I took a week's vacation just to get away from work. I spent lots of time just relaxing at home on the deck and tending my flower garden. I also treated myself to a couple of nifty gadgets. I thought I'd post while on vacation but so many thing to do and so little time. I'm back to work now and paying for the 5-day respite. :-)
I should be breathing a bit easier toward the end of next week and start posting again.
I browsed a couple of posts on the internet today which seemed to give the impression that Pirates of the Burning Sea (PotBS) isn’t a successful game. That’s my nicer slant on what was being inferred, they were really trying to say it was more like a failure. Hmm, I hadn’t heard that it was going down hill on the high seas. That must have slipped by me. *Wink* I did read about the server merges and the reasons they’ve occurred. The Flying Lab explanation appeared to be straight forward to me and not bells tolling its end.
I played a bit of the PotBS BETA and discussed my impressions here. It certainly wasn’t a bad game. They seemed to hit the niche areas that you’d expect to be polished in a seafaring game quite well. I knew it wasn’t my genre going in, so it was no surprise to me that I didn’t buy the game. For me, there was nothing to hate. There also wasn’t anything to love about it either. It’s one of those situations where many aspects are well executed, some things bug you and overall, you’re not really inspired enough to get on board. PotBS isn’t the only game to leave me with that feeling of “eh, I’ll pass.”
There are many things that I like about EverQuest II (EQ2) – crafting and player housing among them. Unfortunately, there an equal amount of things that leave me feeling lukewarm or illicit dislike. All combined, it becomes the same, “I think I’ll pass.” I come back for expansions and twit around a bit but I don’t think I’ve ever played a solid two months of EQ2 – ever.
The whole out in space sandbox environment of EVE Online thrills me conceptually. The avenues of character development and interior role-playing are limitless. I like the player driven economy and it’s potential. I love the idea of being a space pirate. I hope CCP does amazing things and this game continues to grow. Having said that, it doesn't explain another game that I like on the surface but I come and go – where my going is more frequent than my staying.
Whoever you are, you really made me laugh today - the kind that giggles on the inside and out. On occasion, I do check my blog stats to see which posts people have read the most and if there are any track-backs. When I checked today, I saw all these readers coming in from the WOW forums. I RARELY post on forums even though I like to read the train wrecks on a regular basis. I couldn’t imagine why or what was sending them here until I checked a few of the links and noticed one poster in particular.
I LAUGHED OUT LOUD in real life. Thanks man/wo-man for sharing the feeling, being part of the “I solo club” and proud to own it! It’s kinda like Made in America – “This is why I solo!”
*Still laughing*
Even though I don’t consider myself a hardcore PVP player, I do enjoy the excitement, danger and adrenaline rush from being on a PVP server. I did a tiny bit of Kingdom vs. Kingdom (KVK) in Asherons Call 2 (AC2). It wasn’t until very late in my game play that I started going there with the guild. There were no rewards to be gained other than bragging rights.
The initial implementation of WOW PVP didn’t have any rewards to be gained by engaging in World PVP and all that existed was World PVP. I know that I’m not alone when I say, those were the glory days of PVP. It was frantic, exciting and complete chaos in the hotly contested zones. Lagfest and Illidown instability aside, it was as much fun, as any 40-man raid Blizzard ever designed. The unpredictability of facing off against other players in a freeform manner just can’t be replicated in a Battleground or Arena. There were no rules about what you could and could not do. There were no contrived objectives. The rule of law was, if it’s red make it dead.
Continue reading "PVP for No Honor or Reward – Come Get Some Son" »
I got invited into the technical BETA. I started the LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG process of downloading and patching the client then figured, eh, I’ll just wait. Today I received a FilePlanet email about BETA keys for subscribers. I started to check out the link and read the details, but once again I decided not to bother. No reflection on Funcom or AoC but this game was never on my list of MMOs I wanted to play this year. I’ve only considered it since the games I thought I’d be playing have been repeatedly delayed. Okay, well one of them has been delayed where as The Chronicle of Spellborn won't way when that is coming our way. Do they think they're Blizzard or something??
I think I’ll just wait to read what reviews come out of the Open BETA. I’m curious about two things. First thing is what people think about the initial solo play period where it plays like an RPG. Was it a valuable experience? Did it allow them to introduce epic storylines or special interactions like LOTRO does with the solo instanced quests? Is the initial learning curve for the combat system so challenging that you need alone time to get going? I really want to know what gives with this idea. As curious as I am about that, I’m more interested in reading player reactions to the FFA twitch style of the combat.
