f13.net

Welcome to the Auto Assault beta chat.

Last time I played it, it blew. Big time. Someone else try it out and tell me if I should bother logging in again...been a couple of months.

I have blowing chunks to look forward to when I get home. Woo!

Last time I tried it was a month ago. As far as I could tell, I was doing random kill stuff and get stuff missions by holding down the right mouse button and driving around like an idiot. I haven't been inclined to return since then.

I tried in early August.

It was laggy, looked like shit, and had shitty shit shit gameplay.

Ditto to Strazos.

Fedex missions.  So many Fedex missions.

Patcher crashes the game on my laptop!  Woot woot.

I had no issues with the game technically, other than my computer is going through its bimonthly lockup fits, so I had to download it like 20 times. When I finally got to play it, it was completely underwhelming. The damn car slides around too fast, the fighting against people on foot was beyond retarded, and driving up to someone standing on the side of the road to get a mission felt extremely silly. The graphics were underwhelming as well. They need a lot more time on this game or it's going to flop.

Also, that testing schedule is entirely too small a window to get a good testing base. Either that's because the server isn't stable enough, at which point, it needs to stay in alpha, or they just don't want to put in the time to make sure the thing's up 24 hours. Either way, that's going to stretch the beta process a lot more than it needs to be.

Yeah, I didn't understand that either; First game I can remember that had such a limited beta.

Yes. Haven't bothered to dload the client, since it looks like the windows are unfriendly to my playing times, which are sorely restricted these days.

This thread made me not want to play the game.

Amazing.

Playing the game will make you not want to play the game.

Playing CoH makes me not want to play AA.

Explain that one.

Ouch. Beta?

My main impression: it's very bad CoH. Have you ever done fedex and kill quests? Have you ever done fedex and kill quests...in a car? /johnstewart

The driving physics suck. Good thing there is a lot of destructible terrain. Maybe it's my newbism, but the turret was a wildly swinging pea shooter (well, it was a newbie gun) that just never gave me the feeling of a real turret. Planetside kinda raises my expectation for combat. Combat was just stupid, drive around in circles until the mmo mobs die, running them down didn't seem to do much, I can't really explain it other than it felt stupid. The one mission where you have to put a bomb in this camp was pretty much the end for me, psychologically. Completely surrounded by guys with rocket launchers landing their shots at will, while I tried to drive in circles and target them with my limp noodle cannon, it felt in no way like I had much in the way of control.

While it did support widescreen at 720p, the text was tiny. Finally, I got tired of reading the miniscules, and it was just basic mmo quests I've seen a gazillion times, so it really didn't matter. Just follow the waypoints.

There might be some cool crafting stuff later on, but I got tired of the game before the tutorial stage was over, though I did finish the instance.

I don't like mmogs much, but I know an alpha that's better than this beta. Where's the board for that one? :P

That said, I did think my green spiky mohawk avenger in a shiny gold suit was pretty cool-looking.

Forgot to mention - there is joystick support....but you can't reconfigure the controller. So I had driving controls, turret control, and shoot. About a dozen buttons unused, so I really couldn't play with the controller. The gamepad didn't make the driving experience much better, though it was slightly better than the digital contol of the keyboard.

So, DDO is better? Color me surprised.

Like sex in Alabama, it's all relative.

I will say that I sort of enjoyed planting the bomb in the enemy camp, because I had fun running over the little people.  Gunning them down, however, was not fun.

Hey, can we get a City of Villains beta board?

So, "No" then?

The problem with making beta boards is that we wait until the administrators are in because they can see it and seeing it breaks NDA. You know, playing nice with companies and all that.

We're not in the CoV beta yet. Hell, we're regularly thrashing CoV in the forum that the devs read. I don't think we'll be in any time soon. I know for a fact - because I've been told - that the @f13.net email addresses get held off in big betas because we're known as "press." Sort of like @gamespot.com, etc. Except we aren't pole smokers named Tor.

I rarely ever use my f13.net email for a beta, because I figured somewhere along the way, someone would mistake us for journalists or something. Of course, that should mean we get offered coke and whores from every publisher available, but I can only assume since I haven't been given coke and whores, that they actually read our site and know better.

Oh, and I still can't muster up any energy to login to Auto Assault at the prescribed times.

Ditto.

Thirded.

That makes sense.

I think we're just going to delete this forum instead of making it public. The game got delayed, they'll no doubt have another huge beta round when they think it's fun.

Le sigh. The premise was decent. The execution was not. Story of my gaming life.

(http://www.mactavishland.ca/pictures/tumbleweed.jpg)

Heh. I had forgotten I was even in this beta. Maybe I should check it out again...

A few weeks ago I recieved a message about the new client.

Has anyone bothered to grab it, has the game changed in any significant matter, and is it worth the hassle?

How are the coke and whores coming along? I don't do coke, but whores sound like a good deal.

The coke is for the whores, n00b.  :wink:

It still sucks.

This is almost sad. Almost.

MMORPGs don't make me sad anymore. I think it's time to make this forum go POOF.

Edit: Still haven't installed the beta, but then I've only played DDO for 5 minutes too.

I would have liked to play DDO, but the installer screws up.

I still haven't installed the beta. It was so bad last time that I haevn't made the time out of my crazy schedule of late to care.

Give me DDO beta. I demand it.

I want to cruise the wasteland, fighting and scrabbling for my own survival while trying to take over Bartertown.

I don't want to play WoW in cars.

Until they fix the latter part, I ain't reinstalling.

If it was WoW in cars, it'd at least be mildly fun.

No, it's EQ in cars, in that it's not even fun.

I say you share your DDO account with certain people so that we may compare.  :evil:

No.

BUT LOOK AT ALL THE ACTIVITY!

http://boards.autoassault.com/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=50519&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=&fpart=1#50519
I've gotten back into playing Auto Assault for the past few weeks. Here are my thoughts:

The Good:

• If you like blowing stuff up, this is your game. Almost everything in the game can be destroyed if you apply enough force. Trees, telephone poles, guardrails, buildings, and creepy mutant creatures can all be poked, prodded, shot, fried, zapped, and ran over. Nothing is more fun than just plowing through a huge settlement and running everything over in your path. If you hit a person at high enough speeds, they'll explode in a big bloody mess.
• Anything you destroy has the chance to drop some sort of item. You can get items that buff or heal, paintcans to color your car, weapons/armor/powerplants/etc to add to your car, and broker weapons/armor/powerplants/etc and components for crafters. Your vehicle can be outfitted with a front weapon, a turret weapon, a melee ramming weapon, and a rear weapon. They've got rifles, machine guns, flamethrowers, flechettes, missile launchers, and mine layers. Each weapon builds up heat in your car so you can't just run around the whole time firing. You'll overheat and become a sitting duck.

The Bad:

• If you like to do other things besides blowing stuff up, there's not much to do. Besides arr-peeing, the only other thing to do is to be a crafter.
• Some people are tired of class based level systems. Each race has a Warrior Class, a Healer/Buffer Class, a Pet Class, and a Rogue Class.
• Combat can get pretty monotonous at times. You end up doing a lot of driving in circles or backing up while shooting.
• The inventory manangement system is a pain. You've got ton of little items in your inventory and you have to figure out what the hell to do with them all. Since almost everything drops some sort of item, you end up picking up craploads of stuff. If you're a crafter, great. If not, you have to get rid of it somehow or else it will fill up your inventory and you won't be able to pick up the Laser of Whoop Ass. While there are plans in the future for some sort of auction house, nothing exists right now.
• The game is rough on lower end systems. If you plow through a whole bunch of stuff, you'll have items flying through the air everywhere. My nvidia Ti4600 would often slow to a snail's pace and then crawl into a corner to cry.

The Ugly:

• While the BioMek race's mission are pretty well balanced, the Human and Mutant missions are all over the place. I was getting missions that were sending me to kill things 4+ levels higher than me. There are gaps between certain level where you don't get any missions of those levels. You either have to try a mission that pretty much suicide or else you have to go grind somewhere. There are also quite a few bugged missions that just don't work.
• Crafting is pretty screwed up at the moment. The crafting tree is incredibly steep. In order to move to the next tier of crafting, you have to be able to craft lvl 50 items in the first tier. Then you go back to crafting lvl 1 items again.

Touche.

While I'll admit most of the hate I got for AA can be traced back to the limited beta test. I'm from Eastern Europe, my timezone is GMT+2. In the US beta I had to stay up to 2AM in the morning to play around for 15 minutes and hurry to bed so I can go to work the next day, the EU beta was a bit better, but getting more than 2 hours at a time, once a week (if that) was a pain. And as Clyde said the game is a bit heavy so I got pretty low frame rates.  My biggest character was level 7 or something. I find it hard to put my finger on stuff I didn't like, but I'll defiantly not be picking this up when it releases. And this is coming from a serious Fallout junkie. Can't someone just make Fallout: Online and be done with it? That game was a serious disappointment for me. I'll probably give it another shot about a month before release, but as it stands now I don't like it.

edit: In "but I'll defiantly not be picking this up when it releases" i wanted to say definatly, but the spell checker changed it to that and I'm leaving it :P

Note- I haven't played since the very early beta, so take my comments with a grain of salt.

I played AA for about 15 minutes total. I fucking hated it. They had an opportunity to do something really different and fun, and instead made EQ/WoW in cars. Fuck that. If they would have made Car Wars Online, I would be happily playing it for months, and probably have multiple accounts.

I was SO excited to be among the first in the beta, and SO disappointed when I saw what direction things were going. Very similar to my SWG beta experience in that respect.

Fun has not been patched in eh?  What a surprise...

 :?

My sig may indeed be bad luck...

So help me god if Supreme Commander and Hellgate: London are bad I'll be turned off PC Games forever.

And I will lodge sharp things in your throat.

Heh. Unlock that beta forum :P

I'm surprised they lifted the NDA. I would have kept it in place past release. I can't see much good word of mouth coming from beta testers.

This game was incredibly bad. I've not played in a few months, which is a saying that you should get used to hearing, but here's what it was then.

You'd be in town as your dude. I don't remember how much you could customize him or whatever, but you were 3rd person in this awkwardly animated junkyard type town. You wandered around and got quests from people, which were 'kill 20 of these' or 'go here and talk to this dude'. Then you'd leave town and you'd be in your CAR/TANK thing.

Combat in the game involved using the mouse to spin your turret around and the keyboard to move the car. Now, this sounds kind of cool in practice, but it definately was not.

You'd start with a gun that had about a 30 meter range and the "spread" was about 40 degrees or so, forward. So you'd spin the mouse around and get some bad dudes within that 40 degrees and click the left mouse and hold it. Then you'd autoattack in that direction, machinegun fire going all over, and you'd drive around trying to keep this 40 degree BLANKET OF FIRE on the bad guy.

Then you had guns that you could mount on the front and on the rear of your car that fired only in those directions. Apparently later they added ramming devices, but I never saw it.

I GUESS there were 'special attacks' which were hit 1-0 to select one, then right click to use. You'd be chaingunning shit then you'd hit 1 and right click and you'd fire glowing blue rounds for a few seconds. ZAP POW THIS IS GREAT!

Being able to destroy shit wasn't even that grand. You'd run into a little cardboard building (nothing in this game looks solid, or even remotely real.) and it would fold in on itself. Then you could back up about 50 yards, spin your turret around a few times, then drive forward and it would be reconstructed.

The AI, haha, there were some gems. There were these mushroom things that hung out by TOXIC PONDS or some retarded shit, and they had SUPER SHORT RANGE and blew up and injured stuff near them. Thing is, their range is like 20m, and THE SECOND YOU SPAWN INTO THE GAME you have a range of 30m. So if you knew this, for awhile at least, (I hope they fixed it) you'd just have to roll out into the wilderness, avoiding the gang dudes, and find some high level mushrooms. Cause you could hit them, and they wouldn't touch you.

Then you had the gang dudes who had speederbike type things and often travelled in convoys. You'd see them bumping into each other and running into obstacles. One guy at full throttle going right into a rock, but he's at a 5 degree angle so he's slowly moving to the left. Another guy going full throttle right into his fucking kickstand. Physics? Did the guy move him sideways? Hell no, this is a mass multiplayer game we can't concentrate on stuff like that!

Last I played it was when they took the game down for that "break" while they tried to figure out how to make it fun. From what I hear (friend gave me an account, and I think he signed back in to see the painful changes) they totally changed the combat system so you don't even get to spin your turret now. You hit tab to lock some target then either press a key to fire, or hold it down to fire.

Anyways, I can't even remember who worked on this game but I look forward to their future failures. This is going to be an AO-quality launch disaster, with even less content and a world that's not even a tenth as interesting as AO.

This makes me sad. The post "add fun" preview I read said they ramped up the graphics but the gameplay is the same as ever.

I tried to play this twice, before and after the beta "revamp". Why did they put levels in this game? Why is this an MMOG? I can imagine AA as a really fun 32 versus 32 multiplayer team game. There is no way to coordinate with others during combat other than Teamspeak since typing anything meant your vehicle was standing still or autodriving in a single direction.

I made it to level 3 once. Killing things just involved holding down the trigger and driving in circles until your gun overheated.

The destructible terrain was fun. I didn't get tired of it during the combined 3 hours I /played.

It just amazed me that the only people to survive the nukes were nascar fans.

It's not a bad game, but lacks in almost any area that would drive longevity in my opinion. It's a fun activity set in a niche environment with niche motivations, at odds with what's driving the success of the genre. I hope the AA has scaled their business plan for 150k or so subscribers, because I doubt they'll plateau much above that.

Their use of Havok physics makes for all sorts of fun, but it's fun in a CoH sort of way for most: get in, have a great time blowing stuff up, get out and go play something with depth. AA will have its adherants just as all games do though, so I'm sure if I ever say that again, someone will flame me.

