General Gaming Article

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• Apple Co-Founder Steve Wozniak Gushes Over Windows Phone 7
• First Consumer 802.11ac Wi-Fi Router Will Ship From Netgear Starting Next Month
• Ivy Bridge Parts Start Showing Up For Sale
• Nvidia Announces Dual GPU GTX 690 Set For Release May 3rd

Apple Co-Founder Steve Wozniak Gushes Over Windows Phone 7 Posted: 29 Apr 2012 01:19 PM PDT It remains to be seen if Windows Phone 7 can bring Nokia back from the dead, though if you ask Apple Co-Founder Steve Wozniak, Microsoft may have somehow managed to bring back Steve Jobs instead. We are assuming he's joking, but those are still pretty strong praise of a once former rival. Based on the context, it sounds of it he was referring to how well Microsoft nailed the UI experience, which most people credit as the platforms strongest selling point. In a recent interview with The Verge, Woz declared that Windows Phone is like being "with a friend, not a tool".  When asked about his opinion of Android when compared to Windows Phone 7 he was quite clear. He claims there is "no contest" when it comes to the UI experience. Words such as "awkward" and "ugly" were tossed around. As an early engineer of Apple hardware Wozniak has far more in common with today's geek than your average Apple enthusiast, though its still surprising to hear him side with Microsoft.  He later followed up with A New Domain site to put his strong praise in context. "iPhone is my favorite phone. I did give my opinion that the Windows 7P phone had superior visual appearance and operation cues that were also more attractive. In my opinion, it sets the mark for user interface," he said. "I would recommend it (WP) over my Android phones.... I surmise that Microsoft hired someone from Apple and put money into having a role in the UI and appearance of some key apps." "I also surmised that Steve Jobs might have been reincarnated at MS due to a lot of what I see and feel with this phone making me think of a lot of great Apple things."

First Consumer 802.11ac Wi-Fi Router Will Ship From Netgear Starting Next Month Posted: 29 Apr 2012 12:54 PM PDT 802.11n spent years tied up in draft status with the IEEE, and as a result it feels like it's been around forever. By comparison it feels like 802.11ac, the standard being released to replace it, is moving at an amazing pace. In fact, Netgear is preparing to claim bragging rights on being the first 802.11ac compatible commercial router available for sale. Announced on Thursday, the R6300 will start shipping in May, and is capable of speeds up to 1.3Gbps on the 5 GHz band, assuming of course you have a compatible 802.11ac device on the receiving end. Based on the theoretical max speeds listed above, that could mean speeds up to twice as fast as 802.11n under similar conditions. It will be interesting to see if 802.11ac is able to maintain the same type of range as 2.4GHz 802.11N networks. 2.4GHz is much better at penetrating walls and travelling over large distances, but given its popularity is also prone to excessive interference.  The other drawback to the R6300 will be in how it deals with legacy hardware. To use 802.11ac, all your devices must be using that standard, or it will drop back down to the lowest common denominator for everything using that wireless network. We are hoping the default behavior of the dual band feature is to limit the 5GHz band to 802.11ac, and banish everything else to 2.4GHz. Hopefully its possible to add 802.11n to the 5GHz band as well using the firmware, however a fairly large percentage of 802.11n devices are stuck at 2.4GHz. The Kindle Fire comes to mind. The R6300 will be sold for around $200 through Netgear retailers such as Amazon, Best Buy, and Fry's. If we didn't scare you off based on the limitations listed above, you won't have to wait too much longer to future proof your wireless network.

Ivy Bridge Parts Start Showing Up For Sale Posted: 29 Apr 2012 12:09 PM PDT Ivy Bridge officially launched on Monday, though if you were holding off to build a system you might have noticed "launched" didn't actually mean you could buy it. We were starting to wonder what the hold up was, than lo and behold we finally got word stock has started pouring into the retail channels.  A quick look over at Newegg.com shows seven models up for sale. Here is a brief list of what we found, along with the US prices. Core i7-3770K (3.50 GHz, Overclockable) for $349.99 Core i7-3770S (3.10 GHz) for $319.99 Core i7-3770 (3.40 GHz, locked) for $319.99 Core i5-3570K (3.40 GHz, Unlocked) for $249.99 Core i5-3550 (3.40 GHz) for $219.99 Core i5-3450 (3.10 GHz) for $199.99 Core i5-3450S (2.80 GHz) for $199.99.

