Here's a Lego Universe Thread. I'm so, so sorry.

[Yegolev]

I need to try it again with the new version but Ingmar is probably correct.

[Merusk]

I think this game will be like crack for little kids - in my limited experience it is a much better game than Free Realms which would seem to be the sort of thing it would be competing with.

You're very correct.  Plus it's Legos.. so it's proving to be crack for me as well.  Could just be that it's new, but I can't stop playing and often want to kick my son off to get in a few hours myself.

[Yegolev]

Preordered.  I don't do that for MMOs.  Or anything, really.

[Shatter]

I got some beta playtime in this past weekend but it was very little since SC2 came out 3 days earlier :P  Dam you SC2!!!

[Mrbloodworth]

But but but...NETDEVIL! 


 

[Samprimary]

But but but...NETDEVIL! 


 

I pass a giant shrine to Auto Assault on the way to my desk. It's a big life size combat dune buggy crashing in a post-apocalyptic diorama.

Someone put Patrick the Starfish in the front seat, which really makes the piece.

[Count Nerfedalot]

pics or it's just internet trash talk! 

[climbjtree]

Has anyone tried this thing yet?

[FatuousTwat]

I haven't played since beta... Nothing to really capture me.

I only got to the ninja realm, but it seems like the only truly creative thing you could do was build a useless home base. Everything else was just typical MMO fare.

[tgr]

One video explained how you had to get even your name approved (presumably so kids can play this). I'm going to assume that if I were to, in true goon fashion, make a lego dong, I'd get permabanned.

[Lantyssa]

Good.

[Pendan]

Until your name is approved your starting name is created by selecting from list of word you combine to form a 3 word name. Chat in game is done the same way sort of like auto word replace while entering words on a phone but you have a small dictionary and can not use words not in it. Very kid safe.

6 months of beta they had a area in the interface for changing key bindings but it was always empty. You could change settings in a xml file hidden away in your user folder but invert Y mouse setting was not used from the file. In March a CM posted it was actively being worked on in game changing but at release the interface option for controls is still empty according to the first look article I read.

[Samprimary]

One video explained how you had to get even your name approved (presumably so kids can play this). I'm going to assume that if I were to, in true goon fashion, make a lego dong, I'd get permabanned.

You would just not get your moderation approved were you to try to make a dong-filled property public.

[Yegolev]

Playing, having a blast.  But I like to collect things.

Took way too long to get my account key but I have put a little time into it for the past few days.  It's crisper and smoother than beta, some things moved around and generally it has more polish.

Basic gameplay out the starting gate is the familiar quest stuff: collect this, build that, smash those.  Soon enough you claim a property and can build something.  Later on you get to do other things but I have not managed to advance that far in my limited time.  Eager to try out the racing.

Being a bit aware of what to expect, I chose the castle sets from the beginning quest rewards and at the moment have a good start on a front wall, plus a few trees.  I'm pleased that the build interface has been made easier, at least I think so since I seem to be able to use it now.  Placing models is MUCH easier in release.  I almost built some stuff out of raw bricks but I didn't have the time for it just then.  Also I am just scratching the surface of BRICK COLLECTING.

Names, by the way... I selected Element and it was approved within minutes, replacing whatever my three-part name was.  You can keep your three-part name if you like, some of them are pretty neat.

[Yegolev]

Received my Soft Launch Test t-shirt today, plus a timecard for one month.  Rock.

[Yegolev]

Three Wolf Moon shirt in LU?  Get.

[Samprimary]

they tried so hard to get rid of that. SO hard.

[Yegolev]

I disapprove of "they" and "their" effort.

[Samprimary]

n'way man I was definitely on the side of keeping that shirt. We prevailed.

[Samprimary]

If anyone still has any interest in this, like if they want to get their kid hooked on mmos or something, price has been cut in half.

GO GET YO BABBY CRACK

[Nebu]

If anyone still has any interest in this, like if they want to get their kid hooked on mmos or something, price has been cut in half.

GO GET YO BABBY CRACK

I hate you.  I may have to give this a shot now that I've finished my second run through DA: Origins. 

[Hutch]

I went over to my brother's house over the holidays, and he has an account for himself, and another for his oldest boy.

From the few minutes I watched each of them play it, it did indeed look like typical MMO fare, as has been stated previously. My nephew goes in for outfits, and has no problem whatsoever with deleting an established toon so that he can re-roll as a different faction. (I guess the factions can get different looks?)

