After all the chaos of having my Guild Wars account hacked dissipated, I began to reflect on some of the misgivings I should realistically have as a customer. That the system eventually works is a small consolation in a hoop-jumping exercise that would put an HMO to shame. You see, I felt betrayed. (Warning: a bit ranty.)
Author: Ravious
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.A Near Life Experience
Every Tuesday before my Tuesday night MMO event, I usually go hit up Nicholas the Traveler in Guild Wars. Â I punched in my fairly strong password changed from the alleged NCSoft password snafu, and received notice that my account was deactivated (code=45)! Â A quick Google search of code 45 showed that it dealt a lot with bannable offenses, such as botting or PvP match manipulation. Â So many bad emotions flared through my mind, but at the bottom of the barrel was hope.
I knew I had done nothing wrong. Â My biggest rational fear (thought up after a dreamless sleep) was that I had transacted with a true [evil] botter in buying items for Nicholas. Â Otherwise, I don’t even use the unofficially allowed mods. Â I don’t bot. Â I barely PvP anymore, and only in pretty friendly arenas. So, I had a false confidence that all would be right in the end.
Guild Wars 2 Apps
This morning ArenaNet dropped a nice article expanding on the mobile app for Guild Wars 2. Â In conjunction with a brief interview at Rock, Paper, Shotgun, we finally get some screenshots of this app-in-production. Â News of the app has been known since the Curse announcement over PAX Prime, and there are some other really good interviews about the feature. Â I think some of the apps are going to be pretty cool, but I am dubious as to how much of the Guild Wars 2 experience they will carry to the small screen. (ArenaNet says that there will be similar functionality for web users, instead of app users.)
Guild Wars Live Team Interview
With the Guild Wars 2 convention madness slowly winding down, the predecessor Guild Wars will slowly be ramping up with more Guild Wars Beyond, the legendary Halloween festival, and Hall of Monuments information. Â I had a chance to ask the Guild Wars Live Team a few questions, and John Stumme (rhymes with tummy) took some time to answer a few questions about what is happening on the Guild Wars forefront. Â Check it out after the break.
Weekend With Vindictus
I, and just about everybody who wanted one, received a beta key for the Vindictus NA beta event going on until early October (the game is live in Korea). Â I also laughably bought Minecraft on Friday mere moments before the servers crashed due to patch day overload. Â Of course then Minecraft became a free-to-play weekend, but I am happy to support the indie dev making the game. Â It was a very balanced gaming weekend filled with creating cliffside overlooks and aquaducts in Minecraft and destroying just about everything in free-to-play Vindictus.
Bartle-ized Guild Wars 2 Races
A commenter on an another post implied a revisitation to the four Bartle splats for a [MMO] gamer. I thought about it, but it is hard to revisit a subject that has been hammered, beaten, and possibly mishappen through the MMO blogosphere and forums. Instead, let’s also revisit the four non-human races in Guild Wars 2 in view of the Bartle splats. Much more fun that way!
What Am I Doing Here?
Zubon talks about the double-edged blade that occurs when players can scale everything so that everything is end game content. The opposite edge occurs because either developers or players feel that because so much happens on the journey to the level cap then basically there is less at the level cap. My first thought, and the first commenter on Zubon’s post, was about Guild Wars 2. I had just read an interview from an ArenaNet developer on some website, and the developer’s response to a question of end-game content in Guild Wars 2 was very on point:
We have a lot of cool content when you get to the end of the game. That’s one of the cool aspects of our events. You can play all of our content over and over again, and even when you get to level 80 you can go back to old places and finish out the areas and we’ll level you down to where they are to allow you to go back and play that stuff at the appropriate level. So you can always go back and play through content, it’s not just worthless content to you because you leveled past it. It’s almost like a temporary thing where the game sidekicks you down to the level range for the content.
It does sound great on paper. Yet, the opposite edge that Zubon describes feels real. So many MMO players eventually get to the point where they can return to older content. When I do it, I often wonder what I am doing there.
