Post by Morreion on Feb 20, 2014 16:01:45 GMT -5
Trove, New Voxel-Based Game From Makers of Rift, Looks Like Minecraft (But I Don't Care & Neither Should You) (New World Notes)
Well first of all, it will probably be an MMO, if not an MMORPG. That's Trion Worlds' wheelhouse and I doubt they'd stray too far from it. It is clearly voxel-based, which certainly lends itself to the sandbox theory. Rift itself has building tools for users, so it wouldn't be a shock is something similar appeared in Trove. It would be even less of a shock considering the voxel-based (though much more sophisticated-looking) building that will be available to players in upcoming (and competing) MMORPG Everquest Next, through the Landmark system. Both Rift and EQNext relegate player building to private home dimensions for the most part (the most practical way to manage that kind of content in an MMO) so it's likely that's the direction they could take with Trove as well.
Trion officially reveals Trove: Endless adventures through endless worlds (Massively)
Trove originally began as nothing more than a small side-project by a couple of Trion employees. They started out by speculating what a game would look like if it focused on the feeling, seeing, and exploring of brand-new worlds. A couple of months later, the two-man team brought it to Hartsman and other higher-ups, who gave the project their blessing. Several months after that, Trove debuted on an internal test server and quickly became a very popular past-time within the company.
Trove starts alpha testing, sells supporter packs (Massively)
If you're not content to wait for an alpha or beta invite, you can cut the wait with a few bucks by purchasing one of Trove's new supporter packs. These start at $5 and go up to $2,500, with perks such as testing spots, in-game credits, in-game items, the soundtrack, and even the ability to help create a biome. Basically, $5 gets you the beta and $20 (on up) gets you the alpha, if that's what you're seeking.
Massively's first impressions of Trion's Trove
As you often see in the starter zone of any true sandbox, the immediate area is littered with a frightening selection of building experiments. Streams of colored towers stretch as far as your 8-bit eyes can see as players build to the sky's edge for a birds-eye view of the world. I noticed someone decided to craft a phone number into the side of a huge castle wall, and someone else made the RIFT logo floating high in the sky. Surprisingly, I haven't stumbled across any voxel penises yet, but if this type of thing isn't regulated in public shards, it would be enough to easily turn off potential new players.
I ventured away from the mess to discover some castles (seemingly dev-built) and forts (possibly player-built) to explore. The dungeons aren't manned with bosses yet, but I noticed that these castles had walls that were more difficult to break. Some players tried digging under the fortifications to enter from below, while others simply built a cube ladder to scale the walls. Guard towers were blown apart from bombs (dropped as loot from mobs currently), and the ground all around was so dug up that it was actually hard to maneuver in a straight line.
Trove will rejuvenate MMO worlds by blowing them up (Massively)
Although the current alpha isn't quite to the point where world destruction (what Trion's calling "world cycling") has happened, it will be patched in soon. The idea is that at any given point, new worlds are being created all over the place in Trove. Each world will be flat with fixed boundaries, with each boasting a specific biome, treasures, dungeons, and monsters. You, along with 40 or so other players, will jump into a new one and get to exploring, killing, and building.
During your adventures on that world, you have the choice of going at it alone or hanging out with friends and strangers. You can claim an empty plot to summon your cornerstone (more on that later), explore another players' cornerstone, blast your way into a cave, build a staircase up a tower, or take on one of the game's procedurally generated dungeons. But the world will have an extinction point, and that's when you and a majority of the other players there get together to take on the world boss. Once it's killed, the world will be destroyed and you'll move on elsewhere to start anew.
Trove: You make it, we play it (Massively)
Quests are automatically assigned once you arrive in a specific area. They're area-bound and do not respawn until the next world cycle, forcing players to check out the map (another upcoming 0.5 feature) to see where the remaining quests reside.
So why do quests? Other than for experience and personal rewards, quests will be spitting out stars when completed. This is a simple type of experience that is shared with everyone in your world. Your stars along with others go up into the appropriately named star bar, and once the bar is filled up everyone in the world gets a reward as long as they're logged in. Krausnick said that the bar should get filled up every 30 minutes or so, and at least initially it will be handing out that valuable currency that's used to buy everything from recipes to mounts to other classes.
The Trove Diaries: Exploring the wild, wild... peaceful forest? (Massively)
So I generally log in, pick a direction, and head there. Having a mount as a speed boost is a must, although each class has an additional movement skill at the ready. Knights can charge forward at will, while Gunslingers have a nifty jump shot.
For whatever reason, I often end up deep underground. I haven't found anything really interesting yet, but it's still fun to explore crevasses and make my own way. You see, that's another exploration tool: destroying whatever's in your path. You can use either weapons or the build mode to remove blocks in your way and put them in your inventory. But when you get stuck so deep that it'll take far too long to tunnel out, there's a handy self-destruct mechanism at your disposal: /respawn. That explodes you (hey, it happens) and sends you back to your Cornerstone or the main hub (depending on whether you've claimed a Cornerstone in that world).
