Tag Archives: Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning

Joystiq is rumouring that between 60 and 130 people have been laid off at Mythic.

Some of redundancies are apparently from WAR development staff, supposedly including senior designers.

Mark Jacobs, however, made a statement on the official Warhammer Online site claiming that staffing numbers are attributed to consumer need and progress with game design.

“With respect to customer service, quality assurance and play testing, prior to the launch of WAR, we hired additional people to deal with the rush of demand associated with an MMO launch,” he said.

“Since the launch last year, the demand for customer service has gone down as players become more familiar with the game. Obviously, demand for a large QA and play-testing staff also falls after launch. As a result, we saw a staff reduction which is in line with the company-wide initiative.”

We’ve contacted Mark for a further statement.

Mythic’s confirmed Warhammer Online’s to get its own forum, to be run by the developer.

There’s a large post from Mark Jacobs on the matter on the official site. Apparently this is the first Mythic game to get a properly hosted forum.

Mythic just confirmed that Warhammer Online’s first expansion is to be titled Call to Arms. It’s a “live” affair, with a schedule and everything.

It’s free, and will include “two highly anticipated new careers – the Orc Choppa and the Dwarf Slayer – and a new dungeon zone called ‘Land of the Dead,’ set in the desert realm of the Tomb Kings,” according to the PR.

Here’s the timeline:

• ‘Call to Arms: Bitter Rivals’ Live Event (March): Successful completion allows head start access to the new Orc Choppa and Dwarf Slayer careers. The event will also include the new Chaos-themed RvR Scenario, Twisting Tower.
• Two New Careers Join WAR (March): The Orc Choppa and Dwarf Slayer answer the Call to Arms.
• ‘Call to Arms: Beyond the Sands’ Live Event (April): Details to be revealed soon!
• ‘Call to Arms: Rise of the Tomb Kings’ Live Event (May): The race between Order and Destruction players begins to unlock the Land of the Dead for their Realm.
• ‘Land of the Dead’ Opens (June): The deserts of Nehekhara open to players with the addition of a new RvR-gated dungeon zone. To gain access to the Land of the Dead, opposing Realms must battle for control of the zone to access dozens of new Public Quests, instanced lairs, and a massive new Tomb Kings dungeon to plunder in search of the Casket of Souls.

More through the link.

Mythic’s confirmed that Warhammer Online is to geta Korean launch.

Hangame’s to handle the localised product.

Korea will get the game next year.

WAR is just the latest western MMO to make the move to the country, with a Korean version of Age of Conan announced only last week.

Press release after the link.

More »

Speaking to GI, Blizzard’s Paul Sams has said that more than half of the people that cited leaving World of Warcraft to try Warhammer Online have no returned.

“We’ve seen a significant number of people, well over half, that cited Warhammer as their reason for leaving – they’ve already returned,” said Sams.

“It surprises me because Mythic is a very good company and it doesn’t surprise me at the same time because it’s really hard [in the MMO space].”

Sams added, however, that WAR was, in his opinion, the most likely to succeed in the fantasy online market in the face of WoW.

“I think Warhammer is best positioned to succeed out of the various products that have come out thus far since World of Warcraft has come out,” he said.

“It seems to be a good game, certainly a great company, Mythic and Mark [Jacobs] over there and his team, they’re very, very talented.”

More through the link.

Not to be outdone in the patch stakes, Warhammer Online’s been updated to 1.0.3, IGN reports.

The fix includes quite a few new features, including a much-requested “regional chat” facility and a new mail icon on your mini-map.

It’s all go. More through the link.

Mythic’s just put out a press release claiming Warhammer Online now has 750,000 registered players.

“Thanks to our players, the war between the Realms continues to escalate at an incredible pace,” said company boss Mark Jacobs. “The battlefields are alive with three quarters of a million players fighting for the forces of Order and Destruction in truly epic and unparalleled Realm vs. Realm battles!”

The developer said that more than 500,000 players had signed up for the game in the first week of launch, as reported at the end of September.

Full thing after the link.

More »

Mythic’s confirmed that more than 500,000 players have created WAR accounts, and is claiming the MMO to be the fastest growing in history.

“In just one week we have a half a million people playing WAR online, and the ranks of Order and Destruction are growing at a record-breaking pace for a new MMORPG,” said company head Mark Jacobs.

