CCP Games have launched some big additions to agent missions and wormholes in the latest release for EVE Online, Hyperion.

In Hyperion, dangerous “Burner” pirates have started to arrive all over the universe. Trained by the five major pirate factions, these lone criminals hide behind space gates that only frigate-class ships can activate, making for a fresh alternative to the battleship warfare that dominates high-level agent missions. These optional but lucrative new missions mimic the type of battle more often found between players.

Hyperion also includes major changes to wormhole effects. Since wormholes were introduced into the game years ago, EVE players of all experience levels — always ready for a challenge — jumped headfirst into the unknown and carved out fragile refuges amidst a constantly shifting interstellar landscape. Among the changes:

•     New wormhole connections have opened up, and those with Black Holes inside have become the de facto fast-skirmish wormholes.
•     Class 4 wormhole systems have added another reliable exit wormhole, making them the perfect base from which to skirmish into other unknown systems while still providing a substantial income to those brave enough to stake their claim.
•     Changes in the mass calculations of ships entering wormholes should provide some exciting skirmishes, as bigger ships find themselves drifting further from the safety of the entrance.

“Hyperion brings the first of many upcoming changes to core parts of EVE Online that let players explore the New Eden universe and clash with its inhabitants.” said Andie Nordgren, Executive Producer for EVE Online. “Missions, wormhole exploration, and incursions are an integral part of EVE’s player-driven vicious cycle of harvesting, creation and destruction, with players of all levels sewing the fabric of our massive universe with their ambitions.”

Hyperion brings other changes to EVE, including more ship and module balancing, improved UI like sharable overviews and tooltips, new cybernetic arms and “retro” headwear, and the opening of planetary colonies in null security space to those outside the sovereign alliances that control them.

Hyperion follows Crius as the third update in a major shift for EVE development, from two expansions per year to around 10 releases annually, as CCP delivers more content, more frequently, to its ever growing player-base. Hyperion is available free to all EVE Online subscribers and trial users.

Further information about Hyperion can be found here, and the Hyperion in-development video.

The Loadout team have just released a teaser trailer for their upcoming 5.0 Alien PvE beta testing. The beta is only available for the PC version but it’s open for all to try.

More details are coming but they have an official FAQ here. So far the following has been confirmed:

•     Fight the mysterious invaders with up to three of your friends in the new Campaign mode through many missions that will test your teamwork, strategy and quick thinking.
•     Grab rare loot in-game to craft your favorite weapons of mass destruction.
•     Organize your stash of weapon parts and equipment in the new Inventory system.

We know you’ve been waiting patiently, and it’s finally time to share some of the details from Update 5.0! We’ve been quietly working on the largest amount of content the Loadout community has seen since launch. In fact, it’s so big we’re going to run a separate beta with the community to ensure it’s ready to rock-n-roll. The beta will be open to all Loadout players and will go live in the coming weeks. You will help shape the future of Loadout and provide pivotal data, feedback and experience. But we’re not quite ready yet.  In the meantime, we put together a small teaser to give you an idea of what’s coming in the near future:

Celebrating the premier of the spy thriller, “The November Man”, on August 27th. Skilled Halo pros and YouTube stars will battle in their own action-packed Halo Invitational, airing exclusively here on MLG.tv. On Tuesday, August 26th at 3 pm ET, four duo teams will compete playing Halo 3 for a chance at $5,000 and a copy of the soon to be released Halo Master Chief Collection.

Confirmed combatants:

•     JahovasWitniss & KYRSP33DY
•     LEGIQN & Gandhi
•     Flamesword and BigTymer
•     Ace & Snip3down

Viewers can watch via MLG.tv on the web and MLG.tv apps for iOS, Android, Xbox One and the Xbox 360. Throughout the stream, fans can tweet using #NovManMLG for a chance to win tickets to see The November Man, so don’t miss out if that’s your thing. Be sure to follow @MLG for additional details about giveaways and the tournament schedule.

Popular game streaming portal Twitch has been sold to Amazon for an outstanding $970m (£585m). In an letter to the community , Emmett Shear (CEO) thanked the members standing by and supporting the site in its current three years existence.

Sandbox Interactive have confirmed the official start date for the next test on their cross-platform Sandbox MMORPG Albion Online. Testers will be able to explore the medieval fantasy world during the closed alpha test from the 15th of September.

The summer alpha has at least 14 days planned where players can test all features implemented in the game as much as they like. Depending on player feedback and player numbers, Sandbox Interactive may extend the duration of the test.

Anyone who is interested in joining the test and hasn’t managed to get hold of a key can secure their alpha access with one of the founder packs, available now. More information on how to get alpha access can be found here.

Lifeless is a multi-player FPS zombie survival game. In Lifeless, you have to do whatever is necessary to survive in a vast and dangerous world, filled with challenging and intelligent zombies. Working with other players is a smart choice, though attacking other players has its place as well. Lifeless strives to offer an experience that no other zombie survival game has yet to offer. If you want to stay alive, you’ll need to think on your toes and make intelligent decisions; decisions which affect not just you, but everyone around you, players and NPCs.

Today Rigid-Soft Studios released the first public Alpha build. The game is ready for purchase and there are two options; A standard option at $25 to play the game and receive all future updates, or a deluxe edition at $40 with some extra perks.

We originally intended Lifeless to be free-to-play but after exploring it a little more, we decided it would be best to just make it a one time purchase. This is for several reasons but the main ones being the cost of server maintenance, support and development. The other reason is because we quickly realised we would have to turn Lifeless into a pay-to-win game if we even wanted to survive the first month with all the costs and that is something we are strictly against!

I’m always happy to hear when developers are against pay to win, it’s a veritable gold mine but makes games life-less pretty quick (pun intended, couldn’t resist – ex). I think much more people are likely to play with a one time purchase, compared to monthly subs or micro transactions (pay to win).

http://youtu.be/wSTn8y_P6is

Official site.

AlternativaPlatform had a great time with their tank-action browser phenomenon ‘Tanki Online’, they had a fantastic five days last week at the biggest games show in the world, Gamescom. Fans packed out the Tanki booth on every available day of the show, competing for prizes and joining friends and family in a huge celebration of all things Tanki!

More than 2,500 gamers played Tanki Online at the show, each leaving with a badge and a lottery ticket, with four lucky winners going home with an iPad Air! Every two hours, tournaments were held to find out who was the top ‘tanker’ at the booth at that time. Tournaments were characterised by intense battles, every player desperate to prove themselves the best, and some battles going down to the last second! All tournament participants left the booth with T-shirts, while fifteen of the very best players were awarded special game packs that included branded keyboards, headsets and mice.

Players who didn’t manage to make it all the way to Gamescom were also given a chance to be in on the action. AlternativaPlatform introduced a brand new in-game map called “Cologne”, launched specifically for Gamescom. For the entire period of the show, gold box bonuses were doubled and billboards on all maps were temporarily redesigned to feature Gamescom branding. Over 95,000 gold boxes were collected during the event! Fans were also offered 25% off micro-upgrades and speed-ups for the duration of the show.

http://youtu.be/RXTDPcyCYEM

Official site.

With the first anniversary of Final Fantasy XIV fast approaching, SQUARE ENIX Ltd., today updated everyone on a host of special events underway to commemorate the milestone. Full details can be found on the official FINAL FANTASY XIV: A Realm Reborn Anniversary page.

To celebrate this momentous occasion, a free log-in campaign will run from today through to 1st September (11am GMT). During this time, players who have previously purchased and registered FINAL FANTASY XIV, and whose service account is set as inactive during the campaign period, will be able to re-join the adventure throughout the realm of Eorzea and play for free.

The one year anniversary takes place on 27th August, bringing with it exciting events for fans around the world. This includes a special in-game event; The Rising – in memory of those lost to the Calamity. From 28th August, through to the close of The Rising event on 8th September (14:49 GMT), players can purchase various commemorative gifts and items (in-game) and will also be rewarded with the “Huzzah” emote to mark the occasion.

With only five days to go until the official one year anniversary of A Realm Reborn, other celebrations are already underway including an exclusive illustration countdown. Until the 27th August, fans can view new, breath-taking illustrations created by members of the game’s art team – published daily on the Official Anniversary Website. As well as this, fans can further join in the global celebration by taking part in a range of additional special events, including;

Moonfire Faire

14th August 08:00 – 8th September 14:59 (GMT): The heavens are ablaze with fireworks as Eorzea celebrates the Moonfire Faire! A host of events are planned for this year’s faire including various surprises and rewards. The Moonfire Faire gives players the opportunity to better acquaint themselves with the guild, and see what it truly means to be an adventurer.

Messages from Developers

From the date of the official one year anniversary on 27th August, a series of messages from members of the development team will launch, with updates scheduled daily.

Tales from the Calamity

15th August – 12th September: Over the course of five short stories, key characters will revisit events surrounding that fateful day, offering insight into the Calamity’s effect on the lives of many and more. First tale “Where Victory and Glory Lead” is available now on the anniversary website.

14-Hour Anniversary Broadcast

23rd August from 03:00 to 17:00 (GMT): Livestream including 17th Letter from the Producer LIVE, talk sessions with special guests, tips and tricks from the battle team, atma challenge, and much more!

Yesterday morning EvilSeph posted a thread titled “It’s time to say…” over at the Bukkit forums, click the link to read the whole thing, but EvilSeph goes on to say that Bukkit has had one hell of a ride and it’s come to the point where they are stopping development. That they wont be upgrading along with Minecraft 1.8

From the get go we were plagued with issues and obstacles we needed to overcome…….

Fast forward to more recent times and Mojang have made the abrupt and sudden decision to start enforcing their EULA in an effort to quell the outlook of Minecraft being pay to win. While I can completely understand where they are coming from and support their mission to shut down pay to win servers, it’s difficult to be supportive of their abrupt turn-around with enforcing rules they consciously decided not to enforce since the start of Minecraft. On top of this, there are also clauses – which it would be irresponsible of us not to be aware of – within the now suddenly enforced EULA that directly affect the Bukkit project……

At this point in time, I think it’s safe to say that it’s no longer worth it for us to put up a fight when it comes to keeping Bukkit and modding alive. With large and significant changes coming in Minecraft 1.8 that we’ll be hard pressed to provide support for and the lack of support from Mojang with updates since acquiring our original core team (Mojang used to provide us with mappings to speed up the update process), there is little motivation for us to continue limping on across various aspects of the project. From a project management standpoint, it’s become increasingly difficult to find willing and able individuals to help out the project on a purely voluntary basis due to people losing interest in Minecraft or people looking for something more. Simply put, this was ultimately the final nail in the coffin…….

It’s a heartfelt letter and those are only clips, but it should give you an idea. It gets more interesting when shortly after, Jens Bergensten (from Minecraft) tweeted;

Warren over at bukkit seems to have forgotten that the project was bought by Mojang over two years ago, and isn’t his to discontinue.

EvilSeph posted their own reply;

Yes, Mojang does own Bukkit. Them acquiring us was a condition to being hired. If Mojang want to continue Bukkit, I’m all for it 🙂

Quite a lot of servers are running Bukkit, what do you think is going to happen?

The chilling final wing of Naxxramas has been unlocked and awaits you at the pinnacle of the necropolis.  Frostwyrm Lair is now open and it seems a certain Archlich has got a bone to pick with you.

Frostwyrm Lair is the final wing of Naxxramas—home to Kel’Thuzad and his powerful undead frostwyrm, Sapphiron. Just like the other wings, victory over these heat-deprived hooligans will reward you with all-new Hearthstone cards.

Kel’Thuzad is the final boss of Naxxramas, and he eagerly awaits the opportunity to strike down all interlopers who have dared to step into his precious floating necropolis. If you thought the other bosses of Naxxramas didn’t play fair, remember—you’re in his lair now! A victory over Kel’Thuzad will reward you with two Shade of Naxxramas cards to add to your collection.

Defeating all of the bosses within Frostwyrm Lair will add the Legendary Kel’Thuzad card to your collection.

Frostwyrm Lair also features the final Class Challenge that will become available to those who have defeated the bosses on Normal Mode. Overcome this Challenge and you’ll be rewarded with a shiny new class-specific card to expand your repertoire.

For those of you seeking out a serious challenge, Heroic Frostwyrm Lair becomes available after you’ve defeated all of the bosses on Normal Mode. Heroic Mode bosses are significantly more difficult than their normal versions, and the Heroic Frostwyrm Lair bosses will freeze all that oppose them in their tracks!

Source.