Finally, their theme is what I also think will keep them nichey. Not that all games need to be Tolkien ripoffs, but cyberpunk has similarly been way overdone, and it's nowhere near popular enough in MMOGs to build a whole new game around. I long for some serious sci-fi to replace this "let's use sci-fi for BFGs!1!!1"

Is there any compelling reason to pay a monthly fee?  Are the persistent aspects of the game meaningful and integral to the gameplay? 

Well this thread bums me out.   :-(

I admit that I am part of the niche "sci-fi" fanbase.  I love cyberpunk, steampunk, shadowrun, mechwarrior type schtuff.  I actually just like any "fantastical" type genre. 

That being said I was really excited about AA.  I played AO for a good bit, from launch until something pulled me away from it.  (Probably AC1 again).  Aside from the steeeeep learning curve and nuketacular launch I can say I really liked AO and thought it was the one of the better MMO's out at the time. 

I was hoping against hope that AA might be similar enough to AO that I would enjoy it.  And the old "Car Wars" theme makes me nostalgic for my younger days playing with my friends.  I like reading everyone's opinions here but man the anticipation/disappointment rollercoaster for the MMORPG scene is burning me out.  I have even had a couple PM's from folks that were in the Beta telling me to not get too excited.



I will hold out hope that AA will be interesting to me but so far this thread makes me /sadf about AA's actual play.

 

That's definitely an issue. But sometimes a game just isn't fun for a certain group of people. I wouldn't write off AA for yourself anymore than I'd write off SWG or CoV for others. I also would push people to try and wait for a free trial period though, with a free download :)

Betas are already allowing people to do that, but they're cagey about who they allow in.

Like open invitation to Fileplanet or IGN members?   :rimshot:

Seriously, open the beta forum and let people see how much we've been buzzing over this gem.

WHAT FORUM?

I merged the two threads from the beta board together and merged that new thread with this NDA lifted one.

This thread is super funny now.

It should be titled "AA- A Timeline of Suck".

You know, it's a shame. They went back and redid so much and it still turned out to be....meh. It just wasn't meant to be I suppose.

The real tragedy is that no publisher in their right mind will fund a car combat game now, so even a single player Car Wars/Autoduel game is probably a pipe dream. That fucking sucks.

Full Auto for the 360. Car combat just won't appear on PCs now. It's till alive and well on consoles.

Consoles aren't real games.

What were we to do on your feet again?

Place comfortable shoes on them?

Is that what the kids are calling it these days?

Without going into details I can't talk about anyway, I know of 2 auto-racing/combat games in development for PC's, as well as 2 more in early design stages. Yah yah, I agree, "show us the money", but one of them if it makes it out of design is going to be quite interesting!

Is the first word in the title "Interstate" and is it followed by a number? How about the phrase "Mutant League" - is that mentioned anywhere?

I need something to look forward to.

The design doc needs to look like this-

Car Wars

Step 2. Place camera INSIDE car. Make me feel like I am driving.

They should replace the graphic of the car with a Holly Hobbie Oven, and Call it Oven Wars.  At least then if someone caught you playing your could say because you were baked.

The more I think about it, the more pissed I am. Car Wars is such a natural for computer gaming. The car design is reasonably complex, and could be made far more so by different grades of components unlockable by skill gains (ala Eve). Have an online proggressive MMOG side, and an arena/deathmatch side where folks could design cars and fight them.

I'm taking notes!

Racing Destruction Set

If you nail Car Wars the way I see it in my mind's eye, you are welcome to my first born, or any extraneous organs you may need down the road.



Great game. I was a dumb kid when it was out, so I had a pirated version. I wish now that I would have supported it with my wallet, but that wasn't possible at the time. 

BTW, I'm not saying I'm "taking notes" for anything myself or GG is working on, but I may pass along some info to those working on various designs.

Or hell, maybe I will throw a prototype together and see if it's workable!

I really want to have something good to say about this game.

But the best thing I can say is, "Well, maybe there's a fun part that I didn't see during the brief period that I tried playing it."

It's biggest problem the one time I played it was that it appeared to consist of driving around in circles trying to keep your target on the moving and small pixels that were your enemy. It had nothing to do with the levels, or the character design or anything. The mechanics were refried monkey ass bad.

If that one bit hasn't changed since the revamp, nothing else they changed will mean shit.

I played to L7, L5, L5 as the combat character in each faction over the weekend.

The turret will auto-track the currently selected target, or just mostly aim forward if nothing is selected.

The forward gun just shoots in a foward arc.

I found against most non-vehicle mobs, the best tactic is to get the group barely withing in the forward arc, start shooting, then back up, turning to keep the majority in the arc.  Then hit TAB to pick one out to concentrate the turret on.  As long as your in range the turret will hit it. 

But I found the most critical part was not tactics, but finding the right armor and guns.  Then fighting enemies (even +3 levels) that basically could not damage you.   For fun at L3 I found some good armor, parked my car in a spawn point, taped down the fire key, and went to each lunch and watch some footbal.  I came back 2 hrs later, a level up with a ton of cash and equipment spread around the car.

Maybe the game will ship with a roll of Limited Edition Scotch-brand leveling macros.

Bless you!  Now if you could just get SJG to sign off on the project.  Ever since Fallout fell through the cracks I've thought that SJ regretted his stances on "violence" and "gore".

Well so much for 'Weekend in the wastelands'....

I was 'fortunate' enough to get a Euro invite to this, downloaded the client and installed it Friday night, then found out the patching was going to take 6 hours (60MB download to a 6GB installed game) fine, I left it running and went to bed (I'll accept that I could have installed it earlier but you never know when your going to find a game that wont let you patch unless you have a valid account...)

Saturday morning I get up, click play and immediately get a 'this program has performed and illegal operation and will be shut down'-type message. I do a quick search of the knowledgebase, see its not supported on XP64 and reboot to my XP32 build

and get exactly the same problem (sidenote, they said the same about Guildwars and I have no issues with that under XP64 - interestingly when I went to use its uninstaller under XP32 it told me I had to uninstall it from XP64...... so its not supported under XP64 but knows when its been installed on it....)

So I hit the forums, nice big sticky thread with 'what to do if it crashes' (or similar) as the title, go through the suggestions, delete the odd file here and there, repatch and...... get exactly the same problem.

So I stick a post on there forums with the full crash log XP wants to send to Microsoft (lol!) and even go so far as to install my new graphics card (kept putting that off) because my old one was just outside the min. spec.

48 hours later about 50 people have read my post, not a single reply, the weekend event is over and I uninstall the large waste of 6GB

Beta [stress] test or advertising stunt? Have to say this is my first bad experience with NCSoft stuff

-edits-
Typos and details

Six Gigs?  What takes up all that space, are the maps that big or do they have a couple dozen hours worth of car revving mp3s?

This is shipping? lol

I imagine it's all the decals you can stick on top of your car's chassis... eventually.

I'm glad I haven't redownloaded this game.

Yup given the brain damaged AI on creatures driving around backwards is/was the best tactic for taking those out. They were supposedly going to be adding rear-facing weapons but I stopped playing after I tried the "revamp" and realized it was just a revamp of the world rather than the gameplay so I don't know if they added those in yet.

I really don't understand.

The game tested, they realized that people were unhappy with the gameplay, they recognized that and delayed to improve the gameplay - then didn't change the gameplay at all?

Huh?

My belief is that NetDevil is simply in way over their heads -- they just don't have the talent and experience to pull this off.

When I first joined the closed beta warning bells immediately started going off when I saw the extremely limited testing schedule (two days a week and only a few hours on those days). Matrix Online had the same extremely limited testing schedule when I joined that closed "beta" and we all know how that game turned out. While there's nothing wrong with having server stability issues during development so that they can't run 24/7 don't call it beta then. If you are that far behind in your schedule that you can't keep your servers up for even 8 hours a day just suck it up and delay the product (which NetDevil/NCSoft eventually did but it's not going to help).

The next serious problem I ran into was the incredibly poor graphics engine they were using for all the towns and cities. It was like they hired some kid right out of school to write the engine the performance was so bad. Then of course you had the ridiculous looking animations while running and jumping around in town (when the graphics lag allowed you to).

And then on top of all that you had the uninspired gameplay which other than the destructive elements was just a graft of traditional fantasy RPG gameplay onto a bland post apocalyptic setting, though granted things do feel faster paced since you are "driving" around in a car. At least MxO tried to be somewhat innovative in their mechanics rather than just copying your typical fantasy MMO, but AA doesn't even make an attempt.

So the revamp didn't actually change the gameplay because they simply don't know how to change it to make it better.

Edit: broke things up into multiple paragraphs

I was told by Scott Brown that the reason for the limited testing schedule was to maximize the number of concurrent players. Internally they had a world up 24/7 or close to it but for the outside testers they wanted a system where they could have as many people as possible testing at the same time and a limited schedule was the best way to ensure that.

I wish they would have taken the other approach- make a fun, compelling game and you won't have to worry about concurrent players.

That's all well and good if server stability was the only thing that needed to be tested but that was certainly not the case way back when and is still not the case now where they still have a limited testing schedule (though the playtest sessions have finally as of two weeks ago been expanded to 24 hours there's still only two a week). And there are other ways of increasing the number of concurrent users without having such a restrictive testing schedule including letting in more beta testers and having special stress test events.

More beta testers is such the obvious answer to keeping player count high. Any other excuse is an evasion (or denial?) of the fact that if they invited 100,000 people in the beta, 1/10th would be playing after 20 hours /played.

This should be a 32 v 32 team multiplayer game.

4/13/2006 is the release date EB and Gamestop is using.

All I can say is.... :lol:

My god.

I can't imagine 1/10th of the people making it to 5 hours /played.  I don't think I even made it to 1 full hour.

But youknowearlybetamaybeitsbetternowblahblah.  I'm not a fan of the genre, but I really wanted this game to kick ass.

I'm going to enter into a self-enforced NDA, barring myself from talking about Auto Assault.

Therefore:  :nda:

I was hoping this game would be fun, too... but, well... you know... it wasn't.

I guess I am glad this game never interested me at all.

If anyone wants to get beta access PA had a banner this morning that might get you in for a weekend.

SUFFER FOR YOUR HOBBY!

And a random guy sums it up.

http://boards.autoassault.com/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=86484&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=&fpart=1#86484

Note the tenor of most of the posts on the board. I think any chance of reasonable change is gone, gone, gone.

Cool link!


Were you naughty?

From the thread-


Obviously all the anti-psychotic drugs this guy needs are cutting into his gaming budget.


I seriously do not understand how anyone could love that game. It is just so fucking mindless and boring. It takes all kinds I guess...

I WANT to love it. I want to so desperately. I like the world. Graphics aren't bad. CARS WITH GUNS! I fire it up once in a blue moon (been in beta for a pretty long while) and I can't play more than fifteen minutes because. it's. just. so. boring.

I don't think I've ever had my heart broken quite as much by a game. Meh... that way lies rehashing of this thread.

I tried it with a USB Xbox 360 controller, and it was a little more fun, but still only for a couple of hours.  This could actually be part of their cunning, "casual friendly gameplay" strategy.  Unlike WoW, which I used to spend anywhere from 8-14 hours a day, Auto Assault may allow me to have a life.

My own opinion only, not speaking for the company, not even speaking for the coworkers who have also played AA.

I played the PA weekend. It was... okay. Not unexpectedly thrilling like I found City of Heroes, not personally offensive like I found Guild Wars. Just kind of meh (except for the towns, where controls and animations reeked of a rush job). It didn't engage me at any point, I never got immersed in playing. That said, I put in a preorder.

If AA doesn't sell, pointy-headed morons in marketing departments all over the gaming industry will point at it and say, "See? Non-fantasy MMGs don't sell! We need to make EQ XXIV!"

I'm sick to fucking death of fantasy MMGs. I hate them enough to risk $50 on Auto Assault. It's like the last election, when I didn't vote for Kerry, but voted against Bush. The game would have had to offend me in order to stop that preorder, and it didn't do that. I'll give them a month or two to sort things out.

That's absurdly idealistic. I love it!

I'm not dead set against buying it. I might. I might not. What I've discovered is that as these games get more solo/casual friendly I'm more apt to treat them like I would any other game since I don't have to be on every hour of the day to keep up. That's how they SHOULD be treated, ideally.

As such, I keep two subscriptions. The first is to WoW which I still enjoy with the exception of some design flaws. When I get frustrated with those design flaws or just need a change of pace I play something else. It was EQ2 until it made me barf, now it's CoV with a little Guild Wars thrown in as of yesterday. It might very well be Auto Assault if I think they realize they're too deep in the development cycle to turn things around but recognize their mistakes for another day.

I wonder how NCSoft is going to react though. It's not going to do very well and they've not had a flop yet. I like NCSoft because whether I like one of their individual games or not they're willing to take chances on different things. I hope it doesn't make them gunshy.

Screw the pointy-headed morons. If they can't see that it's only the bad implementation that didn't sell, and miss ALL of us wishing it were a good implementation, well, capitalism will take care of them and they'll be behind failed fantasy mmo #43397. The important data is how many people have built up interest in AA to be completely let down...leaving a chasm filled with subscription dollars. The thing pointy-headed morons are supposed to locate and mine...

I was playing it with a wireless gamepad, the results weren't exactly what I'd call fun. Quirky at best. But then, Planetside isn't very good with a gamepad, either, and that game has great gameplay.

It isn't that good.  Weapon balance has always screwed the game.

Weapon balance is a lame critique of PS. Play the "overpowered" faction and shut the hell up. I played TR. Yes, they "felt" weaker but that only made it more fun to play TR. Nothing better than killing those jackhammer assholes with a boomer or thumper.