I’ll admit to not having read much, so I could be way off base. However, I believe it’s supposed to lean more toward the Free-For-All (FFA) style, combined with the fact that it is somewhat twitch-based like a first person shooter. For console gamers that might not be anything new. Where as for pure PC MMO players, that’s a bit of a twist. I want to see how people respond. I think many people take auto-attack and sticky targeting for granted. It’s probably all that they know. Other than the game statistics crunching behind the scenes to determine the probability of your accuracy, hitting a target is pretty much a sure thing. My understanding is that it won’t be that simple in AoC.
Veteran or hardcore PVPers aren’t likely to have an issue with a serious FFA environment, and perhaps those are the only players that will actually play the game. However, I’m kind of expecting that there will be players who purchase the game because they love the IP but won’t like how FFA feels up close and personal.
I spent three evenings looking into the mechanics of how to dual-box two characters using the same computer in World of Warcraft. Thanks to the Dual-Boxing Portal and WowWiki, it was a piece of cake – sorta. If this piques your interest and you’d like to give it a try, just get yourself a trail WOW account to use.
The software side of things was very easy. I read several posts suggesting that you make a copy of your WOW gaming folder to avoid conflicts which might cause the game to crash. I was going to do that when I saw how friggin’ large the folder was and immediately nixed that idea. I just wanted to experiment so I didn’t really care so much if the game crashed a few times. As luck would have it, it never crashed even when I wrote all the macros needed to pull it off. *Shrug*
My first decision was which software to use for sending duplicate keystrokes to the two independent session of WOW. My first attempt at dual boxing was done my actually clicking things on the separate session back and forth – definitely not the way the pros do things. I downloaded AutoHotKey first as it seemed a popular choice on the forums. But after starring at the scripts needed just to get started, I quickly abandoned it. It offers more flexibility but the posts about having to code in ways to pause it so you can chat or interact with the game in other ways other than sending duplicate keys, convinced me that it would be too much work just to mess around.
At first I thought it was just a “me” thing, this need to solo in games which are chiefly designed as a group experience. It was my preferred playing style from the first time I appeared into the virtual world’s landscape. I didn’t think much of it. I was so mesmerized by the ability to simply exist in a fantasy universe. I didn’t care at all about anyone else who might be occupying the same adventure. I was of course awed by seeing other people running around the game and knowing that they were real people on the other side too, but that interest was fleeting.
I remember when selecting my first character in my first MMO which was AC1, I made a conscious choice to select a class that I felt could solo. I didn't use the jargon “solo” but my intention was very much to be self reliant. It was a natural choice and reflected how I lived my life – be kind, have friends but ultimately rely on yourself. This immediately put me at odds with my desire to play a magic based class – fantasy and magic, I was about to experience a personal Holy Grail but wanted a self sufficient character. Luckily, AC is a skill based game and although I started as a Ranger so that I could solo, I eventually learned that I could combine the two into an Archanter – Ranger/Enchanter. I explained all of this to illustrate that going in, without knowing anything at about playing MMOs or RPGs, my first inclination was to solo. This means the desire was there before I had any experiences with the downside of grouping with others. This is an important point for later so hold this thought.
One of the things I enjoy about WOW Radio is the diversity of podcasts for World of WarCraft. Hardcore or casual, raider or not, you can find a show that talks about how you play WOW. Catching up on some the WOW Insider podcasts hosted by WOW Radio, I listened to a show about two-boxing in games. I'm familiar with the concept having run into couples that were doing it in AC2 on a casual basis. Run spouse through <insert name> dungeon because he/she is cooking, doing laundry, dealing with the kids, etc.
I've done short spurts of two-boxing to mule items across our WOW accounts, give a toon a healthstone or soulshard or apply some priest buffs, but mostly to enchant items. In the past I couldn't do it on the same computer for more than a few minutes before my system blue-screened - a VERY scary thing when you're messing with Bill Gates and his infamous Windows OS. :-) But it was doable in very short durations for very specific needs.
Before I continue too much further let me back up a bit and define two-boxing for those who are not familiar with the concept. Strictly speaking, two-boxing is when a single person is operating two sessions of the same game and controlling two characters at the same time. These days we could probably say multi-boxing and not limit the idea to just two. WOW has a few rather famous multi-boxers - someone does 5 Mages, someone is doing an Arena team with Druid, Priest and Mages I think...blah...blah, I'm not up on the whole scene. Bottom line - for the real multi-boxers it is the act of multiple machines running the same game while they control multiple characters within that game. Another variation on the idea is running multiple instances of the game on the same computer. I would still consider that multi-boxing even though there is only a single set of hardware involved.
