One of the few MMO’s the MMOBox team haven’t actually fondled in some way, shape or form over the years is NCsoft’s City of Heroes. Announcing the game’s first major expansion since City of Villains way back in 2005. Going Rogue will be a new experience for CoH players introducing the ‘mirror universe’ of Praetoria and an all-new alignment system that blurs the lines between Heroes and Villains.

Heroes can go astray and become Villains and Villains can see the light and walk down the path to become Heroes. Watch out DC Universe and Champions Online,  it looks like CoH is back on form.

Be sure to check out this handy FAQ.

Blizzard revealed that Grunty, the Space Marine Murloc, will be one of the giveaways in the BlizzCon 2009 goody bag. Can’t get yourself to BlizzCon this year? Then don’t fret as those who purchase the DirecTV pay-per-view will also receive a redemption code for your little pew-pew Space Marine buddy.

Tickets for BlizzCon go on sale May 16.

It is my hope that with persistence, a new team and a mixture of blood sweat and tears we can get things going again.  All being well with a new look and new personality to boot!

I hope you all stay tuned for the coming weeks as MMOBox and The 3G’s come back to life!

EVE Online patch, Quantum Rise 1.0.5 will be released as of Tuesday 27th January. It has been confirmed that the downtime has been scheduled to begin at 11.00 GMT and will run until 12.15 GMT.

The patch, as well as releasing some lovely bug fixes, will also introduce the new Redeeming System, of which details can be found here.

Fixes have also been confirmed as the following:

• Fixed an error in the model preload system. This was causing some slight performance degradation on premium clients being run in classic mode.
• Removed an outdated DirectX check from the client.
• Updated the clients patching mechanism to handle very large files and patches correctly.

I don’t know about you guys, but these days, I don’t seem to last more than 15 seconds in any Arena before I am sucking the dirt through my well pummelled “what used to be where my face was” mouth.  Since Wrath the forums have been plagued with post after post about balance issue after issue.

Earlier this morning a blue post has appeared to inform the Arena loving public that a 45 minute time limit has now been added to all Arenas.  45 minutes I hear you say.  I did have to swallow that hard myself too, but when you consider that a 13 hour 2v2 match has been documented between a Druid/Warrior and a Warlock/Pala team (the latter of whom took home the win), I guess the time limit was bound to come some day.

Blizzard have confirmed that where the 45 minute limit is met with no win, both teams will receive a 16 arena rating point penalty.  I can see the incentive to not stall here, but on the other hand I can imagine the frustration of being penalised for a genuine stalemate situation.

Either way, while this has gone live it shout be noted that the rating loss is currently bugged and will be displayed as a draw for both teams, but you will be loosing your points.  This will be resolved in an upcoming patch.

For those seeking Arena tips to beat the timer, I leave you with a little pre-arena prep talk created for my guildie Reira from our wonderful GM Cheboo!

The Notes for the game update for Thursday 8th of January are now available.  We can confirm that the following changes have been made:

Updated Zaishen Rewards:

• Updated the Zaishen Chest drops to replace the Abominable Tonic with a new tonic for the month of January.

Automated Tournaments:

• Updated Automated Tournament map rotations

Skill updates:

PvE and PvP:

Assassin:

• Palm Strike: decreased Crippled duration to 1/5 seconds; decreased damage to 10/65.

Bug Fixes:

• Fixed a bug that prevented some Item Spells from executing their drop effect at the end of their held duration.

Miscellaneous:

• Xunlai Tournament Agents now offer prizes for the December tournament.  These agents can be found in the Great Temple of Balthazar, Lion’s Arch, Kaineng Center, and Kamaden.

It appears that the wonderful people over at Cryptic Studios have released a few more screenshots of their upcoming release, Star Trek Online to stir the frenzy amongst the eagerly awaiting fans.

With a release date expected in Autumn 2009 , I do have to admit to being tempted to give it a try (even though I cant admit to being a Trekkie; I leave that to Liam who will no doubt report on the game later in the year once he sinks his teeth into it).  The screenshots are indeed impressive, and I hope you enjoy the glimpse!