Nvidia Announces Dual GPU GTX 690 Set For Release May 3rd Posted: 29 Apr 2012 06:39 AM PDT Nvidia warned us it was coming, but until very late last night we had no idea what they were talking about, or if we should even be excited. Would they announce lower end Kepler parts to fill out the midrange? Would they announce you could finally "buy" a GTX 680? Expectations were high when Nvidia CEO Jen-Hsun took the stage for his keynote in Shanghai China, and my friends, meet the all new dual-GPU $999 GTX 690. The GTX  690 has yet to hit the benchmarks, but considering that under that fancy plated aluminum heat sync is a pair of GTX 680's, we are going to go ahead and say what you're looking at here is probably the fastest card money can buy. In total, the GTX 690 has 3,072 CUDA cores, running at a 915MHz base clock, with a 1019MHz boost clock. Both of those numbers are slightly lower than those found on a standard GTX 680, but not by much, and its certainly understandable considering how much heat your generating in such a small area. The memory clock sits at 6Ghz, and each GPU has access to a dedicated 2GB block of GDDR5 RAM totaling 4GB of frame buffer. The design of the card itself is also pretty amazing. Aside from the plated aluminum on the outside, it is also fitted with polycarbonate windows on the front to give it a very unique look. The card runs on a 10-phase power supply, and each GTX 680 core will have its own water-vapor chamber as you can see from the shots below. Nvidia promises limited availability of the GTX 690 by May 3rd, with add-in board partners joining the party on May 7th. If you have $999 burning a hole in your wallet, and you need bleeding edge performance, its safe to say the GTX 690 will be the card to beat for the foreseeable future.

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Latest Gaming and MMORPG Updates

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• Ueda Still Working on The Last Guardian, No Word on Departure
• Kirby’s 20th Anniversary Could Potentially Begin Nintendo’s Criterion Collection
• Four Gameplay Mechanics That Should Have Caught On
• MAZE: The Treasure Hunters (CN)
• SimOcean: The New Sim Game From Maxis?

Ueda Still Working on The Last Guardian, No Word on Departure Posted: 29 Apr 2012 07:11 AM PDT It was reported last week that Fumito Ueda, the man best known for his work on Ico, Shadow of the Colossus, and the upcoming The Last Guardian, was leaving Sony. He has yet to address those rumors and Sony itself hasn’t provided any comment more specific than its standard response to everything it chalks up to “rumor and speculation.” In a tweet sent out earlier today, Ueda stated he is still at work on The Last Guardian but didn’t acknowledge anything regarding his possible departure from Sony and Team Ico. Ueda had gone silent on Twitter in recent days, fueling speculation that his tenure with Sony was coming to an end. He’s begun talking once again today, including one message that reassured fans he is still working on The Last Guardian. Another message pointed out that the 10-year anniversary of Ico’s release in Japan is December 6. None made any mention of his employment status. Last week’s Eurogamer report suggested Ueda would be leaving Sony to work on personal projects, but not before completing his work on The Last Guardian “in a freelance capacity.” His leaving was partially blamed for the game’s long development cycle, although Ueda himself has pointed to his attention to detail as the reason for that. 1UP’s latest cover story went into detail on Ueda’s career; you can read it here or in 1UP Presents #3: The Sketch Issue. Find similar article at: http://www.1up.com/news/ueda-still-working-the-last-guardian-no-word-departure

Kirby’s 20th Anniversary Could Potentially Begin Nintendo’s Criterion Collection Posted: 28 Apr 2012 10:39 PM PDT Remember the Halo Reach sniper rifle shot heard (and bounced) around the world? The one that ricocheted in such a crazy way that it actually went through the head of the very fellow who fired it in the first place? Bizarre as that situation may sound, it can serve as one of many crazy ways to assassinate someone in Dishonored. During the tail end of a recent hands-off demonstration, co-creative directors Harvey Smith and Raf Colantonio briefly went quiet as a Bethesda staffer playing showed off a particularly slick method of taking out multiple targets: Having the player character, Corvo, slow down time before laying down a spring razor trap and using his Blink ability to teleport a short distance away just in time to see the trap detonate when time resumes flowing at a normal rate. To get back to Reach’s unintentional suicide, Smith explained, “Sometimes, when you activate Bend Time, you can actually see the bullet in the air; you can actually then Possess the guy who shot it and walk him around to the front. When time resumes, the bullet kills him and he has this very shocked expression on his face.” Smith has previously described Dishonored as an action-stealth title in terms of its overall genre, but he cites titles like Far Cry 2, Ultima Underworld, System Shock, Thief, and Deus Ex as examples of what he, Colantonio, and the rest of the developers at Arkane are going for with their new creation: An open-ended game driven more by systemic interaction than by scripted spectacle. In other words, they want to simply provide a suite of tools, and objective, and then let players go at it. Corvo has a number of tools — including gear such guns, daggers, traps, grenades and weird steampunk treasure detecting devices as well as more supernatural abilities such as Bend Time, Possession, and Windblast — and his task is simply to find his targets and neutralize them. This can be as simple as stabbing someone in the face; as odd as possessing fish and mice to navigate through the sewers below until you find said target before possessing him to make him jump out a window; or as elaborate and non-lethal as arranging to have his identity stolen in order to condemn him to work in the very same salt mine that he owns. Find similar article at: http://www.1up.com/previews?cId=3187049

