Now that MAG is roughly two weeks old and players have familiarized themselves with the game and its mechanics, we’ve decided to help all of you take the next step towards becoming MAG superstars. Specifically, every day over the next three weeks we’ll be offering a bevy of developer facts and strategies from the team right here at Zipper Interactive. With inside info like that, you can expect to learn plenty of tips, tricks and tactics that should make you all the more prepared for becoming masters of MAG’s game modes, character classes and leadership roles.
First up, is a closer look at the game mode Suppression as explained by lead designer, CJ Heine. Watch this introductory video first, and then look for CJ’s tips listed directly afterward.
Hey everyone, this is CJ Heine from Zipper and I’m here to give you some valuable info on how to maximize your time in Suppression.
Basic Tips
For players that are new to MAG, Suppression is one of the first game types they can play – keep these things in mind as you get your feet wet:
Wins and losses in Suppression do not count in the Shadow War, but you may also find Suppression missions less stressful because you don’t have to worry about impacting the war as you learn the game.
Remember to stick with your squad. You will improve your survivability while learning how to fight alongside your team.
There are no vehicles or objectives to repair in Suppression, so modify your loadout appropriately (no need for the Repair Kit or Anti-tank Mines).
Learn the locations of the Resupply Points as they’ll refill your health and ammo, so knowing the way back to these quickly will keep you alive longer. They also tend to be player magnets, and can often become the center of combat.
Most default loadouts contain a First Aid Kit, so practice using this on yourself when your health gets too low. If you have upgraded to the Medical Kit or have the Resuscitation skill, seek out wounded allies and try healing them.
Don’t bleed out if you’ve been killed! Get familiar with the incapacitation and bleedout mechanics in Suppression, and see if there is anyone available to revive you before you choose to respawn.
Advanced Tips
Go easy on the low level guys! They’re in Suppression trying to learn and gain their first few levels. You are all in the same PMC, and taking the time to help them and answer their questions could make the difference down the road in a Shadow War mission.
Suppression is a great place to experiment with your new skill unlocks. The Suppression missions are small and time to combat is quick, making them a great source for practice targets. Use this closed environment to experiment with things like anti-personnel mines, items from the Electronics skill tree, new weapon upgrades, etc.
Right on the edge of your next player level but short on time? Often times, it’s faster to play a quick Suppression match instead of a full Shadow War mission for that last bit of needed experience.
Thanks for the help CJ! We’ll be back again tomorrow with Producer Alan Van Slyke’s tips for Sabotage – see you then.
Were you aware that Folding@home (now called Life With PlayStation) isn't just an altruistic distributed computing network, but also a brutal team sport? It's true -- reader Chilly_Willy recently pointed our attention to Joystiq's ranking on the F@h leaderboard and reported the delightful news that Team 'Stiq is set to overtake fellow games media outlet G4TV within the next 24 hours. We received the news with dignity, knowing that rankings don't matter -- all we care about is contributing to the scientific community's fight against disease.
We're kidding, of course -- we're purely in this thing for the thrill of victory. In fact, it would be great if you guys could go turn on your PS3s and lend a hand in destroying G4. We want Adam Sessler and Morgan Webb to feel absolutely crushed with defeat at some point during the day, but not know why. We want to run into Olivia Munn and Kevin Pereira at PAX East, and have them be too afraid to make eye contact with us. Please, please, dear readers -- won't you help make our dream a reality?
Over on the PlayStation.Blog.Europe, Jem Alexander managed to wrangle up a great Q&A with Final Fantasy XIII Producer Yoshinori Kitase and Director Motomu Toriyama. But Europe’s not stealing all the fun – We’re heading up to San Francisco later today to speak with Mr. Kitase and Mr. Toriyama, as well as FFXIII’s Battle Director Yuji Abe for the first time. So now’s the time to get those final questions out there (That’s Final Fantasy XIII only, so please keep your questions on that topic. They won’t be discussing anything Versus- or Agito-related). We’re almost exactly a month out from the game’s release, after all!