“We spent years working to provide players with the most stable, epic, and polished online world we could, but it is the players that have truly brought the Age of Reckoning to life.”

If you haven’t got involved yet, do. It’s a great game, no question. Half a million people can’t be wrong, right?

Following reports that Mythic didn’t credit all employees that worked on WAR in the game itself, the developer’s confirmed it is to launch an online database crediting everyone who participated in development. Which is nice.

From Shacknews:

The Mythic team is also taking the following steps to address credit policies:

• In-game and manual credits will be reserved for the launch team.
• Mythic will create an online database listing the name and title of everyone who contributed to a project, regardless of current employment status. Additionally, the studio will make best efforts to provide this information for its previous online games.

“I applaud Mythic for taking steps to address this issue,” stated IGDA chairperson Jen MacLean. “Fair and accurate credits and transparent standards for crediting remain a pervasive problem in the industry.”

More through the link.

More Mark Jacobs this morning, this time from an interview with MMORPG.com. WAR isn’t the game EA wanted to make, apparently: it’s Mythic’s.

“In the end we got to make the game that we wanted,” he said. “Not that game that EA wanted, not the game that Blizzard wanted, it’s the game that we wanted.

“We got two delays out of it with EA where we said, ‘we need to delay it again’. EA didn’t rush us out the door. They could have said to us in June, ‘no guys, you’ve gotta ship it, patch it afterwards.’ They didn’t. And I don’t mean that I threatened so they didn’t, they never said that.”

More through the link. Thanks, Destructoid.

Mythic head Mark Jacobs isn’t frightened of anything. No sir. And World or Warcraft definitely doesn’t bring on the sweats.

“We’re not saying we’re going to beat [Blizzard], but we’re not afraid of them,” Jacobs told Gamasutra.

“We have our own hook; that’s [realm versus realm combat], and we’re pushing it and we’re pushing it, just as we’re pushing other innovations in the game. Blizzard is number one; we don’t mind being number two, especially if it’s a competitive number two.”

Played it yet? You should. More through the link.

Massively’s carrying three new WAR videos, released by Mythic to celebrate the MMO’s release. We can’t watch them because we’re on a train and working on a 3G card, but the game looks awesome so watch then buy. Why wouldn’t you? Friday, remember. WAR day. Have a look.

GOA just sent through this guide to getting Warhammer Online up and running if you live in Europe. Some of you – us included – have been experiencing difficulty registering and patching the game, so if you are, this is what you do.

Hit this for the official site. Then, word for word:

On the left menu bar click ‘Download’ and download the ‘game client’. The download is about 10Gb’s.

Register at www.war-europe.com (don’t try this with a beta key login if I sent you one, get a personal one specific to your email – please note that it is not necessary to login to the war-europe.com to complete this process).

Using the menu bar on the left, click ‘Code’.

Fill the required fields in with your definitive retail code. You should receive a message telling you your registration is being processed. Your ‘login’ name is infinitely more important than your ‘nickname’ at this point.

Make a cup of tea, and maybe call a friend you haven’t spoken to in a while!

Check your email for confirmation that your key has been accepted. If it says something about ‘Certain components could not be activated because they are incompatible with your account’ just ignore it.

Once downloaded, using your ‘login’ name (NOT nickname) and chosen password from step 2, log on and patching should begin.

Make a cup of tea, and order a Pizza it’s time to play WAR!

The game’s out now.

Mythic boss Mark Jacobs has confirmed that content cut from the launch of Warhammer Online – namely character classes and capital cities – is to be reintroduced at a later date as part of the subscription charge.

“Are we going to put [the pulled content] in a paid expansion? No,” Jacobs told 1UP.

“What I’ve told the users point blank is that we want to give it to you as part of subscription content. We don’t have a schedule penciled in for when that will be coming, but we’re going to release it without any additional charge to players.”

More through the link.

GOA has denied that Warhammer Online is still experiencing registration issues in Europe, despite the fact that it… is.

New users are complaining that they’re unable to log into WAR’s European site, following assurances from GOA last week that issues experienced in the open beta would be cleared up before launch.

“Your information is inaccurate, sorry,” we were told by a rep this morning. “These problems stem prior to the launch.”

Which is fine, despite the fact that we personally can’t log into the European WAR site. We bought the game yesterday, and didn’t participate in the beta.

Not being able to log in means we can’t set up an account and patch the client. Which means we can’t play the game.