Four Gameplay Mechanics That Should Have Caught On Posted: 28 Apr 2012 07:10 PM PDT All creative endeavors are informed by those that came before. Experiences of all kinds are absorbed, filed away in memory, and considered — sometimes subconsciously — in terms of how their building blocks might be expanded, altered, or fit into an entirely different framework. In game design, the result of this process is often a slight tweak on an existing mechanic. Given the number of interconnected systems that make up even the smallest title, this is something of a necessity. Reinventing the wheel sounds noble, but try doing it a thousand times while balancing on the wobbly, ever-growing column of wheels. Which is on fire. I’m not sure why, but there it is. This was your idea. Sometimes, however, a truly unique concept emerges and, with a lot of hard work, surpasses the “don’t break everything” barrier to take a starring role in a game. If such an idea proves popular it is often co-opted rather quickly by the rest of the industry, becoming a new foundation for others to improve upon. In a few rare cases, these great ideas don’t catch on. Perhaps they piggyback on games with low profiles, or are so specific to their niche that they have a difficult time getting a foothold. Whatever the reason may be, the result is the same: An audience left wanting more of a promising gameplay mechanic. These are a few of the most glaring examples of the those ideas, terrific concepts that deserve to be featured and improved upon in more games. This is not by any means a comprehensive list, so if there are any personal favorites that you would have included, please share them in the comments. Tactical Mission Planner Rainbox Six (PC, 1998) The first three Rainbow Six games have more in common with simulations than shooters. Players are called upon to fully control several squads at any given time. Each squad is assembled by the player, chosen from a stable of characters with strengths and weaknesses. Every squad member must be fitted with an assortment of gear with genuine strategic impact. Aiming and shooting aren’t as important as cautious timing and situational awareness. When violence occurs, it is fast and messy. If a single gunshot doesn’t result in death, it certainly deals enough damage to cripple someone for the remainder of a mission. Fifteen minutes of careful progress can be wiped away in as little time as it takes to improperly clear a doorway. This would make for an impregnable experience full of frustration if not for the mission planner, a map that allows the player to create a timeline of detailed waypoints for AI squadmates. This tool is so powerful that an entire mission can be automated through the careful use of planning alone. You can, for instance, tell one squad to breach a doorway while another squad throws a flashbang through the opposite window and a third slowly creeps along a nearby rooftop to watch for patrolling enemies. This coordinated effort represents perhaps one fiftieth of a mission full of rooms to clear, bombs to diffuse, heartbeats to sense through walls, and hostages to rescue. This makes for a unique mixture of deep tactical planning with the payoff of tense action, resulting in either the breathless relief of success or a failure which you feel compelled to immediately address in the mission planner. Unfortunately, the mission planner was scrapped as the series took a turn towards pure action with the Xbox release of Rainbow Six 3. The idea remained dormant for years, a terrific idea abandoned by its creators. Part of the problem might have stemmed from the fact that deep strategy and action were no longer looking for a bridge. The mission planner finally resurfaced in this year’s Frozen Synapse, a sci-fi take on the formula which replaces the first person action with bite sized turns that play out within the planner itself. While many of the specifics are obviously different, the basics are all there and just as strong as ever. Single Player Social Interaction Demon’s Souls (PS3, 2009) Don’t worry, this isn’t about terrible in-game social networks or automatic Twitter updates telling the world “I just earned an achievement for sneaking into the women’s bathroom in a video game!” The social aspect of Demon’s Souls is far more organic and interesting. That said, if you know how to delete that message from Twitter please let me know immediately. While it’s possible to open your game up to assistance or invasion from other players, Demon’s Souls is primarily a single player experience. Your journey through the bizarre and unforgiving world is, however, communal in a way that makes as much sense as something in Demon’s Souls can be said to make sense. As you make your way through the game, you come across pools of blood which indicate where other players have met their untimely ends. Interacting with one of these bloodstains reveals the final seconds of a fellow adventurer’s life, played out before you in a ghostly reenactment. If you’re inclined to laugh at misfortune it can be highly entertaining to watch someone defeat a tricky foe only to take a step back and fall off a ledge. Of more immediate use is the fact that bloodstains reveal important information about dangers ahead. You’re still likely to die a horrible death, but it’s nice to get a heads up so you can put your affairs in order. Demon’s Souls also allows players to leave notes for one another. These are assembled by combining words and phrases from a list, which thankfully does not include “weed”, crying babies, or any of the slurs that comprise 90% of all video game voice chat interaction. Notes can communicate strategies, point out hidden areas, or even trick other players. Positive ratings can be given to useful notes, which in turn benefit the writer and encourage players to communicate throughout the game. There’s really nothing quite like this system. Demon’s Souls is relatively new, so there hasn’t been a lot of time for the idea to catch on. There might also be a barrier presented by the fact that many games aim to provide cinematic experiences, which would be broken by the unpredictable nature of other players. With any luck, Dark Souls will popularize the concept, increasing the likelihood that we’ll see some variation on meaningful social interaction in single player games as we move forward. Find similar article at: http://www.1up.com/features/gameplay-mechanics-that-should-have-caught-on

