NCsoft is showing no signs of slowing down even after the big release of Tabula Rasa, and with NCsoft America under Chris Chung's management, massive games are inbound. In his latest interview, Chung talked about making PS3 titles, improving customer experience, and extending NCsoft's domination in Japan. Check out the full article for more details.

The older brother of Lord British, NCsoft North America CEO Robert Garriott, is leaving his post to pursue the MMORPG giant's global business development and planning side of things. Check out the full article for more details.

Online game developer and publisher NCSoft, the company behind the upcoming sci-fi MMORPG Tabula Rasa, has just announced the addition of a new member to its growing family of online game development studios.

The company today officially unveiled Carbine Studios, a dev team comprised of 17 former Blizzard employees that includes lead and senior developers who worked on the insanely popular World of Warcraft MMORPG. The Orange County-based studio is currently working on an as yet unannounced MMORPG project.

"This is a dev team made in heaven," said Robert Garriott, CEO for NCSoft's North American business. "This group is as experienced as they come in the area of computer role playing and multiplayer game design. Making successful games is second nature to them."

Aside from the upcoming Eye of the North Expansion, the Guild Wars MMORPG's residents definitely have something else to celebrate over. Game publisher NCSoft has just sent out a press wire announcing that Guild Wars has broken four million in sold copies since its release two years ago (2005). NCSoft North America's CEO Robert Garriott is reportedly happy about the news, and had this to say:

ArenaNet’s fantastic work on Guild Wars has helped make NCSoft the leading online gaming publisher in the world. Guild Wars players continue to join in droves and stay loyal to the franchise thanks to a business model that makes for a very accessible product. We are all excited about the future of Guild Wars with the expansion ready to be released and Guild Wars 2 on the horizon.

Keep in touch in case we pick up more good news and updates, even as Eye of the North gets scheduled for its release this August 31. For the moment, make sure to brush up on your game knowledge - there's plenty of surprises that await when the expansion makes landfall.

JoyStiq managed to score an interview with NCsoft boss Richard Garriot and Executive Producer Brian Clayton. The talk revolved mostly around the MMORPG industry and their (NCSoft) plans to support the PlayStation 3 with MMO-type titles. Their latest project - Tabula Rasa - was also touched; and surprisingly, they also signified plans to dabble on developing for the PlayStation Portable in the future.

According to Clayton, they're looking at a number of ways on how to beef up the PSP games frontline. A fully immersive and working MMO for the said handheld isn't that farfetched, with Clayton saying that they "see a number of opportunities with the PSP as a standalone MMO or as an extension to our full-blown MMOs on PC and PS3". Hmm... MMO game on PSP, sounds good 'ey? Their plans are best summed in this quote:

I would argue that developing a handheld MMO could be the largest challenge in game development. For example, the game needs to be developed from the onset to address limited communication tools, screen real estate and controls, which are all intrinsic to providing a quality MMO experience. We have a number ideas and solutions to address the above-mentioned concerns, but can't go into those details right now.

The full article awaits after the jump!

NCsoft has released its E3 line-up which the press release called the "market's most anticipated online games". Whether this is true or not is up to you, but there is no doubt that the games are pretty good.

Apparently, this feeling is echoed by none other than creator of Tabula Rasa and NCsoft North America CEO Robert Garriott. He gave some very strong opinions regarding the games to released and how he sees the E3 as a staging point in bringing the company's games to the mass market.

NCsoft strives to deliver the highest quality online entertainment possible, and these products represent the next generation of online games.

This E3 meeting will provide a window for the public to see the breadth of the variety of game genres and business models NCsoft provides, as well as show off how advanced and exciting our products are.