I asked for your Final Fantasy XIII interview questions and you responded in earnest. Thanks so much for your many questions — they were far too numerous for me to ask them all, but I hope you agree that I covered all the important ones with the game’s Producer, Yoshinori Kitase, and Director, Motomu Toriyama. Can you believe it’s only four weeks until the game is in our hands? It’s been a long wait, but we’re almost there.
Do you have any plans for Final Fantasy XIII PlayStation Home content?
It is already happening in Japan. There will be costumes for Lightning and Snow, and there’s a personal space as well as chocobo and other character figures. We don’t know at the moment whether this will be brought to Europe.
Final Fantasy Versus XIII is part of the Fabula Nova Crystallis series, but XIII and Versus XIII only share the same basic mythology. The fal’Cie and l’Cie are just a small part of this mythology, but the story and the characters are completely different.
Are there any games within the Fabula Nova Crystallis series that have yet to be announced?
At the moment we are concentrating on releasing Versus XIII and Agito XIII. At the moment we have no other specific plans to release any other titles as a part of the Fabula Nova Crystallis series.
What made you decide to make Final Fantasy XIII a series, rather than a standalone title?
If you look back at the Final Fantasy series, at VII for example, this later let to Advent Children and Crisis Core. Also, for FFX, we created FFX-2 after its release. In those cases we obviously released the original title first and then created the sequel. This time we wanted to create several games in the same project from the outset.
Will there be an English demo?
We haven’t decided whether to make a demo available yet.
How much emphasis is placed on story and cutscenes in FFXIII? Do you feel it’s balanced with gameplay, or heavy on either side?
The basic playtime is about 50 to 60 hours, for the main story. Amongst which, the cutscenes make up about 10 hours. So, quite a large amount, with very high quality graphics, of course. So there’s plenty of story and gameplay to enjoy.
What will you be moving on to now that Final Fantasy XIII is finished?
At the moment we are still concentrating on finishing off and promoting the overseas version of Final Fantasy XIII, but many of the team have obviously accumulated a lot of knowledge and experience and they will be moved over to work on Versus and Agito. Personally, we don’t know what we’re going to move on to next.
How much sidequest content is there in XIII?
We call them “missions”, rather than “quests”. During the second half of the story, when the characters go down to a place called Pulse, there are many missions available there. In the majority of them the boss of the mission who you have to defeat, is more powerful than the main boss of the story. I’ve already told you that the basic playing time is 50 to 60 hours, but if you want to complete all the missions, the total time is probably twice that or more.
So what are the chances of a CG movie based on FFXIII, like Advent Children?
There are no plans at the moment, but once it is released over here and, if there are some particular characters or features that are received particularly well, then we might make a decision. And of course we need to see how it goes down sales-wise and regarding user reactions, first.
What are your feelings about the current state of the game industry in Japan, compared with the West and what Western games have you been most influenced by?
Some people have been saying that the Japanese game industry is dead, and all that… I dunno. I will say that Final Fantasy XIII is one really epic title for high definition consoles. With this game, we are going to resurrect the whole thing. As for Western games that have influenced us — FPSs mostly. The Call of Duty series, for example.
How do you feel about Yoichi Wada’s statement that Final Fantasy XIII will be the last game of its kind for Square Enix?
We don’t know exactly what he meant by that. We don’t really know what he meant by this style of game. If you consider that during Final Fantasy XIII’s development, at peak time the team consisted of over 300 people. It was a huge team, plus it took a several long years to get the game finished. So, if Mr Wada meant that we would never make another Final Fantasy title with the similar number of people, taking as long as FFXIII did, we would agree. Obviously in the future we want to be much more efficient. Having worked on XIII, we feel that we have got much better at making good games for high definition consoles. In the future our teams will be smaller and more effectively run. We suspect that is what Mr Wada meant by his statement.
The God of War HD remake for the PS3 has been very popular in the US and people in Europe are very much looking forward to it. Do you have any interest in creating an HD remake of a PS1 or PS2 Final Fantasy game?
