Betawatch: Dauntless strides into open beta (May 25, 2018)

lost ark

Official Site: Lost Ark (Korean)
Studio: Smilegate
Launch Date: N/A
Genre: Fantasy MMOARPG
Business Model: N/A
Platform: PC

Betawatch: Dauntless strides into open beta (May 25, 2018)

May 25, 2018 Eliot Lefebvre 14 comments

It’s certainly a daunting task to launch a game into its open beta, but the developers of Dauntless are undaunted as the title does just that this week. Now everyone can daunt gigantic monsters, daunting the local townsfolk into upgrading gear while forging names like “Daunter of Behemoths.” Without paying a dime!

In other news, I’ve now been forbidden from using the word “daunt” any further in this particular post. Also, there’s other beta news worth covering.

As a child, you were likely told that if at first you don’t succeed, you should try again. That is the lesson that appears to be going into Wild Busters rebranding and changing ownership to a new company that has not been kicked off of Steam. It’s technically trying again, yes, but it feels like it skipped a step or two.
H1Z1 launched its open beta on PlayStation 4, and… wow, it managed to get a lot of players in short order, huh? That 200,000 concurrent players is an impressive number.
If you felt like you weren’t getting enough in the way of rewards for Defiance 2050 as a veteran of the original game, good news: There are more rewards now for valor. Perhaps that will assuage any frustration.
Those who still can’t wait to hear about Lost Ark will be happy to know that the game is heading into its last, really last, we mean it this time closed beta. All the great taste of a test version with none of… whatever is an undesirable quality in a beta. Saturated fat, maybe?
Last but not least, Crowfall has been crowing about the features of its latest test build. If something doesn’t work, make sure to tell the development team so they can eat crow.

That’s some beta news, huh? Don’t fret, there’s also a list below if you want to look for other titles in testing. As always, if you see something there that shouldn’t be there or should have a different test state listed, please let us know. If you appreciate overuse of the word “daunt,” also let us know there. Just for funsies.

Lost Ark enters ‘final’ closed beta in South Korea with new class trailers

May 23, 2018 Bree Royce 9 comments

Hey, remember back in 2014 when Smilegate first announced MMOARPG Lost Ark? It’s been a long time. As I’ve written before, I was positively smitten with the gorgeous next-gen Diablo clone (and its NCsoft counterpart, Lineage Eternal) way back then. But it’s been pretty much nothing but delays and testing and restarts and more delays and testing in the ensuing four years (for both titles).

However, MMO Culture reports that the promised “final closed beta” for Lost Ark is beginning this week in South Korea, having formally revealed new trailers for three of the classes. And one’s a Bard! A new dungeon and TCG minigame are also on deck, while treasure hunting and sailing were added last year.

It’s still not a sure thing that Lost Ark will ever come here. While the Chinese version will launch next year under Tencent, Smilegate doesn’t have the cachet here that it does overseas; it runs Crossfire in the west but recently abandoned SkySaga mid-development.

Betawatch: Defiance 2050’s closed beta, ESO’s Summerset on the PTS (April 20, 2018)

April 20, 2018 Bree Royce 7 comments

Beta testing for Elder Scrolls Online’s Summerset expansion – as well as the free update 18 that’ll launch alongside it – began this week as the chapter rolled out to the PTS, with plenty of glimpses at new housing and wearables on the way. What else is new in MMORPG testing this week?

Defiance 2050’s big PC closed beta is live for the weekend – though console players have been put off a little while longer.
Old School RuneScape has begun testing its mobile client. That’s not very old school, but we’re not complaining.
WoW’s Battle for Azeroth kicked off player testing of dark iron dwarves and mag’ghar orcs.
Conan Exiles rolled out what’ll probably be its last major patch for testers before its official launch next month.
Radical Heights’ early access teased female toons. In ’80s leotards.
MapleStory 2 is plotting its western closed beta for next month.

Did we miss anything? Drop us a note in the comments, then check out our traditional list of all the bits and bobs currently ~~malingering~~ trucking along in some form of testing.

Betawatch: Radical Heights springs out to predictable lows (April 13, 2018)

April 13, 2018 Eliot Lefebvre One comment

Good news, Boss Key fans! After the studio pretty blatantly gave up on LawBreakers, it turned around and quickly launched its next project, a battle royale title dubbed Radical Heights. It sprang to life on Tuesday, and then it… sort of limped right after that. The numbers do look at least slightly better after the rest of the week, so hooray? Maybe?

Looking back, I started that paragraph with “good news.” I’m not sure why I did that.

Other beta news? Hey, sure.