Is it just me, or was the linked post great, while the following posts were moronic?

I would go flame them if I had the energy. Skiing does that I guess.  :wink:

That was sort of my point. If a good critique is subsequently drowned out by a deluge of BEST GAME EVER MADE then the devs don't get to hear what they desperately need to hear.

What I liked was that all the AA lovers couldn't explain why he was wrong, instead they said things like:  "I would bother to tell you why everything you said is wrong, but obviously you wont care so I'm not going to bother" or even better "that can be fixed after launch, for now they need to focus on the bugs" welcome to MMO's newblet what you see in beta is what you get.  If anything it gets worse (more people = more bugs/lag/problems).

This game is so bad, how could anyone possibly say it's good.  I'm sure all those people just don't know about the colour green.

Yes, yes, yes, thank you.

Oh, I agree. That's why I said the gameplay was great, not the game. The game has some huge flaws and the dev team isn't so hot.

I fucking hate jackspammers and refuse to play NC. I really do hate them, take that weapon out and the game instantly gets much better.

So pretty much every MMOG beta board, ever?

By the time the games get into late betas, the fanbois have a stranglehold on dev ears and it's too late to change game-fucking flaws in the design anyway. Auto Assault is a turd, and no, the money men with no clue about gaming will think it tanked because it wasn't fantasy.

Very few people seem to realize that sucking on a fundamental level transcends genre considerations every time.

it just struck me as different because even the fanbois were tepid in their praise. Like someone above posted. "Yeah, well. It's pretty good. And, uh... that's all."

I expect rabid defense from the fans not some lukewarm semi-praise.

And they don't have to change it that goddamnedmuch to sell me on it. Make it so I don't feel like I'm moving in mud. Make it handle more like a normal racer; they've already tweaked it once. Make crafting not retarded because the underlying ideas behind it are decent. Make towns... okay, not much they can do about the towns. Different missions. An auction house. Something! Anything!

Instead it's not even that bad it's just resoundingly mediocre. I'd prefer it to be eye bleedingly awful like L2. At least then I could work up a string of fun swear words or something.

I can think of at least one non-fantasy MMO that is doing well.  The marketeers saying this are not in touch with the market.

If you wanted to screw the Fantasy Establishment, there are non-shitty games you could have subbed to.

General consensus says that the money hats who run the Dev labor camps that churn out The Next Big ThingTM believe that Sci-fi MMO's are not what people want.  People want elves, with boobies, throw in a dragon and shiney armor/swords, a dash of generic spells (fireball!) and viola!

There are a great deal of people for which that is true, I wont pretend to understand them but I acknowledge their existence.

The problem with many Sci-fi titles, is that they try to make it into DnD with guns.  That definitely seems to be the problem with AA, the same old EQ-clone systems shoehorned into the brilliant concept of cars+guns.

Which is why I'm really, really hoping Huxley is good and succeeds.

Garriott is giving sci-fi a shot with Tabula Rasa. If he fails, then sci-fi MMOGs are dead for a long time.

Mmm...Gamma World. Or Star Frontiers?

I'd like to see Huxley be good, but it's way too soon to care, and chances say it'll suck. This is forward-looking information, of course.

I want a MMG called Strange Tales or something similar, set in the late 1700s to very early 1900s, focusing on an atmosphere of stories like Sherlock Holmes, Jekyl/Hyde, Invisible Man, Poe, Lovecraft, Frankenstein, you get the picture.  Even Brotherhood of the Wolf, toned down a bit, would be good source material for this.  Archaic, creepy, weird science surrounded by an occult atmosphere.  And hell, set it in London.

(Did I just ask for a League  of Extraordinary Gentlemen MMG?)

I really want an interesting world, but I've come to accept that fact that an interesting world won't have enough dings to make people interested. I think there's a better chance of seeing small scale stuff sooner. Like the persistant UT2k4 RPG mod but full game packages like that. I'd actually prefer this. The ability to set up a server on f13 and only have friends playing appeals a lot more to me than just playing any MMOG.

Awww... you're so cute when you have hope. 

soooo.... If I just got into the euro beta, its not even worth the time to DL it?

Well it depends on how much you value the ability to bitch from a position of authority I suppose.

I didn't like it at all so I would say don't bother.  However, there seems to be people on that forum who think it's wonderful.  I have to say, I've seen more negative opinions on gaming boards than positive.

weeeelll... I guess that could be said about most of the currently-under-development mmorpgs atm..)

Yeah, so what do you do?  I suppose your only reasonable option is to download it, check it out and come back here and say, "Signe was right.  Why do I ever doubt her.  And she's ever so cute, too."  To which I'll blush and giggle inanely.   (http://smiley.onegreatguy.net/yay2.gif)

I'm still willing to defend the position that the fantasy genre is inherently better suited to MMORPG's. The obvious one
is that it allows "magic" and "magical monsters" which gives amazing flexibility as to what the world can contain. A game
that wants to have a realistic sci-fi foundation has to be more realistic in what is possible. Fantasy also involves slow
travel, which allows for a smaller more intimate world.

However the main one is that fantasy is inherently team based. The idea of fragile casters, defensive healers, offensive
melee and plater armored tanks forms a functional gestalt group. In too many high tech environments the optimum
functional unit is solo (pilot, guy with a sniper rifle). Even if you're in a squad like in counterstrike the level of interaction
between members is still low.

Science Fiction is primarily fantasy anyhow, even when it's chock full of "hard science" like a Greg Bear novel. There are as many implausible ideas in a typical Sci-Fi potboiller as there are in "Swords And Sorcery" fantasy books. The biggest problem that comes from the accepted "Fantasy" genre is that the most popular form is something called "High Fantasy" which involves one or more heroes who have a destiny. That doesn't translate well to an MMOG where its not practical to give every player the feeling that they are the central axis of the story.

Yeah, but as people are wont to quote, any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.  Take your fireball spell, rename it "napalm launcher,"  and poof, you're done.  It's science.  And monsters = aliens.


Okay, but I don't think that's inherently because fantasy games encourage teamwork, I think it's because games that require teamwork have been (mostly) fantasy based, which is the problem people are griping about.  There's no reason you -couldn't- do a sci-fi game that had characters of different specialties and so on.  Even if you have trouble justifying why Bob can get shot ten times as often as Frank without dying, you can take it to the level of vehicles (to bring this back to Auto Assault for a second) and say that certain types of vehicles (let's call them, oh, say, "tanks") have a lot of armor, and other vehicles can repair their allies somehow (like that truck from Spy Hunter), and other vehicles have bigger guns, and you'd have an almost identical party mechanic to EQ/WoW/et al (if that's what you're after).

Steampunk MMOG please.

(Or Planescape)

I wouldn't mind a Steampunk MMO at all... with some really weird crafting, too.

I'd sell my mother into slavery for a Planescape MMOG. And not a half-assed NWN thing, either.

Agreed, could a developer please speak to Frank Chadwick and sort out a Space 1889 (http://www.heliograph.com/space1889/) MMOG setting?

I hope someone makes a Planescape or Steampunk MMO and it sucks beyond belief so I can stop hearing about how much you people want these things.

No one is forcing you to read our shitey wibble, are they?

Euro beta for me this week-end. Downloaded the 5Gigs just before the week-end.
Played 2 hours.
Going to uninstall it to get some hard disk space back :)

Signe was right.  Why do I ever doubt her.  And she's ever so cute, too.

d

Oh you....  (http://smiley.onegreatguy.net/blush.gif)

Pfft, saddup, you know you want it too, Shockeypoo.

Entirely unrelated to everything said previously, I just uninstalled the beta software from my computer.

It freed around 8 GB.

I hope the game isn't that bloated when it ships...

Wait, what beta software? Oh yeah, that. It seems so long ago. You're not writing a Steampunk game by any chance are you Stormwaltz?

Nope. Mass Effect.

That's still a year off, there's plenty of time to turn it into a steampunk game.

There's no rush, they could just patch the steampunk in after release.

On a related note, did anyone notice the idea for Steampunk Transformers ?

It looks amazingly ass.

Steampunk is the most overused genre buzzword on the fucking internet. In the history of gaming, tv, books, and movies there's been maybe 25-30 things that actually were steampunk. I, too, have been a victim of overusing the word without noticing. Granted I've said it less than 10 times in 10,000 posts so if someone says it 1 time in less than 1,000 posts - they're more evil than me. Or sommat.

I can only think of a grand total of one steampunk game that's ever really existed that was truly in every sense of the word: Final Fantasy VI. The other Final Fantasy games had trappings that could be considered steampunk but it'd be a stretch to call them as such. And FFVII wasn't necessarily based in "the past." And stuff based in the near future doesn't suddenly become steampunk 100 years from now. Actually I can think of one other one, that I didn't actually play. Arcanum of Steamworks and Magic Obscura.

While I can think of a massive number of books that could arguably called steampunk, there's only a tiny handful of stuff I'd actually call such - Gibson comes to mind obviously.

It's such an underused genre with an overzealous fanbase that hasn't actually played or read anything steampunk - or maybe they've just seen a couple anime like Last Exile or Steamboy maybe they saw the movie Casshern (which wasn't Steampunk but people often call it such). I think there's a valid market for a steampunk game, just because it's a cool word and people will latch on to that. They won't even refer to it by it's real name. They might as well call the MMOG steampunk.

There's positively nothing even POSSIBLY steampunk about Mass Effect. Bioware couldn't patch Steampunk into a single one of their games.

While I may be mistaken, Grenado Espada could shape up to be steampunk...y (though, I fear it will just be victorian with really nice looking weapons and dresses - which is still ok). Steampunk is not an easy genre and it'll take a masterful mind to not completely fuck it up. More often than not, that sort of High Technology is only available in limited amounts to the people and the more powerful groups/governments are the ones that are all crazy with it.

One thing I'd like to call Steampunk, but it isn't, is Shadowhearts 2. While they never quite made it out of the Victorian era, it's still 1945ish and just because there's stuff running on steam in the game, it's not steampunk. The following things are essential to a steampunk setting:

1. It pretty much needs to be based in an alternate Victorian Era and the years have to be roundabouts 1800-1900.
2. It can be an alternate earth or reality, but much of the setting needs to be comparable to what we'd expect. In other words, the incredibly abstracted world of FFVI fits the bill. But the much more reasonable "The Difference Engine" by Gibson fits the bill to a T.
3. Science and technology is far more advanced than it was during our own Victorian era.
4. Shit is steam powered.

Basically, the word steampunk is a total misnomer. When most people say they want something that is steampunk based, they really want futurepunk (which, I'll admit, is a word I've basically invented) or dystopian or even sometimes just fantasy dressed in technology.

What it all boils down to is Steampunk is very well defined and an unlikely setting. Personally, I'd be all over a steampunk MMOG like white on rice. The invention possibilities are endless. It's a world where you can just make up science all willy nilly. Unfortunately given the total lack of anything steampunk in the grand scheme of things, I'm not expecting much. Cyberpunk is simply much more reasonable. While a dystopian game (a la Digital Devil Saga 2 or, *hackwheeze* Aeon Flux) is even LESS likely. Of the 4 genres mentioned, one of which I completely fabricated from my brain, Futurepunk is the most likely.

Here, let me define it. Ready?

Fantasy or Sci-Fi set in the future that really wants to be dystopian, cyberpunk, or even sometimes Steampunk - but miserably fails. Like Neocron or Deus Ex 2.

It is yet to be seen whether or not Steambot Chronicles for the PS2 will be remotely Steampunk, but here's to hoping. Also, games trying to be steampunk need to stop using the word steam in the title.

-------------fastforward 15 minutes-------->
I decided to try and find a list of stuff, Wikipedia has it. I'm just going to go through the games list (since it's compiled by the internet and therefore WRONG) and pick out the most steampunky games on the list. Ones that actually FIT the bill (unlike things someone just thought was neat and had high technology like World of Warcraft and Nightmare Creatures and motherfucking Septerra Core). Just because something has a steam powered object in it doesn't mean it's steampunk. Christ. Anyway, the list...

Baten Kaitos (I can see someone argue this)
Arcanum (previously mentioned)
Darkwatch (Ok, I can buy that, I don't know when the game was actually supposed to be set, but that's reasonable)
Final Fantasy VI (they try to tribute it to FFIX also, but, I don't know, that's something of a stretch compared to VI)
Sakura Wars (interesting call on somebody's part)
Steamband (go go text based steampunk)

The rest are quite a stretch, imo.

Alright, I think I've taken this converastion too seriously for the last 30 minutes or so. Considering the 5 posts before me were essentially one setence a piece.

Edit: By the way, this post was merely to inform those who look at the word and wonder, wtf? Because I'm sure that's a common thing. Most of the people I know would instantly equate it with cyberpunk and think of it as a dystopian future with steam powered technology. Also, I felt like ranting a bit.

↑↑↑  Well, that should kill this thread.  ↑↑↑

So, anyway, like I was saying, has anyone seen the proposed Steampunk Transformers ?  It looks ass.

You mean transformers as in toys?  I've googled but I don't think I'm getting the right results.  Everything I've found looks like ass but none of them look like transformers.

Oh look, schild is being clever and defining a genre label for us again. For his next trick he'll point out why there shouldn't be a musical genre label called gothic and why it should really be called "gits who wear black clothes and shades at night".

Folks have pretty much decided that steampunk includes the works of Moorcock, Jeter, et. al. and that the genre has expanded beyond Victorian settings. It's kind of too bad if you don't like that and have sand in your vagina about it, because that's what people are going to use. Language is fluid, and doesn't stay fixed on the definition schild has decided upon. It's highly unreasonable, I know.

