Legion's Rants

January 16, 2007

World of Warcraft Burning Crusade Expansion

So yeah, I'm a geek. I pre-ordered the Burning Crusade expansion and then attended the midnight event so I could be one of the first to walk around in the new areas post-launch. (Which, if my gaming habit were completely rational, I would admit to myself that at the very least people on the East Coast would get in three hours ahead of me ... not to mention others outside the US. Time-zone-wise, California is on the ass-end of the world.)

But time zones aside, I got my copy and greedily brought it home to consume new content, glorious content. I had been wanting to play a Shaman since beta, but my friends conspired against me by choosing to play the Alliance side. With the new expansion, my dream can be fulfilled! I immediately started Pavlovian reactions as I opened the box to find four ... count them ... four CDs. Holy geez! Ok ... don't panic ... we'll just install them and then get in the game!

...

Yeah well, so after I install the four CDs, it turns out that the patch that I made sure I downloaded and installed before I left for the midnight event ... had to be downloaded and installed again. (Well, it only needed to be installed ... the downloading was lickety-split because it was still on my hard drive.) Oh ... and then, there was anoter little patch that needed to be downloaded and installed. Gah! Fine ... ok ... breathe. Just get it done.

Ok ... now we can play, right? Yes! So I am now the proud owner of a 7^th level Draenai Shaman with Jewelcrafting as his tradeskill. Ugh ... four hours of sleep and now I've got work and after-work things to do tonight. This is going to hurt ...

Posted by Legion at 8:30 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

May 22, 2006

E3 Pics Are Finally Up

I know the vast Internet has been waiting patiently for me to put up my E3 pictures ...

... so here they are.

Of course, the highlight of the show was a piece I have entitled Gimme the Money or Dorothy Here Gets It!

Posted by Legion at 9:05 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

May 11, 2006

Console Wars Reveal Sony's Hubris?

I set out this morning, steeling myself for the dangers that lay ahead. Despite the stories, I knew so little of what truly lay before me ...

First impressions were that everything was just massive. If you haven't been to the Los Angeles Convention Center, think of the biggest warehouse you've ever been in ... and then think of the craziest designed buildings you've ever seen ... but inside the warehouse. Then add bright lights and booming music and dancing girls and you've got some idea of what its like to be at E3.

I spent the first part of the day in Kentia Hall, literally the basement of E3. This is where they relegate all the little guys in the industry. "The underground" as the kind gentleman from Defcon Skins described it. (I'll get back to them in a minute.) This is where the people with new controllers, new technology, all the off-the-wall games that haven't yet made it are kept. If you want to see the far future and its possibilities, this is where you come. I saw many implementations of "body controllers", things you wear on your arms and legs to track your movements so you could really "get in the game". I saw game chairs with speakers and controllers built into them. I even saw a system where you put a strap around your head to monitor your brain waves. It would watch your level of concentration and if you lapsed for too long you would lose control of your car.

Defcon Skins earns an honorable mention for being the most receptive to this humble blogger. As I said before, I got my pass by virtue of being with a large employer, so most of the people in Kentia Hall saw this and wanted to sell things to my employer. Defcon Skins took the time to find out why I was really there and learned of my blog and wanted to sell to my blog and its meager readership. They make "skins" that apply to your game consoles and controllers with graphic designs to spruce things up. These skins consist of stickers, but where I would normally say, "Yuck" and move on ... they assured me that these stickers can be removed and won't leave any glue or residue on the console, they won't crack, peel or fade, and they are designed with tiny channels on the back side so that they won't bubble when you apply them. Sounds like a tall order ... but I'm willing to give it a try with my original Xbox. I'll let you know how it stacks up.

Now ... on to the big boys. Of course one of the biggest things about the show was the dual announcement of the Sony PlayStation 3 and the Nintendo Wii ...

Sony announced the pricing and configuration of the PS3 a couple days ago. The PS3 is going to include a BluRay DVD drive, a hard drive (either 20GB or 60GB), and built-in networking. It's also going to be priced at $500 (for the 20GB configuration) and $600 (for the 60GB). The thing to understand is that the BluRay DVD technology is Sony's bid to take over the High-Definition DVD market. You see ... DVDs currently only store video at 480 lines of resolution. The holy grail of DVD is 1080 lines of resolution ... the quality of the picture in a movie theater. There are two competing formats ... BluRay and HD-DVD. HD-DVD players are currently available for about $600. BluRay players, on the other hand, are not ... but they're slated to be even more expensive, at least $1,000. The BluRay players will become available right at the same time that the PS3 does ... in November of this year. But the PS3 will be at least $400 cheaper.

And now, a history lesson ...

Some of you may remember when VCRs came out. Originally there was only one vendor, Sony. They had the BetaMax standard ... and they licensed it to other people to make many players. But they did so in such a way that the cheapest BetaMax players would be Sony's by a long shot. So the rest of the industry jumped ship and created a new standard called "VHS" that eventually supplanted Sony's BetaMax because it was cheaper and much more common. Nowadays, most people don't remember BetaMax ...

So it appears that Sony is poised to make the same mistake. They're trying to get PS3s into people's houses by basically making it a cheap BluRay player ... hoping that this will expand their gaming market, I suppose. But in the process, they're screwing over their business partners ... again. Its very strange though ... Sony is barely taking an interest in the whole process. They've barely identified any launch titles ... and really, this is the place to do that. The PSP is in the toilet ... most people use it as a portable media platform ... not for gaming. Perhaps Sony is looking to bow out of the gaming market gracefully?

The complete opposite of Sony is Nintendo. They've jumped back into the gaming market with both feet as the innovators they've always been. The Nintendo Wii is the hit of the show with a two to three hour long line just to get a chance to look at the thing and play one game. Everyone I've talked to has had nothing but unabashed praise for the console and the new controller. The controller looks like a TV remote ... and its innocuousness is its power. It is designed with motion sensors so that it can act like a sword ... or a fishing pole ... or a conductors baton ... or a drumstick ... or anything else the developers can dream up. From what I have heard, it is a whole new level of immersion. I hope to be able to see it for myself today ... but I already know that I'll be buying a Wii when it becomes available ... despite the stupid name.

Somewhere in the middle is Microsoft's Xbox 360, the only "next-generation" console that's already out (which really makes them all "current generation" doesn't it?). Basically, their goal for E3 is to show off as many up-and-coming titles as possible ... and they are. Where Nintendo has hours-long lines ... Microsoft has rows upon rows of stations where you can play demos of all the games that are slated to be released this year. Perhaps today I'll have more of a chance to check them out and see what's compelling ... and what's not.

I could go on and on and on ... about all the MMOs I saw, Viva Pinata, Spore and more! But my breakfast is here and I need to get back to the grind. Hopefully I'll be able to find a spot to sit down and type today so that I can report more ... from the floor of E3!

Posted by Legion at 7:44 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

May 9, 2006

E3 Coverage - Day 1

So this is it ... time to head to Los Angeles and see what the scions of the gaming world have come up with to entrance, amaze and entertain us this year. Read on for today's travelogue ...

I'm sitting in San Francisco International Airport and I just have a significant feeling of "ho hum". This was supposed to be Bu's and my big vacation ... and now I'm going by myself. It feels weird to not be excited about being able to make the pilgrimage to the video game industry's Mecca ... but I just don't feel it yet. Could it be that there's some latent emotional scarring from the hotel scare I had the last time I went to a convention in Los Angeles? Could it be that I'm convinced deep down that something is going to go wrong and I'm not going to be able to get in? I don't know ... we'll see how excited I get once I'm in.

My flight is delayed, which is really weird for flying on a weekday ... especially a Tuesday, the slowest travel day of the week. On top of being delayed for an hour and a half, it's jam packed. I can't get an aisle seat to save my life. Fortunately, there's a flight leaving just fifteen minutes later that's much more comfy ... so I switch to that one.

I've been wanting to attend E3 for years and now that I've finally made it, E3 is going to be televised on G4TV and peeks and previews are going to be available on Xbox Live Marketplace. There's an unprecedented level of access to the show this year. I'm kinda wondering if it wouldn't be more fun to just sit at home, skyping with Phicksen and watching the coverage on the television. Of course, Bu has challenged me to get as many pictures of myself with booth babes as possible ...

So I pick up the latest issue of Popular Science and a couple DVDs and head to my new gate ...

Once I've landed in LA, the first thing I notice is that we taxi the plane a really, really, really, really long time. I mean, we must've taxied halfway to Las Vegas before we turned around and headed back to the terminal. And the weather report at SFO said that it was "hazy" in LA. Sorry guys, pretty it up all you like ... the rest of the world calls that "smog". And while we're on the subject of stereotypical LA ... while sitting through traffic on the way to the hotel I saw a young lady reading a book, driving and chewing bubble gum at the same time! Now that's talent!

Los Angeles also seems to really like turning the sides of buildings into billboards. We drove past a building advertising the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra with a picture of ostensibly one of the female members who was about four or five stories high. I wish I could've snapped a picture of it ... because it was hard to believe that she was a band geek.

Once I finally arrived at the hotel, my mood changed significantly. The staff was immensely helpful and courteous ... and surprise, surprise ... my room was upgraded to a "Junior Suite". I thought, great ... so they shoved a sofa in a room barely big enough for the bed. Boy ... was I wrong. You'll see when I get the pictures uploaded ...

Posted by Legion at 10:53 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 30, 2006

E3 Coverage Here

On the ninth of May, I'll be travelling to Los Angeles to attend the Electronics Entertainment Exposition, more commonly known as E³. It is the annual show where the video game industry struts its stuff ... but only to game industry insiders. I'm not necessarily an insider ... but since I work for one, I was able to wrangle a pass. Bu is supposed to be going with me ... this has been our dream for the past two years, to go together ... but he's been having problems with obtaining his pass, so we're not sure if he's going to be able to make it.

So I'll be doing my best, whether Bu can come or not, to provide a glimpse into what this show is all about right here on legoinrants.com. Pictures of booth babes, information on the latest games, all right here as soon as I can find an Internet connection to upload it.

Posted by Legion at 12:04 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 24, 2006

Tomb Raider: Legend

So rather than pick up Rumble Roses XX, I picked up Tomb Raider: Legend. Although it stars equally curvaceous feminine heroes, it has a lot more game to it. Punish long ago extoled the virtues of Tomb Raider to me, but I just couldn't get past the marketing (vis-a-vis Lara Croft's figure) ... so this is actually the first Tomb Raider game I've played. I must say, that it is fun for a 3D platformer ... though it suffers all the standard 3D platformer challenges: inobvious camera angles, sometimes superhuman accuracy requirements, etc. And, since this is the first time I've played a Tomb Raider game ... I'm not sure if the Dragon's Lair-style follow-the-bouncing-button animation sections are new or not. So far, I invariably fail the first time through one of these animations ... and then find them trivial thereafter. Not a complaint ... just an insight.

Maybe more on the game later ... right now, to work! I have to support my habit, y'know ...

Posted by Legion at 8:07 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 22, 2006

Enough to Make Me Blush

I saw the ad for Rumble Roses XX on my Xbox360 guide screen. It advertises that the game "features all female wrestling". Now, anytime a game features all-female anything ... its bound to be something that would put out any woman with the barest minimum of feminist leanings to be certain, but this takes the cake. I have to admit that I have a certain niggling morbid curiosity about the game ... but, then again, if I play it, my Xbox360 Gamer Profile will display that fact forever and ever.

And really, what kinds of Achievements would it offer? Skankiest Outfit Evar?

Posted by Legion at 12:38 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 17, 2006

New Lara Croft Model

So I'm reading about the new model for Lara Croft, Karima Adebibe, and all the training they're putting her through. And the only thing I can think of is, "for what?" I mean, she's the new model. She's not going to star in any movies. She's going to stand around at E3 and other trade shows. She could recite poetry by Goethe and nobody would care. Do people really springboard into an acting career from being a booth babe?

