Paragon Studios ‘optimizes the refocus,’ lays off some staff

Ugh, that’s sad. MMORPG.com reports that City of Heroes/Villains developer Paragon Studios lost nine staffers to layoffs today. Popular developer Christopher Bruce, a.k.a. “Back Alley Brawler,” was reportedly one of the nine.

According to a corpspeak-riddled statement NCSoft sent to MMORPG.com:

“In an effort to put a greater focus on the City of Heroes franchise, Paragon Studios is shifting resources within the studio. In order to optimize the refocus, there has been a reduction in force that has impacted a small amount of people. Paragon Studios is an integral part of the NCsoft West family and will continue to prosper, delivering the world’s most popular superpowered hero MMO game, City of Heroes, to fans around the world.”

The layoffs come almost two months after the release of the latest expansion, “Going Rogue.”

In response to a forum-goer who asked “should I be scurred?” community rep theOcho said: “Paragon Studios is still profoundly committed to City of Heroes and is proud of both the game we have created and the community who plays it. We’re here for the long run, no need to be scurred.”

STO ground combat to turn into Counterstrike

No, of course not. There may be, however, a new and more action-friendly targeting method coming to an aqua-colored lab near you. In Dan Stahl’s latest “State of the Game” post, he says the following:

We have a new ground combat mode in testing that allows you to switch to a target reticule and shoot your weapons where you are aiming instead of needing to click target.

An intriguing notion. This is, as far as I know, the first mention of this new system, and I’m very curious to see it in action.When I read Stahl’s line, I was intrigued. Then I imagined how people would react if STO’s ground combat turned into a twitch-fest, and I started cackling.

I’ve had a troubled relationship with STO’s ground combat, but I’m hard-pressed to describe my dissatisfaction. It simply doesn’t flow like it should. It feels forced. Clunky. Like it doesn’t know what it wants to be.

Saying the ground combat lacks polish isn’t terribly illuminating, but compared to its showier, more majestic counterpart — space combat — it feels unfinished. I’ve recently been skipping ground combat missions whenever possible. It’s partly my own bias. Ground combat scenes in the various Trek series were never quite as engaging as the space battles. Then again, comparing a bunch of guys with phasers crouched behind boulders to a Sovereign going toe-to-toe with a Borg Cube is hardly fair.

I still feel encouraged, and rather comforted, by Dan Stahl’s leadership on Cryptic’s STO team. I can appreciate a leader who’s willing and able to acknowledge shortcomings and mistakes that Cryptic has made in STO’s creation and evolution. At the risk of sounding like I’ve downed a whole jug of the Kool-Aid, I think the game is heading in a much healthier direction.

The new Featured Episodes — new weekly mission arcs that are thematically connected — are nicely done. The initial diplomatic missions were a very welcome change of pace, although the subsequent diplomatic XP grinding still needs to be addressed. Still, there’s promise.

“It also helps to show that our business is not just about putting items in the C-Store,” Stahl writes. Yes, Cryptic is still loading up the C-Store, and each time a new item appears, people set the forums on fire.

STO’s Season 2: A glimmer of hope?

Like many people, my zeal for Star Trek Online dropped precipitously after I hit the level cap in a few months. There simply isn’t much to do. Kill 6 groupings of X. Scan four anomalies after eliminating the hapless baddies standing inertly near each. Be the first to discover D’arsay ruins about 20 times. Rinse, repeat. Not even the occasional new “raidisode” (ugh, that word) was enough.

The RP community atrophied, too. There’s only so much standing around Quark’s pretending to get drunk you can stomach before you realize you’ve done all this before in City of Heroes’ Pocket D, only with capes and Spandex.

But lo, what light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Season 2 is the sun.

Well, let’s not get ahead of ourselves. I spent a few hours with the new Season 2 content that was just released, and while I can say without qualification that it’s a great step in the right direction, there’s still a long way to go. If this is a sign of things to come, however, I am cautiously optimistic.