You should definitely catch up on our PAX East coverage if you haven’t; we got hands-on time with several games in early testing like Pantheon and Ashes of Creation, and we had more interviews with studios behind Rend and Ship of Heroes.
Dauntless is taking the charge to open beta on May 24th, letting everyone get a peek at what it’s like to hunt monsters in a world. But, like… with less corporate branding. Ahem.
Who made Worlds Adrift what it is? The players, that’s who. When is the title moving into early access? Next month, that’s when.
Bless Online chose to change its combat from top to bottom, which is a pretty big shift as the game moves toward a wider release.
And last but not least, Lost Ark is heading into its final beta in its native South Korea. We can only hope that we get to see a release of this game before the players find the ark they’re looking for. (That’s the premise, right?)

Other beta titles? Oh, listed below, as we do. If you notice something jumped test phases without our noticing, do let us know down in the comments. We really appreciate it.

Lost Ark prepares for its final Korean closed beta test

April 12, 2018 Justin Olivetti 2 comments

Ready to raid Smilegate’s Lost Ark? You’ll still have to be this Korean to ride the ride, but if you’re able and willing to handle the translation, you could find yourself checking out this action MMO this spring.

This is thanks to the fact that Lost Ark is preparing to accept applications for its final closed beta test in Korea. Once April 19th hits, interested parties can apply on the website for the Korean CBT. This build will include two additional classes, the Hawkeye and the Soul Master, as well as several new dungeons and a card battling minigame.

As one of our 20 MMOs to watch in 2018, Lost Ark has generated a lot of excitement over its visuals and fast gameplay. Last summer the title launched its second closed beta test in Korea that featured treasure hunting and sailing while busting out a brand-new website.

Source: MMO Culture

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Perfect Ten: 20 upcoming MMOs to watch in 2018

December 13, 2017 Justin Olivetti 31 comments

It has become a long-standing tradition as Massively OP and our former site that we like to end the year by creating a list of titles that we anticipate for the coming one. It has always been a devilish list to create, full of loose dates and fast guesswork about which titles will and won’t be releasing during a 12-month window (just read last year’s list to see how spot-on I was).

This year we’re changing things up a bit by tossing out the qualifying factor of “will see a hard launch in 2018.” Instead, I drafted up a list of 20 MMOs that have the potential to do or be really interesting next year, whether that be a launch, a long-anticipated beta test, or some other significant development. Plus, hey, you get 20 for the price of 10, so no complaining now!

As an aside, this list isn’t going to cover some other exciting-looking multiplayer games that are arriving in 2018, like Anthem, Sea of Thieves, The Crew 2, Monster Hunter World, DayZ, Red Dead Redemption 2, Stardew Valley, Conan Exiles, and State of Decay 2. And you old school fans won’t want to forget that Ultima Online has a new free-to-play option coming this spring.

Betawatch: Crowfall shares lots of fun stuff (September 15, 2017)

September 15, 2017 Eliot Lefebvre One comment

Good news for Crowfall fans this week because there’s plenty on the docket about the game’s development. You might not consider a whole lot of discussion about how the game succeeded at crowdfunding to be new content, but you’ve also got the full list of race/class combinations at launch and a dangerous beachhead for players to fight around. So there’s lots of good stuff happening for fans, yes?

The remainder of the beta news… well, there’s some good stuff in there, too! And one thing that’s perhaps not so good. Let’s head right in.

In fact, let’s start by diving into one of the most ill-considered quotes of the week, in which Chris Roberts of Star Citizen declared he was “fed up” with providing launch estimates for patch 3.0. We imagine backers are a bit “fed up” with waiting for the patch, especially the ones who claimed a refund and then lied about the amount of said refund.
Happier news time for Wild West Online fans, as the alpha test begins this weekend. There isn’t much of an NDA in place, either, so if you’re testing it feel free to say whatever you’d like down in the comments (with the proper alpha caveats, of course).
The second closed beta for Lost Ark is on its way, and we’ve got the video full of happy frolicking animals listening to music to prove it. If you’ve never seen an owlbear soothed by a calming tune, well, that’s your entry for today’s list of things you never knew you wanted before now.
Good news for Worlds Adrift developer Bossa Studios, too, as the studio picked up lots of investor cash this week. That should fund a fair number of islands.
Do you remember Seed? No, not the MMO that crashed and burned in a short span of time, the other game named Seed? It’s not due for any sort of serious beta until summer 2018, but we’re already seeing signs of how the game will deliver its AI-focused design.
Last but not least, why not take a gander at what’s coming for phase two of the OrbusVR closed beta? You can read that update even if you’re in not-virtual reality, aka actual reality, aka… you know, the real world.

Meanwhile, we’ve got that full list of games down below with all of the information you could possibly expect at this point from our regular weekly column. Did something jump to a new phase of testing without us noticing? Let us know down in the comments, we find that fascinating and only marginally annoying. (And the annoyance is with the studios who don’t let us know, mind.)

