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eGenesis to Develop New MMO with Orson Scott Card
Johnathon Walls writes "eGenesis, makers of the non-combat, world-building massively multiplayer online (MMO) game "A Tale in the Desert" versions 1 and 2, has signed a deal with Orson Scott Card (author of Ender's game and The Seventh Son) to develop the pre-Civil War American world of "Alvin the Maker" into a new MMO. This is also going to be a non-combat-centered, community-building world. Questions remain as to the amount of interest these non-combat games generate, and concerns about the rapidly dropping population of Tale 2 (a steady decline from 2089 subscribers on Sep 26 to 1582 subscribers on Jan 6) really bring this issue to the forefront."
who have never read any of Orson Scott Card's work, run, do not walk, to the nearest bookstore/library and buy/check out/steal/photocopy Ender's Game.
For those of you who have read some of his novels but have never read his short stories, you should check out Maps in a Mirror, recently re-released in paperback. In particular, check out "The Hanged Man and the King of Words", "Unaccompanied Sonata", "Mikal's Songbird", "A Plague of Butterflies", uhm... look just buy the book ok.
And while I'm at it. There is a story in the book After the King called "Silver of Gold" by Emma Bull and another one called "The Fellowship of the Dragon" by Patricia A. McKillip, and well, you should read those too.
That's it.
Oh wait. Terry Pratchett is great too...
Oh, hello Nurse Ratchet...
[Sounds of scuffling in the background]
Must press submit...
would be a MMOTG (Tactical Game). One of my favourite game ever is Final Fantasy Tactics, and I always tought: "Goddammit, how cool it would be if it was multiplayer, and how GODLY it would be if it was MM!"
What I dislike about MMORPG is that you don't have the time to say "oh shit" that you are already dead in PvP. You don't have the time to talk to your opponents. Of course, if both players are nice RPers, maybe that they'll talk to each other, but has it ever happened to you with anybody else than people you already knew before combat? Have you ever tried to be a "Verbose PK" in UO? You can't. Combat goes too fast. Of course, you can macro some cool stuff to say, but it rapidly grows boring to say the same old stuff.
I'm saying this and I for one have no idea of a practical way to implement a game like that. Nevertheless, it would probably a MMO I would stick to. Or maybe it already exists and someone will tell me where I can find it?
perception is reality
> Questions remain as to the amount of interest these non-combat games generate
If these games are to be popular past the "gee whiz, check it out!" phase, they need to let the player decide how much or how little time is appropriate.
No game or hobby that requires dozens of hours per week to achieve and kind of success is ever very popular. Life is too full things to do.
On an offtopic note: Is there a SF writer out there who is more right-wing than OSC?
Seriously, I'm trying to think of one.
Operator, give me the number for 911!
If you care for these "ultimate" reinventions Marvel is fond of (I only like Ultimate X-Men, myself), then it might interest you to know that Orson Scott Card is writing Ultimate Iron Man when it debuts in March. I'm not sure how long he's signed up for, but I'd guess no more than 12 issues. See here for details. For those not up on comics, the quick summary is that the "ultimate" line is Marvel's way of restarting their characters from scratch so as to draw in new readers who don't want to fuck around with the 40 years of storylines.
The Alvin Maker series is set before Joseph Smith and I fail to see (other than the author's questionable religion) how the two are related.
Thank you for pointing this out. I had no idea.
We recently had heard in the office over one of the Yellow Machine that's made by Anthology Solutions.
Here are my population estimates for some of the major MMORPG's.
Lineage: 2,000,000 subscribers
World of Warcraft: 600,000
Final Fantasy XI: 550,000
Everquest 1: 250,000
City Of Heroes: 200,000
Everquest 2: 150,000
A Tale in the Desert 2: 1,500
1,500 isn't much in the world of Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game's.
Some folks on here have suggested some of Orson Scott Card's fiction. I would also like to suggest some read his non-fiction. He is an outspoken critic of homosexuality and gay marriage. I read those works by Orson Scott Card and they were enough to convince me that I didn't want to read any of his fiction. Your mileage may vary, but it doesn't hurt to be an informed consumer.
http://www.popularculturegaming.com -- my blog about the culture of videogame players
I, really, still do not see it. Maybe I would have to actually read the last book in the series. I see the overtones of a messiah, but.. come on? The only similarities I see are that Smith and Maker both wandered around the country picking up supporters.
I'm lead designer on this project.
The Tales of Alvin Maker are not combat-free, and the would that we are building based on them isn't necessarily combat-free either. It's certainly not combat-centric, which puts it somewhere on the spectrum between most MMOs and a game like A Tale in the Desert. ATITD is, on the other hand, combat-free.