Hi-Rez send word that their new expansion for moderately entertaining free-to-play jetpacks 'n shooty sci-fi MMO combat game, Global Agenda, has arrived. It's called Recursive Colony, and is free to all players. But what is it? Well: "Recursive Colony puts the players against an army of self-replicating robots invading the once-safe haven of Dome City." It also adds new PvE and PvP maps, the ability to transfer between open zone instances, as well as new crafting stuff, pets, and so on. It's quite the download of additional content, some of which is illustrated by the trailer which I have posted below.
]]>In April, Global Agenda expanded its free-to-play model to encompass those who had bought the game digitally. It seems that this was a very good thing for Hi-Rez Studios because the game is due to receive its largest update yet and that too shall be free. To everyone, no matter how or when they joined the game. As well as adding plenty of tweaks and new stuff, a full list of which is below, the expansion will add an entire new open zone, the Recursive Colony. According to the press release this place is controlled by a “hive-mind faction of robots constructing robots”. That’s a lot of robots. Hi-Rez say this is the biggest update in the game’s history and it suggests free-to-play is working out, attracting enough new players to remain sustainable and turning a profit. It bodes well for other upcoming attractions that hope to thrive using a similar model, not least of which is the studio’s own Tribes: Ascend. Full details of the expansion, due this autumn, await.
]]>Speaking to PC Gamer, Hi-Rez COO Todd Harris said of the decision to take Global Agenda free-to-play: “We have many many more people creating accounts every day, many more people playing concurrently, our revenues are higher than they ever have been before which means we can develop content and put it into the game faster than ever before,” and also: “We now have five times as many interested players every day going through that same experience knowing that it’s free to play and it’s not a demo.”
]]>As Quintin mentioned was about to happen last week, Global Agenda is now free to play. Which it sort of was before. But now it's all free to play, even if you didn't buy the box. What they've done here, right, is called it, okay, "Free Agent". See, because it's a game that's ostensibly about spies (except it really isn't) and it's free, see? Geddit?! No, me neither.
]]>Yes! Massively mediocre multiplayer shooter Global Agenda will soon join Dungeons & Dragons Online and Lord of the Rings Online as the latest subscription-based game to go completely free. Except it's a bit weirder in Global Agenda's case, since it always offered the option of playing a cut down experience if you just bought the boxed copy, but whatever. Come "mid April" the new 1.4 patch will bring the new monetisation model, revised skill trees, a new CTF-style game mode and a new raid. Full press release and a fan video showing some game footage can be found after the jump.
UPDATE: Sorry, I forgot to close this. Consider it closed! Keys going out now.
Oh, what's this then? I've got a few Steam codes for Global Agenda. They've arrived to celebrate and/or promote the retail launch of the game in the UK. Give them away, you say? To you guys? Well, I suppose I could. Oh, what the hell. Send an email over to this address (and keep the tagline "Globaliser, Globaliser" on there) with a reason why I should give you the code. Best reasons win codes. I'll edit this post when they're all gone.
I rather enjoyed my time with the colourful sci-fi shooter, although the big strategic game never managed to drag me in. It's also changed a fair bit since launch, culling the subscription and introducing some open world bits. The most recent trailer for that open world bit is below.
]]>Shooty persistent-world type game Global Agenda has undergone a bunch of changes since launch, the biggest of those having just gone live within the game today. These include the "Open Zone" - which is a wide-open PvE space that you can go off and do missions in, a bit like a traditional MMO- and also, more significantly, the fact that there is no longer any fee to play. Buy it, and you got it, Guild Wars style. Which is good. The new patch also adds in 10-man raids, in which you defend the city against invaders. It's interesting to see the PvE leanings within the game, perhaps because the PvE types got more out of it. The actual conquest part of the game was what I'd had the most hope for, and it doesn't seem to be doing all that well. (Although I had pretty good time in the drop-in PvP stuff I did manage to play, it just didn't have enough bite to stick around.) Worth checking out if you have the game, and hopefully they'll do another free trial, too.
]]>News reaches us via the internet and the whispering of swallows that shooty-MMO Global Agenda has changed its model, removing the need for a subscription to play its highest level content. You can play the first fifteen levels with the trial but then need to actually buy the game to shoot as long as you like (Which is 33% off on Steam's current enormo-sale). More details on their site. I want to write something like "Go On A Global Agenda Bender" but I'm not sure if that's offensive and/or make any sense.
]]>Hi-Rez's MMOFPS MMOTPS (phew, lucky we got that one right, my credibility was in danger!) Global Agenda is getting a hefty patch today, with loads more PvE missions, new PvP maps, and a totally refurbished world-conquest system designed to bring the agency vs agency war onto a single global map. All servers will, apparently, be down today due to the upgrade. Full patch notes are here. People wanting to check it out for no pennies can get on the free trial here.