And please ... to whomever wrote the comment for the picture on IGN, "Mmmmm, check out those birthin 'hips" Those are not birthin' hips. Mimi Rogers has birthin' hips. Kate Winslet has birthin' hips. So don't point to some anorexic wannabe, hips barely wider than her waist, let alone her boobs, and say she's got birthin' hips. I could break her like a twig ... with or without her SAS training.

Posted by Legion at 8:03 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

November 23, 2005

Mission Accomplished!

The package has arrived! The Eagle has landed! And all those other spy-movie euphemisms!

Monday night I camped out in front of my local Best Buy in order to be one of the first to obtain a new Xbox 360. I figured that getting there around midnight would put me at roughly the head of the line. Boy was I wrong!

It seems the first people started lining up around 3pm Monday afternoon. I got to the store early at 11pm and ended up with about thirty-five to forty people in line and around the parking lot that were there ahead of me. It discouraged me a bit ... because I didn't want to stay there all night for a chance for an Xbox 360. But, things have a way of working out for me ... so I decided to stick it out.

I had done my reconnaissance the week before when a helpful Best Buy person told me that they were supposed to get thirty of the Premium consoles (the one I wanted) and ten of the Core consoles. But when I got in line, there were rumors unnumbered about how they were only getting ten ... or maybe it was twenty, but only the first ten were going to be allowed to buy what they wanted ... everyone else had to buy these interminable package deals that started at a grand for the cheapest package with a Premium console. I figured that I needed to cut through the FUD and just go ask one of the Best Buy personnel that was standing around, incredulous at the turnout. Despite the fact that the message was, "You can buy what you want, we'll let you mix-and-match," it didn't do much to dissuade the people in line ... fearful that they were putting in all this effort for naught.

I had brought plenty of supplies ... four ham sandwiches, half a bag of Cheetos (crunchy of course), a case of Pepsi, eight Red Bulls, three books, one copy of the 360 launch issue of Official Xbox Magazine, four movies on DVD (Legend: The Director's Cut, Revenge of the Sith, Chain Reaction, and Batman Begins), my laptop (with two charged batteries) to play them on, my iPod and my camera. I figured I was good to go for the night.

Mostly, I ended up talking with the other people in line though. There was Luis, Chris, Luis' wife, Roberto, the McDonald's man who never gave his name ... and Grandpa Gamer (who was there because his grandson had, that day, told him about the 360 launch). After about 1am, nobody else showed up for the line until about 5am ... and there was a distinct cultural difference between the two groups of people. Devoted would be an easy catchall for the people that got there first ... and of course gamer would be applicable to most as well. I wouldn't be surprised to see any of them say at PAX. The others just seemed to be normal people ... they heard about it and had the initiative to wake up early. It was pretty obvious that they weren't fans.

So after waiting all night in the freezing cold (and boy was it) did I get one? Yup, sure did ... out of the thirty Premium consoles that arrived ... I walked away with #28. I arrived at 11pm Monday night and left at almost exactly 9am Tuesday morning. Over the next few days I'll be posting my reactions ...

Posted by Legion at 1:54 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

November 15, 2005

The Countdown Continues

In just less than one week, the Xbox 360 will be released. I have my super-secret plot to get one ... which doesn't include murdering anyone. Then I'll just have to set about making sure that every last one of my old Xbox games runs on it ... good thing I took next week off!

Posted by Legion at 8:54 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

November 8, 2005

It's That Time Of Year Again

Specifically, the time of year when people start thinking of the welfare of others. Seriously, I'd really rather people thought like this all the time ... but I'll take what I can get, y'know? As you can see, the Child's Play banner is back ... and I'd really like to urge anyone who actually reads this blog to give of themselves ... pick something from the attached Amazon Wish Lists ... give a little money ... or even give time. Over the past two years, people who have donated to Child's Play have contributed over a half a million dollars to give sick kids in Children's Hospitals around the country games and toys to take their mind off the pain, horror or simply boredom of an extended hospital stay. This year, Child's Play is connected with Children's Hospitals around the country and around the world. Seriously, take a look at what you can do ... it really is for the children.

Posted by Legion at 10:28 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

November 3, 2005

Xbox 360

I'm pretty excited about the Xbox 360 coming out later this month. In fact, I plan to be camping out the morning of the 22^nd in order to get one (since I didn't have the funds at the right time to preorder one). As you may have noticed ... I used the new Xbox.com functionality to place my Gamertag in the information bar. We'll see if its useful or not ... too bad it didn't show what I chose for my motto: Quo signo nata es? (What's your sign?)

Posted by Legion at 10:13 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

October 18, 2005

MMO Guild Politics

I don't think I've made it a secret that I've spent a significant amount of time in Massively Multiplayer Online Games (MMOGs). Truth be told, I spent the better part of five years being the guildleader of a moderate-sized guild in EverQuest. For a couple years now, I've had this large missive brewing, nay welling from deep within me. I've wanted to share my insights into the interrelationships of guilds in this new bastion of gaming, because I felt my vision of the mechanics therein might be of some use to future generations of gamers. The entire essay was there, nigh fully formed, cresting upon my brow as Athena did with Zeus. But as they say, the devil is in the details ...

I watch movies not only for recreation, but as a way of sussing out the deeper meanings of the world around me. To see the world through, if only for two hours at a time, someone else's eyes. Certainly, it is but "through a glass, darkly." But my hope is that if I put enough of them together, then perhaps I will be able to piece together the puzzle. The other night, I watched the most recent version of Lord of the Flies ... and finally, the clouds parted and I had one of those moments of clarity where everything just falls into place.

The movie begins with a bunch of young male military cadets crashlanding in the middle of the ocean, far from civilization and happening upon a deserted island. All the adults except one died in the crash and the one that is alive is completely out of commission. At first, they follow the rules with which they had been instilled by society. One by one, they learn that society is what they, themselves, make of it ... being as there aren't any adults to tell them to go to bed, to gather food, to punish them if they steal, etc.

Over time, the group divides into two tribes. One is attempting to maintain some semblance of civilization, share and share alike, taking care of the weak, treating everyone equally. The other is lead by a charismatic and strong leader ... who leads his tribe through power, fear and superstition. But to a lot of the children, the "barbaric" tribe is the fun tribe. They go out hunting. They do what they want. They take what they want. They don't have to follow "silly rules." Slowly all but the most staunch holdouts migrate to the barbaric tribe either through sloth, greed or fear. Even the "accidental" death of one of the young children at the hands of this raving, baying, slavering pack is not enough to sway them back into their "right minds." Nay, it seems to only push them finally over the edge ... to where the outright murder of Piggy, possibly the most knowledgeable and level-headed of them all, even if the most annoying, is simply a matter of course.

I have heard the same story repeated to me over and over again. Smaller, family-type guilds, where everyone looks out for each other and everyone is simply there to have fun, where the guild is set up as a group of friends and people try to make sure that everyone gets along ... are constantly eclipsed by larger, more ruthless, confederations of individuals simply thrown together by a charismatic leader. The family guild is characterized by common backgrounds, common interests, probably a common playstyle ... whether roleplaying or laid back. The confederation I have referred to in the past as "a confederation of assholes." Their goal is simply the raw achievement of the game's goals. Numbers is what they need and so long as you can generally follow directions and you will show up regularly, they don't care what type of person you are or if you get along with anyone else in the guild.

Inevitably, one of each type of guild plays at a certain time slot ... or with similar enough habits that they cross paths regularly ... or even, as has been the case a couple times with my guild, the two guilds were headed by mutual friends. If they cross-pollinate enough ... eventually it becomes a Lord of the Flies scenario. The family-type guild, because it is not so ruthless and demanding, doesn't achieve goals as quickly or efficiently as the confederation guild ... so some members leave the family-guild for the confederation for that reason. Over time the confederation begins outright poaching of the family-guild's members ... using bullying or bribing tactics if necessary. Because the internal dynamics of the confederation does not breed loyalty, it must constantly infuse itself with a steady stream of newer members ... plebians for the older members to put down and use as the grist for their mill of achievement, like a college fraternity with its hazing and degradation and talk of brotherhood. The easiest place to get these new members is from the people they play with already, the family-guild. Sometimes this process continues until naught but the core of the family-guild remain.

Why does this occur? Why is this a consistent, if not constant, pattern? I'm not sure I know ... or even want to know. I only know the pattern that I've seen ... and how it was displayed so succinctly, boiled down into its barest essence by the movie that I watched just a few short days ago.

Posted by Legion at 8:42 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 5, 2005

Jade Empire

So I bought my first Xbox when they were initially released. It served me well for a long time. But I think Xboxes are particularly sensitive to being moved ... because when I moved up to Washington, my Xbox developed a stutter. It would sometimes not accept disks ... and eventually it would just crash when the disk was accessed. It finally got so bad that I just went out one day and bought a new Xbox. This, of course, meant that I had to abandon all my old save games and start over ...

This wasn't so bad because I was, shall we say, between games at the time. I bought it right as DukeZuke, Baudmore and I were starting to play X-Men: Legends together. (Speaking of which ... I never did finish that game either and I have X-Men: Legends II on pre-order. My backlog is growing!) So we merely redid the first hour or so of game content ... which was fine because this let us work the kinks out of our playing style.

When I moved back to California though, one of my two Xboxes gave up the ghost. It just wouldn't boot or anything. Yes, as luck would have it ... it was the new one. So I sent it off to be repaired. It was quite reasonable, actually ... but it came back with the hard disk blank. And this time ... I had a ton of half-finished games that I had wanted to keep my progress on. One of those was Jade Empire.

I had battled about half-way through the game, by my best estimate. It had taken me about 20 hours of effort, but I was really enjoying myself; doing every last side-quest and watching every movie in full. It took me about eight hours to duplicate the progress, obviously skipping over a lot of stuff. Though I was still trying to satisfy every side-quest.

The thing I love about this game though is the total Sunday morning kung fu movie feel. Everyone has their respective combat styles ... I find myself thinking, "Your Horse Demon style is no match for my Thousand Cuts style!" Ok ok ... I admit it ... I've shouted it at the screen after particularly near-escape combats. There's all the political scheming and court intrigue of a good kung fu movie too ... honor and duty and responsibility to one's self, one's family and one's station.

It also has a great rock/paper/scissors combat system. Regular attacks can be blocked, but strong attacks break through blocks, but regular attacks can ward off strong attacks. They also made it very visually obvious what strategy your opponent is employing at any one moment ... rather than trying to pick out some small detail in a sea of color.

There's even a bit of the rock/paper/scissors in whom you face as well. There are five types of combat styles. They are Martial, Weapon, Support, Magic and Transform. Some types of opponents are immune to certain types of styles. Such as, Spirits are immune to Support and Weapon styles. So you can't afford to rely on just one style to save the day.

I am having a lot of fun with the game ... but now that I've made it into the Imperial City ... things are seemingly getting a bit tedious. But I think Jade Empire may be the second game I finish on the Xbox ... probably the second game I've finished ... ever? I'll have to think on that ...

Posted by Legion at 12:18 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

August 30, 2005

I Survived PAX 2k5 ...

... and all I got was about 100 pictures to share. Actually, I got a lot more stuff than just the pictures. I had a complete blast hanging out with all the other PAX Enforcers. The show was amazing ... so much better than last year. It was obvious that we learned a lot. And there are already suggestions brewing for what to do better for next year. I'm going to try to have the pictures up somewhere soon to share. And along with that ... I hope to have some observations and thoughts about PAX to share as well.

Posted by Legion at 8:40 AM | Comments (0)

June 3, 2005

Illinois Set to Ban Sale of "Violent" Video Games to Minors

In this article it states that clerks who "knowingly sell adult video games to minors" could be fined. But then it states that the legislation doesn't state what's to be banned ... it leaves that decision up to the individual retailers. Huh?

Let me get this straight, the law doesn't say what video games shouldn't be sold to minors ... it just says that the retailers should make that decision. So if a clerk at a store sells a video game to a minor that the retailer thinks they shouldn't have ... the government will step in and fine that person up to a grand? Couldn't the store just fire the person?

