You don't list anything specific that has changed for the negative and I'm not going to speculate for you. Maybe for you the game, and the stress of running a kinship, has run its course.
I joined Sept 2010 when the game went F2P and am still enjoying myself. The Tolkien lore is rich and the epic story very fulfilling. Without F2P I never would have tried LOTRO.
GP is not saying "pay for game time", i.e. subscription. He's saying you can compress time by purchasing tools that will lessen the grind. In LOTRO, for example, you can purchase XP accelerator and slayer multiplier scrolls that lessen the number of mobs you need to kill for the next level or quest credit. By not buying these aids you just have to invest more play time, i.e. grind. But game time in F2P is free.
I offer you a quote that might shed some light on the difference between Hollywood's version of good guys, and the real thing.
"If soldiers thought, they wouldn't be soldiers."
Whoever you're quoting, they, and you, have clearly never spent quality time with any soldiers.
Agree on F2P being done right with Lord of the Rings Online (LOTRO). But I'm curious why you think it couldn't compete with WoW. It's not pretty obvious to me. LOTRO came out in 2007. It's newer than WoW and the scenery is quite stunning when set to Ultra High with DX11. Since F2P launch in 2010 they have continued to update and just recently came out with the third major expansion. There's still a lot of life in Middle Earth.
The lore and content is rich and mature. If it fails to match WoW's numbers it's probably due to not catering to teenagers.
My last line was intended to be humorous. Apparently you've lost that ability in your quest to impose on others and call that freedom.:)
Actually I agree with you for the most part. Freedom in a civilization carries with it a requirement to be civil. My point: There is a responsibility to not impose on your neighbor any more than you have to. Your point: Being civil also requires neighbors to allow themselves to be imposed upon to a reasonable degree. Such trespasses have become less tolerated these days as we increasingly avoid our neighbors, a sad trend.
The only interesting definition of freedom is my right to do something you disapprove of, that only puts me at risk.
FTFY. Be as destructive as you like, as long as it's limited to your body and your property... and your insurance pool... and your homeowners association...
On second thought, you're just going to have to move to deep-woods Montana or Alaska.
Yeah when the country will go bankrupt and get the white house will be seized by the chineses those things will be useless....and probably get seized too.
How, exactly, are the Chinese going to seize anything? The US military will still find beans and bullets to defend its shores, even if the rest of the country starves. If the US goes bankrupt China will be in bad shape, too, and they're not (yet) able to enforce their contracts by force. They're in bed together whether they like it or not.
The move to F2P earns a look from me. LOTRO lured me in with its F2P/hybrid model change last year and now I'm a monthly subscriber. The upfront box fee and mandatory subscription are obstacles to entry for someone like me with family and limited time. Unless a game gets stellar reviews from sites or people I trust I'm not going to spend $50+ just to try it for a month.
An added benefit to a F2P/hybrid move is that server populations increase which adds energy and excitement for existing subscribers, too.
I just want a beautiful screen, and maybe an HD tuner and stereo speakers if it's not part of a home theater setup. Leave the other services to modular components.
A TV is a high-end purchase for most people that lasts years. It doesn't make sense to bundle short-term tech there. Netflix and Hulu are popular today but may not be in a few years. They are best provided via inexpensive STBs like the Roku or through a Blu-Ray player that's cheap to replace.
Your wild speculation on what our veterans will do assumes that a drastic draw-down in the size of the standing military will occur. While we may see the Army and Marines shrink to pre-2007 'Surge' levels, that's not a big cut, maybe 50,000 total. Nothing like what we saw during the Peace Dividend draw-down begun in the late 80s after the Cold War ended, where we cut our standing forces by several hundred thousand. Many were forced to retire early or not allowed to re-enlist. As bad as that was for career-minded veterans there was not rioting in the streets.
Most veterans serve a tour, discharge honorably, use their well-deserved benefits and quietly get on with their lives. You've clearly never served, so stop trying to speak for us. I've been serving since 1988 and saw all the above first-hand. Our military servicemembers will be fine as long as we continue to provide those in need the assistance they've earned and deserve.
