrise

The futuristic game Earthrise is one of the upcoming sci-fi massively multiplayer games that we can see on the horizon. It's the first MMO developed by Sofia-based Masthead Studios and features the post-apocalyptic setting of a world divided between utopian idealism and revolution. Massively had a chance to sit down with Masthead Studios CEO Atanas Atanasov at the Game Developers Conference 2009 where he gave us a walkthrough of Earthrise, shedding some light on what this new title may bring to the MMO world.

Gallery: Earthrise

Continue reading GDC09: Massively previews Earthrise

GDC09: Massively previews Earthrise originally appeared on Massively on Sun, 29 Mar 2009 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The Elves of WAR: Meet the Shadow Warrior levels 1-5

Dan O'Halloran — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 13:00:00 EST

Filed under: Betas, Fantasy, Classes, Guides, New titles, Previews, Leveling, Warhammer Online, PvE, Hands-on, Massively Hands-on

Our overview of the High Elf ranged dps career, the Shadow Warrior, may not be enough for you. So here we are with an examination of every skill from level one through five. It's the latest installment of Massively's pre-NDA coverage of Warhammer Online, the Elves of WAR.

Shadow Warriors are the quintessential bow-and-blade class, with skills in long-range, short-ranged and hand-to-hand combat. They have three stances they can switch between at a moment's notice that buffs each combat speciality. The first one, Scout Stance, is explained below along with the other beginning abilities.

Level 1 - Scout Stance
5 sec cooldown
A long distance bow stnace that increases your Ballistic Skill initiative by 2 and the range of your bow attacks by 10%.

Level 1 - Eagle Eye
45 AP, 2sec cast, 5-100ft range
A well aimed arrow that deals 53 damage.

Level 1 - Grim Slash
40 AP, Instant cast, 5ft range
Deals 30 damage to your target.

These are your two basic attacks, ranged and melee, with a ranged buff. Encounters are simple as shoot until melee range, then spam Grim Slash.

Continue reading The Elves of WAR: Meet the Shadow Warrior levels 1-5

The Elves of WAR: Meet the Shadow Warrior levels 1-5 originally appeared on Massively on Sun, 17 Aug 2008 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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D&DO Module 7: The Monk

Mike Schramm — Tue, 27 May 2008 11:01:00 EST

Filed under: Fantasy, Dungeons and Dragons Online, Classes, Culture, Patches, PvE

When we first sign on to the special Demo server Turbine had set up to show us Module 7, we found that they'd created a level 16 Monk for us to play with. The Monk class has been in the pen-and-paper game for a long time, but DDO is introducing them with Module 7 as the tenth player class in the game.

As we signed in and got set up, the folks from Turbine introduced themselves: Kate Paiz (who we've spoken with before) is the game's senior producer, and Stephen Muray, lead systems designer, and Jesse Smith, a content designer on the game, also joined us as well (Turbine's Director of Communications, Adam Mersky, also spoke up at the end of the session). As the screen loaded up, Paiz said that with the design of the Monk, they wanted to create a class that played significantly differently from anything they tried before. All of D&DO's combat is real-time (as in, you must press a button to attack, rather than just choosing a target), and the Monk's new abilities add a twist to this system. Basically, the Monk has four different stances (Ocean, Mountain, Wind and Sun -- the developers said they drew a lot of the Monk's lore from Dungeons and Dragons' Oriental Adventures supplement book), and each tweaks his or her abilities and attacks -- during most of the playtest, we used the Sun stance to try and do more damage, though the designers said that depending on how the Monk is specced, he would also be able to tank and or do some self heals and group buffs as the class trained up.

All of the Monk's abilities are governed by Ki energy, which can be tseen in a meter below the health bar, and is simply earned by attacking. Muray mentioned that this was to counterweight the pen-and-paper Monk's "times-per-day" abilities -- in pen-and-paper D&D, many Monk abilities can only be performed once or twice a day, and while Ki energy still lets players perform Monk tricks much more often, they are still kept limited enough that choosing what abilities you use your Ki on is very important.

"Did you just Abundant Leap across that gap? Nice!"

But one of those abilities stands above the rest: Abundant Leap (a variant, we were told of Dimension Door in the pen-and-paper game). Starting around level 10 or 11, the Monk can perform a move (with a low cooldown costing a very low amoung of Ki) that pushes them forward in space with a quick jump -- as you hit the ability, the screen blurs, the Monk leans forward, and suddenly you're about 15 yards ahead of where you last stood. Abundant Leap was, during our session, the most fun thing to do as a Monk -- even in noncombat situations (and perhaps especially in noncombat situations), we were leaping and jumping as much as we could. Once, to cross a gap, we jumped, in midair hit the leap ability, and landed gracefully on the other side. It's a minor ability in the overall scheme of things, but Abundant Leap, almost more than any of the other moves we used, makes you feel like a Monk.

Overall, the class seems fairly balanced, and Paiz said that they had put a lot of time trying to keep the class not only faithful to the pen-and-paper version, but also a dynamic part of the MMO environment. It should definitely be a fun reroll for everyone playing DDO, and for the players who level it all the way up, the later abilities should offer a lot of interesting twists on what the team has created in the game.

After loading the game and playing with the new class for a bit, our game began in sight of a peaceful shrine to one of D&D's greatest heroes.

Click here to continue the preview...

D&DO Module 7: The Monk originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 27 May 2008 11:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Turbine spills all the Champion update beans

Samuel Axon — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 19:00:00 EST

Filed under: Fantasy, Lord of the Rings Online, Classes, Patches, News items

Turbine has been concocting major revisions to the classes of The Lord of the Rings Online since launch. In the forthcoming Book 12 update (now titled "The Ashen Wastes"), the Guardian and Burglar classes will get full treatment, but Champions will see some boons as well. Those boons have been detailed in the latest dev diary entry.

As we learned on the forums a while back, Champions will receive "Ardour," a new stance which strikes a balance between offense and defense. Previously, they had only the mostly-useless default and the haphazardly offensive Fervour stances until late in life. Glory, the defensive stance that they presently get at level 46, will be moved all the way back to level 30, because the 30s are arguably when Champions are most often called upon to tank.

The class will also get some major revamps to its Legendary Skills. If you want all the minute details, Turbine reps went even deeper on the official forum. We Champs have a lot to look forward to!

Turbine spills all the Champion update beans originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 17 Jan 2008 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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