Skyforge MMORPG, co-developed by Obsidian

[Duraframe300]

Invites for the technicaal beta this weekend went out yesterday.

 

[Duraframe300]

Hi everyone! I wanted to kick things off by thanking everyone for their interest in Skyforge. The developers teams at the Allods Team and Obsidian have been working hard to get everything locked down for this technical test, and for our upcoming closed beta activities. Everyone's enthusiasm for the game throughout this year has been a great motivator for the teams as we've focused on the countless tasks that go to into getting an MMO out of "development" and into CBT. This includes working on high end content like raids while simultaneously getting numerous little things solidified – like updating that UI nobody loved.

It has been a busy year for the teams working on Skyforge. Content was adapted and used as demos and for reveals to the public and press at several trade shows including; E3 here in LA, Gamescom in Cologne, Igromir in Moscow, and most recently events in London and Paris Games Week. With press events and trade shows building awareness to the game the development teams continued to lock down features and get Skyforge ready for the kickoff of the Technical Beta Weekend. Demos are important, and it's exciting to show off features and content to the press and see player's reactions, but getting the game ready closed beta tests is the "brass ring" everyone is really focused on.

Getting to the Technical Beta Weekend - getting "real players" in the game, seeing how game systems behave in “the wild” and iterating based on player feedback & game telemetry is the place all our developers really want to reach.
As many of you have seen we've already begun some testing with players in Russia and are eager to flip the switch on our servers in other territories. The upcoming technical test has two primary goals. The first is to test the infrastructure we've put in place to support critical services like game authentication, client distribution, game server services, and our feedback & support infrastructure in North America and Europe. These critical systems and services need to be in place and tested before we can ramp up into larger closed beta events. Our second goal, and the one I am most excited about is starting to gather feedback and impressions on the game from actual players.

This first Technical Test features a very small slice of content from the huge game that is Skyforge. Players will be testing one open world zone (the Lanber Forrest), three solo instances (Okki Island, Kyris, and the Lanber Catacombs), one group instance (Thetin Rift), and one PvP map (Kingesi Arena). You’ll do all of this while playing as the Cryomancer or Paladin character classes. Remember that in Skyforge you aren’t locked into one single class, meaning you can play as both by changing classes whenever you’re not in combat. However, because it is a very small slice of the game you won’t be creating new characters instead, you’ll have the choice of using one of the many pre-made character included in the technical test build.

I should also mention that because our invite pool is relatively small, we've disabled the matchmaking rules on the PvP map, so players will be able to get in matches quickly, but you may face opponents of much higher or lower prestige. This technical test is just the first of our upcoming round of Skyforge beta activities. Fan support and enthusiasm for the project so far has been great and we wish we could get everyone in day one, but this is just the beginning. Throughout the coming months we'll be rolling out new beta events, testing new content, and continuing to distribute beta keys. If you haven't done so already, be sure to visit Skyforge.com and sign up for the beta. As beta continues, we will continue to send out additional info on future beta dates and opportunities to earn keys.

Thanks again for all the support and for your help in making Skyforge a great game experience.

-Eric DeMilt
Skyforge Development Director - Obsidian Entertainment

 

[Duraframe300]

Developer Walkthrough with Eric Demilt and Aidan Karabaich (both Obsidian)

 

[Gerrard]

So anyone played this? I'm in the English beta right now and it's pretty banalshitboring.

The combat design is inspired by the top features of the best action and fighting games.

I'd like to know what games they played to end up with this shit, is it a matter of shit taste or just incompetence?

 

[Grokalibre]

I played one of the beta weekend months ago. It was basically Cryptic's Champion Online combat with GW2 quests. I suppose you describe it best with "banashitboring".

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

So anyone played this? I'm in the English beta right now and it's pretty banalshitboring.

The combat design is inspired by the top features of the best action and fighting games.

I'd like to know what games they played to end up with this shit, is it a matter of shit taste or just incompetence?

What the fuck did you expect from russkies?
Most of them think AssCreed and Call of Duty are fucking masterpieces of gaming.

 

[Intrigued007]

Played Skyforge during the CBT. It's one of the most on-rails and claustrophobic games I've ever played.

Not to mention weekly limits on how much time you can speand progressing through the game. Roughly 15 hours into play during the week and you can no longer make progress.

Combat is NOT action combat, at all. It's tab-targetting with a clever disguise. After playing for about an hour you'll realize it, but you attacks never miss, require no aiming, and you can simply lock onto a target and never miss.

