Auto Assault

NCsoft will be terminating all services for MMO Auto Assault on 31st August, and sending it to the great garage in the sky.

Auto Assault's US and European servers are to merge this week, according to NCsoft and NetDevil.

NCsoft has released a new update for vehicle combat MMO Auto Assault, which introduces all manner of new features - including the ability to buy "respec".

Yes, you can now purchase "respec" in the form of attribute points, skill points and R&D points at various terminals in the towns. Other new features include the option to share missions, link loot and chat to all the players in your faction.

The update also introduces a large number of bug fixes and gameplay changes, along with more than 50 new missions - including some special ones for very high level characters.

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If you liked the sound of Auto Assault but didn't feel like taking a chance on it when it came out, you might want to check out the offer currently being run by publisher NCsoft - allowing you to try the game out for 14 days with no guarantees.

Some things are better balanced; strawberries and cream or Eric and Ernie, for example. We think it's an issue of complexity, that certain things on their own are just too simple; that people want a certain level of complication to take up those spare brain cycles, and are willing to try anything that sucks them in just enough. Certain gamers, get this, don't like car games. Others, perverse imps that they are, just don't like simple shooters. But combine the two, chuck in a few thousand other people, and they'll play it. Hence the shooty-car MMO genre (sorry for the excessively analytic lingo) and hence Auto Assault.

Regarding the premise, as far as we can discern, some cataclysmic event befell the Earth, wiping out or mutating all life that didn't find cover. This, while cheesy, provides an excellence basis for wholesome sci-fi plotties that inform your every action in the story. And it means we're not Elves, dunmer, dwemer or any thing vaguely fey! Don't get us wrong, we enjoy fantasy as much as the next escapist dreamer, but it's just so refreshing to meet some MMO developers who haven't had the creativity carved out of their heads with a wooden spoon. Admittedly, in sci-fi terms mutants, cyborgs and humans aren't exactly refreshing, but futuristic car combat is one of the less well-mined sci-fi varieties.

Those three factions are the Mutants, the cyborg Biomeks, and the "Geeky Humans who look a bit Tron" (we think that's their name.) They each divide into one of four classes; scout, warrior, medi-mechanics, and leaders (the class with automated henchmen); each of which has its own style of vehicle (though players can unlock more vehicles as they rank up); and its own starting areas, agenda, brand of deodorant, etc. The customisation options for your humanoid avatar aren't as extreme as that of City of Heroes, which is a pity; you feel NCsoft could have just ripped that straight out of the other game. Your vehicle is similarly limited, but you have the opportunity to customise that in the game proper, with junk you find in the wastes.

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Auto Assault is ever so nearly upon us - and I'm not talking about the bad kind prohibited on my antisocial behaviour order.

In case you haven't been involved in any of the other beta weekends, NCsoft is inviting MMO fans to have a go at its post-apocalyptic drive-about Auto Assault this weekend.

The open beta kicks off at 6pm on Friday and shuts down again at a minute-to-midnight on Monday, so there's plenty of time for you to work out if you like the cut of its pistons and what-have-you.

Full details are available through the game's European website, and the actual boxed one will be out this spring. See our Auto Assault game page for all sorts of info, including details of various pre-order incentives.

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NCsoft Europe has released details of what you can expect to find in the Auto Assault Collector's Edition box should you decide to plump for it.

Auto Assault is a driving-based massively-multiplayer game. Both standard and collector boxes will ship this spring, and both will include a 14-day "friend's trial key" along with the game so you can give someone else a taste of it.

According to NCsoft, the Collector's Edition will include a DVD copy of the game, microphone headset for comms, a 96-page manual, a map that folds out to show the Central Wastelands, a soundtrack CD, an engraved metal keyring, mutant/human/biomek postcards, a bumper sticker, and an exclusive in-game 'Pet' (a mini RC car). Plenty there then.

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NCsoft is launching the beta for Auto Assault, a new MMORPG set in a post-apocalyptic world that lets you fight it out in cars, tanks and - yes - motorbikes.

The beta will take place from 6pm - 10pm on Thursdays and from 9am on Saturday until 9pm on Sunday. To register, you'll need to visit the Auto Assault website.

Billed as "the ultimate in car combat", Auto Assault gives you the option to customise your vehicles with all manner of paint jobs, add-ons, armour and weapons. There are solo, co-op and PvP modes, and the whole thing is built around the Havok 2 physics engine - AA is the only MMORPG to make use of it, don't you know.

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As part of our ongoing series of discussions with NetDevil, creators of massively-multiplayer vehicular-combat game Auto Assault, we talk to president Scott Brown about the endgame and beyond, the lessons learned from other MMOs, and what the development team will be doing once they've finished working on the game. Auto Assault is due out in Europe and the USA simultaneously in spring 2006. You can read more about it by glancing at our recent preview.

As part of our ongoing series of discussions with NetDevil, creators of massively-multiplayer vehicular-combat game Auto Assault, we talk to president Scott Brown about releasing the game in multiple territories, the importance of doing so, and how it affects development. Auto Assault is due out in Europe and the USA simultaneously in spring 2006. You can read more about it by glancing at our recent preview.

Extremely promising massively-multiplayer car-combat title Auto Assault won't be released until spring 2006 at the earliest, publisher NCsoft and developer NetDevil have confirmed.

As part of our ongoing series of discussions with NetDevil, creators of massively-multiplayer vehicular-combat game Auto Assault, we talk to president Scott Brown about the game's influences and how they affected its development. Auto Assault is due out in Europe and the USA simultaneously later this year. You can read more about it by glancing at our recent preview.

There's a part of Eurogamer's personality it doesn't talk about too much. It's the part that wants to bulk up, cover itself in oil, strip off and slide into a customised leather harness, wear a hockey mask, move to the Australian Outback, wait for an inevitable collapse of the world's socio-economic structure and then rule a tribe of barbaric machine-riders as king supreme. It's not satisfied often (except for a private party back in 1996 which still causes it to toss and turn at night at the memories), but it's always there.

As part of our ongoing series of discussions with NetDevil, creators of massively-multiplayer vehicular-combat game Auto Assault, we talk to president Scott Brown about the developer's attempts to incorporate the genre's traditional elements of social interaction. Auto Assault is due out in Europe and the USA simultaneously later this year. You can read more about it on the game's European website.

An extended interview with Scott Brown, President of NetDevil, the developers behind Auto Assault, who answers our questions about the fastest, most destructive MMO ever, which will be available from NCsoft simultaneously in Europe and the USA later this year. You can read more about the game on its European website.

NCsoft Europe has announced that it hopes to top its pre-order campaigns for the likes of Guild Wars and City of Heroes by allowing those eager to play Auto Assault, its next big massively multiplayer effort, to elect a favourite in-game weapon to be included in the pre-order campaign for the UK, France, Germany and Italy.