flying-lab posts

Pirates of the Burning Sea celebrates 2nd anniversary

by Krystalle Voecks Jan 14th 2010 at 10:00AM

Filed under: Historical, Pirates of the Burning Sea, Events, in-game, News items

Can ye hornswagglin' scalawags believe it? It's been two years since Pirates of the Burning Sea cast off for the open oceans of MMO adventure. Since their initial launch two years ago, the team at Flying Lab have been busy refining the game, leading to an impressive bevy of changes from large to small.

Now with their second anniversary looming, the Pirates of the Burning Sea crew have announced their intent to hold a rousing Second Anniversary party on January 23rd. Players who log in that day will be treated to PvP combat against the Flying Lab development team, as well as some choice anniversary finery for players to enjoy.

If you've been considering checking out all the changes since launch, it sounds like a good time to weigh anchor and set sail for the PotBS site. They've got a 14-day trial for those who wouldn't mind fittin' in a little freebootin' adventure in their day-to-day.

Tags: 2nd-anniversary, flying-lab, flying-lab-software, pirates-of-the-burning-sea, potbs, second-anniversary, soe, sony-online-entertainment, yarr

Flying Lab offers 6 months of Pirates of the Burning Sea to military personnel

by James Egan Oct 28th 2009 at 6:30PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Historical, Pirates of the Burning Sea, MMO industry, News items

Flying Lab Software announced this week that they're offering six months of free Pirates of the Burning Sea gameplay to military personnel and exclusive in-game items. In addition, the promotion waives the standard $19.99 purchase cost of the game. Sign-ups for the promotion require a military email address to qualify and will last through November 30, 2009. The promotion is open to all branches of the military. Current Pirates of the Burning Sea subscribers who are in active service are also eligible to get six months of free play time.

Flying Lab Software CEO Russell Williams issued a statement about the Care Package, which was originally proposed by community members on the game's forums. Williams wrote: "One of our players posted about serving in Afghanistan, and it got us thinking about the challenges of trying to play an MMO in an unpredictable situation like active service. We feel a special gratitude towards the members of the armed forces who take the time to get involved and play our game, in the face of the very difficult job they have to do to keep us all safe."

[Via Gamers Daily News]

Tags: care-package, fantasy, flying-lab, flying-lab-software, historical, military, mmo-industry, pirates-of-the-burning-sea, potbs, promotions

Pirates of the Burning Sea announces "Power and Prestige" expansion, adds more staff

by Seraphina Brennan Sep 17th 2009 at 4:00PM

Filed under: Historical, Pirates of the Burning Sea, Business models, Expansions, Game mechanics, MMO industry, News items

The guys from Flying Lab Software are busier than ever, as they have announced that they will be creating their very first expansion to Pirates of the Burning Sea and hiring to boot!

Power and Prestige, the first expansion for PotBS, will focus on expanding the game's conquest system, allowing players to take on the role of Port Governor. Governors control how the port is built up, and can work towards building a bustling trade port or perhaps one that is more militaristic. Past that, the details list is being kept hush hush until the early part of 2010. Power and Prestige will be a downloaded expansion, freely offered to all players of the game.

In the mean time, pirate enthusiasts have two things to look forward to. The first is that Flying Lab is hiring, and anyone interested in a job in the game industry should head on over to their careers page to see what they're looking for. The other is International Talk Like A Pirate Day, coming up on September 19th! Pull out your grog, your pirate hat, and set sail for a day of yarrrr!

Tags: flying-lab, flying-lab-software, international-talk-like-a-pirate-day, itlapd, pirates-of-the-burning-sea, potbs, power-and-prestige, soe, sony-online-entertainment

Pirates of the Burning Sea takes bold step to curb mission farming

by James Egan May 18th 2009 at 8:00PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Historical, Pirates of the Burning Sea, Forums, Game mechanics, Quests, PvE

The latest devlog for Pirates of the Burning Sea is written by Lum and focuses on improving the game's mission system, particularly fixing the problem of mission farming. Lum writes, "When we create big mission arcs, we design them to be a fun, engaging, and most importantly, a linear experience. We want players to get a sense of story and to do something interesting. We also want to reward players who accomplish the goals for those missions."