We don’t know the details about the HD remake of God of War. If it’s just a case of attaining high resolution graphics, only, then that wouldn’t be that difficult, but if we were to achieve the same graphical standard as in XIII with a PS1 title, then that would be a huge, huge task. Almost unrealistic. Even with a PS2 title it would be difficult. In the case of God of War, there weren’t really that many characters in the game — the main character and some monsters, maybe ten people or so. That would not be unachievable. As with Final Fantasy titles in the past, like on PS1, even just the main characters amount to around 10 people. Then you have all the NPCs, you’re probably looking at about 200 characters total. All with individual textures for the skin, plus costumes, facial features and everything. That would be a really tricky job.
Will there be any New Game content in Final Fantasy XIII?
When you finish the main quest there are some growth elements of the the characters which will unlock once you’ve defeated the last boss. After this is done, you’ll be easily able to return to Pulse and take part in the many missions available there. There is no way to start the game again with your current character stats, however.
Is there a specific reason why Japanese voices were left out of the game?
For the European version, the facial expressions and lip synchronization are all lined up with the English lines, so the Japanese voices would not match up right. That was the main worry.
People are aware that there is a lot of content that has been cut from the game. Do you have any plans to use this content in the future?
You say “content” but, in reality, it’s more like “ideas”. Maybe a map was a little bit too complex and we felt like the player would get completely lost, so we simplified, or whatever. So this content won’t be coming out separately, as it has been binned.
Will there be a hard drive install available?
There is no installation, the game runs directly from the disc.
Finally, why does Sahz have a Chocobo in his hair?
What happened was, initially we only had a concept of this character being happy and jolly. Nomura designed the character and gave him an afro while, flippantly, drew a small chocobo next to him. As we looked at this, we liked the idea and the chocobo got added into the story. That’s how it happened.
Halfbrick Studios, the Minis-producing development factory in Brisbane, has announced a new title: Age of Zombies. Not to be confused with the Age of Aquarius or the beloved children's film Ice Age, Halfbrick's game is decidedly more macabre -- with a pinch of cute tossed in. (We never thought we'd call zombies both those things, but there it is.)
Age of Zombies follows time-traveling protagonist (and delicious side dish) Barry Steakfries, doing his best to eradicate the hungry undead looking to get a mouthful of his tasty vittles. The debut trailer nestled above gives us a vibe akin to a cross between Robotron and Zombies Ate My Neighbors, which kinda sounds like a good time. There's also the promise of zombified T-Rex dinosaurs, which hardly seems possible in the real world, but, hey, we'll take it.
Age of Zombies will be available to download from the PlayStation Store on Thursday, February 25 for $4.99. In the meantime, fight your way through a horde of new screens in our gallery below.
Mass Effect 2 has maintained the top spot on Chart-Track's UK all-formats sales chart for a second week in a row. However, there seems to be some kind of Batarian flu loose on the isles, because Mass Effect 2 sales, which dropped by 64 percent this week, were "within touching distance" (850 units, to be exact) of Wii's Just Dance. Rounding out the unchanged top three for a second week was Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.
EA's Dante's Inferno had one hell of a premiere on the charts, earning a somewhat sinful spot at fourth. In a good sign for MAG, the mega shooter slipped only three notches to seventh place. Meanwhile, the surprise return of other BioWare game Dragon Age: Origins to the top 40 last week has gained even more momentum, moving up another three spots to 28th.
