Gamescom 2012

**This thread contains information, stories, and updates, from Gamescom 2012**

Wargaming.net teases World of Warplanes CG trailer



Wargaming.net has released a new CG trailer for its forthcoming World of Warplanes title. If you're an aviation buff, or you simply like sleek machines and big explosions, the clip is pure porn that runs for just over a minute.

While there's no gameplay footage, we do get to see a good representation of all the different aircraft up for grabs in the game. Everything from World War II stalwarts like the P-51 Mustang and Messerschmitt Bf-109 to Korean War birds like the F-86 are on display. There's even a glimpse of some World War I-era hardware. See for yourself after the break.



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Gamescom 2012: DayZ stand-alone to have instanced building



Rock, Paper Shotgun caught up with Arma II modder Dean Hall at this week's Gamescom. The braaaaains behind the zombie-centric DayZ mod revealed that player-driven construction is in the works for the mod's eventual stand-alone client.

Hall says that the feature will probably take the form of underground bases accessed via portals (think a grate in the ground). He's leaning toward having players dig out the space, pour concrete, set up hydroponics, and possibly even have the structure collapse around them if it's a particularly gruesome day.

DayZ's stand-alone client will also feature a revamped Chernarus that features more buildings you can actually enter as well as more detail and "entirely new areas."

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PlanetSide 2 available for hands-on play at Gamescom



Players who want to experience PlanetSide 2 but haven't received that coveted beta invite have two hours of opportunity to do so this week -- if they happen to be at Gamescom in Germany. Sony Online Entertainment announced that 48 game stations will be available at Booth #B-060j in the ESL CM Storm Arena (Hall for visitors to take part in battles with one another.

The game stations will be open for Planetside 2 play in four blocks of time stretched over two days: tomorrow, August 16th and Friday, August 17th. On both days the available times will be 11:45 a.m. - 12 :15 p.m CET (5:45 a.m. - 6:15 a.m. EDT) and 3:45 p.m. - 4:15 p.m. CET (9:45 a.m. - 10:15 a.m. EDT).

Additionally, on Thursday and Friday Creative Director Matt Higby will take the stage and present a brand new PlanetSide 2 trailer as well as deliver several game giveaways to those who attend.

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I wonder how it will be there. Hopefully not too many sweaty fatties but then this is a big event :/

End of Nations trailer spotlights customization



Whether they're sporting traditional or tie-dye or polka-dots, players meeting on the battlefield in End of Nations won't have to worry about blending in with the crowd thanks to the variety of customization options available in the Armory. Trion Worlds released a trailer at Gamescom 2012 showcasing some of these available customizations in the upcoming free-to-play MMORTS.

The customization in the Armory, however, goes beyond just a colorful outer shell; players also use this feature to set load outs, design and create companies, and modify units. Want different armaments? The Armory is where you get them.

Check out the variety of options as well as some in-game footage in the trailer after the break. And players interested in experiencing the feature for themselves can sign up for the beta on the official site.

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SOE reveals new PlanetSide 2 trailer



The last PlanetSide 2 trailer was a bit... eh, well, let's not beat around the bush. It was kinda cheesy. Thankfully Sony Online Entertainment has gotten back to what it does best with a rip-roaring romp through the battlefields of Auraxis courtesy of a new clip released at Gamescom.

Galaxies? Check. Ground armor? Check. Infantry, jetpack, and air-to-air combat? Check, check, and check. The new video hits all the sweet spots, so have a look-see after the break!



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Funcom teases The Secret World's New York raid with new screens



Funcom has let slip the first details of The Secret World's first raid at this week's Gamescom convention in Germany. Said details take the form of four screenshots showing player characters duking it out with some sort of tentacled monstrosity in the streets of New York.

A company press release says that "players will be introduced to the story by listening to the accounts of characters that have taken refuge in the New York subway system, and eventually players will battle a monster that towers over the skyscrapers in the middle of Times Square."

Also of note is the game's new three-day trial. Registration is free (but must be completed by August 19th). If you manage to finish 30 missions during your trial period, you'll earn an extra two days of play time. Check out the new screens in the gallery below.

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Neverwinter shows off lore trailer and prepares for 2013 launch



Neverwinter, the upcoming action-based free-to-play title from Cryptic Studios, will be making an appearance at Gamescom 2012 as well as GenCon Indy 2012 and PAX Prime 2012. It will not be making an appearance as a launched game, however, as the official launch date has been pushed back from late 2012 to early 2013. Attendees to these conventions will be able to play an early build of the game, and press members will also be given a tour of the game's player-generated content tool, the Foundry.