Nine million or whatever the number is should say all there is to say, and yet it doesn't. I hope one of the games releasing this year has something up its sleeve. If they doesn't I'm done. After two weeks playing LOTRO I can say with confidence - no brainer I'm sure, that WOW simply put, has the best leveling of any fantasy game I've every played bar none. That is all and that is it.
For all the things I like about the other games I've played since, and for the things that I HATE about the WOW end game, the journey to the end is best in WOW. Oh well... Doesn't mean I didn't have some fun in LOTRO. Or that I love EQ2 crafting, housing and exploration any less. It just means the road to leveling isn't as much fun as it is in WOW.
WOW leveling is simple. It's straight forward and then again not. Because it is so simplistic it means you can do it anyway you choose and you can change your mind every day every session. You can make it as easy or as challenging as you please. As exclusive or inclusive as you please and change what you think pleases you, whenever it suits your fancy. The only thing I'd change is to extend the leveling curve so that they can level of some of the hamster cages at the end. Oh well - it is what it is and isn't by now and not changing drastically any time soon.
I'll continue hopping around on my Captain - which is really what the WOW Paladin always should have been. I'll ride the month's subscription out but I won't be playing beyond that. I recently received a BETA invite to a game that I was marginally interested in but I'm afraid to even download it. What if the only two things on my list as options for 2008 don't even come close to the hype? That would really suck!
I think the fates are conspiring to make me find something else to do with my precious free time. That or I've out grown MMOs!?! Gawd forbid.
I ran into some unplanned downtime this past week called the flu combined with strep throat. I tried to steer clear of it when the first victim in our house got sick. However, it ran through us and our close friends like lightening. When I was forced to take a couple of days off from work, the first thing that came to mind was playing an MMO.
At first I considered loading up EQ2 but to be honest, I don’t find the leveling in that game very pleasurable. I’m sorry that this is the case because there are many things I do like about EQ2, unfortunately leveling isn’t one of them. I’ve considered why many times before and figure that if I’d played it before I’d ever seen WOW I would have been fine with it, given that the leveling is similar to previous games. But after the sugar jolt of soloing in WOW, I just can’t transition back to EQ2’s pace.
My first visit was to EVE Online where I started up an 18-day skill training session. I ran a few missions, poked around the market got antsy and left. My next choice was seeing the new 2.4 content in WOW. I hopped on the Druid and caught a gryphon from Ironforge out to the Isle where I got less than nothing accomplished. I did have fun though. The whole zone was in the grips of open warfare between the Horde and Alliance. You know – WARcraft was actually taking place, imagine that! It took me right back to the days of warring in Duskwood and Southshore before the BGs were implemented. Nothing gained other than bragging rights and a chance to pwnface. Good times. The Druid didn’t fair so well since she’s Feral spec’d . After a half hour of eating too much dirt, I logged on to the Warlock. ::Wink::
When that ran dry I popped on to an alt that’s been dead for a long time. One of the few I had that never made it at least to 60. It’s a level 27 Mage that I just couldn’t get into at the time which was on the heels of playing the Warlock for 1.5 yrs. With maximum rest bonus and an opportunity to stroll through the lower content – my favorite of the entire game, 1.5 days of this was pretty fun. At level 29, I parked her at Inn and probably won’t see her again for a while.
Playing through the podcasts on Virgin Worlds had me listening to RingCast, which in turn, got me to thinking about LOTRO. I’d never even opened my pre-order and installed it. The BETA had left me feeling rather lukewarm about the game so I never subscribed. With nothing to lose and some time on my hands, I figured I might as well sub for a month and do something new.
My Captain was still available which will save me from re-doing the early zones over. I done them three times already testing out the human classes. I was glad not to do a repeat. I did a few quests, camped a few areas and harvested some nodes. My armor was painfully lacking having not done many quests when I was on the game before – not a fan of errand-heavy quest systems. Thankfully, I’d left myself a couple hundred silver – a mere pittance now but just enough for me to purchase a better chest piece, helm, shoulders and 2-handed Axe.