So, Stormwaltz, if you could change Mass Effect into future-based steampunk just to piss schild off, that would be good too. Make sure you have the label steampunk proudly displayed.

Yea I know, it's cool when genres change after they're created. Hell, why not, Mario's steampunk too, how else could those pipes possibly work? I mean we don't even have that technology yet. Oh, and Mega Man X? Definately steam punk. Sure, it's 20XX but that Elephant boss runs on steam. How could I not see this before.


I agree. It'd be cool. I'd be so pissed off I'd play it.

Edit: Here Righ, straight from wikipedia -


I fail to see the problem with my definition. Or even my examples. Did you disagree with the examples or did I just not include enough for you? Did I touch your authors in a bad place?

Nope. I was pushing and prodding because the genre label is an issue for you - the very mention of steampunk riled you up to post an essay on what you though ought to be included under that label. You could call "my authors" wankflabtards for all I care. No matter what you think steampunk is, if the common concensus goes against you, you're pissing in the wind if you try and uphold an alternate definition.

I just posted the "common definition" while it would have been easier than writing the essay, it pretty much covered most of what I just said. I'm not trying to uphold an alternate definition but rather The definition.

Here's Urbandictionaries definition if you're looking for a more fluid response:


Still don't see "future steampunk" listed anywhere.

I don't see the punk in Steampunk.

My favorite steamtech setting: the Thief franchise. Never got far enough in Arcanum to appreciate it.

Steampunk settings are generally counterculture to what the historical setting would be. They're an alternative place. Punk is a rather apt description of it. Though, it was no doubt chosen because it sounds cooler than possible alternatives.

It called steamPUNK because they were riffing off of the cyberPUNK genre.  The same gritty realism and crazy tech but not in the far future, instead it's in the past, steam age.  What if steam power still ruled the world kind of thing.

So it's not just a world where someone forgot to create the internal combustion engine?

Is WOW steampunk?

No idea if WoW qualifies as steam punk but http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Difference_Engine is the first thing I ever recal reading (other than Jules Verne) that was different enough and coherent enough to be a subgenre.  If you look at who wrote it you can see why it got the 'punk' tag attached to it.

The first book that I read which could be reasonably called steampunk would have been "The Warlord of the Air" by Michael Moorcock.

WoW certainly has steampunk elements in it (steam tanks, clockwork devices, etc.), many of which are "borrowed" from WH (which borrowed them from other places) but I don't consider the setting itself steampunk since magic is still the predominant "technology" in the game. Ebberon is another setting similar to WoW in that it has steampunk elements but it's not a full-blown steampunk world.

If you didn't play Arcanum...you didn't miss much.

You take that back! Right now!


On a different note whatever happened to Dragon Age? I'm not getting a 360 any time soon, so that's the sp rpg I'm waiting for

It's coming along. I'm content to let BioWare take as much time as they wish. I haven't had a good PC RPG in a long time.

I NEED MY FIX.

Future steampunk really makes no sense. It's the future and things run on steam? The future is less advanced than the present is today? What makes it the future exactly?

It is obviously after Skynet fucks everything up, silly.

There's plenty of evidence to suggest that there have been cycles involving regression in history, not just one linear progression from savagery to science. Then of course, this being fiction, one could always use such startling ideas as post-apocalypse, alternate histories, parallel universes, time travel, and so forth. No matter how unpalatable you feel that Victoriana set in the future may be, it has already been done successfully.

But that's the future in name only. It's like fantasy books were the world is basically destroyed and magic takes over from technology again. If the future is just like the past calling it the future is just an excersize in nomenclature, it has no real meaning.

You really are a tediously literal cuss aren't you?

I do have something good to say about the AA beta.

The uninstall program didn't erase my hard drive.

Careful, you'll end up being grief-titled with words like that.

Alkiera

I disagree with you there, here's a stupid example.

In the future, the technology the relied on for all the ease/comfort of modern day life fails somehow.  Humanity is tossed into a dark ages, cue magic or something resembling it reappearing for whatever reason.  Now you have a world where there are still the shells of old cities and small pockets of working technology but for the most part they have had to replace it with steam or whatever they can manage to maintain.  Easily you can tie the whole future thing into the storyline, with machine cults looking to revive the old tech while other factions seek to maintain the current balance of power, for the good of themselves or the planet or whatever.

This is totally different from the past with more technology, wouldn't you say?

Better yet, if you can stomach anime go watch some of Scrapped Princess its not a great show but it is solid and gives a fairly decent example of what I'm trying to describe.  It is set in the future but the world looks like the past, with bits of the future strewn about and not fully understood by the masses.  I wouldn't exactly call it steampunk but it still illustrates the difference between the two scenarios decently.

Obviously, Nemesis has taken over the world.

(http://glazius.tripod.com/FakeNem.jpg)

Yes, that's a giant brass battlesuit with a boiler backpack.

--GF

They're currently pimping out their extended playtest. That's right, folks, the servers are going to be up for an amazing 48 HOURS STRAIGHT!

Jesus, they're what? Two months from expected release?

Their datacenter will probably smell like melted plastic from all of the exertion.

Heh. Though to cut them some slack if they can keep them up for 24 hours between reboots that should be good enough to launch with. EVE has daily reboots and it has been doing fine.

If anyone is still interested in this game and they have a Fileplanet account, they can do the beta.

Better yet go watch Thundarr the Barbarian
ARIEL, OOKLA RIDE!

I got a mail recently granting m 24/7 access to the test servers instead of being limited to just the testing times . I  am assuming that every beta tester got one- my testing feedback consisted of < 1 hour of play time, a few posts on the beta boards, and incessant bitching here.

The hot new thing is that Biomeks are levelling at an absurdly fast rate (some went from 20 to the new cap of 40 in one day) while Mutants level at a crawl which would make a Korean 24/7 internet cafe dewd proud. The meks scream "cry more n00b, grind a little while themutants cry nerf.

Interestingly the game looks and feels alot better with this last build than ever before. It's like some magical threshold was crossed and it because stable with a nice interface. I don't think the worst problem with this game is going to be stability or anything technical. Rather, I think these guys have no fucking clue about pacing, class balance and the like.

20 to 40 in one day? Is there some exploit or something?

Nope. There are that many more Biomek quests and they give that much more experience. Some people, in their rush to defend NetDevil, bring up that alot of companies like to see people get to the level cap. That's not much solace for the people playing Mutants, who are apparently the complete and total polar opposite.

Now it may be that ND doesn't want levels to be some massive cockblock and their level cap to be like GUild Wars': not the end of the game and easily attainable. That doesn't explain the gross discrepancy between levelling rates. Given that release is in April by all accounts this is a BIG problem.

I'll give them some props, though. The game is playing smooth as a whistle on my system with this last build and I don't have a screaming rig by any means. They shrunk down the tac arcs on the guns which means I'm not just opening up on fifty mobs at once and decimating them. If they make crafting something less like reading Braille at 20 feet and fix the above issues they might have something worth playing for a couple months; it still wouldn't be something I could play super long term but most games, frankly, aren't. I don't have much confidence they can get those issues sorted this late in the game, though.

Stability was never the problem for the user. The game sucking more cock than a pr0n star was the problem.

It always ran like shit on my mid range system. It doesn't now so, yeah... it was a bit of a problem for me. The game's gone from MY EYES to Meh...ooooooo an ER game! in short order. It could become pleasantly middling by release.

This isn't sounding like a ringing endorsement, is it?

Sounds like The Avatar of Meh.

I thought that was in DDO?

Still curious about the network related user impressions  :nda:

how's lag/latency/warpage?

Lag etc used to feel bad to me but doesn't now. Towns are still a little clunky but at least they slowed down how fast your avatar was moving and turning. You don't feel like you're speed skating anymore.

I've never rubber-banded - huge positive.  A spike of latency or packetloss can cause enemies to 'pop' inside your visibility radius, you can also take an attack or two of adamge without seeing the mob attack you.  Both of these things get worse the faster you are going, but are infrequent enough for me on a cable connection to not be an irritation.  I've never come close to being killed by lag of any kind.

My first experience with AA was last night (8 - 11pm EST), I haven't made it out of the newbie area (humans) but network issues were non-existant.  Good job for a Saturday night, there were lots of 'tards zipping around and I didn't notice any problems in that area.

Some other initial thoughts.

Kill Frenzy (Is that what it was called?)  Excellent idea, needs more cowbell.  Really rock that thing, flashing lights, combo counters, bells, whistles and try and work it into more situations, can't really do it (at the newb level anyway) against vehicles.

Badges are fun, take more hints from games like GTA and the other racing stuff, i.e. more exp for crazy jumps, there is no reason you shouldn't get a badge for doing a 720 in mid-air and landing it.  Heck, it's a car game - embrace the racing and stunt jumping aspects.  Random tracks in the middle of nowhere that track top 10 times or jumps with top distance and 'style' points listed for top 10 (100?) would be fun (screw the fourth wall).

Which brings me to handling, maybe it's just that I was driving a newb car for the 'tank' class but car driving physics could really be tighter, a better sense of acceleration, handling, etc...  Couldn't really spin out, donuts were meh, no feeling of 'punching it', catching air even seemed anti-climactic.  I'll try a different race/class combo and let you know if I see any difference, of course it could be that I was in a newb car too but this aspect of the game needs to be very tight and very fun from the beginning.  It's a car game and people are going to expect car game feel.

The newb area - grey and brown?  I know it's post apocalypse land but seriously you want people to make it out of the newbie areas right?  Not put them to sleep?  Just saying, color is good - don't think it has an impact?  Log into EQ2 and go between Qeynos (colors) and freeport (brown) BIG difference and most people will tell you that its because Freeport is too dreary.  I hope your whole game doesn't have this problem but seriously redo the newb areas a little so that they are more inviting.

Give me a better reason to be fighting.  A good way to do this would have the newb areas be a small city showing the 'promised life' that we are trying to protect, school children playing in playgrounds, normal people going to work, starbucks, etc...  Some emotional investment other then Murder, Death, Kill - remember even Mad Max was ultimately fighting to protect the small bits of community left.  Something more than a mention in passing anyway.

And certainly not least:

Get rid of the part in the voice over where the narrator talks about the 'Final Solution.'  Invoking Godwins law in the first 5 minutes of your game?  Gimmie a break.  Unless I am killing Nazi's don't go there, especially not to tell me my team are the instigators of that crap, fuck that.

Agree with you on making it shinier and more obvious.. nice thing for it though is that if you group, every kill by everyone in the group ounts towards everyone's bonus... which can make it get huge if a group of people roll into and start flattening a base.

Whoops!

Noob areas:
The noob Biomek area is also pretty meh as it feels like a fantasy steampunk mine. I was pretty turned off by the game until I got past that part. The crappy mutant alien crab monsters (who look like they got lost on their way into Asheron's Call) persist though. Where are the mutant bunnies and cows?

Car Customization:
The customization seems dumbed down (like it was much more at some point and they removed it?). You a have standard number of "RPG" style item slots which is all fine and good but then you have a bunch of cosmetic add ons like bars and spoilers which do nothing. Wouldn't it have been better if the cosmetic add ons actually did something like give +1 armor or +1 speed or some such to mod the handling of the car? The car customizer looks good but the car paperdoll sucks. I don't get it. They have better graphics on the website in Flash than they do in the game.

Interface:
The interface felt pretty amateurish. It's no PipBoy5000 I can tell you that. It didn't seem polished and the default size was horrible. It looked much better once I shrunk it down to as small as it could get. The map system looks good compared to the rest of it. The "health", "power", and "exp" is immersion breaking. The least they could have done was use a little green vehicle graphic that turns red as you take damage (re: Planetside).

The other interface boxes feel cluttered and confusing. Why are the medals so small? And when I earn a medal why isn't there a big fanfare and a large picture of the medal splashed on the screen? The least they could do would be to make it scriptable in Python or somesuch ala WoW.

Why do I have to sit on a vehicle pad and watch it say +35 HPs over and over to "heal"? Couldn't it be a garage or at least a robot arm that fixes my car? Immersion breaking. Way to make it feel like I'm playing an RPG w/ a car facade.

Gameplay:
Targeting for the turret with the mouse is a bitch. The cars I tried stop on a dime. The different handling on different terrain is neat. I kept getting collision detection error dialogs in the noob area. The car I upgraded to is a dune buggy and keeps flipping over like a bad SUV every time it nicks some bad world geometry.

The destroyable world objects are awesome. You can collect crafting material by destroying everything you can find in your path (trees, signs, rusted cars, fences, etc). Ramming damage is neat. There was no death penalty other than the time it takes to heal up (20 seconds) and get back to where you were at which is nice.

The "camps" of mutant crabs are pretty lame as they just sit there. Most of the other enemies drive around and fight other factions (and you). The freeways are a bustle of activity with NPC car wars going on 24/7.

It's fun just driving around blowing shit up and feels a lot like Mad Max in that regard. The last mission I did was to run through this snaking canyon full of baddies in 180 seconds or whatever it was (fun). But the mission before and after that is to kill a boss tank with a bazillion hit points (unfun).

PvP:
The arena combat interface was clunky (nothing like Random Arenas in Guild Wars). I had 10 minutes to kill the other guy as many times as possible which usually consisting of us both getting tired of running and then blasting each other at point blank until one of us died. The arena had a "heal" jump which was rather lame as it lets you get to full heath again whenever you want. It looks like there is a central shared leveling area or battleground where the 3 races will have to fight it out. And they also mentioned "Base Attack" battles ala CoH/CoV.

