Following the Electronic Arts second quarter reports, executives revealed that Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning is being delayed again. Once EA acquired Mythic in 2006, this became one of the biggest projects in development, yet the road to MMORPG success proves to be rougher than anticipated. The game was supposed to be out not even half a year from now in March 2008, but the release has been pushed back into the next EA fiscal year. Thus you can expect to start playing Warhammer Online next year, anywhere between April 1^st and September 30^th.

Warhammer was designed as a tabletop game by UK based Games Workshop more that twenty five years ago. The generous fantasy setting evolved and it was only a question of time before Warhammer entered the computer gaming world. Developer Climax came up with the idea in 2000 but the project was shut down when Microsoft ceased its financial support, after four years. That’s when independent developer Mythic Entertainment came in and took the license in 2005, but things changed yet again once EA bought Mythic one year later. News of yet another delay is troubling, especially when it comes from a newly acquired department.

Gamespot had the chance to talk to EA CEO John Riccitiello who reassured everyone that the EA Mythic studios in Virginia aren’t going to be shut down as some rumors say. In fact they will get extended. As to why Warhammer Online was delayed, he said: “Our game is going to live and die by two things. One is realm-versus-realm (RvR) gameplay. The second is overall quality. This is not 1999, 1997, or even 2001. This is 2007. We have to be able to release a game that, in terms of quality, without even going into game systems or RvR, is top-notch. We've seen too many games in this industry, and in this space, release without that, and we're not going to do that.”

It’s refreshing to see such a relevant EA figure speak about the game in comparison to current MMORPG titles. John Riccitiello stressed that he’s fully aware of the competition and the quality standards that need to be upheld in order to beat giants like World of Warcraft. I’m not the only one looking forward to yet another go at realm versus realm tactics. Dark Age of Camelot was Mythic’s first take at the concept. While it turned out well, time left its mark on the title and maybe Warhammer Online will take its strengths further.

Just released this Halloween night, Monster Mega Mayhem is a casual adventure title with a twist, the latest creation of independent developer Icevalk. I was going to tell you all about this Halloween’s productions, with a scent of horror and a taste for the thrill, since The Witcher just hit the shelves, along with Hellgate London and Clive Barker’s Jericho but I changed my mind. These were all long awaited games which will enthrall your senses for months and years to come, thus I chose Monster Mega Mayhem’s simple yet effective play. In the flash-like game, tree monsters will slash, claw and rip as you command, three characters each with a different background. It’s a small jewel of relaxed gaming and you can take it in all at once, so read right on for a sample of storyline ingenuity and catchy gameplay.

First we have Jack, a native of Moonwalker Ranch which basically prompts him as a mix between Michael Jackson and the Pumpkin King (from Tim Burton’s Nightmare Before Christmas). Jack is a friendly pumpkin monster but has a problem with trick or treaters. As he puts it, last year they carved a pumpkin he went in school with and that demands retribution. Now buddy Branden got killed by his brother Eric, so you must become a messenger of vengeance. Swinging the reaper’s blade never gets old and that’s what Jack does best, except maybe for his classic move. As a special, he takes off his pumpkin head and bows for full effect.

Lucy is the vampire type, fresh from the graveyards of Gothic City - Romania. If it’s not Gotham, then Gothic will have to do. She loves to turn into a cloud of bats and haunt its victims, for you see, the evil Half Dollar mastermind sent fans to cut down her ancient oaks. The blatant 50Cent reference made my day so you can check out the in-game billboards for a good image. That’s what Monster Mega Mayhem is all about, making fun of real life clichés as your sidekick on this level is Batgirl herself. There are two main abilities each of your characters can use, one being a form of attack while the other a type of scare. Halloween would not be complete without tricks (and treats) so the three avatars need to scare someone in order to advance each level.

Kevin is the quiet one and lets the chainsaw do most of the talking, a regular habit between Frankenstein style children born out of recycled flesh and circuitry. His “father” Viktor created him for the sole purpose of killing Uwe Hohl, the worst director of all times. It seems he’s going to mutilate Farcrow next in his movie, yet another piece of gaming goodness thrown to the dogs. The developers say that each and all connections to people alive or dead are purely coincidence, so I guess there’s no way in hell all this can be translated into Uwe Boll and Farcry. Be sure to notice the big bad bouncer at the theatre entrance. He needs to be scared, in this case, a joke in German.