MAZE: The Treasure Hunters (CN) Posted: 28 Apr 2012 04:39 PM PDT This game was actually revealed a couple of years ago to be in development over at G*Star (I think it was 2010), but since then nothing much was heard about it. This is MAZE: The Treasure Hunters, currently in development by Korean studio DreamExecution, the same folks who brought us War Rock (link). The artwork might be quite similar, but I can assure you that your opinion will be changed after watching the trailer below. The trailer certainly reminded me of Tomb Raider (also The Mummy and Indian Jones), which of course is part of the marketing strategy now to promote this game. Players will be sent to different parts of the world to explore ancient crypts, tombs, underground mazes, labyrinths, pyramids and what not. As seen in the trailer, there will be various adventure gadgets to use as well to get across platforms. MAZE is also touted as the mixture of 3 genres: AVD (Adventure Game) + RPG + FPS in an online environment.Team work is also very, very important due to some of the puzzles’ designs. This game is looking very unwelcoming for the newbs~! ChangYou will be the publisher of the game in China, and MAZE is the company’s 3rd of 5 games revealed for 2012 and early 2013 in a campaign call “Game+”. You can view the other 2 games here (link), with God Slayer leaving a very positive impression as well. I am not sure what the screenshot below means, but it looks great… (^___^)v Find similar article at: http://www.mmoculture.com/2012/04/maze-treasure-hunters-cn-debut-trailer.html

SimOcean: The New Sim Game From Maxis? Posted: 28 Apr 2012 10:38 AM PDT SimOcean has been registered as a new trademark by SimCity developer Maxis. While there's a chance that it's just a placeholder, a case of Maxis protecting any future expansion of the Sim franchise, it seems unlikely. The Sims series is yet to branch out into sea and with Maxis coming to a close on XCOM: Enemy Unknown and the SimCity on the cards for 2013, it wouldn't surprise us if the studio has a sea-based Sim game is already in the pipeline. Find similar article at: http://www.totalpcgaming.com/latest-pc-news/simocean-the-new-sim-game-from-maxis/

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MMO Updates

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• Rise and Shiny: Gemstone IV
• Previously on MV TV: The week of April 14th
• Guild Wars 2 resumes digital sales, addresses denied accounts
• The Daily Grind: What do you forgive in a beta?
• Free Realms throws itself a nice big birthday bash
• The Mog Log: Blindsided by FFXIV's patch 1.22
• The Tattered Notebook: EQII's hidden gems for low-level explorers
• The Road to Mordor: Is LotRO's questing system over the hill?

