Savage 2

Savage 2 anyone? Could be nice for a period of time that I can't really predict. Seem like a good team based game that we can all get into.

http://pc.ign.com/articles/689/689613p1.html

http://savage2.s2games.com/

Edit:
I'll just post information on the game for those people that don't want to click on the links.

Savage 2 is an RTSFPS hybrid. Commanders in this game are given an RTS view as they build, collect resource, research, and outfit their units, which are other players. They have greatly improved on the commander's role in the second one, instead of an all powerful god that can cripple your team if not played right, they have been given a more tactical role instead. With an overview of the entire map, commanders can work with officers to create battle plans on how to seige the enemy.

If anyone played Rakion, game play will be similar(from my experiences with Savage 1). When in melee mode, you have a third person view, WASD movement and mouse control. With ranged weapons, it switches to first person view. Unlike Rakion, there will be different attacks and special abilities to select and use in combat, and with every weapon tech upgrade done by your commander, new melee and range weapons become available to use.

Anyway, enough of my chattering, onto the actual info from the offical website!

Actual Info

Persistent Items
In Savage 2 items become available as drops from players and higher level NPCs and also from buildings & research from your team. There are rare, higher powered items as drops. Your account has a vault which allows you to keep 5 items, of which, you can bring 2 into any given match as well as stash items you looted. Though considered to be rare, no single item will be overpowered. In Savage 2 player ability and skill is more important than items, experience, or unit class. To stay consistent with this theme no single item will give a player "too much" of an advantage.

Persistent Experience
When you buy Savage 2 you are purchasing an account. What that means is you can download the Savage 2 files anywhere, anytime and use your account to unlock playability. This account (username / password) will maintain a record of all your stats, including experience. The experience you earn in a game will determine your accounts overall experience and level. Increased experience and level offer no true advantages in the game except to show other players your "true" experience.

Unlike RPGs which is a level grind just so you can become more powerful (which is used in video games to simulate the game of true battle experience) Savage 2 shows that true battle experience. The more you play, the more experience you have, the more experience you have, the better you play, the better you play, the more people you kill. This is all possible because at S2 Games we believe that video games should be about your ability and skill to play the game, not an attrition war or level war.

Commanders
The role of the commander is played in a typical RTS format. The view is 2/3 top down and actions / orders are given via left click select, right click action. The commander is responsible for the overall strategy your team will take, the dispersion of additional gold, expansion of resource gathering, researching technologies, base building, and tactical maneuvering. In Savage 1 the commanders overly expansive responsibilities could ruin an entire team’s experience. We have taken some steps to limit that event in Savage 2 without "watering down" the commander’s role. We have accomplished this by allowing players to build structures and allowing the mere existence of those structures to produce new technologies and also, by increasing the role of officers (please read officers description below for more information).

Each player in Savage has experience and a corresponding level, in Savage 2 we’ve expanded that to the team as well. By taking the combined experience your team has earned, your team will gain levels. With each level the officer will have the ability to add attribute bonuses to a group of stats. These stats include health, mana/endurance, stamina, armor, damage, and regeneration. With each level your team is granted 4 percentage points to put towards those attributes. As action players, your team has a maximum level of 10 and no single attribute may have more than a 20% bonus. An example of this in action is a level 5 team has 20 percentage points to use. In this example lets say all 20 points went to health bonus. If you spawned as a legionnaire with 750 base hp, because of the bonus attribute you would have 20% more (150 hp) for a total of 900 hp (750 base + 150 bonus).

Officers
Savage 2 is a strategic (both tactical and elemental) team game and requires entire team organization to achieve victory. Having talented players on your team can affect the outcome of a game, but more important to achieving victory is the ability of your team to act as a cohesive group all working to achieve the same goal. This is achieved through communication and organization. To help with communicating, each team will be broken into squads. These squads are headed by an officer. The officers are chosen in the beginning of the game by the team’s commander (1 officer for every 5 players, minimum of 2 officers per game, maximum of 5). Each officer then invites players to join its squad (maximum players per squad is based upon team player totals divided by total officers).