Towns & Characters:
Towns also feel amateurish and have no soul. It is your standard lifeless MMORPG vending machine town. It's no Fallout or Wasteland as there aren't even any names I recognized (like Vegas, Needles, etc). They should have licenced the whole character creation/graphics package from Cryptic Studios (they're both NCSoft) and just dropped it in for the characters. I didn't read a single mission dialog box so far.

Overall:
I got to level 10 over the weekend and for the most part it feels like WoW which I suppose is good if they want to sell boxes but I felt cockblocked at every turn. Every time I turned around there was some weapon or mod that had a level limit or class limit on it. The name and color schemes of the different enemies felt cockblocky. If I killed something really high level (by running someone over for example) all I received was the regular experience for something of my own level.

And while it was fun it still felt grindy. Around level 9 the grind really started kicking me in the face. By level 10 I've run out of missions to progress it seems without grinding exp to be of the right level to complete the current mission. Did I mention I'm sick of the fucking level based cockblocks already?

It's a half fantasy half post apoc theme park with cars and vending machines in the same vein as WoW.


Bottom line:
Fix the sucky interface, less cockblocks, and polish in more post apoc elements so it doesn't feel like a fantasy RPG with cars and dirty textures.

Nice write-up, its too bad that we're way to far down the path to release for them to fix those things.  Oh and the fact that they overlooked something as simple as the robot arm and sparks versus +35hp when your repairing your car just proves they are  too stupid to make a good game.


learn2dev newbs

I nominate this for the frontpage, if somebody can come up with a witty title.

Auto Assault Assaults An Asshole

Remember kids: always avoid alliteration.

Did they add that recently?  When I tried it a couple months ago you could not flip your car no matter what, except for those super long zone-length jumps, and only if you landed on a slope.  Even then it just righted itself.

That was one of my complaints.  It was like playing any other driving game in 'god mode'.  Only way to take damage was to get shot at.  You could drive into a concrete wall at 85 mph with 0 damage.  I always wondered how bullets fired from little pistols had more energy to cause damage than a wall at 85mph.

I have no idea. I only got the invite maybe 12 days ago. The original noob car was pretty difficult to flip. I expect the vehicle to flip if I'm driving like a maniac but this was overkill.

It really is too bad because they have about 50% of a good game going on but the other 50% of it keeps kicking you in the teeth for no reason.

Exactly. There's half the game that makes me want to like it so, so much even if it's not the most polished thing. Then the grind kicks in and the not enough quests and the dumb quests and the stupid arena PvP and the crafting which is almost oh so cool but then ends up not making any sense... le sigh.

Try it before it's too late and you have to pay for it to try it!  (brought to you by  IT  (https://secure.plaync.com/cgi-bin/free_trial.pl?partner=7))

I got that offer about ten minutes ago.

Cars games never held much interest for me and unless something has changed from everything else said in this thread, I shall accept that you are still right before taking the effort to download it.

Even if I hadn't been in this beta briefly, I probably wouldn't be that interested, either, for one of the same reasons I'm not keen on EVE.  I like looking at how cute I am in games.  It's a nice contrast to the mirror. 

Damn those mirrors.

Uh oh, this does not sound good.

Its sort of Diablo IIish in effect, what it means though is that they can drop LOTS of loot because statistics is going to keep the really good stuff few and far between.

That worked great in AC2.

I kind of like how it works here.  When your in a bit of a scrum and killing stuff left and right it's not uncommon to pick up 9 or 10 things in quick succession.  After the fun dies down a bit you go sort through the random drops and see if anything worthwhile is in there.  The better stuff for your level seems to come 'broken' though and you either need to go fix it or try and find someone who can before you can equip it.  My best loot though has all been the mission earned stuff.

I am still a newb though and not even to level 10 yet so YMMV later on.  I have also been studiously avoiding the boards this time and have absolutely no idea whats coming or what I am doing in the bigger scheme of things.

Translation:  "Holy crap, we've completely failed to make an interesting game at all.  Quickly, lets try to get people (schild) to play the 'zomg wtf, u have 2 by 'dis bcause it not teh fantazy!1!!  if u don by 'dis, der will b m0r w0w clone!1!1 zomg LOLOLOLOL!11' card."

EDIT:  Signe didn't like my nested quotes.

Stupid Signe.  What the hell is she talking about?  She hated that game!

Hey I just wanted to source you for the original quote.  After all the quoted material was being quoted from your post.  Honesty in reporting.

I got a press release this morning:


Consider this game DOA.

You can be pretty in Eve.

(http://img131.imageshack.us/img131/8061/1760293134oo.th.jpg) (http://img131.imageshack.us/my.php?image=1760293134oo.jpg)

See!

In-game advertising is one of my hot-buttons, second only to Starforce. Sadly, I'll be cancelling my preorder. It really does bother me that much. I have no objection to AO-style implementation, where you get a free account if you look at the advertisements. Expecting me to pay a premium subscription and look at ads? No, I don't think so.

I was mildly curious before.. now. Heh, saves me a download.

Yea, just saw this over at Gamasutra (http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=8504).

Storm, do you know for sure this isn't a replacement for the monthly fee requirement? I only ask out of curiosity. I never intended on buying AA, and haven't even logged in for months.

I have to agree.  The last thing I want is adverts in my games... isn't that the reason many of us use DVR?  I really hope this isn't successful.  If it is, everyone will be doing it.

I posted this in response to this exact topic elsewhere, but rather than attempt to retype and reword, here are my thoughts on the matter, because it has the potential to be a good or bad thing, based on perspective and bias.

I'm not fond of seeing advertisements when I am already paying for a service either, but look at the other possibilities here:

1. Banner or No Banner plans for players. Remember the days of free web hosting WITH a banner ad displayed on your pages? Pay us monthly and the ad goes away. That's one possible use for this type of advertising in these games. Free account types to draw more players and still generate some sort of revenue by ads served.

2. Free game entirely supported by ad revenue. Is it possible?

I'm not so sure, but I know that Anarchy Online has been extending their free play of the original game with no expansions for what, two years now? The original offer was to have been available only for a year and I created an account to screw around with since I no longer subscribed at the time. I am still not subscribed and can play classic AO. Granted, once a month, I get an offer to upgrade to the expansions for like 9.95 (with small print telling me that I will then have to begin paying a monthly fee), but I have not received any notice that my free account will die any time soon. Now I know that I see ads in-game in AO on billboards. I'm not sure if paying customers see the same thing, but if not, then this proves that my example #1 can work. How to implement it well is another discussion.

But taking this a step further, could FunCom put ads in for everyone and stop charging a monthly fee? Are the bandwidth and hardware costs such that the ad revenue would support them? Is ad revenue a shaky proposition because of the tenable nature of maintaining the advertisers on a month to month basis (see dot com bubble burst)? If ad revenue could support a MMOGs monthly costs, could a company remain solvent and still generate expansions for the game? And could those expansions be funded by box/online sales revenue? Looking to games like Guild Wars and Warcraft 2/3, it is apparent that expansion box sales pay for the costs of development, so it appears that this sort of MMOG implementation could work.

Taking this back to AA, why would they do this? Well, to me, it appears that NCSoft is hedging their bets. Based upon rather bad word of mouth about the game in its current state and the timeframe in which it has to reach release status, NCSoft might think they have a dud on their hands. So what do they do to prevent money loss on it? In-game ads. Why not? If AO can do it and turn over a little extra revenue with "free" accounts, then it can't be all bad. I've seen very little in the way of complaints about in-game ads (although I've yet to see them attempted in a medieval world ;). If AA bombs, at least they've got some additional revenue coming in to maintain the game and make it right or at least keep it solvent and perhaps build the playerbase over time as they correct all the problems and add the fun. But those are just my thoughts on it. Hell, if it bombs hard enough, NCSoft would be positioned to do the free account deal a la AO and still be able to maintain the game with no further development. Going free still looks better than closing the doors to the game (see Turbine and AC2 and the mistrust of gamers of Turbine with the Tolkien universe).

That's all I want to see.  "Welcome to Molten Core brought to you by Pampers.  Forget the sock."

This at most will be successful in a Uwe Boll kind of way.  Everyone will hate it.  It'll be done in the most distasteful manner possible. It'll be mostly ridiculed while touted as a success by Netdevil.  In the end, it makes money, and humanity is worse off for it.

I'm really hoping this game goes down in flames faster than a Chris O'Donnell sitcom airing at 7pm Friday on Fox.

 :cthulu:

Ha, I almost fell out of my chair!  Congratulations!

You hit the nail on the head. In the end , it makes money. Vive la capitalism!

And as to how the game will do, didn't NetDevil also make JumpGate? Where is that these days? Sure it exists, but whether or not it was a success is arguable... you get the idea. Ads and NCSoft are going to be all that will save the game at this point in time. That's why NCSoft did it. They don't want to have a piiece of vapor in their online gaming line-up, nor do they want any massive "close the doors" failures to tarnish said line-up.

Are we sure this game isn't the result of some bet between billionaires as to who could produce the worst game and get get people to subscribe to it? EVERY step along the way NetDevil has made what I consider the wrong choice. Their consistency is amazing.

Ingame advertising only pisses people off who are used to a time before them, probably similar to TV and Radio commercials.

Personally, I see as one possible harbringer of this the focus more on sci-fi and real-world theme titles. No matter how one spins it, advertisement in a medieval-fantasy game just doesn't work for the players. But also, of course, the genre is dominated by fantasy titles. So with the eventual rise of other environments can come more appropriate territory for advertising.

Whether I like it or not is irrelevant, but I will say I don't mind it in those games where it adds to immersion. If I see Coca Cola ads in GTA or AA, fine. It makes sense. I'd personally rather see Coke ads than "generic drink I've never heard about". That's why I didn't hate the use of McDonald's advertising (and others) in the movie Fifth Element (though if you watch it on FX, you notice they cut the scenes with McDonald's and covered any surface that had the logo on it), or Taco Bell from Demolition Man. Light hearted use to create believable connections to the current world.

When it violates my immersion though, then I don't like it.

You might be on to something there.

Once you drop the subscription fee, we can talk about other payment models.

I saw nothing to suggest that in the press release. If that is the case, I would be much less offended by the decision, and opt-out through subscription if I could. I get deluged in enough advertising over the course of the day. I don't care to see it in my games as well.


Yes, the cable TV argument. I don't buy it. Or rather, I buy my way out of it. I can understand the need to generate a revenue stream for a "live" product, to continue funding development. My opinion is that in the case of MMGs, that's what we pay monthly subscription fees for. Subscription + ads rankles me.

The advertising revenue being able to fund things on the Internet burst for a lot of reasons, but mostly because the advertisers themselves finally realized that just having someone see your ad wasn't enough. They actually wanted someone to CLICK the ad, and then they wanted that person to convert to a paying customer. In short, they wanted results, and most of the places they were advertising on just plain couldn't deliver; all they could deliver was eyeballs on the ad. Shit, TV does that and has established metrics. The Net ads could provide the eyeballs AND they could provide the metrics about where the customer went at every step of the process and where they bailed out or continued on. So podunk sites that specialized in drawing eyeballs (re: portals) failed because the advertisers actually wanted to see results and the podunk's results showed all they did was bring viewers not customers.

Ad revenue in games is a good thing, so long as the ads are done right. But they won't fund a game all by themselves. And there are more effective ways of having ads in medieval fantasy games than billboards that don't belong or other stupid shit like /pizza. Those annoying ass logo screens when you first launch a game could easily be used as ads, patcher screens could deliver ads, hell the client could direct the user's web browser to the advertiser's web site once the client was exited. All of which is annoying without being immersion-destroying.

is there any published evidence (market research) that proves that in-game advertising actually works?  I mean, stuff like Doubleclick/Ominture tags being tracked and some actual click-through revenues published?  Or is this more just bad business-type-A thinking?  I don't understand companies that spaghetti test things like this otherwise.

I don't know about any market research, but Massive was at a game marketing conference last week talking about it.  And there is another upcoming conference dedicated specifically to advertising in games.  Maybe we could get lucky and Massive will get a noob cab driver and stay lost for the whole week.

I must be an anomaly.  Seeing people named Legolaz or XxxxRumpRangahxxx tends to violate my immersion more than seeing a banner ad for Nike shoes. 

If in-game advertising provides me with a fun game that's properly maintained and relatively bug-free, then I'll happily quaff Diet Pepsi heal potions while eating a Big Mac for stamina.

I didn't really notice static "billboard" objects in AutoAssault. When you exit AutoAssault they dump you to their website where you rate the experience between 1 and 10.

Planetside shows full motion video ads w/ sound for TV shows and movie trailers in the empire home base areas. The ads in the combat areas that I've seen so far have been limited to animated images only without sound. Most of the ads also seem to be for Sony properties like the Station Pass, Sony movies, other Sony games, etc. Bullet hole sprites don't stick to the ads.

EVE has a floating billboard ad at every jumpgate but so far the ad is only for ingame lore based stuff.

Branding advertising (vs. direct response) is up ~20% over last year. (http://dev.clk4.com/pubfiles/MKT10307D_PUBSURVEY06.pdf)

From: http://boards.autoassault.com/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=109587&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=&fpart=1#109587


Sounds more like "we need to do this to get the rights to use their copyrighted ads in our game on rusted out old billboards that you can blow up."  If that is truly, and solely[/u[] the case, then I don't have a problem with it.  Theres a crapload of half-blownup, rusted and aged billboards in game.. for stuff and places that are changed 'just enough' from the real locations or products they advertise.   Meanwhile the terrain in game is practically modeled from topograpic maps of real world locations (start a mutant character and tell me the tutorial location isn't Boulder Canyon, NV and Hoover Dam) .. I'd have no problem at all with it being a Coca-cola billboard I jsut blew up by the side of the road, instead of a soundslikecoca-cola one.

