Category: General

[completely off-topic] A friend of mine is trying to take a British kinda-holiday national. That would be today, so-declared International Kissing Day. Those of you lacking appropriate partners can use in-game emotes, although check your game’s harassment policy first depending on your use.

We now return you to your scheduled blogging and gaming. Thank you.

: Zubon

[World of Warcraft] I know this is old news, but I was talking about it with my friends over the Fourth of July weekend and we were somewhat confused about the whole deal. They haven’t really announced what will be going on so I’m not sure how much interesting stuff will be there. Sony had their Fan Faire in Las Vegas which was a sort of Sony Online mini-convention. It didn’t sound like the best time ever, but hey, it’s hard not to have fun in Las Vegas. Blizz Con will be somewhere in Orange County, CA. As long as they keep the prices resonable, I might check it out, being an OC resident and all. The Anaheim Convention Center seems the most likely venue, although they might go for somewhere closer to Irvine.

Anyways, I was trying to get some others to commit to go with me, but the general response was “what are they going to do?” No one seems to understand what the thing will be about. Will it be mostly WoW and maybe about the expansion? Or are they going to throw something WC3, StarCraft, and Diablo players can get excited about? We’ll see, but I found on friend who will be there just to see if they have any models dressed as night elves.

DC

[EVE Online] Today the EVE Tranquility Server was down for patching. This Patch will include the Outposts (dockable POS YAY!!) , Dreadnoughts, Frieghters, and A Missile “Nerf”, as well as a PvP timer that prevents you from logging out to save your ship if you are in trouble.

More information check out the dev blog.

-Zxyrox

This is gold. Comedy gold. The guy that wrote this probably isn’t American so the grammar is a little off, but its the internet. No one has good grammar on the internet (well, besides me).

If you don’t have a wife, or fiancée, or girlfirend, or have ever had one of the above, or ever plan on having one of the above, or have met a woman, or have heard of the term “woman,” then this is not for you. For the rest of us men out there, this is great.

If you are a woman, please ignore the following link…

Guide: How to manage having a wife and playing a MMORPG.

ringthree

[EVE Online] I am warping about Gallente space, running some missions, shooting down pirates, when my contact asks me to deal with The Disgruntled Employee. Hmm, what is this?

Yes, I have something for you. Federation Customs recently sacked one of its employees after a routine inspection revealed a large amount of indecent pictures stored in his personal database. Sadly, this ex-employee wasn’t all too pleased with our decision, and has resorted to camping outside of our headquarters and harassing our customers. Fortunately though, we dug up some old offences this guy made and revealed them to the authorities, who promptly lowered his security rating quite a bit. In effect, he’s fair game. Please warp over to the location on the bookmark I’m about to give you and squash this little pest. I doubt he will survive for long, as some of our customers are heavily armed. So hurry up and take him out if you want your reward.

It is a short distance from “porn on the work computer” to “price on your head.” Of course I select option 1. No problem, I’ll do it, since camping someone’s HQ is rude. Let’s head to the mission!

The disgruntled smut-king’s hideout is supposedly located within this former asteroid belt which has been almost completely mined to oblivion. A suspicious looking hollow asteroid and a few barren rocks are all that remain of this once densely packed belt.

Ah, there he is, with two of the weakest drones I have ever seen. Checking info:

A disgruntled ex-employee who has been harrassing local customers.
Threat level: pathetic

Mission: success! Tomorrow: more heroics!

: Zubon

[Lineage 2] In Lineage 2 you have the wonderful feeling of knowing that if you ever need help, you can simply type /gm and usually within 20 minutes a real GM will be talking to you (wow).

This concept tends to breakdown however when you ask a question and the GM continues responding with prewritten form responses which in no way answer your question. After informing the GM that this response does not answer your question, you are rewarded with another form response which is simply the same response you were given before, yet written somewhat differently.

What is this GM doing, playing Russian roulette with a response generator?

Finally I explain once more what my question is and why this person has not yet answered it. Response? “Is there anything else I can do for you today?” I told them no thank you and to have a great day.

GM Evaluation: Poor!

