It is that time of year again, the time where all your DKP is counted up and distributed across the 'Best Community Managers' of 2014. For three years now, our sister-site, Guild Launch has hosted the Dragon Slayer Awards.

So, how exactly does the Dragon Slayer Award process work? Well, members of the communities of nominate community managers, community builders, streamers, and developers, among others. This happens over three rounds, and when those rounds have concluded the final list is released. Voting is live now and runs through to September 1st, so be sure to register your vote.

Past winners of the Community Manager award include, Jonathan "Zarhym" Brown in 2012, and Andrew "Tamat" Beegle in 2013.

The Nominees

• Beleen of Adventure Quest Worlds
• Charles "Akromatik" Haitkin of Neverwinter
• Doomsaw of Gazillion Entertainment
• Eric Musco of Star Wars: The Old Republic
• Jessica Folsom of The Elder Scrolls Online
• Jonathon "Zarhym" Brown of Blizzard Entertainment
• Martin Kerstein of Guild Wars 2
• Rick Heaton of The Lord of the Rings Online
• Stephen "RockJaw" Reid of 2K Games -- Bio
• Tony Rey of Wildstar Online

What is a Community Manager? 

A CM can be compared to a Man-in-Black, a Sheppard, a conduit, a punching bag... but I like see them as the our best friends (within the community that we are involved in.) Among other duties, they help us through each day, tell us when we are out of line, and pass on any frustrations we may have.

They achieve this through many means; social media, live streams, blogs, live interviews, forums, and any other mediums that can enable productive communications with the community-at-large.

As a former CM, I know that a lot of what happens behind-the-scenes goes unnoticed: long hours, short weekends, infinite coffee, dropped Skype calls. Yet, when that piece of news goes out and the community reacts, good or bad, it's when you know you have done your job. These nominees all do their jobs to the highest standard.

The Question Then

Which Community Manager has ticked your boxes? Is it Tony Rey and the 'I'm a fan' mentality he brought to WildStar during the launch period? Could it be Jessica Folsom and her down-to-earth management of the ESO forums amidst the cries of foul by the community? Or is it longstanding CM, Zarhym, who never fails bring opinion and fact from both sides of the fence when discussing content with the World of Warcraft community? Or will it be one of the other, equally deserving, Community Managers? The power is in your hands.

Let your voice be heard, vote now! Feel free to vote on the other categories too.

Guild Launch, GameSkinny's sister site, is holding the annual Dragon Slayer Awards for the best of the best amongst the video game community. For the 'Best Promotional Effort by a Game' category, Elder Scrolls Online (ESO) is among the five nominees. So what kinds of promotional efforts have been made for ESO since before its release?

Well, since last year there have been seven different contests with great winnings such as a mention of the winner's name in-game, t-shirts (some coming from Pax East), posters, concept art, and gaming headsets. Recently, there was a contest giving participants the chance to create "a winning emote [that] will be adapted by our animators and will appear in The Elder Scrolls Online" and "the opportunity to collaborate with a member of the ESO animation team to assist with the creation of the emote," according to ElderScrollsOnline.com. How cool is that?!

And let's not forget the detailed, gripping cinematic trailers that feature different characters with different priorities, incredible graphics, and creepy beyond-the-universe creatures that we'd probably rather not know about unless we're in the game.

Promotions other than the contests listed on their official website have dwindled, but that doesn't mean that it won't happen! According to their Facebook page, ESO has been busy keeping track of all kinds of fan creations, Ask Me Anything forums (or AMAs), maintenance with megaservers, sparring tournaments in-game and horse race events in-game, among other things.

On the other side of the social media specturm, ESO has been all about in-game events and keeping up with their ESO connoisseurs, according to their Twitter page. In addition, ESO fans tweet their fan art and comics while news of interesting things like the Adventurer's Handbook series sprouts about to help those ESO connoisseurs in their time of need.

Do you enjoy Elder Scrolls Online and feel that they deserve an award for all their promotional efforts? Then visit the Dragon Slayer Awards page of the Guild Launch website and vote today!

Every year, Guild Launch, the site that helped spawn GameSkinny, puts on the Dragon Slayer Awards for the best of the best in the gaming realm. This year, it's all about fans, comics, indie games, video series, Twitch channels, Kickstarters, and so much more. For those select few games that pulled all the stops as far as game advocacy is concerned, there's the 'Best Promotional Effort by a Game' category. Let's take a look at who made the final cut for voting.

And the Nominees for 'Best Promotional Effort by a Game' are...

Elder Scrolls Online

Grand Theft Auto V

Hearthstone

Marvel Heroes

WildStar

'Promotional Effort'? What's that?

Well, whenever you see ads for games on billboards, television, and other things like that, there's a promotional effort being made. Video game companies want you to know that their game is hip and happening in hopes that you'll buy it. Not only that, but they'll also put on giveaways and contests with exclusive, special-made memorabilia that will only be made for promotional purposes.

Mass Advertising

Game companies want the gaming community (that's YOU) to know about their upcoming game titles. And they'll do just about anything to get your attention.

For example, the Homefront marketing campaign was so huge and strange that it pissed off a good chunk of the San Francisco community. According to Joystiq.com, ten thousand red balloons were released into the sky of the City by the Bay...only to end up in the actual Bay. Do all game companies do weird marketing stunts such as this?

Not quite, but it's a way to reach the gaming community, be it good or bad publicity.

Contests

Game companies will put on contests to promote their games and the prizes are usually pretty awesome.

For example, Bethesda Blog held a contest during the San Diego Comic-Con for special-made Evil Within Xbox One consoles - and all participants had to do was take a picture of their favorite console at the Xbox Gaming Lounge and share it on Twitter. It's an easy win for only 20 participants (since there were only 20 consoles) and an even easier win for the game company's marketing department.

Giveaways

These are things you'll find on official game sites, at events like the San Diego Comic-Con, and the like.

Insomniac Games' Sunset Overdrive website announced that they would hold giveaways at the San Diego Comic-Con. On their Twitter page, one of the things given away was a balloon replica of the Over Charge mascot, Fizzie. These balloons were probably just for this occasion, so that makes the giveaway even more special.

Pre-Order Incentives

Games aren't sold by themselves anymore. Go to any GameStop and they'll tell you that if you pre-order a highly-anticipated game, it'll probably come with something like downloadable content, a strategy guide, or something else.

For example, Destiny is offering "early access to Vanguard weapons and gear and a Vanguard player emblem" when gamers pre-order a copy. Another win-win situation.

And they don't stop after the game releases!

Nowadays there's special downloadable content being made all the time. Some are holiday-specific or celebrate something special about the game company. Others are just-because and are 'hyped up' to get gamers excited about being able to experience it for themselves in-game.

No matter how these game companies let us know about their games, we're excited to know about them. We love games! And whether the way we learn about these new games thrills us or pisses us off, we know about them. They're on television, all over social media (and the internet in general), at our favorite annual conventions, and sometimes even in the newspaper. Game companies don't want you to forget their games - they want you to remember them so that maybe you'll buy them.

So if you enjoy Elder Scrolls Online, Grand Theft Auto V, Hearthstone, Marvel Heroes or WildStar, make sure to visit Guild Launch and vote for your favorite! Think of it as a 'thank you' for all their promotional efforts that got you to play their games! But remember - there can be only one winner.

Zenimax Online Studios laid off a number of employees this past Wednesday. Pete Hines, VP of PR and Marketing for Bethesda, said,

As is the norm for games of this type, we had ramped up a large workforce to develop a game of vast scale and ramped up our customer service to handle the expected questions and community needs of the Elder Scrolls Online at launch.

Dropping staff may be seen as a bad move when the game still hasn't realeased on the Xbox One or PlayStation 4. It appears that only customer service jobs took a hit in this wave of lay offs and development will continue as normal. Console fans likely won't see the game until the end of the year. In order to alleviate any fears they might have, Hines continued,

We remain strongly committed to The Elder Scrolls Online, and continue to invest heavily to develop new content for PC players, prepare the game for its console launch and handle our planned expansion..

Players worried about any potential impact to development should consider that patches have been released regularly and add-ons such as the loyalty program for paying for the longer subscriptions have been added to the game since its debut.