So, let’s talk about what I like. The level cap has been raised from 45 to 51, allowing you to rise to the rank of Vice Admiral. That’s fine, provided you can do more than the same handful of dailies killing Borg and scanning anomalies in the Gamma Orionis Sector. Yes, yes, I know there’s the endlessly shifting landscape of PVP, but let’s not kid ourselves. PVPers are in the minority, bless their violent hearts.

There are some new missions to do. Yes, indeed. The Undine are making a show of it again. I played through two of the new missions last night, and I must say, this is the kind of content the game needs. It’s not on the same level as “City on the Edge of Never,” but they’re enjoyable. Though Mein Gott, “Assimilation” is brutal. Wandering through a down-but-not-out Borg Cube, praying your trigger-happy bridge officers don’t blow their gaskets and start blasting every inert drone they see in spite being set to passive mode would you people stop shooting there are now 20 drones touching me in ways that feel uncomfortable!

Sorry. “Assimilation” requires a light touch if you want to get through it with minimal fuss. Which is another thing — it’s actually challenging. After so many missions where the worst that could happen is watching one of your bridge officers falling through a hole in the earth, encountering true difficulty is still new and strange to me.

And hey, am I seeing what I think I’m seeing? These missions have branching conversation options. You mean, if I choose to say or do this instead of that, it affects the outcome? It’s not a straight line from start to finish? Now that’s something. I haven’t explored all the options to see whether things truly happen differently, though I know when it comes to a whole new category of missions, the wrong choice will make you fail miserably.

That category would be the highly anticipated diplomatic missions. These are strictly non-combat missions (as far as I know, this is Picard diplomacy, not Kirk “I punch you in the face then sleep with your wife” diplomacy), and they’re talky. Of course. There are layered conversations, investigations, and lots of running between contacts. What, you want me to run up that mountain to get to the temple? I have a Sovereign-class assault cruiser in orbit. Where’s my transporter chief with that site-to-site transport? That useless drunk.

It’s nice being able to resolve missions peacefully, and it’s a nice change of pace. Diplomatic XP is different from regular XP, and while I don’t fully understand the system yet, I’m intrigued. You gain diplomatic ranks that are separate from your military rank. And I see the much maligned “Aid the Planet” missions give you diplomatic XP now. Cryptic really, really wants us to do those missions. At least now, you can buy the provisions you need from your ship’s replicator instead of lumbering around with cargo holds full of self-sealing stem bolts. I may actually do those missions now instead of warping out of the system the moment someone starts saying they need supplies for their malfunctioning pornographic holoemitters.

Speaking of holoemitters, there’s a holo Leeta in Quark’s now, running the dabo wheel. Yes, you can actually play dabo and win gold-pressed latinum. Cryptic got Leeta’s actress, Chase Masterson to give voice to her character, and it’s very cute hearing her explaining the rules, offering encouragement and advising you to keep your eyes on the wheel, not the girl. She purrs quite a bit.

You’ll now have a mattress under which to stash your latinum, too. Your city-sized starship is now more than a bridge the size of a hockey arena, because ship interiors are here. You have a ready room connected to your bridge with an actual human-sized door, proving once and for all that not every door and passageway needs to be large enough to accommodate a school bus. From the crew deck, you can visit your lounge and sick bay. You can finally invite to your captain’s quarters that nice Caitian ensign you met on Spacedock who is played by an unemployed dockworker from Newark. You can gaze longingly at your warp core in engineering and pretend to experiment on universe-destroying chemicals in the research lab.

The operative word there is “pretend,” as these areas are purely social. There’s no functionality in them. I hear you can place trophies you’ve earned in various parts of the ship, and the potential for future expansion is palpable.

Let’s see. Oh yes, once you hit vice admiral, you get the option to fly around in a non-gimped Galaxy, Defiant or Intrepid. That’s a nice touch. The Tier 5 Galaxy even separates into the saucer and stardrive sections. I saw it for myself last night. Not sure how useful it is but it looks cool –

Hang on. I saw it last night. Which means I was watching a vice admiral flying around. Which means, within days of Season 2′s release, people have already hit the new level cap.