It came as no surprise that the zones I was in were rather empty. I don’t know what the populate size is on my server. Not that it matters, I didn’t expect to see dozens of people running around the noob zones. There were players in the towns – here and there. A couple of Minstrels sent me fellowship invites that I really didn’t want. I accepted three of them just to help them kill the named mob they needed then went about my business. I know how much it can suck being a healer and trying to level alone.
I liked the playing style of the Captain class from the first time I tried it and I still enjoy it. It favors a WOW Paladin to a degree without the painfully slow progress of killing monsters. I used to say leveling a Pally was like watching paint dry – and that wasn’t too much of an exaggeration. Eh, it’s changed a bit and doing an AOE grinding spec does perk things up now. We were crazy enough to have rolled two Paladins. It’s not so bad now but back in the day it was complete torture. Oops, I digress…
I should probably stick to the Captain – level some more and make some money. Instead I’m going to jump on another toon for a while just to try out the farming and cooking. If it’s like it was during BETA I know it’s a money sink but I just have to try farming. I MUST try it. I’m a Harvest Moon fan and from the first time I saw someone type “farm” in an MMO, I thought they meant I could go run a farm in the game. LOL I’m sure you can imagine the riotous laughter when I asked in /g chat where I could go find these farms people were talking about and how could I buy seeds? Yeah, it was one of those priceless noober moments. ::Smiles bashfully::
Anywho – not sure I’d stay on LOTRO past my sickbed time but for now I’m enjoying myself and at least I’m seeing something new.
I had a fairly relaxed long weekend. I even came across a few spare hours where I could consider playing a game. Unfortunately, when I sat down to play something nothing came to mind that I wanted to log into and play. I thought about checking in with my Druid on WOW to see the game on my new wide screen monitor but I couldn't remember the login name or password. And I wasn't interested enough to get up and go get it. I popped on to EVE to start more training and ran a couple of missions but felt very meh about it all. It's hard to get excited about EVE in small spurts because to get all up in anything exciting takes some planning.
Really a shame that it's heading to the end of Q1 2008 and none of the games I had thought I'd be playing last fall have even been released. It's not just the primary game that was on my Watch List, Warhammer, both of my back-up choices are still locked away. No Warhammer, Age of Conan or Spellborn. Nada. Had you asked me this time last year if I'd find myself with no active MMO on my play list, I would have laughed in your face. It's been a long time since I've imagined my spare time sans MMO escapist goodness.
I'm rather disappointed in general and the longer WAR takes to release, the more concerned I become that they are not sure it's going to be all they hoped and planned. What happens if WAR is just meh?? I'm not expecting to like AoC - that was just supposed to be a filler last year, as was Spellborn. I hope I like something - anything because I don't think I can stomach any more WOW. I don't expect to be going back for WotLK unless the other three games go completely belly up.
A couple of weeks back I was reading the posts going 'round about which game you'd unmake. Today I was of the mind that WOW probably would be at the top of my list. I do love what Blizzard delivered in the original release - the pure joy of leveling, epicness of the 40-man raids and the do it your way 1 to 60. However, the quelling of uniqueness and willingness to release niche games that appeal to less than millions of players is curse and burden still rippling through the industry. That followed by Vanguard's huge failure to match its hype machine, I feel, are scaring development houses & publishers, both of which are negatively affecting what's being released to gamers.
Dunno. It's starting to look like my standby hobby isn't as certain as it once was and perhaps I need to look into games other than MMOs. *shrug*
Still extremely busy with work. When the time comes that I have some spare moments there's nothing out right now that I'm inspired enough to play. I'm still skilling in EVE when I remember. Our two WOW accounts are still active but no one is playing WOW anymore.
Hopefully, the spring will bring some relief in my schedule and new games.
The decision was final the minute I decided not to play Pirates of the Burning Seas. Absolutely no point in me continuing to pay $30 bucks a month to play a single Sony title, EQ2. And with nothing I'm interested in on the horizon, it was time to stop paying for the privilege of playing nothing. And now that I don't have time to play anything at all, I decided to flat-out cancel my subscription all together. I know that I'll make my way back to EQ2 again some day - probably whenever the next expansion hits. Until then good luck and happy times to all the EQ2ers.
One of the things I wanted to work on was going MIA on my blog because of work commitments. The blog is important to me as a writing venue. Gaming is important to me as my one and only, guilty pleasure. It's only February and that resolution is in the trash can.
