No other game looked like Spellborn

The Chronicles of Spellborn seemed to provide a wish list of what people want in an MMO. You could look cool from day 1; the gear you chose at character creation could be upgraded by slotting in runes to increase their power. You could still find or craft items with more or better slots, but there was never a time when your character would have to look anything but cool as sheets.

Combat was tactical on many levels. You could not access all your abilities whenever you liked; not only were most of them on cooldowns, but you could only choose from the abilities that were showing on a scrolling deck wheel that would shift whenever you used an ability. The abilities themselves were fairly weak alone; but if you built your deck well and arranged the combos in logical ways on the wheel, abilities could build upon each other to become truly devastating.

The art was state of the. Rendered in a uniquely European style, Spellborn looked like no other game. The lore told a story of a shattered world, populated by survivors rescued from the planet just before it went boom by benevolent godlike beings. The shards of the planet still swirl in winds of the Deadspell Storm, and the people live inside caverns carved within them. Voyages between them are only by taking passage on shard ships, which might themselves be attacked by denizens of the Storm as they make their way.

Players want combat mechanics that are more than “Press 1, 2, 3, repeat”? Spellborn had it. Unique world, graphics, and UI? Spellborn had it. Some of the coolest looking gear in any MMO? Nailed.

So, what happened?

Though the Spellborn devs had a long relationship with Frogster to publish the game in Asia and in parts of Europe, they had no American publisher. When they eventually made a handshake agreement with one, they were barred from revealing it for months, while they did some retooling on the game. After months of no news, the publisher was revealed to be Acclaim, a publisher most noted for its free to play games.

The game then went into further hiatus for five more months.

Eventually, in February of 2009, Spellborn went live in the US and the rest of the world. Instead of a standard subscription plan, players needed to by Acclaim’s cash shop currency, and then redeem that for play time. It was fairly complicated, and since people would be spending different amounts to play the game depending on the deals they got for the cash shop currency, it was hard for people to figure out just how much the game cost, and whether or not they were getting a decent deal.

Acclaim promised heavy support for the game, but when it became clear Spellborn was not a hit, such support dried up. In just a few months, rumors arose that the developers, Spellborn N.V., had all left to find other work, and that the game would be moving to a F2P model with an item shop (for a game without a focus on items!) and other such paraphernalia. The game was to be relaunched to begin again as a MMO like most of the others in Acclaim’s stable, but instead, was just set to be free and left alone, patchless, until the decision came to close the game down.

Spellborn Lead Developer El Drijver has posted a complete (and more correct!) timeline on the Acclaim Spellborn forums.

Even aside from Spellborn’s issues with its publisher and the game’s lack of heavy promotion, the game itself may have taken too many chances.

Though soloing was an option in the game, the game itself was fairly hard to play. Having to keep good aim on an enemy while avoiding enemy special attacks (most enemies had a unique ‘tell’ you could use to determine when they were about to unleash a heavy attack) meant it played far more like a third person shooter than an MMO. Slow travel times meant it could take a considerable amount of time to get somewhere new; shard ships ran on their own schedules and were sometimes dangerous to boot. There were no gates, hearthstones or teleports; it was a worldy-world.

Aimed directly for hardcore players, Spellborn had very little to recommend it for casual players, and this was probably its biggest mistake. By basing its combat on an intricate combat mechanic that demanded the player’s full attention, Spellborn shut out the 90% of casual players that are absolutely necessary to populate the world. Without the casual players, even the hardcore players noticed the world was fairly empty. The PvP clique soon moved on to other games; the hardcore players leveled to the end game and then, with nothing left to do, departed; and the few casual players had already gone.

Hundreds of MMOs, it seems, are released every year, but few of them take as many chances and are as filled with new ideas as The Chronicles of Spellborn. Out of all the hundreds of MMOs, it seems, that FAIL every year, I’ll miss Spellborn the most.

Adventuring after a mysterious apocalypse forever changed the landscape, with strange creatures everywhere and a refugee populace just trying to survive in a mutant world overrun with danger…. I didn’t even know I’d gotten into the Earth Eternal closed beta. Tails Tales of my chubby little rat rogue, the kind that Cinderella did NOT want helping make her dress, once I’ve seen more of the game.

Back in EverQuest, unexpected adds usually meant a group wipe (unless you were specifically doing an AE group). Crowd control or a puller who knew how to split was really important. Modern MMOs ramp down the difficulty quite a lot, and Spinks wonders if specialized crowd control has any sort of place in World of Warcraft, given the tendency to just gather up a room and kill everything at once? And this is why WoW can’t have nice things, like enchanters and bards :)

At Hudson’s Hideout, Rock Hound looks at the two kinds of people who roll up heroes in Champions Online — Conceptionists, who have a backstory and a theme for their hero, and Minmaxists, who just go for the most efficient powers and stats. We used to call these role-players and ROLL-players back in the day…. and this argument has been going on for thirty years.

