MMO Weekly Recap #451 May 7th – Elyon Closed Beta, Destiny 2’s Season of the Splicer & More!

JamesBl0nde recaps the MMO gaming news for the week of May 7, 2021! Transcript follows.

Destiny 2 brings back the OG Vault of Glass raid, The Elder Scrolls Online brings in some mighty fine companions to fight by your side, Eve Online is celebrating 18 years running and just when you thought all the characters where already in Fortnite, think again.

What’s good everyone, JamesBl0nde here with the weekly recap for gaming news and announcements for the week of May 7th 2021 and it’s a rather short week of news this week, but a good one regardles so starting out the news this week…

There’s great news for people who’ve been watching Elyon closely: its closed Beta has officially begun!  From now until May 10, chosen beta testers will be able to access all the general content of the game, and the weekend brings the massive Realm Wars and Clan versus Clan PvP battles the fantasy MMORPG formerly known as A:IR promises to provide.  Beta testers from this first wave will receive a unique mount, outfit, and title when the game launches.  Didn’t get chosen for the first wave of testing?  Don’t worry!  There promises to be plenty of events and sponsorships providing keys to access the game.

And if you’ve ever played The Elder Scrolls Online but had no one else to help you with some of the more difficult content, you might be in luck!  The upcoming Blackwood chapter will introduce Companions to the game, giving you an ally to fight by your side as you adventure throughout Tamriel.  These companions can be customized with the gear they equip and the abilities they use, along with cosmetic changes such as being able to use costumes you’ve unlocked and which mounts to ride.  Two companions are available in the expansion, and both will have a quest to do before you can recruit them.  Of course, there are some restrictions on their usage, such as no PvP or solo arenas, of course, and they’re not available in housing instances either.  Also, the actions you take influence how your companion feels about you, so if you do enough to erode their rapport, they’ll simply be unavailable to you. Which makes sense, don’t make them mad. The Elder Scrolls Online: Blackwood launches June 1, with console releases coming the following week.

Meanwhile Destiny 2 is about to experience endless night, unless you can stop the Vex!  Season of the Splicer has been announced for the game, and with it comes something from the original Destiny: the Vault of Glass raid.  Additionally, the six player Override activity will challenge you to steal Vex code and uncover vast secrets.  There will be a weekly pinnacle mission — Expunge — which tasks Guardians to exploit the vulnerabilities in the Vex Network to try and bring it down from within.  Of course, new gear and more will be available throughout.  Season of the Splicer begins on May 11 and lasts until August 24, with the Vault of Glass raid opening later on May 22.

What do you get when you mix one of the most beloved comic book characters with the most popular arena shooter?  You get Batman Zero joining the Fortnite crew!  Yes, this includes a print comic run twice monthly, which includes codes for bonus items, including the Rebirth Harley Quinn outfit.  Collecting all six comics and codes will also give you the Armored Batman Zero outfit, as well!  If you can’t seem to get your hands on the print comics, not to worry; subscribers to DC Universe Infinite will also be able to access digital versions of the comics, complete with codes, and all items will be available in the Item Shop the moment the print release is out.  Issue #1 launches April 20 and will run until July 6.

In other news, Bless Unleashed launched its Secrets and Scions update, and with it come some pretty significant changes to the game.   In addition to plenty of quality of life changes and class adjustments, a number of dungeons were moved to become time dungeons — ones that can only be accessible during specific time frames. Additionally, two Beoran field bosses were replaced completely, and a sixth Beoran campaign reward was also added, which include a Shadowy Spectral Puma mount to collect.  One of the biggest changes, however, was the team removing the Master Enhancer NPCs from the game.  This NPC was originally there to ease some of the stress of enhancement, but instead had a major negative impact on the game’s Marketplace economy.

EVE Online is celebrating a monumental anniversary: 18 years!  What better way to celebrate than with several ongoing events? From now until May 18, simply logging into the game will grant you daily gifts, including up to 450k skill points.  New event sites are found all across the game, including wormholes, challenging you to destroy capital shipyards and information outposts owned by the Equilibrium of Mankind.  New SKINs, cerebral accelerators, and more are yours for the taking if you can bring them down, but be warned they are designed for battlecruisers and above.  Additionally, the monument to the Massacre at M2-XFE has been completed and can be visited in game. This commemorates the 257 titan pilots and over 3000 other ships destroyed in the largest war in video game history. Really cool that they made a monument to that event.

And to round out our news this week, Journey is back for a fifth season in GWENT!  For those of you, who, may not be in the know, Journey is GWENT’s progression system where you level up by winning matches in the game’s standard, seasonal, and draft modes.  This season features over 100 levels to unlock, with exclusive avatars to collect and reward points to earn.  Those reward points can then be used to purchase items from the in-game rewards book.  Season five focuses heavily on Triss Merigold, legendary sorceress and beloved friend and companion to Geralt of Rivia.  In addition to the base Journey tier, players can also purchase a premium tier, giving instant access to the Neutral Leader Triss skin, and even more unlocks available compared to the free tier.  Season five will remain for the next three months, starting today!

Finally it’s time to talk about the Epic Game Store free game of the week.  This week’s offering is Pine, an open world adventure where humans didn’t end up as the superior species of the world.  You play as Hue, a young man trying to find a home for his tribe.  Along the way you’ll encounter plenty of different humanoid species to which you can trade with, or even fight against.  Events in the game can happen even without your involvement, giving it a true living world feel.  With six distinct biomes to travel, and untold amounts of places to discover and things to do, Pine has a lot to offer open-world RPG enthusiasts.

And lastly, I wanted to let you guys know that next week the family and I will be headed on a much need vacation so that means no recap next week. If only I could have the gaming industry pause the news for a week while I’m gone, so we don’t miss anything. That’d be nice. Either way I’ll be back and refreshed hopefully for the news week after next.

But with that said, that’s about it for all the major news and announcements for this week. Be sure to stay safe, and keep your families healthy! Like always you can find more information on the news topics, linked in the description below, feel free to discuss the news or even more news in the comments below and don’t forget to like, subscribe, wash your hands a bunch, hit that little bell icon to get notifications and of course share this video! But until next time guys that’s going to be it for me… I’m JamesBl0nde… see ya out there gamers!