Come back? Most of us have been home for some time. Well over 1 million (some figures say close to 2 million) have fought in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001. Only a fraction of those (less than 100K) are in theater now. Whatever issues our veterans are having have been happening for ten years now. Since the over 90% of GWOT combat veterans are in the U.S. right now and not rioting I doubt we'll be seeing "real mob justice" like you claim.
The point is, I am not a security guard. I am not about to put my physical safety in jeopardy for the sake of corporate secrets. I do not have the necessary skills to vett or interrogate every new visitor wandering our halls, nor do I have the authority or tools to throw them out.
I will keep my passwords secret, I will choose complex passwords, I will not allow people to tailgate on my keycard access, and I will inform IT security if any of my corporate devices goes missing. I will do all of this, but I will not be your security guard, there are people who do this who are much better at than I could ever be...
You're close to fulfilling your responsibilities. Just add "challenge strangers to present valid credentials" and "report suspicious activity" to your list. You don't have to risk your physical safety to do those.
I would love to see game developers leverage iOS devices and the Apple TV to come up with new types of games. A board game with each player on an iOS device showing their unique player screen, linked to an Apple TV showing the board/world, player stats, standing, etc.
I agree, but getting everything to work harmoniously takes a serious commitment to tinkering.
Our house has A Roku, an Apple TV and a 360 used as a Media Center Extender to a Win 7 PC used as a DVR. A Windows Home Server hosts pictures, movies, and music to all devices. The house also has other Windows machines, iPods and iPhones. Email, contacts, and calendars are accessed with Google. I wish they would all just get along!
Issues: 1) No universal music format outside of the venerable MP3, which is what all my music is ripped to. Playlists do not play nice. 2) Windows Media Center and Windows Home Server don't run iTunes. 3) iTunes and the Roku can't see or play native WMC TV recordings.
Workarounds exist but require file conversion apps, which is a turn off for most consumers. If there were some third party media aggregator that was platform agnostic I'd be all over it. Google, Amazon, or even Logitech (their remotes work with everything) could step in here since Apple and MS don't seem to hate them as much as each other.
It's not optimal for everyone, granted. But if your goal is quiet the 360 isn't the only offender. And I suspect the Slim model closes the gap quite a bit.
Along with my Home Server and its external drives, the Comcast HD DVR (Scientific Atlanta) was very noisy as well (hard disk constantly spinning up and a constant hum), and got the same treatment as my 360 (into the closet) before I finally dumped extended cable after Xfinity's move to encrypt everything. The only visible devices are the receiver, DVD/Blu-Ray and the Wii for Rock Band and games for the younger kids. The loudest sound is the Wii when it accesses the optical drive.
Good idea. If our 360 was just for WMC that's what I'd do. But we use it for games and Netflix, too. I can update my Harmony remote to put the WMC button on the first screen (it defaults to the second screen). That will probably do the trick.
Do you find your media PC wakes up sporadically on its own, even when it's not recording a show? I'm backing mine up to a Windows Home Server, with the media extensions enabled. Between that and WMC it seems to wake up often.
Slashdot Mirror
You don't list anything specific that has changed for the negative and I'm not going to speculate for you. Maybe for you the game, and the stress of running a kinship, has run its course.
I joined Sept 2010 when the game went F2P and am still enjoying myself. The Tolkien lore is rich and the epic story very fulfilling. Without F2P I never would have tried LOTRO.
GP is not saying "pay for game time", i.e. subscription. He's saying you can compress time by purchasing tools that will lessen the grind. In LOTRO, for example, you can purchase XP accelerator and slayer multiplier scrolls that lessen the number of mobs you need to kill for the next level or quest credit. By not buying these aids you just have to invest more play time, i.e. grind. But game time in F2P is free.
If the minimum wasn't good enough, it wouldn't be the minimum.
There are no U.S. bases in Saudi Arabia. Not since 2003.
Much better. I can get behind that one. -OIF vet
I offer you a quote that might shed some light on the difference between Hollywood's version of good guys, and the real thing.
"If soldiers thought, they wouldn't be soldiers."
Whoever you're quoting, they, and you, have clearly never spent quality time with any soldiers.
Serve your country with honor and wind up on the FBI's terrorism watch list: Veterans a Focus of FBI Extremist Probe
Interesting and Informative. I'm looking at gamification in a new light.
