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A Mild-Mannered Reporter: Begin again again

Eliot Lefebvre — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 19:30:00 EST

Filed under: Super-hero, City of Heroes, City of Villains, Opinion, Free-to-play, A Mild-Mannered Reporter

If you like playing a few hundred different characters, City of Heroes definitely supports your terminal fear of the endgame. Unfortunately for me and my dreams of seeing that endgame with any reliability, I do indeed like playing dozens upon dozens of characters, meaning that my character select screen is an array of dozens of characters in carefully crafted outfits, many of which characters are not yet eligible for capes. It's one of those habits that I would dearly like to break, and so I'd eschewed making a new character despite the promise of a new starter experience for heroes and villains alike.

Unfortunately, I am also a recidivist. When I talked about the latest update, more than a few commenters called me out, rightly, on the fact that I hadn't really played through much of the new content that the issue had to offer. So I decided that now was the time. I was going to make myself two new characters -- one hero, one villain -- and I was going to see what the new experience was like. And I was going to do so while smoking because it seemed somehow appropriate.

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A Mild-Mannered Reporter: Begin again again originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 12 Oct 2011 19:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The Daily Grind: What do you want from a starter area?

Eliot Lefebvre — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 08:00:00 EST

Filed under: Culture, Game mechanics, Opinion, The Daily Grind, Miscellaneous

When you start a new character, the starter area determines more than whether or not you want to bother playing any longer. It determines what you think about the game, what you come to expect of subsequent areas. Some games give you a brief tutorial and then throw you into the larger pool almost immediately; others deliver a carefully tuned experience that would fit well even in a single-player game. Both approaches have their positives and negatives, but both are going to form your impression of the game from then on.

As a result, it's important to ask what players actually want from this experience. Leading your character along a single storyline, however engaging, is going to wear thin if you plan to start another character further down the line. On the other hand, it gives you a chance to get used to the new mechanics of a given character, and it keeps you engaged, a definite asset compared to letting you sink or swim from the word go. So what do you want out of your opening zone? A smooth and cinematic experience, or the chance to head down your own path right away?

Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!

The Daily Grind: What do you want from a starter area? originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 16 Dec 2010 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The Daily Grind: What's your favorite starting zone?

Justin Olivetti — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 08:00:00 EST

Filed under: Culture, Opinion, The Daily Grind

No matter where we end up in our MMOs -- the hardcore end game raider, the PvPer, the trade chat troll -- we all share the same starting points: a delivery room at Warhammer Mercy Medical. No, wait, I mean that we all magically start our existence as fully grown adults who already possess advance combat training (just like real life, amirite?), and for whatever reason, we begin our story in the same spots as everyone else in the world.

Perhaps we should be calling these starter zones "Mommy"?

In any case, what's your favorite starting zone out of all the MMOs you've played? What evokes the strongest sense of nostalgia, provides the smoothest leveling experience, showers you with wondrous atmosphere and tells the best story?

Some MMOs add newer starter zones long into the lifespan of the game, forcing players to choose between the creaky "old" newbie areas and the spiffy golden eggs that the devs just laid. As a bonus question, do you prefer these newer starting areas to the original ones?

The Daily Grind: What's your favorite starting zone? originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 17 Nov 2010 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Fallen Earth's developers talk patch 1.3

Eliot Lefebvre — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 10:00:00 EST

Filed under: Sci-fi, Fallen Earth, Events, in-game, Patches

Patch day is an exciting time to be playing an MMO, assuming you can look past the various instabilities, server crashes, and inevitable bugs that come with a major update. Even then, there's still the sense of doing something new and different in a familiar game, however touch-and-go the new content might be. Fallen Earth is not too far from their next major patch day, but if you can't wait for the patch to go live, there's a new developer diary and Q&A from Dev Team Lead Marie Croall and Live Team Lead Ian Lemke.

The patch's major focus was a thorough revamp of the area around the starter towns, and between those towns and the central cities. It might seem odd to add such a large patch to improve the first few levels of the game, but from the developer's point of view, it's those levels that really first get a player hooked on the game, so they wanted to make it as memorable as possible. There's also some information on Deadfall Point, a new encounter area in Sector Three, offering the higher-level players something new to experience. Be sure to take a look at both features to get a picture of what's coming in the near future for your clone in Fallen Earth.

Fallen Earth's developers talk patch 1.3 originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 09 Feb 2010 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Fallen Earth dev diary focuses on introducing new players to PvP

James Egan — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 11:00:00 EST

Filed under: Sci-fi, Fallen Earth, Game mechanics, PvP, Quests

Fallen Earth is one of three post-apocalyptic massively muliplayer online games currently in development that are a far cry from the fantasy titles which have proven most popular in the MMO world. IGN scored an exclusive two part developer diary from Fallen Earth writer and content developer Wes Platt who discusses creating the PvP starter town of Terance. Namely, he explains how and why the Fallen Earth team has been putting so much work into Terance and the challenges and pitfalls faced in differentiating the PvP-centric area from other more standard towns in the game.

The first part is "Building the Town of Terance". It paints a picture of a post-apocalyptic aftermath setting where a psychotic artificial intelligence, long since sealed away underground by its corporate progenitors and forced into a century of dormancy, is woken with dire consequences. Now powered up, the AI -- TETRAX -- prepares once again to work towards the extermination all human beings in its vicinity. Human beings in Terance may find themselves on the run, hunted by AI-directed zombies called Diggers, as well as mutants and vermin.

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Fallen Earth dev diary focuses on introducing new players to PvP originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 07 Apr 2009 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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