For those not able to attend the conventions, the team behind the game has put together a new lore trailer for Ebon Downs, one of the game's many dungeon areas. The short story is that a necromancer is using an artifact to raise an army of undead, but there are more details to be unearthed about the artifact in question and the perils within the barrows. Check out the trailer past the break and new screenshots in our gallery below.

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FFXIV's A Realm Reborn will be 'scalable' for next-gen consoles



When Final Fantasy XIV's A Realm Reborn launches later this year on PC and PlayStation 3, each version will represent a scaled version of the game's highest settings. But with talk of next-gen consoles getting louder and louder, does it make sense to stick with the PlayStation 3? Square-Enix producer/director Naoki Yoshida thinks so, but that doesn't mean he isn't prepared for the looming next generation of game consoles.

"The biggest thing is because we promised we'd release on PlayStation 3, and there are still a lot of players out there waiting for us to release a PS3 version. Before we talked about losing the trust of the playerbase with the original release of XIV and getting that trust back. One of the things to get that trust back is to fulfill our promises. That promise being that we'd release on the PlayStation 3," Naoki said in a group interview today at Gamescom. "That doesn't mean we're not looking to the future. We realize that things will be coming, and then making the game compatible for these systems is something we're currently thinking about," he added.

Of course, "Until Sony and Microsoft actually make an announcement," he said, "we can't make an announcement." Yoshida said that his team's flexibility with FFXIV is due to the game's new engine. "With this new engine, it's very scalable. It runs on low-end PCs and high-end PCs. So when new technology comes out, we can easily scale it to that high end."

Yoshida went on to show the game running on a colleague's Sony Vaio laptop sporting a Core i5 processor. While the graphics were scaled down for the lower-end specs, the game still ran smoothly and looked quite impressive. "This is at about 70 percent optimization," he added.

FFXIV's A Realm Reborn will launch on both PC and PlayStation 3 "this year."

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FFXIV servers shutting down ahead of relaunch, A Realm Reborn beta planned for this fall



Final Fantasy XIV players, take note: Your days are numbered. Er, at least your days spent in the original FFXIV world. When the game's rebirth, called A Realm Reborn, occurs later this year, the game's servers will be taken offline. Rather than overlap the two versions of the game, Square-Enix director/producer Naoki Yoshida says the original servers will be taken offline "some day in the near future," precipitating an alpha and then a beta for the game's relaunch later this year.

"Basically what's going to happen is that the current story is still continuing now, but some day in the near future -- and we'll make sure we tell the players what day that is -- something is going to happen in the story, and at that time, the servers are going to shut down," Yoshida told us in a group interview this morning at Gamescom.

The reason for the shutdown is less thrilling than you might think. "Basically the player data will be taken over into the new game. So, to convert all this new data for the new systems, we need a certain amount of time to do this. There's so much data, so many thousands of characters that we must do this for. And so we have to shut down the servers," he said.

Yoshida was quick to point out that players will have plenty of warning ahead of the shut-down (consider this your first heads-up). He also notes that the original game's userbase will be prioritized in A Realm Reborn's beta queue and that players will "be able to use their current characters in the beta test as well." Though that may not be at the kickoff of the beta, he says, "We're working in a way to try to get it as close to the beginning of the beta test as possible."

A Realm Reborn is headed to both PlayStation 3 and PC later this year.

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New LotRO dev diary about warsteeds



Last week we brought you news about Lord of the Rings Online's warsteed mechanic, accompanied by a video with people talking about that mechanic. The time for talk has gone; now is the time for deep chanting, epic music, and glorious in-game footage of warsteeds in action.

Straight from the show floor of Gamescom comes a new video featuring LotRO's mounts for the Riders of Rohan expansion. These mounts come in three armor tiers, have slots for individual armor pieces, and have customizable skills. They also look pretty snazzy as they carry you into battle.

Check out last week's video to learn more about mounts, or skip below the cut to check out this week's video if all you need is the pounding of drums and the thrill of battle.

http://massively.joystiq.com/2012/08/16/gamescom-2012-new-lotro-dev-diary-about-warsteeds/#continued

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Ever since Blizzard announced that the opening cinematic for World of Warcraft's next expansion Mists of Pandaria would be revealed at Gamescom 2012, fans have been patiently waiting to watch the introduction of the Pandaren in the popular fantasy MMORPG. Now the wait is over: Watch as the black and white kung-fu master takes on two warring combatants in the video after the break.



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CJ Games showcases upcoming games in videos



Back at E3, Massively had the chance to chat with folks from CJ Games Global about a number of their upcoming games, including the horror-themed shooter Hounds, the medieval strategy game Monarch, and the urban action shooter District 187: Sin Streets (formally called Sin Streets Online). For Gamescom, the company showed two short trailers highlighting some of the in-game action of both Monarch and Hounds.

