Posts Tagged ‘patch’

Exclusive Interview: Heroes of Newerth 3.0 with MilkFat (Video)

8 April 2013 | No Comments » | iTZKooPA

Competition, it drives us humans something fierce. The desire to reign supreme over one another. To flex physical or neurological muscle in an effort to show one’s prowess. Tapping into this human emotion is a major driving force behind the success of the multiplayer online battle arena genre as a whole. It tends to work pretty well.

Heroes of Newerth is one of the games that takes full advantage of this inspirable notion. It certainly hooked Sam Braithwaite, better known by his profession eSports name ‘MilkFat.’ Now the Commissioner of eSports for S2 Games, Braithwaite was happy to discuss the game that brought him so much notoriety during PAX East 2013.

With the season finals going on in the background, Braithwaite details the latest patch for HoN. Focused on quality-of-life changes, including an all-new new player initiative, S2 Games believes HoN 3.0 will be more accessible and enjoyable for all. As MilkFat details, it’s only going to get better from here.

Absorb the full interview after the jump. Continue Reading

World of the Warplanes Latest Patch Adds New Maps, Aircraft

20 March 2013 | 1 Comment » | iTZKooPA

The latest update on the Overlord Blog gives players of World of Warplanes a lot to get excited for. Patch v0.4.1 for the flight combat strategy title from Wargaming.net will feature a shortlist of updates that are prone to excite. Two new maps, the addition of new premium aircraft, a reworked user interface, again, and “a nicely tuned joystick (finally)” are all part of the March patch.

The downside? The patch will come with a soft wipe/reset. Wargaming.net hasn’t revealed the full patch notes, so we’ll have to wait for further details.

Hit the jump for the latest screenshots of the Arctic and Harbour maps in addition to a nice gallery of fresh premium aircrafts. More as it comes. Continue Reading

SMITE Patch 0.1.1349 – Neith the Weaver of Fate, Removing Focus, and New Solo Practice

14 February 2013 | 1 Comment » | Mordil

Honestly, this week’s patch has been the first one I’ve been the most happy with since back in November.

Neith is one of the most balanced gods right at release – from what I’ve seen. She doesn’t do too much damage, and she’s about as easy to kill as other gods, even with all her utility. Focus is gone, with it’s somewhat clunky mechanic that was changed almost 3 times before being removed.

Along with Focus being removed, every god had a pass through by the designers to re-assign static values for stuns, slows, damage, speed increases, etc. that used to be scaled by Focus. The lengthy list is below, along with Neith’s God Reveal video, her abilities, and the generic balance changes.

Things of note to me were:

  • Hel’s abilities share half the CD time in both stances now (Her 1 in Healing Stance is used, both her Healing Stance and Damage Stance go on CD, with Damage Stance only being on CD for 1/2 the time)
  • Hercules’ “Earthbreaker” (knockback) ability had the length of its range reduced by about 10ft.
  • New Solo Practice Map for Arena: Ymir, Artemis, Ra, vs. Ymir, Artemis, and whomever you choose.
  • Advanced Tooltips have been added for abilities now.
  • and again, Focus has been removed.
Check out Neith’s reveal after the jump!

Continue Reading

Blizzard Ditches Team Deathmatch for PvP, Looks to Add Dueling to Diablo in Patch 1.0.7

28 December 2012 | No Comments » | pixiestixy

Blizzard will scrap its in-development PvP feature “Team Deathmatch,” but instead will release a dueling feature “soon” in the new year, Game Director Jay Wilson announced yesterday on the Diablo 3 blog. The PvP mode had been long in development and was showcased at previous BlizzCon events, but will not be released for a number of cited reasons.

“For us it comes to a few issues, one of which is depth.  Simply fighting each other with no other objectives or choices to make gets old relatively quickly…

Another is class balance. Like Diablo II, Diablo III was designed to be a PvE-first kind of game, where we never compromised on player abilities in the name of future PvP balance.  We want to be able to carry over as many of the crazy runes, items, and skills as possible, with their crazy effects, and alter them as little as possible. In a casual PvP mode, something equivalent to a WoW Battleground, this would be fine, but Team Deathmatch felt very hardcore, and it put a laser focus on class balance in a way that we didn’t think would be good for the game as a whole.

… It’s not up to the quality that Blizzard gamers expect or that we feel you deserve, and it doesn’t really fit with our goals for the rest of the game.” — Jay Wilson

Wilson said that the development team had the opportunity to fine-tune controls and combat model tuning throughout the development of Team Deathmatch, but that the team would be “exploring other options” for PvP instead. “We’re going to first be looking at new modes that play up to the strengths of the character classes, focus on objectives beyond just defeating other players, and possibly even integrate PvE elements and rewards,” Wilson said.

As for dueling, that feature is slated to be released in patch 1.0.7 in the new year. Further details on the patch have not yet been released but will be “very soon,” according to the dev blog.

 

Transmogrification and the Changing Face of WoW

7 December 2012 | No Comments » | pixiestixy

It’s something that I wished would happen in WoW for a very, very long time. That is, the option to modify the appearance of armor in some way or another. Last I wrote on this topic, the idea was but a dream that seemed, perhaps, just maybe, on the horizon.

Since then, transmogrification has become a force that drives many of us players who like to collect. And earlier this week, we learned via community manager Zarhym’s Twitter account that by Patch 5.2, transmogrification may become less restrictive in terms of allowing similar weapon types to be transmogrified. Here were his exact words:

.@iizeppii Removing main-hand/off-hand Xmog restrictions maybe by 5.2. Also allowing Xmog of weaps w/ similar anims (2H axe/2H sword, etc).

Continue Reading

The Balance Between Endgame Boredom and Burnout: Is there such a thing as too much content?

30 November 2012 | 1 Comment » | pixiestixy

It’s been a delicate line on which Blizzard has tread since World of Warcraft began eight years ago, and one that seems to have reached a tipping point more so with Mists of Pandaria than in previous expansions. I’m talking about endgame content. In years past, it seemed that Blizzard couldn’t create content fast enough. By the time the next patch would come, the hardcore players were completely ready, having already grinded out everything that had been thrown at them… and then grinded it out again and again on their alts.

The addition of account-wide achievements in MoP may have alleviated that process a bit, but even those who weren’t ferocious altaholics would be yearning for that new little bit of action that would come with the release of the next patch.

And that anticipation certainly is still there. Just as in previous expansions, WoW players far and wide were getting hyped for the release of Patch 5.1 that came on Tuesday. There was discussion on various drafts of the patch notes, then of course rounds of cheers and complaints from PvPers on how class balance is or isn’t being maintained, and a rush to hit the servers as soon as they came back up.

But lately I’ve been seeing discussion among players that is a complete 180 — allegations of too much content. And although my personal opinion is that you can never have too much content, I can see where they’re coming from. Continue Reading

Hi-Rez Studios Offers Media Sneak Peak of Domination Game Mode – My Feelings & Impressions

20 November 2012 | 1 Comment » | Mordil

Today, Hi-Rez offered Lore Hound a special VIP sneak peak of its next game mode to be implemented, Domination.

Honestly, they’ve done it again when it comes to the environment. With a heavy Egyptian influence, Anhur should feel right at home among the obelisks.

Granted, I do have that Egyptian mythology and architecture bias…

The new map features various pathways through rock heads, leading to sand piles with genie sand dunes as the “towers” with creep running in the three lanes to assist the gods. With tight corners, and high walls, escapes are not easily made with ganking being commonplace with lots of blood on the rock walls.

The game starts out with the 3 towers neutral to both sides, and 400 points on the counter for both teams. As teams kill the genie, then proceed to stand on the sand dune to capture it – spawning their own genie to defend in the mean time – will tick away points from the opposing team at a set time interval.

Gods start out with 1,500 gold, and at level 3; just like in Arena. Exp is gained through normal Conquest means, with gold income being faster than Conquest, but slower than Arena. Hi-Rez has managed to effectively produce an in-between mode between Arena & Conquest.

Click the jump to get my impressions on the game mode in the two short matches I played in (OK, they were about 25-30 minutes long each, but still!) Continue Reading

SMITE Welcomes Freya With Latest Patch (v0.1.1113.1)

18 October 2012 | No Comments » | iTZKooPA

Teased a scant few days ago during a TwitchTV stream, the norse goddess Freya has entered the battlefield. Hi-Rez Studios didn’t bother with any confusion for the goddess. Firmly declaring her as the Queen of the Valkyries. Scholars aren’t in complete agreement with such a title. We’ll save the lore discussion for the appropriate column and dive right into the latest patch that introduces Freya to SMITE.

Patch v0.1.1113.1 is relatively slim compared to numerous other patches. That being said, it introduces a new god, complete with a purchaseable skin. Ymir sees another awesome skin added to his closet, while Guan Yu player’s are awarded their first, although non-epic, skin to chose from.

The addition leaves Hel as the only character without a purchaseable skin.

In the quality of life department, key bindings are working as you would expect them to in most situations. Gameplay-wise, there are two changes to be aware of. First, the ward system has been addressed. Players are no longer able to easily detect wards with various abilities. Second, Hi-Rez has introduced a pair of new abilities – Structural Invulnerability and Intensify Defense – aimed at increasing tower survivability. They’ll dramatically alter tower diving and lane pushing.

The removal of slow on Cupid’s Heart Bomb is a pretty substantial nerf to the Goddess of Love. Otherwise, it was just Ares receiving a small mana buff thanks to a second shot of Shackles no longer consuming mana.

Hit the jump for the full patch notes. Continue Reading