Spot

[World of Warcraft] I fail today at naming this post but I do provide you with information about World of Warcraft. Cold hard facts from the Lead Developer Shane Dabiri (we go way back, we do!) about the great and wonderful-ness of WoW, and how they plan on taking over the universe on the backs of Epic White Tigers.

There were some comments of note:

We are committed to delivering the highest quality online experience for our players. Some of our upcoming plans have already been mentioned on our community site. For example, in our next major update, we will be releasing Blackwing Lair, a 40-person raid dungeon, where you will be able to battle against the epic dragon Nefarian and his minions. We are also working on a 20-person dungeon called Zul’Gurub, and the mysterious lands of Ahn’Qiraj in Silithus. Outside of dungeons, we want to continue adding new world events, such as a carnival that will take place in Mulgore and Elwynn forest.

Awesome! A third dungeon to grind through endlessly when you have nothing else to do after you ding 60!

Of course, on top of all this, each content update will also bring new quests, items, professions recipes, and continued class improvements. Some have asked about an expansion and what it might hold. I wanted to let players know that it is in the works, and we’ll release details as soon as we can.

Yes, Azeroth, not everyone has left Blizzard to go work at NCSoft! We still have the guy that brings me coffee in the morning. And we managed to shackle two of the junior interns to a desk. They are now being instructed in game coding, a la A Clockwork Orange! So there is an expansion on the way, but the GM’s will be forced to ban you if you ever ask when it might be released. Oh yeah, forgot to mention we tossed that in the last ToS update…

Anyway, back to reality, Blizzard looks like they are working pretty hard at content development, so there should be more for everyone soon.

Blatantly stolen from the WoW general discussion forum.

ringthree

Well, normally I think CCP is one of, if not the best devs in MMO history, the customer service is great, the server is reletively lag-free, and the patches dont take forever to download and best of all, I’ve never been stuck in a server que, ever. In adverse to WoW where there have been server downings, que’s, and just no way to get on. CCP has always made me glad to be onboard, but there is an aspect of the game that sets me over the edge.

1. The GMs (much like UO) are extremely evil and sedistic most of the time. Hell, most of them ARE pirates, and they have been known to kill random innocent players in low sec with thier uber gimped faction ships and tech 2 mods, therefore having a ship about as powerful as 5 Battleships, which is obsurd. And they have the powers of a basic chatroom moderator, except they dont need to be limited to a chat window…no! Lets give them the ability to take away a players ability to type in private conversations, corp, local, and even send eve mails for set amounts of time for either A. being petitioned for disrupting a chat channel (which can sometimes be a false acusation) or B. because you slight them, although it is rare to run into a GM in person or in chat, it has happened and multiple people have complained. I myself was gagged my first week of EVE for “Not respecting the rights of members in the channel” which was basically me going into a chat and being a newb unaware that it was a roleplaying channel, and when my friend asked if anyone liked anime was told “anime, hmm the records have no history of that since 2010!” and then questioning the sanity of the roleplayer.

2. A new bookmark nerf, now CCP has kept nerfs and most things to a minimal if not beneficial degree (the missile nerf sounds like a good idea IMO) but they now want to nerf bookmarks which are essencially an ability to set up a quicker faster route to an asteroid, stargate, or station. Making the travel system in EVE semi-bearable. Now CCP is one of those companies that give the Pirates(PKers) ALL the love as far as nerfs, updates, and fixes with anything else. And they have been complaining that its too easy for an industrial ship or helpless mining craft to escape thier clutches with quickwarps(QW). So the devs are going to make all the pirates happy by proposing a way to make a quickwarp that worked one day, not work the next. However I can see one good reason for this and it is serverside loads from the people with thousands and thousands of bookmarks. Now, saying the QW make players invinceable is a load of bullcrap, it still takes large ships like battleships, battlecruisers, industrials, and even cruisers time to warp, and having to fly 15km in a slowass indie is possibly the most annoying thing you will ever do in EVE, hell in low sec we have to constantly take supplies to our POS in a .3 system, therefore meaning each time we carry millions of supplies through those systems to just keep the thing alive or even to get the products from it to sell, we will need to bring an escort with us, which might not work if they are in large ganging groups. Overall this idea is stupid.

