Posted on January 23, 2014, in Browser-Based, Episodes and tagged browser-based, city of steam, gamerocks, review, steampunk. Bookmark the permalink. 10 Comments.
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The video was so dark, I couldn’t really see the graphics, except for bugs & a motorcycle.
::Rawatches with brightness cranked waaay up::
Welp, I guess this replaces “A Mythical Land” as the be best-graphics-browser-MMO for me.
That song is pretty cool, but it really makes me want to curl up & fall asleep.
Reblogged this on Clockwork Vardo and commented:
City of Steam. Browser based MMO, that seems to really deliver.
While not suitable for an episode, perhaps try out Vanguard while it’s still around? SOE just announced it’s killing it end of July, along with three other of their titles. Despite its age and rocky history it’s still an MMO I feel has interesting ideas and mechanics to show and I’ll be sad to see it go- the diplomacy card game and the classes especially, they managed to create a load of classes that all feel unique and play differently from one another, even with the same roles.
I suppose killing off their less profitable/popular titles is the consequence of their upcoming All Access subscription change. I just wish they’d adopt the Valve approach and keep them as a way to build brand strength (after all, everyone tires of playing the same game over and over. But hey, your sub also includes a completely different title, that’d make a nice distraction for a while!), but SOE is SOE. :/
Really nice looking game. Had chance to participate in closed beta and looking forward to try it again.
Thanks for episode, Jon
You know… You keep saying “steampunk steampunk steampunk,” but I don’t see any of it in nearly any of the footage. The closest the game got was the train sequence at character creation, but beyond that? It looks and feels like a generic, bog-standard Fantasy MMO. When I hear “steampnk,” I think either Wild West or Victorian England. I think built-up industrial cities. I think revolvers and repeating rifles and people in top hats. What I don’t think is medieval broadswords and wooden shields, enchanted forests and spellcasters.
So far, the only game to pull off Steampunk legitimately and still have its cake of Fantasy has been Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura, and even then only because the clash between magic and technology is an overriding theme in that game, with the contrast between the two setting the tone. All I saw from the video was World of Warcraft with steam-powered bikes… Which WoW already has. More broadly, what I was was every MMO released in the last few years – Tera, Allods Online, Guild Wars 2, etc. The gameplay might be different – it probably is – but the overall aesthetic is just tired at this point.
It’s hugely disappointing that an MMO can’t release these days without much of its actions taking place in a forest.
As I mention, a lot of the aesthetic was gutted, but it’s still there, trust me. Many of the cash shop items are exactly as you describe. The city, Refuge, is covered in pipes, and the swords (used to) mostly consist of gears and pipes. There is a “gunner” class as well, but they wield more ornate weapons. As it was explained to me by a former developer, they didn’t initially prefer the term, Steampunk, as much as “Industrial Fantasy”, but most media outlets called them Steampunk for simplicity’s sake. Then when getting sold off to its initial Chinese developer, they decided to revise a lot of the designs because Steampunk wasn’t really a thing in China that people understood, or would sell all that well, so many of the designs were changed to more reflect a fantasy game. See what I was saying by, “a dream deferred?”
Well, that’s sorely disappointing, then. Because a few of the props you showed really did look kind of cool. The bike, especially, looked like something I might actually play a game for. I guess being bought by the Chinese really didn’t do the game any favours.
The bad thing is “I’m in a forest!” Fantasy MMOs are a dime a dozen. You can’t walk five steps in MMO land without tripping over one and falling on top of another. Unique, unusual games with a non-standard design aesthetics are the rare jewels to be treasured. To see that happen to one of them is just disappointing as all hell.
Really much more interesting then I was expecting.
I saw the previews for the game when it was in development and all that and was fairly interested in it, then it “disappeared” as somebody that wasn’t following it closely or anything.
Can’t hurt to give it a try like with most of them I guess, although I don’t remember what exactly I was hyped up about to begin with (Steampunks fine, but it’s not something that would be my sole reason for being interested)
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