Loading... Forgetting to Wipe

Welcome to the 1,068th Edition of Loading...

Loading... is the premier daily MMORPG news and commentary newsletter, only from Ten Ton Hammer.

Server wipes during and after beta are a necessary evil, or are they? Free Realms launched yesterday, to everyone's surprise, just like Chronicles of Spellborn launched in sneaky fashion last week. But Spellborn allowed players to keep their characters while Free Realms is starting everyone from scratch. With the state of beta testing today, is there one right approach? That's our topic today in Loading... Forgetting to Wipe, and we also have several great articles including a City of Heroes five year anniversary interview with Matt Miller, new Free Realms and WoW guides, and more!

Need more newsletter? Play World of Warcraft? Jay "Medeor" Johnson's weekly WoW newsletter "The Overpull" comes out every Tuesday and keeps you entertained and informed on all the latest developments in WoW. Sign up!

The Pulse

First, you vote with what you view at Ten Ton Hammer, and the result is the Ten Ton Hammer Pulse (What is Pulse?). Here's the top 5 this week:

World of Warcraft
Aion: The Tower of Eternity (UP 21!! - Why?)
EverQuest 2
Age of Conan
EVE Online (UP 2 - Why?)

And here are the biggest movers in the Top 20 this week:

Lord of the Rings Online (UP 7 to #11 - Why?)
Aion: The Tower of Eternity (UP 9 to #19)
EVE Online (UP 9 to #8)

Loading... Daily

Today I received a cheerful email from the Free Realms people informing me that since the free-to-play mini-games and gigglefest (that's hooked an alarming number of Ten Ton Hammer staff, I might add) went live suddenly yesterday, and as went beta so went my character. To compensate me for the loss, I'd get a "virtual military hat." I'll stick it in the bank next to my virtual million dollars.

The server wipe wasn't a great loss for me; I'd played a total of about 15 minutes, which is precisely how long it took to reach my cuteness limit for the day. But I am starting to wonder 1) whether going stealth with your release date and then uncloaking at a juicy plot hitch like a Romulan Bird of Prey is in the F2P game making manual somewhere, and 2) whether beta wipes are a good idea anymore.

The pros of a server wipe after beta are pretty obvious - game imbalances might make it easier for players to develop their characters during beta, and letting them keep these characters could be viewed as an unfair advantage (since the same opportunity wasn't available to everyone). The cons are likewise obvious - you often build an affinity to your first character, and taking that away (even if you've been warned it'll happen) probably won't make even the grittiest blueblood tester smile.

But let's contrast the Free Realms launch with another of its semi-free-to-play Romulan pals, Chronicles of Spellborn. Both saw their North American surprise release this month and both were released in sneaky fashion, but Acclaim let Spellborn folks keep their beta characters. Granted, by all accounts, Spellborn players probably had more to lose with a wipe than the more ADHD-prone Free Realms playerbase, and CoS had the testing advantage of being live in Europe since November 2008. Free Realms, by contrast, was in open beta for a little over a week.

Whether you keep your character is probably a function of how finished the game is when you start playing in beta, or should be. If beta isn't really about testing at all, but rather marketing (as our recent beta testing article posits, is there a good reason to prevent players from keeping their characters? Should everyone start from square one on launch day? Do games benefit from having a massive wave of players starting out together, or is it better to stagger the field? Your opinions are welcome in the Loading... forum, or feel free to email me.

Shayalyn's Epic Thread of the Day

From our SWTOR: General Discussion

No Homosexuality in Star Wars?

Ten
Ton Hammer community manager, Savanja, brought this little tidbit to
our attention. According to an article at 1up.com, BioWare has managed
to irk the gay community by censoring certain words from the Star Wars:
The Old Republic forum. According to the article:

Kotaku recently reported that the company locked threads dealing with homosexuality in The Old Republic,
and censored the words "gay," "lesbian," and "homosexual." Community
manager Sean Dahlberg simply said, "As I have stated before, these are
terms that do not exist in Star Wars."

Now,
this thread is just getting rolling, but I can spot an epic discussion
in the making here. No gays in Star Wars? I mean, are we really sure
Lando's flirting with Leia wasn't just a front to disguise his
preference for leather-clad scoundrels?

At one time, the word
"gay" (though not "homosexual" or "lesbian") was censored on the Ten
Ton Hammer forums, not because we wanted to avoid gay and lesbian
topics (although they can often spin out of control), but because we
know the Internet is full of people who use the word "gay" in a
derogatory manner. We've since found out that our forum community is,
for the most part, exceptionally cool, so we removed
the censorship and let discussions like this one commence.