]]> http://www.mmobox.co.uk/2009/01/09/new-screenshots-released-for-star-trek-online/feed/ http://www.mmobox.co.uk/2009/01/09/expansion-release-date-announced-for-eve-onlineapocrypha/ http://www.mmobox.co.uk/2009/01/09/expansion-release-date-announced-for-eve-onlineapocrypha/#comments Fri, 09 Jan 2009 01:33:00 +0000 Laressa http://www.mmobox.co.uk/?p=571

Its official! EVE Online have today announced the launch of the games 10^th free expansion. It has been confirmed that the release date for EVE Online: Apocrypha will indeed be March 10^th, 2009. The official press release details:

The fabric of space itself will be transformed as vast, unpredictable wormholes open to connect previously unexplored regions of the universe to the stars of New Eden. The seeds of advanced new technology await inside of these cosmic anomalies for those brave enough to explore them. This infusion of technology will enable production of the most dynamic vessels ever – Tech 3 modular ships with an astounding amount of customizability that can fill any role from skirmish muscle to industrial support.

Furthermore, NPC agents in EVE Online: Apocrypha will be authorized to assign Epic Mission Arcs to the pilots of New Eden. These branching, far-reaching mission strings are full of meaningful stories and more intelligent and deadly adversaries.

In addition, we are offering an entirely reworked New Player Experience for those joining (or rejoining) the game – giving them better insight into how to thrive in a truly limitless universe. We’ve already launched EVElopedia—a great repository for information on all things EVE where our players are also building their own living history of the previous five years of Alliance warfare, political intrigue and nostalgic recollection.

With 250′000 subscribers to the game it will be interesting to see if this next instalment will tickle the taste buds of fresh fans or simply tantalise the current player base. However, the expansion will hit the stores in March with the option for existing subscribers to download from the this location. Happy flying!

Following up on our story yesterday regarding the stability issues servers are facing when fortress battles are being waged in Warhammer Online, Mythic/GOA have released an update on the situation.

The Mythic dev team will be implementing a cap on the total number of players that are able to occupy the Fortress area during a siege. They say that this will improve server stability, and allow even more players to participate in, and benefit from, capital city sieges. When the population of that area reaches as of yet unspecified levels, players that are Rank 35 and below will be teleported to the warcamp for the region they are in. When the population reaches another threshold, again, unspecified,  players that are Rank 37 and below will be teleported to the warcamp when trying to enter the area. Finally, when yet another unspecified population threshold is reached, only players of Rank 39 will be able to enter the zone.

You can find a full copy of the update from Mythic after the break!

The epic battle between the forces of Order and Destruction rages on across the lands. Dark Elf against High Elf, Dwarfs pitted against their age old enemy the Greenskins, and the upstart Humans of Order wage a bitter battle against the Forces of Chaos.

Sometimes epic warfare is halted by the powerful forces of server instability. The Mythic DEV team is fighting a WAR of our own against these Fortress Siege stability issues and is now prepared to take the next step towards the long-term goal of providing our players with a truly epic Tier 4 Campaign. They will be implementing more improvements in the coming weeks however this initial change will allow more players to experience the Tier 4 campaign to its fullest and we will bring them to the European servers as soon as we have them.

There is going to be a change to the way the Tier 4 Racial Pairing Fortress sieges function. We will be implementing a hard cap on the total number of players that are able to occupy the Fortress area during a siege. The purpose of this change is twofold: to improve server stability, and allow even more players to participate in, and benefit from, capital city sieges.

When the Fortress population reaches certain population thresholds, players who are attempting to enter the area of the besieged Fortress that are Rank 35 and below will be teleported to the warcamp for the region they are in. When the next area population threshold has been met, players that are Rank 37 and below will be teleported to the warcamp when trying to enter the area. The final population threshold applies to players that are Rank 39 and below. Once the total population cap has been met for the area surrounding the Fortress, all players that attempt to enter the area will be teleported back to the region’s warcamp.
Please note that your character will stay in the fortress area no matter which level he has if he entered it before the thresholds applied.

It’s very important to note that the majority our players’ Fortress siege experience should not be noticeably affected by this change. Hundreds of players will still be able to participate in taking the Fortress from their enemies. This measure will help to ensure that players are able to experience these epic battles in a more reliable manner.

Because of the strategic advantage that players will always have when defending a Fortress, the attacking forces will have a numeric advantage when attempting to wrest control of a Fortress from the opposing realm.

So get out there, lay waste to your enemies, drive their forces before you on the field of battle and be sure to choose your allies wisely.

Courtesy of Thistlewood, The Sha'tar

It appears that Blizzard are keen to fix some of the annoying bugs that have been plaguing us since the last patch. After reviewing the updated PTR 3.0.8 notes there are some interesting changes being made while a vast number of current problems are also being fixed. Go Blizzard! Hopefully the fixes wont generate a whole new multitude of new ones though!

For those just wanting to peruse the new changes, you can view the amendments here.

However for those of you that would like to spend half your day reading the full list of patch notes, you can find these at this location. Enjoy.