With each level you must raise the score higher by scaring characters or clawing at them for moderate blood effects. You don’t have all day though, since the small bomb at the lower middle of the screen acts like a timer. The fuse eventually runs out as your avatar moves frantically faster. Maybe you can get that last kill and complete the level in time. Monster Mega Mayhem has the casual addictive feel of time wasters and does it with a taste for comedy. I came to appreciate the real life tie-ins for a good laugh and eventually this crazed story pushed me further in completing the levels. You too can give it a shot by trying the demo.

Discovering Nature is not one of the hardcore gaming enterprises which we’re usually reviewing. It won’t charge an arm and a leg for you to play and doesn’t even require you spending long vicious hours on a daily basis to provide a sense of achievement. In fact Discovering Nature is the kind of game you pass on to your kids when they are young, in the hope that they’ll learn something when the day is done. Maybe the girlfriend or wife will enjoy it, and rest assured, when you have a break at the office you’ll enjoy its catchy casual scent just the same, dear reader.

Discovering Nature has been released by the independent Croatian game developer Ocean Media on October 24th, 2007. Since we’re talking about discovering nature, expect the game to have a strong educational value coming from the myriads of creatures and plants from all over the world. As the story goes, blonde Professor Jane Pinckleport needs to follow the leads and get samples needed to cure a deadly virus. Players are going to be of assistance by helping her in specific locations all over the world. Jane meets about 60 animal species to save from mortal danger by pairing and moving them to the lab. As you might have guessed by now, Discovering Nature is a puzzle game where wits gain you more points and a quick solution to reach the next level.

Each encounter faces you with the challenge of pairing up a certain number of creatures belonging to three different types. The simple drag and drop process allows you link them together according to the current level rules. This is to say, it’s ok to group three little squirrels together and take them out of harm’s way if we’re on a matching trip. But if we’re in the predator game, your advancement relies on triplets like snake – guinea pig – grass, like a food chain condition. All in all you can link as many creatures as the setup allows you to, start the chain wherever you like, and end it as shown in the screenshots.

There are even great bonuses if you manage to link every creature belonging to the current selection in the entire level. The intriguing part is that huge chains will grant you more points but won’t get you closer to the final goal. The yellow box is your trap and it can only be activated when two creatures of the same type share its bonds. Thus the Tetris-like movement of your puzzle pieces needs to clear the way for such pairing.

What starts off as a relatively easy task turns into a real challenge later on. Animals begin to get stuck in spider webs which need to be cleared by collecting and using water buckets, only to see trappers showing up and stealing your prize. It’s a real jungle out there and only the smartest assistants can survive. Should you get stuck in one of your attempts, you can reverse the latest move or even roll the dice once more at a hefty score penalty. You start off in the Amazon and quickly make your way into similar natural habitats. Professor Jane’s friends eventually show up and guide your progress as the virus gets treated in the end.

Discovering Nature is addictive and a great time killer should you need a pause from normal and slightly boring activities. Your kids can delve into a pleasant, mind stimulating, activity and learn a thing or two about ecosystems at the same time, food chains and native animals from all over the planet. There’s a demo available for you to try out and who knows, maybe you’ll even make someone happy with this present. A little bit of casual gaming never hurt anyone.

Microsoft faced the extremely high and unacceptable failure rate of the Xbox 360 systems earlier in July that brought a $1.05 billion loss that covered the repairs for customers experiencing the “Red Ring of Death” error on their systems for three full years.

 Even the retail partners have started to find this failure rate as quite hard to deal with, and that is also the case of GameStop, where the employees received an e-mail: "effective immediately, GameStop will no longer offer PRPs (product replacement plans) on new, refurbished, and used Xbox 360 systems". They were losing themselves too much money already because of the faulty returned consoles.