3. Not being able to dock at a POS. I could go on for hours on this but I already have on everything else so I will spare you the pain…but… I REALLY WANT TO BE ABLE TO DOCK AT MY OWN STATION. I would think this would be standard issue. Considering a starbase is…well…a starbase, and its nothing more than a chore without that ability. Hell I would move out and live in low sec if I could dock with our POS, and yet CCP complains about trying to get people to go out in low sec. Well not being able to dock at a station and nerfing QW, the most essencial travel tools, aren’t going to help. For the first time i’m not liking the choice of CCP but still the game is great and I cant wait for the new Dreadnaught class ships to be released…for now…happy hunting you lucky pirates!

-Zxyrox

I read online forums. Alot of online forums. Not just for MMO’s either, but that is a story for a different day. I have found one constant in the forums about MMO’s. Everyone bitches. They bitch about everything. They bitch about bugs, they bitch about nerfs, they bitch about RMT, MPK and anything else in the alphabet soup of complaints. It gets to the point where I wonder why some people play these games.

In amongst all of this bitching there is the occasional voice of sanity. This is a list of the sane and rational thoughts that I have compiled that, if followed, will likely help to improve everyone’s game experience.

1. Have fun. Seriously, if you are not having fun playing these games then something is wrong. If something is wrong, maybe it’s time to find something else to do.

2. Be nice. Its a pretty simple idea. Don’t grief, gank, MPK, or in general piss people off. I am sure it’s fun at the time (actually, I dont even understand how it could be fun at all), but you are just ruining the experience for everyone else. It’s kind of the American way now to only think of yourself, so I guess it’s the cool thing to do, but almost all of these games are based on some kind of community and if you are not helping the community, then you are just hurting it. Even, if you only care about yourself, then you should still be nice, because no one is ever going to help you if you dont.

3. Dont buy or sell in game currency. What is the freaking point? This is not Doom 2. There is no “idclip” command or god mode. What is the purpose in cheating in an MMO? This one has always gotten to me, I just dont understand the motivation. Do they think that all of their friends will think they are “uber” just because they instantly have “uber” gear? More like they will think that you are an attention whore.

4. Want to have “uber” gear, but don’t “need” it. We all want to have our epic armor, or our rings of doom or whatever, but that doesn’t mean its necessary to have them to play the game. Farm, work, quest, do whatever to get it but dont let it frustrate you that you dont have it.

5. Understand simple economics. Just because things are expensive and they are continuing to get expensive doesn’t mean the economy is broken. A contstant in all MMO’s is that money is always coming into the economy, through farming, crafting and questing, and less of it is going out of the economy, through loss, buying NPC items, etc. This means that there is a constant state of inflation in all games. Inflation isn’t bad, per se, because the cost of the item that you want may be increasing but so is the cost of the items that you are farming. It all balances out.

6. The developer is not out to get you. Blizzard really is trying to fix the bugs. SOE really does want you to be happy when you are playing. Square Enix isn’t out to get you. They have tons of people that are working on the games to make them better all the time. Just because YOU feel slighted because YOU perceive a problem doesn’t mean that it is an actual problem.

So, I guess I just spent a bunch of time bitching about bitching. I know I feel better.

ringthree

[The Matrix Online] OK, everyone has probably heard about Sony Online Entertainment aquiring the rights to The Matrix Online from Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. I played The Matrix Online for a while and I thought it had the most potential of any MMO. But, like the Matrix movies, potential was not realized.

Remember at the end of the original Matrix movie? Neo was stopping bullets in mid-air, beating the crap out of agents, and flying around in full view of the public. You got the feeling that in a sequel with a bigger budget they could do amazing things. Plus you had the very interesting story of how the world (well, those “blue pills” in the Matrix anyways) would react to seeing a flying man. Instead of showing us any of that, in the sequels Neo pretty much just goes around kung fu fighting more people.

