The commercial release of Atlantica Online in Germany is an important milestone, as all the bugs have been fixed and the full version of Atlantica is entirely localized in German. Additionally, the new Item Mall offers all the essentials for brave adventurers; be it items to personalize their characters, various usability enhancements or just improvements for their magical arsenal – there will be something for every Atlantian in Germany who has been curious about the American Item Mall.

“The beta period in Germany gave us great insight into what the German audience wanted, which allowed us to fully optimize and localize the game,” said SeongWon Cho, CEO of Ndoors Coporation. “Atlantica was very well received, and we cannot wait to share the game with a large new group of players.”

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Archlord had previously been operated in North America and Europe by Codemasters Online.

To accommodate the former Archlord players from Codemasters, players can pre-register to apply for their account to be transferred to Webzen. Players will also receive free in-game gifts.

“The service territory expansion and the account transfer from Codemasters will create a user-friendly environment for Archlord. We expect to see a significant increase of new users as well as the overall improvement of Webzen.com business,” said Chang Keun Kim, chief executive officer of Webzen.

Webzen will also provide the next content update, featuring the new Swashbuckler character class: a close range female combatant, armed with a pair of swords.

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“In the next major content update, we introduce a brand new dungeon heavily influenced by the great, yet troubled Post-Impressionist artist, Vincent Van Gogh (be forewarned though, it will contain some spoilers). And it is the tragic-hero nature of his curious, yet influential life that we want to share with our players, not only because it makes great content, but because it also adds to the plethora of historical events in Atlantica Online. While a lot of the quests have been historical fiction thus far, much of the events in this dungeon are based on actual occurrences—like his letters to his brother Theo, as a matter of fact. So it is a very different approach as players will find themselves learning about an influential figure through an uncommon medium.”

A dungeon based on true life events of the painter sounds like a great idea. Atlantica is already full of historical and geographic information. And now this? Maybe this is a cue for more games to follow suit. We’ve had enough of “educational” games that are just plain horrible. Integrating real history and educational content into a game so flawlessly might be the best next step.

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As the Codemasters license agreement of Archlord in North America and Europe ended, the global Archlord servers are now hosted by Webzen . Consequently, all users around the globe except from Korea, Japan.

To accommodate the former Archlord players from Codemasters, Webzen will provide the service to transfer previously activated accounts within this month. Starting from October 8, players can pre-register to apply for the account transfer and receive free in-game gifts.

Also, Webzen is providing the next content update featuring the new character class “Swashbuckler”. The new character, a close range female combatant, armed with a pair of swords to inflict great damage, is the premier introduction among western countries.

Webzen has arranged many in-game events to celebrate and welcome new players. Starting from October 3, all Archlord users will be able to transform and experience the new character using “Swashbuckler metamorphosis potion”. Also, Webzen plans to give away many more Cash Items for free through in-game events.

Meanwhile, Webzen will launch ‘Soul of the Ultimate Nation (S.U.N)’ in this coming October. The official website of S.U.N is already available for pre-registration.

Webzen has also announced that the recent marketing efforts of MU Online, is showing a strong indicating figure in growth of South American players, bringing back many dormant users

“The service territory expansion and the account transfer from Codemasters will create a user-friendly environment for Archlord. We expect to see a significant increase of new users as well as the overall improvement of Webzen.COM business. Furthermore, the update such as introducing ‘Swashbuckler’ indicates our commitment towards the success of the game. ” said Chang Keun Kim, the chief executive officer of Webzen.

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El cierre de los servidores europeos se producirá el día 2 de octubre, y Webzen la encargada coreana de mantenerlos los abrirá al día siguiente con un traslado directo de personajes, cuentas y características de los antiguos a los nuevos.

Esta maniobra terminar por fulminar la práctica totalidad de MMOs de la compañía, que dejará únicamente en Europa Lord of the Rings Online y Dungeons & Dragons Online.

