Month: December 2008

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Промоакции для игроков не только в шутерах — воспользуйся промокодом Vavada от наших партнеров и получи бонусы, которые подарят азарт и атмосферу, сравнимую с игровыми победами.

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From a Business Perspective

Your MMO is not a success based on how many players you have, whether they supply enough revenue to keep the servers running, or even if you turn a profit. If I can get a better rate of return investing in Blizzard and its parent company, I have no reason to invest in your game. I have no idea which MMO company has the best rate of return (Three Rings?), but that is your investors’ target. This is why games shut down even when they are still showing a profit: you can use those resources elsewhere and make more money. Or not, because there are a lot of short-sighted executives out there, but the cynics are consistently beating the gamers who keep hoping the next game will be the New New Thing. An investor may turn his nose up at what a gamer considers a win.

And that is limiting the view to the industry. Anyone care to guess what the return on investment is for a good casual game? How many non-WoW MMOs out-sold the latest Nancy Drew adventure this holiday season?

: Zubon

Update: will it help us avoid distractions if I rephrase as “ROI * risk” and/or “ROI over time”?

Peggle Extreme

In an inspired bit of marketing, there is a free Peggle demo available on Steam: Peggle Extreme. It is not this extreme, but it mixes Peggle and Valve graphics. Unicorn with head crab? Check. Skateboarding beaver on fire? Check. GLaDOS telling you how well you are doing? Check.

And the full version is five bucks this week.

: Zubon

Guild Wars 2 Crumbs Follow-Up

Regina Buenaobra, one of ArenaNet’s Community Managers, took some time to clarify an ethereal post I wrote about the crumbs of Guild Wars 2 information found in the stockholder’s conference call.

The Kill Ten Rats / Massively posts make it appear as if NCsoft has a lot of direction over our marketing strategy, when this isn’t the case at all. The GW2 marketing strategy is determined by ArenaNet, not by NCsoft. The formation of NCsoft West ensures that all studios owned by NCsoft have the freedom to determine their own marketing strategies, in fitting with what they think is best for the games that they develop. NCsoft developed Aion, therefore NCsoft is determining Aion’s marketing strategy. What ArenaNet decides to do with GW2 is independent of what NCsoft wants to do with Aion.

I find the clarification heartening, but for a different reason than the obvious.  To be honest, I have lost a lot of faith in NCSoft.  After Auto Assault, Tabula Rasa makes strike two, but my problem is not the death of the games.  Rather, it is how they lived and died.  I do not think either should have been a part of the $15 flatline from the start, and I definitely think that there were other options than shutdown.  Options that may have retained more consumer confidence, perhaps.

So, I remain in this fearful dichotomy of my favorite developer being corrupted by its Korean overlord.  Regina brings a kind of salve to this fear.   Especially if ArenaNet is further layered away from shareholders by NCWest.  Now, back to writing more so-called articles.

–Ravious
…a reasonable amount of trouble.

Skill Training Complete

I accepted a 5-day “welcome back” offer to EVE Online. It might take me five days to figure out where I am and what is going on.

I have about 8 million skill points. I was feeling pretty good about that, until the new (since I last played) Certificates showed me what a newb I am. I have 4 certificates, two of them in Drones. But I am a newb flying an Iteron V, darn it.

(For the curious, that is 2.7 million in Spaceship Command, 2.2 in Learning, 1.6 in Drones, .6 in Engineering, .5 in Social, and the rest scattered.)

: Zubon

Developer Feedback

You spend all that time on the forums, and occasionally some lucky person gets red/blue name attention. It seems so much like one-way communication, with the occasional community manager contribution. Some games have some developers who comment on some topics, but often the hot issues are avoided or left for an official statement.

In the Kingdom of Loathing, developer Mr. Skullhead responded to some board feedback on the holiday event:

[player], and those who share the sentiment below, **** you. **** each and every one of you. **** you sleeping, **** you waking up, **** you standing, **** you lying down. **** the horse you rode in on, the groom that brushed its mane, and the blacksmith that made its shoes. **** your mother, your father, any siblings, and any other living members of your family tree. **** you.

This is a family blog, so I have edited out some of the 34 F-bombs, but I think we can approve of his candor. If you pursue the link, he responded to specific criticisms as well:

Low drop rates? Favoring farmers? **** you. …
Presents are suboptimal? **** YOU. …
No outfit in the pressies? **** you. …
No wrapping paper? **** you. …
The worst of all of this, the one that really pisses me off, is the whole “you guys were too lazy to write content so you stacked the deck so you wouldn’t have to do any interesting writing.” If you seriously believe that and you’re not just trolling, I invite you to get some mayo, mustard, and maybe a dollop of sour cream, and eat my **** ***.

I need to donate to that game again. I can criticize only the implied connection between graph-making and virginity, although I favor tables to graphs.

: Zubon

Linked changed due to wiki editor deletion. Thanks Noz. In case it re-appears: link.

MMO Lexicon: Il Cattivo

This is the final part in the series on MMO lexicon. Now, the ugly. The lexicon that carries some baggage. It might be good. It might be bad. Regardless, it carries some heavy prejudices when used. These suckers are the unshaven, motherless bandits that run in to town with a rope around their neck to drink horse water.  The law rarely affects these scum.

Continue reading MMO Lexicon: Il Cattivo

MMO Lexicon: Il Brutto

This is the second in a three part series on MMO Lexicon.  Now, the bad.  The lexicon that requires explanation, or doesn’t always make sense.  These are words that a seasoned MMO gamer will know, but that doesn’t make it right.  These suckers are the squinty eyed angels of death that might do you some good, but in the long run they will sell their soul and allegiance for an extra buck. Admittedly, they do get the job done.

Continue reading MMO Lexicon: Il Brutto