Monsters, Dread, and high school bands in Lord of the Rings Online
What happens when MMORPG and Turbine’s Adam Mersky meet in CES 2007? Lotsa new info on how The Lord of the Rings Online will work. Starting with the fact that it will run on DX9, thank Eru. After costing out the needs of a massive Last Alliance of Men and Elves (again), including all the lembas bread being made in Gino D.’s Cooking Mama (we’re making them right now in time for Helm’s Deep), there is no room left in the budget for a Vista-D3D10 upgrade.
It will still look beautiful, though – next! What is Hope and Dread? It’s a LOTRO-unique gameplay concept that works like this: the closer you get to the blasted lands of Mordor where shadows lie, the greater the chance your character will pee his pants. Literally. He accumulates Dread the longer he stays in the blighted lands. The only ways to combat this is (a) get the heck out of Mordor, or (b) start beating up on some Mordor denizens to gain Hope and combat Dread. Talk about the Light of the Evenstar encouraging violence…
You already know “Monsters” as Monster Play, from a dev journal a while back. Here are the more specific deets: the only way you can have a PvP in the Lord of the Rings IP is if one of you guys plays the bad guys. Which is what Monster Play is all about: take over the avatar of a bad guy, beat the crap out of the player good guy, earn experience that is used on your own original good-guy character.
And then Adam brings up a unique (potential) social event in LOTRO. “Player jam sessions!” Create-your-own-soundtrack? Spend your hard-earned gold on instruments, gather all your friends and acquaintances one night under the Party Tree in the Shire and… Are you ready to rock tonight, Bag End?! Guitar solo, Frodo! Good night everybody!!! (Smashes instruments on stage… methinks they are possessed by the One Ring). You get the idea, right?
One word to all those planning to hold their own LOTR jam sessions, though: you guys better have the talent these guys have. Oh, and this brings up an old joke from an old teen flick: “And this one time, at band camp…”
What happens when MMORPG and Turbine’s Adam Mersky meet in CES 2007? Lotsa new info on how The Lord of the Rings Online will work. Starting with the fact that it will run on DX9, thank Eru. After costing out the needs of a massive Last Alliance of Men and Elves (again), including all the lembas bread being made in Gino D.’s Cooking Mama (we’re making them right now in time for Helm’s Deep), there is no room left in the budget for a Vista-D3D10 upgrade.
It will still look beautiful, though – next! What is Hope and Dread? It’s a LOTRO-unique gameplay concept that works like this: the closer you get to the blasted lands of Mordor where shadows lie, the greater the chance your character will pee his pants. Literally. He accumulates Dread the longer he stays in the blighted lands. The only ways to combat this is (a) get the heck out of Mordor, or (b) start beating up on some Mordor denizens to gain Hope and combat Dread. Talk about the Light of the Evenstar encouraging violence…
You already know “Monsters” as Monster Play, from a dev journal a while back. Here are the more specific deets: the only way you can have a PvP in the Lord of the Rings IP is if one of you guys plays the bad guys. Which is what Monster Play is all about: take over the avatar of a bad guy, beat the crap out of the player good guy, earn experience that is used on your own original good-guy character.
And then Adam brings up a unique (potential) social event in LOTRO. “Player jam sessions!” Create-your-own-soundtrack? Spend your hard-earned gold on instruments, gather all your friends and acquaintances one night under the Party Tree in the Shire and… Are you ready to rock tonight, Bag End?! Guitar solo, Frodo! Good night everybody!!! (Smashes instruments on stage… methinks they are possessed by the One Ring). You get the idea, right?
One word to all those planning to hold their own LOTR jam sessions, though: you guys better have the talent these guys have. Oh, and this brings up an old joke from an old teen flick: “And this one time, at band camp…”
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