So with that said, let's take a look at the NCsoft line-up and see what all the fuss is about:

• Richard Garriot's Tabula Rasa
• Set to launch this fall, what better place to showcase Tabula Rasa than arguably the biggest expo this year? The game will have features such as character cloning system, dynamic battlefields with contested control points, deep storylines with ethical parables, and fully integrated voice chat. Will this game deliver the goods?
• Aion
• An offering from the NCsoft’s Seoul studios, Aion is referred to by the press-release as "one of the most visually stunning MMOs in development." The game is set in a fantasy world where divine beings wage a war that will determine the future of the world. This is set for release in 2008.
• Guild Wars: Eye of the North
• Guild Wars: Eye of the North is the first true expansion to the Guild Wars series. The expansion adds lots of new content and will have no monthly fees to play online. It is set for release on August 31 for US$ 39.99.
• Dungeon Runners
• A free to download and play MMORPG, Dungeon Runners is set in a medieval world where players beat up monsters and get loot. It is already available and will have lots of new content added to it through the summer.

This is a respectable line-up for NCsoft this E3 but will these games really draw as much attention as NCsoft hopes it will? That's a question for greater minds than mine. More E3 lineups as they get released.

NCSoft North America has earlier announced that Dungeon Runners, its first free-to-download and play game, is now officially open to the public. To entice the various gamer tribes scattered all over the earth, NCSoft also released a few screenshots and concept art from Dungeon Runners. You can check 'em out below.

Dungeon Runners is currently available for free through digital download at dungeonrunners.com and, as we mentioned earlier, has a play-for-free tier where players can access large chunks of the game's content. Players who have the money can also opt to become members for US$ 4.99 per month for quite a few perks and access to the most powerful gear in the game.

"There are plenty of other 'free' games available for online RPG fans, but none that packs as many features as Dungeon Runners has or comes with the NCsoft stamp of quality," said Robert Garriott, CEO of NCsoft North America. "We expect that players will receive this game warmly because it is fast, fun and free. It is hard to beat that deal."

   

More screenshots and concept art after the jump!

As promised, we've got the second part of the Voodoo Extreme's DICE Summit interview with Ultima Online">Richard Garriott (and a new screenshot to boot!). The transcript has already been posted and we're surprised that the brother, Robert Garriot, also decided to drop in a couple of thoughts during the interview.

As the sit-down progressed, they went on talking about the status of NCSoft through the years. It is, after all, the 10th anniversary of Ultima Online. So how far have they gone and what can they expect in the next couple of years, especially with Tabula Rasa?

Robert Garriot answers this with a quick recap of recent history, with UO setting the standard with its 50,000 sign-ups for beta and eventual 100,00 sold out during its first run. And then EverQuest came out and flushed UO to the side. And eventually, more games came out, each of them surpassing the 100,000 mark of UO.

Richard Garriot then continues the conversation and brings it over to Lineage - yet another market hit. It's even reported that one out of ten people in Korea have a Lineage II account. They go on with talking about market saturation and what it takes for a "next-gen" MMO to survive in the cutthroat battlefield of online accounts - including sticky reticles and more gameplay mechanics.

Check out the full interview found behind the "Read" link below.

GameDaily Biz sat down with the other Garriott, Robert, NCSoft North America CEO and brother to Richard HRH Lord British Garriott (guess they both didn't quit), to talk about Tabula Rasa, microtransactions (*gasp!*), and a bunch of other stuff. Long three-page interview. Can we concentrate instead on TR and the microtransaction bits?

Obviously Brother Richard is trying to change the way we look at and play MMOs with Tabula Rasa, and when Brother Robert describes the game along the lines of a shooter title. Finding traditional MMOs ho-hum boring, what attracts Robert to TR is that it is, in many respects, a shooter. You hide behind obstacles like a shooter, you take your shots like a shooter... only doing so with a bunch of other people and in a deep game system like in MMOs.

Microtransaction's turn. NCSoft will be looking at several micropayment models for their games. The real question they're asking is, what model to use. Think about it: they've got Guild Wars, that's essentially pay once, play for life, he observed. They've got other games that live off subscriptions. They've got coming games that use NC Coin micropayments.

How would this play to Tabula Rasa? We don't know - Robert offers no clues in that direction. Given the variety of weapons and equipment in the game, it's not too hard to imagine either an online shop for equipment, or at the least allowing equipment exchanges among players (with the right price, of course), but that does run into a certain multiplayer taboo concerning ubers. It's also easy to imagine a Guild Wars model of pay-once, but that's certainly taking a big risk with a very much radical new MMO property.