This is the most toothless piece of legislation ever. It says nothing other than it's going to step in and help punish someone who's already probably going to be punished and more effectively. WalMart has a policy about not selling Mature rated games to minors (just like not selling R rated movies to minors). Do they really need the state of Illinois to step in and help them discipline their employees?

I think not.

Posted by Legion at 8:19 AM | Comments (0)

May 31, 2005

Required Reading for All Would-Be Game Designers

The Gamer's Manifesto contains a lot of things to which every game developer should pay attention. My current favorite:

This brings back horrible memories of a Goldeneye level where if you tripped an alarm, an infinite number of bad guys poured forth. We knew a man who failed that level 37 times, then got the Infinite Health cheat for it and came back. He intentionally tripped the alarm, the guards rushed out. Laughing maniacally, he proceeded to shoot those fuckers for four hours, killing 1,183 of them - 682 with groin shots - before his thumbs cramped up. Your game should not create this kind of bitterness.

Posted by Legion at 10:31 AM | Comments (0)

May 12, 2005

Forza Motorsport - First Impressions

Ever since Pole Position, I've been a racing game freak. So whenever a new racing game comes out, I generally go pick it up. Forza Motorsport came out recently and here's my first impressions after about 20 minutes in the game ...

There's two camps in racing games. There's the arcade people and the simulator freaks. Forza Motorsport lands heavily in the simulator category. It gives one the ability to customize pretty much everything about one's cars ... from the tires, to the paint job, to decals, to minute changes to engine or suspension ... to custom parts. If you're a ricer, you will love this game. If you're a grease monkey, you will love this game.

Now, you might think from my earlier characterization that I'm an arcade guy. Nothing could be further from the truth. I prefer my racing games to be simulations ... just don't ask me what the hell "camber" does or what PSI my tires are at. Sure, I'll play with my setup a little bit ... but the racing is what I'm here for. I'm glad that the game gives you the option of tweaking your car's setup ... but I love that custom parts help out noticeably too.

As far as the racing goes, it's quite good. There's point-to-point tracks as well as your standard circuits. The races are also restricted by car class and sometimes other criteria (like front-engine, rear-wheel-drive cars only) ... so you know you're going to be racing cars fairly similar to yours. The game seamlessly supports 16:9 televisions ... so use it if you've got it, the wider view helps a lot.

Ok ... back to the game for me ... I blew about two hours putting together a great custom soundtrack to listen to while driving and I'm not going to let it go to waste.

Posted by Legion at 4:15 PM | Comments (0)

April 17, 2005

Righteous Indignation

I originally intended to post a rant about how my super-l33t surge protector that cost $100 in 1992 finally gave up the ghost and how I'm worried that it did damage to my main computer's power supply or even more vital, and fragile, components ... engendering a trip to my local Fry's Electronics to gather new super-l33t (though cheaper) surge suppressors ... reminding me that I really, really love to spend money on myself. (Can you say "run-on"? I knew you could.)

But I ran into something even more rant-worthy on my way to my keyboard ...

I've been reading about how Microsoft is going to unveil the next version of the Xbox, the Xbox360, on MTV. You can see a representative article here.

But that's not that interesting to me ... marketing gimmicks rarely are ...

What is interesting is gamers' reaction to it. For the most part, gamers see this as a slap in the face. "We don't watch MTV! MTV is a tool of The Man," some might exclaim. Hilariously enough, according to many gamers, Bill Gates is The Man ... so we have ourselves a tautology here.

But I digress ...

What makes this so interesting to me is that gamers, who pride themselves on being so much more intelligent than the average person (and seriously, doesn't every subculture?), don't realize that Microsoft isn't revealing the Xbox360 on MTV for us gamers. It's not about us! Don't you get it? Microsoft is revealing the Xbox360 on MTV for the huge number of people that do watch MTV ... that do sway with the changing breezes of fashion ... that do suck off the teat of The Man!

These rabid gamers are the same people that ranted and raved about the Spike TV Video Game Awards. They called it "insulting" and "insipid." Yes, to gamers it was. But remember, the most popular televised sporting event is not the SuperBowl ... not the World Series ... it's professional wrestling. And the most popular television series in the world is Baywatch. This is the mass market we're talking about. They're the true "average person."

Microsoft can't be the type of successful it wants to be without catering to the masses ... and get this through your heads ... we gamers aren't the masses! The people that own one of every console (PS/2, Xbox and GameCube if you're not one of the initiated) ... Microsoft already figures they have you in their pocket or will if they can gather enough compelling titles ... which they have to do to get the mass market to buy into the platform anyway.

You see? If they can appeal to the mass market ... they get gamers for free! It's just that simple. Why spend money to gather the fanatics into their flock ... when the fanatics will come of their own accord? It's the mouth-breathing, knuckle-dragging, can-only-afford-one-console masses that they're trying to win over with this MTV tactic ... not gamers.

So don't worry ... they're not insulting us gamers ... they're just talking someone else's language ...

Posted by Legion at 1:43 PM | Comments (0)

February 17, 2005

Oh My Dear Lord

As if we didn't just get infused with enough commercialism at Valentine's Day to last us at least until Christmas ... SOE decided now was the perfect time to unveil their new service available from inside EQII. Type /pizza and thou shalt receive ...

If I were a religious man ... I would say that somewhere Baby Jesus is crying.

Posted by Legion at 10:26 PM | Comments (0)

February 8, 2005

PAX 2k5

Oh ... and before I forget ... PAX 2005 has been announced. I'm going to be volunteering again this year ... which means I'll be flying back up here at least in August.

Posted by Legion at 10:26 AM | Comments (0)

January 18, 2005

Birthday LAN Party

For those of you who know me IRL ... here's the announcement:

This weekend, to honor my birthday, I'm having a WoW LAN party. Other games are not invited.

What: LAN Party
Where: My place
When: Starting 8pm Thursday 20^th of January ... Ending somewhere around Monday 24^th of January ... show up when you can
What to Bring: Your own chair ... and potluck snacks, beverages and food

Posted by Legion at 9:40 AM | Comments (0)

Crash Heard 'Round the World

At least around the World of Warcraft that is. Last Thursday, Blizzard took down about twenty of their over eighty servers for an extended maintenance of sixteen hours. The promise was that this would improve the performance of said servers, seeing as these were of the highest populations. What came next should be a lesson to us all ...

As it happens in the realm of man, there were problems with the upgrade. You see, they were adding new hardware ... and sometimes new hardware doesn't quite work the way you expected it. But it is what happened next, or truthfully what failed to happen, that is of the most concern.

Thursday night wasn't a big deal. Friday night was where things started happening, random server resets, minor rollbacks (on the order of minutes), things of that nature ... but not enough to truly cause concern. Then Saturday is when things really started heating up with two or three server restarts happening during prime time. Finally Sunday greeted us with multiple restarts and even a couple periods of hour or two long downtime. Then the kicker ... Monday morning, the population cap was lowered, by my best estimate from 3500 to 2000. Anyone over this magic number trying to log in is greeted with the message, "Realm is full. Your position in queue is XXXX. Estimated wait time: YYYY"

Now lets take a step back ... shit happens. Even the servers maintained by the best IT people in the world crash. What Blizzard's true crime was not that all this happened ... but what didn't happen. During this entire four day period the playerbase did not get one single iota of information. They did not receive one update on what truly was going on. They were not informed when the situation would be resolved, if ever. The Community Relations team was conspicuously silent.

Listen, if the servers are having issues ... I deserve to know. If the upgrade didn't go so well, you need to tell me so maybe I can choose to do something else with my weekend. You've got my money already ... I don't even want to take it back, cancel my account, sue you or anything else that the asinine average message board poster suggests. Just tell me that the servers aren't going to be working up to par this weekend and I can go ... I don't know ... somewhere else.

But as far as reducing the population caps ... it was inexcusable that change was made before it was communicated to the players. As a matter of fact, it happened at my best estimate at least twelve hours before we were told. That is completely wrong. Just like you chose to sneak a server side bug fix in on the Thursday maintenance (I call it a patch, since it affected gameplay ... including spells) and not tell anyone until you were caught red handed and red faced. This trend has to end.

Two strikes Blizzard ... don't make it to three ...

Posted by Legion at 8:24 AM | Comments (0)

January 11, 2005

Every Company Has To Have One Incident

As if I haven't had enough updates in the past 24 hours, Blizzard has given me another reason to shoot off my mouth. In a situation that some have seen brewing for quite a while, Blizzard has asked that those who feel they've been wrongfully banned from the message forums come forward and they'll keep the rabid GMs back this time.

What's that "doomed to repeat" thing people keep telling me about? I dunno, I forget. But one thing I do remember is that at one point there was this lousy rumor that went around the EQ PvP circles that Lady Dagaermo, one of their events coordinators at the time, was a dirty little griefer. The rumor said that this person was a big mover-and-shaker in Darkenbane, at the time the largest griefing guild on Rallos Zek, the no-holds-barred PvP server. I don't know if it was true ... I don't even really care. But I talked to Lady Dagaermo a few times in trying to get some PvP things fixed ... and he (yeah, I'm not confusing my pronouns) pretty much had the "ganking is the natural order of things on a PvP server" attitude.

Have we not learned yet that people don't like to be ganked? Have we not figured out that the only thing that creates more high blood pressure in the MMO community than ganking is ninja looting? Have we not figured out that having a high-profile member of your staff be a staunch proponent for griefer's rights is bad for business? (Before they took it down, the front page of the Kali Compton website, the guild led ostensibly by Nebu, the man allegedly responsible for this uproar, was slathered with rhetoric of the likes of, "If you don't like that we gank you, run faster.")

I've been in business for long enough to know, I don't care how valuable someone is to the team ... if they become bad for business, you have to show everyone that there is a line that cannot be crossed. I would say that having to publicly apologize to every last subscriber and eat crow enough to say that someone on the team abused their position of power and we can't even figure out who they screwed is past that line. If this were my company ... that person or people would be fired.

And really ... when are these MMO companies going to figure out that people who are griefers (let alone are leaders of griefing guilds) are not people persons! You want your people persons in customer service, right? Anyone? Bueller?

Posted by Legion at 12:59 AM | Comments (0)

January 10, 2005

Are We Going to Get to the Eagle Claw Soon?

Not content to be upstaged by SOE for long, if at all, Blizzard released new numbers today stating that WoW has sold "over 600,000 copies". Assuming that they have even an 80% retention rate, this means that WoW has more active accounts than EQ has ever had at any one point in time ... and 60% more than SOE claimed EQII to have on Friday. Hopefully WoW has now claimed the Eagle Claw spot on this bat of one-upsmanship and we can get on to more important things.

Posted by Legion at 4:28 PM | Comments (0)

Dodged A Bullet

As Cosmik reports, SOE has announced a new strategy for content distribution for EQII. They're calling them "Adventure Packs". I call it relentless profiteering.

Seriously, I am so glad I got out of EQII when I did. I mean, does anybody remember the public outcry about some of the broken EQ expansions that have been released? They had a huge guild summit in San Diego to "listen to the players" and basically figure out why one of their coveted expansions didn't sell. I'll tell you why ... because they schlocked out a bunch of crap and their drones finally started taking notice.

Now, in a move that has me only thinking, "Well gee, WoW is charging $14.99 a month, just like us. DAoC is charging $14.95 a month now too. If we can't win in pure size, we'll milk more money out of our subscribers! Yeah, that's the ticket!" Let me get this straight ... people are paying $14.99 a month for what again? Bug fixes? Things that should have been in the game at release? What? Now the strategy is to even add one dungeon to the game, you're going to charge me at least five bucks? (They did say that "the first of these would be $4.95" after all and you know prices never go down.)

Oh ... but it gets better! At the end of the announcement they say they're going to be soooo charitable and give away the Adventure Packs to Station Access subscribers. Golly gee Mister, that's swell! So let me see ... I can pay five bucks two to four times per year ... or I can pay an extra $7 every month.

Really pushing that Station Access subscription aren't they? Why is that? Could it be because if people buy the Station Access subscription they can artificially inflate their numbers to say 310,000?