I had some suspicions from the start that this console wouldn’t perform as expected, even if it does have a video graphics chip made by ATI. There are other products on the market with very similar defects – mainly caused by bad manufacturing procedures, untweaked or improperly mounted wired connections, cheap components and sensitive plastic parts.

Further down the rabbit hole we went, to find our fame and fortune in the temple so black, where fel orcs and demons keep us dire company. The Temple of Karabor was once a marvel to behold, a dream of pure light where the Draenei found shelter and ancestral guidance. It was our duty to help in their release, but fate now sets us on bone littered path. We went through the sewers and defeated Naj’Entus, then into the courtyard where Supremus guards the entrance and helped Akama fight his Shade. Outland shall be restored and Burning Legion cast out of The Black Temple, along with Illidan himself. There is hope, but also a price to pay. With this thought in mind we make our way deeper into the Temple, to Teron Gorefiend’s outer cloister and deep beyond light and hope, to the Reliquary of Souls and Gurtogg Bloodboil.

Doing the Ashtongue a favor …

<-250x250 Square - left->Straight ahead from the Sanctuary of Shadows, in the back of the room and to the left lie the stairs which lead to him. Know that Teron Gorefiend is the first of the real challenges of the Black Temple and when your guild reaches him you’ll discover the meaning of pain. Trash packs leading to his terrace are particularly hard due to the mixed AoE setups, with fel orcs dealing both magic and melee damage. Pulls require two to three mages sheeping and three melee offtanks. I can say from experience that paladin tanks are great since they can hold agro from three targets without ending up in a bloody mess. Felorc casters use bloodbolt, an area of effect ability which deals about 4k damage to each target in a cone and also heals him for the same amount. Curse of tongues or slow on should be on at all times when fighting them as they’re usually sheeped by mages and killed last. Trash pack positioning was never exceptional so watch out for double pulls, especially when going up the stairs. Marking can get tricky here. However, you can handle a regular pack and a patrol at the same time should you be unfortunate enough to pull agro. Once you dispatched the warmaster and his many minions, you need to go up the second staircase, into an open terrace adorned with tall statues in semblance of Felorc warriors.

There are some low hit point orcs which can seemingly be soloed (they have about 20k life) and I’ve seen videos about this part, where a healer and a damage dealer managed to sneak up here and slay them all for incredibly powerful and free random loot. It seems the recent Mount Hyjal itemization on the undead waves was a response to this clever use of game mechanics, thus the Black Temple random drop rates as a whole have been reduced. You can still take a look at how people used to do it before the nerf here.

Teron Gorefiend

Past the two statues like the secluded hall of Teron Gorefiend, an old “friend” you might recall from a while back, when you were questing in Netherstorm. There was a long quest chain that led up to you completing a time old armor initially tailored for the great warlock Gorefiend himself. You let your body be possessed by this armor and defeated its Eredar guardian in its stead, only to find out that a great evil has been let loose into the world once more. It was you who freed Teron Gorefiend from its captivity in Netherstorm and as a matter of honor you must now put his soul to rest for good.

Teron Gorefiend is literally deadly. As the fight starts, he needs to be tanked between the pillars, relatively close to the door. From now on, every thirty seconds he will cast Shadow of Death, debuff which lasts 55 seconds and will kill you once the duration has ended. If you can’t serve the raid in life, then maybe you’ll be useful in death. Once the debuff has 25 seconds left, you need to move to Gorefiend’s starting position, between the braziers, and patiently wait your demise. Upon death, four shadowy constructs will spawn at your location and head towards the raid. Do you see the flying ghosts above the room? Now you just became one of them and must immediately proceed to eliminating constructs as only ghosts like you can hurt them. In order to do so it’s mandatory to bind keys to the three paramount ghost abilities. One will damage all constructs in sight, the second chains them to the ground for a couple of seconds while the third should be spammed each second because it deals moderate damage to one construct and also slows his movement speed. This fight it’s not about dispelling, healing or tanking – it’s about managing your constructs correctly, before they get into the raid and kill everyone. So be sure to bind CTRL+5, 4, 3 to comfortable positions or even get macros for casting Spirit Volley, Spirit Chains, and Spirit Lance accordingly. Use the first two when not on cooldown and using Spirit Lance while continually switching construct targets.

The winged, cowled figure is one of the darkest in the game. He still hits like a truck and his spells hit random targets which need to be healed and dispelled, but it’s nothing that can’t be held under control. Chances of success rise when healers die to Shadow of death first, because DPS is needed. Locks must devise a soulstone rotation of on targeted players, so that the first two can come back to life after ghost duty. Shamans can get up on their own, which pretty much leaves Divine Intervention the only wipe recovery tool. Running back to Gorefiend’s room after a wipe never gets old but as long as constructs are under control, Teron’s wicked soul will soon be put to rest.

Gurtogg Bloodboil

Descending back into the temple main room it’s time to take a sharp right, into the Halls of Anguish where Felorcs are trained in to grow more powerful and ruthless, ready to pierce the enemy wherever the fight may lead them. The great hall hosts many skirmishing packs and you are presented with a choice in confrontation. Darkness takes many shapes should you go right and pass the ghost fields, into the Reliquary of Souls chamber. Unlike its spiritual counterpart, on the other side of the compound resides Gurtogg Bloodboil, a being anything but ethereal. First you will have to get past the huge Bonechewer Behemoths, which rain fire from the sky. While they don’t hit hard in melee, meteor after meteor will run your healers dry and the raid hurt.

Our path leads to Gurtogg Bloodboil’s lair to fight the greatest Felorc gladiator to ever walk the face of Outland. Just like every encounter henceforth, we were faced with a harsh reality check when we couldn’t keep Gurtogg’s fury in check. He just slashes away at cloth users like a knife through butter so group setup is of paramount importance. Get 10 healers, less mages and warlocks, with more melee DPS than usual since they are the prime damage dealers. It can be done with a two-tank rotation but three are advisable since Gurtogg leaves a debuff which lowers armor and does damage over time. Tanks must switch agro control from one to another on 10-13 debuffs and no-one is allowed to past their threat because Gurtogg also disorients tanks on occasion. The boss must be tanked at the right wall position while ranged DPS and healers stay further away, near the opposite wall. Bloodboil is his main damaging ability in phase one, a damage-over-time attack which hits the furthest five raid members. It gets cast every 10 seconds thus three healer and ranged DPS groups must take turns at taking Bloodboil. It can stack up, resetting the timer, deals 15k damage and must be healed through. So if you’re in a sponge group, every twenty seconds you’ll run away from the tanking position, roughly to the opposite wall and take the next Bloodboil, then come back and resume your role.

Every minute Gurtogg goes into a rage and throws a buff on a random party member. During phase two, fel rage grants you armor, hit points and a sizeable damage buff, because Gurtogg will only attack you. Everyone else in the raid becomes insignificant and will generate no threat so and they can DPS at their hearts content. The problem lies with Gurtogg getting fel rage himself, dealing incredible damage to his new found obsession. This is the phase where wipes occur, especially if a cloth user gets targeted. With a bit of practice your healers will be able to heal through the rage and phase one starts again. We usually undergo three fel rages until the boss is down but mana is hardly an issue and when the acid clouds lift from your gaze, Gurtogg Bloodboil will be laying in ruins, crushed.

The Reliquary of Souls

One being of immense power still calls the Halls of Anguish its home. They call it the Reliquary of Souls, the collective spark of every lost essence that found its end in the Black Temple. From the entrance and to the right lies a medium chamber patrolled by ghosts, some visible and some invisible. Every member of the raid must follow the tank and move as one because the main tank will “schedule” three stops, picking up three subsequent ghost packs which must be killed by AoE fast. There is little room for error, because the area has a very fast respawn timer of about 15 seconds, so if you’re slow, additional packs will agro, making your progress impossible. Once the third stop has been performed and the ghosts are dead, make haste down the stairs. It’s a common occurrence that casters don’t have time to drink at this point, but don’t worry, phase one is not mana intensive and everybody gets refreshed before entering phase two.

A huge monolithic box resembling a cube starts pulsating as you approach. It is in fact a prison and the first face of darkness you’re going to see is the Essence of Suffering. During this phase, all healing and regenerating effects (including mana) cease to work and basically you will body tank every little bit of damage thrown your way, with the notable exception of priest power word shield and mage shields. This boss fixates a target pretty much like Thaladred does in the Kael’Thas encounter and will swing a couple of times in melee before switching to its next target. As a rule of thumb, the Essence of Suffering always attacks the closest target in melee, thus hunters are the best choice in taking the first hits because they need to distance themselves afterwards in order to deal damage. The first hunter gets in melee range, fixated, then he needs to move one step further away but still within melee range. That’s when a second raid member moves in even closer to the boss and gets the next fixate. Once hunters have done this one time each, the bulk of the raid moves in and gets damaged. It’s important to remember that you can’t remain in the same place when fixated, but you can’t move away more than one step away either. The point is to keep the Essence still, while everyone soaks some damage. Once you get hit and lose more than half your hit points, it’s wise to move away for the rest of the fight and keep doing damage. The essence of Suffering also casts damage over time curses at random group members so dispellers must keep alert. Rogues and dedicated tanks should never get fixated because their massive damage avoidance capabilities need to be used on enrages. The Essence of Suffering enrages for ten seconds roughly every 45 seconds and attacks a single target for sustained damage. Rogues with evasion can do the trick, or tanks with high dodge and parry chance. If everything goes well and no-one dies, after the third enrage the suffering end and the essence runs back into the cage.

Harmless ghosts rush the raid and regenerate 2000 hit points and mana upon death, so everyone will get topped off by the time the Essence of Desire emerged from its prison. Imagine healers having twice the normal healing power and your offensive abilities doing twice the damage. It’s beautiful, but with a twist. Every raid member takes half the amount of damage they’re dealing. To make things worse, your mana cap will constantly lower to the point where in 90 seconds you have zero mana out of zero maximum mana. Needless to say it is a DPS race but you still have to keep the fight under control. The Spirit Shock casts need to be interrupted by a three squad rotation (consisting in a rogue kicking and another class as a backup); otherwise their casting speed increases and the tank gets disoriented. On the other hand, the deaden ability should never be kicked, but spell reflected back to the Essence of Desire by the warrior main tank. Thus damage is again doubled against the ethereal presence. There was a joke among mages, about an instant empowered pyroblast critical strike on the deadened essence, which basically one-shots the said mage due to partial damage reflection. Do not try this at home because it is possible and likely to happen. Mages can still have fun by spell stealing a rune shield the essence occasionally casts, for 10 seconds of damage immunity and 100% greater casting speed. Otherwise, the shield needs to be dispelled, or devoured by the felhunter warlock pet since spirit shock interrupts aren’t possible as long as rune shield holds. It’s gamble really, and your luck has better hold if you want to get past to the third face of despair.

Yet again, everyone gets refreshed to maximum hit points and mana before engaging the final and deadliest of them all: the Essence of Suffering. Where do I begin? This time you will not run out of mana in 90 seconds – you’ll flat out die in 60 unless the essence is destroyed, due to it’s aura of suffering. It starts off by dealing moderate damage, somewhere around 130, but then continually doubles until its next tick one-shots you. Everything goes in this phase, every little dirty trick, the most mana consuming spells, all potions and cooldowns are blown right off from the start. Soulstones should be placed on rogues because once they die, they can revive and even evasion tank the essence for a while. Damage ticks will just start from 130 again so a rogue can live without healing for 10 seconds more easily. Since there is no way to recover from a wipe here (due to the ghost halls) shamans will just self resurrect in this fight and keep the battle going. I found out the Reliquary of Souls to be a most brutal skill check for everyone in the raid, as well as a massive gear check. Although luck is a big factor, incompetent players will get stuck here for ages. This is hands on the most challenging fight in the game, in line with Illidan and Kael’Thas. 60 seconds and you know if fate chose you victor. There is always silence after the kill, with half the raid dying at the same time, but casualties can bask in the glory of a job well done once the Reliquary of Souls crumbles and its spirits get released.

The way to Illidan’s upper sanctum is now cleared as the gate opens downstairs. The last demise brought us one step closer to final victory and we can but wonder what the future has in store for us. Tomorrow is another day, and this time we are prepared.