Riot rework League of Legends' "severely abused" refer-a-friend system to fight botting
Riot have been running a refer-a-friend scheme in one form or another since League of Legends launched half a decade ago. The current system rewards players who introduce others to the MOBA with new skins - but will soon be revamped to tackle a growing problem with botting and account selling.
“Ordinarily we might tolerate low levels of fringe misuse if it meant we were still doing right by the vast majority of players,” wrote Riot. “However, RAF abuse was increasingly degrading the average players’ experience, forcing us to contemplate changes.”
Nobody is buying Unity: "it is best for us to be an independent company"
Whispers began circulating over the weekend that Unity was looking for a buyer, and had begun pitching its popular game engine to the likes of Google. As the rumours threatened to cage the company in a great, suffocating speculattice, its co-founder was forced to head to the Unity forums and clear the air.
“Sometimes when we talk to our partners, discussions turn to talk of acquisition,” said CTO Joachim Ante. “Our response has always been that for Unity it is best to be an independent company.”
Warlords of Draenor group finder will allow WoW players to "actually meet new people"
Blizzard have decided that WoW’s dungeon finder is perhaps a little too efficient. The grouping tool pulls strangers together for five-man dungeons, and fires them off on their separate ways immediately afterwards. No time lost - but all too often, no friends gained either.
“The pre-made group finder we’re introducing in Warlords of Draenor is very much trying to take a step back in the direction of World of Warcraft being a place where you can actually meet new people,” said lead designer Ion Hazzikostas.
“It’s about creating a world where players can find like-minded others to adventure with, but also a way you can talk to them.”
Wasteland 2 patch offers low-spec PC users a "large amount" of memory optimisations
The second post-release patch for InXile's Black Islish opus, Wasteland 2, went live on Steam yesterday afternoon. It'll appear shortly on GOG, Origin and something called Glyph, if it hasn’t already.
Like one of those non-canon blimps they had floating about Fallout Tactics, the patch is a biggie. It begins with improved performance for lower-spec systems, takes in a bunch of fixes to California’s questlines, and winds up in a pile of extra hints and tips to be shown during loading screens.
Skywind trailer beautifies some of the Elder Scrolls' oddest-ever environments
The western highlands of Vvardenfell are known as the West Gash. It’s a matter of Elder Scrolls lore, and the sooner we get over that fact, the sooner we can talk about their reimagining in Skywind. Okay? Okay.
It’s a source of administrative aggravation that we can’t yet add Skywind to our list of the 100 Best Skyrim Mods, because it isn’t finished. But the latest alpha footage shows that a familiar landscape is beginning to emerge.
Hands on with Assetto Corsa, a racing simulator made using lasers
Full disclosure: the people who make Assetto Corsa put me in a race car and let me drive around a race track at a million miles per hour, simultaneously burning both rubber and the paper-thin veneer of journalistic ethics that prohibits having any fun on press trips.
The idea was that by driving around the Autodromo di Vallelunga in real life I could fully appreciate just how accurately the developer had simulated the track in Assetto Corsa. In practice I was too busy concentrating on not flipping the car over and murdering everybody in a giant fireball to take any notes.
Largely speaking however, all of the corners appeared to be in the right places. So well done.
Rebel Galaxy is an outlaw space adventure with big ol' capital ships from ex-Torchlight devs
When Runic Games’ co-founders, Travis Baldree and Erich Schaefer left the Torchlight studio and set up Double Damage Games earlier this year, they had yet to announce their first project. However, given their past, developing Fate, Diablo and Torchlight, it wouldn’t have been bonkers to expect them to make another ARPG.
Rebel Galaxy is not an ARPG. It’s a Firefly, outlaw and ‘70s sci-fi inspired space adventure.
Crusader Kings 2 gets fatter with the Charlemagne expansion today
At some point in the not so distant future, Crusader Kings II will have grown so large that it simply becomes our primary reality. That’s great if you’ve always wanted to kill a family member and grab their title, or manipulate the nobles of Europe into declaring a religious war on the Welsh. It’s not so great if you like cars, computers and not dying at 30, though.
Today sees the grand strategy game get closer to that horrifying end point with the launch of the meaty Charlemagne expansion and the 2.2 patch.
The Flame in the Flood Kickstarter sails past its initial goal; stretch goals go up to $400k
The Flame in the Flood, the procedurally generated rafting misadventure being developed by ex-BioShock, Halo and Guitar Hero devs swam past its initial Kickstarter goal today, only a week after its inception.
Now that the $150,000 has been pledged, The Molasses Flood is now looking at stretch goals, from $175k to $400k, and the first five have already been revealed.
Dragon Age: Inquisition trailer piles on the pressure
Am I going to keep posting Dragon Age: Inquisition streams and trailers every day until it launches next month? Well, that really depends on whether or not new ones keep appearing. And wouldn’t you know - a new one did appear today.
Take a gander at the Inquisitor being all important and heroic below.
The Humble Mozilla Bundle says cheerio to OS restrictions and game managers
The latest Humble Bundle has taken the leap to becoming free from the shackles of anything but your browser. Each of the nine games in the Humble Mozilla Bundle can be downloaded and run from a browser.
No Steam, Desura, installers or Mac, Linux and PC versions - Firefox or Chrome are all that’s required.
World of Warcraft given subscriber reprieve ahead of Warlords of Draenor; up to 7.4 million players
Blizzard’s next World of Warcraft expansion is less than a month away; you can almost feel the increasing anticipation from the millions of players: 7.4 million players to be exact. Over 600,000 new subscribers are back in Azeroth, ready to take on the Iron Horde this November, according to the latest investors call.
Also the current expansion, Mists of Pandaria, is now included with the base World of Warcraft game, along with all the expansions before it.
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