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[GW2] Market Patterns

Even without the use of super helpful tools like GW2 Spidy, I am beginning to see plenty of patterns in the market. There is quite a distinction in trade and volume for the weekend as MMO weekend warriors have heavy impact on the market. There is plenty of money to be made by flipping items, and it really does require just a couple of minutes a day.

The surprising market, for me at least, is the money that can be made on intermediate crafting components.  Flipping raw materials is extremely difficult, and the final items seem to lose a lot of market value over their components. However, flipping the intermediate components like sword hilts or bow strings or sandal pieces is pretty profitable. Continue reading [GW2] Market Patterns

[GW2] Flame and Frost Preview

Each month ArenaNet has a nice web page detailing in easy-to-chew form what is to be expected from that month’s update. For the end of January, Guild Wars 2 is getting Flame and Frost: Prelude. The earth and sky are the enemy in this one, which have led to norn and charr refugees streaming in from Wayfarer Foothills and Diessa Plateau. With that in mind, the concept art wallpaper for this update looked like norn refugees. I am not sure where people got Cantha, although having a horse in Guild Wars 2 concept art is a tad interesting. No mounts anyway, says ArenaNet as they chalk up the errant horse to “art”. Continue reading [GW2] Flame and Frost Preview

Further Match-3: Tower of Elements

Following up on Sunday’s post, our old friends at Frogdice wanted to mention that they also have a fantasy-themed match-3 game called Tower of Elements. It is a tower defense game, a genre of which I am a fan.

I have played the demo but am not tempting myself with a new tower defense game just before a conference. I’m not sure how well it clicks in the first ten levels. It’s match-3 gameplay. I’d look at how that varies in the late game, but after you beat the tutorial you don’t get the option of seeing anything except the credits, so I can’t see what I’m missing by not buying. You need to match tiles in the right row to attack the enemy, which is rather particular for small monsters like rats. It seemed to go well with the strategy of “spam matches at the bottom of the tower, and other matches up top will just happen.” Vertical matches were more useful for covering ground, but I imagine the later levels have enemies who need many hits and who might care about what element you use to attack.

Tile drops happen instantly, and I never realized how satisfying it was to have the next row of tiles fall into place until I did not have it. You know that moment when you get a big chain and tiles just keep falling into place? Thunk, next, thunk, next, thunk. Of course, you might really hate that if you were waiting on the chain to get your next fireball going. Instead, you get huge waves of those fireballs when you do set off a big chain, which is satisfying in a different way. Either the demo is rigged or it is really easy to get chains with five tile colors.

“Click on the gold in the next few seconds or you lose your treasure” is a game mechanic pet peeve of mine, but the items you could buy with gold seemed unimportant when you could spam walls of fireballs. I never used an item outside the tutorial, but they are one of the mechanics to deal with “there’s a rat on the bottom row and I don’t have 3 to match down there.”

The art and sound are not carrying much of the weight. It is not adding much or causing a distraction. It is not appealing to nostalgia with pixelated art, which I appreciate considering how many small publishers are doing that lately.

Frogdice also wanted to offer a 50% off code: CFXR000QV

: ZUbon

Quick Review: 10,000,000

link

A variation on the Bejeweled “match 3” formula, you are gradually escaping from a dungeon. It plays a bit like Warriors End, although you are plowing through monsters rather than fighting one opponent. You also collect crafting materials to upgrade. Graphics and music fit the 8-bit standard so popular as “retro” at the moment.

This could be amusing on a mobile platform, but it does not offer a lot if you sit down to play for a block of time. Like Bejeweled, once you understand how the system and its few specials work, you have mastered the game. There is not much Raph Koster fun here, but it is a small variation on a comfortingly (or stultifyingly) familiar formula. Running the dungeon would pass a bus ride nicely, but it will not satisfy an itch for deeper play.

I found myself disappointed by the treadmill nature of the upgrades. You know this formula from MMOs: enemy hit points rise at least as quickly as your weapon damage, so your numbers increase but you do not become more powerful. Many flash games with similar upgrade systems make the improvements still feel meaningful by sending you through the weak enemies before getting to the big ones; that can feel boringly repetitious, but you really do notice when your Super Upgraded Sword clears ten enemies in less than a second and you zip through, rather than starting somewhere level-appropriate so every monster still takes the same amount of time despite your thousands of gold pieces spent at the blacksmith.