Source - Mass Effect 2 leads an unchanged top 3 [GFK Chart-Track] Source - Latest UK Software Charts [GFK Chart-Track]
As mentioned in our last post, we’re trying something new to keep you up to date on all things LittleBigPlanet DLC. So on Mondays we’ll be here filling you in on the latest DLC coming to the PlayStation Store. In time, we hope to fill out this post with more DLC-related news, announcements, highlights, etc. But for now, this week’s post…
As Valentine’s Day draws near, PSP fans will be able to dress up their Sackboys and Sackgirls with costumes of ‘Luvre’! Two new packs will release on the Store this Thursday, February 11:
Luvre Costume for LBP PSP (FREE) – Show the world that you’re all heart, with this free costume that’s, er, filled with hearts…
Luvre Theme Pack for LBP PSP ($2.99) – Here’s an idea. Create a lovely custom level for your special valentine with this new theme pack. Then have your valentine play through the level designed specifically for them – it will be the best valentine ever! To help you, this pack offers 15 valentine-themed stickers to decorate your level and 4 costumes to dress up your Sackboy/girl in. And when you’re done, upload it for the rest of the LBP fans to play – and maybe use for our own valentine :)
Valentine’s Day Mini-Pack for LBP PS3 ($2.99) – If you missed this last year, now’s your chance to get the Valentine’s Day pack for the PS3. With a special Cupid outfit, 10 love-themed stickers, lots of objects and 5 different types of materials, you can make enough levels for all your Valentines this year! LIMITED TIME – Hurry, these items will disappear from the Store on 2/25.
Chinese New Year Costumes for LBP PS3 (FREE) – In celebrating the upcoming Chinese New Year, be sure to download this free costume pack, complete with his/her traditional costumes for this special time of year. LIMITED TIME – Hurry these items will disappear on 2/25.
I know it, you know it; heck, I'd bet if they were being totally honest, the staff of 2K Marin would tell you they knew it too. BioShock was that rare combination of a perfectly realized world, fresh yet refined action and a narrative that left me with no real burning questions. It didn't need a sequel.
But all that has very little to do with BioShock 2 because whether it needed to be made or not, it's here now. And the surprise isn't that someone other than Irrational had the chutzpah to make a BioShock sequel. The surprise is just how worthwhile it is.
We have mentioned in the past that Sony could consider dropping optical drives on their next generation Sony Playstation 4 when launched, although Sony have more recently indicated that they are not yet ready to abandon physical medium just yet. Also the poll we ran also indicated that 74% of our readers would want an optical drive.
This leads us on to another thing to discuss that we have also mentioned before, and that is if Sony will continue to use Blu-ray optical discs, or if they will move on to something else as they traditionally do between generations of consoles. One idea is that they could make use of Holography on their optical discs to cram even more data on to them. A while back GE were apparently testing HVD for storage with theoretical capacities of up to 3.9TB per disk that would provide plenty of space for a game or even a good number of games.
By increasing the capacity of optical storage it would further allow developers to more comfortably work with 1080p HD video formats and high quality audio in games without worrying about being restricted to certain physical limits, or spanning across to a second or third disk.
Another reason for such large capacities being needed could be related to security according to psxextreme who mention an area of the disc could be used for enhanced security keeping copied games to a minimum.
We haven’t really had any official word on the Playstation 4 just yet although plenty of hints at a next gen console have been dropped by high profile gaming folk along with some of Sony’s staff. We expect that the PS4 will arrive in the next 2 to 3 years though sometime in 2012… maybe with a new optical drive format.
We have mentioned in the past that Sony could consider dropping optical drives on their next generation Sony Playstation 4 when launched, although Sony have more recently indicated that they are not yet ready to abandon physical medium just yet. Also the poll we ran also indicated that 74% of our readers would want an optical drive.
This leads us on to another thing to discuss that we have also mentioned before, and that is if Sony will continue to use Blu-ray optical discs, or if they will move on to something else as they traditionally do between generations of consoles. One idea is that they could make use of Holography on their optical discs to cram even more data on to them. A while back GE were apparently testing HVD for storage with theoretical capacities of up to 3.9TB per disk that would provide plenty of space for a game or even a good number of games.
By increasing the capacity of optical storage it would further allow developers to more comfortably work with 1080p HD video formats and high quality audio in games without worrying about being restricted to certain physical limits, or spanning across to a second or third disk.
Another reason for such large capacities being needed could be related to security according to psxextreme who mention an area of the disc could be used for enhanced security keeping copied games to a minimum.
We haven’t really had any official word on the Playstation 4 just yet although plenty of hints at a next gen console have been dropped by high profile gaming folk along with some of Sony’s staff. We expect that the PS4 will arrive in the next 2 to 3 years though sometime in 2012… maybe with a new optical drive format.
