Blade & Soul Closed Alpha Information

[EChondo]

Hello all!

 

For those interested there's a new MMO coming out in Q1 2016 called Blade and Soul, but they have planned Closed Betas late October, November, and early December. I'm very excited for this game and so are many of my MMO friends and we've been keeping a close eye on information regarding the game. Just today I got an email enclosing a serial code and a downloadable game client for a Alpha Test happening this weekend.

 

Email;

 

You are invited to participate in this weekend's Alpha test of Blade & Soul! The Alpha test will be live from Friday October 9th at 10AM PDT / 5PM UTC until Monday October 12th at 10:00PM PDT / Tuesday October 13th at 5AM UTC. This Alpha test will be English language only and will take place on servers based in North America.

 

Please be aware that we will be testing many technical and server-side functions in preparation for Closed Beta, and your gameplay experience may be affected during this time.

So for anyone interested in the game expect leaked screenshots, video gameplay, and other information from this Alpha Test.

 

For example, I can boot into the client and have screenshots of the settings;

https://imgur.com/a/G50Ps

 

I'll be updating the thread with video gameplay over the weekend, unless they watermark it or there's a ToS clause(I haven't seen anything of the sort though).

 

*Update 1*

 

So it appears that the game's anticheat system is nProtect GameGuard. Why is this worth mentioning? Well it's basically a rootkit.

 

 

GameGuard hides the game application process, monitors the entire memory range, terminates applications defined by the game vendor and INCA Internet to be cheats (QIP for example), blocks certain calls to Direct X functions and Windows APIs, keylogs your keyboard input[citation needed], and auto-updates itself to change as new possible threats surface.

 

Since GameGuard essentially works like a rootkit, players may experience unintended and potentially unwanted side effects. Since the game's process cannot be stopped from the task manager, if the protected game has an infinite loop or hangs in any way, it is effectively impossible to close without logging out or restarting the computer. This is even more frustrating since GameGuard checks if it is already running on the game's launch and does not permit the player to start a new instance in such cases. If set, GameGuard blocks any installation or activation of hardware and peripherals (e.g., a mouse) while the program is running. Since GameGuard monitors any changes in the computer's memory, it will cause performance issues when the protected game loads multiple or large resources all at once.

If you're not comfortable running an anticheat rootkit on your machine, you might want to steer clear of this game completely. As for my opinion I'm not comfortable with it on my machine. However from looking at my machine when the game is on and off, GameGuard's processes and services also turn on and off and doesn't linger when the game isn't on. So it's probably fine, but to me it's still really sketchy to have this on my machine. GameGuard doesn't install, it merely runs alongside the game client, but when you uninstall the game you have to manually delete GameGuard in three locations: in the game's install files(Program Files), SysWOW64 or System32, and supposedly even in the Registry. I can't find it in my Registry, so I don't think it branches in there. For more detailed instructions removing GameGuard go here: http://www.alteredgamer.com/pc-gaming-tech/1709-how-do-i-uninstall-nprotect-game-guard/

 

*Update 2*

 

With the first Alpha weekend closing I have recorded some gameplay for you all here;

 

The class is a Kung Fu Master, I'll try to have some gameplay of the summoner uploaded in the middle of the week. The next Alpha is Oct 16, 10am PDT - Oct 19, 10pm PDT, so expect more people coming in and having gameplay up as well.

[XTankSlayerX]

I've been eyeing this game, looks fun...

Albeit its more adult oriented with its art style It still looks really great (Also, the dance animations are really great)

[Orvid]

According to a reply by one of the B&S staff on Reddit here, there's no NDA, so I don't think they'll have an issue with anything said here.

[EChondo]

I've been eyeing this game, looks fun...

Albeit its more adult oriented with its art style It still looks really great (Also, the dance animations are really great)

Oh yeah, it's more than likely getting a M rating if it hasn't already. Some of my friends were able to play one of the Asian versions of the game a while back, but the latency was unbearable, so they've been waiting for a NA release.

 

According to a reply by one of the B&S staff on Reddit here, there's no NDA, so I don't think they'll have an issue with anything said here.

Ah cool, thanks for the heads up! I don't visit Reddit anymore so I wasn't aware there was a B&S sub-Reddit.

[XTankSlayerX]

Oh yeah, it's more than likely getting a M rating if it hasn't already. Some of my friends were able to play one of the Asian versions of the game a while back, but the latency was unbearable, so they've been waiting for a NA release.

I wonder how bad the censorship is if there is going to be any.

America doesn't play will with anything remotely sexual/nudity. I hope they don't censor then fun out of it (I.E. Make a legit cool looking character look terrible, like they did with TERA I believe.)

[EChondo]

I wonder how bad the censorship is if there is going to be any.

America doesn't play will with anything remotely sexual/nudity. I hope they don't censor then fun out of it (I.E. Make a legit cool looking character look terrible, like they did with TERA I believe.)