My job has me by the throat again. I'm so stressed and agitated at the end of a 13+ hour day that I'm not playing a-n-y-t-h-i-n-g. For the first time in many months I haven't read any blogs or listened to any podcasts. In short, MY LIFE IS HELL. See you when I see you.
Real Money Trading (RMT) in MMOs remains a hot topic of discussion. I understand the arguments on both sides of the fence. However, one of those arguments – it destroys the game economy should probably be put to rest. I recently learned that in addition to the widely known fact that Sony supports RMT on specified EQ2 servers, EVE Online allows a flavor of trading that amounts to RMT and to reduce the risk of being scammed, implemented a secure mechanism to facilitate the transactions. Did I just hear you say, “Wha?”
Continue reading "EVE Online: Sanctioned Real Money Trading" »
A happy ending to my "High Cost of Mistakes" post. The Support team reviewed the situation and today I received this email in game...
2008.01.30 05:31
Dear <removed>,
A salvage operation recently recovered your "Catalyst" class ship from a debris field in "Luminaire". You should be able to retrieve your ship at "Algogille XIII - Federation Navy Testing Facilities". The salvage team could not find any items that were ejected from your ship prior to its apparent destruction so if you were not able to retrieve the cargo canisters there is sadly nothing we can do. Law requires us to notify your friendly insurance company and they have deducted any financial payout from your account.
Sincerely,
Your friendly neighbourhood CONCORD police squad.
Sweet deal. Now I have a ship that I can use for PVP focused activity while I'm learning the ropes.
The Virgin Worlds podcast reached an epic show #100. As you'll hear, VW was the first podcast I listened to and I've been a loyal listener ever since. I guess he was too modest to include my assertion that he is definitely, the Mack-Daddy of MMO News!
Go Brent!
If you don't listen to his podcast, take advantage of his news feed or read his blog, you're missing out on a fabulous resource. Do yourself a favor and get over there right now!
The computer gaming Gods conspired against my plan to spend a couple of weeks fussing around in EQ2. While I was actually only playing my Illusionist, one of my kids tripped over my Ethernet cable and ripped the sucker right out of the back of my tower. The damage cracked the shared casing it was housed in requiring a trip to good ole Best Buy, where I had to leave my baby as they didn’t have a replacement but would order it. Sans tower, left me with only my laptop and I had NO intention of downloading and patching the EQ2 client on that puppy. Given that the EVE Online (EO) client download and patch is fast and painless, I returned to the dark crevices of deep space.
When last I left EO, I was without a corporation. Since that time I’ve received numerous suggestions regarding corporations that might suit me better. I followed a huge group of track-back links to a forum that was discussing my EO posts and ran into some very helpful players. Several of them were gracious enough to send me private messages once I joined their forum, to point me in the direction of good beginner corporations, PVP corporations and even, serious role playing corps and channels. If you’re not already familiar with the Scrapheap forum, go check it out.
Removing leveling from the equation of character progression means that I’m free to only do whatever it is I really enjoy in this game. For me, that comes down to exploration and crafting. I’d also like to decorate my two-room apartment into something special. The leveling will come however and whenever.
Having elected not to quest anymore than I absolutely want to, means that my gear and weapons will fall behind, unless I make a conscious effort to obtain upgrades on my own. If I don’t create alts do craft my armor and weapons it’s likely to be a very expensive proposition. And those costs will be on top of purchasing spell upgrades as the profession I selected for this character was provisioner. I made that choice because I love cooking – both in game and in real life. I figured if I’m going to spend time crafting, it should be something that I enjoy. However, as I now consider the possible costs of keeping my character appropriately equipped for soloing, I’m wondering if I must, for the first time ever, roll a crafting only character in a game?
The word knockoff came to mind when I was thinking of how to explain to anyone who might not understand why I personally consider Vanguard, a bad game. My opinion isn't based on whether or not the game has any value. I'm sure there is value there and the people who've elected to play the game are enjoying it. No, that has nothing to do with my issue.
My problem with Vanguard is that it didn't deliver to the expectations set by Sigil in promoting the game or its officers when speaking of the game. What I received for my pre-order dollars and subscription fee was more like an MMO knockoff versus a present day Class A title. And no, I'm not going to compare Vanguard's quality at release to what EQ1, EQ2 or AC1 may have released as years ago and what we accepted as reasonable back then. This is NOW not then. I didn't pick this game up out of the $9.99 bin at Best Buy where I expect lesser quality, "get what you get" gaming experience. If I had, we wouldn't be having this conversation. ::Smile::
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