He says that mission farming and the in-game monetary rewards aren't necessarily the problem, although it's not what the devs had in mind for players. Lum says that since people stop to repeat the most lucrative parts of a given mission arc, they're not experiencing the game as it was intended for the players. Even worse, some players make faction choices on the basis of how lucrative a certain mission with that faction is. Flying Lab Software wants to change missions in Pirates of the Burning Sea so that players are continually progressing through stories rather than motivated to remain in place to reap the gold harvest.

Gallery: Pirates of the Burning Sea core gallery

Tags: devlog, experience, factions, fantasy, farming, flying-lab, flying-lab-software, gold, historical, loot, lum, mission-farming, missions, npc, npcs, open-sea, pirates, pirates-of-the-burning-sea, pve, quest-farming, quests

Pirates to get more RvR love from Flying Lab Software

by James Egan Apr 5th 2009 at 12:00PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Historical, Pirates of the Burning Sea, Game mechanics, Guilds, PvP

Pirates are always the underdogs in MMOs, aren't they? That seems to be the case in Pirates of the Burning Sea, where the Pirate nation has been at a disadvantage with the game's Conquest system. While their ports can't be controlled (permanently) by another nation, they're likewise unable to keep the ports they conquer. The latest devlog from Flying Lab's Lum is titled Pirates and Conquest and addresses this disparity between the Pirate nation and all other nations in the game.

One solution they plan to implement is increasing the four points that Pirates gain by capturing a port to five. Lum explains, "Currently, Pirates get four points every time they Raid a port, while Nationals get 10. This means that for a Pirate to keep pace with Nationals, they have to win three port battles in order to get the same amount of points. Since every nation can only attack three ports at a time, this means that Pirates would always have to have their maximum amount of attacking ports at all times, and then they have to win all of those battles." Ouch. However, by increasing their capture points to five, Pirates will only have to win two battles and won't need to maintain constant port attacks to stay on par with other nations.

Tags: capture-points, conquest, conquest-system, dev-blog, devlog, fantasy, flying-lab, flying-lab-software, game-mechanics, guilds, historical, lum, martial-law, pirate-nation, pirates, port-battle, ports, potbs, pvp, raided-state, realm-vs-realm, rvr

PotBS to hold ship skirmish testing event today

by Shawn Schuster Mar 6th 2009 at 10:00AM

Filed under: Historical, Pirates of the Burning Sea, Events, in-game, PvP

Today marks a very special event for the players of Pirates of the Burning Sea. Starting at 3:45 PST / 11:45 GMT, a ship skirmish event will take place on the Testbed server to analyze the effectiveness of the ship skirmish system. Named "The Battle of Gull Point", this event will match four teams of twelve players each to battle it out using "all of your ship combat skills to defeat your opponents".

Simply meet up at the Marsh Harbour and the devs will auto-level you to 50 before the actual skirmish starts at 4pm PST / midnight GMT. The spots are first come first serve, but all participants will receive the special title "Gull Point Veteran" once the new patch 1.13 releases on the live servers.

Tags: flying-lab, pirates-of-the-burning-sea, potbs, ship-skirmish, skirmish, testbed

Flying Lab Software cannonading for new casual MMO

by Kyle Horner Jan 29th 2009 at 6:00PM

Filed under: Pirates of the Burning Sea, New titles, News items, Casual

It looks like after many long years of developing Pirates of the Burning Sea, Flying Lab Software is ready for something a little more laid back. Which is why the Seattle-based developer's next project will be a family friendly casual MMO through a partnership with trading card company Upper Deck. They're even opening a new branch entitled Flying Lab Casual to work on the project. Right now we really don't know anything beyond that, but more detailed information about the title is expected in the coming weeks.

We say more power to FLS/FLC for mixing it up and keeping things fresh. Nothing is worse than a developer whose lost some of that sparkle in their eyes. Then again, we're sure that the booming casual market has at least a little to do with the choice as well.

That being said, current Pirates of the Burning Sea players have nothing to fear as new content will continue to flow freely as rum on a salty sea dog's ship.

