Gold Empire
Gold Empire is a 2004 MMORPG developed by Level-5 of
Dark Cloud fame and published by Nintendo. It is Level-5's first project done under a non-Sony company, and the first one to be released on a Nintendo console. The game was originally set to be published by Microsoft, but they exchanged responsibilities with Nintendo by giving them
Gold Empire in exchange for DICE's
Battlefield 1942, as Nintendo did not want to directly publish
Battlefield, and felt that
Gold Empire would've fit in better with their own portfolio. As a result, the troubled production that occurred for OTL's
True Fantasy Live Online is butterflied away, as Level-5 got along much better with Nintendo than they would've with Microsoft.
Gold Empire is pushed as a key title for the Nintendo X, and as a rival to
Final Fantasy Online and (to a lesser extent) the formerly Dreamcast exclusive
Phantasy Star Online.
In terms of gameplay, battles take the form of real-time battles offering mobility, similar to OTL's
Final Fantasy XI,
Final Fantasy XII, or the
Xenoblade series. Online battles can happen anywhere and are similar to random encounters in a regular RPG, while offline battles happen by raiding randomly-spawning dungeons, similar to how
Dark Cloud has procedurally-generated dungeons. However, in
Gold Empire, dungeons generate themselves by taking the players' stats into account, and will generate enemies and obstacles targeted at the player's weaknesses. In order to avoid this, players are encouraged to rotate through the classes offered in the game, though a number of players decide to challenge themselves and go through these dungeons without changing their classes. The game features twelve unique classes, which are:
- Starter Classes
- Swordsman - Utilizes swordplay and melee combat.
- Knight - Carries a spear and a shield, specializes in more defensive melee combat.
- Sorcerer - Performs magical spells and fights from a distance.
- Archer - Relies on projectiles, speed, and stealth
- Monk - Heals other players and induces status effects on enemies without outright killing them.
- Barbarian - Fights barefisted or with gauntlets.
- Unlockable classes
- Elemental Knight - Fights with a combination of swordplay and magic.
- Bishop - Uses a combination of healing and offensive magic.
- Trickster - Combines the speed of an archer and the status afflicting spells of a monk.
- Warring Mage - Fights with martial arts enhanced with a sorcerer’s spells.
- Beastmaster- Carries a spear and can command beasts to fight for them.
- Ninja - A fast swordsman who deals quick but deadly strikes.
The main character of the game is referred to as "The Scion", and is a customizable silent protagonist. The default names for them are Irving for the male protagonist, and Selene for the female protagonist. The side characters in
Gold Empire are Kora, the childhood best friend of the Scion and the game's main source of exposition, Emperor Tob'il, the benevolent but sickly ruler of the Arlesian Empire, Rhan, the fearless but dimwitted leader of the Arlesian Knights and an assisting NPC who can help the player learn new classes, Jodia, the blacksmith of Olan, the hometown of the Scion and Kora, and Sei'tu, the main antagonist of the game. The main premise of the game's single-player campaign is that Sei'tu casts a curse onto his brother, Emperor Tob'il, of whom he was jealous of for becoming emperor, and the Scion is tasked with defeating Sei'tu and restoring Tob'il to health. The story is fairly simple, mostly because Level-5 chose to prioritize online play over the offline content.
The game has three different territories, each with three sub-areas:
- Arlesian Empire
- Olan - The starting area and hometown of the player character and Kora, it is set in a lush forest.
- Castle Angorde - A castle near the sea plus its surrounding village and port, and where Emperor Tobil resides.
- Zeli Plains - An open area featuring grassy plains, as well as small settlements.
- Unclaimed Territories
- Stelik Range - A snowy mountain range beyond the Empire’s borders. Features freezing bluffs and the walls signifying the borders of the Empire.
- Jenjis Mire - A large swamp featuring lots of poisonous fauna and monsters.
- Duriste - A tavern and hotel, plus the surrounding desert area, featuring sinkholes and encounters with outlaws.
- Kingdom of the Pitch
- Valerum - The homeland of the Warriors of the Pitch, a volcanic region featuring the ruins of a large fortress where the Warriors reside.
- Mobis Volcano - A large active volcano within the Kingdom of the Pitch.
- Umbral Citadel - An abandoned citadel that is a heavy source of black magic, and features lots of dangerous monsters. This is where Sei'tu is encountered and fought.
