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.
.This is the sort of thing that makes me want to give your company money.
Tech Support will rise from the ashes soon! With his trusty metal companions at his side, he will become an Architect to fear!
Or maybe it will suck and I’ll re-cancel a week later. Stay tuned to find out!
– Ethic
I am not hardcore enough for Darkfall Online.
Then again, I wasn’t hardcore enough for Everquest the second (or, as those of us in the know liked to call it, EQ’s sequel) because I thought that sitting around for 3 hours for a quest spawn was just a little bit of a waste of my time. Not that it didn’t stop me doing that in Star Wars: Galaxies I hasten to add. That damned Corellian Corvette on the Master Pilot mission was mine several times.
But Darkfall Online? No – definitely not hardcore enough.
I’d QQ more but, honestly, first I’m just gonna have to go right ahead and start caring.
Continue reading It’s True!
For the first time in an MMO, I feel I am on the cusp for forthcoming content. I am no longer catching up to the masses. I have always been a more casual gamer in MMOs. The aged Bartle Test would classify me as an EAKS. In Lord of the Rings Online, I am finally max level, nearing the end of the current epic quest line, and finishing up the current zones. Being on the cusp does not mean I have nothing to do; rather, the anticipation to forthcoming content is a bigger deal. It’s a bittersweet place to be.
Marc Nottke at Massively writes his last column on “phasing” for MMOgology, a column that had a very good run. Phasing is a mechanic in a persistent MMO world where prior to some event horizon players are all in phase alpha of a zone. After the world-changing event, players belong to the phase beta club. A town that players once loved is burnt to the ground, there may be new mobs, new quest-givers, etc. in the beta phase.
The problem with the big MMOs current use of phasing (namely World of Warcraft and Lord of the Rings Online to a much lesser extent) is that the community is partitioned. The door goes one way, folks. When you raised the ire of the enemy and your city was burned, well you can’t go back in time to see the city unburned. That would be silly. Now it’s time to eke the new world order out of the ashes.
Guild Wars phased the world between the starting area and the rest of the game with the first offering, Prophecies. Players refused to leave. They stayed in phase alpha, and to some degree – as much as is possible in Guild Wars – built a community there. This is an extreme, but it does highlight the dangers of phasing. People are not happy when people in the beta phase club cannot come back and group up with the slower alpha phase club. Developers therefore have to be careful to limit the scope of the alpha phase in width and depth. Areas unaffected by the event should not be partitioned, and players should not have to spend inordinate amounts of time trying to pass through to beta phase. More thoughts after the break.
I’ve been tagged by Ysharros over at Stylish Corpse to post my sixth screen shot so I looked into my storage drive to see what was there. Asheron’s Call 2? Dungeons & Dragons Online? EVE Online? Nah.
I decided to go with my World of Warcraft folder because the 6th image in there comes right out of the end of beta event and includes three Magmadars in a place where they just don’t belong. Without any further rambling, here it is.
This is a tag-free post so relax. You may pretend I tagged you if you want to play along.
– Ethic
I have been starting the end game for Lord of the Rings Online Mines of Moria expansion. There are six dungeons in Moria. I have not been in every dungeon, but each dungeon seems to be a full dungeon having hours of content. The ones I have experienced so far each have had an excellent story vignette, and they are beautifully crafted.
However, I don’t know if I will ever get to play the full experience of each dungeon.. or just one. Each dungeon has a hard mode. The best way to describe it is hard mode requires a trick, which usually requires two things. The first thing is players must usually ignore a lot of the dungeon’s content in order to accomplish hardmode. The second thing is players must employ some sort tactic that is not usually required.
When hard mode is beat players get a one-in-six chance to get the absolute best armor in the game - radiance armor. This armor is required to fight the (current) ultimate boss of Moria: the Watcher in the Water. The loot gained from doing the dungeon as normal pales by comparison, as does any crafted items. So, Turbine created an atmosphere where players only want to do hard mode. Yesterday, I saw a group on a global chat trying to form for well over an hour to go through to play one of the dungeons normally.
I like the challenges that hard mode presents, when they are not bugged to hell (which many are). I do not like that Turbine funneled players to this extreme degree. I hope that upcoming Book 7 update looks at hard mode with a hard eye.Â
–Ravious
hip about time
Epic quest 2.3.9, “We Cannot Get Out,” is one of the most fun session play instances: you play a dwarf champion with ridiculous stats, and you slaughter many orcs. The quest also has a recurring bug: the NPCs you click to advance/leave the instance break. You cannot get out.
: Zubon
“Montana Sucks! Now go home and tell all your friends!”
Recent discussion of WoW tourists brings to mind the problem of all tourists: “let’s go somewhere different and whine about how things are not like they were back home. The food here is funny. The toilets are weird. They act like they don’t even speak English.”
The tourists go looking for virgin wilderness, something pristine and untouched. Then they leave tire tracks, litter, and poo; they call for modern conveniences, ideally heated cabins with indoor plumbing and room service; they mock the locals as yokels and wonder why they are not friendlier.
We conclude this series with another double-length binge spent roaming the tunnels of the world’s largest dungeon.
I have been to the north, where the cave opens to the snow-blown mountaintop. I have been to the south, where the fiery depths begin and where the spiders lie in their holes. (As the map shows, north is up and south is down.)
I have been to a garden, kept alive underground with light reflected from the surface. I have been to a grand cavern of fungus, where one might live out shadowy years on mushrooms and brackish water.
I have seen rooms and tunnels carved with great care, wrought stone columns supporting an unnecessarily high ceiling. (Compensating for something?) I have seen natural caverns that twist and lurch, where flowing water slowly carved a path and where dripping water is gradually rebuilding walls of stalactites and stalagmites. I have seen a cavern so huge that one might forget there were walls, were it not for the lack of a sky; and the tramp of a million orcs’ feet has made the uneven floor smooth, like a sand-blasted desert.
I have banished wights in the Forgotten Treasury, down and down a winding ramp following a borehole that continues to unseen depths. I have fought goblins in the Cooling Chamber, which collects water for the dwarves to drink, and I have fought worse in the deeper Waterworks where wheels still turn in the endless flow. I have saved books in the burning Library of Steel and dwarves nearly everywhere. I have followed incomplete maps to a hidden forge, still lying pristine, and I have chased riddles all across Moria to a simple chest at the end.
(I have slain my first level 60 enemy. I have found my first Second Age relic and given it away.)
I have seen the 21st Hall, and the 16th Hall, and the Second Hall, and the First Hall. I have found the eastern doors and looked upon the forests of Lothlorien.
I have not nearly seen it all.
: Zubon