Posted by Legion at 9:14 AM | Comments (0)

January 4, 2005

Farewell Forever SOE

This morning with a bit of trepidation, I cancelled my EQII account. With how much I have bashed SOE over the years, one might ask why the hesitation?

When EQII and World of Warcraft were still in Beta and there could be some doubt as to which was the better game ... I listened to a good friend of mine, Searra, get all excited about EQII and the guild she wanted to form there. I got genuinely excited too ... but also a bit worried because I figured I knew how things would turn out. But she beseeched me to give SOE another chance ... that they'd do things right this time.

After playing in the Stress Test Beta of WoW I became even more concerned. This was a game that I could actually enjoy ... like I could with EQ long, long ago ... but better. I implored my friends in Arcadian Exiles to give WoW a try as they had asked me to give EQII a try ... but they weren't budging. As WoW became more and more real ... moving from Stress Test Beta to Closed Beta to Open Beta finally to Release ... I knew that WoW was the game for me. "I don't play for the game, but for the people," was a common chant among those that decided to either stay in EQ or play EQII. My reply was always, "Why should I have to choose?" (Really it should have been, "If you don't play for the game ... then why pay for the game? Why not just go to IRC and roleplay there?")

After years of playing MMOs as an escape from reality ... pulling the soft blanket of EQ around me so I wouldn't have to think about how much I was letting my life go down the tubes ... I finally broke out. And I finally discovered something about myself ... MMOs are just a game. They're not a world. They're not a better way to be (just ask Ole Bald Angus, The Greatest Roleplayer Alive). They're just games.

Once I made that mental leap I was able to say to myself, "Self ... if you and a friend were playing Tic-Tac-Toe (a game that has the tactical possibilities of a race to the bathroom after an authentic super-spicy burrito) and you got bored ... wouldn't you eventually say, 'Dude ... how about something else?'" And I replied, "F'in A I would ... I hate that game! (War Games aside)"

Because really ... when I thought about it ... there are times in any MMO where there's nobody else around. Times when you have to solo. Times when you're home sick and everyone else is working. Times when you wake up in the middle of the night and just can't get back to sleep for the life of you so you decide to hang out with that one person in the guild from the other side of the world (you know every guild has one) ... ok that's not completely alone, but still. And its those times when the game has to be a game, not a world, not a glorified chat program, but just a game.

WoW is a game that I can enjoy all by itself ... even if I were there playing completely alone, I would still enjoy it. And it only gets better with other people. EQII was something to be endured to spend time with my friends.

And that's what it boils down to ... I won't pay anymore for a game that I don't want to play.

Posted by Legion at 7:50 AM | Comments (0)

December 10, 2004

Child's Play Dinner

I just got back from the Child's Play Dinner and Auction. For those of you keeping score at home ... yes, I will be appearing in a future Penny Arcade comic. Tune in tomorrow for the full story ... after I've had some sleep ...

Posted by Legion at 12:14 AM | Comments (0)

November 27, 2004

Nintendo DS ... The Future of Portable Gaming?

So I saw on the Penny Arcade website that they were working with Garrison Titan, a local Star Wars "reenactment group" (for lack of a better term), on a toy drive for Child's Play. They invited people to come out and have their World of Warcraft Strategy Guide signed (since Penny Arcade did a bunch of comics for it) or bring out your brand new Nintendo DS and try out the wireless multiplayer action.

Well, I gave up on EBGames ever shipping my Nintendo DS and I was able (with the help of my local EBGames store ... thanks a bunch guys) to track down someone in town that actually had a few left. So I grabbed my newly minted DS and went over to the Toys R Us and actually was the first one to whip mine out. Tycho and I went at it at first ... taking turns completely wiping the other out. Then some others joined in and we got a four-way Metroid Prime Hunters (demo version) wireless game going. It was a blast.

First reactions? Well, I think the wireless multiplayer is an awesome idea and it was implemented very, very well. Just standing around in close proximity of each other we didn't have any lag or hiccups that I could see. (We also didn't try to test their range, since the game was what this was about.) I was impressed that my DS had enough battery life straight out of the box to play for a good two hours before the low battery light came on. Having the two screens and especially one being a touch screen takes a bit of getting used to ... but it remains to be seen what people really do with it. The backlight is nice and bright and the rechargeable lithium ion battery (which is replaceable ... nice touch) is a nice lesson learned from the original Gameboy Advance. Overall, I'm impressed ... so far.

The system has a lot of potential ... what remains to be seen is if Nintendo can convince developers to move to the new platform. You see, if one makes a game for the Gameboy Advance, the game can be played on any GBA or DS. If one makes a game for the DS ... it can only be played on the DS. And unlike the GBA (which could play any Gameboy Color game as well as a Gameboy Color could), the DS does not include 100% of the capabilities that one would have in a GBA game ... namely, the wired multiplayer or wired controller hookup to a Nintendo Gamecube. But, if one wants to play a single-player GBA game ... you're all set.

Personally, I'm enjoying my purchase ...

Posted by Legion at 7:27 PM | Comments (0)

November 25, 2004

What Games Can Teach Us

Many people say that video games teach only to kill ... are horrible for children ... and are the reason behind America's children's growing obesity rate. But through all that ... video games are games, like football, soccer, baseball and all the rest ... that can teach things like honor, sportsmanship and the good side of competition.

I give you, Bow Nigger.

Posted by Legion at 8:00 AM | Comments (0)

November 24, 2004

Message for my WoW Friends

I suggest relocating to the new Pacific RP server (Cenarion Circle). I've created a new character there and though it is lagging ... it is in better shape than the old server.

Posted by Legion at 5:31 PM | Comments (0)

Bumps on the Road

So WoW had a few bumps in the road yesterday. Namely, "OMGlaaaaaaaggg", "WTF? Queues?!?" and "Blizz is teh suck, they won't let me play with my friends!!!!!111" For a translation out of d00d-speak and into modern English ... read on.

So the first issue was the so-called "loot lag" that initially showed up in the final stress test when WoW had an influx of half a million players. Basically, things are moving along and you go to loot a kill ... and you get stuck there. You can't move ... you can't fight ... etc. Now, I've never had it that bad ... I've just been unable to loot when I run into this. Although, from what I understand, things are worse on the overcrowded Eastern/Central servers than they are on the Pacific/Mountain servers.

The next issue was login queues. Basically, in order to ensure that people have a good play experience (and that the servers stay up), Blizzard instituted a queueing system like a phone hold queue ("There are 15 callers ahead of you, please hold for the next representative.") Except people get a tad upset when they try to log in and get a message saying they're 327^th in line.

And finally, it seems that large groups of people came up with the brilliant idea of "Hey, since we don't know the names of the servers ... lets all jump on the server that is alphabetically first!" Thereby bringing the Archimonde server to its knees. This reminds me of the brochures they pass out at Disney World that say, "To have a more pleasing experience, follow the left-hand path around the park ... since 90% of the park's attendees follow the right-hand path, you'll experience far less crowding." Even after they put out the brochures ... 90% of the people who visit Disney World go to the right.

My personal solution to this issue is to not have server names. If you want to play with friends, distribute a "server key password" amongst them that's different from their regular password. The backend system keeps everyone typing in the same server key on the same server ... but evenly distributes said groups across all the servers. This way you won't have the one server that's always overcrowded on launch ... and hence, overcrowded for the life of the game.

My experience? I got in ... I played for several hours last night and another hour this morning. I ran into the lag once. I sat in a queue for a total of three minutes. And I wasn't a dumbass in choosing the server I was going to play on. Overall, I'm very happy with my purchase and with the game ... oh, and my zergling is awfully cute!

Posted by Legion at 8:30 AM | Comments (0)

November 23, 2004

It's WoW Release Day

I dragged myself out of bed this morning at 7am *gasp* ... and was out of the house before even 8am *shocked* to pick up my copy of the World of Warcraft Collector's Edition. This way I'll be able to leave work early and pick up the groceries on my list ...

Let's see ...

Microwave food (for general sustenance while playing)
Fruits and other easy to prepare, but nutritious food (for variety)
Meat and caffeinated beverages (for staying power)

I get two days off for Thanksgiving ... so I'll be putting them to good use.

Posted by Legion at 8:42 AM | Comments (0)

November 22, 2004

Speaker Setup

My buddy Bu wanted a link to the Logitech Z-640 Speakers that I bought for my system. And by the way ... these speakers rock if you've got a 5.1 capable sound card (such as the SoundBlaster Audigy). The sound quality is top notch. The only way you'll get better is if you go with an actual home theater type sound system.

Posted by Legion at 2:40 PM | Comments (0)

Its Not Just Me

I love it when people I respect come to the same conclusions as I do.

Posted by Legion at 7:29 AM | Comments (0)

November 21, 2004

Quality

It's funny ... ever since I read the classic book Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Quality has always been in the back of my mind. The book found a special niche with me because, at the time I read it, I was a disaffected teenager and superficially it was saying that school wasn't designed to actually teach ... or at least, homework and tests aren't generally designed to test if the teaching was efficacious ... i.e. that the student actually learned anything. Fortunately, I grew up and learned that few truly pursue Quality ...

Case in point ...

Maybe someone needs to take SOE by the ear and explain to them that an "out of memory" error on a machine with a gigabyte of memory is unacceptable. There is no possible way, after playing the game for less than an hour that it should be so poorly constructed that it would run out of memory with that much memory to start with. My decision to purchase a second gigabyte of memory should be a choice between the game running and running better ... not running or running reliably.

This is why it is wrong to design a game to run on tomorrow's machines ... because it sucks on today's.

Posted by Legion at 6:16 PM | Comments (0)

November 10, 2004

EQ2 vs. WoW ... First Reactions

A friend of mine challenged me to give EQ2 a try, despite my misgivings. You see, I used to be an EverQuest addict. After getting bored and frustrated with the game, I moved on to other MMOGs, including PlanetSide and Star Wars: Galaxies. All of these were made by SOE, Sony Online Entertainment. And all of them burned me to one extent or another ...

To give you an example of what I mean by "burned," here's a quote from the blog of Jeff Freeman, chief architect for content in SWGs new expansion Jump To Lightspeed:

To couch this in a fantasy game example, systems driving content (the traditional approach) works something like this:

• You add a warrior class.
• You then go about adding things for the warrior class to see and do.
• Maybe you add a warrior's guild. Or several.
• You add some variations here and there to make those warriors guilds distinct from one another.
• You add a thief class.
• You run out of time and don't add anything for thieves to do.

Just kidding. Skip that last bit. I mean really. That never happens.

Now, don't get me wrong. I respect the man. I've been reading his blog for months now. And in the rest of his blog entry he really does have some good things to say about the way things should be done. But I'm not talking about that ... I'm talking about how they are.

The above strategy, from my experience, tends to be SOE standard operating procedure. Rogues in EQ had skills that had no use at all until four or five expansions into the game, i.e. four or five years later. PlanetSide had anti-vehicular weapons that were designed best for anti-infantry and were still darned good against vehicles, thereby giving no reason to specialize in anti-infantry weaponry. SWG, the worst offender, had entire skill trees that were not working, not implemented, or downright useless up to a year after release. Let me put it right out on the table ... this is wrong.

My purpose here is to show not necessarily what EQ2 is doing wrong, but all the little things that WoW is doing right. My first reaction to EQ2 is that it is simply more of the same. More of the same lack of attention to detail. More of the same carelessness. More of the same lack of flair. They are simply dumping the same old schlock on the table like the neighborhood diner that survives not because the food is good or the service is superb but simply because its been there forever and its cheap and easy to get to.

User Interface

The user interface in MMOGs is the way that your players interact with the world. It is the thing that enables them to enjoy your game. In my opinion, it can not necessarily make but it can break a game. If it is easy to deal with, more people will be able to enjoy the (presumably) great game you've made ... if it is a pain, that alone can drive people away.

