Multiplayer Online Battle Arenas, more popularly kns MOBA, are taking over. What started as a Warcraft 3 mod has given birth to Smite, League of Legends, DOTA 2, Heroes of Newerth, and Guardians of Middle-earth. It's an insanely popular genre worldwide, so it makes sense that Jagex would change their upcoming Transformers Universe browswer-based game from an MMORPG to a MOBA.
Based on the 2010 computer animated series Transformers Prime, Jagex Games Studio has changed the game to a MOBA because traditionaly MMORPG concepts didn't mesh with the brand. Chief Creative Director Alex Horton said:
Transformers are about war; they’re about action. They don’t carry gold, bake bread, catch fish, cut down trees. But for all they take away, they throw open so many more opportunities. Maybe there’s more in a selection of characters and abilities, and the strategy in that, than there is [in] levelling a character endlessly and going through f**k loads of boss battles.
What's popular now is the short-session, player-versus-player competitive scene. World of Warcraft is being replaced by World of Tanks. League of Legends is preferred over Lord of the Rings Online.
Transformers Universe will have players collected Jagex-designed Transformers through playing matches, and will upgrade their weapons and abilities as they send them one at a time into battle. You fight on either the side of the Autobots or Decepticons, and every time a faction wins a battle, they progress to the next part of that faction's specific storyline.
It's bringing it's own flavor to the MOBA genre, so don't expect three-lane battles to down someone's Nexus. It's not like that at all. If you want to learn more about how Transformer's Universe will play, you can visit Edge-Online for a fantastic read.
You can follow Movies and Culture Editor Lance Liebl on Twitter @Lance_GZ. He likes talking sports, video games, and the stupidity of celebrities. Email at [email protected]