Don't panic just yet. It hasn't even been released across all of its intended platforms and still charges a monthly subscription fee. Going free-to-play seems to be the move MMO's make when they are in bad shape.

Any Pirate worth his sea salt could tell you "Dead men tell no tales," however, Bethesda's ESO is challenging us to help an unfortunate soul by asking us to tell their story.

Bethesda has always been known for their stellar story work, especially in their open world games, like the Elder Scrolls series. Though this time around, they have handed the creative control to us and asked the gamers to spin a tale of the dead in their new contest.

Posted in their website forums, the company supplied us with an image of the dead character in question. In it we see a skeleton in a rocky crevice, wearing partial armor, helmet on the right, cheese plate and wine bottle on the left, and a spear protruding out of their head. For more detail check out the picture below:

Can you imagine how this could have happened to the man/woman in this odd display? Then you should get cracking on your entry before the deadline of September 26th. Make sure to check the rules on the contest before entering.

3 Winners will receive a $25 electronic gift card to the Bethesda shop and an Elder Scrolls Online t-shirt. You can submit all entries in the  Tales of the Dead 2 forum thread the contest was posted in.

It's time to pick up your pen and craft your very own piece of lore in the Elder Scrolls universe and possibly help this poor soul finally lay to rest. 

Note: Stinkyboard manufacturer, Stelulu, gave GS a board for review purposes.

I'm a small gamer in a small space. There's a lot of great tech that I have to pass up on because of a tiny desk and a tiny apartment. I don't even own a desktop right now - I haul around a beastly laptop. As much as I would like to do all my gaming on a PC powerhouse, that's not always an option. And I'm not the only one. A lot of gamers have to compromise their setups because of size, space, and cost restrictions. 

Unfortunately, scaling down a setup usually means sacrificing certain capabilities - controls being one of them. We can't always get that extra "edge" from a shiny, new gaming keyboard with all the bells and whistles. Most of us figure out how to make do, but there isn't a lot of tech out there to help us. 

There are also gamers with disabilities, broken bones, absent limbs, or chronic pains like carpal tunnel syndrome. (Or there are gamers like me, who have tiny hobbit hands that can't reach keys as easily.) These gamers don't have a whole lot of tech accessories that can help them compensate. A fancy mouse with extra buttons might help a little bit, but sometimes it's still not enough. 

Enter the Stinkyboard

I was a little wary of it at first. I thought that adding extra controls to my feet would be more of a distraction than an aid. But once I started testing it out and playing around with different configurations, I realized:

Stinkyboard is pretty damn great. Setup is a breeze, and the configuration program that's included does a lot of the technical lifting for you. I tested it out across multiple games and configurations, which I'll outline further down. Let's start with the basics. 

That New-Tech Smell

After wallowing momentarily in the scent of fresh tech, I dug into the Stinkyboard box. It included the board itself, a USB cable, a tiny instruction pamphlet, four sets of springs, and an allen wrench. (Don't worry - you don't really have to assemble anything if you don't want to.) 

The only thing I really had to do immediately after opening was visit the developer's site to download the configuration client. After that, it was just a matter of plugging the board in and customizing it for play. 

The board has four programmable pedals - front, back, left, and right. Each pedal can be bound to any key, or any combination of up to 3 keys. The config software allows you to set these bindings, then choose how you want the pedal strokes to behave. You can choose from three settings: 

• Normal: pressing the pedal is a single keystroke
• Hold Down: holding down the pedal holds down the designated key
• Pulse: pressing/holding the pedal makes multiple clicks/keystrokes

In the pulse setting, you can also choose the number of clicks per second, from 1 to 30. 

You can save all your keybinding and pedal mode choices into individual profiles. Then you can set the configuration client to associate certain .exe files with certain profiles you've saved to your board. If you turn on auto-switching, the software will switch between profiles for you as you play different games. 

Speaking of Games, Let's Talk Gameplay

Like I said earlier, my biggest concern with this board was the idea of adding even more buttons, and having to use my foot to work them. I'm not a graceful (or particularly coordinated) person. I expected to struggle with the board. A lot. 

But I didn't. I picked up the foot controls quickly, and couldn't stop using them once I started. Weirdly enough, the foot controls sometimes seemed more intuitive than regular keyboard/mouse controls. When I want to roll dodge in Elder Scrolls Online, for example, it's more natural to my reflexes to side-step (and activate a button in the board) than it is to click myself away. In Skyrim, it's far more intuitive hold my heel down and crouch than it is to hold my pinky down. If you're one of those gamers who can't help but play with your whole body, you need to pick this thing up.

Not only were certain foot controls convenient and highly intuitive, but I was also able to re-map certain keys that my fingers have trouble reaching. That awkwardly-distanced ~ key I have to hit in ESO to swap my weapons set? Now I just tap my foot forward and I'm ready to keep swinging. I need to pause my Dragon Age: Origins combat to zoom out and survey the field? One backstep and I've got a bird's eye view. 

After a couple hours, I was a little bit surprised by how fluid and efficient my combat had become. I felt like I was so much more reactive to what was going on around me, and that got me more involved in what was happening on screen. 

It's a great piece of tech for MOBA-style games, too. I tested out a few different configurations in Smite. Recall got mapped to my back pedal, actives to my left and right. Depending on which god I was playing, I usually mapped the front pedal to open the item store or lay traps. While this probably isn't the ideal configuration for most gamers, it really helped me compensate for my tiny hands. Freeing up my F and G keys from actives allowed me to move my abilities from 1, 2, 3, and 4 to Q, E, R, and F - a much more manageable distance for my short fingers to travel. 

Great Response and Lots of Customization

The only complaint I really had about the Stinkyboard was that sometimes the left and right pedals weren't as responsive as the front and back ones. The two side pedals are a bit larger, and oftentimes I'd step on either pedal and receive no response. The larger area made it a lot easier to miss the sweet spot for those two pedals. 

But it turned out that Stelulu was thinking way ahead of me on that one. In order to compensate for different kinds of players and play styles, the Stinkyboard offers customization options to adjust for your needs. There are soft, medium, and hard springs included with the board. The tension boxes in the board are completely user-adjustable. Using the included allen wrench, you can easily change out the current springs for a more suitable stiffness. I changed to the soft springs, and my problems with the side pedals improved markedly. I still miss them on occasion, but not nearly as often. 

The board itself is remarkably sturdy, so it can withstand some serious action. After hours of testing, it still looked fresh out of the box. 

Verdict

I can't recommend this thing enough. Once you get all the configuration and tension adjustment done, this thing is a blast to play with. It opens up a lot of new options for control mapping, and it markedly improved my gameplay. Combat got easier and more intuitive, and I felt more involved with my games.

Whether you need the extra accessibility or not, this is a great piece of tech to have on hand. The $99 price tag isn't that bad, either. Definitely worth what you'll be getting out of the board. 

To learn more about the Stinkyboard, visit the Steululu website. If you're interested in purchasing or reading user reviews, check out the Amazon page for the Stinkyboard. 

2014 saw tons of MMO releases and news. I'm here to share the best and worst of the 2014 releases as well as the best of what's to come in the next year or so. Each category will count down the top three with a few honorable mentions that didn't quite make the cut. Keep in mind this is still just an opinion piece, and you're free to disagree. I'd like to hear your opinions in the comments below as well.

The Bad:

Let's start the reflection with what went wrong in the MMO industry this year. Most of these issues are from over-hype just to find out the game just wasn't that great...

3. WildStar

WildStar had a vast amount of potential, the problem is it didn't live up to the hype-train on launch. On top of that, the leveling went by too fast for little reward upon hitting max level. You spent a good 2-3 weeks after just grinding to unlock the quest-line for "Eldergame" content. After that it was about a month worth of solo-que for Adventures and dungeons to meet a requirement for the quest progression for raiding. Basically, it boiled down to an unwelcoming end game experience.

Since launch, Carbine put in a lot of effort to improve the gameplay and experience. Unfortunately, many of the dissatisfied players decided it was better to just wait for the other big releases of the year instead of returning to a game that burned them once.

2. ArcheAge

Here's a familiar scene. Cheating the disconnect system by using the training dummies to remain logged in. This techniques was used to dodge login ques on launch, and is now used in the winter event to cheat the system.

