Review: Guns Of Icarus Online

You and your crew are soaring through the sky in your trusty and reliable steam-powered airship, when suddenly an enemy ship pulls out of a nearby group of clouds and rams right into you, jostling you and your mates as you run to man your stations!

Harpoons skewer your balloon and flak cannons pound your port-side armor! You and your mates desperately try to hold the ship together, but the smoke and fire fills your eyes and the panic rises in your chest as your realize it's too late and your ship explodes into a ball of flame and scrap metal!

Guns of Icarus is a game like few others. It is a team focused multi-player steam-punk airship battle royal that is so detailed and immersive I guarantee you will be talking like a sky-pirate by the time you're out of the novice bracket. This game offers such a unique setting and game-play that its worth picking up simply for the experience.

There are three classes to choose from: Gunner, Pilot and Engineer. Each is vital to your ship's survival and making sure you have a crew and gear load-out to suit the style of your ship is vital for survival. A large ship needs more engineers to repair damage, a ship with weaker guns could use more gunners to compensate and you probably won't ever need a second pilot. Ever.

The guns are varied and interesting making each combination unique and viable in it's own way. If your ship has heavy armor you could trade broadsides with your enemies, firing mortars at one another to see who breaks first. A fast ship could load up with flamethrowers to set the enemy ship ablaze and escape before taking any damage. There are tons of ways to customize your ship and loadout to suit you and your friends play style.

Speaking of friends, when you step into this game get ready, because your bound to make a few. This game gave me friendliest multi-player experience I have ever had on an online game.

The game's community is very accepting of new players. It encourages players to learn from their mistakes instead of calling them out and has a "thumbs up" system that lets you give a commendation to your fellow crew members for a job well done.

The game made it's debut in October of 2012, but don't let that deter you. This game is still only just getting started. After recovering from some major financial problems, a crooked publisher and capturing the attention of a now thriving niche community, "Musegames" has been working on a major content expansion. This new expansion will prominently feature a new "Adventure Mode" with co-op, factions, an in game economy and boss battles.

"Musegames" is a rare breed of game developer. They have more concern for their patrons than any other any other company I have ever seen.

For example, while I was playing there were some unfortunate server issues that made the game a little laggy. I play a lot of online games and a little lag is to be expected. There some triple A tittles I have played that had more lag then this. Much to my surprise I received an email from the developer that not only apologized for this minor inconvenience, but gave me and everyone else a free in-game item!

These guys have literally braved floods to keep their fans happy!

With plans for such a large addition to the game on the horizon, now is an excellent time to purchase Guns of Icarus Online. The game goes for regular $15 price tag, but the game often goes on sale for prices as low as $3.75. Come on guys, that is less than a sub-sandwich. If anyone deserves your money it's these guys.

Guns Of Icarus Online
Developer: Musegames
Operating Systems:
Price: $15 standard, $3.75 Sale
About: A team based competitive objective game featuring airships in a steam-punk setting.
Release Date: October 31st, 2012

More Information
Guns of Icarus Website
Totalbiscuit's first-impression review
IGN Review

What makes a good MMO? Wildstar Vs. The Elder Scrolls Online

Everyone has a particular field of interest in their life and mine is video games. Everything about them completely enthralls me: how they are made, the industry, the artistic value and just plain old fun.


My particular poison is the MMO genre. Massively Multi-player Online. The key word here is massively. While many games have online multiplayer an MMO takes that to the extreme. We're talking hundreds to thousands of players interacting on screen at once.

This is a very popular genre to focus a game around, but few pull it off in a way that does the genre justice.

There are three things that help me decide if an MMO is good or bad: How the game plays, how much there is to do and how much do I have to pay?




Two recent MMO games which I have recently participated in beta testing for are: Wildstar and The Elder Scrolls Online. These are a perfect exampleson what is a good MMO and what is a bad MMO based on how the game plays, the content progression and the overall business model. Both are MMO-RPGs and are set to release this year.

What can you do in an MMO?
To support those massive numbers an MMO will often times have one large persistent world that players can interact with in a meaningful way. Often times this will mean teaming up to defeat challenges in the game world like powerful bosses or random events or teaming up to fight against other players in potentially massive battles. The terms Player Versus Environment (PVE) and Player Versus Player (PVP) are commonly used terms that describe the former.

Wildstar takes a fresh take on how MMO-RPGs are played by innovating in both PVP, PVE and player customization.

The PVE encounters are fast paced and exciting with players having to constantly keep maneuvering and adapting to the enemies' mechanics and is a refreshing change the standards for such encounters. The new telegraph and nontraditional crowd control abilities make PVP more enjoyable and less frustrating than most titles in this genre. There is also a large amount of customization options for characters that allows you to be rewarded based n what you enjoy doing in game whether it be exploring, fighting or crafting items for yourself and your friends.

The Elder Scrolls on the other hand is less than inspired. The PVE encounters are boring and repetitive and feels like combat from a 90's MMO-RPG. The PVP is the games strong suite, but laggy and unresponsive and most of the mechanics are borrowed from older titles like Dark Age of Camelot. At release the game restricts your customization and crafting options unless you pay an extra $20 dollars on the special edition.