Jaye from Journeys With is pushing back against the grind. Having to essentially solo for weeks or months upon joining an established game to catch up with max level guildmates has killed many friends’ interest in playing EQ2. With ten more levels coming in February, who could possibly be dedicated enough to go through 89 levels of mostly soloing? It’s an issue for any established game, and I wonder what SOE is planning to help new players bridge the largest level gap of any subscription game. I’m guessing nothing, because there’s one thing that SOE loves more than anything in all its games, and that’s the GRIND. It’s a holy mandate with them.

EQ2′s Game Update 53 that introduced the Shard of Lurrrrv and lots of other coolness to the game has gotten Gestalt Mind’s Rao back in the game. Being able now to pass appearance and quest armor among alts is a nice thing, and the new adventure zone that adjusts to the group level — sweet.

Ogrebears is not so much of a fan, averring that the new WoW-like achievement system is turning everyone into mindless, achievement-hungry zombies who care for nothing more than wracking up pointless accomplishments.

Having trouble getting Age of Conan to look as good for you as it does on their web site? Worry not, Openedge1 is on the case, looking at drivers and settings for two different video cards to see how to best boost AoC’s performance.

And lastly (and only because I have to run to catch a bus!), Andrew of Of Teeth and Claws has journeyed back into the world of Spellborn and pronounced it — AWESOME. Yeah, the game is definitely a feast for the eyes :)

Wow, can’t believe it’s almost autumn. Summer came so late to New England; cool and rainy through most of it, a couple of hot and humid days, and now the cooler days are back. It’s like living in Seattle.

Played a bit of Champions Online over the weekend. I take a character to level 10, start them in on the Hero Games cage matches, see how well they do and take what I learned to the next character. My most recent character was the Green Reaper, a character with all of Green Lantern’s abilities without the power ring. Custom framework of supernatural + telekinesis, allows for a ranged power builder, ability to make ego weaponry from thought alone, and the ability to toss heavy objects at people — with her mind! Travel power is green fire flight.

This build usually gets me in the top two scorers for a match. Having my main damage power — Ego Weaponry — be a melee attack is a problem. You want to be powerful at ranged in cage matches. You need to be able to cast a hold. You need a travel power that lets you run away — burrowing seems best for that, followed by teleport. DoTs are good for those people. My best cage match character remains Daddy’s Little Girl, my gadgeteer from beta. Heals really help! Swinging was her travel power.

Playing Champions Online and wondering how it compares to City of Heroes? Or vice versa? Scopique has a nice comparison of the two superhero games which gives a decent idea of the differences. I’ll add that City of Heroes has Day Jobs and Mission Architect, while Champions has the excellent Cage Match PvP instances. CO was looking mighty boring before I discovered those.

Saw a tweet from the Spellborn folks last week that implied the F2P version of Spellborn was crazy popular. O rly? Beau of Spouse Aggro says Ya, rly! Looks like new dad Heartless_ is having some fun with it as well.

Both WoW and EQ2 are revamping their innate racial bonuses, and the Verdant Dasypodid at Player vs Developer looks at the reasoning behind the changes, which seems to be at cross purposes. WoW is adding more fluff and less advantage to theirs, while EQ2 aims to give certain race/class combinations a decided advantage over others. I’m just kinda miffed they are taking away the halfling ability to summon pie :(

Spinks continues her mini-symposium on roleplaying in MMOs with a focus on using emotes and fluff items to set a mood. Given how pretty much all her suggestions were commonly implemented in the era of MUDs just shows how much we lost when we moved to games with more of an emphasis on graphics than gameplay.

Syp asks if it’s worth jumping into a MMO after the rush of release day has come and gone? Do late adopters have any fun? Or do they have to catch up to everyone first?

Stargrace at MMOQuests has an excellent guide to EQ2′s new Achievements system. New to EQ2, anyway, since it’s about as blatant a copy of similar systems in WoW and Warhammer as I’ve ever seen. I’m just happy there are still MMOs out there for *non*-Achievers. Ogrebears has the patch notes for the complete list of changes coming for Game Update 53, including the Shard of Lurrrrrv. I am SO HOPING that’s a no combat zone! I’ve been wanting to meet the Goddess of Love, Erollisi Marr, since I spent all those years on her server in EverQuest. I DON’T want to kill her!

Cownose loves Darkfall! He loves the world, loves the big fights, loves the exploration, loves everything about it! So why is he quitting, never to play again?

This is definitely the season for betas. Over the past few years, a game’s beta has taken on an importance way out of proportion to its former status as a way to get some player feedback during development (the pre-2004 model), or a way to stress test the game before launch (the pre-2008 model), to where it is now — a free trial in which the player is not expected to give any feedback on the direction or goals of the game and is more a marketing tool for which players should perhaps expect to pay a token amount. Maybe they should just call it a Gamma or something. Anyway. Syncaine looks at the timing of open betas, asking if companies should time their open betas for the time when no other mindshare-swallowing games are doing theirs? Should MMOs be scheduled like summer blockbuster movies?