Andy Warhol is probably rolling in his grave.

I think it's too new, relatively speaking. Games aren't really considered "serious" places in which to advertise, at least insofar as serious advertisers are concerned. I think part of the problem is that while games can be hyped into hundreds of thousands in sales, there's such a high churn rate that attention is lost rather quickly. Further, games themselves have not really been taken seriously as an industry until rather recently, and mostly because of negativity.

Heck, it's only really been in the last few years where the product placement's been such big business in televison.

Ingame advertising is sorta more analagous to Product Placement than the Banner Ads that Haemish references as part of the dot.com bust. I mean, sure, you could click a banner ingame and be launched into a browser window, but the act of doing so is even less likely to happen than clicking a banner ad. What remains though is something Banner Ads could never do:

Provide relevance.

Ingame Advertising isn't about billboards. It's about using a Browning 9mm gun instead of just a 9mm, drinking Coke instead of Generic_Powerup_00 or driving a Ferrair instead of some car stylers wet dream. Games, like TVs and Movies, can all use product placement to link properties to protagonists to objectives to plot. It's not easy of course, but that's where I think the promise is for those who think there's promise.

Most of advertising is really just getting the product name out there and keeping it out there. The message really isn't nearly as important most of the time. Look at beer - every beer ad by every beer company is basically the same. There is no message at all.

Your message matters if you are doing something like selling a database to a fortune 500 company. For consumer products name recognition is all that's important. So I would guess in-game product placement works fine.

I'm like Stormwaltz and hate in-game advertising. I also hate Internet advertising in general with a passion and go to great lengths to disable that sort of stuff. Which is ironic since I worked at an early competitor to DoubleClick back in the day.

For those of you who haven't seen the Massive system in action here are some screenshots (http://psforums.station.sony.com/ps/board/message?board.id=psdiscussion&message.id=660283) from PlanetSide. Fortunately it was easy enough to disable the ads in game though I expect that to get more difficult in the future if it isn't already.

In game advertising in an MMO with technology like Massive's goes far far beyond a banner ad or even product placement. With a system like Massive's the advertiser can tell *exactly* who looked at the ad, for how long, which parts of the ad they looked at, and from what angle. In other words unless you lied in your Account profile and pay only by time cards advertisers can know your name, age (or date of birth), sex, where you live and whatever other personal information you filled in and tie that into the ads you looked at. It's a fucking advertiser's wet dream. Now I don't know if Massive's system is currently tied to personal account info but it can obviously easily be done and the other technology aspects (info about how the ads were viewed) are already in place and being used (it's something Massive likes to brag about to their advertising partners).

Ya know, if everyone hated internet advertising, the internet would fall apart. Half of the companies and websites you like - they'd cease to exist. It's high time everyone learned to fucking deal with it. If I like a website, I'll go decent lengths to click on any ads they might have, even if they're terribly annoying. The same will eventually go with games. And when everything goes to RMT, I'll set aside $15 a month to pay for my gaming in that game.

It's just how things have to be.

Horse puckey. Nothing has to be any one way, so long as the game gets enough to keep going. Warcry.com offers an ad-free subscription service on their network. AO offers ad-supported free subscriptions. That's the way things should be.

To be blunt, if your MMG can't be profitable collecting $15 a month per subscriber, your business model needs a reality check somewhere.

RMT is the future. It really, really is. It may be far off, but it's inevitable. Client is free. Playing is free. Uberness is not free. It's a fantastic way to do things. Buy tokens in a shop, use those tokens in game. But everyone still sees the ads. You know what, I'm OK with that. I pay taxes for nice clean roads, but there are still billboards that I find hideous that don't even cater to me. But it makes sense that they're there. If I'm spending 1-8 hours in a game, I'd expect ads in some places. Sure, there should be a set of rules, no ads should appear on main quest routes, in quest instances, etc. But for the most part, Developers should work hand in hand with people who want to advertise to make the ads blend in cleverly. It'd be more effective.

As for websites...Yes, the alternative is to pay to get RID of ads. That's fantastic. And supports my entire point. Instead of clicking on an ad once a month and them getting .10c. You're paying them $15 to not see it. In other words you're paying them 150x what they'd get from you seeing the ad. I'd rather click the ad. I don't see why anyone would not click the ad. Advertisements apparently touched people in the wrong place at some point.

As for websites that let you punch a donkey for a free PS3 (Blues news started doing those). That's just weak fucking sauce.

At the end of the day, it's not about "profit" it's about providing the best game experience and total package available. If advertising money gets me more content per year, or an extra skilled quest writer, or another expansion pack every 2 years, it's worth SUFFERING THROUGH. I think the real problem is that people just let it bother them. Fuck, it's really not that goddamn bad.

Edit: I mean dev controlled RMT btw, think Gunbound or Gunz, etc. Not IGE.

The problem I have with clicking on web ads is the whole slew of java/adware/spyware bollocks you probably just invited in to your PC for milk and cookies

If advertisers had some integrity (yeah right!) maybe people wouldnt be so anti-adverts (what I'm basically saying is the bloodsucking marketing types have brought this on themselves)

Personally I have Javascript set to prompt - sure it bugs the piss out of me every page but at least the machine stays clean

I dont have a problem with in game ads if they are done correctly, Matrix Online, Neocron and Anarchy Online did them well, Planetside did not. Unfortunately this kinda comes down to the games settings, I just cant see adverts working in a fantasy settings regardless of how well they are done

"Hail barkeep, how many silver pieces for your finest wanta fanta?"

Bad analogy.  Billboards are on private property off of the public right of way.  In MMO terms they are on the fansites.

That's it right there. We don't know really. But there are people who have gotten in trouble for doing this sort of thing without full disclosure to the consumer, so we'd basically have to know if they're doing anything more than the average banner ad is doing (which measures click throughs, stickiness, and other things you know about).

Micropayments are the future. RMTing connotes the sort of unlocked uberness of weapon or armor purchases. Micropayments meanwhile are more abstract. It's the difference between EQ2's Exchange Enabled servers and everyone being able to buy an Adventure Pack.

RMTing is not the future because of this. While the industry makes a lot of money, it's not making that from a lot of people (much like MMOs actually). And true growth comes from more people, because there's only so much you can leech from a limited quantity of contributors.

But in general, I do agree with you that people just need to deal. I couldn't care any less about banner ads or those popup/under things or the highlighted hypertext at 1up or anything. I really find it amazing what pisses people off. There's an entire category of stuff I don't have the time to be bothered by. Advertising is one of them.

I'll assume that if the adverts in MMOs are too subtle, people won't notice them.  If they're not subtle enough not to notice, they'll probably annoy me.  Why can't they just put their adverts on their website... even in the forums?  I have clicked on adverts on websites if they are hawking something I might be interested in and sometimes to support a site I enjoy, like here.   I expect adverts on websites.  I can also avoid websites.  Maybe adverts in a game such as CoH or AA wouldn't bother me quite as much as one in WoW or EQ2 because of the game's environment... billboards and newspapers would look ok and my mind could deal with it.  You know, however, if it's a success of any sort that other games will give it a go.  I think my head would assplode if I was questing my way through Stormhold Keep and saw a Big Mac adverts scribbled on the wall. 

And Stormwaltz is right.. I already pay for my MMO... will I have to pay extra to avoid commercial interludes?  Or will I even have a choice?  Can I buy Tivo for my game?

(please add assplode and Tivo to the demented spell checker)

AA may achieve that nirvana of in-game advertising: see dilapidated Coke billboard, shoot dilapidated Coke billboard and ram the remains, scoop up shinies. Halfway across the world, another dilapidated Coke billboard spawns silently just beyond sight range, and the cycle continues.

This of course assumes companies are willing to see age-worn versions of their advertisements and allow players to blast the hell out of them.

--Pollyanna, er, GF

Yes. Hell. Fucking. Yes.

RMT is a stopgap measure. Ad sales for game developers are not going to be about improving the game, they are about IMPROVING PROFITABILITY. Collecting that money for in-game ads has fuckall to do with making a better game, it has to do with making a game more profitable.

RMT is one option for a non-subscription MMOG, or a profit center for a subscription MMOG. I don't think either RMT or in-game ads will do shit for removing the subscription fee for NEW MMOG's. AO's free thing? That was after the game was creaking with age. You probably won't see an ad-supported non-subscription MMOG. And we still don't know if the Guild Wars model is profitable.

But a micro-payment, per-use thing? THAT could be the sweet spot. Hell, DDO is tailor-made for that type of thing, and if DDO had gone that route, I might have been all over it. As it was, I couldn't pay $15/month for what was offered.

I agree.  If I could pay Turbine $15 to run a single character to level ten, I think I'd be in there now.  D&D is about the character, not the world, really.  If I wanted to do all of DDO again with a cleric instead of a magic user, another $15... or whatever price.  $10 might be better, but you get my point I hope.  A new module comes out and I can either pay full price to reroll and play the whole game, or pay maybe 33% of full and have an unretired hero do the new content.

This system would also allow a way to remove the "do a dungeon more than once" thing.  It would also allow a system wherin Turbine could release a module for a particular level range and people would be able to roll a, say, new level 7 and do the module.  Just like the PnP game.  This speculation is probably all from The Great Toothless One, but anyone at Turbine can feel free to print this out and pin it on their cube wall.

If that could be done through an out-licensing arrangement, where the module developer got a cut based on the people who bought the module and could support the hosting/bandwidth/service with that money, then I think it could work.

As it is though, MMOs have significant costs for both the recurring game stuff and the people who maintain it. Except maybe for Blizzard, I don't know of any developer or publisher rolling in gobs of unspent cash from their MMO(s). It's because they're fulltime jobs for the full life of the game, from Alpha to shutdown. Nobody has a metric yet to say how long an MMO should stay live, so everyone still assumes perpetuity.

That's perpetual game stuff and people to maintain it. And that means long term budgets, scalable assessments, and all the normal rigors of any established company. The best way to ensure there's money to be distributed is to lock people into a rolling fee.

It's hard to mess with the formula.

But I think it will be messed. The value of $14.99/mo is becoming more and more questionable as the cost to justify it continues to increase. $14.99 brought a lot more content and wholesale game design changes to EQ2 than $14.99 brought to WoW, and yet EQ2 maybe has with the best of estimates 5% of the players WoW has, and therefore pulls in 5% of the money.

Micropayments would benefit SOE more. This is one reason I think they keep chasing the strategy. It can also benefit others though because nobody else is Blizzard.

Micropayments, RMT - call it whatever you want. They denote the exact same thing. Using real money to buy content. I sure as shit didn't mean RMT through IGE was the future.

Isn't DDO mostly instanced?  GuildWars?  Bueller?

Our company had all those demographics for 1.5 million users during the bubble and nobody wanted them. They just wanted to blow out as many ads as possible. Even now for the most part there isn't huge demand for those kinds of demographics. Context sensitive "if you like this then you might like this" is more important to advertisers right now than full demographics in my opinion.

I dunno, most of my good stuff came from drops, playing as a BioMek Agent.  The quest stuff was generally not as good, in my experience.

As for the broken items, and the crafting system in general...  Garbage.  Absolute garbage.  I never managed to craft anything, as I never found any items that only required a skill of 1.  Everything that was broken either required skill > 1, or a tier2 skill, which requires you have a previous skill over 50 or so.  Terrible.  From what I could figure out, crafting consists of the following steps:
1) Find trainer, buy first point in crafting skill of choice.
2) Find broken item with skill requirement of 1(good luck).
3) Collect crap.  This is the easy part, crap drops off everything.
4) Refine crap to the level required by the item in question.  Low level stuff seemed to only require one level of refinement.
5) Go to repair place, and repair item.  Hope to $DEITY_OF_CHOICE you manage to memorize the item in the process.
6) Gain a skill point?(Never got this far, this is kinda assumed.  No idea how it handles skillgain vs difficulty)
7) If you memorized the item(base 55% chance, if it was a simple item) Go to 5, or maybe 3, and grind up skill on the memorized item.  Otherwise, go to 2.

The hardest part, from my experience as a biomek from 1-5, was step 2.

Alkiera

There are skill trainer thingies now that you can buy for like 1 clink from certain vendors.  Once you have the skill memmed go to town on grinding it.  My problem with it is finding all the little odds and ends you need for the combines.

And the announcement all of you have been eagerly awaiting (drum roll please):

Auto Assault has gone gold (http://www.plaync.com/about/2006/03/ncsoftas_auto_a.html)

In stores April 13th.

I've enjoyed my time in Auto Assaults beta, as much as I've enjoyed most of the betas I've been in (which is almost all of them) and I think that they have a profitable game on thier hands. I think maybe that it is to much of an MMOG and relies too much on MMOG constructs like leveling, hitpoint, armor class and spells.  I would have prefered cool cars with guns driving really fast, which it almost is - it just doesn't quite get there for me.   There is nothing there to make me tell someone not to play it but I'm not going to be picking it up at retail.

Ditched my pre-order for GW:F.  Not that NCSoft cares...

It's in no way ready to go live. The experience is still fucked with different advancement for different factions, it's bloated, crafting is still mind boggling and pointless, still no need for a group. I had such high hopes. Another also ran.

Waitasecond.  This game is called "Auto assault".

And there's memming skills?  Jesus christ, talk about devs being stuck in predetermined mindsets.  I haven't played the game, and from what I hear it's decently fun, but that kind of unimagination on the part of a dev team would make me extra wary to pick up the game - the same spidey sense that's steered me clear from RF Online despite quite a few interesting features.


Maybe it's just me, but I've never judged whether or not to play an MMO based on subscription cost; I'm not particularly moneyed, but  15 dollars a month for anything that provides more than 5-10 hours of good entertainment is fine in my book.

