I'm excited to announce I've been co-writing an MMO called City of Eternals, from a new company called ohai, founded by my friend Susan Wu. (Here's a good profile of the game and company on TechCrunch.) It's the first full-fledged MMO set in a world of modern vampires, and I'm having an insane amount of fun helping develop it. That also means I get to exclusively invite a select number of New World Notes readers to check it out early (we're still in private alpha.)
To request an invite to City of Eternals, go here, and enter your e-mail address.
And no, this doesn't mean New World Notes will suddenly turn into a blog about vampire games; I'm just splitting my time between writing for City of Eternals and writing about Second Life here. They're very different online world experiences, and I'm passionate about both of them.
So, tell us what you can about how it is like SL and how it is different. :)
Posted by: Nalates Urriah | Wednesday, December 09, 2009 at 01:10 PM
Small Web. I re-tweeted one of her comments on virtual currency shenanigans today. I'm not even sure who on my followed list is following her. I don't know if I have the spare cycles, but If I do I will check this out.
Posted by: Nexus Burbclave | Wednesday, December 09, 2009 at 02:59 PM
I think this idea for a virtual world sucks!
(sorry I could not resist)
Posted by: Albert Haskell | Wednesday, December 09, 2009 at 08:04 PM
Another vampire game? Has no one got any fresh ideas?
Lets hope this one doesn't make the players annoy non-players like certain other vamp games do, but the only way I'm going to get involved is if they include a slayer class.
Wooden stake anyone?
Posted by: Talwyn Mills | Thursday, December 10, 2009 at 04:06 AM
congrats Hamlet - have fun!
Posted by: Valentina Kendal | Thursday, December 10, 2009 at 08:01 AM
Congratulations on the gig, Hamlet. I'm afraid I'm not your target audience. To me, vampires are ticks in human form -- repulsive parasitic vermin to be exterminated. If you want romantic alien immortals, that's the Fair Folk.
Posted by: Jack Abraham | Thursday, December 10, 2009 at 08:25 AM
I'm gathering this is off the SL platform completely in a separate MMO rather than another in-world vamp sim or Bloodlines-style game hud. Like City of Heroes with fangs, or am I off-base?
@ Talwyn, my favorite Facebook flair is a button that says "And then Buffy staked Edward. The end."
*grins evilly*
Got that after I got over-spammed w/ invites into some sort of Facebook vamp MMO that a lot of my friends have gotten sucked into.
I may check that out, though, Hamlet. I'm still waiting for Guild Wars 2 to come out, so I'm up for a diversion in the meantime for those days when I don't wanna socialize as much as I wanna go in and blow off steam w/ simulated destructive behavior, LOL.
Posted by: Arcadian Vanalten | Thursday, December 10, 2009 at 08:31 AM
Thanks all! It's very different from previous Facebook vampire games, btw, it's a true MMORPG for one thing.
Posted by: Hamlet Au | Thursday, December 10, 2009 at 09:35 AM
The platform looks solid, and I'd jump on the opportunity, save for one small issue -- I despise vampires almost as much as they despise themselves. But I hope that this effort floods ohai with resources and they follow up with some offerings that don't make me want to carry a portable sunlamp as an icebreaker.
Posted by: Arcadia Codesmith | Thursday, December 10, 2009 at 10:03 AM
Hamlet, if it's possible for you to say ...was there any consideration of basing the game in SL? (I understand from the link that you gave that it's an internet browser-based game). And if it is possible for you to say, could you tell us why the decision was made to develop as internet browser-based rather than SL-based (given you involvement in and knowledge of the SL platform).
And congrats on the game and your work for it - I'm sure you helped create some great content there.
Posted by: Vooper Werribee | Thursday, December 10, 2009 at 10:24 AM
@Hamlet Ah I see, not something that runs in SL, fair enough. Unfortunatly I couldn't see the techcrunch article when I originally posted, works firewall must block the site.
Posted by: Talwyn Mills | Friday, December 11, 2009 at 07:11 AM
Hmm. You use your Facebook account, ergo, your RL identity to play it? That's a turnoff to me. I like to have better boundaries between my RL and online socializing. There are some really great friends I've met and chosen to pull into my RL networks, but there are also some real weirdos that leave me very, very grateful that they don't know for sure where I live (or at least, would have to put forth a LOT of extra effort to track it down).
Posted by: Arcadian Vanalten | Friday, December 11, 2009 at 07:37 AM
I randomly got invited to the City of Eternals a few days ago... It's actually pretty fun, I mean, for a vampire game that used to suck really REALLY bad... I just wish that the currency wasn't "Ohai" because you gotta buy that with real money... I mean, why can't it be the Rubies? =/
Eh. I wanna know how I got invited though. xD
Posted by: xhearingxcolorsx | Wednesday, December 23, 2009 at 07:28 PM