New forum enroute to RobotEntertainment.com as SixOkay introduces himself and future plans
New Robot Entertainment Community Manager Justin “SixOkay” Korthof has posted his first blog on the Robot Entertainment website introducing himself and updating fans on some community plans going on at Robot. After some requests by members particularly on Age Community SixOkay has today announced plans to launch a new web forum on the homepage of RobotEntertainment.com in an effort to refresh the site and add more community features going forward.
I’ve seen a ton of requests over the last few days specifically for us to open up a new forum. I’m happy to announce that one of the updates we’re working on for the new site is in fact a new message board. Soon, you’ll be able to come by and speculate to your heart’s content about upcoming Robot projects, interact with our community team and development team members, and generally stake your claim as a hardcore Robot Entertainment fan who was there since the beginning.
This is excellent news as this will provide a new platform for fans to engage in speculation on new Robot projects. With input from Community Manager Justin and Community coordinator Duncan Stanley I expect there will be lots of discussion and interactivity. As Robot gets closer and closer to being public about games they are working on its exciting to see investment in a new online community in the interim.
If you are asking “who is this SixOkay chap?” then you have been out of the loop for a while. SixOkay, or Justin may just be announcing his becoming a Robot on the website now but has been in the role for about five weeks already.
I’ve been working here at Robot for about four weeks now. A lot of my time has been spent catching up on the many awesome things that the developers here have been working on for just over a year. If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you already know that we’re working hard on two really amazing projects. Looking around the web, I have seen a ton of interest from the avid Age of Empires fans, as well as from other gamers, about what exactly we’re working on. We love that you’re all so interested, but this is the part where I ask for your patience. I wish I could give you all the details right now, but we’ve still got some time before everything’s ready to come out of the oven, so to speak. I did want you to know, though that we have been reading your comments and forum posts, and we’re just as eager to announce things as you are to read about them.
Stand by for more information about future community happenings at Robot. While I try to update this blog as fast as I can its always a good idea to follow Robot Entertainment and other studios on social networking sites such as Twitter so that you can get the latest information about Ex Ensemble Studios as it happens. I have created a Twitter list to help fans dig out their favourite studios on Twitter.
343 Industries takes over Halo Wars Community support
As of March 1st 2010 343 Industries’ Halo Waypoint team will take over support of both Halo Wars and the Halo Wars Community at HaloWars.com. Community Manager Jon Goff from 343 has made his introductions in the general discussion.
Hey everyone,
As most of you know, Halo Wars and HaloWars.com are transitioning more closely into the Halo Waypoint family.
As of this weekend, Halo Waypoint will oversee both Halo Wars’ matchmaking and stat tracking servers, as well as HaloWars.com as we continue to bring the Halo universe together as never before.
Before I continue, the Waypoint team would like to thank the amazing group at Robot Entertainment, who have spent the past year working closely with the Halo Wars community, helping to build a vibrant, dedicated fan base, and we look forward to supporting the Halo Wars community as the Halo universe continues to expand and evolve.
Jon then continues to expand on some of the most frequently asked community questions – whether or not there will be a Halo Wars sequel of even any additional DLC. The response is as expected – no.
Will there be a Halo Wars 2?
There is currently no information to share about the possibly of future Halo Wars games. We understand the desire from the Halo Wars community for another installment of Halo Wars, but for now the focus in regard to Halo game titles is squarely on supporting Bungie as they prepare to launch Halo: Reach this Fall.
Will there be more Halo Wars DLC?
Likewise, there is currently no new information on additional Halo Wars DLC.
The transition from Robot Entertainment to Halo Waypoint indicates Microsoft’s reduced commitment to the title for the near future as Halo Wars loses its developer. It is currently unclear whether some small bugs outstanding from the last title update will be resolved. Two of these include the issue that units can use the Y-Ability across the entire map and secondly there are missing cut scenes in the Halo Wars game menu. Robot Entertainment has advised that these issues are now the responsibility of Halo Waypoint.
Whats next for Robot Entertainment?
Losing Robot Entertainment in the Halo Wars community is a sad thing. No one is better placed to support the game and its community than the games developer and Robot had the majority of people from Ensemble Studios working on the titles support. However, this is not the end of Robot’s community presence on other games. Robot will continue to provide support for both Age of Empires and the Age of Empires Community. Also expect Robot to be hard at work on a brand new community for thier upcoming video game project. Robot are expanding thier community team to no doubt make the future community as, or even more vibrant and exciting than ever before. Stay tuned.
Bungie CEO: “Ensemble didn’t build a game with a community that carried it”
Some interesting remarks from Harold Ryan the CEO of Bungie who in an interview with Brier Dudley at the Seattle times said:
Q: It’s interesting how you’re mentioning Bungie like that. Are you now trying to raise the profile of the studio? Is this a step toward additional games beyond Halo and saying hey, we’re not just ‘Halo, we’re Bungie’?
A: Yeah, definitely. When you go back to the divestiture from Microsoft, that was when we started paying more attention to the Bungie brand. It means something – there’s now an existing game, Halo Wars, that wasn’t built by Bungie. There’s a big difference in the success – in sales, in the review numbers of the title. The Ensemble guys (who made Halo Wars) are great guys, they did a great job with what they did, but I don’t think they made a Bungie game. They didn’t build a game with a community that carried it.
It seems somewhat a harsh comment seeing as the Halo Wars community website has been online long before the titles launch and was lead by a fantastic community team at Ensemble Studios. One might like to point out that the community was damaged due to the Microsoft decision to close the studio. Obviously, any community will suffer when a company is closed. Today the community is lead by a sole community manager, Duncan “Aloysius” Stanley and Robot Entertainment has recently held a developers play night with the fans and a feedback thread asking for fan feedback on Title Update 3 fixes.
Seattle Times article:
Players invited to discuss Title Update 3 for Halo Wars on official community forum
Never say the Robots dont listen! Tim “Timotron” Deen has kicked off a discussion thread on the HaloWars.com forums to announce some of the intentions Robot has for balancing the game in Halo Wars title update 3. The changes suggested so far are as follows:
1. Gauss warthog gauss cannon damage bonus against units with heavy armor (Scorpions, Wraiths, Scarabs, Locusts) reduced so that tanks will stay as a viable option to counter warthogs.
2. Warthog build time slightly increased to restrict how fast players can mass and replace warthogs during the game.
3. Anders bonus to tech build rate reduced to further balance the leader.
4. Base turrets attack and health boosted slightly to increase turret viability in early and late game.
5. Elephant health increased to improve survivability and viability as a unit.
6. Grenade/ Plasma grenade / RPG damage against medium armor (warthogs, ghosts, choppers, wolverines and cobras) increased to both better balance marines/ grunts against warthogs and to improve marines overall against players who try to turtle with wolverines and cobras.
7. Recycle basic cost return fixed to be 50% for constructed buildings. (While a technically a bug, this directly impacts many slightly exploitive strategies)
Any thoughts? You can let Robot know by posting in the official thread over here:
http://www.halowars.com/forums/1/618956/ShowThread.aspx
See you in the discussion!