Rise and Shiny: Gemstone IV Posted: 29 Apr 2012 10:00 AM PDT Filed under: Fantasy, Video, Culture, Game mechanics, Previews, Opinion, Hands-on, Casual, Rise and Shiny, Livestream, Miscellaneous, Sandbox This article was a long time coming. Not only have I avoided taking a look at any sort of pure MUD for many years, but I meant to write this up last week but real life interrupted my plans. I just didn't think it was fair to write up a first impressions based on only a few hours of play. I was quite hesitant to take a deeper look at Gemstone IV mainly because I knew that the non-stop reading would surely create more migraines that might derail my work again. I was very worried, actually. Luckily, the Gemstone IV client is customizable enough to allow me to create a "book-style" experience: black text on a white background. I don't think I'm alone in my inability to view bright, colored text on a dark background comfortably. If I were, popular websites would still look like they were from 1996. We've moved past ugly fonts and horrible color combinations. Unfortunately it took me most of the time with Gemstone IV just to learn how to play, make the text comfortable to read, and understand what my character was supposed to be doing. Once I got comfortable, though, I honestly had one of the most enchanting times in a game yet. Continue reading Rise and Shiny: Gemstone IV Rise and Shiny: Gemstone IV originally appeared on Massively on Sun, 29 Apr 2012 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink | Email this | Comments

Previously on MV TV: The week of April 14th Posted: 29 Apr 2012 08:00 AM PDT Filed under: Betas, Fantasy, Video, Previews, Free-to-play, Browser, Casual, Livestream, Miscellaneous, Previously on MV TV What a week it has been in Massively's world of streaming games! We have a little bit of something for all types of viewers. Hardcores, roleplayers, explorers, crafters and lazy-bums like yours truly: We have something for all of you. Be sure to bookmark our livestream schedule page so that you can always see the schedule ahead of time. It's much easier to plan your life around our videos if you know the schedule early. Invite your friends... we love to hear from new people in the chat room! This week, we had some EVE Online adventuring with Mike followed by his attempt at Drakensang Online, a browser-based action MMO. Adventure Mike took a spin in the way-back machine and streamed some EverQuest, and MJ scored some time in EverQuest II, a chunk of Vanguard, and Aion. She's been a very busy streamer! Lastly, I took a look at Gemstone IV, a fantastic MUD that almost brought tears to my eyes. Tears of frustration, but many tears of joy. Let's get to watching! Continue reading Previously on MV TV: The week of April 14th Previously on MV TV: The week of April 14th originally appeared on Massively on Sun, 29 Apr 2012 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink | Email this | Comments

Guild Wars 2 resumes digital sales, addresses denied accounts Posted: 29 Apr 2012 07:15 AM PDT Filed under: Betas, Fantasy, Events, in-game, Guild Wars 2 Beta weekends are no strangers to rocky and unexpected events, as Guild Wars 2 can now attest. While many players are currently testing the heck out of the game, some have been shut out due to an error code on their account while others have been unable to pre-purchase the game due to halted sales of the digital product. ArenaNet has addressed both of these issues to help players resolve the matters and get into the beta. The error code (9:4:5:1093:101) that some are getting signifies that the account is not flagged for the beta event. According to ArenaNet, this is either because the players used a pre-order instead of a pre-purchase code and accidentally received an invite email to the event or that a credit card was flagged during the pre-purchase order. In the case of the former, ArenaNet will honor the mistaken emails and allow all recipients into the remainder of the event. The studio also announced that it has increased capacity for the beta event and thus has begun selling digital standard and digital deluxe pre-purchases of Guild Wars 2 once more. Guild Wars 2 resumes digital sales, addresses denied accounts originally appeared on Massively on Sun, 29 Apr 2012 09:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink | Email this | Comments Source: GW2 Twitter, GW2 Facebook

The Daily Grind: What do you forgive in a beta? Posted: 29 Apr 2012 06:00 AM PDT Filed under: Betas, Culture, Game mechanics, Opinion, The Daily Grind, Miscellaneous If you've logged into the Guild Wars 2 beta this weekend, you've gotten an experience that's very different from what the final game will look like. For starters, the final game will probably not have several hundred people clustering around every single event like rabid concert attendees at all hours. It's easy to forgive that as a fluke and a byproduct of the fact that this is the first time many players have gotten to play the game at all. Of course, for some players, that experience in beta is going to define their impression of the game all around. Similarly, some players are going to assume that a buggy beta will have a buggy launch, even if by the time launch rolls around, most of the bugs have been ruthlessly squashed. So what do you forgive in a beta? Do you turn a blind eye to the community or population issues? Do you grin and bear missing objectives or unclear quests? Or do you offer no respite to a game no matter how early in the testing you might be? 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 forgive in a beta? originally appeared on Massively on Sun, 29 Apr 2012 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink | Email this | Comments

