Editorials

In this week's "RoleCraft," Jim Moreno continues his look at character alignment in MMORPGs - this time focusing on how in-game factions make characters "evil" (or not).

Following the onslaught of rumors and shutdown news, NCsoft Austin officially confirmed to Warcry "that 21 positions are being eliminated in the Austin office of NCsoft in the area of product development."

Read the full announcement after the jump.

Massively and Joystiq reported yesterday about rumors indicating that "NCsoft home offices may be considering closing the Austin studio". So far, these rumors have been refuted by a couple of NCsoft staff over at the PlanetTR forums [1][2]. Read more after the jump.

The Play NC Store is now accepting PayPal for digital purchases through the store. Check out the official announcement by clicking below.

In this week's examination of Clausewitz "On Gaming," Jonathan Steinhauer looks at what victory and defeat mean ... to NPC monsters.

In this week's RoleCraft, Jim Moreno looks at the standard D&D concept of alignment, how it works in roleplaying, and how it's applied to MMORPGs.

Those wacky dudes at Dungeon Runners have put together another terrifically funny video lampooning subscription-based MMOs as compared to DR that "won't kick you in the junk". You'll understand what that means after watching the video.

Jonathan Steinhauer continues his application of the writings of Carl Clausewitz to MMOGs, this time focusing on defeat and "life after death" in online worlds.

This week in RoleCraft, Jim Moreno looks at ways for roleplayers to deal with the Fairer Tongue of Elvish.

Dungeon Runners Bling Gnomes™ announced today that PayPal is now a payment option for those monthly fees. Read the statement by clicking below.

Jonathan Steinhauer continues his application of the writings of Carl Clausewitz to MMOGs, this time looking at what happens when victory is yours.

NC Soft has released their summer schedule of planned convention visits for both North America and Europe. The company is also planning a peek at Aion in the UK. Check out all the details to see if NC Soft is coming to a venue near you.

NC Soft has announced that the PlayNC store will now accept Paypal for US dollar purchases. Check out the press release by clicking below.

This time on RoleCraft, Jim Moreno wants to hear from you roleplayers out there.

As it utterly defies description and is simply something that must be seen, hit the link below to see the Bling Gnome as found in Dungeon Runners. Even if you don't play Dungeon Runners, it's worth watching the video!

In this installment of RoleCraft, Jim Moreno looks at an interesting idea from WoW RP Realms: Full Immersion Roleplaying (FIRP).

NC Soft and Dungeon Runners developers have sent out a bunch of screenshots of an...er...excreting Bling Gnome. It has to be seen to be believed so click 'read more'.

Jonathan Steinhauer continues his study of Clausewitz and examines the art of the kill.

The Dungeon Runners bunch have announced that a European server has been launched to give Euros a break from the Yanks. Check out the details by clicking below.

Dungeon Runners players are experiencing some disconnect issues. NC Soft and DR devs have issued the following announcement:

The problem seems to be that some zones are crashing under certain combat situations. This results in a "Disconnect" as all folks in the offending zone are logged out.

We're going to be deploying a build to World 7 to help isolate this problem. Once isolated, we'll get a fix up to all worlds.

Thanks for your patience on this and sorry for the problems!

Remember, grasshoppers, patience is a virtue!

Dungeon Runners servers will be undergoing a short period of downtime on Wednesday, June 4th to put heave version 126 online.

Head through to read the patch notes and the official notice.

Just in case you may not be aware, RoleCraft isn't the only place where you can find roleplaying related info on the interwebs. Of course you know that, and I'm only joking. During the course of my day, I am given and locating sites which are directly related to or merely referencing some aspect of roleplaying, and I consider it part of my duty to help keep you, my fellow roleplayers, informed as much as possible.

NC Soft announced that there will be a server outage on Thursday, May 22, 2008:

PlayNC.com will be undergoing a 2 hour maintenance tomorrow, May 22, 8:00 AM to 10AM CST.

During this time the PlayNC Account Management site will be down including the ability to make in-game purchases as well as internal tools used to assist NCsoft customers.

Plan accordingly!

The box art for the upcoming retail release of Dungeon Runners has been released.

Here's what players will get with the in-store version:

• 6 Months of Membership Access, and all the perks that come with it, which would normally cost $5/month. The marketing geniuses at NCsoft think that's a pretty sweet deal, one of them recently learned how to count. No Credit Card Required!
• Yes, you can buy 2 and get a full year's membership for $40. You can also buy 3 and give one to your friend, or keep the third one and get 18 months for the price of 12. Really it's nobody's business what you decide to do with your boxes. Heck, buy 4!
• Access the new Bling Gnome sidekicks, that help you collect loot and, ahem, 'process' your gold. Available only with the boxed version of Dungeon Runners.
• ...oh yea and Exteel is in there too.

Since we are dealing with computer-generated cyber worlds that are more than likely not our own creations, there are certainly roadblocks and speed bumps in these games that challenge roleplayers to improvise and adapt. These game mechanics come with the nature of the beast, and many are very necessary to the operation of the games, and are often so obvious as to threaten to pull a roleplayer out of character. While they may not be pleasant to experience during roleplay, their effect in-game can be at least lessened through the lens of imaginative roleplaying.

Dungeon Runners announced that Build 121 is now live on all servers. The "heave" (patch) can be downloaded at log in.

Here's what players will find:

Here are the patch notes for Build 121:

Bling Gnome

Bling Gnome support for our retail box is going out in this heave. The retail box is planned for late June release! The Bling Gnome is a new passive skill that, when equipped, summons a little gangster gnome that picks up all your gold. You can occasionally activate the gnome to pick up all of your nearby loot (below Uniques) and convert it to gold. Each time your gnome does this conversion, he has a chance to poop out a powerful item. The more items he picks up at once, the better chance you have of getting a powerful item. Items that have been picked up by you and later dropped will not be converted to gold by this skill.

The Bling Gnome will only be available to players that buy the retail box.

New Social Window

We've totally reworked the social window. You know the social window -- it's got your friends list and who's online. We've made the lists sortable, added more information to the friend's list and added a new group tab. The group tab shows all groups on your world and allows you to join any open group that is within your level range.

Click below to read the rest.

As game worlds become more and more advanced, they also grow larger and larger. The by-product of this improvement is the long distances that must be traveled between locations. For some reason, with this increase in world size, there is not a corresponding improvement in traveling systems. Indeed, there seems to be almost a perverse joy in sending players on quests that involve running back and forth between two distant points with no other objective but carrying a bickering message between a pair of NPCs.

Ever wanted to dress up a website with official Dungeon Runners images? If so, here's a new kit to jazz things up:

Looking to bling-out your fancy Dungeon Runners-themed site but don't have the proper logos, images, or other accouterments? The answer now lies before you with the new Dungeon Runners Fansite Kit! It's got concept art, wallpapers, logos, IM icons and lots more.

Download it all RIGHT HERE.

Jim Moreno tackles the difficult task of roleplaying a merchant in this edition of RoleCraft: "Even roleplayers are known to struggle with this cookie cutter gameplay, and with keeping their characters from looking and acting just like every other character in game. What to do? One sure way to avoid the pitfalls of routine is to realize that there are many other classes in game besides adventurer. It's time to become a professional roleplayer!"

Dungeon Runners devs have announced that the latest "heave" (patch) is on its way to the player test server.

Good news everybody! Build 118 is now on its way to the PTS and should be available in the next 24 hours.

The patch notes follow so click on through.

Sean Bulger's periodic community column today looks at t