Here's a game I was really looking forward to. I played quite a bit of the ArcheAge alpha and enjoyed the systems the game had in place. But, there were two factors that hurt this game: the cash shop and the lack of preparation by Trion at launch. Just before launch, a few items were snuck into the cash shop that completely ruined any sense of achievement players would have in the game.

The other issue was just poor management of servers. ArcheAge had one of the worst launches I have seen in my history of gaming. I'm talking worse than the 3102 issue of FFXIV, and even the over-population issues of WoW's Warlords of Draenor. From launch, I spent a good two to three weeks just trying to log into ArcheAge only to get disconnected halfway through 13 hour ques, because there weren't enough servers to handle the over population. Trion's lack of resolving this issue in a timely manner quickly destroyed player interest in the game.

1. Elder Scrolls Online

Anything that could have went wrong with this game, did. This game was not ready for launch when it came out. I could go on for days about how quests just didn't work, or how player phasing made group questing impossible, or even the slide-show style PvP where nobody could do anything due to non-stop lag in the battles. ESO was just a poor showing all around for Zenimax. I only know of four or five diehard fans that still play ESO out of a play group that was originally 40 to 50 players deep at launch. The only way I'd ever reinstall ESO is if the game went free-to-play and they truly fixed the things they claim to have fixed.

Not Quite Making The Worst of the Worst List: Tera Rising

The Ascension and Wounded World patches just left players wanting and likely should have just been released all at once instead of separately. The Fate of Arun expansion didn't do much to remedy this issue. Tera stole a page out of WoW's book with the recent level increase scroll, but implemented it poorly by taking you to 58 and leaving you with no gear and no way to acquire it for new players. They also adopted ArcheAge's middling crafting system. With all of this combined, they just barely missed being one of the top three worst for the year.

The Good:

Now that we've made it past the worst the year had to offer, let's take a look at the best.

3. Elite: Dangerous

This is the only game out this year that I didn't get my hands on personally. From what I've seen through streams like Londongaming4fun since its recent release, this game has serious potential. Elite: Dangerous has open world space exploration and combat that looks visually amazing. I'm impressed considering this is a game that kind of just sprang up out of nowhere.

There are only two downsides I noticed when checking this game out, that prevented it from getting placed higher on the list. The first was just a lack of population, or the feeling of population to be exact. With as vast as the game is, it requires a lot of searching to run into other players in some of the regions. The other issue is the fact that to get the true immersion this game can offer you need third-party programs; programs like Voice Attack that allow you to program in voice commands for the game. Elite: Dangerous seems completely playable without them, but they make it feel much more real.

2. Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn

Since it's release late last year, FFXIV has steadily released new content and patches every three months or so. These patches make Tera's Fate of Arun "expansion" look like no more than a bug fix with the sheer amount of content disparity between them. FFXIV introduces more story, at least three new dungeons, a new Primal, and endgame continuation in each patch. I can't really think of a bad thing to say about FFXIV for the year.

1. World of Warcraft: Warlords of Draenor

I'm sure most people aren't surprised, and are liking thinking this is a biased opinion. However, if I was being biased: FFXIV would have ranked higher as I've always been a FF fan. Now before I get into what makes WoD the best release of 2014, let me start by saying I literally started playing WoW for this expansion. My official start in WoW happened around 2-3 weeks before the expansion launched. I got to experience a bit of Mists of Pandaria before journeying to Draenor. Up until WoD launch I wasn't really impressed with the game.

Now, let me explain why I speak so highly of Warlords of Draenor. A big thing for me getting into this expansion was the beginner friendly approach that first quest-line before you get your Garrison has. Blizzard took into account that there would be a lot of new players with the returning players and made it so that they could get a feel for the game as well. On top of, that the story actually has a genuinely epic scale to it and it makes the player feel like their character is really making a difference in the story's progression, even though the flow and events are linear and scripted.

I'm never left with a feeling of a lack of things to do in Warlords of Draenor. It actually comes down to me trying to scramble around and get things done at the last second more often than not. Keeping your Garrison productive and not stagnant requires constant attention. Whether it means going out and gathering materials for your craft buildings or tracking down Garrison Resources for that building upgrade, it's almost like having a second job (in a good way).

The last thing I want to mention is dungeons and raiding. As this article shows, I play quite a few MMOs. I've never experienced an MMO that has been as personally challenging as this expansion. You have to constantly be aware of at least five things at once, and during a three-hour raid session that can be very taxing. It's a refreshing change of pace to most MMOs which favor the casual idea, "Let's make content that anyone can clear." These raids are designed with the understanding that not everyone can clear the Mythic difficulty, giving those that do that huge sense of accomplishment.

Honorable Mention: Blade and Soul: Taiwan

I got my hands on the Taiwan version of Blade and Soul the moment it launched back in November. I must say that it's everything I'd hoped for in Blade and Soul.

Fast-paced combat that requires skill really brings excitement to the game. Blade and Soul doesn't have healers, meaning players will live or die based on their own merits. It's nice having a game in which there is no one to blame but yourself for failing.

The reason this placed as an honorable mention instead of the top three is due to the fact that it requires a third-party translation patch to understand for english speaking players. GameSkinny writer Ashley recently wrote about a site that provides these translations.

The Future:

It's time to take a look at, "What's Next" for the MMO world. The next year or so is going to be really exciting, from what I've seen so far. As a lot of what's involved in these future releases is shrouded in secrecy, I'll share videos for each one.

3. Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward

The first expansion for FFXIV is slated to launch some time in early 2015, I'm willing to bet sometime between March and May. This expansion brings three new jobs, flying mounts, Ishgaard, and so much more.

2. Tree of Savior

Tree of Savior is the spiritual successor to Ragnarok Online. Everything I've seen on this game has made me sure I want to play it. It takes a step back from those fancy, realistic 3D MMOs without taking away from the beauty of the world.

1. Black Desert

Another game that I decided I had to play after only seeing one video. This game reminds me a lot of the combat style of Blade and Soul, but on a more epic scale.

Honorable Mention: Lineage Eternal

This is a game I stumbled upon more recently, and I know very little about. It looks very Diablo like, but I'm not really sure of anything outside of that. I do know this game isn't expected until late 2016 though, so it'll be a long wait if this is the game you're looking forward to.

That wraps up my year-end review of MMOs and what to look forward to in the future. I'm very open to your opinions on what you think are the top three in each category. Be sure to share this with your friends and leave your opinions in the comments section below.

Wednesday Bethesda announced a new subscription-free model for The Elder Scrolls Online and took to Twitch to share the details of the new system, as well as the upcoming console release for PlayStation 4 and XBox One.

In the live stream, Bethesda's Vice President of Public Relations and Marketing sat with Game Director Matt Firor and Creative Director Paul Sage to discuss the impetus for the changes, as well as to explain how the new features will work.

In Wednesday's Twitch stream, Bethesda released the fourth and final part of the trailer for The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited.

Beginning March 17, The Elder Scrolls Online will move to a "buy to play" model - that is, users will initially purchase the game, but will not have to pay a subscription fee. Those dedicated fans who choose to continue to subscribe to gain premium access (now called "ESO Plus") will receive a number of perks to reward their loyalty to the game, including:

• 1500 complimentary Crowns (the new in-game currency) per 30-day membership period
• Access to all downloadable content
• 10% bonus to experience earned
• 10% faster crafting research times
• 10% increase to crafting inspiration gain
• 10% bonus to gold acquisition

The hosts of the Twitch stream also discussed the new Crown Store, a micro-transaction system which Firor emphasized sells items of "customization and convenience" such as costumes, new mounts and pets, as well as potions that can be purchased in the regular in-game stores (but that are not as good as player-crafted items).

The new Crown Store will sell costumes for users who want to customize their armor to suit different professions or occasions without losing the armor's bonuses.

As of this new system, the game will be known as The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited, and a series of DLC will herald the arrival of the game to consoles, expanding the in-game world in a way that will be scaleable to player level. The DLC will be free to subscribers of ESO Plus as well as available for a la carte purchase for those who choose not to subscribe.

To read more about the console release, check out the press release here.

I cannot tell you the number of times I’ve had to decide between one MMO subscription and another. When World of Warcraft released, I had to decide between that subscription and Star Wars Galaxies. I was young and had no money, so I couldn’t afford two subscriptions. As a Star Wars fan, I picked SWG; clearly, the rest of the world picked WoW, but I don’t regret that. What I do regret is not being able to play both.

These days, I keep a suite of MMOs that I subscribe to or support financially in some way or another. However, I do have a limit. Most recently, I had to pick between WildStar and Elder Scrolls Online. Thankfully, I picked ESO. But ESO is changing its pricing model. On March 17th, ESO will launch ESO: Tamriel Unlimited, which will drop the subscription fee and allow anyone who buys or has bought the game to just jump in and play forever, without having to pay another dime for the base game.

This whole transition got me thinking about payment models for different kinds of online games. And I’ve come to the conclusion that, despite the many different types of payment models MMOs have, buy-to-play is clearly the best.

I should define what I mean by buy-to-pay

All buy-to-play games have an up-front cost to play, and there is no required subscription to keep playing. This does not mean that there isn’t a subscription for other benefits, or that there isn’t a trial of some sort so people can get a taste of the game for free. An example of this type of payment model can be found in Guild Wars 2.

Buy-to-play isn’t free-to-play; that gets confused sometimes. Free-to-play means that the base game is free. Usually that means that getting to max level can be achieved or a vast majority of the game can be played without spending a dime. League of Legends is a great example of a free-to-play game. The base game can be played without paying anything, but champions and other items have to be bought from the cash shop.

The subscription model seems to be pretty obvious. Players have to pay a subscription to play the game at all. Sometimes these games will have some sort of trial, but the vast majority of the game requires that you some sort of monthly fee. World of Warcraft is probably the prime example of this, but to be honest, nearly every other MMO on the market at the time of WoW used this model.

Beyond that, we see hybrids of these modes. Some are buy-to-play, with cash shops for in-game items, or there are subs where game time can be purchased in game. The list goes on, but the most common is usually referred to as the Freemium model. Essentially, this is a free-to-play model with an additional subscription that gives you access to the “whole game.” A good example of this is Star Wars: The Old Republic, but Lord of the Rings Online and EverQuest 2 used this model before SWTOR.

Buy-to-play is the only one that works

However, out of all these models, the buy-to-play model is the only one that works well for both the consumer and the developer, and is therefore the best.

The free-to-play model seems to be great, right? You get a whole game, but have to pay for nothing at all. You can tool around, find what you want, and even play some content without paying anything. If you want something neat that you see someone else wearing, likely it’s in the cash shop for you to buy. It's generally great for the consumer, because you don’t have to pay for anything. Of course, gold spammers are usually horrific, but that’s a small price to pay for a free game, right?

On the developer's end, you only have small increments of revenue to work with. Of course, there are some games, like MOBAs, that have lower development overhead and can get away with having smaller purchases. But when you have a game with the scope of an MMORPG, the developer has to focus on keeping the cash shop relevant, while at the same time focusing on other aspects of gameplay development. I believe this is what's beginning to happen with Star Wars: The Old Republic. The expansion packs are getting less and less complicated, and they're catering to the least common denominator of player type.

I think we’ve all felt the woes of the subscription model of MMO. We have to juggle our subscriptions, because we feel that if we are paying for a month of gaming, we have to spend a month in that game. Subscriptions create an all-or-nothing scenario for the developers, too. They have to drop everything into the game without cost, or the customer will feel he’s being ripped off. And don't even think about making a cash shop. Most sub games that have real cash shops have received so much flak. Oh, and if the developer doesn’t release something each month, then the game will start to bleed players because they could spend their money on another MMORPG and get new content.

The best case scenario would be buy-to-play. Players will not feel slighted when you create a cash shop to keep things running. You can even have a part of the team focus on making things specifically for the cash shop. The rest of the team can focus on building the next DLC or expansion. Developers can even charge for that DLC, and players will not feel slighted. The DLC would also not be on a schedule, other than one that is within a reasonable frame of time to keep the players interested.

Guild Wars 2 has been running really well off this model. In fact, while other MMOs had major layoffs after a launch, Guild Wars 2 was actually hiring people. One key, however, is that you have to keep the box price at launch retail price for quite some time in order to recoup development costs and then make enough profit to build the following DLC.

I think the other two models can work in very specific situations, but we can talk about that another time.

I bet most of us would raise our hands when asked if we’ve played World of Warcraft. It’s a huge game, and it’s really well made. I think most of us would raise our hands again if asked if we ever left World of Warcraft for an extended period of time.

And out of those who did leave and come back, how many have felt the overwhelming sense of inadequacy when the weapon or armor that you worked so hard to get before you left is now completely worthless? I know I’d keep my hand raised -- but not just in WoW, but in every single MMO that I’ve left and come back to has had this issue.

Superman Syndrome

In the past, I’ve called this issue the "Superman Syndrome." In the beginning, Superman had a limited number of powers. But Superman had to grow as a character, and the enemies he had to fight had to become more and more grandiose. Eventually, it became so that there was nothing that Superman couldn’t do. In the comic books, Superman had to die. When reborn, his powers were diminished.

In the video game world, we call this slow growth in strength and invincibility Power Creep, and that’s what I’d like to talk about today. How does it start? Why do we still have it? And how do we fix it?

You keep using this word…

I’ve made too many assumptions in the past thinking that people knew what I was talking about when I referred to gaming development terms like power creep, so let me explain what I mean.

When an MMO launches -- even one that has a skill system versus a non-linear progression system like WoW -- there is a finite number of levels or abilities that a player can have. Sometimes this limitation is placed on the number of skill points a given character can have. Other times, the limit is in the skill bar itself. Maybe you can only have five active abilities at one time, as in Elder Scrolls Online. In the case of WoW, your limitation is based on your level. When World of Warcraft launched the max level was 60, and the whole game was based on that kind of progression. Dungeons, weapons, armor, and bosses were all based on that level cap.

When expansions hit you could level up to 70, then 80, then 90, now 100. As your level increased so did your player power. If you were doing 3,000 damage per second at level 60, then by level 90, you were doing 30,000 DPS. This was expected because your stats increased linearly and exponentially.

You didn’t just gain a damage stat increase, you gained increased strength, agility, stamina, etc. Although this wasn’t a multiplicative increase, the growth was exponential because a number of different stats were increasing at the same time. Suddenly, the dungeon that was difficult for you to complete at level 60 was like slicing through butter.

However, that also meant that if you left the game at 60 and came back when the level increased to 70 or 80, then your gear that you were wearing was no longer worth the time you spent gaining it.

Progression simplification

Effectively, power creep makes certain content worthless to even do. The hours that developers spent on creating those dungeons or even raids have now become wasted, and there is really no reason for players to ever visit that earlier content again.

Why do developers do that? Why would a developer want to spend so much time building something that will only become worthless by the next update?

I can tell you that many of the people actually spending time making that particular content would rather not spend their time creating content that people will blow through to never play again. However, from a production standpoint, games need to continue to make players feel more and more powerful -- or in some way make them feel that they are progressing. The easiest way to do that is simply make the player stats bigger.

I was just talking to a friend about the gear treadmill. The idea is to make the player more powerful so that they stick with the game. But the truth of the matter is that power creep is so evident in systems that linearly progress player stats that it actually makes a player feel weaker. I hear things like, "Didn’t I do this exact same thing last expansion?"

Nothing compares to this

The question then becomes "How do we end the treadmill?" The direction that World of Warcraft took, was not the answer. With the Warlords of Draenor, the developers simply crunched all the numbers. Effectively, reducing the power output of the players. Of course, this helps make the numbers smaller so that they have some place to grow, but it doesn't exactly fix the issue. The player still has to hop on the same treadmill, and the cycle starts again.

The best way to avoid a treadmill and power creep is to find a way to eliminate the direct linear progression. This is done through non-comparables, which are defined as abilities or stats that are not a direct increase in power from a previous stat. Putting it in the most basic terms: health and stamina are non-comparables. Non-comparables can be even more complex like haste and or critical chance.