Tags: family-friendly, flying-lab, flying-lab-casual, pirates-of-the-burning-sea, potbs, soe, sony-online-entertainment, upper-deck

Pirates of the Burning Sea celebrates its first birthday with style

by Kyle Horner Jan 25th 2009 at 10:00AM

Filed under: Pirates of the Burning Sea, Events, in-game, News items

It's been a whole year since Pirates of the Burning Sea left its dry dock and sailed out into the vast and sometimes-choppy waters of the ocean of MMOs. While it hasn't been a relatively safe year for adventurous new titles, Flying Lab Software's still got a lot to be happy with: Their game is solid, they're part of the SOE family and now they've got one year tucked under their belt.

To celebrate the occasion, the team is gave all players a new and very stylish anniversary coat to wear. Plus there was an anniversary event yesterday that kicked off a new story arc for players to enjoy. All in all, while the game saw a slow start, Flying Lab has added a good deal of free content and new features that definitely make Pirates of the Burning Sea a title worth looking into for any lapsed or newly interested players. We're looking forward to seeing how the game progresses over the coming year, and wish the development team the best of luck.

Tags: anniversary, flying-lab, flying-lab-software, pirates-of-the-burning-sea, potbs, soe, sony-online-entertainment

2008 wasn't a good year for MMOs

by Seraphina Brennan Jan 12th 2009 at 10:00AM

Filed under: Culture, MMO industry, Opinion

One of the blog posts over at the Hellforge community that is getting some traction is Agamemnon's look back at the MMO failures of 2008. Included are looks into why Tabula Rasa, Hellgate: London, Age of Conan, and Pirates of the Burning Sea either outright failed (in the case of Tabula Rasa and Hellgate) or were unable to get the subscriber numbers they expected with their launches.

What separates this blog post from the myriad of other posts on the same subject is that the article ends with the many things that these games all did wrong and other developers should learn from. Little things, like listening closely to the feedback from your beta testers, fostering a community, and learning to stay away from the concept of "we'll patch it to perfection." It's a good analysis of the many failures of other games, and a kind tip of the hat to the things an MMO can do right, such as Mythic's openness with Warhammer Online.

Tags: failure, flagship-studios, flying-lab, funcom, hellforge, hellgate-london, hgl, mythic-entertainment, ncsoft, patch, pirates-of-the-burning-sea, potbs, rgtr, subscribers, tabula-rasa, war, warhammer-online

Pirates of the Burning Sea's economic stimulus package

by Shawn Schuster Jan 10th 2009 at 10:00AM

Filed under: Historical, Pirates of the Burning Sea, Business models, Economy, Game mechanics, MMO industry, Crafting

Over at Flying Lab, they're doing their part to make Pirates of the Burning Sea an enjoyable and balanced game. It's their job! So in a recent developer log, we get word of a revamp to the economy through streamlining items, structures and the recently introduced insurance for ships.

This will all be accomplished through an extensive process of removing redundant crafting items in provision making and ship building, plus a readjustment of how insurance will work. What do you do with all of those obsolete items in your inventory? Luckily, they've created a merchant who will turn any obsolete good into its base raw material. Check out the lengthy developer log for complete information on what they plan to change.

Tags: adjustment, balance, crafting, economy, flying-lab, insurance, pirates, pirates-of-the-burning-sea, potbs, ship-building

Ten 2008 machinima worth checking out

by Kyle Horner Jan 3rd 2009 at 4:00PM

Filed under: Culture, News items, Humor

IGN has put together a top ten 2008 machinima movie list that's most definitely great for killing some time, should you have any in need of slaying. The list is surprisingly diverse, with movies created in Age of Conan, City of Heroes, Pirates of the Burning Sea, Guild Wars and of course World of Warcraft.

We're not too surprised to see an Oxhorn Christmas Tree and a Snacky's Journal 4 take the top two slots, as both series are always incredibly worth-while -- Snacky's Journal 4 won the 2008 Blizzcon Movie Contest. Although we highly recommend checking out The Return of The Revenge of Dr. Mechanico, as it's an amazingly wonderful use of City of Heroes as a storytelling device. Also, if you've really got some time to pass, take a look at Election Duel if you're in any way a politically-minded type with a sense of humor. Good stuff!

