Welcome to rand() week at Kill Ten Rats unknowingly sponsored by Leala Turkey of Spouse Aggro fame. For those sane enough not to have scratched much of the surface of spreadsheet programs or number intensive programming, rand() is a random number generator. And this week, I will be talking about randomness, choosing random topics, and generally throwing things to the whim of the all-conquering RNG. Sound boy, proceed to blast into the galaxy. Continue reading rand(Two Step)
Month: March 2010
.
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.
.Perspective
A friend of mine has dolls that she treats as children. They each have personalities, wardrobes, adventures, etc. She posts about them on the assorted social networking sites. I sometimes find this odd until I remind myself that we are doing the exact same thing, probably for more hours per day, only our dolls our imaginary, digital, and gated behind a monthly fee.
: Zubon
If you’re gonna play the game, boy…
… you gotta learn to play it right.
Major props to the guys who did that masterpiece.
Comment Spotlight: Cryptic’s Model
I was going to try a positive spin on Cryptic’s approach, but Sente covered it, so let’s pull that up from the comments:
The philosophy that Cryptic has applied here is one that is “player-driven development†in the sense that feedback from the players should drive much of the development of the game.
I think it is a nice idea and also something that puts less risk into the project, which I think is needed for MMOs. But going with a traditional subscription-based model topped with an item shop does not fit that well into this approach to development.
The offerings of 6 month/12 month/lifetime subscriptions for STO and CO is also something that does not quite rhyme well with this development approach.
Given the choice if Cryptic should have spent 2 years or 5 years developing STO I definitely prefer the current approach of 2 years. But it is not fair to ask customer to pay to wait for them to develop what initial player feedback might indicate.
I forgot at which blog I read a little model showing moving “release” a few steps earlier in several waves of “fix bugs and add content” (link it [thanks!] if ya got it). Of course, a downside is if an entire system fails. City of Heroes underwent massive overhauls to basic systems in years of beta, such as back when Origins were very important rather than 98.72% decorative. If you decide that your entire combat system needs to be re-done, there are few positive synonyms for “NGE.” If they decide in 2011 that Champions really should have been class-based, that is hard to graft on top.
: Zubon
Evil Behind the Curtain
The big gaming news this week is easily Activision’s firing of the Infinity Ward heads, and the storytelling lawsuit by the two fired against Activision. Infinity Ward heads the Call of Duty franchise, which is one of the three Activision franchises accounting for a gross proportion of the corporation’s income. World of Warcraft and Guitar Hero being the other two. The plaintiff documents paint a picture of pure corporate greed. It is not just the firings of the two people just prior to when they would be paid a believably significant royalty but also the immediate actions of Activision after the firings in creating a Call of Duty business unit.  Either Activision is going to very nearly slander the plaintiffs in the response or this will all get settled outside of the public eye. My popcorn bowl hopes for the former.
It brings, once again, an interesting dilemma: how important is it that a gamer’s fun is created by a good-willed corporation?
The end is the beginning is the end
(yup)
If you haven’t heard, WoW is reworking its mechanics and stats a great deal when Cataclysm comes around. Take a look. Nice post.
It’s silly to generally judge all these changes as a whole and form an opinion right this second about them, because no one outside Blizzard has seen these new mechanics at work. Of course there are people who don’t like it already, but I guess that’s just the logical reaction when your cheese is being moved around. System shock and all that. I’ll wait and see how it works myself.
But what I think we can say is…
Famou$ Credit
I can’t stop raving about Wizardblox. Other MMOs need this pronto. It gets even better when my wife plays Wizardblox and all of the sudden I see a gift pop up on my Wizard101 screen telling me she just sent me 100 gold or so. It’s a funny hypocrisy, but I hate getting crap in game – like for Lord of the Rings Online festival gifts where I get some crappy food I will never use. Yet, when I can accrue some crap and some other niceties out of game… it feels nice. It feels rewarding.
Anyway, one thing I received through Wizardblox was a transformation potion that changed me into a Krokotopian mummy for an hour (I love how they run with their little Krok legs). I landed in the commons area of Wizard City, and my screen blew up with friend requests. I couldn’t hide in the mass of players when I was standing twice as high as them. I had to quickly run out of the zone with the annoying friend request in the middle of my screen. Continue reading Famou$ Credit
Price Cut
Suppose people are disappointed with your product. Suppose it’s an MMORPG and people are arguing whether it’s really an MMORPG or not. People are claiming they’ve been ripped off. People are upset. Seems like a price-cut will make everyone happy right? No, not necessarily. You won’t find copies of Cryptic’s offer from a few days ago on their website. For that, you’ll have to check out forums outside Cryptic’s control like the mmorpg.com forums.
Lots of MMOs have price cuts, of course. But MMOs are not supposed to have a price cut within the first month after launch. The hardcore Star Trek fans who paid for their pre-orders weeks ago, felt ripped off. To make matters worse, many of those same fans purchased multiple copies of the game in order to secure one of every pre-order bonus item. Too bad there’s no end-game content to wear those precious limited-time cosmetic uniforms to. If there was, then the STO lifetimers would have something to do other than troll their forums.
Continuing Preparations for the Zombie Apocalypse
As gamers, you have likely slaughtered thousands if not millions of the virtual undead. We celebrate your preparedness. Daniel Lakeland has modeled several zombie apocalypse scenarios using rigorous statistical methods, and he estimates that we may need as many as 4 “elite zombie hunters” per 10,000 population to make up for the general apathy and lack of education concerning the zombie threat. Be ready to take your honed skills to the streets, for you may be all that keeps the death cry of humanity from being “Braaaaains.”
: Zubon
Hat tip: Gelman
Game of Thrones
HBO is going to have one more sub soon thanks to this news:
Winter is, indeed, coming.
HBO has greenlighted highly anticipated fantasy series “Game of Thrones.”
The premium network has picked up the project for a first season debut next spring (below is the first released photo from the series). Nine episodes plus the pilot have been ordered. Production will begin in Belfast this June.
Awesome.
– Ethic