LOTRO have just announced the second expansion to their MMO, entitled The Siege of Mirkwood. This is the follow-up to their launch ‘volume’ Shadows of Angmar which took part across Eriador, and the first expansion Mines of Moria which took players under the Misty Mountains and into Lothlorien. I wonder how much farther east they’ll go before they start to move south? I suppose they realise that once they get to Mordor there’s not anywhere left to go.

I haven’t played LOTRO since I took part in the beta, but that’s only because I was busy and without a computer decent enough to handle the environments. When I finally (!) get my new PC, I’ll be plunging into Middle Earth for a bit.

Previous coverage:
First impressions of LOTRO
LOTR beta baby

… before they choose YOU!

Funcom‘s upcoming MMO The Secret World have updated their website for the first time in a while to launch their new “Initiation Test”, basically a personality test that asks the player to answer a series of questions with one of three choices. At first it appeared that 1 was the ‘Illuminati answer’, 2 the Templar one and 3 was for ‘Dragon’ and, while I usually tended more towards the ‘Dragon answer’, I tried to mix it up a bit. I ended up being lumped into the Templars, but I decided to align myself with Dragon in the end.

Unlike some of their earlier ARG’s, there doesn’t appear to be any great effect from this choice yet and, rather, they actually invite you to post your allegiance to Facebook (how terribly secretive of them!).

UPDATE: Apparently too many of the questions are weighted towards Dragon answers. I wonder how they’ll right that? And you can see a representative from each of the factions at Director Ragnar Tornquist’s blog.

Blizzard have been busy boys. At BlizzCon they announced the next World of Warcraft expansion: Cataclysm. The Black Dragon Aspect Deathwing will return from his convalescence in the Earth Elemental Plane of Deepholm to wreak his revenge on the unsuspecting denizens of Azeroth. A result of this will be the sundering of the Azerothian landscape as familiar zones such as the Barrens are rent with rivers of lava.

This redesign of classic Warcraft zones has finally meant that flying mounts will be usable there. They are also adding two new races: Goblins for Horde and Worgen (the previously quarantined human kingdom of Gilneas) for Alliance. Apparently Worgen players will be able to switch between human and werewolf forms at will, except in combat when the Worgen form will be locked. I was hoping for a day/night cycle thing like the poor citizens of Pyrewood had to follow, but I imagine that wouldn’t be very playable. They’ve also opened up a whole lot of new race/class combinations, with every race except the Draenei gaining at least one class.

Blizzard are also using this expansion for some much-needed catch-up on incomplete zones. We will finally be able to access Gilneas, Grim Batol (in the Twilight Highlands), Hyjal and the aforementioned Deepholm beneath the zone just north of Elwynn, presumably accessible through the Blackchar Cave in the Searing Gorge.
[/geek-out]

In an interview with DexX Production Director Allen Breck laughed off the idea of a WoW2, saying the shorter dev cycle on patches and expansions was working fine for them at the moment. I imagine Cataclysm is their alternative: a complete overhaul of the orginal game.

I recently took part in the 2nd Beta of Turbine’s Lord of the Rings Online. This was my first run as a beta tester, and I have to say that at that point it was fairly polished. I’ve since been accepted into the public beta (3) but haven’t logged in yet, and the main reason for that is my graphics card. Even playing the game on the lowest graphics setting I still have a MAJOR lag problem.

The few times I amped it up to full bore, however, I was gob-smacked by the lush environments. Possibly in line with the depth of Tolkien’s Middle Earth mythos Turbine have decided to avoid the cartoon stylings of something like World of Warcraft in favour of going for a super-realistic aesthetic and, as far as the environments go, they have succeeded magnificently. You’ve only got to log onto one of the umpteen fan fora around to hear enthusiastic excurses on the water ripples of Eriador.

When it comes to character design, however, things are less wonderful. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that it’s a failure, but once that word is out there there’s not a lot I can do about it (sorry, Turbine). The faces are Everquest-ly bland, and the lack of bright colours due to the realist aesthetic make everything a bit drab. Admittedly, I felt the same about the ugly humans in Warcraft when I first got it, but soon learned things looked different in-game. Perhaps the same will happen for LOTRO.

There’s also the problem of choosing race: the options available are male or female Human, male or femael Elf, male or female Hobbit, or Dwarf (this last on account of the fact that Tolkien’s dwarfs – his plural, not ours – are bearded whether they’re male or female, leaving little difference for gameplay). Having decided that gameplay is going to be heroic, Turbine (who have rights to use material from both the books and the films – something no previous Middle Earth video game has had) have excluded the option to play as any of Sauron’s minions. After the player’s character reaches Level 10 there is the option to play as a minion of Sauron for a limited time which constitutes the games PvP content, although as I have not played the PvP content I cannot really comment on the mechanics other than saying I couldn’t be bothered getting my lvl 10 dwarf to Bree in order to access it.

