End of Nations : Fully Localized Russian Version in the WorksEnd of Nations : Fully Localized Russian Version in the Works

 

Trion Worlds and Petroglyph have announced that End of Nations will be fully localized in Russian. The development team credits the Russian beta community for its passion for the game as the driving force behind the decision.
“The tremendous interest we have seen from the Russian End of Nations community during Beta testing has demonstrated that there’s a huge passion for massive scale military strategy gaming in Eastern Europe,” said David Luehmann, Executive Producer for End of Nations. “We believe our decision to localize the game into Russian shows our commitment to strengthening the global community for End of Nations and making it as accessible to as many players as possible.”

 

 

 

The Secret World : Doing Right By GamersThe Secret World : Doing Right By Gamers

This week’s column devoted to The Secret World takes a look at how news outlets sometimes opt to frame Funcom’s game in a negative light despite the fact that, indeed, TSW seems to have already turned the corner. See what we’ve got to say and then leave your thoughts in the comments.
Like it or not, the way things are reported or framed creates a certain viewpoint that allows people to associate positively or negatively to a given article. A byproduct of being human is that we tend to create these viewpoints or write in a way that creates these associations without meaning to. We also tend to have something called confirmation bias, in which we favor information presented to us that confirms our existing beliefs or hypotheses.

 

Runescape : Player Events Support Breast Cancer Awareness MonthRunescape : Player Events Support Breast Cancer Awareness Month

 

RuneScape clans have banded together to raise awareness for breast cancer research by donning pink for the month of October. Thousands of players are sporting pink hair, clothing, armor and more. Players also participated in a walk across the Gielinor game world.

The march was a community led initiative and was organised by RuneScape members who gathered together and joined forces to mark the beginning of Breast Cancer Awareness Month, the annual international health campaign which is organised by major breast cancer charities every October to increase awareness of the disease and to raise funds for research into its cause, prevention, diagnosis, treatment and cure.

The idea for a march originated from a forum post by ‘Darth Brick’ in the RuneScape forums and soon gathered traction as numerous RuneScape clans signed up and pledged to wear pink throughout October.  Over 31 clans took part in the march across the game’s world, ending with a celebration in the game’s trading hub, the Grand Exchange. The march was the first of many scheduled to take place throughout RuneScape during October.
 

 

 

New Developer Post Addresses Community Concerns New Developer Post Addresses Community Concerns

The MechWarrior Online team has posted a new blog to address some of the concerns raised by the community. Among other things, the team announced that the open beta will be delayed for some time until issues can be revisited and that the team is listening and responding to the player base.

Game development is similar to trying to steer a very large ship.  To make changes in direction takes time and accurate judgement calls.  Even after the decision to change direction has been made, it takes a lot of time to make sure the change is working and the direction is valid.  A lot of the feedback on the forums specifically are in the pipe for implementation, but again it comes down to time to get them ready and tested before sending it out to you folks on the live servers.

That being said, we’d like to address the concerns and worries that many of you have regarding Open Beta, Match Making, Founder’s Premiums, Game Balance, New User Flow and the future of Community Warfare.

 

 

Turbine adds Ken Rolston as Director of DesignTurbine adds Ken Rolston as Director of Design

In a press release today, Turbine announced the hiring of four new key pieces of talent to help the company steer “the next generation of online gaming.” One such hire is Ken Rolston, former lead designer of the Elder Scrolls series and recent designer of Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning.

From the press release:

Ken Rolston, Director of Design – Ken brings an exceptional track record to Turbine as one of the most accomplished fantasy RPG computer and video game designers of all time, with over a decade of lead designer experience on the award-winning Elder Scrolls franchise and, most recently, he released Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning to critical acclaim. Ken will lead the vision and the implementation of all aspects of game design for Turbine.

Additionally, the studio has hired three technology oriented folks as well, perhaps hinting at what the studio’s future projects might hold.

Alan Villani, Vice President, Technology – Alan joins Turbine from NetherRealm Studios, where he was responsible for driving the technology platform that supported Mortal Kombat™.  Alan will be responsible for our digital technology platform that helps drive online engagement and monetization.

Jai Singh, Executive Director of Technical Operations – Jai joins Turbine from Zynga, where he managed the technology infrastructure for some of the largest social games in the world. Jai will be responsible for managing all online operations hosting & computing infrastructure, technical support and network operations.

Demetrius Comes, Executive Director of Engineering – Demetrius joins Turbine from Petroglyph Games and brings almost 20 years of technology experience spanning the video games, telecom, and computer security industries to his new role. Demetrius will oversee all engineering functions for the studios product development team including Game Platform, Release Engineering and Technical Production.

 

 

USRC 2011 Starts LiveStreaming Today!USRC 2011 Starts LiveStreaming Today!

USRC, the yearly PvP tournament hosted through Ragnarok Online, started today at 10:15am PST and will be live streamed directly from the Ragnarok Online Facebook page. Head on over and check out the action!

Visitors to the ACONY booth at gamescom in Cologne will also get guaranteed entry to the closed beta as part of the celebrations for the first public show with Hedone. Booth C-036, in online gaming hall 9 will be presenting the game to press and gamers from August 17th to the 21st. Anyone who plays the game on the booth will be granted automatic entry to the beta as soon as it starts.
The yearly PVP tournament USRC is a chance for Ragnarok players to compete for the top prizes, and prove their team is the strongest in the PVP team around.
USRC is the United States regional championship for Ragnarok Online global PVP tournament. The competition is fierce as teams of 7 members compete on a level playing field where the only advantage lies with strategy and skill of the team. The USRC champion team wins in-game swag as well as a chance to represent North America in the World Wide tournament RWC!
All the matches for USRC are recorded so next year’s aspiring competitors can bring a tougher game to the veteran competitors. USRC 2011 is the 8th Regional Championship and this year the entire event will have live commentary and video streaming so everyone can enjoy the battles!
USRC 2011 will be live streamed starting 10:15am PST, Saturday June 11; to watch the event live anyone can view from the Ragnarok Facebook page. Once the event is complete the recordings will be uploaded to the GravityUS YouTube channel
The culmination of the tournament will take place in Seoul Korea in the October 2011 as the worlds regional champions all compete to find out who is the world’s best Ragnarok Champion, and for Cash prizes! All participants have an all expense paid trip to Seoul Korea to compete and share in the worldwide brotherhood that is Ragnarok Online!