Probably the most notable aspect of these locations are the integration of the building mechanics that return from
Dark Cloud, though here they're executed a bit differently. Every month, Sei'tu unleashes a blast of devastating magic that damages random areas within the three territories, and it is there where the player build new structures, settlements, and temples. However, the catch is that each buildable object corresponds to different stats that attract players based on their own stats, and through them the player learns new skills. For example, if the player builds three things that correspond to healing and white magic-related stats, then they will likely attract players of the Monk class. By attracting other players and fighting them, the player can learn more skills, so in order to attract as wide a variety of players as possible, players are encouraged to build all manners of things, and never to build more than one of the same thing.
Gold Empire launched on April 7th, 2004, and unlike
Final Fantasy Online, it does not require a monthly subscription, instead offering the base game for $60 and expansions being released as DLCs. The game would see expansions released on a yearly date, each containing a storyline expansion and a new territory with three sub-areas. The game receives largely positive reviews, many of whom praise the interactivity with other players as well as the game's customizable nature, though the simplistic story is disappointing for some. The game sells around two million copies in the first month of release, with around 800,000 active players, though that number drops to around 500,000 as the year wears on. Nevertheless, the game is a success, and finally provides the Nintendo X with an MMORPG that can stand against
Final Fantasy Online and
World of Warcraft.
Full roster of Twisted Metal: World Tour revealed
"The full roster of the highly-anticipated Twisted Metal: World Tour has been revealed, totaling at eighteen drivers, ten of which are returning from Black, and eight of which are brand new characters created specifically for World Tour. Present in the demo were Jubilee/"Silent Night" and Nikolai Ryzanov/"Red Terror", but six new characters have been revealed in recent promos for the game. They are Josef Caron, a disfigured racecar driver based off of famed Austrian racer Niki Lauda who drives a racing car called "The Bullet", Jerry Weathers, a Texan riding an RV decked out in American colors dubbed "Star Spangled Cruiser", Billie Warner, an Australian explorer who drives a Jeep called the "Outback Offroader", Felix Gaius, an undead Roman soldier who uses a chariot drawn by undead horses called "Empire's Glory", Esmeralda Salvadora, a Carnival dancer from Brazil who drives a float called "Samba Siren", and Lou Siffer, the Devil who is disguised as a human doctor, Calypso's main rival, and driver of "Hellhound". With a colorful yet macabre cast of characters and a long-anticipated online mode, it seems as if Twisted Metal: World Tour is prepared to live up to its and take over the world on Sony's PlayStation 2 next month, and perhaps the gaming world as a whole."
Nintendo and Microsoft play catch-up with Apple; Microsoft expands stake in DICE to 60%, buys majority stake in Bizarre Creations, while Nintendo buys out Silicon Knights and acquires European developers Factor 5 and Avalanche Studios.
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In wake of the Eidos Interactive and Visual Concepts acquisitions, it seems that Apple's entry into the console market has left the bigger players in the market more concerned than we realized. Just last week, Microsoft expanded its 40% stake in DICE (makers of Battlefield 1942) to 60%, thus giving them ownership of DICE, while also buying a majority stake in Bizarre Creations, the developers of the Project Gotham Racing games and the upcoming Excitebike reboot under Nintendo. And speaking of Nintendo, it seems as if they have also been made worried, as they have bought out Canadian developer and recent superstar Silicon Knights (developers of Eternal Darkness and Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes, as well as being the original creators of Sony's Legacy of Kain series), as well as two smaller studios. The first one, Factor 5, is known for developing the Rogue Squadron games for LucasArts, so the closer relationship with Nintendo has already been established.
But Avalanche Studios is where things get interesting, as they are a brand-new developer whose only been around for a year, and have not developed any titles to their name. Supposedly, they initially proposed their game first to Eidos Interactive, but were rejected due to Eidos' financial situation and the impending buyout from Apple Inc. As it seems, it looks like they have ended up with Nintendo somehow, though details on their game is hard to come by at the moment. What most of these studios have in common though, save for Silicon Knights, is that they are all European developers, and all closely affiliated with Nintendo and Microsoft (or at least, known to be closely affiliated). Given that Eidos was European as well, and was a strong supporter of Sony's PlayStation and PlayStation 2 consoles, it seems as if the two have decided that mass-acquiring western associates was the right move to make with Apple's entrance into video games. Nintendo was rumored to be attempting a takeover of Japanese toy company Bandai, but internal sources from the company are saying that the money was diverted at the last minute to these second-party studios."