*muffled screaming*

OK, so, some things haven’t changed.

Note: I didn’t touch on a number of other features, including the Klingon PvE content from which Season 2′s tagline, “Ancient Enemies,” is derived.

The permanent EVE noob

I think I will always be a n00b in EVE Online. It doesn’t matter how long I play, or how much I learn. I will always behave like a n00b.

It’s not so bad when I’m off on my own, doing my own possibly idiotic thing. But when I join with other members of my corporation for some good old-fashioned violence, it becomes something else.

I haven’t been playing many MMOs of late. BioWare has owned my soul for a while now, between Dragon Age and the Mass Effect games. Because I’ve been re-reading Peter Hamilton’s “Night’s Dawn” trilogy, however, I got into an EVE state of mind and have been bipping between star systems over the past few days.

The problem with leaving a game like EVE for several months is, you forget how a lot of things work, which is a problem with a game that’s as complicated and unforgiving as EVE. I barely knew what I was doing during my last play period. Now, I’m having to try using half-remembered commands and wonder what that thing is that’s flashing, and whether it’s time to start mashing buttons (which never works in EVE, by the way).

My difficulties with EVE are compounded by my reticence to ask questions. I do a lot of reading, sure, but when it comes to standing up and announcing: “I have NO idea what I’m doing, and I think I am on fire. Please help me!” my pride rears its head and tells me to shut up. It seems I rarely encounter anyone who hasn’t been playing the game for years and can speak only in the arcane shorthand of a veteran. But instead of asking for clarification like a rational person (“What you just said was very interesting. Could you say it again in English?”), I keep my mouth shut and plow into the sides of things.

Like this, for example: Guess what happens when you warp to an enemy empire’s jump gate? Yeah.

I’m in a small corp, with a small handful of active members. Those few who are around act and sound like they have all played for a while and know what they’re doing. I know this because I understand only half of what they say. They seem, however, reasonably friendly. And despite my repeated presentations of rampant newbie-ism bordering on dangerous incompetence, none have ever uttered an unkind word (to my face).

I logged in to hear my corpmates talking about getting together to harass the Caldari. Being Gallente, it’s what we do. We were all to fly Thorax cruisers fitted out a certain way. For them, this was like slumming, or riding kiddie bikes as a lark. For me, it’s cutting edge — I think a Thorax is the biggest ship I can fly at the moment.

Only, I didn’t have a Thorax — my last one got blown up real good some time ago. I asked how much it would cost me to fit out a Thorax the way the others had and learned it would cost roughly all the ISK I had.

So I told them I’d love to come along but that I had to bow out, since it would beggar me (and I assumed I’d almost certainly be killed). Without a moment’s hesitation, two players sent me enough money to buy the ship and equipment two times over.

Surprised and embarrassed by the generosity, I set about buying things, only to realize I didn’t have the skills to use all of this advanced gear, so I downgraded. After streaking between systems, I finally had a fully-equipped Thorax, loaded for bear. Sort of. More on that later.

We all hopped on Teamspeak, rallied up, and proceeded to prowl through contested systems and Caldari space, looking for trouble. I didn’t know where I was or where I was going; I was just following our leader’s command. Our scout tried tracking a group, but lost it. This went on for a while with, sadly, no violence, when finally it was time for me to sign off so I could get food for the family.

“You should head back to Villore using the Abune pipe,” one person helpfully said. Well, of COURSE I’m using the Abune pipe. What, do you think I’m stupid? I’m sure not going to ask you just what the blazes the Abune pipe is, since I’ve never heard of it before in my life. In fact, until I did a search on the star map I wasn’t even sure Abune was a solar system. But I won’t say so, no, sir. So I set my autopilot to Abune, which was several jumps away, and went to warp. A few seconds after I sped off, a shocked voice on Teamspeak said: “Did that guy just warp to [system I can't remember]?”