Progression, Content and Social Interactions
An MMO game will often time have some sort of progression system for players to spend time on. Players who spend more time on the game unlock newer features, abilities and become more powerful in the in-game world. This encourages players to keep playing the game and in turn paying money, but often times is a very rewarding system in which players feel the direct effects of their time invested playing the game.

But the biggest part of playing an MMO will ultimately be the social aspect. Players come to play the game but stay for the friends and enemies they make in the game world. Successful MMOs encourage players to team up in PVE and compete in PVP. Many MMOs require you to team up to experience the highest level of content and will often split the player base into factions to give them a little bit of rivalry straight from the get go.

Wildstar has a lot of refreshing innovations when it comes to progression, content and social interactions within the game. Players can pick and choose what they want to spend their time doing and get rewarded for it via the Path system. The game encourages player interaction from the get go by offering opportunities to work together in the game world straight from the get go. The developers have also announced that they already have a year's worth of extra content ready to go for the final release.

Its a shame that The Elder Scrolls Online falls short on all three of these aspects. The progression is slow, repetitive and boring. It tries desperately to cling to the success of it's source material, so much that it fails at being a good MMO or a good Elder Scrolls game. The social interaction of the game is also a total mess making it so players who want to play with their friends are phased in and out at random intervals, can't get credit for working on quests together and overall completely defeats the purpose of an MMO.

Business Models
Creating and sustaining such a massive game world and keeping players interested in the game are two of the most vital parts of an MMO game. It is both expensive and difficult to keep game servers running 24/7 and this is oftentimes reflected in an MMOs business model.

Many MMOs will require purchase of the game and then an additional subscription fee each month. The amount paid for the subscription can vary but is generally $5-$15 dollars monthly. To justify this added costs subscription based MMOs will usually add additional content to keep players entertained and discourage them from unsubscribing.

Another commonly used alternative business model is to instead have a micro-transaction store in the game where players can buy items to boost progression, provide cosmetic effects and other miscellaneous perks to enhance their experience, but not give them any unfair advantage.

Many games will also have a free-to-play model where they provide limited access to certain content or features until players purchase content through a micro-transaction or sign up for a subscription to get full access.

Both Wildstar and The Elder Scrolls Online come at an standard $60 release price with an additional $15 a month subscription fee.

Unfortunately, The Elder Scrolls Online charges an additional fee if you want full access to all available content and already has a micro-transaction model on release. Many people, such as Gamespot Staff Member Eddie Makuch and YouTube personality Joe Vargas (Angry Joe) think that the game will be forced to enter a Free-To-Play business model like other recent subscription based MMOs.

Some Additional Perspectives
Angry Joe's Elder Scrolls Review
Angry Joe's Wildstar Impressions
Jesse Cox's Youtube Channel

At a glance
Taking a look at Massively Multiplayer Online games.
What makes them good or bad?
Wildstar Vs. The Elder Scrolls Online

Warren Coffeen Profile

Studying micro-biology isn't what most people would consider the most interesting topic, but in Warren Coffeen's classroom it's not only interesting, its a good a great time. Whether its picking up seeds with spoons to simulate natural selections, playing high stakes games of jeopardy for extra credit or answering questions about smurfs and hobbits on the final exam, if your in Coffeen's class you'll probably be having a good time.

If you're a student at LBCC and want to have a good time while learning biology Coffeen is your guy.

Coffeen enjoys working at LBCC because of how in depth he can be with the students. After teaching classes of near a thousand students he really appreciates the in depth close interaction he gets out of 20 to 30 person classes here at LBCC. It allows him to conduct more interesting and exciting labs, as well as share his enthusiasm for the topics which he teaches. His passion is for teaching molecular biology and genetics shows in any one of his classes where his energy and interest in topics is unavoidably contagious.

After teaching part time at Oregon State and applying for jobs all over the country Warren noticed that a position opened up at LBCC, so he went ahead and applied here as well. Turns out he was a perfect fit for the position and much to his surprise he landed the job. After being prepared to head anywhere in the country he instead landed a job only 30 minutes away.

"I enjoy teaching students to love and appreciate this very small world.", says Warren when asked about his motivations to teach.

Warren's enthusiasm for biology is only matched by his enthusiasm for his hobbies. Within the last few years Warren has become an avid runner who has competed in several marathons and relays, and is currently in training for the Newport Marathon at the end of May, as well as preparing to compete in the Epic Relay again this year as part of a group of five other LBCC faculty members.

Warren first started running about two years ago after recovering from two knee surgeries that made it hard for him to compete in his former passion: team sports such as basketball and Frisbee.n. He has since fallen in love with both the training process and challenge of running.

Warren's wife is also an avid runner and she along with his four and six year old and incredibly energetic sons live an active lifestyle.

At a Glance
Warren Coffeen, biology teacher at LBCC
Interests: Micro-Biology, Marathon Running, Team Sports


Additional Information
Information on Newport Marathon
Information on Epic Relay