Another way to add to the pool of non-comparables is to have passive abilities that augment an active ability. For instance, what if on one passive ability decreased the cooldown of active ability? That would be a non-comparable, in fact, that is likely the best kind of non-comparable. They are very specific to certain classes. In WoW, this is done via set bonuses.

Set Bonuses and Non-Traditional Leveling

Despite doing other things wrong as far as power creep is concerned, WoW hit the nail directly on the head when creating set bonuses. Of course, the problem is that WoW didn’t do enough of these. There tends to be only one set bonus per build; if you could build off those set bonuses or make multiple different kinds of sets bonuses, then you could create a sense of progression without actually creating power creep. Another example: if set bonuses are encounter-specific -- maybe one set of gear mitigated damage from an ice attack from the Lich King -- then it could be possible to never have a numerical level increase again.

Guild Wars 2 if far from a perfect game, but its willingness to try to get rid of traditional MMO leveling should be commended. Currently, the level cap is 80, and when the new expansion comes out, the level cap will still be 80. But how are characters still going to feel like they are progressing?

Guild Wars 2 is implementing skill lines that are meant only for the new zones. In fact, some of the abilities can only be used in those zones. Of course, we’ve only seen the new abilities demonstrated by the developers so far; it could fall on its face when player get their hands on it, but I’m optimistic.

I’m grateful for games stepping away from WoW way of progression, and more and more MMORPGs are seeing the importance of reducing power creep. But unfortunately, it’s still there. If games like Guild Wars 2 can be successful, then perhaps the future of MMOs isn’t too glum.

It's only been a week since ESO: Tamriel Unlimted launched, and already Zenimax Online Studios is looking to expand it’s PvP servers. Once again they're dealing with Megaserver lag due to the influx of returning players.

But all this talk about expanding has us asking questions. ZOS has said in several conferences (most notably at QuakeCon) that there's more content they want to see in the game. Whatever became of that content?

It would be wrong to say that ESO didn’t have a very rocky launch. With many bugs left in the game and gold spammers aplenty, it was honestly quite impressive they were able to maintain an estimated 750K+ player base as last summer drew to an end. It was right around this time when ZOS announced upcoming content at QuakeCon, having earlier promised frequent content updates. As time went on though, updates became less meaty and more spread out.

One obvious reason that content packages were “delayed” was due to the sheer number of system changes ZOS had to make in response to player feedback. Everything from PvP balances to environmental changes took top priority. Looking at the major list of changes in updates from launch to 1.6, most were things people could argue should have been in the game from the beginning.

This is where Redditor Dominoid73 comes in to shed a bit of light on the very quiet ZOS. His first datamining thread popped up last month, and it shows the “Alpha” map for the up-coming "Wrothgar" DLC. This was quickly followed up by loot tables added by ESO 1.6. Since then, Dominoid73 has been a primary source of information regarding things that have been added into the game but are not yet active.

Official word from ZOS in relation to these leaks was released on the official forums :

Datamining information isn't illegal or against the TOS, but please understand that anything datamined isn't final and is subject to change.

-ZOS_GinaBruno

ZOS is taking an approach that is keeping them very transparent and close to the community. A major part of the reason ESO continues to do well is because they use this approach. Listening to consumer feedback and prioritizing player concerns over initial plans has given them the good will of many TES fans playing the game. Which is why for better or worse, this attitude has dramatically changed the way the game feels from beta and launch for the better.

In the following weeks, I will be keeping tabs on these data mined threads and the implications their content has had or not had on the game. I will also add in my own personal experiences with the game as I have been subbed since Beta.

When asked about what major PVP update players would like to see in ESO, the resounding answer would be: Imperial City. While PVP in ESO has been pretty fun, it does feel like a whole lot is missing. This is ignoring the fact that things had been removed from the game since launch. Considering these facts, our question isn’t about what players would want to see; rather it becomes what is missing.

How PVP Currently Works

As of this writing, the process for many players regarding PVP is essentially the same: login, travel to your campaign (unless you login there), type LFG in zone chat, and travel roughly 8-12 minutes to the nearest battle. Once there, you pick a “role” and start supporting the war effort. If you want to man siege weaponry you either bring it yourself or hope a teammate places one. You can work at killing players through direct combat in many ways or hang back and heal if that suits you better. It might not sound so great on paper, but it’s been fun enough to keep many playing for months.

The noticeable problems begin to rear their head when certain gameplay aspects are either abused by other players or hinder the game.

The noticeable problems begin to rear their head when certain gameplay aspects are either abused by other players or hinder the game. A great example would be Emperor trading seen just a few weeks after launch. Simply put, the highest ranked player on a PVP server in their alliance could be crowned Emperor if his/her faction controlled the central keeps. Many players that traded around did this as a means to help keep guild members who helped them gain emperorship within the guild, others because there wasn’t much point to being Emperor outside of denying it to other players. Ultimately though there was a key piece missing to this equation which is why it was so easy to abuse in the first place; a throne.

What is the Imperial City?

For anyone who’s played Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, you already know the iconic white-gold tower is the palace of the Emperor within the Imperial city. Logically, this means that anyone who becomes Emperor must journey within the city to claim the throne; but they can’t because it isn’t available yet. The Imperial City content which is currently not within the game was meant to be more than just “another thing to do in Cyrodiil”. It is the cap stone PVP/PVE map within the alliance war. It has close-knit quarters for combat that allows players to fight in very close proximity for a tangible faction felt reward.

The Imperial City is a huge chunk of content that even the most dedicated would have trouble completing quickly due to it’s PVP nature. There are seven unique areas within the city each with their own list of quests. Beyond the PVE quest, there will also be the normal PVP quests on top (or rather below in the sewers) of them and the fact that many people will be fighting for the right to enter the city in the rest of the Cyrodiilic map. This leads us back to problems with Emperorship and it’s odd role currently in the game.

How PVP Might Look After Imperial City

Fighting to get leaderboard scores, and crowning an Emperor are fine and dandy, but the reality of the situation is these don’t always appeal to most of the game's population. Getting the best score you can get and earning the best gear because of it is great, but sometimes you want more from spending weeks on end grinding out Alliance Points. Once Imperial City is introduced into the game, it will become the reason many people jump over from regular PVE. As PVP is now, it’s an activity for hardcore groups to dominate completion, or for zergs of casuals to jump on late at night and railroad the map. Once the Imperial City is introduced it will do more than just add another stopping point, it can add layers to an otherwise good but somewhat flat experience.

There is a common saying among the guards of Tamrie: "Anyone can be crowned Emperor, but that's the risk we take."

There is a common saying among the guards of Tamriel: “Anyone can be crowned Emperor, but that’s the risk we take.” Never would this be truer when you have to consider that the most powerful player in your faction has a role to perform beyond glorified security guard. To hold the title of Emperor means you’d need to fight on several fronts to secure the city and maintain your position. This kind of macro management is what should define an Emperor, not simply the person who’s been logged in the most.

To find out more about the imperial City, reddit user Dominoid as datamined achivements available within the zone.

Bethesda and ZeniMax's Elder Scrolls Online was published April 4th, 2014, and the MMO is celebrating the one year anniversary. Being a frequent and long-time player of the game, it has been a pretty cool experience. To imagine that the game had been out for a year and was doing just so well was amazing. The anniversary was a day to think back on everything we've done and all the things yet to come.

In the days following the celebration, there was a large update for the game as well as some new items on the Crown Market. Now, the Crown Market has received criticism in the past, but now that ESO no longer has a monthly subscription, Zenimax has to make money somehow.

I do not hate the studio nor do I look down on them for adding microtransactions, because I think removing the monthly fee is a big step and a step in the right direction. It's brought many new players to the game who were not able to play the game before due to the monthly fees.

There is much more to come from the game and possibly many more celebrations like this to be had. I am excited for what they will do next, regarding updates and what not. One big question that's being tossed around: 

Are they ever going to complete the map?

People who play the game know that there are parts of the map that are not accessible and have nothing there, but are they ever going to fill it in? Of course, the map is very large, and there is much to explore, and the fact that the game can render all of it and keep it running smooth is amazing. But will it ever be complete? The biggest place that is missing is Skyrim. Of course, some are satisfied with just The Rift and Windhelm, others want to see more, like Whiterun and Markarth. These people are, of course, the die-hard Elder Scrolls and Skyrim fans.