“Uhhh…”

So yes, I went the wrong way. Trying to save face, I lamely replied, “Yeah, I took a wrong turn.”

“I’d say so.”

I didn’t have much chance to wonder why, because I came out of warp in the midst of a squadron of suddenly hostile Caldari Navy ships. Ah.

Our fleet leader calmly told me to turn my butt around, warp to a planet — any planet — and land. Huh, we can land on planets now? OK. Then, I was to undock, warp back to the fleet, and get my crap together. This all sounded strange, but the Caldari were cheerfully tearing into my shields, so I frantically plotted a course to what I thought was a planet — and warped to a Caldari station.

Whoops, OK, that wasn’t a planet. But! I see a planet, right there in the distance. It’s a big, round, planetary-looking thing. So, I warped to it. Where I found a Caldari Navy ship waiting for me. It welcomed me into its territory in the only way it knew how. I think my shields were gone at this point, and my armor was dropping fast. I hit the context menu for the planet — and didn’t find any option for landing. I could open the planet view, sure, but I was still technically in space, since I could hear my ship being torn apart. Hrm.

My fleet leader checked in. “Uh, how’s it going?”

“Um…. one sec. … Yeah, I just died.”

By this point I was feeling incredibly silly.

The fleet leader gently pointed out that this was a good reason why you should never warp to X jump gate. The others expressed their agreement.

I acted very casual about the whole episode. No biggie. I made my goodbyes and signed off so I could go do something I can actually accomplish without falling down — which was ordering carryout from Pizza Hut.

It was only later that I realized I’d never loaded my weapons with ammo.

More Mass Effect thoughts

Just random items I thought of. Pretend like it’s three years ago and these things are still fresh.

• The Citadel, the seat of galactic power, is a gargantuan, state-of-the-art space station which is so advanced that even its most learned inhabitants don’t fully understand its mechanics. And yet, it still has slow-arse elevators with cheesy music. I understand this was tied into loading into new zones, which was a small matter on my PC, but apparently rather onerous in the original Xbox version.
• I played a soldier. Soldiers shoot things, making them fall down, bang bang. While you can hold your own with basic decryption and electronics tasks, there comes a point late in the game when you can’t open certain things. I doubt they’re mission critical since I was able to finish the game, but it was frustrating, in an OCD-like way, to have to skip things, and be taunted with “too hard for joo, knuckle-dragger” messages. You have teammates with much greater skills in such things. I’d like to order one of these punks to open something for me.
• When you leave your ship, you typically leave with two squad members, and no more. The rest of your team is benched. Even for the most high-octane, apocalyptic, larger scale battles, when you’d think you’d want to pull out all the stops, you are part of a three-person team. What are the others doing? Are they getting quietly drunk in the mess?
• Once again, journalists are made out to be crass, pushy twerps — with one surprising exception. I’m so unused to seeing a journalist being portrayed in a sympathetic light that I took her quest/mission/thing without hesitation. I would’ve directed my character to do a nude photo shoot if the option had existed.
• In Flux’s casino, did anyone bother playing Quasar or Pulsar or whatever it’s called to make actual money?
• The National Football League apparently diversifies at some point in the future and goes into the business of designing combat armor. Sadly, I never found a purple and yellow option.

The effect of mass

Meanwhile, in other news, I just finished playing through Mass Effect for the first time. I’ve been aware of Mass Effect, of course. After the release of the first game, and the sequel, I’d be peppered with tiny Mass Effect arrows while strolling through gaming sites. I remained, for whatever reason, impervious. Then Steam fired a ballista bolt at me with its one-day sale on both games, and this time the shot stuck.

And so, I lost many hours of free time, and I don’t regret it. It’s been a while since I’ve played through a true, full-fledged single-player RPG. This isn’t the RPG-lite in which you merely assign skill points and manage your inventory of gear in between firefights, it’s the real deal.