In WoW, when you have a merchant window open, it opens in a pre-defined location near the upper left corner of the screen. This predefined location doesn't overlap with any of the control elements that are always on the screen. Your character window (how one sees what equipment one's character is currently using) opens in the exact same spot. You might think this is bad ... and it might be. But if you have a merchant window open and you hit the button to open your character window ... the merchant window shifts over to the right and the character window opens in the normal spot. If you had the character window open and opened a merchant window, the character window would do the shifting. The entire interface is laid out in such a way with planned shifting maneuvers that no window overlaps with any other. In EQ2, things just open willy nilly and it is your responsibility to move everything around so that things don't overlap if you don't want them to ... which, even for a veteran like me means constantly readjusting one's window positions. Pain in the ass.

I would say, that for some (if not all) players of these games that the chat is an important feature. If you can't see what other players are saying ... then you're going to have a hard time playing the game. In EQ2, the default chat configuration is to have every single piece of text including combat spam ("X hits YOU for 1 point of damage"), quest text ("Go forth and slay the mighty snake"), every system message ("The servers will be brought down in two minutes, get your shit together"), show up in the main chat window. 95% of this is ignored by the average player ... all he (and I agree) cares about is the chat from other players. In WoW, the only things that, by default, show up in the main chat window is chat and system messages. There's absolutely no need for combat spam and quest text to show up in the main chat window ... because both games put the important combat spam and quest text up in the main world view at the appropriate times. WoW does it right ... EQ2 makes you fiddle and filter and create a second window ... 20 minutes wasted trying to get it right.

Am I nitpicking? I don't think so. In EQ1, having never had a user interface that took care of me like WoW's, I just accepted having to deal with always moving windows around and filtering my chat. Now, every time I open a window in EQ2 that pops up behind another window or some text message shows up where it doesn't make sense to ... I growl at the designers.

Graphics

WoW embodies the concept of "less is more." In my new job, I've learned a lot about how people use computers all over the world ... and how those other markets differ from the U.S. One of the target markets of WoW is Korea. Koreans don't upgrade nearly so often as Americans do ... hence any game that targets that market has to keep in mind that you can't expect state-of-the-art systems from them. But, on the other hand, Americans will expect eye candy that rivals the latest games ... which do expect state-of-the-art systems.

Yes, EQ2 has some pretty good graphics ... but that comes at a price. They've specifically designed their system to require a more than state-of-the-art computer ... so that in the future (say five years down the road) it will still look good. What this means is that in busy areas ... the graphics get choppy and slow. It also means that sometimes when you look at people standing right next to you, they look like blurry dolls with only smears for clothing.

In WoW, the graphics never do that. The target system is at best half of what EQ2's is ... so it looks its best on any system that was built in say, oh ... the last three years at least. And really, because of the quality artists they have at Blizzard, I would wager that things look better. Its like walking through a painting. I mean, I'm not exactly the world's best art critic ... but geez ... looking at the two side-by-side as I have ... you can tell they have artists at Blizzard and just modelers at SOE.

Some people may not like the style that Blizzard chose for rendering their graphics. "They look too cartoony," is a comment often heard. And yeah, screenshots do make it look like that ... but when you actually log in and move through this world ... it really feels like its alive. I have yet to have that same feeling of awe from EQ2.

And I mentioned attention to detail at the beginning of this missive ... one of those "details" is animation. Everything in WoW moves differently. The werewolves actually drop to all fours to run after you ... a movement in-and-of-itself when I first saw it made my sphincter clench and forced me to have second thoughts about fighting these things. The murlocs, these slimy, gurgling, fish-people ... they come at you swinging wildly. Their skin is actually shiny as if covered by some sort of mucus that you don't want to touch for fear it'll give you warts. In EQ2, most things just move towards you in this weird shuffling gait ... like a marionette being dragged unwillingly by some amateur puppeteer.

Conclusion, for now ...

These two things are the items that confronted me first and foremost upon having played both of these games. There is more, but this may be too long already to expect anyone to read the whole thing ... and I think it really is important to read it all. I will be writing another rant or rants as I can over the coming weeks ...

To wrap up, Punish asked me what I thought of being torn between playing with friends who are dear to me and I enjoy spending time with and playing a game that truly is enjoyable. I told him I felt like Charlton Heston at the end of Soylent Green ... running through the streets screaming, "Soylent Green is people ... Soylent Green is people!" I feel like I'm the only one that understands ... or even cares ... that a horrible crime is being perpetrated upon the gaming public.

P.S. Thanks Dad for making me watch Soylent Green in the first place ... I didn't understand then, but I understand now just what a classic movie it really is.

Posted by Legion at 10:30 AM | Comments (0)

November 2, 2004

No More Jonesing Here

The WoW Final Stress Test Beta has begun! Bu and Punish are going to join me and we're going to tear it up! Between that and EQ2 coming out ... I'm going to be a busy, busy gamer. I need to make sure I buy a lot of provisions ...

Posted by Legion at 8:14 AM | Comments (0)

October 18, 2004

Squeeked in Under the Gun

A couple of friends have been in the WoW Closed Beta for a long time. A few weeks ago Blizzard emailed them another Closed Beta key. Then later that day they got another email saying that it was a mistake, but instead of turning the key off ... Blizzard said to give it to a friend. Well, after much deliberation ... I am that friend! Not all was well and good though ... it took me all weekend to download the client and get it patched so that I could finally log in this morning. But now ... I can finally get my WoW on ...

*sighs* After I get home from work ...

Dammit.

Posted by Legion at 9:31 AM | Comments (0)

October 4, 2004

X-asperated

I've been having problems with my Xbox for a number of months now. Basically, its been choking on brand new discs, saying they are dirty or damaged. I would take the disc out ... check it over ... nary a scratch. I would even clean them, despite their already pristine condition ... and put them back in ... still "dirty or damaged."

I decided to have a few friends over to play the latest Xbox title, X-Men Legends. But every time we would stop moving for more than a minute or two (which happens quite often when one is deciding exactly how to level up a particular character), the game would lock up and we'd have to go back to our last save point ... which are somewhat rare in this particular game.

So ... I got tired of it. I went right out and bought a brand new Xbox and it is working just fine. The only issue I have now is that all the songs I've downloaded ... all the save games I have ... all the three years of history is stuck on the original Xbox's hard drive. I'm going to look into using my memory card to download my save games and transfer them to the new box ... but even that is going to be a pain ... since the house only has one TV.

As for the fate of the old Xbox? Well ... I probably should send it in to have it repaired ... and then I could give it away to a friend in need or something. Qrom has been jonesing for an Xbox since I introduced him to Crimson Skies. Maybe an early Christmas present ...

Posted by Legion at 7:10 AM | Comments (0)

September 22, 2004

Dammit!

Ok ... Blizzard announced a new round of Beta testers are getting their invites into the World of Warcraft closed beta test. I have just one thing to say ...

*taptaptap* Where's my email?

Posted by Legion at 8:46 AM | Comments (0)

September 16, 2004

Fable

Most of the time, I'm not a fan of EBGames' policies. Like the "If you didn't preorder it, you're out of luck for the first month" policy. Or the policy to be rather snide if you actually expect like service ... or something. Or the other policy to really, really push the strategy guides. But sometimes, just sometimes ... they're the only ones who have the game right away. You just have to know how to deal with them.

So yesterday morning's adventure went like this ...

I staked out the local EBGames, hiding behind one of those concrete garbage cans that you typically only find in open-air malls. I was dressed in black with shoepolish on my face. When finally a worker snuck out to put up the morning signage ... I grabbed him from behind in my best Splinter Cell chokehold, pressed his pasty face up against the glass and shouted, "Sell me Fable or Registerboy here gets it!"

And what's priceless is when I recounted this tale in the office after successfully retrieving said Xbox game, one of my coworkers (the only female in the office of contractors) said, "Are you serious?"

I had to assure her that I was not ... or else my cover was blown. I mean really, she was too nice to have to liquidate.

Posted by Legion at 8:56 AM | Comments (1)

September 12, 2004

WoW Stress Test Slated to End Today

Well, as They say ... all good things must come to an end. Today the WoW Stress Test is supposed to end, unless you believe the vicious rumors that Blizzard is sending out even more stress test invitations today. I enjoyed my week and a half as a guest in Blizzard's playground ... and I even brought back some pictures! (Click on the picture for the full-sized version.)

Here we see a poor human that probably didn't know how to swim! Either that or he didn't know how to read his breath meter and drowned before he could reach the surface. I found him swaying and bobbing in the current ... and then swam on ...

Here is the Night Elf Priest I made flying through the air on the back of a Gryphon ... on his way to the dwarven city of Ironforge. The flying creature rides were all amazing ... in my time in WoW I rode a bat, gryphon and hippogriff ... each one of them a spectacular ride ... specifically designed to be scenic.

The cities of each race were all enormous ... and amazingly alive as well. Here we see a school marm with her flock of happy children following dutifully as she led them around.

Now here's something that made me literally say, "Wow!" As a little orc shaman ... one has to go on a quest to get one's first totem. Well ... Mbogo was sent on a trip into the hills to commune with the earth. He was sent to find a hidden trail ... with a sacred rock at the end of it ... and then and only then ... was he to drink the sacred potion. Well, Mbogo did as he was instructed ... and lo and behold, before his very eyes appeared a Spirit of the Earth that Mbogo's companion could not see!

I just never got tired of flying over the countryside on the various tamed creatures available ...

This is the type of horse that Undead can get (or Warlocks of any race ... bastards) ... and I want one!

As a going away present for ourselves, Allastria and I chipped in together and bought a pet cockroach! Here's Amunsetna and Roachie rockin out together.

And ... as I said ... all good things must come to their end. But this isn't goodbye. It's farewell until retail baby! (Or at least Open Beta ...)

Posted by Legion at 11:10 AM | Comments (0)

September 3, 2004

WoW ... the Short Review

Well ... on the second attempt at downloading, I was able to get it all down. I woke up at 5:30am this morning to play ... and I must say that with Blizzard, it's the little things. Yeah they've got the quests and the world and the great art ... but it's the little things.

For example, when my backpack was full and I attempted to complete a quest that would have given me two items (that would normally end up in my backpack) ... it told me that my backpack was full and wouldn't let me complete the quest. So what did I do? I ran to a nearby merchant ... sold a bunch of stuff and went right back and finished the quest. EverQuest would simply have let me complete the quest and the items would have been eaten by the quest demons. I would have been shit-out-of-luck ... thanks for playing ... please drive through.

I'll write up more after I play some more ... unfortunately, it's time for work ...

Posted by Legion at 9:03 AM | Comments (0)

September 2, 2004

WoW Stress Test Begins

The WoW stress test beta began today. Fortunately, I was able to get myself a spot. Unfortunately, it only lasts a week. Oh well ... downloading the client now ... from what I understand it's about 2GB compressed. I've got 677MB downloaded so far ... *tap tap tap* ... *sigh*.

So close but yet ... so far ...

Posted by Legion at 8:25 PM | Comments (0)

PAX04

I'm back from PAX ... back to the humdrum of the real world. Back to what seems like so much tissue paper stretched over an existence that, for the weekend, was lush, vibrant and with a couple tiny exceptions if not everyone saw eye-to-eye ... at least they respectfully cooperated. Tycho probably summed it up better than I could ... but I want to delve more into specifics ...

I was working through most of the convention and ended up only sleeping for four hours Saturday night ... but it was all worth it.

The Good

The Omegathon was six events of gaming goodness. It was billed as the ultimate gaming challenge to with the ultimate gaming prize. Twenty contestants were selected from the pre-registrants and competed in six games of various types: Diceland a tabletop game, HALO deathmatch, Mario Kart: Double Dash, Dance Dance Revolution, DOOM and the last secret round to determine the final champion ... Pong. The competition was amazing with some great performances by everyone. My early on favorite was Josh Eash who eventually went to third place in the overall standings. Congratulations to everyone who competed ... I can't wait until they release the DVD of the event so I can see it all.