I just updated the OP. I found out that the game uses GameGuard for it's anticheat, which is basically a rootkit. It doesn't install itself, it runs alongside the game's client, but to me it's still sketchy. Just thought I'd give you the heads up and anyone else who is interested and reads the thread.

[Sujieun]

To bad only a hand full get selected if you purchased any of the founders pack.

I guess purchasing the 125$ pack doesn't matter T_T

[Orvid]

They're trying to scale up the tests a bit more gradually, as more people purchased the packs than they anticipated. They sent out invites at random to those who'd purchased a founders pack, and will send out more for the second technical alpha, before allowing everyone in with the first beta on October 30th.

 

I did notice that the game wasn't in the process list, which I assume is part of bitguard's anti-cheat mechanisms, but I have to wonder just how effective that actually is. Also, you said it was a key logger, are you sure it isn't just a key listener? The former is a security risk, while I could care less about the latter.

[Nomy]

I've played it for some time on the russian server, I enjoyed it and I'm looking forward to it's EU release.

Though those quests.... I guess mmo's are doomed to all have the same type of quests, not sure what else I should be expecting but those linear quests are such a bore.

 

Let's hope their closed beta's go withouth problems so we can finally get that open beta started, considering how long this title has kept us waiting already <_<. 

[Nomy]

I just updated the OP. I found out that the game uses GameGuard for it's anticheat, which is basically a rootkit. It doesn't install itself, it runs alongside the game's client, but to me it's still sketchy. Just thought I'd give you the heads up and anyone else who is interested and reads the thread.

GameGuard is a well known anti-cheat program. It's been used for several big mmo's over the years.

Not sure what you're so paranoid about, I've played many games with it and never had any issues.

[EChondo]

They're trying to scale up the tests a bit more gradually, as more people purchased the packs than they anticipated. They sent out invites at random to those who'd purchased a founders pack, and will send out more for the second technical alpha, before allowing everyone in with the first beta on October 30th.

 

I did notice that the game wasn't in the process list, which I assume is part of bitguard's anti-cheat mechanisms, but I have to wonder just how effective that actually is. Also, you said it was a key logger, are you sure it isn't just a key listener? The former is a security risk, while I could care less about the latter.

It's been reported that it used have the functionality of a keylogger, but it's still classified as a rootkit, so I think that's worse than a keylogger

 

GameGuard is a well known anti-cheat program. It's been used for several big mmo's over the years.

Not sure what you're so paranoid about, I've played many games with it and never had any issues.

If it was so well known I wouldn't have found out about it right now for the first time. 

Cool that you don't have issues with a rootkit being used on your PC. Also many people have had issues with GameGuard, this is my first time encountering it so I'm on the edge. I have had to use other programs like Punkbuster before, which is a PITA and have caused me loads of issues, so I don't understand why companies still use this crap.

 

Also, just because it's well known doesn't mean it's good. I have a personal friend who bypasses GameGuard on old MMO's they used to play, this isn't going to be any different it seems.

[Nomy]

It's been reported that it used have the functionality of a keylogger, but it's still classified as a rootkit, so I think that's worse than a keylogger

 

If it was so well known I wouldn't have found out about it right now for the first time. 

Cool that you don't have issues with a rootkit being used on your PC. Also many people have had issues with GameGuard, this is my first time encountering it so I'm on the edge. I have had to use other programs like Punkbuster before, which is a PITA and have caused me loads of issues, so I don't understand why companies still use this crap.

 

Also, just because it's well known doesn't mean it's good. I have a personal friend who bypasses GameGuard on old MMO's they used to play, this isn't going to be any different it seems.

 

It's not an ordinary rootkit. It doesn't grant them access to your operating system or files, only the priviledge to close down programs and prevent certain actions from being carried out while you're accessing their software which in this case means: playing their game. Don't be one of those that just throws the word rootkit on software and leave it at that, do some more research.

 

And just because a 19 year old has only just found out about a certain anti-cheat software doesn't mean it's unreliable.

We were talking about you being afraid of having this so called rootkit on your PC, what your friend does to bypass anti-cheat software on an old mmorpg is not something I can comment on.

The fact that this company and their anti-cheat program exist for so many years already and is used in a wide variety of mmorpg's however does give it some credibility to not be your random googled rootkit program.

[EChondo]

And just because a 19 year old has only just found out about a certain anti-cheat software doesn't mean it's unreliable.

We were talking about you being afraid of having this so called rootkit on your PC, what your friend does to bypass anti-cheat software on an old mmorpg is not something I can comment on.

The fact that this company and their anti-cheat program exist for so many years already and is used in a wide variety of mmorpg's however does give it some credibility to not be your random googled rootkit program.

And just because a 24 year old trusts a random rootkit on their PC doesn't mean that everyone else has to take your word for it.

 

My friend already got past B&S's GameGuard, so it's already broken and worthless.