Each officer will be in close communication with the commander. Each squad should have a particular objective throughout the game (defense, besiegement, NPC farming, and offensive). In order to keep squads close knit a player may always spawn at the closest spawn shrine your officer has “taken” (shrines may be used by more than 1 officer on a given team). Also, players within the vicinity of THEIR squads officer are given stats bonuses (+15% mana regen, + 20% health regen, +20% stamina regen, +15% armor).

Action Players
There are 2 types of players in Savage 2. Each team consists of one commander (RTS) player which we discussed above. Outside of those 2 players, everyone else is considered an action player. As an action player you can play multiple types of characters, from the fast paced Savage to a slower paced support unit like a Chaplain. The units are played in both third & first person perspectives. Each unit has a specific task; the Legionnaire and Predator are damage absorbing tanks, while the Savage and Summoner are high damage wielding units. Other units like the Scout and Shapeshifter are great for sneak attacks and scouting, while the Chapplain and Shaman are great support units with a majority of their abilities using magic. Siege units are manned by players to bring down enemy structures and strangle the opponent’s resource pipelines. Each unit has a set of special abilities including healing, stunning, mass damage, radius damage, buffing, and debuffing. The use of these abilities, along with your skills at melee combat and your aim will determine how long you live and how much damage you deal.

While there are many different styles of play within all the action player units, one thing is guaranteed: a blood rushing, intense experience of playing the role of a trooper in a competitive, epic struggle to bring down your enemy.

Soul Collecting
A new addition to game play is the collection of souls. When you make the fatal blow to a higher level NPC or to an enemy player a soul is released (only YOU can collect those souls). Souls are a valuable resource used along with gold to purchase Hellbourne units at your teams Sacrificial Shrine (which is built upon “Scars” along each map). Using Hellbourne units is very key to getting the upper hand against your opponents. These units are very powerful and are the only non siege units that offer siege damage. They also have more armor & hitpoints and deal much more damage.

The purpose of soul collecting changes while you are a Hellbourne unit. Not only will collecting souls increase your stockpile but it is the only way for a Hellbourne unit to heal. The Hellbourne units must “feed” in order to stay alive. This means that the moment you exit the Sacrificial Shrine you will slowly lose hitpoints.


Here's some info on how a game in Savage 2 would most likely go. (Average game length in Savage 1 was roughly 25 minutes.)



Note: Any of the more mechanical details in this overview can be changed at anytime depending on how they affect game play.

Oh, and I believe games can have up to 64 players.

 

Was that an overjoyous reaction to the game, or am I that sexy.

 

Yeah, this game is going to rock. XD

Finally something to look forward to.

 

Updated info on the first post. For all those too lazy to find the info themselves.

 

Err, they said that they are not going to have the commander role be all important like in the first one.

And I quote, "In Savage 1 the commanders overly expansive responsibilities could ruin an entire team’s experience. We have taken some steps to limit that event in Savage 2 without "watering down" the commander’s role. We have accomplished this by allowing players to build structures and allowing the mere existence of those structures to produce new technologies and also, by increasing the role of officers (please read officers description below for more information)."

 

Oh, well, make room for this game, because you're getting it.

 

Well, they have the account pages set up and it seems like they're going to start beta sometime soon. And by soon, I mean it could be next month, or next year, but, it feels like it's going to be sooner than later. Anyway, I still think this game might be something CDL could look into before some of the other big games come out next year(ET:QW, etc). Plus, since they're only selling it through their website, they cut out the middle man, and the game only costs $30. I don't know, but for those interested, keep an eye out these up coming months.

 

New gameplay video:
http://www.gamevideos.com/video/id/8636

 

http://savage2.s2games.com/movies/12_large_139.wmv

Same video, better quality. They still haven't optimized the net code so there are some choppiness. But it's all game footage, no editing.

Right click and save.