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Movies, and More
Movies 7/11/00 - There's an interesting new Atriarch clip over at Atriarch Vault, and the new movie for the upcoming massively multiplayer team combat game Halo also looks pretty amazing. |
 Will it barter? |
Economy and Trade
on Darktide and Atriarch 7/10/00 - A Darktider would be hard-pressed to find anyone willing to sell valuable items like mattekar robes for the official pyreal currency. If anyone were willing to part with a mattekar robe, it would be in exchange for some other |
| valuable
and hard-to-get item. The barter system has always been used throughout history, under any conditions where there is limited confidence in the official currency. As a real world example, the official currency of Romania became basically worthless paper at one point.....and most personal transactions were conducted using packages of Kools and Marlboro cigarettes as the "currency". |
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On Asheron's Call, the de-facto currencies are small portable and valuable items, that are somewhat difficult to get. Things like motes, shards, mattekar robes, ravener guts, ect. These are used as substitutes for the over-inflated pyreals, because these things have an intrinsic value of their own. There are two ways around the inflation problem. One is a game-design fix, and the other is a player-created fix. |
Relative Values: (on Ebay) Mattekar Robes: $200 200,000
Pyreals: |
The game design fix would be to remove the easy supply of coins from monsters and woodland creatures, and to provide something for the players to buy that was both expensive and had recurring costs (a money sink). The player-created fix could be done by the players themselves, but it would require cooperation and a certain level of organization. On Darktide, the smallest unit of "real" currency is the mote. Already, Dread Azile and others have formed a warehouse to handle exchanges of the various currency items, with the relative value of the items being tied to a published trade index. The next logical step would be for a player organization to issue "mote certificates" which are redeemable directly for warehoused goods at the current indexed prices. This was the basic concept behind most real world currencies (Silver Certificates in the U.S.) until the 1950s. Something like this is very possible, but difficult to set up on Darktide. In an environment like Atriarch, with a much larger emphasis on trade skills and less available coined currency, we'll certainly see something along these lines. (Click here to comment on this story) |
|
 Wand Monkeys |
Tufa Falls to the
Evil Forces of Xai 7/9/00 - Despite the valiant defensive efforts of the Warlords of Tufa, that once peacefull city has been reported to have fallen into the sinister clutches of the Xai Monarchy. Initial reports indicate that many of the defenders have betrayed the Anti-PK cause and cravenly joined the enemy. Those few loyal Anti-PKs who |
| have stayed loyal to the cause of Light continue to fight a guerilla-style campaign from the desert sands. | |
Despite the horrible death toll that the Anti-PK's hit-and-run attacks have caused among the low and mid-level Xai troops, the monarch himself remains unconcerned. Xai was qouted as saying "The Antis are just weeding out the weak." The questions on everyone's minds are now: Will the forces of Good be able to band together and strike a blow at the Xai |
Evil PKs in matching Olthoi helms |
| Monarchy's senior leadership and drive them from Tufa? Or will Tufa pass from the light of | |
Another desert town falls to PKs |
Good into eternal darkness as so
many other Darktide towns have already? Can the Anti-PK forces of Good who once joined together as one to defeat the Azilite invaders at Stonehold, join together again to liberate Tufa? These answers remain to be seen. GZR will be sure to keep you updated on conditions in Tufa as they continue to develop. (Click here to comment on this story) |
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Azile Opens
Darktide Trading Center 7/8/00 - The Dread Azile has started a trading service on Darktide known as "The Warehouse", which uses a trade index based upon the relative value of frequently traded goods such as motes, shards, guts, and Mattekar coats. |
| GZR Game Reviews:
Diablo II 7/7/00 - (Posted by AdvancedWalnut) - The most awaited game of the summer has finally arived! And GZR is there to bring you screenshots, and game information. When Diablo II was finally released I went right to the store to pick up a copy. |
| I brought it home, and installed it, and then I was taken into a world that I enjoyed. Diablo II beats its younger brother (Diablo) by far. The gold system frees up inventory room, you | |
| have the
ability to gem your own helms, and new weapons
and staffs with benefits. The new spells are
impressive, but a bit dull and the skill system
makes them all suck until about level 25. I installed the game, and being a long range magic lover, picked the Sorceress (instead of one of the four other choices: Paladin, Necromancer, Barbarian, and Amazon). I swiftly named her Armageddon, and was swept in. It was 3 days, and about 2 packs of Mountain Dew later that I finished. |
Imitating Turbine's "Rain of Cows" spells? |
Diablo II had been beaten. I thought the game to be linear, and the storyline was dull until the end of Act 2, but the cinema was outstanding. On my 850 with a Voodoo 3 3000 AGP it looked good, and with my Soundblaster Live! 64 bit PC soundcard it sounded great. But without a good system and video card, the game cannot truly be enjoyed. CD-ROM problems also run rampant with this game, many of my friends cannot run it on their systems. This is a good game, and it was fun to beat, but it will never truly take out the best of the RPG's out there (including console games). |
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I reccomend you buy this game and play it through only if you're bored with Asheron's Call. (Click here to comment on this story) |
GZR RATING: |
Interview with Atriarch's
Serafina Pechan
7/7/00 - PC IGN has a new interview with Atriarch's Lead Designer.
One qoute that should get all of the aspiring Unarrans and Tyrusins
smiling is: "Before
the end of this year, we will be opening up Atriarch to a
select group of outside testers".
Pico Vs Überkids |
GZR Game Reviews: Latest Installment in Tom Fulp's Pico Series 7/6/00 - General Zang's kid sister took a break from the rigors of leveling on Darktide to review the latest entry in one of the hottest game series on the Flash |
| market,
Tom Fulp's Pico Vs Überkids. The Pico
series can be found at newgrounds.com. Judging from the previous two entries in the series (Pico's School, and Pico Vs Bear), the game's hero lives in a rougher neighborhood than Shoushi West and goes to a worse school than Holtburg Jr. High. By comparison with the earlier titles, Pico Vs Überkids is relatively sedate. Instead of the roving gunbattles with multiple weapons that you might expect, it's a simple game of paper scissors rock with the added fun of Russian roulette as Pico and friends go head-to-head with the genetically engineered Überkids. The game's graphics are done entirely in Flash animation, and the point-and-click interface is very intuitive. |
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With gun-in-mouth, head exploding action, ( and entirely free to play), it's well worth the time. (Click here to comment on this story) |
GZR RATING: |
| Shocking Comments
by Joval Soulblighter Lead to Carebear Invasion
of Darktide 7/4/00 - Revelations as to the real identity of the lead members of the Xai Monarchy, caused hundreds of Carebears to flood into Darktide hoping to catch |
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| a glimpse of their pop music idols. Joval Soulblighter posted on the CoD Board that "Xai and his followers won't go away. They're like the Backstreet Boys...they lay low for a while and just when you think they all O.D'ed on crack, then surprise surprise they release another album." Most observers assumed that Joval was simply making it up, reasoning that the international pop music stars wouldn't actually buy Darktide characters...until photographs clearly revealed |
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| that gaming site owner Jeff K. was also a member of the
"Yaraqstreet Boys". Most Darktiders interviewed were highly upset by the lag-filled Carebear invasion and once they were informed by GZR interviewers that the Xai Monarchy was to blame, many vowed to seek revenge. (Click here to comment on this story) |
Xai and cronies. Jeff K. can be seen on the far right. |
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