.

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.

.

The Old Comfortable

In Lord of the Rings Online: Siege of Mirkwood, my journey is over.  I have a smattering of small quests left to do on the Eastern side of the zone, but for the most part my leveling and errand-boy running are done.  Now my time with my main character has simplified drastically.  Instead of pushing from quest hub to quest hub and through the epic story, not quite sure what’s next in store, I have set goals with planned steps.  Signing on has become a comfortable chore that I was used to for months before the expansion jarred me from my oasis of calm with the rest of the herd.

This is not a bad thing, and for many MMO players this is how we actually play.  We sign on to craft a few items, check the auction house, do a few daily quests, and that’s about it.  These gaming chores are interrupted on busy or event nights by grouping up for a group instance.  The braver choose to make random connections through pick up groupings.  The best part is that everybody at this level is right there with me.  When I was journeying geographically and leveling, I was for all intents alone.  Sure there were clearings in the forest where my journey would intersect another’s, but for the most part everybody was either at the end or somewhere in the middle.

Is this another diseased symptom of MMOs following the DIKU/Everquest based ancestors?  Or is this a benefit of allowing so many gameplaying styles in MMOs?  For a “true” solo player, couple, or static group, the journey together can easily be the whole game.  Whatever sticky content exists at the end like being drunk for 10,000 minutes for a title or killing 10,000 rats for achievement points is irrelevant.  For those whose social groups are guild or alliance-based, the broader social net means a more heterogeneous place in the journey.  The so-called “end game” merely provides a place in the journey where broad social groups (like an entire server) are all on the same page.  It’s an old comfortable place to be in the herd until the devs tell the us to move to another watering hole.

–Ravious
crackalackin’

Wonders of the Internet

While looking for a Penny Arcade strip after a friend announced that he was planning to marry a mermaid, I discovered the Wikipedia page on the “mermaid problem,” said problem being the difficulties that human men have having sex with them. It mentions two solutions to the problem without noting the main difficulty men have in this, which is that mermaids do not exist. It also goes on to mention H.P. Lovecraft and Starbucks in the same sentence, which is always a winner.

I note this because the internet decided there needed to be an encyclopedia page on the subject, with more than 100 people contributing to it over the past 5 years. And you can’t get your own Wikipedia page because you are not notable enough.

: Zubon

Massive Delays

Gamers love when Blizzard says that a game will be “released when it’s ready” because they believe it indicates the final product will be of high quality. However, we don’t really react well to news of a delay, do we? When Bioware announced that Star Wars – The Old Republic was being pushed back an extra year into 2011, the community on their forums went into a nerd-rage.

Continue reading Massive Delays

At the Library Conference

One of the exhibitors is showcasing Battle Royale. It is a Japanese novel from 10 years ago, now in manga and movie form, about a bunch of teenagers armed then left on an island until there is one survivor. The Hunger Games came out in the US 2 years ago, it being a novel about a group of teens enclosed and forced to fight until one remains (sequel is out, movie planned). If I can find a few more of these, I must just read them all in a row.

Knowing a bit about each book, I am reminded of how different our gamer tactics are because of respawning and chat. People set up great ambushes and backstabs in FPS games, and you might warn your friends while dead or spawn as a countering class to go back for the guy. I know one character from those books who does very well with a “feign death and ambush” tactic, until he meets someone who knows rule 2: the double tap. And it only needs to fail once.

I have also been offered five teen vampire romance novels. I can tell that others lie in wait behind the less prominent promotions.

: Zubon

Names I Miss

One thing I miss from City of Heroes is that absurd names made sense. Back in generic fantasy world, the characters theoretically have the names their parents gave them. You might be able to justify Goblinslaya as a self-given name/title, but people like Roflcopter or Moocow are wandering immersion-breakers, implying either that we accept Theme Park YAFMMORPG as a game rather than a world or that this one idiot does not while the rest of us are pretending to take the setting seriously. WoW seems more conducive to silly names than The Lord of the Rings Onlineâ„¢, but I maintain my persecution of names like Analfist or xXxShadowAssassinxXx.

Actually, I’d still hate those people in City of Heroes or Team Fortress 2. Seriously, “Analfist”? It’s not like I’m making up any of these names.

In City of Heroes, the names are intended to be self-given titles. Comic book characters get funky names; it is part of the genre. King Waffles is a perfectly cromulent hero name. Statyk Shok? Hey, I’ve seen worse alternate-spelling names in real comic books. People who use upper-case Is to look like lower-case Ls? Okay, they need to die.

: Zubon

STO Reviews: Short and Long Form

Conveniently, you do not need to think about Star Trek Online, because the blogosphere has already done it for you. Keen has the quick version that about matches the consensus. If you want all the details, West Karana is the place to be:

Sente has the middle-length version.

: Zubon

Nice Touches

I am on the road today, and I would like to comment on well-programmed bits in an online non-game, namely MapQuest. First, MapQuest has an “avoid” button on its directions so that you can conveniently re-route around undesired roads. Some competitors hide that feature or just lack it. Second, it lets you opt-out of having ads printed on your directions. Opt-in is preferred, but I understand the business case, and the opt-out box is at the top of the page. Third, you can now hide roads on your printed directions. This lets you cut the quarter page that amounts to “get to the freeway from your house.”

As we say in our MMO context, these little bits of polish make all the difference.

: Zubon

Legos On-screen

I have been waiting for Guild Wars 2 and Diablo 3 for a long time, but I have been waiting for Lego Universe even longer (and it’s been delayed just as much). I’ve been playing with Legos for most of my life.  My Facebook icon has been and always will be a rendering of me in Lego form.  Small sets of Legos scattered around my office (and I don’t work in a place where hip swag is really allowed).  My first gift to my first daughter was a Lego set.  And, I have had Legos on my computer since 2004.

Continue reading Legos On-screen

Marathon MMO, A Vignette

A happy couple sits at the end of a gently used sofa.  The husband has his arm around his wife and has his other arm resting on the armrest of the sofa.  He watches a laptop on a laptop table while his wife thinks deep thoughts about how to spend Christmas gift cards as she occasionally glances at the laptop.

Wife: That’s pretty.

Husband:Yeah, Lord of the Rings Online ™ has some great visuals.

Wife: I like watching you play this game because of the landscapes.  It’s much better than shooting people all the time.

Husband: You know… once I get my Guild Wars 2 computer, you can use this computer to play this game with me.

Wife: I don’t know.  You are always yelling and killing things.

Husband:They aren’t really living things.  Think of them as pinata gift bags.  You told me you liked that part when we played World of Warcraft, briefly.

Wife: That was kind of fun.

Husband: This game is not just about killing things either.  You can craft things, farm, fish, and even decorate your own home.  I know you would like that.

Wife: I suppose.  I don’t know, the game actually seems kind of boring.  All I see you do is run through the pretty landscapes anyway.

–Ravious
Captain Shakespeare: It’s my reputation.