– Ethic
Author: Ethic
I own this little MMO gaming blog but I hardly ever write on it any more. I'm more of a bloglord or something. Thankfully I have several minions to keep things rolling along.
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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.
.All Access Pass
SOE has theirs and NCSoft is working on one. Turbine should give some very serious consideration to having one. In fact, it just might keep them alive. Fire up an old AC2 server and include it just for fun.
I can only see an upside for an all access pass for any MMO company that has more than one game. It would create more box sales and keep more customers playing. Can anyone think of the downsides?
Oh and while I’m at it: Family Plans.
UPDATE: SOE raised their price to $29 for their pass. Are they nuts?
– Ethic
Too Many Characters
I decided to create a character to play along with Kwip in World of Warcraft when this happened:
Some sort of bug I guess. Bah.
Director of Internal Affairs
[EVE Online] The latest dev blog over at EVE Online brings some hope for a cleaner, brighter future.
In what a feel is a good move, the new director of internal affairs makes an introduction and follows with some plans for the future. The part that Arkanon said here is what I was hoping to read:
I believed, and still believe that we owe our player community the right to be the focus of EVE, without paid employees using dirty tricks to swing our universe in their favor. Even playing by the rules, I frown on employees being power players to the extent that their gameplay results in any sort of domination over others. I don’t believe CCP employees should run the EVE universe; that spot is reserved for the paying customer. EVE is a sandbox, but it’s not our sandbox. We’re here to keep it clean and provide the sand.
I hope so Arkanon, I hope so.
– Ethic
The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar – Beta Screenshots
[The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar] Finally got the clarification that we are indeed allowed to share screenshots from the beta test. I went through my first batch and will share them with you today. If there is something you’d like to see, let me know and I’ll try to get it for you. Remember while looking at these, I had my graphics turned down so they do not look as good as they could. I’ll try to get some better shots soon.
Approaching town, the guards blocked my entrance. But as I closed on them they decided I was friendly and let me in. In town, I stopped by the jail to taunt some of the prisoners. Outside, people had their laundry hung up to dry. There was a blacksmith nearby, hard at work.
Continue reading The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar – Beta Screenshots
The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar – NDA Lifted
[The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar] The NDA has been lifted for The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar. As this announcement caught me off guard, I really don’t have anything prepared so I’ll just go off on a very brief ramble review here.
I have been in the beta for several months now and I still log in to play at least once a week. My wife has me playing World of Warcraft most of the time and that is fine with me because I am planning on pre-ordering The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar anyway (and taking advantage of the lower fees). I really don’t want to play it too much before it counts. Surprisingly, even though she is a big LotR fan, she is not showing any interest in the game. She says she just got into WoW and does not want to go starting something new right now – so perhaps it will be a game down the road for her.
Continue reading The Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar – NDA Lifted
Hunter Update
[World of Warcraft] Since I last left you, our blood elf hunter duo has reached level 21. On the way there, we have had several really fun moments. It’s amazing how much more I am enjoying this game with my wife at my side.
When we were night elf hunters, my wife tamed a ghost saber as a pet when she was level 20. There are these little cat figurines in Darkshore and we kept picking them up. Eventually, a see-thru cat spawned and attacked us. We wondered if we could tame it so we spent another hour trying to get one to spawn. Eventually we did get one trained. Not long after, it dropped dead and we didn’t know what to do. She tried to rez him and it worked. Guess it is some kind of bug, but anyway I digress.
CCP Comes Clean
[EVE Online] CCP t20 On Recent Allegations:
As you might have read and heard, there were recently some allegations posted regarding developer misconduct that basically come down to:
* Developers helping (an) alliance(s) gain information they otherwise would not have.
* Developers having an unfair advantage of game mechanics.
* Developers helping themselves acquire goods in-game by means of in-house tools, otherwise not available to regular players.
All allegations mentioned above are untrue, except one. Sadly enough, the allegation regarding unlawfully obtained blueprints are, in my case, true. I’m here, laying out the facts of what happened in June 2006 so this whole issue — which jeopardized my colleagues, my company and our community — can be put behind us, I hope for the better.
Should Devs Play Their Own Game?
Recently, in EVE Online, allegations have arisen about the possibility that the most powerful alliance in the game had gained benefits due to having several CCP employees playing in their various corporations. The accusations revolved around things such as finding out about events ahead of time, getting valuable items handed over to the corporations, and gaining inside information that might help advance a war against another alliance.
CCP has investigated these claims and so far has only admitted to having employee characters in many alliances and since they have now been “outed”, they will be removed from the game (or maybe just revised to have a different name and corp history – my thoughts only, not something CCP said they would do).
PVP is Grief Play
[EVE Online] My subscription has run out and I think I’m done playing EVE Online for good. War between large alliances has shown me some things about pure PVP games, things I don’t care for. Is PVP in it’s true form nothing short of grief play? At least in EVE, I say yes it is.
In EVE, it seems the best way to win a war is to try and ruin the fun of the game for your opponent. Smack them on the public forums, get spies into their alliance so you can post private forum threads on the public forums, steal their stuff, shut off their player-owned stations from within, and do everything you can to demoralize them. In short, make them want to quit playing the game. In a game that supports these play styles, expect nothing less.