We'll be hearing much more about this now, apparently 4 years after Carbine Studios was formed by (among others) Tim Cain of Fallout fame and other industry vets.
NCsoft Reveals WildStar and Features Guild Wars 2 Playablehttp://www.carbinestudios.com/en/news/ncsoft_reveals_wildstar_and_features_guild_wars_2_playable_8.phpDeveloped by NCsoft's Southern California-based Carbine Studios, WildStar offers epic high adventure, where players make their mark as Explorers, Soldiers, Scientists or Settlers and lay claim to a mysterious planet on the edge of known space. WildStar's iconic visual style and "Momentum Mechanics" immerse players in a deep world stacked with content, challenges and rewards that respond to the play style choices of individual players. Depending on a combination of faction, race, class, and path, WildStar will present gamers with unending surprises, mini-quests and challenges, ensuring that their experiences are fun and fresh.
Eurogamer previewhttp://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-08-17-wildstar-previewWildStar is the product of an awful lot of research into how and why people play MMOs, and it shows. This is a game that's spurting rewards and mini-challenges all over the place and near-constantly, and even in the hour or so I've played, its torrent of gifts and dares seemed a far cry from the stop-start trudging and kill-ten-rats mentality that so many other MMO's starting zones fall prey to. All this is built on top of something that will inevitably draw a ton of World of Warcraft comparisons: this is NCsoft's most concerted effort by far to look Blizzard square in the eye.
What I'm most curious to see is how its play styles combine and entwine on a large-scale basis: how an Explorer can involve Fighters, Collectors and Builders in their remote adventures, how Builders can create a better world, what happens when a Collector is busy scouring a zone for datacubes while his mates fend off any lurking horrors. There's a lot to prove still, given how many promises Carbine are making about this being the "deepest" MMO ever.
Gamespy at Gamescom in Germanyhttp://pc.gamespy.com/pc/wildstar/1188366p1.htmlAlong with the slick, hand-drawn art style, WildStar features a "Momentum" meter that gradually builds as players land or evade attacks, granting greater experience bonuses as the meter builds. In short, it's a system designed to reward players who play the game with skill.
The main schtick seems to be that it's an MMO trying to cater to all tastes within one game, but only one at a time. So if you like combat, you have a character focused on that; exploring, you have a type focused on that; another on building; another on finding all the scraps of lore in the game.
Whether that all adds up to fun or just having four "crippled" character types, who knows?
Sounds like an interesting take on things at least. It's like a buffet restaurant that asks you first what your very favorite food is, and then they throw everything out except that one food item (i.e, the
only thing available to you in the buffet is that favorite food). Is that good, bad or crazy as a game concept? Maybe I'm oversimplifying (maybe it just means you're "best" at one thing but can still do the others?), but that's how I read these early takes.
The look seems a little anime-cartoonish for my tastes (others might say too WoW-ish, but I don't play WoW so you tell me
), although maybe it's just the kangaroo-rabbit girl character that has that effect on first impressions...
