Category: World of Darkness

[EVE] Idiot’s and Outsider’s Guide to Controversies

Regardless of whose right or wrong, Ms Freak definitely gets a swath of internet points for clear cutting to a ton of issues currently going on in EVE Online. Being an outsider myself, I had mostly just agreed with Tobold that the delivery of many of these items was what made it so big of a list of problems. This list makes it seem a lot more real than I had suspected.

There are rumors and filings that CCP is going through some serious growing pains regarding cash flow and management. The cash flow issue is to be expected at the very least since they are working on three MMOs, only one of which is making money. (I did find it funny that Ms Freak in the list says that CCP can do whatever they like with regard to microtransactions for Dust 514 and World of Darkness.)

Again as an outsider, I am not opposed to a $70 appearance item, and I do think it is a little sensational that it’s being used as the poster child for all that is wrong in EVE. Hopefully for all those not really understanding what has been going on as of late, these links might help clear the air.

–Ravious

World of Darkness and Disappointment

It was before GenCon that White Wolf (maker of table-top RPGs and upcoming MMOs, owned by EVE’s CCP) was alleged to have told a friend of a friend that some people would be happy and some people would be upset by a coming announcement. This was refuted by White Wolf, and GenCon passed with very little big news from White Wolf. Later at the Grand Masquerade, which is an officially sanctioned World of Darkness convention, White Wolf released their first teaser bit about the World of Darkness. Our blogger in arms, Ardwulf, posted some pretty breaking news and the video of the teaser over at his site. The news hit the floor, and I realized that the alleged statement rang pretty true for me.

The quick news run down is that it will be launched at the earliest in 2012, and it has been in production for about 3 years so far (with 1.5 years of design/planning prior to that). The game will be called World of Darkness Online (WoDO), and it’s first iteration will be based on Vampire: the Masquerade (Masquerade). Later on, it is hoped that the other splats like werewolves and changelings will become playable characters, but for now it will be vampires and possibly human characters, such as hunters (vampire killers) or ghouls (Blood-addicted humans).

CCP is also making “official” some playstyles, which WoDO will contain in an interconnected manner. They are coffee house (Second-Life chatroom), theme-park (World of Warcraft, Lord of the Rings Online), and sandbox (EVE, A Tale in the Desert). However, the game is going to have a very mature slant with little room for immaturity, some sort of self-policing, and inclusiveness to the LGBT audience. There will be combat, but it won’t be the core of the game. So that’s what we know so far. My thoughts after the break.

Continue reading World of Darkness and Disappointment

Funcom’s World of Darkness

I can’t help but feel a little disappointed in CCP/White Wolf if Funcom comes out with an onion-layered dark world MMO before the makers of EVE do.  Massively gives a peek at Funcom’s upcoming game The Secret World, which honestly seems pretty cool.  It is a story-driven, time traveling, action-oriented, classless MMO in the vein of Call of Cthulhu or The King in Yellow, from what I surmise.  And, the producer is Ragnar Tørnquist who brought us the excellent The Longest Journey games.  It sounds very intriguing, but still I have that little pang of fanboism hurting.

CCP/White Wolf announced the World of Darkness MMO sometime in 2007, shortly after the two companies’ “merger” (read:acquisition).  Since then we have heard nothing.  According to Massively, on the other hand, The Secret World started concepting in 2002.  I have not seen when official production began, but I do not think we will get The Secret World until 2011.  On the other hand, World of Darkness has been running like a submarine, and one can only guess if and when that game will come about.

I guess I should be a little thankful that this game genre is finally coming to an MMO.  I think that The Secret World is going to take a lot more from Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem (one of my top ten games of all time) rather than having vampire and werewolves, especially as protagonists.  Still, the two games would be like brothers, each in their own dark world.  If anything, maybe this will push CCP out of the deep to counteract any of Funcom’s marketing “firsts” and “onlys.”

–Ravious
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