Welcome back to a quick roundup of recent news from some not-so-massively online multiplayer titles.
Wolf Team: Gamigo’s MMOFPS introduced a new map last week called Jungle, a deathmatch template. Wolf Team doesn’t get a lot of coverage, but yes, this is a PvP game where you transform into werewolves and use wolf powers. Hey, it’s unique.
Second Extinction: Survival sandbox Second Extinction teased its early access roadmap and new gameplay video.
The Cycle: The Cycle (shown in the header above) kicked off a new dev diary series; the first entry is sort of a day-in-the-life piece of a typical character and the gameplay he or she can expect on a regular day.
Paladins: Hi-Rez’s shooter announced a new champion called Vora the Harbinger; she’ll be the 46th added to the game since its launch.
Valorant: Last week, Riot discussed the potential for a “Left Hand View model,” skin updates, queue times, and the hitbox. Unfortunately, this week, Riot patched in serious nerfs to the Operator. The patch notes attempt to justify the nerfs:
“The Operator serves an important role in VALORANT: It provides the most difficult tactical challenge for teams to overcome, requiring strategic planning and clever utility use. We’ve been taking a long look at the weapon to try to understand the best way to adjust some of its outsized strengths while ensuring it remains the most powerful angle-holding weapon in the arsenal.
“For you Aggressive Operators—dry peeking angles with an Operator is noticeably more effective than we’d like (especially when jump peeking). Additionally, pushing an Operator off of an angle with utility feels less valuable since the user is able to re-peek and kill their opponent at a reliable rate. This suite of mechanical changes (deadzone, scoped move speed, firing rate, equip time, jump land inaccuracy) targets these issues, increasing counterplay around high-mobility Operator play. The Operator is still quite potent at peeking angles but predictable repeeks should be easier to punish.
“Regarding Operator access—we’re seeing some of you obtain the Operator+Armor combo as early as round 3 and snowballing that lead into additional Ops throughout the half. The new price point delays the Operator’s appearance and increases the penalty for dying with one in hand. We hope to better balance the risk/reward of using this premium weapon.
“A related note on breaking angles with abilities: Many abilities in the game are built to aggressively take angles, especially when a powerful weapon like the Operator is posted on that angle. The recent changes to Breach have given players access to more powerful angle-breaking utility, but it still feels like there’s more to be done. We’re looking at a few changes for a couple of Agents, but they’ll need some additional reps internally to build confidence around them. Expect more from us in the future!”
Iron Harvest 1920: KING Art’s dieselpunk MMORTS kicked off the game’s first season with a brand-new ranked mode. MOP’s Not So Massively column previously covered this game in-depth!
New Frontier: Finally, MMO Fallout’s Connor noticed that New Frontier has been all but abandoned. New Frontier, you’ll recall, was a reboot of the failed Wild West Online MMO. It was intended as a survival sandbox, but as Connor notes, it was never finished either and hasn’t been updated in half a year, in keeping with the pattern for Free Reign and Sergey Titov’s other titles. Please stop buying this crap!