A game like DDO, of all the MMOs out there, I would think would have people the least concerned about subscription costs.  It's structured in such a way that if you set it down for six months and come back later, the world hasn't really shifted under your feet; so why wouldn't someone who's concerned there's not enough content simply subscribe until they beat everything, unsub, come back a few months later when there's more content, and sub for a month again to play the new stuff, plus any oldies-but-goodies they missed?

The whole "I'm not willing to sub because I'm worried about the rate of content creation" reasoning seems like a vestige of Dikus hence rather than a reasoned response to the current crop of pick-up-and-put-down friendly games.

Given I couldnt even get this bloody game to run on my PC (either my XP32 or 64 build - same issue) and that _no one_ on theofficial forums seemed to give a damn I'll wait until there either a downloadable trial or this thing hits the bargain bin

My short review:
It's a medicore game - a weak 4/10 in single player game standard. There is just no way in hell rationalize paying 15 bucks per month for it. No fucking way.

To list few things:
-UI sucks A LOT:
It's even more ugly than SW:EaW. For God's sake - if you're going to permanently waste 15% of screen with some stupid bitmap, you could at last add some shadows! All pop up windos are unmovable, and they shows up in worst place (like over chat interface, which is worst chat interface have ever seen!) with map being worst - it pops in middle , taking 90% of you seeing space. After 6 months of bug reports, begging, whining, and threating the autostacking of inventory items is still not working (you can have like thousand items into stash, and you have to stack everything BY HAND).
-physics are NOT THERE:
All damage is modeled over level difference. Two examples: You can run over and splash lv1 pedestrian, but colliding with exactly the same, but lv20 pedestrian will make your 4 tonnes car speeding over160 km/h bounce back or go flying. you can demolish buildings, and trees, but it's still about damage. running into stuff will slow youdwn by ~50%, but shooting into it will demolish everything. Even if everything is huge house and you're shooting with sub-machine gun turret (aka pea shooter). The game also bear record for worst use of rag-doll physics - AA devs use it only for corpses, whose whole purpose is to make you stuck if you drive into them. Of course, there is no environmental damage - you can run into cliff with over ~500 mph and you won't get a single scratch. Regarding jumping - earlier in beta cars felt like mine train soldered to the ground, now you get the impression that you're driving a huge, helium filled balloon.
-everything combat is totally level dependant:
It doesn't mean a anything how you drive and aim - if you're going against high level mob, even if it's a huge truck and you're firing at it from one meter away, you will still get 70% of MISSES. Same goes for your defence - auto aiming npc turrets will hit you no matter how good driver you are, and your uber armor will let you absorb even most ridiculous amounts of damage.
-storyline is totally butchered:
When I got a a quest named "Dye another day IV", I just fucking crl+alt+del out of game. Yeah, that is what 99%l the quests looks like. they only differ by type/amount of creatures to kill and a fucking appendix. If you're curious, "dye(...)" quest ends at number 5. you get five quests and all they differ is a fucking number in a quest name. Not to mention, that all the quests are totally retarded per se, like "our outpost at xxx is having problems with thugz, go kill 6 thugz rollers to make outposts guys life's easier" Now, at firest glance, there is nothing wrong with it, however the fucking map have over 200 thugz rollers all the time. I could set up macro, and kill 1,000 of them within an hour, and they would still keep spawning just as I turn around. So how the fucking fuck is killing mere 6 of them going to accomplish anything?
-there are a lot of bugs/unbalances:
Crafting tree lacks certain skill, which makes it impossible to get half of it. Entire progress in the game is done by missions, but there are still several level long gaps in them (lv 23-26 gap would mean weeks or really painful grinding!)     

and there are more...

Maybe the card game (http://www.autoassaulttcg.com/) will be better?

Card game? That is... wow. Just wow.

Wow, this sounds so bad, I think I will give it a try.

Just so that I can say I played it at release. :-D

I see AA and DDO in the same kind of light:  developers trying to see how little they can offer and still charge a monthly fee. As such, I hope that both suffer disastrous failures, so that the answer from the players will be:  "More than this, please try again."   

I'm still trying to process the fact that they've got a card game tie in when the game itself doesn't work right.

I assume the cards are filled with typos and printed with game info on both sides.

Good point.  If you are trying to make a MMOG "on the cheap" you're better off making a single player game.

What the devs are offering is fun - the other stuff is just a means to an end.  DDO offers far more in the way of fun (IMHO) than AA.  Maybe it's just my econ background showing, but cost requirements for the devs (how much do they have to spend on servers, etc.) doesn't strike me as the determinant factor in an imperfect competition market (MMOs) for how much they charge for a game and how often.

I could imagine devs charging a monthly charge to play a completely singleplayer game - and if the game was fun enough, I'd pay it.

Some people may find DDO fun, but by many accounts the fun only lasts for around 20-30 days.  An odd subscription model.  Apparently players are expected to stick around waiting for more content, but Turbine has been less than clear about what players can expect.  And this approach - where a team releases a game with a bare minimum of content and then strings players along on the hope of something to do?  Yeah, it needs to fail.

I would not.  I'm not ready to abandon the concept of software ownership in favor of an open-ended cost structure, just because it meets some arbitrary fun threshold.  Life is not just about having fun, its also about controlling the costs associated with that entertainment.

Correct me if I'm wrong - but is your basic argument that the MMO market's pioneers irrationally lowballed the price structure given what people were willing to play, and you want to make sure the asymmetrical nature of price pressure (If you go lower on price than the other guy, people will have to follow you, but if you go higher, they'll often stay where they are to get a comparative advantage) is maintained for as long as possible, to the consumer's benefit - a form of rent-seeking made possible by the imperfect competition in the market among a limited number of prominent MMO firms?

Sounds right to me - but then, it creates a tragedy of the commons effect.  We (MMO consumers) would all gain rent from following your lead and taking a unified stand as to which price structures are acceptable, to the detriment of the MMO companies.  However, as individuals our happiness would be maximized by simply playing what's fun when the costs are worth the fun provided, thus weakening your unified stance.

Your position seems analogous to ad-hoc collective bargaining - and that's not without merit, but it's difficult to make it work.

Are you writing a dissertation?  Because I'll need to be credited in there somewhere.  Call me Dr. Sexy, MDDO.

Nah, I talk like that in RL too, sometimes.  Plus liberal use of the term "goatfucker".

would you please stop using "-" that's my gimmick.

The AA card game has nothin' on the official AA 'explosion' ringtone.

at least their marketing team does the job :-D

Just in case Auto Assault's stellar gameplay was not enough to entice you to buy the game they are giving away spots in the Tabula Rasa closed beta to the first 200 people to subscribe after their free month has expired:

http://www.autoassault.com/community/promotion_01.html

In theory you can send in a postcard to enter the promotion but they don't say exactly how many postcards they will be drawing so my guess is it'll be just one.

Edit: fixed link

The Auto Assault Card Game is actually pretty cool. They're in open beta (http://www.autoassaulttcg.com/) if anyone wants to tool around.

That promotion link is broken.


They are getting a pretty good traffic spike from all the advertising they are doing (see chart (http://traffic.alexa.com/graph?w=379&h=216&r=1y&y=t&u=autoassault.com/&u=)). The Amazon sales rank seem kind of crappy for today (~#1000 for the standard and ~#2000 for the collectors) but that might be because they are all preorders still. For a comparison one of the DAOC boxes is at sales rank ~#256. AA is at #2 and #4 on Gamestop for sales today though.

AA also has a propaganda contest (saw it on BrokenToys). My entry (Boomtime (http://youtube.com/watch?v=fXpljh6Y2oA)) clocked in at way over the 60 second video limit. The entry I submitted is a stripped down version of Boomtime but YouTube hasn't approved that version of it yet. Suffice to say it didn't turn out all that great.

Whoops, sorry about that.

Hey look, a fanboy fellates it. (http://www.gamedaily.com/mmogames/review/?gameid=3042&page=1)

This is not going to go well. There were some immensely slobbery fan boys made all the worse because they tended to be of the older, pseudo-smart variety as opposed to the average Blizzboy. Already said my two bits on how it plays but it's alot easier for a developer to dismiss dewdspeak than falsely intellectual crap defenses of their crap.

I don't know exactly where I was leading with that except that this game is not going to be faring too well three months from now.

Sight, you fucking tit. Your first paragraph that is supposed to draw people into reading your review should not have such an obvious spelling error.

I was kind of curious as to why he capitalized wasteland but then I thought of something else.

Maybe he was wishing he was playing that instead of Auto Assault.

Unpossible. Wasteland was actually fun.

AA full court press (http://msnbc.msn.com/id/12248810/) which includes this mind boggling quote of the day:

How about instead of being determined to make new mistakes they just try not to make any mistakes?  Regardless they seem to have succeeded.

I like this one:

So who's going to buy this and give us a blow by blow account of release day server stability?

You?   :-)

You're funny today. Stop it.

Gaffer always did have a good sense of humor.

http://boards.autoassault.com/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=124511&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=&fpart=1#124511

I can't see how a public catass race in a game with repetitive, limited content could possibly lead to bitching and burnout two months from now, do you?

I actually liked Auto Assault more than Dungeons and Dragon Online.

Not giving either of them my money though.

I love this:


Does every single fucking "mainstream" story have to start with a description of the main subject of the story being portrayed as the actual participant in their MMOG fantasy? Do we have to hear about Harry MacCatass is an affable guy who slays dragons and fucks sheep every night after work?

If this is "real journalism," I can see why game journalism is a bastion of ass-thumbing twi'lek humpers.

What I really want to know is if I worked on a game for 4 1/2 years, would I find it more fun than if I was seeing it for the first time? How can anyone at NetDevil who considers himself a gamer think that Auto Assault is a great game?

If the developers are honest with themselves about it, then how can they stand to play it day after day? And if they aren;t playing it day after day, isn't that a big red flag that it sucks?

There are certainly parts of my job that suck, but there are other parts that are great. Things are balanced. I just cannot imgaine spending 4 years on the same project and then having to play it even though it isn't actually enjoyable.

If I had spent 4 + years on a project I would be totally blind to it's failures and utterly uninterested in it's successes.

That makes sense to me and probably explains a lot about MMOGs.

Amazingly enough, Auto Assault delivers some vintage fun, straight from the 8-bit era, but with a Diablo 2 flair.
And true to its 80s core, save for arenas that I couldn't test, it's basically a single player game with some marketable multiplayer online decoy functions.

I got it for free, of course, but I just made up my mind and I am giving it my money for some time.


--
the Falconeer

What am I missing?  Should I know why you got it for free?   :|  Are you, like, somebody?

Anyway, I got an early-ish beta spot but couldn't play it due to it being total rubbish.  That was early, though, so I dropped back in after it had been purtied up but still had that totall rubbish problem.  So... when did they fix the total rubbish bug?  Maybe it's not the game... maybe it's me... maybe it's my drivers.

Sorry, no. Forget that.
About the rubbish, it's still there. Most of it.
The game is far from polished.

It's just that it is fun. I find it enjoying in a retro kind of way, but with a slight layer of complexity (ie: crafting, tinkering, reverse engineering, random stats drops. I couldn't see that coming) that keeps it engaging. Especially for hyper quick destructive gaming sessions or some hours of optimistic storyline progression.

Far from me the idea of giving it a rating or hints of a positive review.
It's just that I played better games... without getting any fun from those.
Now, without a monthly fee it would be perfect.
Being a paying customer I expect them to justify the moneyleeching with promised arena-pvp-tournaments.

I know it's bad, dirty, and doesn't have a job...but dad... I am afraid I love him (it)...


--
the Falconeer


P.S: Hello, I am new here. Sorry for not introducing myself. I am Drew the Falconeer from an unknown location in southern Europe.

What?  Like this:(http://www.willforte.net/imgs/wp/thmb/Falconer800x600.jpg)

I didn't know that Falconeer's got free games as a matter of course, if I feed a pigeon in the park occasionally can I get a copy of tetris or something?

Of course he got it for free, moles don't need to buy copies of the games they are supposed to hype  :-).

The mole is in Italy or at least the proxy the mole is using is in Italy. Viklas.

Neg. Viklas, well, Viklas can make proper paragraphs.

And I asked to forget that :)
The point is just that I am a thief. I sneak into malls and get what I want claiming that Society stinks. It's Society's fault and Society made me what I am... just a 21st century schizoid man. There it goes my free Auto Assault copy.

That said, if I were a mole paid to talk high of AA I guess the F13 assignment would be my last one. /LFJ!

--
the Falconeer

This is what happens when we leave the door open. 

Seeing as how you list yourself as a communist on your ICQ profile I can believe both your story about stealing the game and that you have deluded yourself into thinking society is to blame for your actions.

Italians seem poorly represented on f13.

Italians were poorly represented in SW:G either. By which I mean, they were evil.

I'd argue Italians are poorly represented in Hollywood as well. (http://us.imdb.com/gallery/granitz/1933/Events/1933/Actordirec_Ausse_799236_400.jpg?path=pgallery&path_key=Benigni,%20Roberto)

Also, restaraunt chains. (http://www.olivegarden.com/)

As if the two were related in some way.

Italy is falling (http://www.italyisfalling.com/)

Looks like you are a believer.
Good for you. :)
Oh, don't forget to check my icq profile again when you'll be accepted in the beta of the most secret and coveted mmo around, called Irony Online.

I represent myself only, never mentioned Italy.
What do you represent, sir?

--
the Falconeer

Return of the double poster

Could you post in the SWG thread?  It's almost at 100 pages and the need a little push to get them over the top.

We have HRose -- isn't that enough?

I just played Auto Assault for the first time. While I'm going to post more thoughts int he weekly release thread, here's the first impression - Not As Bad As Anyone Said.