Being a very avid player of Skyrim back in the day (where I one-hundred-percented the game a few times and finished the main story more times than I could count) I was looking forward to seeing some of the cities I know and love in ESO, yet that isn't the case. I am in no way ragging on the game; the new places on the map are still amazing. I love the new places, but it'd just be nice to have some of the nostalgia back.

Either way, it was a big day and a big week for the game and its players and all are looking forward to the future.

Bethesda and ZeniMax

Gamers who preorder The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited will have the option of playing as any race/alliance combination, publisher Bethesda Softworks announced on Tuesday. Those who do not preorder will be limited to selecting one of the races associated with their chosen alliance.

The game has three alliances: Aldmeri Dominion, Daggerfall Covenant, and Ebonheart Pact. Each alliance is composed of members from three Elder Scrolls races. Because gamers may only play cooperatively with members of the same alliance, having the preorder bonus means not being forced to sacrifice playing as your favorite race to fight through Tamriel with your friends. You will still have to agree on an alliance, however.

The bonus is part of the exclusive Explorer's Pack, which also includes a Scuttler vanity pet and a collection of treasure maps, and is available for preorders of both physical and digital copies. The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited is available June 9th on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.

A common question that all MMO players have to eventually ask themselves is “what do I want in a guild?” Of course, many of us ask this question without realizing that is what we are asking. We might phrase it like “I need a group to run dungeons” or “Where are the good PvPers?” There are always those guilds that send out the random invite to those who aren’t guilded, but I suggest never taking those invites.

Most of the time, our needs as players appear to be simple, we want a group of like-minded people to hang out with as we game. So when did running a guild become a second job?

As I’ve said previously, I’ve run gaming communities, and I’ve seen all sorts of guilds. I love them. I think they instill a sense of pride and purpose for players among other positive social aspects. But many have grown from social circles into kinds of clubs where the goal isn’t to hang out with friends but actually help progress your gameplay prowess.

And I question if that is something we actually want from our guilds.

My friend Eliot writes a column here that guides guild leaders and guild members about how to make the most of their gaming groups. And I believe that there needs to be organization and structure for a guild to function well. No matter how good of friends you are, you cannot just wing everything and hope that it all turns out all right. (I guess an exception to that rule would be if you want your guild to grow no larger than the five people you have an speed dial.)

But a guild really shouldn’t be a second job for anyone, but there is certainly a trend for guilds to turn into jobs.

Are guild becoming jobs?

I have friends who are in a really large guild, and it’s certainly a lot of fun for them. It’s called the Old Timers Guild. I’m sure many of you have heard of this guild. It advertises having more than 10,000 active members, and if you visit its forums, you’ll see at least 100 people online, even during the slow times. Its games range from anything to everything. In many games, The Old Timers Guild has to make multiple in-game guilds just to accommodate all the members because the actual number of guild members exceeds the in-game guild member caps. I recall, specifically, that OTG was forced to enact a no-alt policy when Star Wars: The Old Republic launched because of the number of people joining the guilds.

But OTG isn’t alone, there is a long-standing trend to make your guild as big as possible because bigger is better, right? Many guilds have attempted to increase their size by joining large networks of guilds or even some media networks. This allowed guilds to build exposure and legitimacy as a strong guild. In the end, this also required more work and if a guild joined a media network the guild would have to be worthy of the time invested by an employee of the network.

Guilds partner with media groups

The Gamebreaker Nation guild is similar to this. The guild runs under the banner of a the Gamebreaker media network, but operates independently with a community manager from Gamebreaker acting as a liaison between the guild and the media group so that there is cross-promotion of activities. This set up literally has a person whose job is to take care of guild management.

I don’t fault the guilds nor the media groups for latching on to this kind of system because there also appears to be a trend of games catering to these kinds of guilds. Guild systems in MMORPGs tend to support larger guilds, leaving smaller guilds in the dust. That’s not to say that the designers intentionally set out to exclude small guilds, but the unintentional consequence of the games’ systems cause smaller guilds to be left out.

Games encourage huge guilds

I’ll give you an example using the recently launched Elder Scrolls Online. I could argue that the RvR PvP system in and of itself promotes zerging in order to dominate an instance. Although that is partially true, I do believe that ESO has done many things to circumvent the inevitable zergfest. Most of the zerging can be counteracted with a well-placed siege weapon.

The biggest issue is the trade market. There is no auction house or anything similar to that in the game, and the only thing that even comes close to being community-run sales machines are the Guild Traders.

Guild Traders are not Guild Stores, which exclusively sell to guild members. Guild Traders are specific vendors throughout the game world that sell specifically flagged guild wares to the public. Although there are quite a few vendors throughout the world, and it is definitely a unique alternative to the auction house system, the larger guilds dominate the best vendors because the vendors are bidded on, and of course, the guild that bids the most gains the vendor.

This means that the guilds that have the most money and/or the most people will likely gain these vendors over the smaller guild -- even if the smaller guild isn’t poor in relative comparison.

Guild Traders isn’t the only example of game mechanics being weighted towards larger guilds. Guild leveling in Guild Wars 2 and WildStar leans toward larger guilds. Conquests in Star Wars: The Old Republic require that your guild be big in order to top the conquest charts. When H1Z1 goes live, you’d best have a large guild if you want to game comfortably.

Let's talk about this trend

I’m not exactly in a position to say if this trend is good or bad overall, but I am not a fan of it. I feel that it alienates smaller guilds, and it causes the truly exceptional guilds to be overshadowed by the zerg. Many of the world-first raiding guilds aren’t really that big. Most have just enough to fill the raid group with a few bench seats to fill in when there is an absence.

When I asked a panelist on my debate show, Massively Opinionated, what the optimal size was for a guild, the largest number was 50. That answer surprised me. I was expecting for someone to say something in the hundreds of members. He felt that 50 gave optimal number of people being online so that there is enough activity in guild on a daily basis to provide enough players to do all the fun things that people like to do. Any higher than that and the panelists believed that it starts to become more work than fun and that ruins the ultimate reason why you play a game.

Clearly, on this topic, I don’t have all the answers, so what do you think? What is the optimal number of guild members? At what point do guilds become jobs?

Bethesda’s E3 press conference was highly anticipated by everyone and their mother in the games industry. Fallout 4 was almost going to be a given after the trailer last week, and the DOOM remake had already been confirmed, but what else were we going to see? Some were hoping for Dishonored 2, others RAGE 2, a lot of people wanted The Elder Scrolls VI. Here’s what we actually got, in chronological order:

DOOM

Bethesda’s first ever E3 conference kicked off with Pete Hines, the vice president of Bethesda Softworks, introducing the DOOM remake they and id Software have been working on for some time.

They introduced us to the new DOOM universe with a gameplay trailer and boy does it look impressive. Even games like Mortal Kombat X will be put to shame by the amount of gore and violence shown, some of the executions and finishers were intense. Splitting bodies in half with chainsaws, ripping arms off and punching heads clean off will be a regular occurrence. Combine this with how the game looked graphically and we’re in for a treat, provided there are no graphical downgrades prior to release of course.

They also showed off a variety of weapons including the Super Shotgun, Plasma Rifle, and Heavy Assault Rifle. They look pretty impressive and pack a powerful punch… except for the Plasma Rifle. It looked weak and unimpressive compared to the other weapons on the show, although it goes without saying the game is still in development. Nevertheless, DOOM appears to be a lot of shoot-em-up monster action!

They also introduced on a new feature for DOOM, called Snapmap. It appears to be DOOM’s version of the popular Forge mode from the Halo franchise, allowing you to edit and create your own maps and arenas, while also controlling how the game responds to individual actions. An example they showed in the footage was placing down a piece of armor, then as soon as your player character picks the armor up, it spawns an enemy in front of you. There seem to be a lot of different possibilities that could lead to some unusual creations, especially since they announced content created on SnapMap will be compatible with all versions of the game.

Multiplayer was also announced and shown off; it gives off a lot of Quake vibes. Fast paced, high octane action, there’s not a lot else to say! It’s what everyone expected for DOOM multiplayer, and they didn’t disappoint. They confirmed the game will be releasing on PC, PS4, and Xbox One next Spring.