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Een vrolijke Ier met de naam Jamie neemt plaats aan een tafeltje met een laptop erop en vertelt wat over de achtergrond van Allods Online. Na het opstarten van de game is direct te merken dat ’t niet om zomaar een gratis MMO gaat. De makers, Astrum Nival, hebben duidelijk erg veel werk gestoken in het vormgeven van het spel. De grafische stijl deed me direct denken aan World of Warcraft, al moet ik bekennen dat ik Allods mooier vind. De kleuren zijn wat scherper en de stijl is net wat leuker doordat het naast een fantasy-sausje ook veel sciencefictioninvloeden heeft.

Allods Online speelt zich af in de spelwereld The Astral Space. Dit is een grote ruimtewereld bestaande uit verschillende eilandjes. Deze stukken land komen van de planeet Samaut, die door een explosie uit elkaar is gesprongen. Het is de bedoeling om een schip te bouwen, dat vol te krijgen met minimaal vier en maximaal negentien andere spelers en vervolgens met dat schip The Astral Space te gaan verkennen. Op zo’n schip kan de speler fungeren als Captain, Navigator, Helmsman, Engineer of Cannoneer. Elk is erg belangrijk op zijn eigen manier. Zo moet de Engineer schilden repareren, de Cannoneer schieten op vijanden en moet de Navigator een koers uitstippelen voor het schip.

 
Terwijl spelers door de ruimte reizen is er grote kans dat er vijanden op diens pad komen. Dat kunnen één van de driehonderd verschillende wezens zijn of simpelweg een vijandig schip. In een strijd is het belangrijk dat de Engineer goed zijn werk doet. Elk schip heeft vier schilden. Wanneer die naar de Filistijnen zijn, kan er ingebroken worden in het schip. In dat schip zullen dan weer gevechten plaatsvinden tussen jou en het binnenvallend gespuis. En uiteraard gaat dit gepaard met melee-, ranged- en magic-aanvallen zoals we wel van meer games kennen.

In de game zijn welgeteld twee facties: League en Empire, die worden aangeduid met de kleuren rood en blauw. Hoe deze precies in het verhaal passen, werd me niet geheel duidelijk, maar gelukkig wees Jamie me erop dat op de website van de makers een uitgebreide documentatie over de spelwereld is terug te vinden. Jullie moeten me even vergeven dat ik nog niet alle dertig pagina’s heb doorgelezen. Wat ik nog wel meekreeg van het verhaal was het volgende: elk personage dient uit te vogelen waarom de planeet Samaut nu precies tot ontploffing is gekomen, en er zijn blijkbaar meer dan vijftienhonderd quests nodig om hierachter te komen.

Al met al ben ik onder de indruk van Allods Online. Het ziet er fantastisch uit, de gameplay belooft een hoop goeds en er lijkt meer dan genoeg content te zijn voor de game. Nergens kreeg ik het gevoel te kijken naar een gratis rip-off van World of Warcraft of iets in die richting. De game doet zijn eigen ding en is een goed voorbeeld hoe het ook kan. Dit is een MMO om in de gaten te houden.

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‘Ben X’ is directed by Nic Balthazar. It tells the story of Ben, a teenager with a specific form of autism known as Asperger’s Syndrome. Ben spends much of his free time playing an online computer fantasy game called ArchLord where he feels at home. Ben feels like a hero when he plays his game and it allows for him to live a sort of second, more fulfilling life. Unfortunately, when Ben is not in the comfort of his home he finds himself repeatedly picked on and bullied. The other students at school harass and terrorize him for “being” different and Ben’s inability to interact with them socially makes it difficult for him to peacefully defend himself.

The thing that no one else realizes, including his distressed mother, is that Ben yearns to live a normal life. Not necessarily one without his autism, but one where he’s not abused on a daily basis. Ben has been carrying on a meaningful relationship with a fellow gamer called Scarlite, with whom he plays ArchLord with. The two of them live out their relationship online through their characters, until Scarlite decides she wants to meet Ben in person. When they do finally meet, Ben cannot force himself to seal the deal and he risks losing her forever. In addition, Ben’s curiosity about death and suicide begin to take a stronger hold on his life, tempting him with a fail-safe solution to his life of peer-induced misery. Ben will ultimately make a powerful decision about his life that will affect everyone in his life.