There was a concert Saturday night that unfortunately only 400 people were able to get into, despite the entire convention of about 3000 wanting to attend. We only had 400 seats in the theater, which I'm sure is going to be rectified for next year. The performers were Conney Lin playing selections from Final Fantasy on a grand piano, Optimus Rhyme, The Minibosses, and long-time Penny Arcade friend MC Front-a-lot. Each of them were great performances and they were awesome all rolled into one. And yeah, I did get a little misty during the soft point in the Minibosses performance when nearly everyone in the theater was holding up a backlit device of some sort (cellphone, GBA SP, PDA ... whatever) and swaying instead of a lighter. It was a thing of beauty.

The Exhibition hall was filled with playable games that have not yet been released. Yes, most of them were the same thing the game industry saw at E3 ... but who cares! Real people got to see them at PAX ... gamers ... y'know ... the people without whom there wouldn't be a game industry. Microsoft was there with Fable, Forza Motorsport, Mechassault 2, Conker: Live and Reloaded, Jade Empire and others. Warner Brothers was there with a showing of The Matrix Online which was the surprise head-turner of the show. I thought it would be a dead booth, since most gamers basically shun anything built on a license ... especially that one. But the TMO people were quite successful in wooing a steady stream of people to their booth and were even capable of convincing me that they might have some interesting concepts in their game. I'll actually look at it when it comes out now.

The Bad

Well, you can't have light without darkness, as the movie goes. Two young girls who stated in conversation that they weren't even drinking age yet (one of them was even married already ... what is this world coming to?) decided to pen a letter about how their noses were offended at the smell of some of the rooms after people had been gaming in them all day long. But y'know what ... I've been to gaming conventions where the place gets ripe ... I mean make-your-eyes-water ripe. Yes, there were a couple examples of people who hadn't showered or put on deodorant in a couple days ... but do you complain about marathoners sweating? Do you complain about an NFL locker room smelling less than springtime fresh? When you have a hundred people packed into a small room for 14 hours ... it's going to smell like hot people ... there is no deodorant in the world that's going to change that. So some people, including the two giggling girls, need to get off their high horses.

Now ... to those of you who give us a bad name ... I have only to say, don't be surprised if PAX05 has a deodorant sponsor and roving bands of people handing out soap, a washcloth and deodorant and suggesting you do the right thing.

The Ugly

And finally ... to the fucktards that thought it was ok to steal a promotional banner and a PS/2 that a volunteer loaned to the show so that as many people as possible could get their game on ... there are a lot of people looking for you.

Posted by Legion at 8:30 AM | Comments (0)

August 27, 2004

WoW . . . and I do mean WOW!

So, last night I went to a good friends house to playtest a miniature wargame with some friends. After finishing up, I went in to the computer room to check my email and poke around a bit . . .

What I found was that these friends of mine have been given a gift by the game gods, a World of Warcraft closed BETA account.

So I said "Ummmmm, does this mean you have an actual Beta account?" "Yup" came the happy reply. "Could I, you know, maybe log on and check it out if it's not too much trouble?" "Yup" came the happy reply. "w00t" I said.

So I made an undead Warlock and rose from the grave as it were. The happened in more ways than one given that I used my long since abandoned EverQuest character's name, Ankoku. Immediatley, the ambiance hit me. This is not some cardboard world, it' lush and alive in a way that only Blizzard seems to understand these days. EQ is still a fun game, but this game is fun, beautiful and interesting again, which EQ lost after a while with me.

I got those butterfly's again . . . the one's you get when exploring an new place and learning your way around. I went and got my first few quests, "beat up the low level bad guys just outside the gate", which I took up in earnest. After a bit of that, I was asked to go kill some spiders, which are aggressive and will attack in numbers, which surprised me a bit. Between my fire spells, my little imp helper and my extremely useful claws, I was able to get my self a new suit of clothing and I must say, for an undead guy, I looked pretty good. In any case, all day I've been jonesing to play this game again. I even went so far as to sign up for the stress test beta, which will only last a week. With any luck, I can finagle an account for the closed beta somehow.

Posted by Punish at 8:22 PM | Comments (0)

August 25, 2004

Sony Online Entertainment

This comic over at Penny Arcade is the most succinct way of stating all the reasons why I really don't want to play any more SOE MMORPGs. I've still got my EQ account ... but I'm not going to shell out the money to buy anything new from them.

Posted by Legion at 10:33 PM | Comments (0)

August 9, 2004

Making Doom 3 A Little Less Scary

Some enterprising person made a mod for Doom 3 that turns the flashlight into a Hello Kitty light. Somehow I'm not sure that the "Pastel colored candles in the shape of cute animals are like direct sunlight to the Powers of Darkness" theory is going to work here.

Posted by Legion at 8:11 AM | Comments (0)

July 31, 2004

Something Is Wrong With the World

Something is essentially wrong with the world when I go looking for a decent strategy game for the Xbox and in the top five "most popular" are Playboy: The Mansion and The Urbz: Sims in the City. Was Leisure Suit Larry a strategy game? It wasn't a bad game ... but it wasn't a strategy game. Oh ... and three of the top five haven't even been released yet! How does that work?

I weep for the species ...

Posted by Legion at 8:08 AM | Comments (0)

July 1, 2004

I Wonder

What the video games kill people crowd is going to say about this teen having a heart-attack while playing DDR.

Posted by Legion at 10:55 AM | Comments (1)

June 14, 2004

Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time

I picked this game up on the way back from the PAX meeting. I figured it was time to go back to my gaming roots. I remember the original Prince of Persia on the PC as being one of the few games that intrigued me enough for me to actually finish ...

This is what I'm talking about when I mention great games. PoP's graphics are not necessarily top-of-the-line, but the gameplay is where its at! The whole thing has a Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon psycho ninja feel to it. The game has a physics engine that allows for all sorts of wire-work, action movie moves ... but still makes you feel mortal when you fall too far or the sand demons stab you in the back.

I'm sure I'll have more to say about it as I play it more, but this is already becoming one of the more cherished games in my collection.

Posted by Legion at 8:41 AM | Comments (0)

June 6, 2004

Speaking of AI

Since I brought it up, I've been thinking about writing something about AI or more specifically, A-Life. AI is the discipline in computer science about building machine intelligences. A-Life is the practice of creating digital creatures that behave like living things ... whether or not they actually "think."

I've been thinking about doing some experiments of my own ... but I've got so many conflicting ideas, it's hard to narrow them down. Is it better to start with something simple like a Sim-like creature that eats, sleeps, eliminates and moves about? Or should I try something more targeted ... like a creature that "fights" and learns to fight better?

My typical leaning is to build something that learns. I think the future of gaming is to compete against opponents that don't always follow a fixed path or strategy. I mean, why is playing against people more fun than playing against the computer? Because people are unpredictable ... they have predilections and strategies ... but they also know when they get their ass handed to them repeatedly doing something, that they should try something new.

But I'm also fascinated by AI systems that are flexible and can act in ways that surprise even the inventor. There is a story about Peter Molyneux while he was writing Black and White, probably one of the best examples of AI in gaming, about how they were designing the Creature AI. At one point, one of the basic creatures was hungry ... but it couldn't find any food. Then it realized that it was edible, itself. So it started eating itself. I want to apply that type of non-linear thinking to artifical game opponents.

So I guess it boils down, as always, to ... where do I start?

Posted by Legion at 11:32 PM | Comments (0)

Random Musings About Games

I've been playing a lot of video games lately. And in the back of my mind, I've been collating a lot of information about what I find enjoyable and for how long.

The two main attractions of my attention for the past week or so have been City of Heroes and Grand Theft Auto. I bounce back and forth fairly randomly ... depending on my whims. Generally, when I'm feeling good ... I elect for City of Heroes. When I'm pissed about something ... I go beat up on random civilians in GTA.

City of Heroes is quickly devolving into yet another level grind MMOG. A level grind is when one simply kills X beasties to gain Y experience which then allows one to kill bigger beasties to gain more experience. Every MMOG currently on the market follows this formula ... each with their own trappings and method of achieving one's goals. Unfortunately, I'm tired of it ... and new trappings doesn't help.

GTA on the other hand isn't about a level grind. Your character starts out just as capable as it ends up. You unlock some equipment ... but the game is about learning how to play better. And at any moment in time ... there is a wide variety of things to do. One can choose to slaughter people until the police arrive to take you down. One can choose to race around the streets and perform "insane" stunts by jumping vehicles using ramps scattered about the city. One can simply explore for 100 packages secreted in various locations in the city. You can even carjack an ambulance and rush about saving lives.

Variety, as they say, is the spice of life. So why can't the MMOG makers figure this out and make a great game like GTA? Because making a great game is HARD ... and right now all the MMOG makers are simply capitalizing on the EverQuest formula ... getting their piece of the pie by making EverQuest with new trappings.

I've been thinking about this a lot over the weekend. I used to think that all these games needed was better AI. Make the game more challenging by giving the people truly smart opponents ... ones that learn what tactics work and don't and get better as the players do. But that won't take away the fact that this style of game is simply uninspired ... a formula that is as hollow as the 3D models that populate the various game worlds.

Posted by Legion at 10:40 PM | Comments (0)

May 22, 2004

City of Heroes

Well ... if you were looking for a review of City of Heroes, I've found one that is at the least entertaining.

Posted by Legion at 3:55 PM | Comments (0)

April 25, 2003

Must ... have ... goals ... dictated ... for ... me

People on gaming message boards never cease to amaze me. In years past we've had the backseat driver, the armchair quarterback, and the weekend warrior. Well ... move over bacon ... now there's something meatier! We now have the at home game designer.

I never really appreciated the amount of thought that went into game design until I started wanting to do it seriously myself and started bouncing some ideas off one of my friends. We'll call him Alan, because that's his name.

Alan has been into gaming for ... well ... longer than I've been alive. He's designed scenarios and plots and backgrounds ... and even entire game systems. He is a fount of game design information. He doesn't know more than I ever hope to learn ... because I really want to know everything ... but he knows enough to keep me busy for many years to come. If I ever have a question ... I know I can go to him for advice.

But I digress ...

There are many people that don't have their own personal, squeezable Alan-on-tap. And these people think, as I did originally, that game design is a piece of cake ... that anybody can do it ... especially them. And most of these people show up on message boards devoted to online games and tell the developers exactly how things should be done ... because their idea is the Word and the Power, Forever, Amen. Their arguments are generally backed up with FUD-style predictions. They say, "The game will fail soon after release if you do not follow the words of MegaBozz!" "Players will suffer burnout and leave ... never to return!" they cry.

As mentioned in my last post, I'm in the Beta of Planetside. And yep, the at home game designers are here too. One of the things that they're saying is that they need more incentive to do certain things in the game ... that there has to be more goals in the game ... or else, "What's the point?"

Here is what I posted in response:

I confess that I haven't read this entire thread. I also confess that I'm not going to read responses to this. I just hope that my reply will open some people's eyes.

Much has been said about this game needing to give the player a "point" ... a reason for being there. People have said in this thread that the reason EQ has lasted so long is because there is always more to do ... always another goal to reach ... another item to gain.

Hogwash.

I, and a number of my best friends, have played EverQuest for three and a half years. Even though there are dungeons that I have not been to ... I know exactly what they will look like. Even though there are items I have not obtained ... I know exactly what they will do for me. I know the game intimately ... the ins and outs of the game system have been mapped out in my head. I can look at a situation and plot out exactly what it will take to solve it. There is no mystery to the game. There is nothing truly new to do. It is just more of the same.

I have friends who have been to every dungeon. I have friends who have killed even the biggest gods and have been the equivalent of BR20 with a locker full of ill-gotten booty and conversation pieces for longer than they can remember. There is definitely nothing more for them to do that they have not done already. What do they do? Most of them roll up an alt and play the game from a different perspective.

Why do all of us continue to play EverQuest? There is no "point". We have each in our own way, beaten the game. We have all won. So why continue? For some of us ... it is for the other people. For others ... when we defeat one goal ... we create another completely artifical goal. My main character has a collection of the strangest daggers he can find. Why take up storage space with daggers I hardly ever ... if ever use? Because I think it's cool. Did the game designers need to give me an incentive to do this? Heck no! I decided to do it myself.