Bethesda.net

Before launching into the next game, they announced Bethesda.net, a new centralized hub for all of Bethesda’s games. Not a lot was said on the functions of the site, but the Bethesda blog states “will be the home of featured content you’ve come to expect here on Bethesda Blog, revamped community forums, and powerful tools for sharing game stats and content.”

BattleCry

A gameplay trailer for BattleCry by aptly named BattleCry Studios was shown, announcing the beta is now open for public signups. BattleCry plays as a third person tactical team-based online game, with a striking similarity to Bethesda’s failed 2011 title, Brink. Three factions have been announced so far: The Imperial Marines, The Cossack

Three factions have been announced so far: The Imperial Marines, The Cossack Empire, and The Han Feudal. If you sign up before June 18th you receive exclusive in-game content, while the beta itself will go live in the fall. You can register here: BattleCryTheGame.

Dishonored 2

The game everyone was hoping for but hadn’t been confirmed made its appearance next: Dishonored 2. It started off with Harvey Smith and Raphael Colantonio of Arkane Studios talking about the original and how grateful they are it did so well before launching into the official Dishonored 2 trailer.

It’s confirmed to take place 15 years after the conclusion of Dishonored 1, with the ‘good’ ending being canon. Each mission will give you the option to play as either Corvo, the protagonist from the first game or Emily Caldwin, your daughter and the girl you have to save in the original. She also has various powers and abilities, but they’ll all differ from Corvo’s, allowing plenty of options and routes through a mission.

No release date confirmed. However, they’re aiming for Spring 2016. They also announced the Dishonored: Definitive Edition, a re-release of the original with all DLC included for the latest consoles. You can grab that on PC, Xbox One, and PS4 this Fall.

The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited

Nothing much here, just a new trailer as the game has just launches on consoles, and two new areas are available: the Imperial City and Orsinium, Land of the Orcs.

The Elder Scrolls: Legends

Following in the footsteps and aiming to emulate the success of Hearthstone, Bethesda also announced there will be a collectible card game with an Elder Scrolls theme called Legends.

It’ll be free to play on iOS, Android, and PC.

Fallout 4

This is the big one really, isn’t it? And boy oh boy, Bethesda did not disappoint. Here’s a rundown of all the features and interesting things they mentioned:

They started off by mentioning it’s been in development since 2009. That’s a long time, since before New Vegas came out and only a few months after 3. Let’s hope it’s been worth the wait!

Fallout 4 starts before the bombs fall, on a beautiful sunny morning where you get to design your character and pick his stats from the comfort of your own home. You rush to the vault, somehow manage to survive the bombs, and then emerge as the sole survivor of Vault 111.

Character creation has taken a new turn with the ability to drag various parts of your face to the exact proportions you want them. Playing as a female is also confirmed, as is being able to change your ethnicity.

They’ve announced it’s running on a new-gen version of the engine and dialogue is now dynamic. Not feeling the conversation anymore? Simply turn around and walk away. Or blow their head off, if that’s more your style. On top of this, the protagonist is no longer a mute! Devs also claimed to have recorded over 1000 different popular names for people to use when referring to you by your chosen name.

The German Shepherd shown in the trailer is confirmed to be your companion. You’re able to command him to pick things up and bring them to you, stay where he is, go somewhere or attack an enemy. It also showed his name as Dogmeat. However, the dog's name is likely customizable.

VATS is back, with it only slowing down time now rather than stopping it completely. The armor system is now layered for more protection while you’re also now able to sprint, although it does drain your Action Points. Power armor also now appears to be limited in use, with the player seen to climb in the back of it and place down what appears to be fuel of some kind. It’ll likely be rendered immobile once you run out of fuel.

Your Pip-Boy is able to play different tapes, audio logs you find scattered across Boston and the surrounding wasteland, along with game tapes that enable you to play simple, old school 2D games on your Pip-Boy.

You can now build up your own settlement and defend it! It looks similar to The Sims building mechanics, you can craft and place furniture, build up a house, entice NPCs to come and make your settlement their home. You’re able to fortify it with turrets and barricades, which will end up being necessary as raiders are able to lay siege upon your home. If you have more than one settlement, you can also run Brahmin Traders between them.

All that useless junk in the previous games, toy cars, glue etc. It all has a purpose now! You can break items down into individual components to craft useful things such as furniture and weapons.

Various types of enemies were shown, ranging from Deathclaws living in the sewers to a huge Mirelurk Queen trying to rip your guts out. Super Mutants are also confirmed to be back, along with the Brotherhood of Steel.

There’s two smartphone apps! The first one is a Fallout 4 companion app for iOS and Android that will release at the same time as the game. It basically enables you to use your phone as a Pip-Boy, which is useful for the collector’s edition, which comes with a real life Pip-Boy holder to go on your arm for you to then place your phone in!

The other app is called Fallout Shelter and is available now on iOS only with Android coming at an unconfirmed later date. You are the Overseer of a vault, with the goal to grow and expand your vault to become the King of Overseers! It’s pretty much a Fallout themed management game as you get your vault dwellers to exercise, go out hunting, cook food and make love. Nothing revolutionary however the initial response seems to be okay! It’s free to play with some microtransactions.

Fallout 4 will be available on PS4, Xbox One and PC on November 10th, 2015.

There we have it, the end to Bethesda’s very first E3 conference. They definitely didn’t let us down, with Fallout 4 exceeding all my expectations along with DOOM and Dishonored 2 being the icing on the cake. Just five months to go until Fallout 4!

To celebrate its twentieth anniversary, online giant Amazon is having Prime Day. They put almost every type of product (video games included) on sale for one day only on July 15th. Many gamers were extremely excited at the prospect of a sale that was promised to be "bigger than black Friday" - and they could get all the deals from the comfort of their living rooms. Rather than racing and brawling your way through crowds to incredible deals, the deals would come to you, sitting there waiting for you to click on them. 

Sadly, if you have any experience with real sales (perhaps January sales in London or Black Friday in New York), you were likely sorely disappointed by the modest and at times pitiful savings that Amazon offered - savings that often seemed like they were on items that Amazon simply wanted to shift.

A good example is The Elder Scrolls Online, which claims to offer a 25% saving. Sounds good, right? But in reality, that only translates to $5 off. The 25% refers to the recommended retail price, not the actual Amazon price. So the game is only a fiver cheaper than it was the day before and will be the day after Prime Day.

To give credit where it's due, the sale only appears so bad because Amazon is cheaper than the high street already. And it's technically not false advertising to phrase things as they did. Regardless, as sales go, it was a major let down and something that I won't forget anytime soon when shopping online.

How did you feel about Prime Day? Find any good deals, or is it all just misleading advertising? Let us know in the comments!

Coming up next month, Elder Scrolls Online will release its first expansion pack, Imperial City. PC and Mac users will have access on August 31st. However, console users will have to wait about two weeks till the get in on the action. Xbox One users will be able have access on September 15, and PlayStation 4 will have access the next day.

The DLC takes place as Molag Bal and his forces takes over the Imperial City and it is up to you and your allies to take it back. The DLC will include the following content:

• Six new Imperial City Districts
• New quests and characters in the Imperial City
• Two new PvE group dungeons in the Imperial City: White-Gold Tower and Imperial City Prison (in both Normal and Veteran ranks)
• A new public PvP dungeon: The Imperial Sewers 
• Treasure Vaults that contain new Veteran Rank 16 set jewlery along with other rare finds
• The Tel Var Stone system 
• 23 new Veteran Rank 16 item sets from the Imperial City
• Xivkyn racial motif style
• New collectibles from the Imperial City (pets, polymorphs and a costume)
  *All content is available for players that are level 10 and up

During the launch of the DLC pack, a base game patch will also be released for no added cost. Everyone with a copy of the game will have access to this patch. Details for the patch can be found here.

The Imperial City DLC can be purchased for 2,500 crowns (roughly about $17.50- $25, depending on what bundle you choose). Anyone with ESO plus membership however, will have the DLC included.