One of the senior moderators also threatened to ban people on the forum for using the term P2W, which was hysterical and made headlines on a few MMO sites. This was after it was revealed that you could bypass the weekly limits on progression by swiping your credit card and exchanging cash shop currency for in-game credits. This resulted in many people being far more powerful far more quickly than other people were allowed to, leading to a very serious P2W gap in PvP and PvE.

Also ... It's not being westernized. At all. You play on the NA server of the RU game, and since you are several builds behind RU none of your feedback/suggestions on current content (you can play) ever matter. All news and updates posted at Sf.my.com is a complete copy/paste of previous articles and updates posted to the RU site weeks prior.

My advice on Skyforge? Avoid it. Completely.

 

[DawnrazorDCLXVI]

I still have high hopes, but no MMO so far has reached the level of MUDs in terms of depth, nor complexity, unfortunately.

 

[Infinitron]

750 beta keys giveaway: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2015/07/09/skyforge-free-key/

 

[Whiran]

750 beta keys giveaway: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2015/07/09/skyforge-free-key/

Odd. The game is in open beta. Well, kinda. Early Access open beta - whatever that means. But, if you're a "founder" (a whale) you get one week of early access to the open beta!

These keys apparently get you into that early access open beta.

 

[fizzelopeguss]

This is invictus with a bigger budget? or does it actually open up into a gameworld at some point?

 

[Zed]

This game is garbage.
The only good thing about this game is the tits and ass slider at character generation.

 

[Hamster]

Yeah, i am a slowpoke but i only just now learned that Skyforge is the often mentioned "russian MMORPG" that Obsidian is working on.
Well, fuck this shit is all i can say. Mail.ru could have got Obsidian to collaborate on a true single-player sequel to Allods written by Avellone and instead they went with this. I dont even.
Back then when our developers had a budget of two sacks of potato they somehow managed to make fun charming games, now they have tons of cash but don't want to do anything good with it.

I should check how much would it cost to have some farmer spray Mail.ru's office with cow dung.

 

[Hamster]

Most of them think AssCreed and Call of Duty are fucking masterpieces of gaming.

Pff. Where is this paradise on earth where people think differently?

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

Most of them think AssCreed and Call of Duty are fucking masterpieces of gaming.

Pff. Where is this paradise on earth where people think differently?

For you?

http://rpgwatch.com/

 

[Hamster]

 

[Excidium II]

How big can you make the asses?

 

[Gerrard]

Not big enough to redeem the shittiness of the game.

 

[Krraloth]

I've looked but couldn't find any posts about this on the codex, I've benn playing it for the last week or so and I am bored out of my fucking mind. Anybody ese play/played this?

 

[SerratedBiz]

http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/obsidian-to-co-develop-skyforge-mmorpg.83209/

I played for a while but the grind put me off. I had like 6 weeks to go before I could unlock the class I wanted (sorcerer).

 

[Berekän]

I installed it, played like 20 min to test it a bit and created a joke character to try the char creator, realized I couldn't delete it, sent a support ticket, they told me to fuck off, uninstalled.

 

[SerratedBiz]

Why would you delete it? There's a character appearance editor for free at the start.

 

[Animal]

Looks like a mix between final fantasy/generic asian mmo/destiny. The performance is not constant and ranges from 120 fps to 50 fps in fights and in the city. Fiddling around the graphics options doesn't seem to do much (i5-4590; 770).

You are an immortal or a god and you hang around a small circular floor that looks like a library, with a holographic globe in the center. Mortals cry for help and you teleport down to an instanced area, proceeding to fight humanoid rats and reptiles.
The first area had quests that triggered when you approach them (kill X rats, destroy X holes, etc) and random players running around. The next two or three were small areas with a "clear trash, fight boss" mode that you could enter solo or queue for party.

The combat mechanics don't look too bad, at least playing a melee. You click the standard attack and it pops up a combo that varies depending on the number of regular attacks you chain up. You also have a few dodges on a stamina like charge mode, that you can use to evade special attacks.

It may appeal to people that don't like exploring and look for the instanced like gameplay. The overall aesthetics may also be appealing for some.

It lasted maybe 4 hours on my HDD.

 

[Berekän]

Why would you delete it? There's a character appearance editor for free at the start.

I also fucked up the name and it wouldn't allow me to change it for free, shame.

 

[SerratedBiz]

It -is- pretty retarded you can't just delete shit you want to delete. Fuck accessibility and streamlining if it takes options away from you.

 

[Lhynn]

Game is retarded with a passion. Final fantasy XIII level design, a different flavor of the same banal shit boring progression other mmos do and its so fucking repetitive.

How do you fuck it up that hard? i dont get it.