Category: General

X is a problem with the community or structure of a game such that others can have a large negative effect on your gaming session. Usual recommendations: solo, bring your own friends/group, avoid potentially risky (i.e. anything involving gameplay) interactions with others.

I keep saying that if game Y is fun so long as you bring your own group of people, almost anything is fun if you are just using it as an excuse to hang out with your friends, so the game is contributing nothing. You could randomly pick any of dozens of options, and you will probably be better served by playing something other than an MMO. But most folks seem comfortable with this equilibrium in which we are contact with building gated communities within gated communities instead of pushing for pro-social game designs. This pushes me away from MMOs, because what’s the point without that first M, and into lobby-based games where we get up to 4 friends together, done.

On one hand, this is a natural consequence of the Hell that is other people. On the other, shouldn’t we expect better?

: Zubon

A few days ago, a fairly entertaining little F2P game launched, Glitch. This game has a dev team like one of those interesting dev teams that made me take a deeper look at Rift, so I of course had to check the game out. With a Flikr co-founder and the creator of the wildly fun Katamari on board, it was bound to be fun to look at, if nothing else, I thought.
Continue reading A good Glitch

Long time reader and commentator, Muckbeast, who actually has a real name I suppose. Let’s call him “Michael Hartman.” Anyway, turns out he’s in charge of Frogdice, Inc., which has been around for nearly a score, and a Mid-West game developer on top of that! He asked if we could shed some light on their new social web game that “is NOT on Facebook.”

It’s called Coin ‘n Carry, and it seems pretty neat. There is a very thorough tutorial/overview on the game at YouTube, which tech-deficient parents might find useful if they don’t understand how to sign up for things. The basic premise is economy and mini-games. Working with the community is helpful, but Frogdice created the game with those implied Facebook games in mind. In other words, things that are wrong and annoying with Facebook games, like mega-spam, they developed away from.

The game is free-to-play, which is what Frogdice have been doing for their games since when I was a lad. Hartman says that:

“Unlike many other F2P companies, we target the long term with our customers. It is our philosophy that deep gameplay designed to entertain people for the long term will result in players eventually choosing to pay something towards the game. We feel that value proposition works best for all parties in the long run. As a result of this philosophy, a significant portion of our customers on Threshold RPG have been playing for over 10 years.”

Kind of refreshing, actually. And, they have years of evidence to prove it. Anyway, supporting developers on the ‘sphere is a good thing, in my humble opinion. Hence the plug. If you check it out, feedback here is most welcome.

–Ravious

The krepost in Civilization V is one of the most simple, elegant, nearly hidden pieces of design you are likely to find. Every Civ V civilization gets a special ability and two altered units or buildings. The Roman legions can build roads, the Siamese wat combines culture and science, and the Americans are good at bombing things. The Russian unique building is the krepost, which replaces the barracks. It is a normal barracks plus a 25% reduction in the culture cost to acquire new tiles. Like the barracks, it is unlocked with Bronze Working, an Ancient Era technology.

That one bonus on one building creates a dynamic that simulates Russia beautifully. It encourages you to build a barracks in every city, even for a quasi-pacifist player like me who has no need to build troops in every city. That leads naturally to a more militaristic playstyle. The bonus also facilitates the creation of a large empire with extensive borders. Those borders will put you into conflict with neighbors who object to your taking up half a continent, but those neighbors might be hesitant to mess with an enemy who is prepared to mobilize troops in every part of the empire. And this mechanic starts in the earliest stages of the game, which gives it time to define your strategy and to let those cultural borders expand.

Add one unrelated bonus to one item and watch the entire play dynamic change.

: Zubon

In a recent survey of FPS players, 8 out of 10 deaths were caused by “lag,” “laaaaaag,” “high ping,” “damn hackers,” and “those idiots on my team.”

: Zubon

I’m happy to help a friend in need so long as I think it will make a difference. You have some friends whom you would gladly lend money or your car. You have other friends who constantly need to be “lent” money, and you know it is going down a bottomless pit. They have back-to-back Facebook posts about how much they love their new iPhones and how they can’t afford to buy books this semester.

I feel the same about game developers. I want to keep afloat the companies that make products I enjoy, but I am immediately disinclined to contribute to someone who always has his hand out. I presume that the latter brings in more revenue than it drives away, but I am one of the driven away. I don’t mind a cash shop ad at log-in plus a link somewhere on the UI. I do mind if the most visible (worse: and flashing) UI element is a shop ad, along with a constant stream of pop-ups and item descriptions that ask you to spend money.

There is an old one-liner about how banks will only lend you money if you don’t need it. Close, but where a good banker makes his/her money is being able to distinguish between an investment that will pay off and a black hole of endless “need.” In life, try not to resemble the latter.

: Zubon