I’m as happy as a clam can be before being plucked off the sea and put in a soup with other fellow clam carcasses. I have found a new metric.
See, it was about time. The last metric I had adopted was TTC (Time To Crate), and this was years ago. Sure, I still use it. It’s a good one. But it’s been years! I needed a new one, so lo and behold, I found this baby casually skimming the LOTRO boards.
Say hello to my little friend: TTSHF (Time To Start Having Fun) - or, as I renamed it, simply TTF : Time To Fun.
Continue reading ‘My Newest Elusive Metric’
Here’s a question for those that raid out there: You’re about to hit a new and likely unfamiliar target, but one that is announced ahead of time. Are you more likely to:
a) Pull up a spoiler site and read up on the event to prepare yourself
b) Ask questions on the guild site about the fight
c) Log in a bit ahead and see if people know what generally will happen
d) Log in and wait for the raid leader(s) to tell you exactly what to do, including when you can go to the bathroom.
Me, I tend to over prepare, including watching videos. That’s the way I’m wired. I like to win. I don’t mind failing dramatically either, or going down in flames with a valiant attempt. Standing around for an hour while prepping is annoying, however. That’s why I left EQ raiding. And while I realize when you pull in people there will be some confusion, having to explain to 18 out of 25 people, individually, what their jobs will be really bites. Also, waiting an hour for anything in a game is really really dull. Not even /gems can save that.
People are willing to spend hundreds of dollars for characters, items (useful or fluff), gold, virtual land, “premium” access, privilege and even life-time accounts. But what else would they be willing to part with their hard-earned money for?
I’ve charged people to officiate weddings in some games, I’ve seen artists charge gamers to draw their pencil/paper RPG characters, and I know a few talented writer types that have charged to write cool backgrounds or stories for their friend’s favorite characters.
Would you pay to name a street in a city? How about christening a bar or tavern in some metropolis? What about naming a creature or being able to design a creature? How about having your favorite RPG character immortalized in the history and lore of an MMO?
Continue reading ‘What Price Fame and Immortality?’
I somehow failed to mention that the Annals of Improbable Research has a paper directly relevant to session play. This could help Turbine work out some issues in advance. For those of you not interested in reading some fairly academic research, there is a video of the author presenting a summary at a conference.
: Zubon
My wife bought The Last Unicorn for our two year old daughter yesterday, and I watched it again last night after nearly fifteen years. It is most definitely created for a young audience, but it was one of my first experiences with the fantasy genre close to a quarter of a century ago, and still holds a dear place in my heart. If you have children, buy it and watch it with them. You and they will not be disappointed, and you will be fostering the MMO players of tomorrow. We got our copy for $1.89 in the discount bin. What a steal! My daughter awoke this morning, clammoring for more with cries of, “Daddy, watch corn?”
~Cyndre
As jokes go, the punchline to this is going to be a huge letdown. So let’s make like an goblin raiding party and move swiftly on.
The recent news about the forthcoming “session play” was greeted with mixed feelings amongs the community, not least this one. While the introduction of player Trolls and Rangers in the Ettenmoors PvP zone was understood, there remained a big “why?” with respect to the introduction of player controlled chickens.
In an interview with GameSpy, Creative Director Cardell Kerr gives a little bit more of an insight into the thinking behind this decision, amongst other musings on the games future:
Chicken play is an experimental prototype for the eventual inclusion of other time-limited Monster-play type classes in the game’s PvE zones. “This all started because we were thinking about a monster-play style quest in which the player plays as a wounded orc trying to get back to his camp after the attack on Trestlebridge,” Kerr said. The problem, according to Kerr, was figuring out how to control the presence of evil player characters outside of the Ettenmoors in PvE zones. This is an issue the development team has been wrestling with for a long time and it’s one he admits that the team hasn’t figured out how to solve….Chicken play is the first step in figuring this out.
So there we have it. Let the discussion commence.
My wife and I are really, really enjoying this game. However, I have reached that point in every steamy new MMO relationship, where I start to Google information, re-read old reviews, and generally preview whats in store for us around the next level or the next 10-20 levels.
What I’ve read, scares me a little…
Continue reading ‘Lord of the… Flings?’