This weeks community play diary discusses a few new features in TERA. Scapes and BrotherMagneto cover the basics of dealing with tougher enemies as they progress through the starting zone. More and more they are relying on TERA's combo system to keep their timing and momentum going during combat.

In this week’s edition of the community play diary, we delve further into the Isle of Dawn starting zone for TERA. Scapes on his priest and BrotherMagneto on his berserker seem to be fairing well for themselves.

Most of the topics covered this week have been touched on in the past but they bring more details to light. One of the more interesting topics covered is climbing. In TERA player will be able to climb certain surfaces. This differs greatly from many other MMOs and we at ZAM are intrigued to find out how this mechanic will affect overall gameplay.

Check out the rest of the article here!

After I fought my way through TERA's Smuggler's Hideout instance at the Game Developers Conference, I had the opportunity to sit down with Senior Producer Brian Knox to talk briefly about the demo, the game's recent launch in Korea and his thoughts on the North American release. It appears that once the upcoming community play event is held in early spring, players can expect to see some more consistency from En Masse Entertainment in terms of further community and beta events.

Keep reading after the jump for the full interview, and be sure to check out our look at the GDC demo for details on enemy AI, the user interface, combat and big ass monsters.

During my visit to the Game Developers Conference, I had the opportunity to get my hands on a new TERA demo and play through a portion of the Smuggler's Hideout instance with Producer Chris Hager and Associate Producer Stefan Ramirez. With these two guys playing as the main tank and healer, it's safe to say we took down one of the dungeon's huge bosses and emerged victorious. Of course, I like to think my damage-dealing skills helped out a little bit.

Before we dove into the demo, however, the producers took a moment to discuss the depth of TERA's combat. They explained how the team has focused on the enemy AI, the user interface, the combo system and “big ass monsters” to make TERA's skill-based action combat stand out among a sea of other MMOs.

In this edition of the community play diary, Scapes and BrotherMagneto move further into the Island of Dawn zone.  They encounter more difficult quests and creatures in their travels and as early as level 4 they fight a monster that requires smart play to kill rather than button mashing.

This edition helps to show us that we can expect both difficult single target matches that require skill and mobility to survive as well as multi-target combat that requires finesse in using your combos to keep the horde at bay.

You can read the full article here!

MMO gamers have come to expect resources like Wowhead to be available at or near release, so we’re here to make sure you have the same sort of tools and resources at your disposal. To make your life easier in the early days of RIFT, we’ve compiled a nice list of ZAM resources to utilize while you’re playing your first few hours of RIFT.

Further details can be found after the break, but if you just want to browse what we have to offer, feel free to examine the Soul Tree Calculator, Achievement Database, Ability Database, and Wiki at your own pace. Also, don’t forget to check out the Coming Soon! section to see what’s next up for the ZAM RIFT!

Frogster, the European publisher of TERA, has released a couple videos that show off some of the creepier areas in the game. Arachnaea is a breeding ground for the ghastly Arachens, while the castle at the peak of Mount Tyrannas is filled with all sorts of evil things.

Even though G4TV posted the Mount Tyrannas trailer last week, we're sharing it again since it pairs perfectly with Arachnaea. Check out both trailers and some lore after the jump!

This week’s edition of the community play diary follows Scapes on the priest Amareth and BrotherMagneto on the berserker AmungUnRama on their first few steps into Arborea. They discuss controls, questing, leveling, training, and much more! It seems quite apparent that these diaries are going to be very detailed and cover almost every aspect of the game as these two developers progress.

Check out the full diary article here!

On Tuesday, En Masse Entertainment gave us an exclusive in-depth look at TERA's priest, a class that is capable of both healing allies and smiting enemies. We wanted even more information on the priest, so we sat down with Associate Producer Stefan Ramirez to get some additional details about this versatile healer.

Check out our exclusive interview with Ramirez after the jump to find out what he had to say about the priest. And in case you missed them, take a look at our priest screenshots and video to see the class in action!

En Masse released a new trailer today and G4TV.com is hosting it. This brief trailer shows us the dungeon castle that is "Mount Tyrannas." The ambiance of the castle gives a very dark and menacing feel. Also take note of the monster models and animations and the level of detail that has been put into them.

Check out the video after the jump!