Tags: age-of-conan, arenanet, blizzard, city-of-heroes, flying-lab, funcom, guild-wars, ign, machinima, ncsoft, oxhorn, pirates-of-the-burning-sea, snackys-journal, soe, world-of-warcraft

Massively.com giveaway: Pirates of the Burning Sea

by Michael Zenke Nov 5th 2008 at 12:00PM

Filed under: Historical, Pirates of the Burning Sea, Contests

Yesterday when we put up the post for the Pirates of the Caribbean Online skulls we used a lot of pirate-speak, so we'll spare you today. Suffice it to say that we love pirates, and pajama-clad martial artists are clearly inferior to rum-swilling treasure hunters. That's why we're so pleased to be able to team up with Flying Lab and SOE to offer a small pile of Pirates of the Burning Sea swaggery! We have four boxed copies of the game, plus five one month time cards! You can get the client for free online, so even if you don't play already the cards are a great snag! The time cards each retail for $14.99 and the box goes for about $25 each. Total retail value would be about $175.

All you have to do to enter is leave a comment on this post telling us which you like better: Ninjas or Pirates? You'll need to comment before 7:00 AM EST Friday, November 7th. You can only enter once per person, and after the contest closes we'll ship out these fantastic prizes to 9 randomly-selected winners. Give us at least a week to ship out this massive pile of swag, though. To win you must be age 18 or up and a resident of the US or Canada (excluding Quebec). For full eligibility details, we suggest you read our official rules. Good luck!

Tags: featured, flying-lab, massively-giveaways, pirates-of-the-burning-sea, potbs, soe, sony-online-entertainment

Pirates of the Burning Sea offers free trials

by James Egan Sep 30th 2008 at 5:00PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Historical, Pirates of the Burning Sea, Business models, News items

The MMO scene is absolutely dominated by fantasy titles. You may have noticed. Obviously this sits well with most MMO gamers who can't seem to get enough of the genre. But if you've ever wanted to try your hand at something different, something other than sci-fi, there's probably never been a better time to look at Pirates of the Burning Sea. In the past, to even try the game, you had to purchase it and hope it lived up to your expectations. Well, no longer.

Flying Lab has announced that they're offering a public launch of 14-day trial keys. The prolonged absence of a trial was a barrier for some to checking out the game. There are a few conditions though: Only new Pirates of the Burning Sea accounts are eligible for the 14-day trial, existing accounts and Station Access accounts are excluded from the trial offer. If this caught your attention, be sure to check out the full details on their announcement page.

Tags: fantasy, flying-lab, flying-lab-software, free-trial, historical, pirates, pirates-of-the-burning-sea, station, trial, trial-keys

Pirates of the Burning Sea celebrates Talk Like a Pirate Day

by Shawn Schuster Sep 19th 2008 at 11:00AM

Filed under: Fantasy, Historical, Culture, Events, in-game, MMO industry, Roleplaying, Education, Humor

When you're the official game of International Talk Like A Pirate Day, today is your day to shine. So the folks at Flying Lab Software have been working hard to make today the ultimate in grog-swillin' and booty-plunderin' in their flagship game, Pirates of the Burning Sea.

All day today and until September 26th, you'll find special missions and secret booty for all players. What makes it even better is a special 14-day trial, so you can try it all out for free. Plus, if you fear your Pirate-speak isn't up to par ...or yarr... today, Flying Lab has created a handy Pirate Reference Guide you can find right after the jump. If that's still not enough to shiver your timbers, several other MMOs are celebrating this day with special quests as well, including Lord of the Rings Online, World of Warcraft and Guild Wars. Avast!

Tags: flying-lab, free-trial, international-talk-like-a-pirate-day, pirates, pirates-of-the-burning-sea

Dragon*Con 2008: Flying Lab Software on Pirates

by Elizabeth Harper Sep 16th 2008 at 11:00AM

Filed under: Pirates of the Burning Sea, Events, real-world, Massively Event Coverage

At this year's Dragon*Con, we ran into Flying Lab Software's Russell Williams (CEO) and Kevin Maginn (PotBS Lead Designer) who had a lot to say about the design philosophy behind Pirates of the Burning Sea as well as the challenges of continuing to work on a live game. After its release in January, Pirates has continued growing with monthly updates, providing new game systems and new content.

How do the designers decide where Pirates is going from here? We've got the skinny on both where Pirates came from and where it's going, after the jump.

Gallery: Pirates of the Burning Sea core gallery

Tags: dc, dc-2008, dragon-con, dragon-con-2008, flying-lab, flying-lab-software, pirates, pirates-of-the-burning-sea, potbs