‘Ben X’ takes the audience on a stomach-churning tour of his life. Balthazar manages to reinforce the unsettling story with unstable camera techniques and jarring motion to keep the audience from getting too comfortable. Watching the film is an experience of being an uneasy witness and a moth drawn to light all at once. Throughout the film, Ben imagines himself as his hero character from ArchLord as a way to help him cope with the stress of his life and Balthazar utilizes the CG special FX with great effectiveness in this way. ‘Ben X’ is an amazing film with a superb story and a powerful message about the state of our teenage culture towards a growing population with autism. This is a film that is beneficial to all, but should resonate strongly with the teenage crowd and hopefully impact them in a positive way. I strongly suggest this film to everyone!

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This patch will adjust the location that ArchLord looks at to connect to the patch server and game servers from an IP to a domain name. If you do not run this patch you will be unable to connect to the game servers after the data centre move on 24th November.
Important ArchLord Patch

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Designed to give readers a more informal look into the behind-the-scenes goings on at Codemasters, the community Blog sports entries from every member of the ever-expanding team headed up by “Satine”.

With subjects ranging from what you’d expect – games and the gaming industry – to the unexpected – beauty products and ice cream – what you can be certain of is never knowing exactly what will be on the agenda for discussion. Exclusive news and tidbits will also find their way onto the Blog first so be sure to check daily for snippets of exciting news.

Readers are encouraged to participate by leaving comments, joining in with the ad hoc contests and voting on the polls.

See you there!
maycontaingamers.com

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Unfortunately, that contest wasn’t the only thing that didn’t turn out well. Archlord, at best, is a mediocre MMORPG that brings nothing new to the table, other than it’s Archlord system which has already fell flat on its face once.

Character creation is a simple thing, really. Pick from 3 races, and a hand full of classes such as the staple Knight, Hunter, Archer, Berserker, etc etc…. Gender is based on class type, and of course classes are race specific. Customization of your avatar is also disappointing, as a lot of the choices are bland and you don’t have access to all options in the creation process. Once you get in game though, you can opt to pay for haircut, color and face changes at the stylist in town, which is an idea I always have liked and am glad to actually see in game.

Combat is nothing special. It’s your standard fare hack and slash, click to use skills, skill points at level up affair. Skills are level and class based, meaning you get one skill point a level, and are limited to not only just what skills you can use at that level, but also how many points you can have in them. For example, early in your career, you will find yourself walking around with a couple extra skill points pooled that you can’t use. Your skills have as many points in them as they can have, and yet no new skills have opened up for you to spend your newly earned skill points on.

Graphics are also nothing to gasp at, although I wouldn’t go so far as to say they are terrible. They meet the needs of the client though, and run pretty well even on aging systems like mine. The music is decent, but sound effects on the other hand got so repetitive that I had to my sound down fairly early.

Leveling is also very standard, with your groups of mobs to mow through, with random “elite” type mobs in camps. And the quest system also consist of a lot of go here kill, fetch repeat quests. One of the things that usually make those manageable, to me at least, is interesting story or narrative to go with the quests, but nothing ever really grabbed my attention enough ever really make them more than a bore.

PvP is something that is an integral part to the treadmill of the game, especially with it’s Archlord system, but honestly I didn’t have a chance to partake in it. The reason for that is, is that I just could not get past a lot of flaws in the PvE game, which is nesscary to get the levels needed to participate in the PvP game. This to me is a glaring issue. The only people who are going to be participating in PvP in its seige forms, are people that can manage to look past the games flaws and stick with it to the end.

All in all, Archlord was a disappointment to me. Before you even say it, I realize that Archlord is now on a Free 2 Play(F2P) model now. But even on that model, I don’t think the game is one that I would rank up there as one of the few good F2P games. It just didn’t pull me in as a lot of other F2P games have actually managed to do, and you can’t even compare it to most of the Western developed Pay to Play games.

Score: 2.0/5.0
Recommendation: It’s your basic F2P model type game, but it’s more boring than average grinding result in a game that is just not worth the time invested unless you are into hardcore PvP and the Archlord system. If you are one of those gamers, and can get passed the flaws of the title, you may find some enjoyment within the game world.

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