Free Realms throws itself a nice big birthday bash Posted: 28 Apr 2012 06:00 PM PDT Filed under: Events, in-game, News items, Free-to-play, Free Realms, Family MMO birthdays are the best celebrations. Instead of getting your favorite game a lot of presents to celebrate its age, most games give the players presents. So it is in Free Realms, which celebrates its third year of operation today with a number of events and rewards for players. The most basic rewards don't require any real effort on the part of players; just logging in today nets you a Birthday Cake hat, and you can enjoy triple Station Cash for the rest of the day. There's more to the party, however: The game's offering a number of daily quests to help Queen Valerian produce the best birthday party ever. There's also the dread monster Cakenstein, a beast assembled from... well, you can probably guess from the name. The extended events will be running until May 24th, but the Station Cash promotion and the hat are only for today. So if you're a fan of Free Realms, log in and start enjoying the festivities today! Free Realms throws itself a nice big birthday bash originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 28 Apr 2012 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink | Email this | Comments Source: Free Realms birthday events, Triple Station Cash

The Mog Log: Blindsided by FFXIV's patch 1.22 Posted: 28 Apr 2012 04:00 PM PDT Filed under: Fantasy, Patches, News items, Opinion, Consoles, Final Fantasy XIV, The Mog Log I had different plans for this week's column until I realized that Final Fantasy XIV's patch 1.22 had sneaked up on me like the monster in a slasher film, except instead of stabbing me and laughing, it just brought a bunch of new content, so the metaphor doesn't really work. I'm not sure exactly how I missed the patch's coming so quickly, but I'm happy to see it's finally on the live servers. Of course, in a lot of ways, this patch is smaller than its predecessors, though not in terms of content, obviously. No, it's a smaller patch by virtue of the fact that it's a pure content patch. New systems are in short supply, but new things to do are in abundance. It's a focus patch, in other words. Recent patches have vehemently focused on trimming up the mechanics and making sure that the game plays nicely with all sorts of content; this patch focuses instead on what you can do with all of your shiny abilities and classes and so forth. And aside from a couple of missed opportunities, it succeeds at that beautifully. Continue reading The Mog Log: Blindsided by FFXIV's patch 1.22 The Mog Log: Blindsided by FFXIV's patch 1.22 originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 28 Apr 2012 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink | Email this | Comments

The Tattered Notebook: EQII's hidden gems for low-level explorers Posted: 28 Apr 2012 02:00 PM PDT Filed under: Fantasy, EverQuest II, Opinion, Free-to-play, The Tattered Notebook One of the things I've enjoyed with the new EverQuest II update is how fun it is to get out there and explore the new zones. The Withered Lands has lots of nooks to check out, like the Holgresh caves up along the cliffs and the ruins just outside the Combine Foothold. As much as I like epic storylines and lofty challenges, sometimes it's fun to just mount up and scout out some really interesting locations. GU63, however, really doesn't offer any new content for lower-level players, and it's hard for someone under level 90 to get around the Withered Lands and Skyshrine safely. But one of the reasons there's not much new content at the lower levels is that past updates have added in so much already that there's almost too much to see and do. Queue up the Bud Light music, for in today's Tattered Notebook, we salute you, Mr. Low-Level Player. You tirelessly work through the Golden Path, but you deserve some cool hunting spots and gorgeous vistas. Below the cut are some of my favorites! Continue reading The Tattered Notebook: EQII's hidden gems for low-level explorers The Tattered Notebook: EQII's hidden gems for low-level explorers originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 28 Apr 2012 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink | Email this | Comments

The Road to Mordor: Is LotRO's questing system over the hill? Posted: 28 Apr 2012 12:00 PM PDT Filed under: Fantasy, Lord of the Rings Online, Patches, Free-to-play, The Road to Mordor There's a good chance you're not reading this column right now but instead are fully immersed in the weekend beta for Guild Wars 2: Guild Harder. That's OK. I won't hold it against you -- I may even be playing it as well. Oh, those ArenaNet folks. They make such lofty promises, don't they? They're going to rewrite MMOs as we know them and show us once and for all that we've been playing with Tinker Toys when we could have fully functional jetpacks and whatnot. I don't harbor any ill will against Guild Wars 2; in fact, I'm quite looking forward to it. But as everyone's focused on the game's excising of traditional questing as popularized by World of Warcraft, I thought it would be worth examining just how dated Lord of the Rings Online's questing system has become, if at all. In an era of dynamic events, public quests, full voice-over, and other techniques designed to get us away from the text box questing model, will LotRO hold its ground against these fads or is it truly becoming a relic of the past? Let's dig in! Continue reading The Road to Mordor: Is LotRO's questing system over the hill? The Road to Mordor: Is LotRO's questing system over the hill? originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 28 Apr 2012 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds. Permalink | Email this | Comments

