WAR: Obligatory Open Beta Information (OB Starts Sept. 7th, 2008)

Unfortunately, I didn't care enough to post it when it first came out, BUT, for those who must know, WAR will enter it's Open Beta stage on September 7th, 2008.

Hmm, okay, that's about all the excitement I can muster at this point. I suggest you guys give it a go yourselves and formulate your own opinions.

Meanwhile, I'll put a space hat on a Squig and pretend it's a Tyranid. *pets the Tyranid*

EA REVEALS OPEN BETA DETAILS FOR
WARHAMMER® ONLINE: AGE OF RECKONING™

Mythic Begins Preparations for September 7th Open Beta

FAIRFAX, Va. - August 5, 2008 - Mythic Entertainment, an Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ: ERTS) studio, today announced that the open beta for their highly anticipated MMORPG, Warhammer® Online: Age of Reckoning™ (WAR), will begin on September 7th, 2008. This means that hundreds of thousands of fans will be able to enter the gritty fantasy world of WAR to experience the thrill of Realm vs. Realm™ (RvR) combat before the game goes live on September 18th, 2008.

"For three years we have been saying that 'WAR is coming' and the team has been working hard to deliver on this promise," said Mark Jacobs, co-founder and general manager of Mythic Entertainment. "In just a few weeks, we are going to throw open our doors and invite more players into the game than ever before. They will have a chance to delve into the open beta and see for themselves that WAR has arrived and it is glorious!"

Players can get into the North American open beta by pre-ordering Warhammer Online from select retail partners. Participants of the North American closed beta will automatically be granted open beta access. For more information about the WAR open beta, visit www.warhammeronline.com/openbeta.

Available for PC, Warhammer Online is rated "T" for Teen by the ESRB. WAR will be the first MMORPG to launch servers simultaneously in North America, Europe, and Oceania when it goes live on September 18th, 2008. For more information, visit http://www.warhammeronline.com/

Atlantica Online: A Belated Bump

Since I've been a bit busier of late, I haven't been able to devote as much time to mah gaming addiction. I haven't touched AoC in ages (mainly because, urr, my guild and I were like 80 the first week or so and then we were bored as all fuck for the rest of our dreaded time there), and started cheating on it with some oldies but goodies (BF2142, COD4).

Anyhow, my friend introduced me to Atlantica Online, which I resisted for a long time, but...it turned out to be a good amount of fun for being a free game with an Item Mall deal (no Item Mall as of now however). It's not your typical F2P Asian grinder, but a turn based RTS type game system where you and two friends (and your mini armies) can join up forces to destroy all monsters (and gather sexy loots), which is actually quite a lot of fun. The best way to explain it would be like, old school Final Fantasy with a little Tactics thrown in, and instead of having 2 computer controlled allies, you substitute your stupid friends instead.

Here is the little blurb about the end of the 2nd closed beta. The 3rd Round of Closed Beta is due to start August 25th, 2008 @ 6:00 PDT, and I'll be there!

Go give it a whirl if you're looking to waste just a few hours at a time.

TCOS: Acclaim Named as US Publisher

Well, I've been scarce as of late (wahahaha), but I've been busy busy busy with stuffs! (Plus, for some reason, I got addicted to Atlantica Online for a bit!)

At any rate, the folks at TCOS have been shopping around for a US publisher, and they've found one that's almost legit. And from what I read, there's even going to be a "free to play" beginning area to hook you. Yay!

Are we still excited?

Here is the official blurbage and a link to the official press release:

North American publisher for Spellborn revealed!

TUESDAY, 19TH OF AUGUST 2008 :: POSTED BY BANSHEE :: 19 COMMENTS

We are very proud and delighted to announce that our North American publisher is Acclaim!
Acclaim is impressed by the work and dedication that has been put into The Chronicles of Spellborn and is looking forward to releasing TCoS in North America! You can read the press release here.

Also, here's a link to the open letter from David Perry, Acclaim dude and the US Director of Spellborn:

OPEN LETTER FROM DAVID PERRY TO THE SPELLBORN COMMUNITY

Hi,
My name is David Perry, and I’m the Chief Creative Officer of Acclaim Games (the new Acclaim) that is now the #1 American publisher of Free-to-Play Online Games. Some of you “old school” gamers might remember me from the old Sinclair Spectrum/Amstrad CPC/Commodore 64/Amiga/Atari ST days, back before the MMO concept even existed!

The CEO of Acclaim (Howard Marks) was the Chairman of Activision Studios through their massive growth during the 1990’s, and together we travel the world in search of the best new games that we can possibly find. Right now we’re tracking over 400 MMO games (yes it’s insane!). My poor old gaming PC is literally peppered with games in every conceivable language, and I’ve just kept playing, patiently waiting for that WHOA! moment. The game that finally got us there is Spellborn. When we saw it running, our jaws literally dropped to the floor. “Who the heck made this? We need to talk!”

Two reasons why I knew this game was really cool:

REASON 1
I had been at the G-Star Game Conference in Korea, and I had a note in my notebook saying “Frogster �" Spellborn” with a big giant STAR beside it. From the zillion games at the show, it was this game that really stood out to me. I remember going back several times just to take another look.

REASON 2
My staff (who absolutely LIVE for these kinds of games) have been bugging me like crazy. “Have you heard of this ‘Spellborn’ game? Come on Dave, you know people, can’t you get us a developer account?” One of them just asked me again today!

So now the word is FINALLY out! I just want to officially say to the creators that we immensely appreciate the hard work that’s gone into this game, and I know, that they know, that I know just how tough that work is!

So congratulations to the entire Chronicles of Spellborn team for making this game. We will make you proud in the USA/Canada and will soon have tons of gamers eager to play with you all in this amazing new world. I also want to say thanks to the Closed Beta testers that are helping with balancing. At Acclaim, our players & testers are highly valued, and we form player advisory boards for each of our games so that the Gamers have a voice to Myself, the CEO, the Acclaim Team & the Developers of the game.

At the keynote speech of this year’s Leipzig Game Developers Conference, and I reminded everyone of the three golden rules of running an MMO like this:

(1) Community
(2) Community
(3) Community!

A game like this, using a cutting-edge engine (thanks to the talent over at Epic), is an incredible opportunity for us all to grow this world, to make it a success and to make new friends.

So I look forward to meeting many of you in the world of Spellborn!

David Perry.
USA Director - The Chronicles of Spellborn