Dungeon Runners

Development

Development on the title first started in 2001 as Trade Wars : Dark Millennium . The game was based on the early computer game series of the same name and was featured in a science fiction setting. ^[1] It later became Exarch in 2002 and was scrapped for some time until it resurfaced in 2005 with its third and current development team as Dungeon Runners .

Dungeon Runners entered the closed Beta phase in May 2006, and a game trailer was exhibited at the 2006 E3 convention. Open Beta began in December 2006, and Beta accounts could be acquired via an invitation from an existing player or through the NCsoft website. On May 24, 2007, the game officially went live.

Much of the original art was conceived by comic-book artist Joe “Mad” Madureira .

On August 13, 2008, the parent company, NCSoft in Korea, decided to cut 21 members of its staff in Austin, TX due to the company’s overall decreasing profits. Out of the 18 member team which developed Dungeon Runners , only three of the original developers remained.

Features

Free gameplay was unlimited (no playfield or activity is closed to free players), but an optional USD $ 4.99. ^[2] Additionally, users could purchase the game for $ 19.99. The boxed game has 6 months of membership and has a “Bling Gnome”. Although described as an MMORPG , the game world was almost entirely uniquely instanced for each party of players.

Dungeon Runners implemented a classless system (see Classes , below) and offered regular updates through patches. One of the most acclaimed patches was the updated coined “The Heave” that introduced the first player to “Chill Bill”, and a new high level dungeon. This update was made by the gaming community and was considered by many of the game’s best updates. ^[3]

Classes

The Beta version of the game featured three playable classes: mage, warrior, and ranger. Each class has different abilities and has different NPC trainer in each neutral playfield. As with similar games, each class had a specific role to play within a party grouping. The warrior was the melee specialist, a ” meat shield ” to gain and hold aggro . The store Was a fight ranged specialist, with spell-like skills That allowed different kinds of damage and damage over time(DoT) attacks. The mage was a ranged area of ​​effect (AoE) fighting, dealing in the fight against the enemy.

With the public release of the game, a classless system had been implemented. Like before, the player a class thing ( fighter , mage , ranger ^[4] ) when generating the character, determining which package of beginning skills, which weapon and what type of clothing or armor the character began with.

After the first dungeon (Dew Valley Forest), the skills, the ranger skills, and the mage skills. Any character could learn any skills of any of the three trainers. In the course of a class, each character had a four word descriptive title that changed depending on which character was used. When the player has been introduced to the Skill Bar, the Skill Bar is an interface element at the bottom center of the screen. The Skill Bar had eight slots plus two additional slots mapped to each of the mousebuttons. The character could learn all the skills in the game if the player wished; However, it can only be accessed at any given time, being limited by the number of slots in the Bar.

If the player wishes a radical change in the character’s abilities, a “Re-Spec” button was available on the Character Sheet. This player has the ability to completely redistribute the character’s attributes at any time by spending some of the character’s gold. The charge for a Re-Spec was based on the character and inexpensive up to level 20, after which the price increased much more quickly per level. The final level cap was 100.

Graphics and Gameplay

The gameplay and graphics styling of Dungeon Runners had been compared to Diablo and Diablo II , ^[5] especially noting the instanced dungeons (whose level layouts and content were randomly regenerated each time a player logged into the game), the ” action RPG ” gameplay style, the naming conventions for in-game items, the class structure based on archetypes (five in Diablo II ), and the absence of a “healer” class, among other similarities. One notable difference is that Dungeon Runners were rendered using polygonal models, rather than the sprite -based isometric graphics of the Diablo series.

GameSpot and Eurogamer , ^[6] stated that the graphical quality, third-person point of view and screen layout more closely resembled that of World of Warcraft , another MMORPG.

As of the latest 147 patch, a substantial graphics update was added.

PvP

NCsoft had introduced a PvP world where they could be played with the other players. Each character started off with a PvP ranking of 1500 and this number changed according to dual outcomes.

Players could engage in one or two groups of players. The difficulty of the match was also scaled to the ratio of the group sizes. For instance, a single player facing off a team of two players would be at 100% power while the other team’s two players would be toned down in damage and armor. Depending on your performance, you might receive King’s coins.

Sound

Dungeon Runners ‘ in-game music was composed by Tracy W. Bush as a straightforward forward game in the vein of Diablo II , when the monsters had their own theme, varying in such styles as black metal , synthpop , klezmer and funk .

End-of-Life Announcement and Shutdown (January 2010)

NCsoft said it would be refocusing its efforts on big-budget, top-tier MMOGs. The MMOSoft Dungeon Runners MMOG Dungeon Runners . Dungeon Runners HAD dropped, as producer and lead programmer Stephen Nichols confirmed que la game will be taken offline on December 31. Dungeon Runners , qui operated under Both a free-to-play, microtransaction -supported and subscription-based business model to lancé good reviews for the PC in July 2008.

” Dungeon Runners is not cutting the mustard”, Nichols said on the Dungeon Runners forum. “If she was a ship, she’d be taking on water.” Yeah, she’s been taking on water for a long time. of business is to be profitable! ”

Went there to Nichols notes That, while the team Had a number of ideas to generate revenue , They Would Be expensive and risky to Implement. He also noted that these plans would be greatly enhanced by the fact that they had two team members.

Nichols noted that those with paid memberships to Dungeon Runners would receive digital copies of City of Heroes ‘ Architect Edition and Guild Wars: Prophecies . The producer also stated that it would be necessary to take care of it.

The online service for Dungeon Runners ended on January 1, 2010. The website was shut down shortly thereafter on January 3, 2010. Many players ^{[ weasel words ]} had commented on the official forums they thought the biggest mistake was the re-organization of the servers that occurred when the game went to a retail box version. Several of the servers Were merged or made available to retail purchasers box only, and good game communities ^{[ clarification needed ]} Were broken up as a result ^{[ citation needed ]} .

References

Notes

Bibliography

• Dungeon Runners official website
• Steve E3 interview with Mark Tucker
• MMORPG.com interview with Stephen Nichols, 05-Feb-2007
• NCSoft cuts 21 at Austin
• Dungeon Runners Shutting Down