Public Service Asides
A few quick notes before the weekend.
The biggest news on the MMO scene is, of course, that Lord of the Rings Online is now “free-to-play.” Â People of all station are arguing over whether it actually is free-to-play because – now make sure your sitting down if you are reading this on a mobile device – eventually Turbine will want players spend money if they want to continue playing through the content by at the minimum buying content packs. Â Shocking, I know. Â I, myself, thought Turbine was becoming a gamer charity organization.
My two-bit review of the pricing so far is: the cost of content and vanity items seems pretty fair, while the cost of luxury buff items, especially temporary ones, seems a bit high. Â I spent roughly $2-3 buying a skill that now lets my Captain warp to Rivendell once an hour. Â It would’ve cost me about a $1 to buy a one-time-use warp to Rivendell. Â Like any vast cash shop with everything from housing items to hour-long buffs, it has its ups and downs. Â If you intend on trying this game out, head to Landroval if you can, where all the cool kids are.
Another small thing is that Guild Wars 2 beta scams are becoming pretty prevalent. Â Some scam sites are even advertising in Google, and they look pretty professional with solid URLs and ArenaNet art assets. Â I have an eye half-cocked at ArenaNet for not having something more definitive on their site about a beta. Â They have an answer to the question of a beta in their FAQ, but with the huge amount of attention they garnered in the past few months, I think a beta placeholder page is now warranted. Â Anyway, nothing less than either an ArenaNet blog announcement or guildwars2.com site update is going to pass as official for a beta announcement. Â So beware, ye Guild Wars 2 fans.
–Ravious
Guild Wars 2 – Completionist Hearts
I saw them days, possibly a week or more, before I knew what they were. Â From the Guild Wars 2 gamescom videos almost every one showed the player hitting the map. Â The world would zoom out and re-orient from the character in a somewhat artistic way, and I saw heart outlines on the map.
I actually allowed the puzzle of their presence a few cycles of the old brain when an NPC was circling the hearts and at the same time telling me there were farmers about each heart that needed help. Â Event hubs! I first thought. Â Wait, hearts as the icon for event hubs don’t make sense was the second thought. Â Then because I didn’t like the look of hearts on the nice map, I conveniently forgot about them while I was inundated with plenty of other Guild Wars 2 information.
LOTRO – Out of MMO Storage
I have a weird relationship with Lord of the Rings Online (LOTRO) that is unlike any other MMO I play. Â It’s definitely one of my favorites, and it is always part of my Steam catalog. Yet, after it becomes my main game for a few months. Â I have to go completely cold turkey on it for a few months. Â It stays there staring at my as Steam illustrates my array of games, but I have almost a revulsion thinking about firing it up. Â There is no logical reason for it. Â Seriously, I have written and deleted multiple sentences right here trying to put some sense to it.
However, I am back in it now that it has been re-born as a Free-to-Play (F2P) title. Â Not because it is now playable without a cover charge as I have a lifetime account, but because it feels fresh. Â It feels new, and in parts it feels like a different game. Â One that is more caring of my time. Â I like that. Â There is so much to learn, but I think that many LOTRO posts will be coming in the future. Â I saw a few blogger friends also in-game so hopefully they will speak on such things as well. (Oh look, during editing I see one has!)
Last night I was a little overwhelmed. Â Dozens of titles splashed across my screen. Â I was gaining Turbine Points (“TP,” the cash shop currency) at an irregularly weird rate, and I heard that my points I racked up the past few months might take a bit to show up. Â I checked out the slick new dungeon grouping system (please make a collapsible menu), and I did a quick Rift skirmish with a few friends. Â Last night’s play felt like walking into a restaurant and getting free samples of the coming meal before I am even seated. Â Then when I sit down to look at the menu it’s too hard to make one choice. Â I am excited about LOTRO, and I can’t wait to start digging deeper in to all the changes.
–Ravious