None of this is being helped by the fact that there’s no customer support available for the game by phone. Only email.

We’re also hearing reports of queues of around 30 minutes to get onto a server for those that have managed to register.

GOA added that the launch was on track.

“For your information, our launch went very well yesterday,” said the rep. “Our figures are good.”

We’re waiting on further comment from GOA in France and UK PR reps.

GamesRadar’s reviewed Warhammer Online at 9/10, as you can see here. The site clearly managed to get on a server, something we didn’t manage to do last night. They were obviously allowed to register for the game as well. Again…

Snip:

Its similarities to and improvements on WoW – most especially in PvP – make it the natural next home for anyone either dispossessed by Blizzard’s effort or who has held out from all MMOs in the hope of something a bit meatier. Playing Warhammer Online, it’s easy to forget that this game stems from a hobby so often accused of nerdiness. It shares design values, fiction and certain concepts with the Warhammer tabletop game, but really it’s only the name that binds them. Conan was supposed to be the so-macho MMO, but against this it seems a bit Sealed Knot. WAR is war. The associated intensity of this means it probably won’t pick up anything like the audience WoW has, but it will get a large one. And a very, very satisfied one at that.

Full thing through there.

Undecided? Mythic boss Mark Jacobs isn’t. Warhammer Online has now launched and he reckons World of Warcraft players should try it. Here’s why, courtesy of MTV:

If you’re looking for the best RvR [Realm vs. Realm] in any online game, you come to “Warhammer.” This is what we do well. This is the most core reason to play our game. If you’re looking for the latest and greatest RvR of any MMO, you come to play our game.

Our number-one focus is RvR, but we have spent so much time and resources on PvE [Player vs. Environment]. We’ve put so many things in there, that if you’re a casual player you should come here. One of the things that certain games have done — and we won’t mention names — is that they’re trying to go back to an old school, we-want-people-to-work-harder-to-level [style of gameplay] and make it less fun. No, we’re not going to do that. We want you to have fun in our game, and we want you to feel like you can accomplish something. You won’t come in and go, “If I can’t get four hours in straight, I’m going to feel awful.”

There’s more reasoning through there. Loads more. Mark can talk. We’re installing WAR right now. Are you?

Hugely anticipated fantasy MMO Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning has gone live, Massively reports, and the servers are now open for Order- and Destruction-related business.

This is by far the biggest MMO launch so far this year, and behind the scenes buzz for the game has been huge.

The game is now on sale, and pre-orderers have been playing for the last four days.

Hit this for the official site and heaps of information about character classes and all the rest. We’ll be online later. Do the right thing and get involved.

Following a comment yesterday from WAR creative director Paul Barnett regarding EA knowing “nothing about launching MMOs in Europe,” Mythic boss Mark Jacobs has clarified the situation by calling Barnett “sarcastic” and “irreverent.”

“Well first you’ve got to understand that Paul is Paul,” Jacobs told Eurogamer. “He’s very sarcastic. He tries to be very funny – he usually is. He can be a bit irreverent. And so you need to look at anything he said in the interview from that perspective.

“Second, in terms of GOA: we had done a deal with GOA before EA bought us. So the idea that we went with GOA because supposedly EA doesn’t know anything about doing online games is just not true. There was no EA in the picture. So that was one part of it.

“What Paul said about EA not knowing anything about launching MMOs: you know, Paul likes to exaggerate – of course EA knows things about launching MMOs. EA is responsible, certainly, for one of the most important MMOs of all time, and that was Ultima [Online]. And that had people in Europe playing, people in Japan playing – it was really the first MMO to have any success in Japan. And it was the first one to break 100,000 subs.”

Loads more through there. WAR launches tomorrow. Order or Destruction? The million dollar question.

Bloody hell, Paul. Don’t hold back. In WAR’s launch week, the MMO’s creative director has launched a stinging attack on EA, saying the firm simply “knows nothing” about bring an MMO to market in Europe.

WAR is being published by GOA in Europe.

“GOA did it with Dark Age of Camelot and they’ve done it really well. They’ve done it in a very European way, but they’ve done it very well, and it’s more of the same,” Barnett said.

“EA couldn’t have done it, what the hell would EA know about it? They know nothing about launching MMOs in Europe, unless it’s spending lots of money closing them down I suppose.”

The quotes are from a Eurogamer interview. Knock yourself out.