Lost Ark releases a trailer for its second closed beta

September 11, 2017 Eliot Lefebvre 5 comments

We’re going to lead off with the bad news: Lost Ark is currently planning its release in South Korea and China in 2018 with no real word on a localized version for here just yet. So keep that in mind while you watch the eight-minute trailer below. If it all looks enticing and interesting to you, well, you don’t know when you’ll get to experience it in a language that you actually speak. So you may have to go your whole life without getting to play music with a group beautiful enough that it attracts a rampaging owlbear to sit down and listen happily.

Of course, having typed that line, you probably have to see what the heck is actually in this trailer. There’s a lot of more standard stuff in there, too, like sailing across the ocean, exploring ruins, and creeping through dangerous areas filled with monsters… but there’s also the aforementioned “singing and gathering woodland creatures” bit. So perhaps you out to just check it out to see everything being added to the game for its second closed beta test.

Lost Ark gets a new website, opens second CBT signups

August 25, 2017 Bree Royce 3 comments

Korean-born MMORPG Lost Ark has just gotten a huge website revamp that hints at a development ramp-up. If you run the site through Google translate, it’s pretty usable even if you can’t read Korean; there are profiles for the four classes, a beautiful interactive map, and a run-down of basic features.

Smilegate has taken the relaunch to announce a second round of closed beta testing. Signups begin today and end September 8th, with the actual test slated to run September 15th through 24th.

Steparu notes that signups are aimed at Koreans, so you’ll probably need a Korean phone number to successfully register, but hey, this is the internet, so I’m sure you’ll figure it out.

Source: Official site via Steparu

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Lost Ark sails into closed beta 2 this Friday

August 22, 2017 Justin Olivetti 5 comments

Countdowns could mean many things. Missile launches. Christmas. New Year’s Day. Or in the case of Lost Ark, the start of its second closed beta test in Korea.

The official (Korean) site is currently sporting a countdown to this Friday, when Lost Ark’s CBT2 is set to begin. This time around, the beta is greatly expanding to include a focus on sailing, so there’s a whole lot of ocean, ship, and harbor imagery going on with the previews.

Smilegate said that the beta will also feature a new class, the opening of a brand-new continent, and more stories to experience. If you feel proficient in your Korean, you can attempt to sign up for a spot on the site!

Lost Ark’s Korean beta features boats, storms, and treasure hunting

August 11, 2017 Bree Royce 4 comments

When Lost Ark was first announced back in 2014 as basically the next generation of Diablo-clone in an MMO, I remember being straight-up grabby-hands about it. But Smilegate’s splashy isometric MMO, like its soulmate Lineage Eternal, has been delayed significantly, with a beta landing last year (a year behind schedule) and continuing even now. Fortunately, this summer we’ve had a trickle of news crossing the Pacific thanks to the translation efforts of Steparu, who today has another update.

And it’s got boats.

Steparu reports that the game has improved significantly since the first round of closed beta testing. The new screenies demo sailing content, islands, treasure chests (looks like they’re being hauled up from the depths of the sea from a boat crane), an ocean storm, marine life — it’s gorgeous. Even if you aren’t an isometric viewpoint fan, it’s worth a look.

Lost Ark shows off new zones, including one that takes place on the body of a slumbering giant

July 18, 2017 Justin Olivetti 2 comments

After a long info drought on the anticipated action-MMO Lost Ark, we’re finally getting a deluge of lore and screenshots courtesy of Steparu. This week he graces us with another installment straight from the closed beta program going on over in Korea, so if you don’t mind some minor spoilers, you can wallow in all of the reveals.

Some of the locations featured in the beta include Rohendel, a floating zone that serves as the starting area for mages; the Eastern Regions, which are littered with ruins and have serious pagan problems; Totoike, an island that is actually a slumbering giant; Ardetain, a high-tech city in the desert; and Shushire, a land held in the grip of an eternal winter.

Steparu also looked at a few more of the oversized bosses that are brimming over with personality, as well as a smidge of the story. The second round of Korean closed beta testing includes the Destroyer, Summoner, and Arcana classes as well as a quest system overhaul.

Lost Ark details changes coming with the game’s second closed beta test

June 30, 2017 Eliot Lefebvre 5 comments

It can be hard to be interested in a title that may eventually be ported over to North America but has a dearth of information available on a whole. Lost Ark is heading into its second closed beta, and the good news for fans watching the title from afar is that a whole bunch of translated information about the second closed beta is now available, courtesy of Steparu. Two of the existing classes (Warlord and Bard) are getting extensive reworks, with the former becoming far more tank-heavy and the latter adding more emphasis on support skills instead of straight DPS.

The second closed beta will also feature the Arcana, Destroyer, and Summoner classes. Arcana is all about drawing cards and unleashing semi-randomized effects, the Destroyer uses a big hammer to smash things, and the Summoner summons things to serve as either a DPS or a tank-style character. There’s more information to come, certainly; for now, you can just enjoy what we have so far in translation.