I’ve had it. I’m done with letting developers tell me that something is too hard. It gives me zero insight into why something isn’t being done in a game. On top of that, it makes the developers look like idiots and it makes interviewers look like idiots for taking "it's too hard" as a real answer.

Readers should not take “it’s too hard” as a legitimate answer from a developer. There is always more to it; there is always a limitation on the development team that they are just not revealing.

Of course, I’m not trying to say that every game should have everything we want in it. Nor am I saying that there aren’t things that developers can’t do. Saying that things are too difficult or too hard not only doesn’t paint a true picture of what’s really happening, but it also makes it sound like the developer just isn’t skilled enough to pull off whatever it is the interviewer is asking. That might be the case, but you don’t want to tell people that! (Note: that’s not usually the case.)

In case you’re confused by why Assassin’s Creed Unity didn’t have a female multiplayer character model or why the PC port for Batman: Arkham Knight released unplayable, let me give a list of five things developers could really mean by “it’s too hard.”

1. Doesn’t fit within the limitations of the engine

Engine choices are obviously made early on in the design process. More often than not it’s simpler to license an existing engine when designing a game now because it takes a lot of developer time to create an engine from scratch. On top of that, many of the existing licensed engines are robust and highly customizable. I completely understand the cost-effectiveness of not reinventing the wheel.

However, there are sometimes limitations in tech within the engine itself. Of course, developers can usually rewrite the code of the engine, but if the game is already built, then rewriting something core to the game could easily break the game to a point where is it unplayable.

Instead of “too hard,” developers should reply something like: “We have assessed the ramifications of implementing this feature in the game’s engine and have concluded that adding it would cause irrevocable damage to the gameplay.”

2. Would require more man-hours than we can allocate

The ultimate idea behind making a video game is making money. And I don’t begrudge people from all levels of development for wanting the game to make money. Of course, there is a line where making money supersedes making a good game, and that is bad.

Regardless, when you make a game, producers have to keep in mind how much time is being spent on certain features. And if too much time is being spent on one feature that doesn’t benefit the game’s bottom line as much as spending time on another feature, then it’s understandable that the resources had to be allocated to another part of the project.

A better, although equally unwanted reply, could be: “There are many features that we wanted to implement into the game, but our allotted man-hours didn’t allow us to work on that feature.” That could be followed up with “But we hope to implement that in the future” or “If our sales of the game reach beyond our projected threshold, then we can work on implementing that.”

3. Would require hiring extra staff

This particular reason for not implementing something in a game is similar to the last one, but usually this means that they would have to hire staff that has a skillset that the current team doesn’t have. Think about it like this: It takes a completely different style of design for Kerbal Space Program than making Call of Duty. That also means that different designers are required.

Sure, there is overlap because they are both video games, but I think you can understand that from a more narrow perspective that different games will require different people to make them successfully.

If the current team doesn’t have the background to implement the feature an interviewer is asking about, the developers should state that. For example: “That feature does sound great, but our staff consists of a different type of developers. If we wanted to implement those features, we would have to hire a different team, and unfortunately, that is not in our current budget.”

4. Will not fit in the client-side minimum requirements

One of the biggest limitations on game developers is the platform it’s being developed for. Everything from the controls, to the GPU, to the amount of storage required for the game all weigh against the choices behind what is or isn’t implemented in a title.

Sometimes, certain features have to be scaled back so far because of the console limitations that it’s not even worth implementing. For instance, Elder Scrolls Online didn’t bother implementing a chatroom on its console version because the keyboards for consoles are just plain awful and are rarely used. There was more benefit in implementing a built-in voice chat.

If this is a reason why something hasn’t been implemented in a game, simply say: “We had to scale back that feature because it didn’t work on this platform.” As the PC master race, it’s sometimes hard to accept that, but understand that it's often better for business to cater to console and low-end PC users.

5. It’s outside the scope of the vision for the game

Lastly, games have to have a solid vision to work out well. If it attempts to do too much, then it enters the dreaded sea of feature-creep, meaning that the things that the game does will not be done well. Sometimes, developers have to choose.

Of course, that will mean potentially losing players, but it’s better to satisfy the players that you do have than to satisfy no one.

A developer can say here: “We had considered that feature at one point when designing the game, but we felt it was beyond the our vision for the game.”

When we live in a world where CGI is better than what we can see with our eyes, there is nothing that is impossible or “too hard.” It all has to do with the limitations that developers have placed. I just wish developers were sometimes more forthcoming with their reasons why.

I don't know about you, but half my iPhone's music library has about 10GB worth of music that has come straight from video games.

Games have come a long way from just being something you do for fun. We now have the opportunity to play them for the stories they tell us, more like an interactive movie in a sense. And like movies, games have started using everything they have in their disposal to convey the emotions it wants us to feel.

Apart from the cinema-quality cut scenes we've been getting treated to over the past few years, gaming companies have been setting aside a big budget in order to snag the best music composers out there to make soundtracks that echo the tone and emotion their games are looking to convey.

We can always find faults in gameplay, plot holes in storylines, flaws in characters and other things that can turn us off. But music has never been something to find fault in.  

Halo 3 OST - Never Forget (Martin O'Donnell)

Halo is a favorite for many. And it's not surprising. 

It's a game that really brought a community together. Friends were made through this, so many of us can remember the nights we've spent playing split screen or organizing massive LAN parties for this alone. 

We can't forget Master Chief's story either. But this particular soundtrack feels more like a love letter to the fans of the series. The nostalgia we get just by listening to this beautiful piece is enough to keep remembering the reasons why Halo will always be up there as one of the greatest FPS's of our time. 

Metal Gear Solid 3: Way to Fall (Starsailor) 

This is not a song made specifically for the game, but in no way is it any less fitting. 

The Boss was always a pseudo-parent figure to Snake (Big Boss). The ending of the game, the tone it carries is matched perfectly by this song, fitting together like pieces of a puzzle so perfectly that it's difficult not to think the song was made for this game.

Or if the game was made based on the song. 

Assassin's Creed II: Ezio's Family (Jesper Kyd) 

I count Assassin's Creed II as the best in the series. 

This beautiful piece probably contributes a lot to why I think that. With Ezio's father and brother's tragic deaths setting him on the path for revenge, ultimately making the master assassin we know Ezio Auditore da Firenze to be, this melancholic soundtrack manages to capture the emotions perfectly.

Despite the Assassin's Creed series falling from grace since it's initial few releases, the soundtracks have always exceeded expectations. For that, here are a few honorable mentions;

Assassin's Creed III: Aphelion (Jesper Kyd)

Assassin's Creed IV: The Ends of the Earth (Brian Tyler) 

Dishonored: Honor For All (John Licht and Daniel Licht)

This song was written specifically as a reward for players who finished Dishonored.

The heavy emphasis on the violin fits the theme of 19th Century London perfectly, and the overall tone of the piece serves as a fitting representation for Corvo Attano's journey you undertake throughout the course of this game. 

You can ask for no more fitting a reward than this masterpiece. 

Final Fantasy VII Crisis Core: The Price of Freedom (Takeharu Ishimoto)

Ah Crisis Core. One of the gems from the PSP age. 

This beautiful piece is a fitting send off to Zack Fair, the game's main protagonist. The title itself is an indicator to the price he paid for wishing to break free of Shinra's clutches and giving Cloud Strife his freedom. 

If you haven't played this game yet, you're doing yourself a disservice. More so if you are a fan of Final Fantasy VII. Zack is a character everyone should be familiar with. The price he paid should not be forgotten. 

Elder Scrolls Online: Beauty of Dawn (Malukah) 

Let's be honest, Elder Scrolls Online was not as good as everyone thought it would be. But can a song make up for the downsides of a game? 

Normally, no. But this piece does a great job in coming close. I prefer to just think of it as something composed for Skyrim instead. 

Either way, even if you don't like ESO, get the soundtrack. You'll be saving money while getting some of the best, if not the best parts of this game: The soundtracks. 

Far Cry 3: I'm Sorry (Brian Tyler) 

Did I ever tell you what the definition of insanity is? - Vaas Montenegro

Vaas is one of the most iconic characters to ever grace a video game. As such he deserves something to remember him by. For me, it's this soundtrack. 

That's it for now! What are your favorite tracks from video games? Share below so we may all experience them!