Hounds will feature five types of gameplay, including endgame raiding and PvP. The game is scheduled for a fourth-quarter release in 2013. Planned for release just before that in Q3 2013, Monarch utilizes soldiers-for-hire to siege opposing territories in large-scale combat.

Check out the in-game footage of both titles in the trailers after the break.





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Matt Higby sheds light on PlanetSide 2's factions and design



PlanetSide engendered some fierce faction loyalty, which carries over quite naturally to PlanetSide 2. According to Matt Higby in a new interview at Gamescom 2012, every faction's players feel like their faction needs more attention in the early release material. The main challenge of design is keeping all three factions balanced while ensuring that all three are different enough to feel distinct. Higby stresses that the team is trying to push the differences as far as possible without creating balance problems.

Another major issue that Higby brings up is ensuring that new players can get into the game without removing anything that old players enjoyed about the original. That means new mechanics to help players drop in if they've never played before, but the same core design of gathering hundreds of players to accomplish sweeping tactical objectives. Check out the full video after the break for more of Higby's insights into design; the video starts off in German, but the interview itself is in English.

http://massively.joystiq.com/2012/08/16/gamescom-2012-matt-higby-sheds-light-on-planetside-2s-factions/#continued

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RIFT Storm Legion walkthrough



Fantasy MMO RIFT has been regularly updated with new content since launch, but its upcoming Storm Legion expansion has the potential to blow all previous updates out of the water. The expansion will triple the size of the game world with the two brand-new continents of Brevane and Dusken. Between them, the new continents will launch with 11 new zones, seven new dungeons, three new raids and a new capital city.

At Gamescom 2012 this week, Trion Worlds revealed further details of the new expansion with a full walkthrough. The expansion aims to add even more customisation options to the already expansive game, with one new soul per calling and all existing souls being extended up to the new level cap of 60. Check out the walkthrough video after the cut to see the new Harbinger soul in action and several of the new game zones.

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SWTOR will sell statted gear, debating new planet monetization



How do you take a subscription title like Star Wars: The Old Republic and turn it into a free-to-play MMO? According to Executive Producer Jeff Hickman, you do it as carefully as possible. "Give the story away," he explained. "Make the casual player understand what that is. Don't try to monetize that. Monetize all the things around that. I think, actually, as we looked through it, it is not as complex as you think it is. It is very difficult."

While plans for SWTOR's cash shop are not finalized, Hickman did admit that players could use it to purchase gear to help them level up: "I don't want to unbalance the game by putting things out on the store that somebody can walk in on day one, buy and be the winner. Having said that, there will be some things that we put out in the store that do enhance power value in some way, but not at the top end."

Hickman nibbled around the topic of the planet Makeb, which is still under construction. With more story and more systems, he hopes players will be pleased with the final result. However, Hickman could not confirm nor deny that it will expand the level cap, nor would he go into detail about whether BioWare is going to attempt to sell this to subscribers or not.

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GDC EU dates announced for 2013



The more than 275,000 attendees of this year's Gamescom in Cologne, Germany, were the first to see the planned date for the 2013 convention -- if they noticed the large banner hanging overhead, that is. Folks wanting to get a headstart on planning for the event can mark their calendars: The fifth annual Gamescom will be held August 21st through the 25th, 2013. To get in on GDC Europe, plan to get to Cologne a few days earlier as this convention will run August 19th through the 21st, 2013.

The 2012 Gamescom saw the introduction of mobile and social titles to the usual line-up of console and PC gaming. Organizers noted that 83 different countries were represented between the exhibitors and trade visitors of the con. GDC EU 2012 broke previous attendance records with over 2,100 game industry professionals attending the event.

For more about this year's conventions that just wrapped up, check out Massively's 2012 Gamescom and 2012 GDC Europe coverage.

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Behind closed doors with Trion Worlds



Germany is crazy about MMOs. Proof of this was the Gamescom attendance of almost all major players in the genre, showing off what they had in store. Trion Worlds -- known well to fans of RIFT, Defiance, and End of Nations -- was no exception. The studio gave us a closer look at some of what it's got in store for us: RIFT's first real expansion, Storm Legion, and brand-new third-person sci-fi shooter Defiance. Jump past the break to read all about them.



Storm Legion

RIFT's first expansion, Storm Legion, promises more of the same quality and quantity of content that we've come to expect from Trion Worlds. Among the additions are two new continents, a new hub for both factions, expanded crafting systems, and a raised level cap (to level 60). Additionally, four new souls will be introduced to the game, of which only one has so far been announced: the Harbinger. The Harbinger essentially works as the archetypical battlemage. Summoning various magical weapons with various abilities providing passive and active bonuses, Harbingers take the fight to the enemy with melee attacks and powerful magic.