My inner mmo-cynic was wailing "Oh my god look at that inventory UI, there's no way to sort or group, it's just a giant list of icons!"

Also, my brother told me that the game makes new shards to handle population overflow, similar to CoH and Guild Wars. But, you can't move freely between the shards. So if the two of them are logged on at the same time, it's blind luck if they can actually play together.

[Yegolev]

I have been working up the pressure needed to post something about the inventory needing filters of some type, at least for the blocks.  Probably what makes me hesitate to free build more than anything is the belief I will get a blurry-eyed headache squinting at those little icons trying to find that one piece that I want but am not sure that I have.

As I have not made any in-game friends, I cannot comment on the multiplayer features of LU.

[Samprimary]

... they never fixed inventory organization, did they.

[Yegolev]

Fixed or implemented?  The backpack has three-or-four tabs and if there's a sort or filter on any of them, I have missed it.  Might be in the property menu, I suppose I will have to go look.

[Yegolev]

I checked in the "brick" tab of my backpack and there is actually a filter system.  Selecting/deselecting various attributes for the filter work like - wait for it - Legos.  Now to go to my one lonely property and try to build something from raw bricks, only to find I am missing that one piece.

[Lantyssa]

It's just like play with real Legos!

[Trouble]

So...is it fun?

[Merusk]

So...is it fun?

Fun is subjective.  I had a blast in the beta as did my son.  It's super ezmode combat, almost exactly like the Lego series of console games (shock.)   It's still entertaining, just don't look for much depth on the game side of things and enjoy wacking baddies collecting bricks and free building.

If all you want to do is free build and can't stand the Lego games then I'd recommend the Lego Design By Me tool from the official Lego site.  It has the bonus of being able to create your own set and ship it to yourself with custom box art and everything.

[Yegolev]

So...is it fun?

It's a decent diversion.  The MMO stuff is the expected kill ten things and collect ten drops, do these things to get into this faction, etc.  If you hate that stuff, there you go.  There are achievements and car racing, which I assume no one hates.  The main (and important) way that it deviates is with the build system.  Using prebuilt models or raw bricks, build shit on your property.  If you want, you can buy bricks from the brick vendor rather than smashing the environment to get them, but I find the smashing to be a lot of fun.

[UnSub]

Gazillion sells Lego Universe back to Lego; layoffs reported at NetDevil.

I guess the near complete silence around LU was for good reason. Also interesting that Brevik mentions that Gazillion is "focus[ed] completely on internally-published, free-to-play game businesses" which would seem to refer to Fortune Online and not to the Marvel-based properties.

[Samprimary]

LEGO is pretty much eating it on this to save face on the company line and not throw LU (and ALL of its team) to the wind. When all is said and done, though, I don't think they want to think too much about what they invested into this project.

I would expect them to wind down LU slowly and quietly.

[UnSub]

My favourite quote was:

"The transition of members of our team to the Lego Group allows us to conclude the work-for-hire segment of NetDevil's business and lets us expand our internally-published, free-to-play game businesses," said David Brevik, President and COO of Gazillion. "We're proud of the Lego Universe game that our team built, and we are certain that it has a bright future."

"Yes, it was always our intention to build up a development team around Lego Universe, launch it and then four months later sell that title and most of the developers to Lego. It's massive success at a dedicated MMO development studio is sure to continue under completely new management who don't really have any MMO expertise. Please come and play our online Diablo clone. "

[Samprimary]

The mood over there is remarkably grim. Anyone talking about this who got a ride over to LEGO from this move is feeling wildly stressed, mildly to wholly distrustful of management, and many confide that they have a claustrophobic itch that they get from now effectively knowing you're on an effectively tanked project that's now being quietly wound down to keep from being too public a disappointing mark on the company brand.

The people who are stuck with NetDevil, on the other hand, are feeling wholly fatalistic.

I had a pretty wonderful six months there and still have the impression that Lego is a really upstanding company (albeit unfortunately naive to have gotten invested with NetDevil), but sometime in the eighth month I had a divinely revelatory interaction with my manager, asked some questions, tested these answers versus things I could observe, and realized that it was a really, really, excellent time to get the hell out of dodge. So I quietly kicked my own business back up, made some emails, sat back, relaxed, and waited for my contract to end and be declined renewal.

[Yegolev]

I liked it, and furthermore it's gotten me to buy more real Legos.