On sale at Steam for a couple of days as I post this. A full playthrough has a few hours of content; going for all the achievements will take longer, especially since there are two for low level runs. With the game’s upgrade and score systems, I’m pretty sure you can get those two by upgrading slowly, carefully keeping your score low, then sprinting for 10,000,000 all at once (and start over completely if you get a good but not perfect score that ends the “low level” part).

: Zubon

One Nash Equilibrium

  1. The business cannot expect customer loyalty. Get as much out of him/her as you can while you can.
  2. The customer sees the business trying to exploit him/her as much as possible as quickly as possible. The customer feels no loyalty.
  3. Go to 1.

Charities can operate much the same way: past donors are likely future donors, but someone who is “thinking about donating” will probably still be thinking about it a year from now. Keep returning to that well.

As a blood donor, I am troubled.

: Zubon

[GW2] The Daily Grind

I have plenty of goals in Guild Wars 2. Their importance is like some weird slurry of where the wants and pressure change the densities of each goal. Right now I really want a permanent trader contract, as unfeasible as it is, but I am working towards it mostly by playing the market. I can easily create my Ascended back piece now since I finally got some pink goo, but that would cost 5-10% of the amount of the trader contract. I also need to kill Zhaitan, finish the Vigil banner, get another character to chef mastery, finish 4 more crafting professions, etc. I have no doubt I will not even come close to a permanent trader contract before another batch of particles floats to the top of my chaotic slurry.

There is one thing I do almost every day regardless of my goals: the daily achievement. Usually I play how I want to, and then nearing the end of my gaming time I shift gears to efficiently complete the daily. This usually means tracking down another 2-3 events and 6-8 more enemy types. Psychochild comments that, at least with regard to events, it does not bode well how quickly I have turned the system in to a grind. I’ve thought a lot about his comments especially with the daily achievement in mind. Continue reading [GW2] The Daily Grind

[GW2] Black Lion PvP

I play the market in Guild Wars 2 in spurts. One of my goals is to get a permanent merchant contract eventually, which will set me back a cool 150-200 gold. In cash I have about 15% of what I need. So I’ve been dutifully playing the market every day trying to build that amount passively.

Compared to the so-called Black Lion barons, I am small potatoes. I would say at any given time I am only moving around 5 gold, though that amount is slowly building up. I would guess on that amount I make 30-50 silver per day. I am getting more comfortable with what I am doing as well as getting the feel of the market. I would be pretty happy making 1 gold per day off the market, and I think that is a reasonable goal. Continue reading [GW2] Black Lion PvP

[GW2] 2013 From the Clouds

Colin Johanson (whose name I can barely spell, and I apparently can’t stop talking about) released the much anticipated official blog post about plans for early 2013. The post is a whopping 2500+ words with some good information, some vague teasers, and focus on direction.  It’s still pretty high level, as ArenaNet really does not like talking about things that aren’t nailed, stapled, and Gorilla-glued to the floor. Still there is quite a bit of meat to discuss. Continue reading [GW2] 2013 From the Clouds

[GW2] Core Event Density

Game Director Colin Johanson recently stated that this year they are going to make their core game as strong as possible. He was specifically talking about bosses and creatures, but it made me wonder. Here was the game director saying that he wanted to refine the base. Colin could have just plugged all the wonderful new features and content. The big brass only have so many dev hours a day, and to send even a lone dev (the one that didn’t refill the coffee) at creatures that could be “working as intended” gives me pause. Perhaps I am too jaded from Guild Wars 1 as I expect what we got at launch to be it.

I love doing my daily achievement, but the one I always hate is sadly events. Hang on here, these are the hallmark of Guild Wars 2 PvE. I only need to do five events. Compared to 15 unique kills which is sometimes a puzzling pain or the grind of 60 kills this seems easy. Yet it seems like unless I am in a high event density area (Orr, dragon timers, or starting areas) it takes substantially longer to fill that bar than any other. Continue reading [GW2] Core Event Density