Monday, December 28, 2015

MMO News

MMO News


Weekly Recap #271 Dec. 28th – Smite, ELOA, Triad Wars & More!

Posted: 28 Dec 2015 06:09 PM PST

A quick look and discussion for every major announcement and update during the week! This week we discussed updates from the following games: ELOA, HeroWarz, Paladins, Smite, Gloria Victis, Flyff & Triad Wars!
 
Weekly MMO News summary for the week ending December 28th, 2015 (Dec. 21st – Dec. 28th).
 
ELOA launched its first expansion increasing the level cap and adding new zones:
http://mmohuts.com/video/eloa-first-expansion-trailer
 
KOG Games revealed a new Prologue trailer for HeroWarz:
http://mmohuts.com/video/herowarz-prologue-trailer
 
Paladins introduces an experimental que, spliting the traditional game mode in two:
http://mmohuts.com/video/paladins-closed-beta-patch-11-overview
 
Smite introduces this year’s epic skin: Ragnarok Force X Thor:
http://mmohuts.com/video/smite-ragnarok-force-x-thor-skin
 
Gloria Victis goes from Pre-Alpha to full Alpha:
http://mmohuts.com/news/gloria-victis-moves-to-full-alpha
 
Flyff celebrates its 10th anniversary:
http://mmohuts.com/news/flyff-celebrates-10th-anniversary-with-skip-level-event
 
Triad Wars slowly comes to a close:
http://mmohuts.com/news/triad-wars-announces-sudden-closure

The post Weekly Recap #271 Dec. 28th – Smite, ELOA, Triad Wars & More! appeared first on MMOHuts.

WE MOBA

Posted: 28 Dec 2015 04:09 PM PST

The post WE MOBA appeared first on MMOHuts.

Smite Lore: Who is Thor?

Posted: 28 Dec 2015 02:38 PM PST

Nevercake tackles the story of Smite‘s favorite poster boy, Thor, in this episode of Smite Lore.

The post Smite Lore: Who is Thor? appeared first on MMOHuts.

Durango

Posted: 28 Dec 2015 02:17 PM PST

The post Durango appeared first on MMOHuts.

Blade & Soul Mobile (Korea) Game Trailer

Posted: 28 Dec 2015 01:57 PM PST

NCSoft Korea presents the first official trailer for Blade & Soul Mobile, a chibi-style collectible card game.

The post Blade & Soul Mobile (Korea) Game Trailer appeared first on MMOHuts.

Blade & Soul Mobile

Posted: 28 Dec 2015 12:16 PM PST

The post Blade & Soul Mobile appeared first on MMOHuts.

Paladins Evie Impressions and Balance Updates

Posted: 28 Dec 2015 11:32 AM PST

If you haven’t read the preview Ragachak made, I suggest you check out his article first as it offers the overlay of features and functions that I will be going into greater depth on in this follow up article. Paladins is the next evolution of MOBA games; instead of having a top down view and having to use your mouse for the walking, the game transitions into a much smoother and improved version as we know 3D MOBA games of today. Despite not having any creep mechanics, the control point system combined with siege engines goes far to pull MOBA players into the shooter genre.

But first off lets touch on the newest champion introduced after Ragachak’s write-up: Evie. Evie is the winter witch of Paladins, equipped with a staff that fires ice towards its target, she is also capable of making an illusion, teleporting in the form of a blink, and flying clear of danger on her staff like a true witch. But before I tell you more about Evie, let me first explain to you how exactly the champions in Paladins get their powers, besides their spells they also get a bunch of cards that basically empower their current spells.

Paladins Evie Impressions and Balance Updates

Even if you can fly on your staff, horses are still nice.


 

The card system in Paladins is really interesting, and grinding these cards is done as easy as playing games. Right from the moment you start playing, you are given a bunch of basic cards to get a feel for the system. When finishing a game you get a treasure, and in these treasures you will find a lot of different cards for random champions. Usually these cards are better than the ones you were given at the start, though even repeat cards have their use. The best CCG comparison to the system is Hearthstone, each card will empower your champion in a way, but since each game is different and you will be fighting against different champions and people, sometimes the cards you have do not really work out in your favor. Each card has a different type of rank, and this rank basically tells you in what phase of the game you get to unlock these cards to choose from.

The color goes from silver to green to blue to purple and the last is gold. As you can imagine, the golden cards are the best and basically empower your characters in such a way that it can enforce a quick victory or give a losing team that holds on a chance to climb back into the action. For each champion you can select three cards for each rank to make your deck. Basically an experienced player will have some options to counterplay foes that newbies will lack. Though recent changes at least balanced out pure power cards from impacting the start of the game, so at least in the first few firefighters, players will be on an equal playing field.

Paladins Evie Impressions and Balance Updates

The new deck building modes have taken some RNG out of gameplay.


