World of Warplanes - We've Got the Details! - PAX Prime 2013
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2014-05-07
·
925 words · ~4 min read
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lineus Tech tips coverage of PS 2013 is brought to you by Western Digital Intel
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and steel series we've got Chris Cook director of public relations at War
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gaming and they are showing off not one but two extremely exciting things here
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at the show we are going to be starting
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with world of war planes so give me the basic concept assume they've never heard
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of wargaming they've never heard of World of Tanks they know nothing so what
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we're known for as a company is freet to-play games digital um we hit it
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really really well with world of Tanks 70 million registered players around the
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world a completely free-to-play game that is really about taking some of the
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world's most iconic tanks from the World War II era pitting them against 15
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versus 15 player matches it's really fun it's been hugely successful W of War PLS
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is really our next chapter in this wargaming universe same concept
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completely free to play 15 versus 15 PVP
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but really taking a lot of the iconic planes and and warbirds from the late
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30s to the early 1950s and letting players just really get into a game have
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fun and and pro prove that they got what it takes now let's go ahead let's make
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it even more basic let's assume they've never heard of free to play they have no
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idea what that means what is your monetization model for World of War
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plans because obviously this booth wasn't free sure so what we're known for
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is like you just mentioned free-to-play games or a digital download game um you
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have to download a client install it on your PC but there's no cost for that and
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there's no cost to play the game where we make money is um in-game monetization
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we have in-game purchases one thing that really I think sets us apart and what
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makes us really proud is that none of our in-game purchas purchases give you
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an advantage in battle so you're buying things from us like skins and
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customization things to make your your tank or plane look cooler you're buying
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consumables that you use in the heat of battle that are only temporary but
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nothing that you buy is going to make you better than player B or C or D we
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really pride ourselves on making our games all about skill we don't want
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anyone whether you're paying or you're not paying at all to feel like you're
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better or you have a better Advantage anyone else okay so let's talk about
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balance then so World of War PLS is obviously a completely new challenge in
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terms of I mean it's a completely different type of game so uh what have
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you guys done to make com combat interesting tell me the top two or top
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three things well you know I think we really sped the game up you know World of Tanks is a game that's a little more
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methodical a little slower a little more strategic obviously when you're in a
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plane you're moving constantly so you know you're doing things that take a lot
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more I guess mental recognition of the
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battlefield and where all the en players are where your teammates are but you
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know we've done a lot of cool things like really making sure that the geography and the environments are going
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to play heavily into battle things like Canyons cities even things like clouds
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and sunlight can be used by the player while they're fighting that is
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incredibly cool now obviously a question that I'm sure I'm not the first person
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to ask you is is there some kind of a plan to take World of Tanks and world of
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warplanes and combine them into World of Tanks and warplanes and whatever else
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the case may be I think maybe someday we'll look at that right now we're
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really focused on getting World of War PL just done out the door on September
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26th in the US and make sure that we really we build it and grow with a lot
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of cool content like new modes new nations new planes down the road maybe
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the real challenge is is is making sure that's it's balanced because what we
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don't want is a player in a tank to get blown up by a plane that's 10,000 ft
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above them and have no real way to to stop it you know what I mean we want the
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experience to be great whether you're in a tank or you're in a plane or whether
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you're in a warship because we have a game World of Warships coming next year
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as well we want to make sure that no matter what you choose you're going to
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have a fun time it's going to be balanced so we'll look at it it's it's
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something that we're always looking at and definitely as you said before lots
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and lots of people ask us about it so we'll see maybe a little bit further
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down the line great thank you so much and uh enjoy the rest of the show cool
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thanks it's been a pleasure