Vanguard E3 Coverage

[Laerazi]

--- Media ---

- 39 Screenshots

Various shots of Vanguard's character differentiation, armor sets, housing, outdoor environments, skies, etc.

- Safehouse E3 Photo Gallery

Pictures of Jeff Butler showing off Vanguard, including a shot of rudimentary design for the game's box art.

- Warcry Network's E3 Shots

Five pages of pictures taken of the Vanguard booth and some ingame shots.

- Vanguard Box Art

Explained by Brad McQuaid :

Before Keith passed away, but when it was obvious he wasn't going to be able to paint the cover, he let us know that he wanted Donato http://www.donatoart.com/ to do the art for the box.

What Donato did was and is amazing. He painted a large piece, of which the left section is used for the front of the box (just like Keith did with EQ). But what he did was paint the left side more in Keith's style, in homage to Keith, and then the painting blends nicely to his style as you move to the right.

Normally an artist won't do this -- if you ask them to paint in another person's style, they're not to interested. But this was a special case, something in homage to Keith, and Donato pulled it of even better than my wildest dreams.

Also, if you look at the front cover and see a character you don't recognize there... that's Keith, immortalized on the front of Vanguard's box.

- Silky Venom Customization/Mounts Video

Features a close look at the variety of mounts capable in Vanguard, as well as another look at character customization.

- Silky Venom Housing Video

Features an in-depth look at player housing in Vanguard, including item placement, housing purpose, purchaseable lots, and guard towers

- Online Welten Combat Video

40 second clip showing off a fight inside of a dungeon; shows item inspection. (May need to open in IE to save/view)

- E3 2006 Trailer

(1:05) Brief trailer showing a random assortment of in-combat clips and various locations from Telon. Note : Requires registration at Gamespot.com to download the trailer; can be viewed without registration.

- NVNews Ingame Footage

Three separate videos showing ingame footage of combat, character customization, and showing off dungeons. Includes an extensive playthrough of the customization features in Vanguard's current beta build, and shows off pieces of the UI. Probably the most exposure of the game seen yet.

- 2old2play Interview/Gaming Session

Very lengthy interview with game developer, showing off the game's interface and a group fighting. Includes a long Q&A session.

- 2old2play Flying Mount Clip

A clip featuring a flying mount being taken around the gameworld.

- E3 Live Interview with Jeff Butler

Scroll to Thursday - 3PM, the Vanguard clip is almost at the very end, and lasts ~ 2 minutes. Visuals include crafting interface, ingame map, character running to docks, "summoning" a Thestrian Galleon, and riding it out to sea. Jeff gives a brief overview of the newer aspects of MMOs that Vanguard will include.

- Youtube Video featuring Sailing

A brief clip of ingame footage showing a boat sailing around in open waters.

--- E3 Impressions ---

- MMORPG.com's Unbiased Impressions

An overview of the Vanguard presentation at E3; detailing some positive and negative impressions of the current state of the game.

- Warcry Network Impressions

A very lengthy and informative writeup regarding all aspects of Vanguard's newer features including mounts (land/air/underwater), player housing (plots/access/guardtowers/shops/taverns/towns), customization, ships, dynamic weather, etc. A few very interesting pieces of information :

"Not only will there be ground based mounts, but Sigil is looking at aquatic mounts such as dolphins and sharks, and they currently have flying mounts for higher level characters."

"While exploring one of the dungeons in the game, a Necromancer’s pet was stumbled across—a freakish looking abomination that changes based on body parts that the Necromancer pieces together from the corpses of other creatures, causing it to change forms. Different body parts unlock vastly different abilities for the creature to use as the Necromancer builds it up over time, switching out parts for new ones."

- IGN Writeup

Details Vanguard's player housing/furniture, mounts (both land and flying), armor, weather system, room for expansion, and customization. Here's an interesting quote :

"If this sounds like a daunting enterprise, what till you hear this: Sigil has documented every addition to the game they want to make… for the next seven years. Every race, every town, every building, every item, and every beast of the world. In fact, Butler tells us that it very likely won't all fit into "Vanguard One." He went down a long, long list of continents and locations that might never make it in to the first installment. Land masses twice the size of the biggest one we'll see at launch. Entire continents populated by an unusual choice of denizen. One wonders how someone could possibly see it all within the proscribed level cap. Then Butler tells us that's the games mechanics are designed to scale to a theoretically unlimited character level."

- 1UP Blog Impressions by Jeff Green

"Vanguard: Dang! Honestly, I haven't known what to think about this game over the last two years, mostly because we never saw more than pretty, empty environments. But now that the game has become a game, I admit I was pleasantly surprise. Brad McQuaid and Jeff Butler, the original EverQuest designers, have a LOT on their plate here as they attempt to reassert their place in the post-WoW world, and, I gotta say, they have some very good ideas here (such as flying mounted combat!) They also made the first-ever, for me, good case as to why owning a house in an MMO might be something worth having. I'll write more later, but here's another thumbs up for a couple of the hardest-working and nicest guys in the biz, who have an incredible challenge on their hands but, with four years and counting of development, seem to be making real progress here."