This limitation may be nicely in keeping with Tolkien’s sentiments, but limits an already severly limited franchise even further. Tolkien’s Middle Earth stories may have effectively started the Fantasy genre and its susequent MMO evolution, but it is relatively late to the game itself and has been left few trappings to appear original. People are deservedly weary of sword and spell MMOs, and its extensive mythos has impaired it in ways other franchises are not. In Tolkien, for instance, there are only a handful of wizards in history, whereas in other MMOs there are as many as there are players who create them. While this keeps an encounter with a wizard a special occasion and prevents the streets of Rivendell from being clogged with them, it removes a key attraction from MMOs: freedom. When I play Warcraft I can be made to feel that I am changing the course of Azeroth’s history, a sense that is capitalised upon in the Burning Crusade and its new races. Those who have read Tolkien, however, will probably know how Middle Earth’s history turns out in the end (at least the Third Age). While this still leaves room for the accomplishments of unknown heroes, the suspension of disbelief is that much harder when 90% of people you encounter are other such heroes, most likely 30 levels more accomplished than you and replete with shiny mounts.

The HUD and general interface will be familiar to Warcraft players, and indeed seems to be modelled on it to be accessible to defecting players. The crafting system is interesting as any profession is composed of three subsidiary crafts that overlap with other professions, although some things need to be worked out before launch: during beta 2 there was no beginners’ forge in Thurin’s Hall (the dwarf city). All in all however it seemed like a decent MMO, if a little disappointing to someone who saw the coming wave of licenced mythoi (LOTRO, Age of Conan and, to a lesser extent, Warhammer Online) as the antidote to our addiction to Warcrack. I feel unable to give a proper evaluation, however, without playing it for considerably longer on a machine that can handle the lovely landscapes.

Previous coverage:
LOTR beta baby

Wandrew started playing the Lord of the Rings beta yesterday. They’ve still got a link to sign up for it on LOTR Online, I registered so hopefully I’ll be seen as worthy enough. It looks fun. The player mods could do with some improvement, they’re just a little boring looking and too Poser-ish (shudder). Not a patch on WoW. But there are some nice touches like the naming suggestions when you go to create an Elf so that you can get in character without having to be a huge Tolkien buff. Also wandrew tells me that you can set up back stories for your character and genealogies which all sounds pretty pad.

If you like the beta, LOTR are offering pre-order “Founder Memberships” including a lifetime membership for $199 (or $9.99/month so you’d want to be playing for 20 months), from what I gather you’d need to buy the game as well (I think you’ve got a month to do that). Wish WoW offered lifetime membership. Stupid Warcraft.

The Sydney Morning Herald has a couple of stories on how there are only 3000 active Australian Second Lifers and companies buying up islands there are just wasting their money. Well, duh! I’m actually surprised it is that high.

The Mashup article compares it to Tumbarumba Shire on the border of New South Wales and Victoria which has a similar population. It’s an obtuse comparison because the inhabitants of Tumbarumba Shire aren’t anywhere as influential or hip as those of Second Life. If you’re a tech or a communications company then it’s imperative that you have your little stake of SL so you hang out with the cool kids. Or at least stand somewhere near them. Of course many of the cool kids in SL are super geeks in real life, but enough of them are not. Even better, some are famous and rich. If you’ve got the money to blow then hey, why not? It’s probably better spending it building something in SL than on making a fake blog or some other pathetic “viral” campaign that will just prove an embarrassment later down the track or illegal if Europe has its way.

For the record, I can’t stand Second Life. Give me Warcraft any day.

Stumbled upon a blog referencing those Chinese WoW Coke ads, it brought back so many happy memories, I had to share them with you:

And this unofficial Wow Coke ad:

Wandrew is off with the fairies, well, the elves at least. Blood Elves to be precise.

This guild invite was found on the general chat around Silver Moon (Blood Elf territory for those who haven’t rushed out to play the Burning Crusades):

THE BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE are now accepting other members of the Horde into our guild. Looking for able bodied Warriors and Druids. We may take some Shamans. Come be a great meat shield for the greatest race ever to grace Azeroth! (RP Guild)

Beautiful indeed. You can check out some my screenshots of Blood Elves (along with some plebby Night Elves and other less blessed races) here.

These guys create great custom artworks based on your MMO character:

Tremendous amounts of time and effort go into developing characters for these online games, with no real way to capture these creations other than in-game screenshots. What we offer is the opportunity to immortalize your character forever in an original, personalized piece of professional artwork. From structured poses, to combat scenes, and even short story comic books, there are no limits to the artwork that can be created for you. (M M O | A R T)

Have been thinking of trying out Guild Wars for a while now, the screenshots look beautiful but I’m not sure I like the gameplay so much (they even refer to it as a CORPG – a competitve online role-playing game – rather than an MMORPG). Here’s an interview with the CEO, Robert Garriott on their business model by the super trendy Wagner James Au (he of New World Notes – journo in 2nd life – fame). It’s missing a few things that add to the Guild Wars coffers like the fact that you can only create 4 “heroes” (add 2 if you get Factions) and “purchase extra slots if needed”.