Trion had their 27th February 2015 Friday Livestream where they talked about RIFT’s past and gave away a ton of giveaways both in-game and on the livestream including a signed copy of RIFT and some original comic strips.

No announcements about the game were made, you’ll have to wait for Trion’s PAX East Party next week for those.

Click here for a replay of the 27th February 2015 Livestream video on twitch.tv.

Legend:
Black/Normal Text = Livestream Summary.
[Dark Blue Text] = My own comments. i.e. May not be indicative of actual content.

Trion had their 27th February 2015 Friday Livestream with Community Manager Eric “Ocho” Cleaver, Art Manager “Marigold”, Game Director Christopher “Archonix” Junior and Lead Content Designer Julia “Darkmoon” Flemming.

Executive Producer Bill “Daglar” Fisher, Studio General Manager Ross Brown, Engineer SuperMan_Socks (RoughRaptors) and a multitude of Trion staff members also appeared on the stream.

As always, everything can be subject to change prior to the content hitting Live.

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Reflections on a RIFT

Trion reminisced about the past in relation to RIFT as part of celebrations for the 4th Anniversary of RIFT.

• During launch day, the team were mostly playing the game alongside players.
• There was a countdown to launch announced throughout the office.
• Archonix’ favorite content is Chloromancer.
• Marigold’s favorite content is Hammerknell Fortress.
• Darkmoon loves making open world zones and stories associated with it.
• Daglar’s favorite content is Lantern Hook quests/area.
• Hinted at players visiting Hammerknell Fortress in Patch 3.2. [Likely the HK Instant Adventures mentioned a while back by Tacitus].

Countdown to RIFT 2011

CaptainCursor shared a youtube video in the livestream chat channel where he counts down to the launch of RIFT in Trion’s office. You can check it out below:

Direct Link: “AND WE ARE LIVE!!!” by Captain Cursor.

‘RIFT’ in 2007

Trion showed off what ‘RIFT’ looked like back during an initial concept build in early 2007, four years before its launch in 2011. At the time the game wasn’t even called ‘RIFT’.

The segment on the video can be seen starting at 9min 5sec into the recording here. The video shows off a port (not Port Scion), some of the old character models, skill bar, an in-game event called “The Port Siege” and some of the initial Dragonian mobs.

Interestingly, one of the RIFT Store feature image backgrounds looks exactly like this ‘Port’ from back in 2007. It leads me to believe that some of the other feature images are concept art for areas in the game that have never existed since launch.

Here’s some more screenshots from the video:

Inside the harbor, with winding stairs on both sides of the main entrance and a windmill to the left overlooking a waterfall.

The original character model with action bar. Interesting No.5 seems to be a chair, so likely the sit emote, and No.6 is likely the clapping emote.

“The Port Siege has begun!” – a ‘zone event’ from back in 2007 where a ship sails into the port and then explodes in front of the players. From the looks of it, either the red and green are factions, or perhaps even early guild emblems that didn’t make it through to launch.

Some early Dragonian mobs. Blue lizards/gecko-looking creatures without much taste for armor. Very different from the fashionistas over in Droughtlands.

Quite an interesting look at ‘RIFT’ back in 2007, 4 years prior to launch. Again you can check out the video at 9min 5secs into the recording of this week’s livestream here.

New Zone/s

Trion seems to have hinted at new zone or zones coming to RIFT. Here’s some quotes:

Darkmoon:

Really looking forward to…maybe some new zones in the future.

Archonix:

…but if there was say, a zone, that, maybe players have wanted for a while that we’d give it to them…

CM Ocho:

Mentioned maybe once or twice haha.

Archonix:

…that’d be cool. I’d like to do that some day.

Archonix previously mentioned that they hadn’t started on Myrkur’s Depths but that there is a new zone coming. Could it be Planetouched Wildes? Anyone’s guess at this point, but Planetouched Wildes is definitely a place mentioned a few times by players. Another possibility mentioned quite often is Shi-Ming.

We’ll probably have to wait until PAX East to find out though.

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4th Anniversary Arclight Rider Mount

Trion showed off the new 4th Anniversary Arclight Rider Mount. It uses the Arclight Rider model, but has ‘hot rod’ decal and a “IV” symbol on the hood. The Arclight Rider mount was designed by RIFT’s Lead Concept Artist Sven Bybee.

Note: In the above image, DEV_Darkmoon has a ‘puppet head’ vfx so her head is larger than usual.

The mount has 155% mount speed, or matches your fastest mount. It is also Amphibious.

Although not visible in item preview, the mount has a “IV” sign on top of the hood at the front of the mount in celebration of the 4th anniversary of RIFT.

Archonix has mentioned that the mount will not be available in the near future on the RIFT Store, but that it will be available from Trion community events.

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Livestream Giveaways

In-Game Giveaways

Several of the 4th Anniversary Arclight Rider mounts were given away to random players in Tempest Bay on the Faeblight (NA) shard during today’s livestream. Some of these were based on being the first to link various completed achievements, such as the legacy achieve “I’ve Got Soul And I Am A Soldier”, which is an achieve for obtaining a PvP soul (no longer exists in the game).

More copies of the mount are being given away during Trion’s Party at PAX East on 6th March 2015 in Boston.

Note to EU Players: Darkmoon has stated she’ll be on an EU shard on Typhiria (EU) in Tempest Bay tomorrow morning at 11am PST/7pm GMT on Sat 28th Feb so keep an eye out for her. She’ll have trivia and achievement challenges!

Livestream Channel Giveaways

During the Livestream, a handful of livestream chat channel viewers received:

• 1x 4th Anniversary Arclight Rider Mount to 5 livestream viewers.
• 1x Ultimate Nightmare Edition Pack to 1 lucky livestream viewer!
• 1x RIFT Classic (Physical) copy of the game with various signatures from the RIFT team + 4th Anniversary Arclight Rider Mount to 1 lucky livestream viewer
• Several original art for RIFT’s comic book + 4th Anniversary Arclight Rider Mount to several livestream viewers!

You can check out all the original art that was given away here.

Congratulations to all the winners!

(From Left to Right: Ocho, Marigold, Archonix, Darkmoon)

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Some interesting things revealed about RIFT, including a most fascinating video of RIFT from back in 2007 (4 years prior to launch). Congratulations to all the winners of the various giveaways as well and hope you all have a Happy 4th RIFT Anniversary!

What’s Next?

Keep an eye out for any announcements for RIFT during Trion’s PAX East Party in Boston, Massachusetts (USA) on 6th March 2015 at 6-9PM EST. More information on the event can be found here.

If you are in the Boston area be sure to check out Trion’s party, which will contain various giveaways, including further codes of the 4th Anniversary Arclight Rider Mount and game announcements.

Past Livestream Summaries can be accessed here.