Stargate Worlds: DOA

Just when I thought there might be a game coming out that I was interested in (other than AoC), I read this:

IGN: So you can take cover too?

Dan Elggren: Absolutely. You can utilize the environment to break line of sight, you get a bonus for being behind cover; it gives you a little more protection. We’re going to try to emphasize to the player that that’s really where you want to be, is to move out of the way so you’re not standing out in the open. If you do stand out in the open you’re probably going to get “pwned.”

Chris Klug:: It’s traditional MMO in that combat is resolved and that targeting is done. It isn’t like an FPS in that you’re not shooting real bullets, there’s no physics engine, we’re not causing you to have to follow a target as the target runs across the battlefield. You target by Tab-ing or by clicking like in an MMO and you start firing, and there’s a combat resolution system under the hood that’s taking care of the details as in a typical kind of role-playing game. The biggest difference is it’s not a hit point battle. If you’re standing out in the open and you’re attacked by even lower level guys than you and you don’t do anything, you’re going to die unless you take advantage of the cover and ability set as Dan said.

IGN: What do you mean by it’s not a hit point battle?

Chris Klug:: What I mean is that in traditional MMOs the goal is to increase your hit points such that you can stand toe-to-toe with somebody and outlast them. Everything is measured in DPS and hit points, and you can do the math and unless you totally screw up, you’re always going to beat somebody who has less hit points than you, as long as you have a comparable weapon or better weapon.

In our game, it’s about do you take cover, do you take advantage of cover, are you using your ability set to your best advantage, are you keeping track of where the enemy Jaffa is flanking you, because if you lose track of him on the battlefield he’ll come around and shoot you in the back because you’re always engaged in multiple targets.

I am asleep. You just put me to sleep.

Tags: Cheyenne Mountain, Chris Klug, IGN, preview, Stargate Worlds, sucks, tabbed combat

Chris Chung Wants Your Fucking Money

At the recent CES, Massively had a chance to gather meaningless information from people trying to sell stuff. One such person was Chris Chung, who had this to say regarding NCSoft’s recent acquisition of the CoX titles:

Massively: You said that you don’t forsee bringing newer business models to subscription games; there’s no interest in applying that to a game like City of Heroes?

Mr. Chung: In terms of games like that, the issue is finding out what the players actually want. We need to make sure the players have ways to access the game the way they want. Instead of saying “here’s a half-finished product and you’re going to pay for the other half” … if we do offer microtransaction items for City of Heroes we need to ask the fanbase directly what they want that isn’t already in the game. We need to figure out what they want, what they’ll pay for, before we offer it to them. As we explore this we need to carefully tread this water.

Look, I know that English isn’t Chung’s first language. And I’m really not trying to be an ass, but this man (presumably) went to college and has an MBA or the Chinese equivalent thereof. While I don’t expect full disclosure on the floor of the CES, it still begs the eternal question: WTF? This is the breakdown of what he said, in essence:

A. NCSoft has no plans to re-release CoX as a half-finished game, then charge the players who want to play the old “finished” version. Good move, I think.

B. Chung believes that, before you can sell something, you must decide what to sell. No shit?

C. Thus, his next step is to figure out what you, the consumer, wants. And then to charge you for it. I’m asleep. His answer just put me to sleep.

D. NCSoft plans to tread water until it figures out why it just purchased a seven-year old hunk of code from a developer who is in the process of putting CoX out of business entirely.

Truly groundbreaking stuff. Massively followed up with this:

Nothing. Because they are not real journalists.

Tags: Chris Chung, City of Heroes, City of Villains, CoX, Massively, NCSoft, treading water