But the Harbinger's arsenal has more than just magic. "For the Harbinger to successfully melee an enemy, we have given the soul powerful positional abilities," Will Cook, RIFT's senior game designer, explained. "One of the major strengths of the Harbinger is the ability to flicker in and out of combat." This flickering, as Cook showed us, is used to both close with and gain distance from enemies. To fully use the Harbinger's powers, players will need to utilize these positional abilities intelligently. At higher levels, the Harbinger even gains stealth to jump in or jump away. These abilities trademark the Harbinger's fighting style as a melee DPS soul.

Another cool new feature that Will showed off certainly demands some attention: dimensions. Dimensions function as personal housing instances within the world -- they're real estate. A players can build her homes in a dimension, fill it with all kinds of ornaments found along her adventures, and eventually show it off to friends. Decorating these dimensions piqued our interest right away. Cook told us, "We wanted to give players powerful tools to customize their dimensions so that they could create something truly unique. We simply thought, why not give them ours?" What we saw was, according to Cook, a rough, unfinished version, but it's the essence of the team's vision. Players can rotate objects, drag and lift them, and even scale them up or down as needed. Limitless variations will be possible because of the unrestrictive toolkit used.



In fact, the only limiting factors seem to be available space and the customizable objects on hand. "As players progress through content, they'll unlock objects they come across to put into their dimension. They can then place them where they like. The idea is that the unlocked objects reflect the player's personal achievements," explained Cook. Player houses in MMOs are often glorified trophy cabinets, but Storm Legion's approach nurtures player creativity as well.

So how about PvP in these dimensions? "It certainly is something we are thinking about but currently haven't implemented," Cook said. "The first thing we want to get right is that the customization tools are working properly and can be used effortlessly."

Finally, we were shown a high-level boss encounter featuring a mountain-sized colossus. This, too, is something we've seen before many times, but this particular one had some nifty tricks up his sleeve. Said Cook, "As players fight him, he makes his way through the area, destroying anything and anyone in sight. At one point, he'll arrive at a walled off area and break down the barriers, enabling players to explore new and previously unavailable content within." It's a heavily scripted event, though players seem to have some impact as to how to bring this colossus down. "We didn't want players to stand at his feet and carve away at his toes," Cook clarified. "You'll be able to target and destroy several individual parts of his body to a variety of effects. We certainly want it to be a dynamic fight."



Defiance

We also got some hand-on time with Defiance, Trion World's upcoming MMOTPS. What's special about Defiance is that it is linked to an actual television series of the same name, broadcast on cable channel Syfy. It's much more than a simple tie-in as we've seen previously with movies and books. The idea is that events that occur in the series will influence events and content in the game. We weren't given exact examples, but think along the lines of changing story lines, factions, and NPCs. This would mean that as enough time progresses, a new player's experience would be significantly different from that of a veteran player when she started playing. More interestingly, though, is that events in the game will also impact the course of the series. Random world events that take place in the game enable players to participate and decide the fate of the world, which is in turn reflected in the series. We were left in the dark about any other synergy between game and series, but the smirks on the faces of Trion Worlds' people left our imaginations running amok. Defiance maintains a unique position within the genre in that it is being developed in close collaboration with the Syfy series, and we can see this being a strong selling point to fans of both genres.

The playable portion of the demo allowed us to pick up a shotgun and run around in one of the PvP maps. We were told this was a very early pre-alpha build and that the PvP portion of the game is still under heavy construction. Despite this bit of information, running around shooting people instantly felt smooth and rewarding. There were no classes to choose from, only pre-made builds, so fans of customization should feel right at home. All weapons have primary and secondary attacks, which vary tremendously in effect. One of the guns caused the enemy to grow enormous when hit as puss filled boils on his body. The puss that oozed out attracted a number of little critters that did damage over time -- creative, but also a lot of fun to witness (though less so for sufferers).



In terms of game modes, all we were able to see was Team Deathmatch. The action was straightforward, fast-paced, and at times confusing, but the objective felt familiar at least. The developers promised many more game modes at release, together with larger maps (the one we played on was the smallest of the bunch) and no pre-made classes.

Although playing the PvP map immediately reminded us of a lobby-based shooter, Defiance promises to have fully fleshed out MMO features. It will feature a seamless, persistent world with missions, factions, and (of course) world events. There will be a huge emphasis on story (obviously), and NPC interactions and story presentation will be heard in full voice-over. Defiance is still in the early stages of development, so it remains to be seen whether and how these promises will eventually be fulfilled. Until then, the unique TV/game synergy should create enough waves to keep this one on the radar for some time to come.

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