The game must have collision then for Schild to like it  :-P

Well, you collide with buildings and such. You can run into them to knock them down. You can straight up run over enemies to kill them. You can't collide with friendly units and such. But I suppose that makes sense. Griefing would be SO easy if you could.

I gotta play it more though.

Try running over small enemies that are higher level than you. From what I've read it's like hitting a brick wall which is sorta silly.

It's true.

It's not bad. It's probably good for 20-30 hours of entertainment. I just can't stomach the leveling.

The sales on Amazon still look crappy. It's still beating out Oblivion on Gamestop (@ #2 and #3). I wonder if you can buy your way into the best seller list on Gamestop?

No ads on Google for 'auto assault'. They don't have an affiliate program.

Yea, the leveling is pretty goddamn slow.

Not as bad as anyone said but just uninspired. And grindy.

Err, I was actually mostly positive, I just said it wasn't quite where it would need to be for me to pick it up after beta having already experienced it.

I also said I liked it more than DDO.

From the Apocalypse of Posterius chapter 1:

And the fanboys did look upon the game in sadness. The great seven tongued beast the NetDevil had wrought great disappointment unto the wider world as a throng of humanity chanted the holy syllable MEH loudly and in unison. One amongst the fanboys cryed up o the beast, "This is a word of mouth MMORPG so people will start flooding in as people recommend it to their friends." And Jesus wept.

Server pops are apparently way, way, way low. WAY low.

I guess I pre-ordered because the game arrived this weekend (from EBGames.) The sane part of me says return it, but I am going to let it ripen a bit before I decide either way. BTW, Planetside was fun this weekend.

Ditto.
Can we vote Planetside for Best MMORPG comeback of all time?

--
the Falconeer

I don't know. EQ2 had the best turnaround in my opinion. Looking back, comparing the launch game to now, I don't know how I ever put up with the original at all. The new "version" is much much better.

Doesn't AO win that award just by existing this far down the road from the absolute worst launch in the history of launches?

I can't decide if AO or WWIIOL was worse.

Sorry to re-derail, but what happened on PS that made it fun this weekend? Or rather, more fun than usual?

No. It's really not that good.

Nothing in particular. I just hadn't played in close to a year. They have a new feature (to me) where squads that are looking for members can be viewed in list form by players. Easy to find a squad that way. I just really enjoyed bombing the crap out of the VS from my Liberator for a few hours.

Well, after that 20h of entertaiment you will realise that new cool area is just a copy of what you already saw. Just a different shad3 of sand and little scaled up monsters.

Mmm. Sounds like a MMORPG.

--
the Falconeer

Not the 'Carmageddon Online' or Mad Max Online' people were hoping for then?............

Looks like I'll be grabbing it from the bargain discount kick-out bin earlier than expected!

How's the PvP?  Is it twitch, w/ no locking on?

You can lock on with your turret but you still have to stay in range,this also works for your specials.But you'll have to line up your front and rear guns as well as stay in range for them to have an effect.

Still have tank, priest and thief cars?

Yes. It is still retarded like that.

As long as my Mage-bike can fight Dragon-trucks for their gold carburetors.

That sounds Earth-and-beyond-ish... am I the only one to remember mage-spaceships and flying space-skulls?
That leads to another award.
Worst "major" mmorpg ever?

--
the Falconeer

No, though it's probably close. Horizons may be the worst. Or Asheron's Call 2.

I think we should wait for Vanguard before giving out the award.

And both of them lasted more than twice EnB.
I am not disagreeing here, just stating that EnB could be, at least, the MMORPG with the shortest lifespan ever.

--
the Falconeer

Worst major MMOG? I wouldn't consider Horizons a major MMOG. Everything about it was no name.

THE worst major MMOG? EQ. It fucked us all. Forever.

The only way to win is not to play, huh?  :-D

Don't hate the players. Hate the games.

I'm definately hating the games.

But I also hate the players. It works out well. Winback 2 comes out this Wed. I don't think I'm keyed (or whatthefuckever) for a raid with my paladin. So, good stuff.

Awesome reference :)

--
the Falconeer

At lunch today I walked to a bunch of stores and there were still old boxes of AC2 on some of the shelves.  If anyone buys them they're going to be pretty pissed off when they get home.  That must make for some awkward/amusing help desk calls.

Veteran Rewards! (http://www.autoassault.com/gameinfo/vetawards.html)


The last part is not worded correctly -- you don't have to buy a "6 month sub" to get the Gold reward -- you just need to have been subscribed for 6 months (e.g. six 1 month subs works fine, same applies to Silver reward).

Am I the only one who finds it odd they're handing out 'Veterans rewards' for a game that's been out maybe a month at most?

No you are not.

Ok, that's depressing.

Burnout device for six months ain't kidding...

Everything about this game is sad, I had high hopes for it but the second I heard tank/rogue/healer cars I went to the bathroom, threw up, and tried to forget I had ever heard about it.

Limp-dick-EQ-cloning-interesting-world-ruining-pricks, enjoy explaining this flop to your investors.

Waaaiitasec, rogue cars?  Like with stealth and shit?  Now that's cool.  Tell me more.

Ok, let's make it clearer.

Auto Assault is just Diablo 2 with Cars.
Just as dumb (and fun) as that.
The devs specifically admitted they wanted to recreate the Diablo feeling. Especially loot-wise.

If this makes for a good product or not, it's up to you to decide.
I love it.

--
the Falconeer

I am not satisfied with my previous post, but instead of editing it I'll add something.

I DON'T think Auto Assault is a good product. Too many unpolished, unfinished, underdeveloped aspects.
I just enjoy it a lot.
As I said it's vintage fun for me, as MAME or any other emulation kind of fun. But with a hint of modernity that injects the addiction factor.

I think the Devs accomplished their mission: to deliver an old school videogame based on an old school setting with old school mechanics. As I already said, It would be the PERFECT mindless fun for me if it weren't for the monthly fee (as, go figure, Diablo and Diablo 2). As it stands, I think it is as short lived as many other single player action games out there.


--
the Falconeer

These are just cleverly-worded "power-for-cash" schemes.  Really no different than officially-sanctioned RMT.

I just finished localising a flash banner ad for the game. I feel dirty.

"... It may be just the inovation massivly multiplayer games needed." Game Informer

"... a breath of fresh air in a genre that just doesn't need any more magic swords." Gamespy

"... an incredibly promising, polished and wonderfully different MMO." 1up.com

 :-o Heh. Press rocks.

Diablo2 is infinitely deeper than Auto Assault. It's painful to me each time you compare the two.

I sincerely respect your point of view, but would love to know more about it.
Deeper, like how?

--
the Falconeer

Making cars fit the same tank/healer/rogue/mage archtypes of other shitty MMOG's was just the first of many, many mistakes with this game. Not subtly ripping off the old Car Wars game is another.

Fuck, you could have ripped off Twisted Metal and been more interesting.

I want to hear more about these Rogue Cars.  Stealthy stealth?

If Mel Gibson had designed and coded the fucking thing it would have probably been more interesting.

AUTO PASSION! NOW WITH MORE BLOOD! JETS OF BLOOD!

How many viable templates does the D2 Necromancer class have? The number is around 8.

What can you do in autoassault aside from shake your head in shame at the lack of physics and actual control of the cars? I'd be ashamed to have worked on it. Like Haemish said, but a step further. If it was HALF the game Twisted Metal was, it would be a great mmo to play.

Honest question 1: do you know how many templates, for example, does the Human Engineer class have in AA?

Honest question 2: Was Diablo "infinitely deeper" because one of the 5 classes, the Necromancer, had 8 templates compared to the yet unknown viable templates of one of the 12 classes of AA?

--
the Falconeer

Yes totally :)
You become transparent (a la EQ2) to yourself, but completely invisible to everyone else (groupmates too, save for a green party arrow above your car).
It last about 30 seconds if I remember correctly, and you move as slow as my son's RC car without batteries.
Actually, stealth is technologically way more "believable" than "remote healing/fixing" to me :) Just to state that it's not the cheesier thing in AA.

--
the Falconeer

Stealth slows you down and/or you can't turn it on forever?  That's bullshit.

1. No, I could only stomach AA for about 20 minutes.
2. Yes.

Honest question for you, now:

Are there magical cars that can cast healing spells on other cars?

Does the Grammar Snake have a cousin, perhaps the Spelling Horny Toad?

No, it's the Spelling Gerbil; and they're are business partners, not cousins. There is a lot of tension in their relationship because snakes eat gerbils and because spellcheckers are more common than grammercheckers.  Probably shouldn't say anymore, I don't want to spoil the end of the first trilogy.

What's wrong with the Phonics Monkey?

(http://www.bestsp.piwko.pl/s313.gif)

Aochan and Gohan (http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=1518777)  :heart:

To their credit, they attempted to explain this.

The biomeks, I believe, launch small repair bots at other cars.

The mutants.... okay, get this.  The toxic waste that caused the mutants to become mutants and which they now use in just about everything is called Blood.  They can use this Blood on their vehicles, and it will I guess solidify and do something like... I dunno, collaboratin' with all the chemicals 'n' shit.  It fixes it.  So it's not magic.  It's magic radioactive waste.

I don't know about the humans.

(And you're just being fucking stupid by saying that D2 is deeper because we've seen all the various templates that can be done, whereas Auto Assault has been out all of a week and we don't know how many potential templates it will offer.  If AA had been out a year, you'd have a point.  First week into Diablo2 people still thought it was impossible to make a Necromancer without the Summoning tree.)

You know they are in, and I agree that sounds stupid. :)
My point is just that Diablo was NOT deep at all, but was lots of fun.
I am not sure AA is lots of fun, and I know is as shallow as Diablo 2.
But I think they wanted to do a game similar to Diablo 2 (with a different setting) and in my opinion they delivered.
And believe me, 12 classes are better than 5 and tons of skills per class are better than... uh... well, less than that :)

I have no problem with you or everyone else hating Auto Assault, but there's no point in trying to demonstrate that Diablo 2 was a Sid Meier game while AA is a crapbag.
They are very closely related, and yes. Builds/templates in AA are probably much deeper than Diablo 2 ones.

--
the Falconeer

I'd agree since this was before they "fixed" the blood golem.


If this was universally true, Atari would not have had to scrape Horizons off of its boots.

And in the whole AA bashing, this crapbag is slowly gaining points to me.
I just participated in my first AA PvP tournament, and it has been very nice.

Let me explain:
There are cities where you can check the OCD terminal, actually the Arena terminal.
Here you can see your global ranking for all the different kind of matches, as in 1v1, 2v2, 4v4.. up to 32v32. Right now I am ranked 982 on the 1vs1 ranking and no ranked in the other ones, as I have yet to compete.
Or you can apply for Instant Action, entering a queue similar to the WoW battlegrounds one that will follow you in the game until a match is actually ready for you to join. This is a nice tool but definitely nothing so new or worth me eating my hat.
The shiny part is the tournament section.
On the OCD terminal there's a "Tournament" tab that lists all the upcoming tournaments, their limitations (levels, number of players, size of teams) and their prizes. This sounds interesting but it's actually better!
I logged in at 7pm and noticed there was the usual very long lists of upcoming tournaments, but luckily a 1vs1 lev 5 - 10 was about to start on 1 hour. Prize being money (not bad) and XP. I applied and got the said WoW-is queue window with a countdown to tournament start.
I went in the field and xped to level 6 and got some new skills until he countdown expired and I got teleported into the arena to face my first (and last, alas) opponent.
Match are 10 minutes long and I faced an opponent 3 levels higher than me (my fault, I was level 5 in a 5 - 10 tournament :) ), I went close to kill him a couple of times, but in the end, I lost 5 to nil.
End of tournament, but great fun.
And not the match itself, where it was basically carnage. But the whole tournament feeling.
I played in the Best of the Best in EQ1, Clash of the Guilds in EQ2, I love duels and arenas. This kind of things in mmorpgs usually have to be player made and no matter how well they are organized, it's different when a game gives you the ultimate duel tool :)
Again, it's nothing so special or new. It's just that it feels nice. It's good to go to the OCD terminal, browse upcoming tournaments (there are lots everyday, usually in peak hours) and join one or just check for the most interesting for better experience or money payouts. And the whole thing is gamewide, completely cross-server. In a way that when it comes to the arena and the OCD you are not limited to your server, you can face players from any server and the global ranking is cross server. And as soon as the final matcc ends, the winner is broadcasted to the whole server, or should I say to the whole game. Again, that's nice to me.
I know all of that was in Guild Wars already. Ok. It's good to see it in AA too, and let's put it in every existant mmorpg, I say.

Bottom line: Arena and tournaments are lots of fun, they are easily accessible and the whole duel/battle thing look very interesting, especially for a mmorpg in its early days.

It's sad that such a feature is lacking in other, better, bigger mmorpgs.
Now keep on the bashing :)

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the Falconeer

Touchée :)
Anyway, in a Diablo kind of game, I welcome a higher degree of customization.

-
the Falconeer

The arena tourney feature is in CoH in almost the exact method you describe.

I am afraid CoH is to me what AA is for you all :)
I didn't know that though, and I think it's safe to say that this kind of matchmaking/ranking thing is a NCsoft trademark.
I really appreciate it.

--
the Falconeer

As would I.  I am eyeing Hellgate while trying to keep my expectations low.

Artifact/Tulga added the ability to for crafters to use different models for end products in Horizons, such as a serrated blade or a fancy hilt on a sword.  I thought that was a great idea, but by then there were no more players.  All this proves is that we are niche.  In fact, I should be honest and say that the only reason I don't have a HZ account right now is due to their combat revamp (grind++), plus the absence of my guild.