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General gaming

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Kirby's 20th Anniversary Could Potentially Begin Nintendo's Criterion Collection Posted: 28 Apr 2012 04:57 PM PDT We've seemed to scream ourselves hoarse on how some company should take the initiative in developing a sort of Criterion Collection for video games. There's nothing quite like having a physical object that wholly celebrates a title, a series, or the artists themselves. Valve has shown some spark in this area through the spectacular inclusion of commentaries in games like Half-Life 2 and Portal, but this idea still deserves to be taken further. It's going to take a company with a rich, stories history; a company whose fan-base who its past and is keen on its preservation. A company like, say, Nintendo. To be perfectly honest, Nintendo completely botched Mario's 25th Anniversary. As Jeremy pointed out in last year's lamentation, Super Mario Bros. deserved better. Arguably the most influential game of all time, it deserved to have the vaults opened wide for fans to have access to every bit of content related to the original title. After consuming the disc, we should've been left utterly full, yet definitively satiated. But that's not the route Nintendo decided to take -- instead, we got a disc with a rom of Super Mario All-Stars for the SNES, a flimsy book sprinkled with pull quotes, and a CD containing a shamefully bare selection of tracks. In essence, Nintendo celebrated the 25th anniversary of their iconic mascot by making a quick buck. And while this left us undeniably disappointed, hope remains. Kirby is turning 20 this year, and at the most recent Nintendo Direct press conference, Satoru Iwata announced that they will be celebrating this milestone by releasing a retail disc for the Wii that includes undisclosed Kirby goodness. Outside of promising a variety of "fan-favorite" Kirby titles, Nintendo has left the rest of the details to our hopes and fears. This could be Nintendo's chance at historical preservation redemption. They could right all of the wrongs from Super Mario All-Stars Wii by giving us a fully comprehensive look at Kirby's past, present, and future.

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MMOGaming News

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• Upcoming MMOs in May 2012
• A Year of RIFT - Second Impressions
• RaiderZ(KR) OBT Version Revealed, Dinner and Performing Systems Added
• World of Tanks Review
• Pathfinder Online: Interesting Ways to Develop Sanbox PvE Content

Upcoming MMOs in May 2012 Posted: After 5 cb tests, now we finally got TERA this month. Is it a mmo worth paying to play? I observed some fansites and sub reddit community and they are not that active than they were even in Open Beta. What's your opinion? On the other hand, how about The Secret World? It seems great at first but now I'm not that sure it's a good game for playing. Continue reading Upcoming MMOs in May 2012.

A Year of RIFT - Second Impressions Posted: RIFT, the massively multiplayer online game packed with dynamic world events and a constantly shifting universe, launched on March 1, 2011. Since then, the game has seen countless upgrades, tweaks, modifications, content patches and evolutions, thanks in large part to its passionate community and the active involvement of Trion Worlds. In short, the RIFT we played in 2011 is not the RIFT we're playing now. Continue reading A Year of RIFT - Second Impressions.

RaiderZ(KR) OBT Version Revealed, Dinner and Performing Systems Added Posted: According to the information gathered, RaierZ will kick off its OBT at the first half of this year, and it's about to unveil the core contents continuously in the future four weeks. Continue reading RaiderZ(KR) OBT Version Revealed, Dinner and Performing Systems Added.

World of Tanks Review Posted: So, you fancy yourself a hardcore gamer, and you're looking for a challenge. Somehow, you've made it here to a review of World of Tanks. Continue reading World of Tanks Review.

Pathfinder Online: Interesting Ways to Develop Sanbox PvE Content Posted: Pathfinder Online's 11th development blog, delving some of the PvE experience, has been updated recently. The development blog represents the current state of our game design and is subject to change based on testing, further design and community feedback. Continue reading Pathfinder Online: Interesting Ways to Develop Sanbox PvE Content.

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