That is why EverQuest and it's ilk have lasted so long. Because it doesn't give you an incentive to do particular things. It just lays out a world for you to decide what you want to do and sits back and lets you do it.

If you are so narrow-minded and weak-willed that you need the game designers to hold your hand and lead you from base to base saying, "Ok ... now if you go do this ... we'll give you a cookie." Then there are plenty of single-person games out there that do exactly that.

If you believe that there must be a way to win the game in order to keep a person's interest ... I cite every MMORPG and MUD that has ever existed. Meridian 59, Ultima Online, Asheron's Call, EverQuest, Dark Age of Camelot. Heck ... Meridian 59 lasted for what ... seven years?!? And even after the original developers called it quits ... a year or two later it got resurrected by some other company and people are still freaking playing it.

EverQuest launched in, IIRC, May of 1999. I started playing it early in October of 1999. I read the EQ message boards back then ... and y'know what? People were saying the exact same things about EQ. "What happens when we reach level 50? There's no point in continuing to play after that!" "Other than the levelling and the loot, there's no point!" "Give us more clearly defined goals ... give us a way to win!" They were saying that if these things didn't happen ... EQ was going to die out.

Well gee ... how's that shoe leather taste now?

Posted by Legion at 12:20 PM | Comments (0)

Planetside

Well, someone finally has done it. They've created a MMO FPS. It was only a matter of time and some would say it's about time. I have been watching for this game since they first announced it what seems like about two years ago now. Maybe it's only been a year and a half ...

What is Planetside? Well, it is a lot like Tribes 2, but on a much larger scale. It is also persistent, meaning that the achievements you make are not transitory ... they do not disappear when you leave the game. It also means that other people are still playing in the same game world even when you're not there.

The game is not quite released yet, it has a ship date of May 19^th 2003. But I have been playing in the Beta, helping test the game, as time permits. My first impressions? Glad you asked ...

I've been playing EverQuest for a long, long time ... and I was looking for a change of pace. I'm not leaving EQ, mind you ... far from it. But I am looking for something else to play ... for when I get frustrated with EQ. I didn't really want another EQ ... and when I get frustrated ... I really just want to kill things. Lots of things. An FPS is something I can really sink my teeth into at those times.

FPS games generally have evolved from the kill-or-be-killed Deathmatch-style games into systems that require teamwork and tactics. This is something that MMO games have excelled in for quite a while now ... being designed around systems where grouping is key, if not all-important. Planetside is simply teamwork on a more massive scale. There is an entire world there being fought over by three factions. And there are facilities scattered about the continents of this world that give strategic advantages when captured.

The thing that has me most excited about this game is the thought that has gone into making a system that rewards players for using good tactics. I was in a battle the other day where my squad had taken a tower overlooking an enemy base. My squad quickly set up firing positions outside the tower using cover behind rocks and trees all facing the entrance of the base, waiting for the eventual onslaught of enemy soldiers to come pouring out. We were not disappointed.

The enemy came out, at first, just throwing themselves at our defenses where they were easily picked off. They discovered that they needed to get it together themselves and the fight was now on. Quick moving soldiers ran out of the base and took up opposing firing positions ... trying to pick off our troops that had more time to dig themselves in. Anticipating this, our squad leader sent out some invisible troops to sneak up behind these people and take them out. Unfortunately, the enemy was a bit too fast for us ... while we were gathering to press our attack, another wave of enemy came out of the base with armored vehicles and heavily armored troops in front with standard infantry behind. I wasn't able to stay to see what happened because the game crashed ... this is a beta, after all.

But the game crashing is not what I want to focus on. It is the richness of the gameplay that has me completely awed. In that half an hour that I was on that hill, crouched down, picking off enemy left and right ... I was completely caught up in the illusion. I was learning to think about what to do ... should I run in and get grenades? Should I go don my cloaking suit to sneak past the defenses and give my squad a tactical advantage? Will the defenses hold long enough for us to push inside? It was tons of fun.

I don't know how much it will cost per month ... probably about $13. But I'm probably going to be paying it. This game is a blast.

Posted by Legion at 5:29 AM | Comments (0)

March 14, 2003

Master of Orion 3

There's been a lot of talk back and forth about Master of Orion 3, MOO3 as it's affectionately called by fans of the series. Some people hate it. Some people love it. Well, I finally played my first full game tonight ... here's my take ...

The first thing that can be seen is the low production values. This is somewhat of a disappointment ... given the history of the series. Yes, it was built by five people. No, graphics don't impress me nearly as much as gameplay does. But there are a lot of things ... unfinished ... about the game. The ending movies are simplistic. There is no flexibility in a lot of features (it's hardwired to 800x600 for one thing). It just has a bunch of things that should have been finished before they released it. And as far as the problems go ... I understand the devs are working on some patches to fix the real bugs that have come up in the game.

Now ... the other thing that many people are complaining about is that it is a "macromanagement" game. It is designed in such a way so that you can give some general orders ... and let the AI take care of the details of your empire for you. Now, as someone who doesn't like to micromanage ... but loves strategy games ... this is a godsend. Now, you can get down and dirty into the details if you really want to ... but there are so many details ... I can't imagine the type of freak that would enjoy that. And if he does exist ... I don't want to meet him.

So lets talk a bit about space combat. The end-game in MOO2 generally devolved into massive battles with bunches of capital ships on each side. It would get to the point that the capital ships were such juggernauts ... that it didn't even make sense to make anything smaller. Let's just say that they've changed the balance somewhat. When you build ships ... you give them a mission, like "Carrier" or "Indirect Fire" or "Long Range Attack". This determines how they fight. But you also form them into units referred to as "Task Forces" ... and you give the Task Force a mission too. So you can have a Carrier Task Force with three carriers, four point defense ships (to defend the carriers against incoming missiles and fighters), and two scouts (as spotters). The whole unit will hang back and attack things from afar with the fighters from the carrier ... and defend itself accordingly. Tres not bad!

Ground combat has received a boost as well. In MOO2, you either invaded a planet and won ... or you invaded and were routed. Not so in MOO3. If you're too evenly matched ... the battles can go on for many turns. Also, there's just as much flexibility in building your assault force for the planet's surface. You can pick how many support units you want going and what types they are ... you can pick how experienced a set of troops should be. Heck ... you can even pick what type of attack strategy they use.

"But Legion, I thought you said it wasn't a micromanagement game?" you ask? Well ... it's not ... because all of the decisions I stated above. You can, with the push of a couple buttons, tell it to auto-build Task Forces and ground assault units. You just give it a couple instructions and poof ... you have what you asked for all assembled and ready to fly. You can painstakingly design your ships ... or you can say, "Gimme a design for the best Long Range Attack Destroyer you can come up with from current technology." You can even mark old designs obsolete and schedule them to be scrapped ... or mark them obsolete and leave the crappy ones defending your backwater worlds where you think nobody will ever show. (Marking a design obsolete means that no new ones will be built after any that are already scheduled for construction when you designate them so.)

Now what about those diplomatic style players? Well ... you aren't left out in the cold either. There's even more for you to do too. As a matter of fact, you can even work your way into the Galactic Senate and pass laws ... ask the Senate as a group to impose Trade Sanctions on rogue empires, whatever! The sky is the limit. Of course, I tend to be more militaristic when I play ... but that's just me.

I haven't had a chance to try the multiplayer mode yet. But I intend to check it out ASAP. I'm already training ... so that I can get my macromanagement groove on in a minimum amount of time. Y'see, MOO3 has timed turns ... so you can make for a fast-paced multiplayer game ... or a slow one.

Yes, it's got some problems. Yes, it's got some things that are a bit irritating. But, personally ... for true fans of the MOO series ... it's a great game and you'll love it.

Posted by Legion at 1:42 AM | Comments (0)

January 14, 2002

Porno Quotient

As I've said before, I've been playing a lot of DAoC lately. But, my EQ guild had a Blood Rite the other day ... so I had to be on hand to officiate. My major reaction to the new graphics of the Shadows of Luclin expansion to my beloved EverQuest has been "maximum boobage".

Perhaps I'm overreacting. Perhaps I'm not getting enough. Perhaps I'm just a perverted freak. (One local radio announcer asked the question, "I went to see Pocahontas and I just want to know ... is it wrong to get wood from a cartoon character?" So even if I am a perverted freak, I'm not alone.) But somehow, I don't think so. I mean, when one of my guildmates' (mad props to Viertania) major goals in the game is to find armor for her character that doesn't look like bondage gear (no, no link on that one you sick puppies! Find your own pr0n!) ... something has got to be wrong.

I know that many other people have commented on this aspect of EverQuest in the past ... and it's never really bothered me, until now. I wouldn't be so riled up about it, but one of the producers actually stated that one of the goals for the new character models in SoL was to "reduce the porno quotient". I'm not kidding! I wish I could find a link ... but that's what he said. He talked about the Elvish females not running around in swimwear anymore (drat!) ... no chainmail thongs (double drat!) ... and hinted at many other changes that meant that female characters in EQ could poke their head outside of the far corners of Greater Faydark where they're hiding and not get sexually harassed.

So, without further ado, submitted for your perusal ... Verant's idea of "reducing the porno quotient" of EQ.

Here we have "aDervishCutthroat01", a decent example of one of the new models (and if you're wondering about the placement of the perspective on it, my main is a Dark Elf ... they're naturally short ... leave me alone! Kinda like my theory about gnomes.). Isn't she so sweet and innocent looking in those side-stitched leather pants and push-up leather shirt? I mean, if she takes a big breath ... she's gonna come spilling out of that thing. And this is tasteful compared to the stuff that the Barbarian females start out wearing.

But this is nothing compared to the new Luclin expansion race, the Vah Shir. Was my back turned when EQ turned into FurryMUCK? (No offense to animal lovers and closet Cat People ... but I remember there was a time, and maybe it's still true, that the big draw to FurryMUCK was getting it on with a half-human/half-animal anthropomorphic, as they put it.)

Everyone ... meet Banker Naudi. She's one of the two bankers in Shar Vahl, the catperson starting city. This isn't too bad, as most of the stuff in EQ goes. She's a bit top-heavy ... and rather leather-clad, but hey ... if everyone in the game was dressed like this, I probably wouldn't find room to complain. Although, it makes me wonder what kind of world Norrath is where nobody ever wears baggy clothes. (And don't try to tell me that it's HARD to change the models on the fly like that ... they've been doing it for helmets in EQ for at least a year ... they can do it for baggy blouses that modestly conceal a woman's "endowments".)

And finally, we have Katja. She's the jewelcraft merchant in Shar Vahl. Could they have made her any more "hooker" if they tried? I don't just mean what she's wearing ... but her stance ... is it just me or does the way she's standing just say, "Want to know if my tongue is rough?" or what? (I guess the part about women not running around in swimwear anymore only applied to the elves.)

Now, to play a little Devil's Advocate on myself ... these are the same things that people have been saying about the comic book industry for years. They've been saying that comic books target adolescent males with their over-curvy females and big-pects males in skin-tight (or less) outfits. And, in some cases that's very true. In others, it's not so true. But, in my experience (as a comic-book reader since the age of 13), the thing that attracted me to comic books were the stories ... and in those stories, the women were positive and strong role models a majority of the time. They were peers, not supporting characters. EQ doesn't really offer a similar experience. In comic books, the story is right there in your face ... most people (that I know of) don't buy comic books solely for the art. In EQ, the story is sometimes bloody hard to find, let alone even wanting to find it in the first place.

And those of you who know me, know that I am probably the last person to ask a woman to put some clothes on (and sometimes the first one to ask her to take them off). And if it were just me ... I'd just sit back and enjoy the visuals. But my kids play this game. My son and daughters play this game. I've enjoyed this game for over two years ... because it really was groundbreaking ... and I want my kids to be able to enjoy the game without having to be beaten over the head by sexual undertones. They get enough of that from TV.

So ... my final message is basically this: Verant, if you're going to market towards the gonads of the 15 year old male ... have a spine and say so ... or at the very least, don't say you're going to try to fix things that you have no intention of fixing and then go about making things worse.

Posted by Legion at 9:23 PM | Comments (0)

January 12, 2002

And While We're on the Topic ...

... of Verant bashing, what's up with the new Soulbinders in EverQuest? People have been asking for something like this for over two years (the discussion was old when I first started playing the game) ... and they just now get around to doing this? Nooooo ... it couldn't possibly be because in Dark Age of Camelot they have bindstones in every town? Could it?

You have to understand some of the history of the argument, but basically Verant has been dead-set against giving the players an easy way to bind in starting cities for various reasons (it would "reduce player dependence" or "reduce the death penalty").

I'm glad that a smart company came along and decided that the goal of a game is to have fun. I'm glad that they stuck their necks out on the line and I'm glad that they're getting rewarded for it. And yes, I'm glad that this is having a positive effect on EQ too.

How's the shoe leather taste, guys?

Posted by Legion at 2:10 PM | Comments (0)

January 2, 2002

Life Will Find a Way

Ok ... I don't remember the exact phrasing of the quote from Jurassic Park, but this is pretty close. I've been playing a lot of Dark Age of Camelot, lately. And I've noticed something different ...

I've been playing video-games for a long, long, long time ... ok, I'm 30 ... maybe it's not that long. (Actually, I remember when Space Invaders and Asteroids were big and all the young kids were gathered around these new-fangled things called "video games" and this guy, probably about the age then that I am now, took me aside and pointed to a pinball machine and said, "You want to try a real game? Play that. Don't be like the rest of these punks." I think he was drunk. But I digress ...) I started with consoles and worked my way up to computer-based video games ... and then back to include consoles again. I remember when multi-player meant that your buddy sat next to you with a second controller and faced the same TV you did and did their best to beat you.

Then came the Internet. One of the things that the Internet gave us is, as Jim Carrey said in The Cable Guy, the ability to "play Mortal Kombat with a friend in Vietnam". Multi-player now meant that you could play video games against someone that wasn't even in the same city, state or country ... let alone the same room.

For the past two years, I've been playing a game called EverQuest. It's been an interesting exercise in relationship-building, gaming ... and most of all ... dealing with Stupid People?.

There's plenty of Stupid People out there in the world. I do my best to avoid them. The thing about massively multiplayer games is that the Stupid People look, at first glance, just like the normal people. You don't know what they are until they start begging cashes from you with lame rationalizations like, "You've got more than you need, you've got money in the bank and I have none ... it's not fair!" (Phrases like that always make me think of the bodybuilders skit from Saturday Night Live ... talking about the Ahnuld accent here> little babies and girly men.)

But, back to DAoC.

As I said, I've been playing EQ for over two years now, but I've recently been wooed away by DAoC. I've been getting burned out on EQ. The problem isn't the game itself. It's a great game with a rich world with plenty of background to get lost in and roleplay around. Unfortunately, I've gotten tired of the engine ... the underpinnings underneath the content. I've learned everything there is to know about the engine ... and there's nothing knew to discover. Within minutes of seeing a new encounter, I know exactly what it takes to defeat it and if I have the resources to do it and how safely. There's no risk unless I choose to place it upon myself ... there's no feeling that I am not in complete control of the situation. In addition, there are things about the engine that irritate me ... and have for nearly two years. Sony Online Entertainment has been slow in fixing these things, even when they knew about them ... because they knew that they could keep a majority of their customers if they kept supplying a steady stream of new content. But there's a new kid on the block ...

Actually, there's a few ... but the only one that is a serious challenger is DAoC. DAoC basically is to EQ what OS/2 was advertised to be to Windows ("A better Windows than Windows and a better DOS than DOS."). It took all the suggestions that had ever been made about EQ and AC and some other games and added them to itself. It is a massively multiplayer game with an all-new world to explore and fixes to most, if not all, of the things that have bugged the shit out of me for years. You want PvP without having to worry about being ganked? You want tradeskills that mean something to you and your guild? You want tradeskills that are gasp profitable? You want a hundred little interface improvements? You want a brand-spanking new graphics system with better looking characters? DAoC has it all. Unfortunately ... there's no easy cure for the Stupid People.

In EQ there was a chat channel called "shout" that allowed you to broadcast whatever verbal diarrhea you just needed to share to a whole zone. Now, like any tool ... it could be used for good ... or could be turned to the ways of the Dark Side. The nice thing about it is that you could turn the whole channel off ... and not "hear" the 99% crap that people wanted to spew ... including the 10% of the shouts telling people to shut up on the shout channel and stop bothering people with crap that nobody cared about. Best to just shut the whole thing off. The thing is that if you chose not to "hear" the shout channel, nobody knew. You could have a hundred people in a zone that had their shout channel turned off and the one guy who wanted to share could shout to his heart's content and would never know that he wasn't being heard. He could scream all day long and be satisfied that he'd invaded people's day with talk of how so-and-so was a gay, kill-stealing, baby-killing, heartless puke who's mother mated out of season and nobody would have to even know. It was the best of both worlds.

One of the improvements in DAoC was that there was no such channel. DAoC is engineered differently, so a shout channel wouldn't have worked properly anyway ... but there were always complaints from the RP Police that a shout channel just wasn't realistic (They're right, it's not ... but there are gameplay reasons for it so most people use it without complaint) so it's an "improvement" in DAoC too. But remember the title of this rant? I'm getting to the point ... really ...

Lately, when I've been minding my own business in DAoC, I've gotten tells from people wanting cashes, wanting a group, wanting whatever. They're using the unlimited range of the tell channel as a backup shout channel. Yes, you can turn off the tell channel ... but that's also the easiest way for your friends to get a hold of you ... so if you turn off the tell channel, you won't hear your friends either. Now, I don't mind the occasional "Greetings!" I get. I don't even really mind getting invitations to hunts through tell. But if I don't respond ... it's because I've chosen to ignore you. It doesn't mean that I didn't see it the first time ... I regularly scroll back through my chat buffer to see if I missed anything. If I want to talk to you, I will. Case in point, I got a tell from someone the other day "25 skald LFG". I didn't respond the first time ... so they sent me another one just like it a couple minutes later. I didn't really have the patience to wait for a third request (having only had about 4 hours sleep two nights in a row because I was attending a LAN party) so I responded with a smartassed remark ... that got rid of them. Eventually, someone else in my group (sitting right next to me at the LAN party) got a tell from the same guy ... he had actually spruced up the message somewhat, making it humorous and entertaining ... and he didn't spam him. I guess they can be taught ...

Posted by Legion at 3:57 PM | Comments (0)

August 15, 2001

Feedback in Games

I remember the first time I encountered feedback in a game other than visual or auditory. It was a driving game ... the name of which is completely lost in obscurity. The wheel shook back and forth whenever you went off road. It added an extra bit of immersiveness and realism to the game. But it didn't allow me to play the game any better ... as a matter of fact, it made me play worse, because it was harder to get back onto the road with the wheel shaking everywhere.

Then came the next driving game, determined to one-up the previous force feedback steering wheel. It gave you something that was sorely lacking in simulators. It gave you the ability to "feel the road". When you turned, it resisted. When you turned too hard, it resisted more. When you lost traction, it stopped resisting. It was something that I didn't truly appreciate until I learned to drive ... and to feel the road through the steering wheel of a real car. But it gave the player more information with which to better play the game. This is what force feedback should be for.

So, I started to play Allegiance about a year ago. It was a space flight/combat simulation. I had seen the force feedback joysticks in the store and decided to pick one up along with Allegiance. I got everything set up and configured. I installed the force feedback drivers. I set to playing. I quickly found out that the only force feedback in the game was a jerk when you fired your guns and a slightly longer pull when you fired a missile ... oh and some shakiness when you were damaged. I'm playing a new space flight/combat sim now and the force feedback is exactly the same.

So ... let's see ... the force feedback makes it harder to aim and fly straight. Now, while "realistic" (don't get me started on all the reasons why a space ship wouldn't have this type of feedback) it does beg the question, "Does force feedback have any place in competitive play when it doesn't add any relevant information to the player's estimation of the game world?"

No, it does not. Immersiveness is all well and good, but when you're competing, you're competing. And besides, those jerks and shudders of the joystick become damned annoying after a little while. When flying home with tons of damage in Allegiance, I would get hand cramps just trying to keep the bloody thing on course.

Then there's the other players. The majority of the other players in these games are not going to have force feedback equipment (because of the high price-point of such devices ... most people have a hard time shelling out over US$100 for a joystick). Which means that if you play with force feedback enabled, you're knowingly and consciously hobbling your abilities versus those of the other players. In a game like Allegiance, where PvP combat is the whole point of the game ... there is no reason for including this element in the game other than a checkbox on a features list.

Now, what could be done to improve this situation? In the case of a space flight simulator, I don't really know. The only ideas that I've come up with, while realistic to think that a culture with such advanced technologies would reasonably construct something of this type, give players with force feedback equipment a distinct competitive advantage. One idea was a targeting system that would encourage you to keep the current target in the right place for a hit ... but that's too much like autoaim scripts. And those advantages for people with force feedback joysticks are just as bad as the disadvantages ... where competitive gameplay is concerned.

But somebody ... somewhere ... has got to have an idea ...

Posted by Legion at 11:54 AM | Comments (0)

July 31, 2001

Whining Minimaxers

They're known by several names: minimaxer, powergamer, leet d00d. They're the ones that go out of their way to find the best loot through the least expenditure of effort. The ones that stand around for hours in West Freeport begging for plat or in Omni Entertainment for credits. These are the people that expect stuff to be handed to them on a silver platter and when the going gets tough ... the minimaxers start whining.

Minimax is a term from economics and game theory which basically refers to the sweet spot where you can get the most out of a system for the least invested. It's a very valid idea and something that people do naturally to a certain extent. I'm not bashing the idea or that one should do more than what is necessary to achieve a reward. What it seems that this type of person thinks is if it doesn't gain me some decisive advantage ... it's worthless.

My current frustration has grown from reading the Anarchy Online Community boards. In Anarchy Online, there are three factions: Omni-Tek, Clan and Neutrals. The idea is that Omni-Tek is this huge, evil corporation and that the Clans are the freedom fighters. This is something that everyone can pretty much sink their teeth into. I've read complaints from members of all three factions that they can't play because they don't have the advantage they thought they would.

In the beginning, it was purported that Omni would have the best equipment. Clanners would have the easiest time raising skills. Neutrals would be able to travel safely in either side's areas. As it turns out, Clanners can get Omni equipment from Clan missions. Omni has an easy time levelling because they have the most land area to hunt in and its pretty well protected. And Neutrals are pretty much shot on sight by overzealous members of the other two factions. Now, minimaxers playing each faction are complaining that they don't have the perks they "were promised" and they "can't play" without them.

It's not just Anarchy Online. In EQ, there were huge holy wars over which weapon or piece of armor was the most "uber". There were reports of people being excluded from raids if they didn't have the Flaming Leet Sword of Badassness (or Fiery Avenger to those of us still addicted).

At this point, Funcom, the publisher of Anarchy Online, has bigger problems to worry about keeping their servers up and fixing lag and client crashes. They don't need to be listening to a bunch of snot-nosed punks who are going to take their ball and go home because they can't play the game with the rules that mean they can win, guaranteed. Take your ball and go home then ... I'm enjoying myself!

This whole thing about being promised certain things just eats me up too. Most of the time, there was no promise involved. There were different pieces of information that got a lot of stuff read into them between the lines. Now, all of a sudden, things were promised to people. When did this happen? Somewhere between some leet d00d's ears. And if you "can't play," then why are you spending hours a night working to level up your character? So you can brag to your friends how you finally got your second Super-Uber Macro-Mega-Nuke Pistol so you can dual-wield them now.

In one of the whining threads, a signature read, "Those who say it can't be done should step aside and get out of the way of those who are doing it." Or, in terms that these people will understand ...

STFU K THX GW

Posted by Legion at 3:00 AM | Comments (0)