Lastly, shout out to Cliffski of Positech Games, an indie developer whose Gratuitous Space Battles lets you create mad space battles between huge fleets. Picture of me horribly failing my first battle in the preview beta for pre-order customers is below.

Having heard about the EVE Fitting Tool from a helpful commentator, I spent a lot of time last night working some Battle Clinic builds into viable builds for me. VERY happy. Later on, the corps went on an impromptu trip through a wormhole, where we were relentlessly shadowed by the corp (Bones) who had staked it out. They allowed us to take on a Sleeper cell before we left. We got some T3 loot, but since we’d all brought expendable ships (that’s my Exequoror “The Liberator” hovering outside the wormhole), we weren’t up for taking out the second wave, which included a battleship. (Drew at Wizard of Duke Street has a little more about wormholing).

The biggest news in the EVE realm had nothing (or little) to do with the space game. Yesterday, at GDC Europe, EVE developers CCP announced Dust 514, a dirtside FPS for consoles where success on the ground leads to success ij space based planetary and system control.

Not much is known about the title. The teaser video shows standard FPS action on the ground, with two frigates trading shots overhead. I get that Starship Troopers feeling from it, and it’s a good feeling. Darren of Common Sense Gamer doesn’t see any way they can pull off a new MMO in the current generation of consoles. Heartless_ wonders at the connection between Dust 514 and the technology for EVE’s announced “ambulation” mode, where players can walk about on space stations.

With Blizzcon only days away, bloggers have been speculating endlessly about rumors that the next World of Warcraft expansion will bring a complete revamping of the old world. That didn’t go over so well when EverQuest started on that path with the Prophecy of Ro and Depths of Darkhollow expansion, but maybe Blizzard can succeed where SOE failed. Spinks wonders if even a total revamp could get people back into the old zones again, especially if flying mounts and other modern features were brought into the old world. Damion of Zen of Design doubts people will want to revisit zones they were already quite tired of before.

The Cataclysm rumors also suggest that many new previously forbidden (by lore) race and class combinations will get WoW players back in the alts game. Green Armadillo wonders why developers are all so eager to cite lore as reasons for something they didn’t want players doing, but have no problems breaking it at their whim if they change their minds.

Writing about Lord of the Rings Online, Armadillo says:

The problem? This game is set in Middle Earth. I don’t remember Gimli’s axes bursting into flames as he fought the malevolent ice wraiths of Caradhras. (Actually, I don’t remember the malevolent ice wraiths of Caradhras either, maybe Gandalf was busy whining to Aragorn about being forced to go to Moria while the battle raged off camera. Of course, if the game stuck to just foes the Fellowship actually fought during the story, the beastiary would be very repetitive indeed, especially in the context of a game full of “kill 360 of this type of enemy” deeds.)

Naamah at Aionic Thoughts has a new video courtesy of Kotaku about the game’s 1.5 patch, the one that will launch with the game in September and has never been played by Western testers. The developers say there is no grind in Aion? That’s good news. WoW-like gaming has been synonymous with grind for so many years.

And speaking of videos, Werit has been going all Stephen Spielberg lately with Fallen Earth, the post-apocalyptic MMO which has largely been overshadowed by higher-profile releases. Wanna kill posthuman mutants and zombies and save the scattered fragments of humanity? Fallen Earth might be your game.

A fan of Wizard101, but upset because you can’t get anyone to team up with you for arena dueling? Stingite of The Friendly Necromancer advises sitting down with your friends and finding what it would take to get them into the arena, or why they may be reluctant to go. Seven hour duels would be reason enough for me.

F2P game correspondent Warhammermer has a Dream of Mirror Online AMV to the tune of The Killers’ “Human”. The line, “Are we human, or are we dancer?” refers here to DOMO’s Dancer job. Yes! Dancer is a job in DOMO! Warhammermer also has some news of a movie tie-in within SOE’s Free Realms which left those outside of the US without meatballs.

Anjin at Bullet Points has been spending a bit of time in the F2P version of Dungeons & Dragons Online, and aside from a few crashes, kinda likes how DDO mixes up the standard dungeon crawler with more action.

Spellborn has officially become a Free to Play game, says Acclaim Games’ Community Manager, David “Historian” DeWald:

At point, you checked out The Chronicles of Spellborn. Today, as you read this, Spellborn as it currently exists is now free to play. Keep in mind that there will be no upgrades and no patches. It has become in effect, an Action RPG with superior Multiplayer. The only thing it will cost you to play is the time it takes to download.

So play it. http://www.tcos.com

Now because it is frozen in time, we will be creating events for the players and we will help support any players that want to make their own events. And if you have thoughts on how we might make this version more enjoyable as we wait for the New free to play version, we are glad to listen.

Is that enough news for you? It’s just gonna keep flooding in as the games we’ve been waiting all year to play start hitting the shelves. So happy hump day, and keep gaming!