petroglyph posts

Earlier this year developer Petroglyph announced Rise of Immortals, its free-to-play entry in the growing game genre made popular by titles like Defense of the Ancients. Today Petroglyph sent Big Download an exclusive first look at one of the game's hero units, or "immortals". This character is called Nysuss and as you can see in the included screenshots from the game she a bit similar in terms of her looks to the Medusa creature from Greek myths.

You can check out a back story on Nysuss along with her power and abilities after the jump. Rise of Immortals is currently in closed beta testing and will officially launch later in 2011.

Rise of Immortals was announced several weeks ago and today it was revealed that the upcoming free-to-play fantasy PC game from developer Petroglyph would start its open beta testing on April 5. Petroglyph is aiming to invite over 10,000 people to participate in the closed beta test.

As an incentive for people to sign up for the closed beta, Petroglyph is offering all beta testers exclusive access to the Metal God skin for one of its Immortals, Lazarus. The exclusive skin can be accessed during the beta and also after the game is launched by beta testers. You can still sign up to participate at the game's official web site.

The so-called MOBA (Multiplayer Online Battle Arena) game genre has been exploding on the PC game scene in the past year and later this spring yet another free-to-play game that based on this genre will launch. It's called Rise of Immortals from developer Petroglyph. Using the fantasy world that Petroglyph introduce in its downloadable strategy game Guardians of Graxia, the game aims to take the MOBA game trend in some new directions. It's currently taking sign-ups for its beta test.

Big Download got Petroglyph's community manager Mathew Anderson to tell us more about the game, how it relates to Guardians of Graxia and other features of the game.

Rise of Immortals is the latest free-to-play game to be announced that fits into the action-RTS genre that has exploded lately on the PC game scene. This new entry comes from developer Petroglyph and is set in the same fantasy universe as the developer's downloadable strategy game Guardians of Graxia. The game will feature single player gameplay that will serve as practice for the game's online multiplayer modes with support for up to 10 players.

The game will allow players to upgrade their Immortal characters via a persistent skill tree that will allow players to keep their new upgrades and abilities after matches are over. There will also be a place where players can show off their game achievements, chat with other gamers, form and manage guilds and more.

While the game is designed to be free to play it will have an in-game store where players can purchase items like skins for their Immortals (the game's version of Champions) and more. The title will have 12 Immortals to choose from when its released and new ones, along with other new content, will be added on a monthly basis. Petroglyh is already taking sign ups for the game's closed beta test on its official web site. Rise of Immortals is set for its official launch later this spring.

Mytheon has had plenty of hands-on previews and gameplay videos, but this trailer is not one of them. Rather, it's a cinematic detailing the grief of Zeus as he attacks a group of mortals that dare to defy him. While it's not quite as good as other cinematics, it's also for a free-to-play game, so we can't be too overly critical. Zeus's voice-acting wavers between genuinely emotional and unintentionally hilarious, mostly because of the tremors, and the animation is a little bit stiff, but it's still a trailer worth watching.

Download Mytheon 'Zeus' Trailer
Check out all Mytheon downloads

As promised late in 2010, developer Petroglyph has now released the first expansion pack for its fantasy strategy game Guardians of Graxia. The expansion, Elves and Dwarves, is now available for download and purchase via Steam. Normally the expansion would cost $5.99 but for the next week its available on Steam for 10 percent off its normal price. Also the main Guardians of Graxia game is on sale for the next week for 25 percent off.

The expansion itself adds two new guardians to the game (Flist the Elf and Broxin the Dwarf) along with 14 new units and six new maps. The expansion also has maps that will support randomly generated tiles, giving them more replay value.

We've been following the development of UTV True Games' upcoming free-to-play fantasy multiplayer action-RPG Mytheon ever since the game was first announced back in December 2008. Indeed we posted up the first interview about the game the day of it's official reveal. The game was originally developed by Petroglyph and in 2010 it seemed to be getting close to its official launch. In February the game went into its closed beta phase and in April it started its open beta test.

And that's when things got ... interesting. In May 2010 UTV True Games filed a lawsuit against Petroglyph claiming that the developer was holding the source code to the game "hostage". A few weeks later everything seemed to be OK again as the two companies announced that their legal issues had been resolved and that Mytheon would officially launch on July 13. But that wasn't the end of it as it was later revealed that the launch date for the game was pushed back indefinitely. In the end both companies admitted in the summer of 2010 that Petroglyph was no longer involved in the development of Mytheon.

The open beta for the game was shut down in September as UTV True Games announced that the development of Mytheon was now under their own internal development team. Tonight, Big Download can exclusively reveal that Mytheon, under the company's Beijing studio, will restart its closed beta test by the end of January.

The press release, which you can check out after the jump, has more details about the relaunch of Mytheon including word that previous beta testers of the game will be contacted soon via email. Those users will be able to use their old beta accounts in the new closed beta test and will also get "exclusive keys and in-game rewards in the coming weeks" before the beta test begins. The press release does not indicate when Mytheon will officially launch. Big Download also has the first screenshots from the new version of Mytheon which you can check out in the gallery below this post.

Developer Petroglyph Games just recently released its downloadable fantasy strategy game Guardians of Graxia. However the developer team is already busy working on the game's first expansion pack. The Wargamer has the first details on the expansion, which is titled Elves and Dwarves.

The expansion will add two new guardians to the game (Flist the Elf and Broxin the Dwarf) along with several new units and six new maps. The expansion will also have maps that will support randomly generated titles, giving them more replay value. The expansion pack is due for release sometime in January but there's no word yet on pricing.

Gallery: Guardians of Graxia Screenshots

Last month developer Petroglyph released its downloadable fantasy strategy game Guardians of Graxia on GamersGate's PC game download service. Now Big Download has learned that the game will be coming to the Steam service next week and that more content for the game is coming soon.

According to Petroglyph's community manager Mathew Anderson, the game will make its Steam debut on November 10. The Steam version will add achievements to the game's features. About a week after that, a map pack for the game will be released and Anderson tells us, "A full expansion is also being planned before Christmas holiday." We hope to get more info on these expansion plans soon.

As we first predicted earlier this past weekend, developer Petroglyph Games has now released its latest game, the fantasy strategy series Guardians of Graxia. You can now purchase and download the game exclusively (for now anyway) at the GamersGate PC game download site.

As we have noted before, this game is a mix of card collecting features with board game looks and mechanics (indeed Petroglyph is also selling an actual Guardians of Graxis board game). The single player only game, where players have to collect and use cards in the game to build their army on top of the "game board", is already planning to add to the title with downloadable extras and maybe a nice steak to the mix.