Welcome to the 57th edition of Reloading…
Everyone needs a feel good moment to start the day. Let’s go with this…
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Team Ten Ton Hammer is spanning the globe this week to bring you the latest live event coverage. Our intrepid Managing Editor Reuben Waters is touring the Left Coast carousing with developers and, no doubt, doing things that would be illegal in the eastward 45 states… things like, you know, activism and surfing.
Two half continents and an ocean away, Ben de la Durantaye and yours truly, Jeff Woleslagle, are in Cologne covering gamescom 2011. Spelling ‘gamescom’ in ultra-lowercase is important; if you were to ask a German how to get to Gamescom or (worse) GamesCom, they’d give you a polite, eye-darting blank stare (the much preferred German equivalent to the French farty face), even though all Germans apparently speak English better than I do.
Better yet, everyone here dresses like they could have just walked out of a MacGyver episode. As a culture, they seem to have proved Seinfeld’s notion that a man forever dresses in the clothes he wore at the happiest time of his life, and for Germans, their halcyon days were probably the unification. The Member’s Only jacket is alive and well here (at least in cut and style), as are various acid-washed shades of tight man-Levi’s. I’d consider at least picking up a jacket, but the last time I was here, for GC Leipzig in 2009, the airline misplaced Hoskin’s luggage. Our esteemed leader tried to buy a pair of jeans and nearly died of leg strangulation.
Speaking of the virtues of Europe (which is all I’ve got for you, since our first press conference, EA BioWare, isn’t until 10am US Eastern): trains. The train stations here are large, light, and airy places where space shuttle-looking trains come gliding up, rip through the World of Tanks looking landscapes (castles and all). Trains here will take you to any big city you want to go to (not just the ones along the coasts) for reasonable prices without the questionably fresh stains on the seats you tend to find on North American trains. Inside the train you’ll find comfortable seats, leg room, decent food brought to you in sensible carts, the Internet, and that unfortunate yet ubiquitous tinge of European body odor.
BO and constant personal space invasions aside, gamescom looks to be a busy event. Here’s what we’ve found out so far on gamescom Day Zero:
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The makers of World of Tanks couldn’t just stop with World of Warplanes , which will be live at gamescom. Today, Wargaming.net announced World of Battleships, which is sure to lead to many a ripoff of the classic Milton Bradley one-liner.
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Still no release date for Star Wars: The Old Republic. At the EA press conference, BioWare’s Dr. Ray Muzyka and Gabe Amortangelo showed off the first level cap content players will come across – the Eternity Vault, an 8 to 16 player operation. Gabe revealed that operations will have variable difficulty modes, and reiterated that beta weekends will begin in September.
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38 Studios and Big Huge Games’ freshman title Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning got a European release date: February 10th, 2012. If all goes swimmingly, it’s safe to assume that the game, featuring the talents of R.A. Salvatore, Todd MacFarlane, and Ken Rolston (Morrowind, Oblivion), will release shortly before or on that date.
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At the above mentioned EA press briefing, we found out that the studio formerly known as EA Mythic has is working on another Games Workshop licensed title: Warhammer: Wrath of Heroes. Little was revealed about the game, except that the format would be built around three groups of
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According to Funcom Executive Producer Ragnar Tornquist, The Secret World is headed for an April 2012 release. Beta signups are set to begin on August 26th.
And that’s the news from GamesCom. More to come after we sleep off some jet lag, so keep checking our gamescom 2011 portal.
Until tomorrow,
Jeff “Ethec” Woleslagle
