Fools Abound

**Confucius** · 04-01-2011

Well as I am sure you all know today is april 1st, also known as april fools, and as always many people are in the spirit, including several gaming companies! Here's at some of the april fools jokes some major MMOs or upcoming MMOs have released as so called news, at least we all hope it's a joke!

Lets get started!

Crabby: The Dungeon Helper!

As always Blizzard is always in the spirit and they have announced the new dungeon helper Crabby! He will help you play the game by providing helpful tips and tricks for every situation you manage to get yourself stuck in!

Here's some more information about our new friend Crabby!

Introducing Crabby:
The Dungeon Helper
Nothing But the Best

Few things are more fun than plumbing the depths of Azeroth's dungeons with your friends, defeating scores of terrifying monsters, and emerging with your bags stuffed to the brim with epic loot pried from your enemies' cold, dead hands. However, every adventurer knows that the more fantastic the treasure, the more powerful its guardians — and some of the challenges posed by World of Warcraft's Heroic dungeons can be quite daunting.

Wouldn't it be nice to have a helpful friend at your side, ready to provide you with tips and hints when you're stuck? A friend who's there to provide encouragement, who will help you pick yourself up off the floor after the fifteenth wipe of the night? Someone who will stick with you — no matter what?

Everyone can use a friend like that... a friend like Crabby!

Someone to Watch Over Me

You're a hero. An adventurer. A sword-swinger or spell-slinger for hire. Whatever your character's motivation may be, if trouble doesn't find you, it's because you found trouble first. But what do you do when Asaad throws down a grounding field? How do you respond when the Faceless Corruptors enter Erudax's room? Eventually, you'll be thrown a curve ball that you can't catch. When that happens, you'll be glad to have Crabby at your side!

Crabby uses a complex and extensive set of context-sensitive situational heuristics to analyze your current status in real-time; that's tech talk for "Crabby always knows what's up." He watches your every move with his all-seeing eyes. Nothing escapes his unwavering gaze; not even the slightest nuance of your play style goes unnoticed. Before long, Crabby will know what you're going to do before you even do it. And he will use this knowledge to help.

Crabby is able to tell you exactly what's going on and what you should do. His many useful tips will appear in the bottom right corner of your screen, where he hangs out, ever patiently, waiting for you to need his help. Of course, whether you follow his advice or not is entirely up to you; Crabby may possess an advanced level of artificial intelligence, but we're reasonably sure he doesn't have any feelings you could hurt. Reasonably sure. But just in case, the ability to remove Crabby has been disabled for now.

I've Got You Under My Skin

Few things are more fun than plumbing the depths of Azeroth's dungeons with a trusty, unwavering friend at your side. Together with Crabby, your new companion on all your journeys going forward, you can rest assured that no challenge will be beyond your reach.

You can learn more about Crabby here: Dungeon Helper - Game - World of Warcraft

Now onto the next joke of the day!

The Commando

Guild Wars 2 has announced a new class for their up and coming MMO, the Commando!

A master of the battlefield, this elite soldier is equally at home on the mean streets of Lion's Arch, in the steamy Maguuma Jungle, or on the Orrian front. The multi-role commando is a combat medic, an infiltrator, and a tank. By land, sea, or air, the commando is a technological force to be reckoned with. Come get some.

Commandos have several different special skill types:

Grenades—Sometimes you need to kill a whole lot of tangos—fast. Grenades enable the commando to perform area-of-effect attacks with a variety of devastating results. From flashbangs that blind enemies to shrapnel bombs that apply bleeding, the commando has a grenade for every occasion.

Vehicles—Vehicle skills act as the commando's utility skills. A commando can opt for an armored personnel carrier (APC) or a tank for land travel, a helicopter for air travel, or a submarine for undersea travel. Each vehicle gives the commando three utility skills, ranging from depth charges on the submarine to flamethrowers on the APC.

The APC, tank, and helicopter can also carry allied passengers to maximize your firepower. Passengers acquire new skills based on their profession and their position in the vehicle. For example, an elementalist manning the tank's main gun can fire flaming shells, while a necromancer riding shotgun in an APC can use the Corrupted Headlights ability to poison and blind foes caught in the beams.

Force Multipliers—Commandos are one-man armies, but they don't have to fight alone. Force multiplier skills let the commando call in helicopter gunships to take out a boss, rain death from above with Predator air strikes, or even request a danger close offshore naval bombardment.

Weapons
A commando can use ten different weapons to bring the pain on the battlefield. The commando weapons are:

Two-Handed: assault rifle, grenade launcher, shotgun, shoulder-fired rocket, flamethrower
Main Hand: sub-machine gun, pistol, scepter
Off Hand: sub-machine gun, pistol, knife, walkie-talkie

A commando can easily switch between his two active weapon sets as needed, but swapping ranged weapons triggers a brief cooldown during which the commando shouts, "I'M OUT!" or "RELOADING!"

The commando has a long reach. Commando weapons don't have set ranges, they just use line of sight. While other professions need to run to different locations on the map, the commando can set up a bunker to snipe at ettins, drakes, and other unsuspecting tangos at map-wide range.

Because of their military training, when they have a knife equipped, commandos gain an automatic bonus to movement speed. They also have the downed state ability to crawl closer to allies who can revive them.

For the full article of the commando along with videos and images you can go here: Commando | Guild Wars 2

I hope you are as excited about Guild Wars 2's new class as I am! Now let's take a look at the new approach to Star Wars the Old Republic!

RAWWWR
Star Wars the Old Republic has announced that their new up coming MMO will now be done completely in Shyriiwook, the wookies native tongue! Here's some more information!

Since the initial announcement of the localized versions of Star Wars™: The Old Republic™, we’ve heard the growls and roars from the community requesting the game be translated for Wookiees, and we are pleased to announce that this dream is now becoming a reality.

From their subtle roar of sadness to the pleasant yelp of excitement, Wookiees are a role model for companionship, loyalty and respect, and we at BioWare and LucasArts want to show our appreciation. Therefore, all text in the game will be translated into Shyriiwook, and all voice-overs will be re-recorded by authentic, native Wookiee speakers.

Though the Shyriiwook version of The Old Republic is still in development, we have a sneak peek at some of the most dramatic moments in the game so you can see how these cinematics will play out for our Wookiee audience.

See this dramatic confrontation that comes at a key moment in the noble path of the Jedi Knight on Tython.

See how the Shyriiwook delivers the feel of another epic moment in the exciting Esseles Flashpoint, when Commander Narlock rallies the troops in their desperate battle against the Empire.

Another great clip allows you to feel the emotion of one of the most exciting romantic moments of the game, where Shyriiwook adds an entirely new dimension to the experience.

Finally, to fully immerse yourself in the Wookiee mindset, we’ve developed a plush new version of the user interface that should keep that warm, fuzzy feeling alive even when you’re in the depths of the ice caves on Hoth.

We are further proud to announce that this is the first-ever video game to take the step of reaching out to our furry friends, and we hope that Wookiees and their loved ones across the galaxy will feel closer to the entire gaming community as a result.

Wyaaaghh ma Garrrhh ghh wa-gwah! (translation: May the Force be with you!)

I hope you are as happy for our furry friends as I am!

Well that brings this article to an end! Happy April Fools!