Blog Posts from "Arreat Summit" - Gameriot.com

New Witch Doctor Art

no.spam@gameriot.com (Sp3tSnAz) — Fri, 26 Dec 2008 02:37:26 -0500

The Sons of the Storm website has once again been updated, just in time for the hollidays.

This time it bring us two pieces of Diablo 3 artwork from Drawgoon and Raneman, however we've already seen the Drawgoon one previously.

The art by Raneman is new (because of the background), and features a Witch Doctor female which we have seen in a few magazines. At least now we know who drew it!

Enjoy

Could the New 40k MMO be for Consoles too?

no.spam@gameriot.com (Sp3tSnAz) — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 23:57:11 -0500

Some of you might know from Hellgate Guru that I had a large thread on the 40k MMO with all details of it we've known so far.

While the game is still very early in development, I've tried to find all information I could on it, as it's a very cool IP in my opinion with lots of possibilities for a great game.

There was a new bit of new today about it, specifically detailing a job offer for Vigil Games, the company in charge of making the game.

The job is for a Senior MMO Programmer, but what is most interesting is these two points:

Physics/ action game experience is a big plus.

Categories: Programmer / Engineer

Experience Required: 5 yrs

Platforms: Xbox 360,Windows

This makes it seem like the game could possibly be destined for the Xbox as well. Although it could just be that they want some skillsets that Xbox consoles develop for a PC MMO... Who knows, but hopefully we'll find out more soon!

Bill Roper Joins Cryptic as a Lead Designer

no.spam@gameriot.com (Sp3tSnAz) — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 10:20:46 -0500

GameDaily has just posted up a new interview they conducted with Bill Roper, who as per a press release sent by Cryptic Studios, is going to be a new Lead Designer on Champions Online.

While we know Bill Roper as the CEO of Flagship Studios and his game Hellgate: London which we have covered for a long time, many people always blamed bad decisions of the managing team for the fall of Hellgate London. It was even stated by Bill many times that they tried to take on too much and couldn't handle it all.

This is why it seems a bit weird that rather than putting Bill into a design position or maybe a storyline position he is being thrust straight into such a leading position. Champions Online was another game that we followed on the Guru websites, so it's going to be sad if it ends up failing like Hellgate London.

Either way, good luck to Bill on his new venture and hopefully he has more success with the new game.

More Hints of Hellgate's Comeback

no.spam@gameriot.com (Sp3tSnAz) — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 02:52:57 -0400

To follow the last few posts on the new RedBana studio working on Hellgate London, the Game Espresso Blog has been updated again with a new post.

This time it is a letter from the Korean Developer of Hellgate London.

Hopefully this means that the game might make a comeback, and hopefully they figure out some deal with the old founders to maybe enable us to at least play the core game for free (as currently this is only Act 1 and Act 2 in Korea)

Man Wants to Wed Comic Book Character

no.spam@gameriot.com (Sp3tSnAz) — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 05:14:41 -0400

I swear, the news from Japan just gets weirder and weirder.

After last weeks post about the Japanese woman being jailed for killing her virtual husband, comes news that a Japanese man wants to marry a comic book character.

Ah Japan... what to expect of you next week!

Rumours and Speculations - Hellgate: London Possibly To Live

no.spam@gameriot.com (Sp3tSnAz) — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 03:20:05 -0400

File this one under rumours and speculations as based on my own findings.

While we do know that FSS has died, as per yesterday's post about Hanbiton acquiring Hellgate: London, we do know that the IP is owned by T3 now.

What we didn't know however, is what would happen to the US version of the game. A new post went up today on the Korean Hellgate London website. It is a post talking about Halloween events and the "re-opening of the Hellgate", however what is interesting about it, is that it has a section written in English on a usually Korean only website.

The post also sounds like they are getting ready to re-launch the game (could this mean transferring the old players over?) and the company in charge appears to be Redbana. Further research leads to the Taiwanese MMO company called Redbana, which appears to have quite some experience in gaming. Further research leads to findings of a new San Francisco office for the company, which is where Hellgate offices were located previously.

So take this news with a grain of salt, but until we have more news, there is possibility that the game might come back in some way.

Enjoy

Hellgate: London and Mythos Live in Korea

no.spam@gameriot.com (Sp3tSnAz) — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 08:28:28 -0400

This was posted over at the Game Espresso Blog, which seems to be a blog dedicated to Hanbitsoft. The game will only be available to Koreans, as it is IP blocked on their website.

Enjoy all you Korean players. Hopefully Mythos will be available to the rest of us too!

Hellgate London US/EU Servers Shutting Down Feb 1st

no.spam@gameriot.com (Sp3tSnAz) — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 01:01:24 -0400

Directly from the Hellgate London website:

P.S. All the sub features and everything are open to everyone till servers go down.

Well it was fun while it lasted.

Good luck to the various people who worked on the game with whatever they do next, thanks to Tiggs and the other ex-Ping0 people who stuck around until the end and thanks to all the fans who made Hellgate Guru a joy to be a part of.

Now onto Diablo 3!!!

Woman jailed after 'killing' virtual husband

no.spam@gameriot.com (Sp3tSnAz) — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 02:35:28 -0400

This was posted over at Yahoo News and I found it quite interesting since many people here play all kinds of online games.

The story goes as this. Two people from Japan who didn't live together were playing Maple Story aÂ free-of-charge, 2D, side-scrolling massively multiplayer online role-playing game. In this game, avatars can marry each other. The two people got married and then later over some disagreement the husband divorced the wife inside the game.

The forty three year old woman then got upset over this decision, logged in with her husbands avatar (doesn't say how she knew his login info), and deleted it. What happened next is very strange in my view.

Does anyone really get attached to their characters that much, that if one is deleted it feels the same as if it was murdered? Sure, maybe stealing his data and logging in could be considered fraud (although we don't know how she got that information), however who would tell on someone doing something like this to them in a GAME... Do people really get this close to their avatars that they must revenge anything that happens to them? Or are they worth a lot in games like Maple Story?

So yes... is the behaviour of this this couple weird or am I weird for not being this attached to my online characters? Do people think she really deserves to go to jail over something like this?

EA at work on a new Syndicate title

no.spam@gameriot.com (Sp3tSnAz) — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 01:01:17 -0400

Syndicate was one of the first games I played on the PC back in the day and I fondly remember how much fun I had with it when I played it at a friends house for the first time.

I don't recall many of the details of it, because of how long ago it was, but I remember key details like mind control and the fairly cool looking environments that it provided. This is why I was so surprised and pleased to see an announcement on CVG that EA is working on a new Syndicate title.

Here is a snippet from CVG.

Hopefully the game doesn't get ruined by the new remake as many game remakes these days tend to be like. It would be great to see the game prosper, as the whole Cyberpunk genre is very fun to play in my opinion.

Hellgate IAH Servers Finally Down

no.spam@gameriot.com (Sp3tSnAz) — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 07:22:07 -0400

In what would appear to be fairly obvious news to anyone involved with Hellgate, the IAH servers for the game (that's the South East Asian ones) have finally been taken down.

Here is a statement from the site.

Oh well, it was good while it lasted and although it's sad to see them go, it doesn't look like many people on their forums care.

Guess this is the prelude to the possible downing of the US servers in the future, so until that news post....

Enjoy

Warcraft 4 Confirmed, Starcraft 2 to be a Trilogy

no.spam@gameriot.com (Sp3tSnAz) — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 19:02:50 -0400

The latest panel from BlizzCon has been about Starcraft 2. The big news is that the campaign will be split into three separate parts, each being sold as a stand alone game. (people were booing this decision)

This is to ensure a faster release and a more polished campaign. Each of these will feature the same multiplayer experience, however you will have to purchase a separate product to play each of the campaigns.

In other big news, it was also announced the Warcraft 4 will use the same sort of system, which basically confirmed that Warcraft 4 is in the works!

GamesOn.net has a write up of the panel, as well as the news of the trilogy.

What went wrong with Hellgate

no.spam@gameriot.com (Sp3tSnAz) — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 07:22:12 -0400

There is a new article on Multiplayer blog with Mythic VP, Mark Jacobs, about his new Warhammer online game.

The article also mentions a number of things about Hellgate and why he thinks it failed.

â€

He then goes on to talk about why games like AOC failed, which you can read about at the link below.

Link:Â http://multiplayerblog.mtv.com/2008/09/02/mythic-vp-on-hellgate-and-age-of-conan/

Games Convention Booth Babes

no.spam@gameriot.com (Sp3tSnAz) — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 16:14:10 -0400

German site Gamona has posted up what they think are the top ten booth babes from the Games Convention.

They have a voting system in place for the top ten, so here are the top three below:

You can view the others on their website.

Enjoy

Link: http://www.gamona.de/gamesconvention2008/voting.html

PC manufacturers view piracy as hidden benefit for consumers

no.spam@gameriot.com (Sp3tSnAz) — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 07:05:53 -0400

Found this article over at Gizmodo, which was originally published on GamesIndustry.biz. It seemed pretty interesting and got me thinking about the issue at hand.

The article is basically talking about how the CEO of idSoftware, Todd Hollenshead believes that manufacturers of PC Hardware secretly accept file sharing and piracy as they see it as benefiting their Hardware sales.

While he states that they would never admit this publically, it is apparent that a number of them likely see it as a benefit when they sell their PCs that they come with some unlisted benefits such as access to "free hardware and software".

What's really interesting about this, is that while piracy may not benefit a lot of game sales and so on according to some manufacturers, there are cases out there where various artists and film makers, as well as some game makers do come out and also state that they believe piracy helps them get exposure.

While I'm not condoning piracy as being something that should be legal or somehow morally justifying it, it's hard to deny that there are definitely benefits that come out of the whole piracy ordeal. It helps get unknown artists and game makers exposure to the market, as otherwise their games might not be purchased. It also helps a lot of people make a decision on whether they want to actually buy the game after trying it a bit. On top of that, it helps test out system requirements.

While it's obvious that a very large percentage of people who pirate will never buy the games, it's also clear that without the piracy, they wouldn't likely buy those games anyway. However there is that small percentage that make their decisions based on the pirated gameplay, especially if they want to move to online play of the games.

It is also important to note the original point of the article, that the hardware manufacturers may see a side effect of this which helps them boost sales of their gear to gamers who get this large variety of games.

It is clear to everyone that there are both good and bad sides to piracy and it's an interesting topic for debate, however it's also interesting to see another side to the whole argument as was stated by Todd, which adds another industry into perspective.

So yes, what are your views on Todd's argument?

Do you think that Hardware manufacturers aren't really making the effort that they could to limit piracy (which they quite easily could do throught things like hardware disabling when pirated software is found, however this leads to a whole massive argument of backlash from the community)?

Do you think that the argument made by Todd is very one sided as he is from the industry that seems to suffer the most from piracy?

So yes, feel free to express your views in the comments to hopefully lead to an interesting discussion of this very important topic for PC Gaming.

Enjoy

Original Article: http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/hollenshead-carmack-part-one