Warhammer Online at Ten Ton Hammer - Taking MMOG Gamers to the Next Level!

8:50PM
I step around the bodies and head towards the Hickman’s office. There is a faint smell of liquor.

[Click]

JH: … Why don’t you have us buy you something? [prods the tape recorder]  So here I am talking to … is it on? Here I am talking to Justin on a 1800-year old …

JW: So, I’m not actually going to use the audio … I’m going to transcribe it. You don’t need to talk right into it.

JH: Justin [while beating the tape recorder]… this sucks.

JW: It’s Paul’s.

JH: Paul, you are cheap. So, I’m sitting here drinking bourbon. And ….So, I have to talk to you don’t I? Just pretend that bit didn’t happen. Does it pick me up?

JW: Who knows?

JH: This will be interesting.

JW: It will.

JH: So, What did we do tonight? So we got in on Deathsword and it is the version we are going to go live with. And it’s an odd feeling. I don’t know if other people have it, because I don’t know if they realize, truly, that what we were playing tonight is the game when we go live. There really will be no more changes. There’s nothing left for us to do. We’ve got four days, and we’re gonna go live. Everybody thinks it’s the 18th. We announced today that it’s actually the 14th. When we talk about our head start, it’s actually our live date. So we’re going to let all of our Collector’s Edition players in on the 14th, which means 60,000 people are going to come in and play. So the version we’re seeing is THE version. … Version one-point-oh. Which is cool as hell by the way.

JW: What were you playing tonight?

JH: So I was playing a … I was playing a Witch Hunter. I ALWAYS play a Witch Hunter, … because they are awesome.

JW: I was playing a Bright Wizard. I was burninating the villagers.

JH: [nods in approval] I got in. Played through the first quests, Got into the scenarios … Played two scenarios. And just reveled in the final-touch beauty of the game. And it’s the little stuff that again nobody really notices but me: The spacing of the PQ tracker that we fixed; the new loot window; some of the stuff on the new PQ tracker that we’ve just polished up.

JW: So, in the last couple of days, have you seen anything that was something you hadn’t seen for a while that had been updated? That made you go “Ooooh! I’ve forgotten how cool that was” or “that looks a million times better”?

JH: Hmm

JW: Or anything where you walked around and found something and said “Yeees! that’s effing cool” or any little funny things you haven’t noticed before.

JH: That’s tough for me. I really do look at the game all the time. So, I hadn’t seen the Dwarf starter area in probably a month. I just hadn’t been in it. When you start playing one area all the time, you forget how characterful it is, and when you go to another area, it’s different. It doesn’t just look different. The way it plays; the way it sounds; everything in that area is completely different from the game you’ve been playing for the last month. And it really underlines to me, just how re-playable the game is. Like, play the game through as an Empire person. Go back and start over as a dwarf. It will be completely different.

JW:  I noticed something tonight that I hadn’t noticed before.

JH: Did you notice the eyepatch?

JW: Hmmm, Angie’s character was wearing an eyepatch.

JH: Eyepatch went in like four days ago.

JW: I haven’t played E1 (Empire Chapter 1) for a long time. So I went into the hub and some of the NPC placement was modified, and there were a couple of extra green overhead quest-giver icons. So I clicked on one, and it was a Tome quest and I hadn’t done a Tome quest before, and that was really cool.

JH: They are cool. Everything has just super-come-together. The new skinning of the Tome is awesome. It’s all … it makes me excited.

The Eyepatch

Just then, a cleaner wearing a backpack vacuum cleaner arrives and starts cleaning around us. The audio is toast. Jeff chuckles and starts singing “Who you gonna call? Ghostbusters!”

JW: One of the things about the old Tome, that, while everything was in it, was if you went to a  new unlock and then went back out, and decided you wanted to double check it and maybe set it as a title, it was hard to get back and find some of the places. And now, all the tabs make sense, everything is front facing and upfront …

JH: And awesome …Yeah! Yeah! This is pretty boring right? What else? Come on Justin! [Claps]

JW: I don’t know. I wanted to get you playing. I wanted to get you swearing.

JH: Well, you missed me in the scenarios.

JW: Do people gang up on you?

JH: People don’t gang up on me, I just kill them. [Jeff leans back and punches the air. It’s quite frightening and the room fills with testosterone]

JW: Do you always play the same character name?

JH: Erm, I have two character names. They’re very close to each other. But I will always be playing the same character name because when we go live, I get to reserve my name before anyone else on every single server.

JW: Is that true?

JH: Yes. Damn straight it’s true!

JW: Is your name a public name that you want people to know so they can hunt you down and kill you.

JH: Hell no! Are you crazy? No Way! Cos they won’t hunt me down and kill me, they’ll send me tells about how awesome the game is… and complain about their characters and stuff.

JW: All my names are normally taken.

JH: You should reserve your name before you start playing the game. You can do that Justin. I’ll be sending out an email about it. Everybody in the studio has the ability to reserve their names before anybody else does.

JW: That’s nice.

JH: Hey! You don’t think we get perks! We get perks.

JW: That’s interesting as well because I think most people who play the same genre of games that we do – role-playing games over and over and over again – always have that one name that you are especially close to.

JH: Absolutely. So, Ill give you all a little … you want a little bit about my background? So I used to play EQ1…long ago, thousands of years ago. And I was playing a dark elf, and my wife got interested in the game and started to play and, of course, in EQ1 the only character my wife would play was a Wood Elf … the pretty race. And she “really” wanted me to come play with her. I didn’t want to because I would have had to make either a wood elf or a half elf – they are the only ones that started in that area. And so, I didn’t want to, because I thought they were pansies, and so I ended up making a character at her insistence. She was nagging me. And I made a character that was a half elf, not a wood elf, a half elf. And I just tried to come up with the stupidest, stupidest name I could just to spite her. And so, BATSPANKER was born, because you kill bats a lot in that area. I ended up playing EQ for three-and-a-half years as Batspanker…on Fennin Ro!

JW: So I take it that’s not your preferred name?

JH: Batspanker! No, Batspanker died with my EQ account.

JW: Batspanker the Witch Hunter? So that’s not your Witch Hunter? There’s lots of bats in E1.

JH: No, Batspanker will not be resurrected in Warhammer. [Chuckles]. It’s not going to happen, although it is a funny name.

JW: Is that really booze?

JH: Yeah it’s bourbon. Yeah, it’s after six. BOURBON! Blanton’s Select… From Colin Shannon’s Bar, which he has in his office. … Now you just have to get more hits than me.

Shannon's liquor stash.

WAR is coming!

As launch approaches, tempers begin to fray. As a social experiment, I want to see whether small insignificant requests can push someone over the edge. This small regular column is something I like to call “Can I borrow a dollar please”. Today, I try to” borrow a dollar please” from Ken Shuck [Insider Note: Ken is the Senior Development Director and ultimately my boss]. He’s been looking a bit stressed recently, so here goes:

JW: Hello Ken.

KS: Hello

JW: Do you have change for a ten, or could I borrow a dollar please? I’ll pay you back tomorrow.

KS: Sure, I have two fives. Does that help?

JW: Hmmm I really just need a one for the soda machine.

KS: OK. Here you go.

JW: Thanks [Hehe]

Hmmm. No implosion there then. Join me tomorrow, when I try to borrow a dollar from Colin Hicks.

(Editor's Note: If you'd like to read all of Justin's exclusive WAR launch blogs, simply click here!)