Approved Tech Alcoholic Massacre

[Janick Beauchamp]

The logo of the vanilla game

OUT OF CHARACTER INFORMATION

• Intent: To submit a MMORPG in the Chaos context.
• Image Source: Beer Labelizer
• Canon Link: N/A
• Permissions: N/A
• Primary Source: Hologame

PRODUCTION INFORMATION

• Manufacturer: HoldoWare
• Affiliation: Open Market
• Model: Alcoholic Massacre
• Modularity: Yes
• Production: Mass-produced
• Material: Code, digits, downloaded from the HoloNet or installed from a card-chip.

SPECIAL FEATURES

• Single-player storylines and questing in several areas
• Player housing
• Guilds
• Crafting (not only of gear, but also of mounts, decorations for player housing and other decorative items)
• PvP arenas and warzones
• Group PvE content with multiple difficulty levels (dungeons, raids, trials)
• Loans, banking, mutual funds and bankruptcy
• Players can play all three traditional roles of the genre with the same character and using the same set of gear

STRENGTHS

• Has a wide array of content for a variety of playstyles.
• Can be accessed from a wide variety of computer devices so long as the device has a HoloNet connection

WEAKNESSES

• If access to the HoloNet is cut on a device with the game client installed, the game cannot be accessed from the device

DESCRIPTION
Alcoholic Massacre is the latest entry of HoldoWare into the hologame market, made by purchasing a flagging hologame developer based on Farboon, with the game being available on cloud-based servers. The game was designed so that every character could play any class regardless of race, and racial characteristics are purely cosmetic. The game setting is a psychedelic mashup of pre-hyperspace societies, with technological levels encountered in the game's world ranging from pre-gunpowder to primitive space age. So it's not uncommon to go from one region that only features weapons such as swords, bows and arrows to another region that produces virtually all of the world's photovoltaic panels and yet another region that relies on steam-powered transportation.

What makes Alcoholic Massacre different from other games in the genre is that all classes have at least one spec in each of the three main categories (tank, DPS, healer) allowing a player to use the same character to play every role thanks to the use of passive, spec-specific abilities that convert part of the stats of a character's gear into other stats as relevant for a different role, mostly converting DPS/healing stats into tanking stats and vice-versa. Some classes rely on heavy armor to take hits, while others are more agility-intensive, where their ability to dodge hits instead make them shine. There are therefore nine classes a player can play, each with four or five specs (one tank spec, one healer spec, and 2-3 DPS specs, depending on the class):

• Melee classes:
  • Knight (tank: defender, healer: hospitalier, DPS: templar, paladin)
  • Warrior (tank: barbarian, healer: marauder, DPS: myrmidon, bandit)
  • Rogue (tank: vandal, healer: thief, DPS: assassin, ninja)
• Mixed class:
  • Entertainer (tank: dancer, healer: jester, DPS: acrobat, juggler)
• Ranged classes:
  • Ranger (tank: bard, healer: hunter, DPS: archer, crossbowman)
  • Machinist (tank: grenadier, healer: skirmisher, DPS: musketeer, cannoneer, voltigeur)
  • Wizard (tank: earth wizard, healer: life wizard, DPS: fire wizard, thunder wizard, alcohol wizard)
  • Priest (tank: bishop, healer: cleric, DPS: vicar, deacon)
  • Scholar (tank: mentalist, healer: alchemist, DPS: arcanist, summoner)

These nine classes are given a few utility tools and abilities of all three roles that are spec-independent so that they are all viable in solo content, which has lessened the dependence on what MMORPG enthusiasts call the "trinity" especially at lower difficulty levels of group content, but has sometimes led to accusations that non-DPS specs are glorified DPS by some purists. The characters proper get twelve gear slots (two-handed weapons take up two gear slots), while mounts get four gear slots. Companions are obtained by the player for the purposes of crafting and gathering materials, and, in single-player gameplay, can perform one of the three roles.

As for group PvE content, the content is subdivided in several categories that differ in length and in team size, with all players obtaining at least one piece of gear from every boss, and cutscenes varying depending on the difficulty mode as well as whether some conditions are met, such as beating the bonus boss, or beating bosses in other content (even though the people that actually watch them are usually new or returning players):

• Dungeons: available in either story mode, which is solo and does not yield the same level of gear as higher difficulty levels, or as five-person content, and typically features three regular bosses and one bonus. The higher difficulty levels are called hard mode and nightmare modes, with hard mode generally being clearable without a dedicated tank, and the queue can, in hard mode, either give a party of 1 tank, 3 DPS and 1 healer or 4 DPS and a healer. Nightmare mode requires the trinity, and is further subdivided into "N-0" (or "nightmare-zero") and N+ (or "nightmare-plus"), with each affix yielding more powerful gear than the last one but has a higher difficulty level
• Raids: these are larger-group content, with all difficulty modes being available with flexible-size parties, and the minimum size being 10, and the maximum size being 30. Two tanks are required in all three difficulty modes (story, hard and nightmare, in ascending order) regardless of party size, and the optimal raid composition has one healer for every five players, rounded down.
• Trials: Single-boss content available in five-man or raid formats and in two difficulty modes (story and hard).

Players advance through the story, which includes a class-specific storyline, area storylines and sidequests, some of which unlock additional features (such as outfit design, haircuts, player housing, banking, borrowing, mutual fund investing, and so on, so forth) while others are repeatable on a daily or weekly basis (higher-difficulty repeatable quests tend to be repeatable on a weekly basis). As players go up in level, they gain access to additional group content. Players are currently capped at 80, with additional content being available via HoloNet patches as they are released.

 

[Alkor Centaris]

Approved