Hi-Rez send word that their free trial for Global Agenda, which is now also available via Steam, allows anyone to play the game for free, up to level fifteen. You can even create eight different characters along the way, so you get a taste of the different mechanisms. Personally I always enjoyed the nippy little recon chaps, because you had a sword, could turn invisible, and jump like a Kung Fu hero. Admittedly, I also got a bit tired of the game before I got properly stuck into the territorial conquest stuff, but the PvP generally is fun, and it's definitely worth taking a look at for free.
]]>Okay, we've created an agency in Global Agenda, because we'd like a crack at that conquest game, which I should point out is open to all players, even non-subscribers, until March. The agency is simply called RPS, and anyone should be able to sign up. So come join us if you're in-game. (I'm rather enjoying the PvP games playing as a mercenary, but not sure about the PvE stuff, the rewards aren't high enough.)
]]>Sci-fi shooter with clever MMO territory bits, Global Agenda, launches today at 12pm EST, which I think is about an hour from now. Are there any RPS folks playing? I've not had a chance to play yet, but I'll be looking to hook up with RPS folks for high-fives and game-worth-examination purposes over the coming week. Post in comments if you're in-game and we'll try and get some sort of RPS team established.
Launch trailer and bunch of other videos below.
]]>Below is the first part of our intricate guide for PC gaming in 2010. There's a horde of muscular-looking titles on the horizon, many of them likely to stop you and demand your money, like ludological bandits. Meanwhile, others that we expected to land, such The Old Republic, have already fled to 2011. Read on as the clouds in our crystal ball roll back...
]]>Global Agenda is out on the 1st of February! How did that happen so fast? The online spy game (although still no one has figured out what it has to do with spying) is a fascinating mix of traditional MMO and multiplayer shooter. This is a claim that's been made before, but when I played it at E3 I was confused to discover it actually seems to deliver this. I'm intrigued to see how it all plays out once it reaches its meta-game, which appears to introduce the third prong, strategic battles. Anyhow, there's a new trailer out to remind us all it's only a couple of weeks away, and you can see it below.
]]>Via the Eurogamer Expo, we got some time with Global Agenda. Here's the hands-on experience, complete with some input from the developers themselves.
Global Agenda is a game straddling two worlds. It has two different payment schemes, and two different games within itself, almost. It’s a multiplayer third person shooter, with a class based system and jetpacks. But it’s also a huge sprawling PvE/PvP MMO, with the PvP driven by player Agencies that can form and break alliances on the fly in a bitter battle for territorial zones that grant bonuses and benefits. It’s also got some instanced dungeons thrown in there, for the uncompetitive among us.
]]>John was rather intrigued by Hi-Rez Studios' shooter MMO Global Agenda when he saw it at E3. It has intrigued the rest of us too, but we haven't yet had a chance to play it. You might get a chance though, as the very first round of beta testing is now in motion. On a handful of people will be allowed in for the first look this weekend, and we have a special code that will enter you for that first round draw. Clickwards for more.
UPDATE: This has finished! Winners drawn and below. Expect information today/tomorrow.
]]>It's a Global Agenda visual festival! Five new videos have appeared, showing off various aspects of the online shooter-cum-MMO. Having had a play of it recently, it's a game I'm really looking forward to playing more of, finding out how it transitions between the initial co-op shooty quests and the latter PvP game. Well, follow that link for all the details. Meanwhile, the many videos appear below.
]]>Global Agenda requires you to change your mind. Despite being built in the Unreal 3 engine, and despite looking really rather fine, it presents itself as an MMO. It's a third person view of your character, with a tray of icons along the bottom of the screen, health and energy top left. But try and play it like an MMO and you're going to end up dying rather a lot. This is fast, it's proper action, and until you accept both genres melded into one, you're going to be rubbish at it. Or at least I was. And then it clicked.
]]>Embedded below is a huge video trailer for the forthcoming action MMO, Global Agenda, featuring its executive producer Todd Harris. The video covers a huge amount of material, discussing everything from the way in which the instanced combat missions are linked together to divide 60-man PvP raids into half a dozen smaller, mission-based systems, to the over-arching construction of bases by player factions. Harris says "not just more power, but more options" when talking about player advancement, and then goes on to explain that newbies can compete with older players in PvP. This makes me like him. I'm still a bit foggy as to what makes the game "spy", but the "fi" part might just work. Also: Jetpacks!
Global Agenda is scheduled for release in late 2009.
]]>2009's set to be a funny old year for MMOs. On the one hand, we've got The Old Republic and Love on opposite ends of the spectrum, both promising important, enticing changes to an often static genre. On the other, there's the distant thunder of how badly 2008 went for so many existing massively multiwotsits - last year cost us Tabula Rasa, Hellgate, Mythos and RF Online. So news of a promising newish name on the virtual world block is definitely good news. Especially one that's got robots in.
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