Why are people still playing APB Reloaded? I left that question unspoken when I wrote about Little Orbit picking up the cops and robbers MMO a couple of weeks ago, but you can bet I was thinking it. I bet that most everyone who read that post was too, and I bet you're thinking it right now.
Then I remembered I was a games journalist, and that I should just go in and ask.
]]>I was going to open this post by saying 'Remember APB?', but Graham already did that in 2013. Um. Do you remember remembering APB? It's the cops and robbers MMO that launched in a shonky state back in 2010, causing Realtime Worlds to sink just weeks after launch. Then the game got picked up by GamersFirst, who turned it free-to-play, slapped 'Reloaded' onto the name, and made it...a little less shonky?
This week, the story continues. Little Orbit have bought GamersFirst, and their CEO is promising to look after the somehow-still-existent APB community with big content updates and a shift to a newer engine. Will it be enough to make those cops worth robbing and the robbers worth copping?
]]>Have You Played? is an endless stream of game retrospectives. One a day, every day of the year, perhaps for all time.
The story of APB is a twisted games industry tale that makes us all squirm with discomfort. Presented as Grand Theft Auto meets MMO it had neither the confidence of the former nor the lifespan of the latter. It was ambitious but also doomed. Poor driving controls, humdrum shooting matches and a lack of variety couldn't save it from the ire of heartless critics, myself included, not even when Realtime Worlds collapsed and the game was bought and relaunched as APB Reloaded.
]]>Remember APB? It was GTA Online before GTA Online existed. It was a massively multiplayer game of cops and robbers. It launched like a soggy biscuit and its developers, Real-Time Worlds, collapsed just weeks after launch. It was eventually bought by another company, GamersFirst, and turned into a free-to-play game called APB: Reloaded that we still didn't like.
Yet the game carries on, buoyed by a small but dedicated audience and a team of developers who are clearly passionate about making it better. They've done a lot of work over the past couple of years, and a new post on the team's development blog outlines the game's future, while also offering some candid thoughts on Grand Theft Auto V.
]]>In today's game news from another universe: Modern Warfare's sensitive depiction of the banality of combat has prompted the Pulitzer committee to add a video games category. Half-Life 3's midnight launch also brought with it Steam 2. And APB, the most populated and well-received action-MMO of its generation, spawning a cultural revolution and raising gaming to the highest artform, has a sister game in production: the action multiplayer shooter known as APB Vendetta.
]]>As RPS' only painfully single person at the moment, I'm happy to inform you that Valentine's Day is cancelled. A pox on all happy couples, literally and figuratively. Return to your empty, silent houses with the biggest bag of sweets you can, turn off the lights, and spend the evening sobbing until the sweet, sweet chocolate oozes out of your eyes and anus.
...or alternatively, jump into one of the many Valentine's Day events taking place this week in assorted games. Almost anything with a cash shop will be running a sale, but many are running special events. (Though not all. DC Universe Online for instance scrapped the Valentine's content it tried last year in favour of waiting until the team has the time to do something good instead.) Jump in with a loved one, or just celebrate Aching Solitude Awareness Day by ganking any of those pesky doting sweethearts who get too close. Like I care. Sob.
]]>Mr Caldwell has been playing APB Reloaded. We asked him to tell us what he thinks about it. It's quite the story.
Right, this is the thing...
]]>It's a strange sight, seeing APB back on Steam, a year after it went away. Of course this is the new version, brought back to life by K2 Networks, reinvented as a free-to-play game. Which as of today can now be played-for-free via Steam. So, you gonna?
]]>Oh, this spate of live action trailers the world is currently suffering from will surely end soon? Beyond giving the message, "we don't think our in-game graphics are impressive", I'm not sure what else they're supposed to convey. But fortunately, this latest for APB Reloaded does occasionally switch to in-game footage. Which, of course, ends up looking (slightly) unfairly lame having just been watching its real-world equivalent shot on high-def film.
]]>APB Reloaded's delayed open beta is set to go live at 1400hrs UK time. It's going to be interesting to see what changes GamersFirst have made in their efforts to reboot the dead MMOFPS as a free-to-play title, and they're keen to stress they're very much regarding this as a beta, despite the game having launched once before. Interestingly, the company has taken on Dave Jones (GTA mastermind, and the mind behind APB in the first place) as an advisor to the project. Make of that what you will.
]]>Ah, APB. That most ill-fated of games. What shall become of you? Well, we will soon be able to have a better idea, thanks to being able to get our hands on GamersFirst's free-to-play reboot of the game. The open beta kicks off on May 18th, and I suspect a fair few people will be popping by to see whether the new owners have managed to deal with the game's various problems. What's also fascinating is the openness with which the APB Reloaded blog has been dealing with things like cheating. Take a look at the section on cheating in that last post, for example: "We have ON PURPOSE not kicked hackers for over a week to monitor what they are doing. That clearly will change. One semi-famous aimbot site realized that we had caught a slew of their users over the weekend (though we did so silently), then they stopped their own hack, and then earlier today re-enabled it. Sigh... when will they ever learn."
]]>We've got some codes if you want to get into the final days of the APB closed beta. But there's a limited number of them! So it's going to be a race to see who can email in to here with a good reason as to why you should get a code. Don't change the subject line. I'll update when they're all gone.
]]>So APB Reloaded is now going into its second week of beta, and the APB Reloaded blog has a full breakdown of what took place during the first week. If only all beta-tests were so transparently documented! The team have also released a trailer for the game, which is currently undergoing lots of tweaking for both balance and performance. The trailer shows a car-chase, and it looks like the APB we knew and were indifferent toward. Nevertheless I am still fascinated to see whether this free-to-play company is going to get the game right after its multi-million dollar catastrophe. The closed beta sign ups are done, but there's a newsletter here if you want to keep an eye out for further developments.
]]>And now, some guns! GamersFirst have released the first few screenshots of APB Reloaded, their upcoming free-to-play reboot of Realtime Worlds' cops'n'robber MMOG. There are four of these shots, all showing a man enjoying a day out with his gun. The screenshots accompany a long blog post from designer Zak Littwin (previously the QA Lead at Realtime Worlds) detailing just some of the changes coming in the game. Not convinced? You might be after you read the quotes I've pulled from the post below.
]]>The APB: Reloaded blog has come up with some details about how to join the closed beta. Sign up and create a GamersFirst account is the first step, but later there's information and DxDiag and things. They're just warning you that it's going to get involved, or something. Apparently 20,000 people have already registered, which sounds like a decent number, but I wonder how many of you lot will? How many of you want to go back? How many of you feel excited that this game is relaunching? I have some hopes that GamersFirst will be able to fix some elements of what made APB wonky, but it's tough to know if they can really make the big changes that would bring the game into the state it should have been at launch.
]]>That's according to this tweet from the company that now owns the game. Last year's biggest disaster is being transformed into a free-to-play title by the chaps at GamersFirst, who picked up the dead game for a bargain price when RealTime Worlds collapsed in September. For more details - and to keep an eye out on beta details promised for later in the week - you can check out this blog.
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