It’s a talky game. There were several moments in which I remarked “Good lord, these NPCs never shut the hell up,” but I quickly got sucked back into the story. As for the morality of my character’s decisions, I stayed true to form and took the “Paragon” route rather than “Renegade,” though there sure were moments when I wanted to say screw it, let’s just blast them all into little bits. Some of the calls you have to make are nicely ambiguous, and leave you wondering, “THAT was the right thing to do? Huh.”

There’s some great voice acting, though it’s not all top-grade. My geeky parts were tickled when I recognized some familiar voices — Marina Sirtis and Lance Henriksen, to name a couple.

Prior to getting the game, I was aware of the mini-controversy surrounding the sex scene. I viewed it as merely another entry to the long list of mainstream bottom-feeders freaking out over things about which they know nothing.

There is, indeed, a sex scene toward the end of the game. It is brief, it is suggestive rather than explicit, and you’ll see saucier stuff in your average prime time drama. You know it’s a sex scene because there’s suddenly kissing, and you see quick cuts of bare skin, and after it’s over the participants are smirking knowingly at each other. Also, it is optional. It’s up to you whether you choose to pursue intimacy. This is a real RPG, after all.

Also, it appears that in the future, most humans have Canadian accents.

I’ve always been fond of Bioware, ever since I played Baldur’s Gate. Like Blizzard, they rarely take a misstep (at least in my experience). And God help me, I bought Dragon Age: Origins and its expansion through Steam, too. I’ve been glancing at coverage of Star Wars: The Old Republic. I haven’t paid too close attention because I am, frankly, terrified of getting sucked into yet another MMO. There’s a good chance I’ll be grabbed by its gravitational pull, though.

Small Saurian spy invades Cryptic HQ

Joe Blancato at Cryptic reports via Twitter on a guest appearance at their offices.

“Taking office lizard as a sign to get an auto insurance quote. Also as a sign to get a pet lizard for the office.”

“Office lizard. I shall call him Larry. http://twitpic.com/1zcd6n“

“Just found a lizard in the office. He’s chillin’ out with some sunglasses on. Cool lizard.”

1. Taking office lizard as a sign to get an auto insurance quote. Also as a sign to get a pet lizard for the office. 13 minutes ago via Seesmic
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2. Office lizard. I shall call him Larry. http://twitpic.com/1zcd6n 19 minutes ago via Twitter for Android

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3. Just found a lizard in the office. He’s chillin’ out with some sunglasses on. Cool lizard.

Play Ultima now, my lord

EA just announced the launch of “Lord of Ultima,” a free browser-based strategy “MMO” along the lines of… well… Evony and its ilk.

I played Ultima games from the time I was in elementary school all the way through Ultima Online. As far as I can tell, Lord of Ultima is sorta-kinda set in the Ultima universe, though in some future/past/alternate timeline. At any rate, it appears to involve building cities, defenses and armies, which you then send off to pillage and plunder. Evidently Lord British finally said heck with it, and has scarpered.

Still, it’s sort of Ultima, and these types of games can be reasonably engaging, so WHA-HA-HAAH, it looks like –

OK, so… OK. At least it’s not run by some sort of shadowy group with questionable ties and even more questionable taste in marketing. And there aren’t huge-breasted strumpets lounging about in their undies enticing you to play Lord of Ultima, right?

Oh, seriously? Was that really necessary? Is this parody? Steady, steady now. You guys are ju-uuust about at the line. See that line in front of you? Yeah, that line. Don’t go across that.

Let’s say for the sake of argument that this is a decent game, for what it is (I haven’t tried it yet, though I probably will). It’d be nice to have a “legit” alternative to Evony which leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

Damn, WoW, you scary!

So let me see if I have this right. Blizzard makes a mount available for sale for real cash-bucks. Early estimates indicate roughly 400,000 people bought one. That’s about 3.6 percent of WoW’s 11 million subscribers worldwide.

As a matter of scale that may seem like a pittance. Less than 4 percent of WoW subscribers bought the mount. But then, you figure in the price.

The celestial steed is $25. Multiply that by 400,000 people and you get… $10 million.