Instead of one agent he takes on hundreds, plus two ghosts for good measure. We don’t learn how the world reacts to flying Neo or seeing Morpheus swordfight on a moving truck. By the time the third film came along, they basically gave up everything they set up at the end of the first film and focused on the real world (Zion). I actually enjoyed the last film a lot and I think the people making the new Superman movie should watch that final fight between Neo and Smith. The second film actually isn’t that bad either if you try and ignore all the pretentious pseudo philosophy talk. However, neither film lived up to the potential of the first one. Why is Neo even worried about agents when he could stop bullets and easily defeat them at the end of the first one (the answers is probably because they didn’t want to make him too powerful, which would be boring to watch since he would never be in danger)? Well, the game pretty much suffers the same fate as the film series.

The game is based on a great premise that it never really lives up to. Maybe I’m just missing the whole techno punk aesthetic, but the game is very depressing to play. The gloomy, green tinged cityscape aside, the central concept of the game is to maintain the status quo. The three factions (Machine, Zion, and Merovingian) have a peace which you must maintain although you spend much of your time killing operatives of the other factions. While it makes no real difference which side you choose in the game, if you look at it logically, why would anyone side with not Zion? Before you point to Cypher, who betrayed everyone and worked for the Machines in the first film, realize that in that film the Machines agreed to let him re-enter the Matrix and live a happy life with no knowledge of the real world. Which mean the motivation (storywise anyways) for joining the Machines in game is to… one day not have to play the game? Maybe I’m just taking the story aspect too seriously. Some people probably just get a kick out of working for the Machines, but for me I must be emotionally invested in the story to enjoy the game.

In WoW I truly have moments when I feel bad for the Undead and want to kill those Scarlet Crusade bullies picking on them. In MxO the most sympathetic faction is Zion, but they admittedly cannot win and their goal is to only maintain the status quo, which isn’t exactly the most exciting of motives.

MxO was probably designed to have murky motives that might appeal to some. The incredible ammount of customization of wardrobe and abilities would definately appeal to more hard core gamers. However, the game suffers from more than just a tedious storyline. The finished game just wasn’t polished. It was confusing as hell and it was harder to get into than Guild Wars. To be fair, I did not experience any of the live events that MxO is know for. Friends who have told me those really shined and alone are enough to justify the monthly fee. If they are as fun and involve as many famous actors from the film as I’ve heard they are, I would agree. (BTW, what ever happened to those elemental attacks promised in the last, last WoW patch?) I love in game events. I even liked the lack luster Children’s Day WoW had a while back. It was lousy, but at least it was something new.

Getting back to MxO: under Sony I’m not sure the special events will continue. They were probably the main reason to play to game to anyone outside die hard Matrix fans. Over the past few years Sony has actually gone from electronics company to major media player. They bought out Columbia Pictures and are now a major Hollywood player. I would imagine that they could definately continue putting out decent MxO events. They got Heather Graham for EverQuest 2 so it isn’t as if they haven’t involved famous actors with their online games in the past. I’m just not sure MxO will be a huge priority for them. The game doesn’t have huge subscription numbers and their flagship title is EQ2, which has had live events as well, although, by all reports, not as fun as the MxO ones.

It’ll remain to be seen if SOE is commited enough to continue producing live events for MxO. Remember, the MxO live events involve must be approved by the studio (Warner Bros. would probably not be happy if they had a live event where everyone dies and they can never make another sequel), the creators (who have been said to have wanted to continue the Matrix storyline in the game and were active in the games development), and actors (who would get hefty paychecks and some creative input). How difficult will it be for SOE, which is owned by Sony Pictures, to work with Warner Bros., a rival studio? Then again, SOE seems to get along fine with Fox, which owns Star Wars, but everyone knows Lucas really owns Star Wars.

I was going to write about SOE aquiring the rights to a DC Comics MMO set to be released in 2007, but didn’t realize that I’d write so much about MxO. I’ll do the DC Comics thing later this week. For those keeping score: DC Comic is at Sony Online Entertainment. Vivendi Universal has the rights to a Marvel Comics MMO.

DC