The drama on the SWTOR forums, for now, seems to have ended,
and BioWare has re-opened controversial threads and lifted some of
their censorship restrictions. Even so, it's a hot topic for
discussion. Can you appreciate BioWare's stance? Or do you think they
were narrow-minded, and limited their potential player base by
offending the gay/lesbian community? Voice your opinions here!

==============================
Awesome Quote from the Epic Thread

"As
for those words being banned, it's not because BioWare are
anti-anything, it's because asshats on the forums will make posts using
those terms in a negative manner. It's a sad fact that the majority of
good people can't use them because a few jerkwads would abuse them."

- AngryBeaver
==============================

Have you spotted an Epic Thread on our forums? Tell us!

4 new MMOG hand-crafted articles today! 132 in April! 518 in 2009!

New MMOG Articles At Ten Ton Hammer Today [Thanks Phil Comeau for links and Real World News]

Exclusive Aion Class Interview #1 - The Gladiator
The first of our bi-weekly Aion class series takes a look at the Gladiator! As a member of the Warrior archetype, this brute excels at hand-to-hand combat with enormous two-handed weapons. Interested in learning more about this Aion class? Keep on reading!
City of Heroes Firth Anniversary Interview with Matt 'Positron' Miller
This week, City of Heroes celebrates its five year anniversary, and the Ten Ton Hammer staff sat down with Lead Designer Matt "Positron" Miller to have a very honest discussion about the best and worst moments in the franchise, the future of the brand, and how the Paragon Studios team plans to remain competitive against the two newest contender to their super hero throne.
EVE Online: Sci-Fi Sharecroppers
This week's Sins of a Solar Spymaster column penned by GoonSwarm's The Mittani explores what can occur when a smaller corporation becomes a "pet" of a larger alliance. The results of such an arrangement can be catastrophic, so make sure you check out the article and learn from the universe's previous errors.
Exclusive Image Gallery for Aion's Gladiator Class

Earlier this week, the Ten Ton Hammer staff published their first exclusive class interview for the NCsoft's upcoming MMO, Aion. Along with the Gladiator-focused interview, the NCsoft developers included a handful of brand new pics of the melee-oriented class to show off the epic swordplay of this player character. These screenshots are breathtaking and definitely give players a feel for what the Gladiator will look like in later levels of the game. Don't wait any longer, make sure you go have a look!
Free Realms Bixies Gone Bad Quest Guide
Free Realms isn't all about playing games. Occasionally, you'll need to bust some bad guys' heads to restore order to the world. The basic combat job is called Brawler, and you can complete the Bixies Gone Bad quest handily at Brawler level 4.
World of Warcraft: UI Mods and Addons for the Priest

Let's take a look at some add-ons, or mods as they are commonly called, that can no Priest should be raiding without. I'm not going to discuss standard mods that everyone uses like Bartender, or Questhelper. These are great add-ons, but are designed for anyone and everyone. I'm going discuss the add-ons every Priest should have, and will help improve your raiding 10 fold.
World of Warcraft: UI Mods and Addons for the Rogue

After many trials, you’ve become a master rogue - a bad-ass dealer of pain and death to all those who foolishly oppose you. You’ve got incredible gear, got the best enchantments that money (or the threat of violence) could buy, and you’ve completely mastered your abilities that allow you to thrive in the swirling chaos of combat. However, despite all this, you feel that something is lagging. Some tiny thing that keeps holding you back, keeping you a mere mortal when you should be elevated to near-godhood status. The answer to your dilemma is addons.

Hot Content - Or, what I took a fancy to:

Real World News

Woman stabs priest during confession

Clergyman claims that he never promised her a rosary garden.
Russian shamans split over top shaman elections

Bottom shaman elections proceeded without any problems.
Two men eat brother's body to conceal murder

Consumed with guilt, both men expressed great remorsel as tears spilled from their tenderize. Jurists digested the evidence and sentenced them to death. No word yet on what will be their Grade A choice of final meal on death row.

Thanks for visiting the Ten Ton Hammer network!

-- Jeff "Ethec" Woleslagle and the Ten Ton Hammer team

To read the latest guides, news, and features you can visit our The Chronicles of Spellborn Game Page.

Last Updated: Mar 13, 2016

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