Um, Jesus?

Only a small minority of WoW players have bought the mount, but despite that, Blizzard brought in $10 million in gross sales. Gee, do you think that qualifies as a good return on an investment of time and manpower?

Disclaimer: I am in no way an expert statistical analyst, and I’m using anecdotal information. Responsible blogging!

Naturally, this has caused a ruckus, though it has merely added to the already growing hubbub over buying in-game items with real money.

In essence, the debate goes something like this:

Grumpy Player: I already pay a recurring subscription fee, which is supposed to give me access to everything the game provides. Why should I have to pay real money for in-game things, and why isn’t there an in-game manner in which I can earn these items?

Developer: You don’t have to pay for any of it. These are optional, cosmetic items and features. You can still enjoy the game to its fullest without them. You don’t need them, we’re just offering you the chance to get some extra shinies you might like.

Grumpy Player: But I’m already paying money to you. I don’t want to pay you more. You’re nickel and diming us to death!

Developer: We’re not holding a gun to your head. If you object to having to pay for these items, the best thing you can do is not buy them.

Grumpy Player: Angry! Mongo smash!

I am not opposed to these stores. Heck, in City of Heroes, I’ve bought almost all the booster packs, which provide silly new emotes, silly new costume pieces, and silly new powers, because I thought they were cool. Not a single pack provided me with an “I Win” button. I bought them because I wanted to, not because I felt I had to.

Do these purchased powers provide you with an advantage? Well, strictly speaking, sure. Even if it’s just a weenie power, it’s still a power you have that others don’t, and you usually can’t earn these new things strictly within the game.

Are developers and publishers looking for more ways to make money off their games? Of course they are. Is it just a bald-faced money grab? That depends on your point of view. The powers that be can do almost anything they want with their games. How their playerbase reacts is another matter entirely.

Does the rise of these stores bode ill for the quality of the games themselves? It doesn’t have to, but there’s a risk. I’ve seen a fair number of posts from WoW players who are drawing lines in the sand. They say that as soon as actual character gear is offered for sale, they’ll cancel their accounts.

The game makers need to walk a very delicate line between offering items of sufficient appeal that don’t offer unfair advantages to those who won’t (or can’t afford to) buy them. So far, I haven’t encountered any examples of that line being crossed, and I hope it stays that way.

Ultra Mode brings dynamic sewage reflections

A friend of mine found the best way to describe Issue 17‘s Ultra Mode: Evolutionary, but not revolutionary.

I couldn’t have put it better myself. It’s a definite improvement, but it isn’t going to blow you out of your chair or cause you to achieve nirvana and expire. Many of the improvements are so subtle that you’re hard-pressed to spot them, but the overall effect is a more attractive gaming experience.

Yes, there are more detailed shadows — more shadows period. The water reflection effects are very nice. I don’t say “wow” in sewer missions that often anymore, but I did upon seeing the detailed reflections in the glistening… sewage. Mmm, dynamic sewage reflection. That was probably discarded as a major selling point.

There is a downside to Ultra Mode. By necessity, it demands more of your video card. That’s a given. Those of us who are used to running at near maxxed graphics settings may need to swallow our pride. I know I did. It appears my dual 9800 GTs in SLI mode aren’t up to the task of running Ultra Mode with all settings put to the wall. At least, not without what I consider an unacceptable hit to my frame rate.

So, the game will look the prettiest on high-end systems. Big shock, there. Issue 17 is, in many ways, setting us up for Going Rogue, and I’m very interested to see what graphical improvements will come with the big launch.

Speaking of the expansion, the two new mission arcs (levels 20-30, hero- and villain-side) are great fun. I won’t spoil the surprise, but you know things are going to get interesting when the first thing you hear from a new contact is basically: “Hello, nice to meet you. You’re under arrest.”

I haven’t messed with Demon Summoning or many of the other features Issue 17 brings. I did read that we’ll be able to carry up to seven missions instead of three, which is great.