(Also includes impressions of The Burning Crusade)

- Impressions from Gamespot

Reports that the game is said to still be "in an early Beta state". Covers the stage of development of the game and what the developers are currently focusing on, including "reevaluating the content on the game's first two continents to make sure there's a good amount of content balanced against Vanguard's vast overland areas", details of player housing, and descriptions of dungeons similar in appearance to Crushbone and Mistmoore/Unrest.

- Negative Impressions from Actiontrip.com

"Anyway, as some of you may know, Vanguard (check out the screenshots here), the upcoming MMORPG from Sigil Games (founded by one of the original creators of EverQuest), recently received a new publisher. So instead of paying them a visit tomorrow as part of my MS appointment, I caught a glimpse of the game during day one, at SOE's booth.

Now let me tell you, it's almost unbearably obvious why MS got rid of this one. Merely looking at the game was a disappointment right off the bat. One of the folks from the development team was trying half-heartedly to explain the game's features, controlling an avatar in a five-man party and clearing some monsters in a keep. All I could do was stare at, what appeared to be, an unattractive and unappealing fantasy MMO world. The character animation seemed stiff and the models were very poor when playing from third person perspective. Most of the areas were practically swimming in gray tones, and well, it's kind of hard to explain. In my humble opinion, the game just doesn't look appealing in the least bit.

Gameplay wise, Vanguard seemed standard in every possible sense. The developer explained to me that there are no instanced dungeons in the game world and that's about it from what I could understand. The interface seemed highly reminiscent of any other MMOG… and that's it. The content itself didn't seem fun to play."

- Gamespot Information regarding EMotion FX

A short article revealing Vanguard's use of EMotion FX technology, and how it allows all humanoids to share animations.

- Ten Ton Hammer Writeup

Impressions of seeing Vanguard in-person, played by an Associate Game Designer. Discusses the game being played in a Mistmoore/Unrest type area, experiences in combat, and AI. Ten Ton Hammer is a Vanguard Affiliate Fansite.

- Ten Ton Hammer Writeup #2

This impression goes into more discussion regarding customization, mounts, player housing, weather, and sailing. An interesting quote :

"For those of you that don't want houses, there is also the option to build guard towers. These towers will actually spawn NPC guards."

.

[Tuco]

Update this thread with some gameplay videos when someone finds it. Thanks.

[redav]

next 30 pages?

JACK
In a World, where Brown was King..
FANBOY
Uh, no Brown, Jack..
JACK
What do you mean, "No Brown'"..
FANBOY
It's not that kind of game..
JACK
Oh? Okay. In a Brown that—
FANBOY
No 'In a Brown' either.
JACK
In a Time—
FANBOY
Nah, I don't think so.
JACK
In a Brown Before Time—
FANBOY
It's about immersion, Jack.
JACK
One Brown—
FANBOY
No..
JACK
When your Brown is no longer your Own—
FANBOY
Wha—What does that mean—
JACK
When every Brown you Know is Wrong—
FANBOY
That's wrong—
JACK
In an Outpost—
FANBOY
No—
JACK
On the Edge of Brown—
FANBOY
There's no Brown—
JACK
A Brown Girl—
FANBOY
No.—
JACK
Two Brown Girrrls—
FANBOY
No.
JACK
Now—
FANBOY
—no—
JACK
—More than Ever—
FANBOY
Stop it—
JACK
A Renegade Brown—
FANBOY
—I hate you—
JACK
A Robot Renegade Brown—
FANBOY
You're TROLLING!
JACK
You're TROLLING!
FANBOY
No, you're actually Trolling.
JACK
I'm Trolling?
FANBOY
Get out of this discusion, Jack.
JACK
No. I Like it in here.

[Skars]

I really really like how the armor looks.

Also I didn't see much brown which I was quite thankful for.

[Designz]

Except it's 3fps?!?

[Skars]

Originally Posted by Designz

Except it's 3fps?!?

Alas, I am unable to discern this from screenshots!

[holymight]

The player models look really good. Their faces has improved a lot since last E3. The armor is also nicely varried.

[Designz]

I think many of the models and screenshots (released by Sigil) have looked good for a while now. We really need some gameplay videos to dispel the NDA breaker hate.

[Xhar]

Originally Posted by Designz

I think many of the models and screenshots (released by Sigil) have looked good for a while now. We really need some gameplay videos to dispel the NDA breaker hate.

What exactly is it that you want to see in videos released? Gameplay, or graphics/frame rate? Just curious.

[Soygen]

The second row of pictures is the entire beta testing crew.

Thank you, thank you! Just remember that the daytime show is completely different from my night performance.

Bad jokes aside, some of those screens look pretty nice, but I too am interested in the framerates they are running at.

[Blargius_FR]

Those nautical shots look pretty.

[holymight]

Does this mean boats are in the game and working already?

[Skars]

Originally Posted by Soygen

The second row of pictures is the entire beta testing crew.

.

Rofl, that's cold man. Funny but cold

[Xhar]

Originally Posted by holymight

Does this mean boats are in the game and working already?

I'm pretty sure they are to some extent.

[dub]

Good looks at the races and armor: