Category: Gaming

Middle-Earth: Shadow of War removes Loot Boxes

The new, free update to Middle-Earth: Shadow of War finally removed their loot boxes called War Chests. Released in September 27th, 2017, Monolith Productions defended the addition of loot boxes as they didn’t influence the game or ruin the narrative. The boxes provided stronger Orcs for the player in the game’s famous Nemesis system and it would help reduce the grind of improving the Orcs. These helped players earn stronger Orcs without relying on chance. However, the game’s true ending is difficult to obtain without extra grinding for strong Orc captains which angered many players. Players felt Monolith and Warner Brothers (Developers and Publisher) were encouraging players to spend money on loot boxes to obtain better Orcs. As of July 17th, the loot box system and store has been completely removed from Shadow of War.

What happens after the Loot Box removal?

To help players obtain better Orcs, the game now provides challenges and Spoils of Wars which give players Training Orders. You can also purchase Training Orders with in-game currency. Monolith also allowed players to earn gears much easier than before. Previous players who have already gone through the game receive masks which helps improve Orcs. The studio has also made reduced the number of stages and missions required for 100% completion of the game.

Some fans lost their Orc, loot boxes and war chests after the initial update but Monolith is working hard to return everything that players purchased. Shadow of War sold 1.75 million units worldwide but perhaps sales were deterred due to the loot box system. The previous title, Shadow of Mordor, sold 3.2 million.

Question

Do you think Monolith has earned good grace for removing the loot boxes or is it too late?

Sources:

Shadow of War Update – July 17th

Shadow of War – Loot Box fix

Venturebeat – How to previously earn 100% on Shadow of War

Polygon

 

Target’s Big Discount Code Disater

Late last night, Target release six coupon text codes which gave users 15% off products and 20% off if you spend over $50. While most discounts are good, there was a glitch that allowed coupons to stack.

Some people began buying video game consoles and televisions with the coupons. People began to rush to order online and “Pick up a Store” before the store could cancel their request. Even I did it this morning. I paid for two Nintendo Switch games for $43. Some people saved over $300! Unfortunately, all the codes have been disabled and texting will no longer provide you with the discount. But for a brief couple of hours, Target probably lost a huge profit. Thanks to CheapAssGamers for tweeting this deal. Check out their website and Twitter for more.

Fortnite Summer Tournament begins!

Starting this weekend, Epic will be hosting their Fortnite Summer Skirmishes. The series is 8-weeks long with the reward being $8 million! This is the first in-game tournament with prize money on the line for Epic. The prize is $250,000 for Duos (Two people on the same team in a Battle Royale). Epic chose specific players and Community Creators who are actually competitively good. Invitations have already been sent so if you’re expecting to receive one, sorry.

Each tournament will be a different format which will keep tournament interesting. There will also be different qualifying factors for each tournament so players will change accordingly.

Earlier this year, Epic announced that they will be starting their own competitive venue with the pot being $100 million. With Fortnite becoming the top viewed game on Twitch, their self-hosted tournaments will grab them a bigger audience. It will be more professional but it may lead to smaller tournaments disappearing as more players will compete for a higher prize and properly run.

Sources:

Fortnite Summer Skirmishes

Polygon

TL;DR: Guild Wars 2 Writers Firing

Jessica Price and Peter Fries, former story writers for Guild Wars 2, were recently let go from ArenaNet. The company promotes their developers and game designers to communicate with the player base. However, a recent Twitter response from Prince against a player resulted in her release.

Click on the thread to see the response.

  • Prince is open with her opinions on her Twitter and wasn’t forced to respond based on corporate
  • Deroir is a YouTube partner with a focus on GW2 (Guild Wars 2)
  • Prince had recently done an AMA on story crafting for GW2 and went to Twitter to tweet further regarding the topic
  • Deroir responded and offered his own opinion on storytelling
  • Princes’ responded on July 4th:

Prince began to expand further on Twitter:

“Today in being a female game dev: ‘Allow me–a person who does not work with you–explain to you how you do your job.'”

Minutes later, she added: “like, the next rando asshat who attempts to explain the concept of branching dialogue to me–as if, you know, having worked in game narrative for a fucking DECADE, I have never heard of it–is getting instablocked. PSA.”

Peter Fries also jumped into the conversation and defended Prince:

“Today is a national holiday. It is our day off, after working hard for months on our most recent content release. If I’m being embarrassing and unprofessional, it’s because I’m enjoying a beverage in the sun in my backyard and this nonsense is being directed at someone I respect. Jessica is great at her job and deserves to be treated with respect, was the gist of what I was reacting to.”

ArenaNet president Mike O’Brien released a statement that both employees were released on July 5th:

Recently two of our employees failed to uphold our standards of communicating with players. Their attacks on the community were unacceptable. As a result, they’re no longer with the company.

I want to be clear that the statements they made do not reflect the views of ArenaNet at all. As a company we always strive to have a collaborative relationship with the Guild Wars community. We value your input. We make this game for you

Prince stated that O’Brien ” caved to a handful of people and an army of bots and sock puppets….now he’s got almost every female developer I know — as well as some men — furious with him.”

However, O’Brien stated “Whatever Jessica and Peter felt internally about the situation, this was objectively a customer engaging us respectfully and professionally, presenting a suggestion for our game. Any response from our company needed to be respectful and professional. A perceived slight doesn’t give us license to attack.

Who do you side with? Do you think Prince spoke too harshly and her layoff was warranted? Or do you believe O’Brien and ArenaNet took the proper steps to lay off Prince and Fries? Both sides have huge supporters and it will be interesting to see how this will end.

Sources:

Polygon

Guild Wars 2 Forum – O’Brien Response

Guild Wars 2 – Community Responses

Eurogamer

Princes’ Twitter Responses