 

But enough on cards. Let’s use Evie again to compare Paladins to other arena shooters. When I was playing Evie I noticed that despite her appearance, she fills a more traditional sniper role in a shooter setting. Now granted every class has ranged damage through their gun style auto attacks. But Evie’s abilities pack massive range that sets her apart as a sniper. Further emphasizing this sniper playstyle, her auto attacks have a delay, making each attack more meaningful and forcing you to lead foes like any true sniper. They do however have a small explosion so you still do damage if you just slightly miss your target, making her slightly more forgiving.

After collecting a few cards for Evie, I mitigated her weaknesses by making her auto attacks go slightly faster so its easier to hit. This was a tough choice though as the opportunity cost was losing an extra powered blink that was ideal for pursuing a dying foe from up close. Clearly the former is more novice friendly, but the later is used properly is invaluable; neither choice is wrong! Evie is one of the first characters introduced to the game with a rather brutal skill curve that allows veteran players to snowball out of control, while being a total drag when a novice picks her up, or when your cards just aren’t coming up right.

Paladins Evie Impressions and Balance Updates

When the enemy is on the run, Evie is amazing.


 

Even though there are several maps in Paladins right now, somehow they’ve made it so that you queue into the same map almost always. For the most part I imagine this is showing their focus on character balance before worrying about how competitive and fair their various maps are. I have played them all, and on some maps I have felt that the maps needed a little bit more work, you see the current and only game mode in Paladins is called Siege. In Siege you have three capture points on the map, that both teams have to fight for. When a team has taken over a capture point for a hundred percent, they gain the siege, that well… sieges the enemy base. And on some maps these capture points were a bit too favored for one side of the map, which does not combine well considering how snowbally the game currently is. The siege phase of the game is very straight forward: your siege will attack the first layer of the wall, and once it breaks through it will do the same to the second layer. When both layers have been destroyed, it will attack the core of the base to end the game.

 

Paladins Evie Impressions and Balance Updates

Siege engines still feel a bit too tanky for a losing team to properly counter.

The game in its current state is extremely fun to play, but you will still notice a few bugs here and there and the balance still has a way to go. Sometimes with Evie for example, you will try to fly away and get stuck in the side of a small hill since there still is a bit of clipping. Matchmaking is still lacking, likely both technically as well as due to the small starting playerbase. Don’t expect battles to last longer than 10 minutes as one side tends to steamroll the other.

Conclusion

Even though I’ve laid out the clear differences in mechanics, its impossible to talk about Paladins without comparing it to Overwatch. Both are trying to attract the same audience, and are encompassed by the outer edge definition of being a MOBA. My recommendation is that traditional shooter players that fawned over Team Fortress 2 are going to stay on team Overwatch due to its fast nature and gameplay rewarding twitch skills and a steady hand. Conversely Paladins will suck in the MOBA players as it awards having a balanced awareness of skills, counterplay, and map awareness, while offering more AoE style attacks to be more forgiving on the twitch skill side. Individual skill seems to win out in Overwatch while team coordination seizes the day in Paladins. Overwatch gameplay gets a bit stale with your defined rolls at the start of the match, while Paladins constantly switches you up from offense to defense on the fly, keeping your heart racing. While it’s too soon to say if one is done better than the other, both feel like intense competitors that should be watched closely in 2016.

The post Paladins Evie Impressions and Balance Updates appeared first on MMOHuts.

Triad Wars Announces Sudden Closure

Posted: 28 Dec 2015 11:07 AM PST

In a surprise forum post just before Christmas, United Front Games announced that Triad Wars would be ending its beta and service on January 20, 2016. Refunds will be offered for gold purchases during December (more on that here),

No clear reason was given from UFG or from Square Enix, and the only hints that something might be changing was in a few staff departures during November and December.

Since the start of the Triad Wars Closed Beta this year, diligent Enforcers have run rampant through the streets of Hong Kong, killing rivals and building Empires. During this time we have gathered immense amounts of feedback, information, and data on the game. We've loved seeing how you've played Triad Wars but we know it wasn't right for many of you so we're letting you know today that we are going to close the beta and service on January 20th 2016 at 12 p.m. Pacific Standard Time. That's 4 weeks from today and over this time we're going to leave the game up and running for you to continue to enjoy but we will not be accepting any more purchases. To help you enjoy these final 4 weeks we're going to make Gold available free of charge and we'll shortly be posting news on the forums about how to deal with refunds of unused Gold. Thank you very much for all the testing, feedback and support!

The post Triad Wars Announces Sudden Closure appeared first on MMOHuts.

Liberators

Posted: 28 Dec 2015 10:02 AM PST

The post Liberators appeared first on MMOHuts.

Marvel Contest of Champions Groot Trailer

Posted: 28 Dec 2015 09:54 AM PST

Marvel Contest of Champions welcomes Groot as its latest champion.

The post Marvel Contest of Champions Groot Trailer appeared first on MMOHuts.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...