Besides, the usual stuff of organizing rank, dues and all the trappings you'd come to expect from games like WOW, EQ-2 and CoX, WAR's Guilds will include such cool stuff as Guild Banners to take on the Battlefield, for greater glory and buffs, or to lose in shame and defeat.
A new reign begins on the GW Amp site today. A new herald of the Site Manager title has been chosen and his name is Wyat_Hawke.
For those unaware, outstanding staffer/member Kanna recently stepped down as Site Manager for the site. In his departure, a new SM was sought to fill in the void. Kanna will be missed as staffer but I am pretty sure he isn't completely leaving the site. I would like to be one of the first to thank him for his time and effort he placed into the site on a daily basis. Also please give congratulations to Wyat in his new position for the site.
With Wyat taking over as SM, we are considering opening up to take on new staffers. Stay tuned for news on seeking out site assistance. If anyone has any questions feel free to contact Wyat or myself.
Stay tuned to Gameamp.com for more news on Guild Wars.
We all know that in-game Gold is sold for Real Money in a process called RMT. We know it because we get tells in-game from seller accounts and because we sometimes (think we can) see the farming accounts at work in our beloved game.
That there is a market for in-game gold can not be doubted once one looks at Google's WOW Guide WOW GOLD trend analysis. Some go as far as to compare the phenomenon to prostitution, claiming it's the unsavory elements around it that are the problem, not the "service" itself.
Game Security blogger Play no Evil got some statistics straight from the monster's mouth. IGE has been busy tearing itself to shreds so was unavailable for comparable figures.
The article is an interesting read, showing some interesting tidbits like WOW-EU gold being persistently cheaper than WOW-US Gold. Could it be that Blizzard patrols the EU servers less fanatically or is it to do with time-zones, the proverbial Chinese Farmer doesn't have to wait nearly a day for the US market to wake up before offloading the hot goods. Some of the comments are even better. Truly showing how complex and diverse this issue really is.
dinna fret, it’z complet'ly legit.
it’z made by da developa boyz demself an’ appearz to be a pretty accurate take on wot you’d see in beta wot is clozed if you were in it.
or so i’s been told...
For a widescreen version on a Dutch site, click here.
Strictly speaking this isn't news, since this item is about two decades into the past and one decade into the future.
The first is a Visual Histroy of MMORPGs (first part) hosted at Massively.com which shows a nice overview of the genre, starting with the first MUD, created by Richard Bartle and Roy Trubshaw back in 1978 (told you it was two decades) up to around the time Everquest hits the scene in 1999. Presumably, that will get a viewing in part2. But for a quick timeline of that classic, check here.
But this is all preface for Richard Bartle's (who is indeed the same Bartle as from the famous Bartle Test which many Developers still use to define players by) Keynote speech at IMGDC 2008, in which he sets out three brilliant though sometimes scary visions of how MMORPG's will evolve in the next ten years or so.
Best of all, he posted his Slides online!
I would invite you all to look at the pretty pictures by Massively and then read through Richard Bartle's Slides, if only to find out how he managed to link MMORPG's to two of the best things to come out of the seventies, namely the Muppets and Debbie Harry.
Once you're done, I'd like you to share your thoughts on the past and future of MMORPGs here.
EA Mythic brought saddening news earlier this week when they announced a fall launch, showing once and for all that a release set in mud can still easily slip.
But since that sad day, Mythic's been making up for it with a sleuth of items that hitherto had only been hinted at. They accomplished this by means of letting a TTH crew film just about everything they had tape for during a visit to the Mythic offices.
“Tech is as deep as plastic. Game play is forever!”
In another part of the world, we learn that EU Open beta this summer will be guaranteed for the 55,000 people who will be pre-ordering the Collector's Edition. The rest will presumably be drawing straws.
The good news is, that ominous count-down on the WAR-europe.com site turns out to be for the pre-order of the Collector's Edition for Europe, not for a Launch Date announcement as some hoped.
That was about an hour or so earlier, and also the not-so-good news for those eagerly awaiting the game.
As Ten Ton Hammer reports in what appears to be a scoop for them, in a unexpected move at a show in Paris, Jeff Hickman announced today another delay for Warhammer Online moving the games release date to "fall."
Many followers of the game's development were expecting a delay already, but this puts it back a bit further than anticipated, at the end of Q3.
There's some really cool stuff in that pre-order kit though, and the CE will feature exclusive in-game content as well as the almost obligatory tin-miniature. Now who's honestly surprised that a figurine made its way into the box?
Let the Good and the Bad not overshadow the "Ugly" though, as the new look for the War Herald is anything but ugly.
Missy Hatch of EA Mythic Entertainment has put out a very nice Beta test review of the Empire vs Chaos tests done over the last few months.
In an 'in character style' she manages to relate a lot about the atmosphere of the game, blending lore and mechanics in a good to read, easy to understand and yet lengthy and thorough article.
Of note are the unveiling of several masteries:
Bright Wizard Masteries
Warrior Priest Masteries
Chosen Masteries
Zealot Masteries
And some details on Siege gameplay, but for that you're probably better of checking out the Special Feature on the subject over at the main Warhammer Online site.
Well, we've got no-one to blame for this but ourselves.
We did ask for this after all. Thanks to the valiant efforts of our Developers, you are now only a click (or two if you miss-click like me) away from seeing which of your site's staff-members are online at the moment.
So if you need a staffer, and need one NOW, that's the place to check who to PM. In emergency situations, you can also use the staff page of other network sites. You can easily navigate by means of the pull-down menu at the top right of every page. The four mentioned sites are the most active though. A link to the Staff page is always provided in the left column as part of the box labeled "Gameamp", usually at the bottom.
Keen and Graev, two blogging brothers have done what I've been meaning (read procrastinating about) for a few weeks now). I.e. to put together an overview of all the many wonderful Warhammer video's available and put them in one list,
on YouTube as it happens. Probably because it's so eminently suited for such a thing. All Paul Barnett's crazy stuff as well as useful video's and other wacky Brits in one place!
Besides above shown lovely Video from Games Day Köln 2007, there's lots more to watch:
