UO Stygian Abyss Interview

[DoranM]

There's a new interview up at Curse with Cal Crowner and Josh Drescher!

here's the link: http://www.curse.com/articles/uo-en-news/557725.aspx

here's a snippet of the article:

Curse: New dungeons have always been exciting and some of the past additions, Lamp Post stealing in Doom, the Dark Father, etc. What's in store for players with Stygian Abyss?

Cal: The Abyss. If you've seen the trailers you'll know that the Abyss is MASSIVE. The idea is the Abyss is out of time, it's in a void, and the areas don't make sense. There's one area called the "Silver Sapling" and there's this massive glowing tree in this area next to lava pits and you'll notice in different areas you'll have a different experience. If you enter the Abyss form Britannia you'll have a very different experience than if you enter it from the Gargoyle side. Everything comes together in the Chamber of Virtue where the Slasher of Veils is and there's a chasm in between that divides the area. Within the Abyss there's between 7-10 smaller encounter areas and will really give the players a unique experience.

 

[Sweeney]

Curse: New dungeons have always been exciting and some of the past additions, Lamp Post stealing in Doom...

Lamp post stealing is the most exciting thing ever.

 

[Snakeman]

Now if we could steal someones undies... Now That Would be EXCITING!
But a lamp post ya right. (Think he's ever played the game folks......)

 

[Lord Patapon]

The efforts on advertisement are really cool, though.
(except if those focus on lamp post stealing, of course )

 

[phantus]

TV spots....can't wait to not see those haha

 

[Tay M'real]

thanks for posting - i'm psyched about the new content

 

[christy1221]

Thanks for posting this. I can't wait till next week.

 

[Aurelius]

"Curse: Staining is a new skill that allows gardeners, cooks, and alchemists, will that be different than previously rare and awarded dye sets?"

Either that sentence is missing 'to make dyes' and needs serious grammar repair work, or he reckons us gardeners, cooks and alchemists are the results of stains...

 

[Llewen]

He mentioned Steam. Does this mean the expansion and/or the client are going to be available on Steam?

 

[HillBilly]

...this will be the biggest marketing push that UO's seen in years

I like hearing things like this

Why doesnt EA offer UO on the EA Store website? Its been MIA for quite some time. Sad.

 

[Cear Dallben Dragon]

He mentioned Steam. Does this mean the expansion and/or the client are going to be available on Steam?

yeah i keep asking them to with feedback. would be a great idea.

 

[Tina Small]

These are interesting responses from Cal regarding the champ spawns in the Abyss:

How we did Champion spawns is a little different than we've done in the past. The process is much more interactive and there's a path to get to the Spawn. You won't be able to just teleport in and teleport out. You'll need to follow the path to get into the area, we've also implemented semi-instancing that allows us to set up a queue for players to get into the champ spawns. We've also got a timer to prevent people from being AFK and camping the spawns. A lot of thought has gone into the process and we think it will provide a very smooth experience that players will really enjoy.

The Prime Evil Lich and the Abyssal Inferno are the Champs, the boss mobs for peerless encounters are the Stygian Dragon, the Medusa, and the Slasher of Veils. The other part that's interesting about Champ spawns is that the battles change as the spawn continues, so as the encounter escalates there are things that will come into the spawn area that will assist. For The Abyssal the environment will change and become more hostile as the spawn progresses. You'll get very different experiences in these Champ spawns.

I'm fuzzy on whether the semi-instancing is for the Fel champ spawns or the peerless encounters. I guess we'll find out soon.

 

[Llewen]

He mentioned Steam. Does this mean the expansion and/or the client are going to be available on Steam?

yeah i keep asking them to with feedback. would be a great idea.

Every time I encourage some company to release their product on Steam, I laugh. I remember what a disaster it was when it was first released, and how much everyone hated it...

 

[Beer_Cayse]

or at the very least give wedgies!

 

[Chrissay_]

I like hearing things like this

Why doesnt EA offer UO on the EA Store website? Its been MIA for quite some time. Sad.

It will be on the EA Store website by September 8th

 

[kelmo]

It will be on the EA Store website by September 8th

I plan on buying one...

 

[DoranM]

Now if we could steal someones undies... Now That Would be EXCITING!
But a lamp post ya right. (Think he's ever played the game folks......)

Really?
Ask around.
Anyway, yeah lamp post stealing was pretty exciting when it first came out.

I don't really think it's appropriate for a moderator to be openly mocking someone, especially when that someone has played around 5000 hours of UO in their lifetime.

 

[Kiminality]

Moderators are people too.
While everything a moderator says reflects on Stratics, in a sense, volunteering to moderate doesn't mean signing away your ability to express yourself within the RoC.

 

[GalenKnighthawke]

This quote is about Staining:

It's intended to be complimentary instead of replacement. This will not be a stand in for other dye colors. They're slightly different and you'll be able to understand the distinct value of an existing dye set compared to these new staining sets.

I like that, I like that they tried to not devalue the other dyes.

For those of you who at the start of this thread made fun of stealing lamps?

One of the worst things about the UO player base is that a vocal minority of players feel the need to devalue parts of the game they don't participate in. (I remember a few months back a simple post of someone's house design had to be locked because those players spammed it with "house design sux u should go 2 fel" posts.) I know of several people who had a lot of fun stealing lamps and other things from Doom for a very, very long time. It has been quite profitable during at least 3 different time periods that I can think of, and it's been fun for a lot of people at other times even when it wasn't profitable relative to effort. Sadder still when one of those folks is a moderator.

And for the record: No, I was never a Doom Rares Thief, myself. The point is that other players were.

-Galen's player