Agree on F2P being done right with Lord of the Rings Online (LOTRO). But I'm curious why you think it couldn't compete with WoW. It's not pretty obvious to me. LOTRO came out in 2007. It's newer than WoW and the scenery is quite stunning when set to Ultra High with DX11. Since F2P launch in 2010 they have continued to update and just recently came out with the third major expansion. There's still a lot of life in Middle Earth.
The lore and content is rich and mature. If it fails to match WoW's numbers it's probably due to not catering to teenagers.
I've known some people from Minnesota, and I think large numbers, possibly a majority, are smart enough to know when it is cold out.
Yes, that's when we wear pants.
My last line was intended to be humorous. Apparently you've lost that ability in your quest to impose on others and call that freedom. :)
Actually I agree with you for the most part. Freedom in a civilization carries with it a requirement to be civil. My point: There is a responsibility to not impose on your neighbor any more than you have to. Your point: Being civil also requires neighbors to allow themselves to be imposed upon to a reasonable degree. Such trespasses have become less tolerated these days as we increasingly avoid our neighbors, a sad trend.
The only interesting definition of freedom is my right to do something you disapprove of, that only puts me at risk.
FTFY. Be as destructive as you like, as long as it's limited to your body and your property... and your insurance pool... and your homeowners association...
On second thought, you're just going to have to move to deep-woods Montana or Alaska.
You probably work longer hours, and have less say over your daily schedule than a medieval serf.
I'll take that bet. Now, serf, go sling manure until I say stop, or I'll kill you.
Don't know why you're modded troll. I'm not sure I agree a Roddenberry utopia is possible anytime soon, but it's nice to contemplate.
Yeah when the country will go bankrupt and get the white house will be seized by the chineses those things will be useless. ...and probably get seized too.
How, exactly, are the Chinese going to seize anything? The US military will still find beans and bullets to defend its shores, even if the rest of the country starves. If the US goes bankrupt China will be in bad shape, too, and they're not (yet) able to enforce their contracts by force. They're in bed together whether they like it or not.
The move to F2P earns a look from me. LOTRO lured me in with its F2P/hybrid model change last year and now I'm a monthly subscriber. The upfront box fee and mandatory subscription are obstacles to entry for someone like me with family and limited time. Unless a game gets stellar reviews from sites or people I trust I'm not going to spend $50+ just to try it for a month.
An added benefit to a F2P/hybrid move is that server populations increase which adds energy and excitement for existing subscribers, too.
I just want a beautiful screen, and maybe an HD tuner and stereo speakers if it's not part of a home theater setup. Leave the other services to modular components.
A TV is a high-end purchase for most people that lasts years. It doesn't make sense to bundle short-term tech there. Netflix and Hulu are popular today but may not be in a few years. They are best provided via inexpensive STBs like the Roku or through a Blu-Ray player that's cheap to replace.
Your wild speculation on what our veterans will do assumes that a drastic draw-down in the size of the standing military will occur. While we may see the Army and Marines shrink to pre-2007 'Surge' levels, that's not a big cut, maybe 50,000 total. Nothing like what we saw during the Peace Dividend draw-down begun in the late 80s after the Cold War ended, where we cut our standing forces by several hundred thousand. Many were forced to retire early or not allowed to re-enlist. As bad as that was for career-minded veterans there was not rioting in the streets.
Most veterans serve a tour, discharge honorably, use their well-deserved benefits and quietly get on with their lives. You've clearly never served, so stop trying to speak for us. I've been serving since 1988 and saw all the above first-hand. Our military servicemembers will be fine as long as we continue to provide those in need the assistance they've earned and deserve.
Come back? Most of us have been home for some time. Well over 1 million (some figures say close to 2 million) have fought in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001. Only a fraction of those (less than 100K) are in theater now. Whatever issues our veterans are having have been happening for ten years now. Since the over 90% of GWOT combat veterans are in the U.S. right now and not rioting I doubt we'll be seeing "real mob justice" like you claim.
The point is, I am not a security guard. I am not about to put my physical safety in jeopardy for the sake of corporate secrets. I do not have the necessary skills to vett or interrogate every new visitor wandering our halls, nor do I have the authority or tools to throw them out.
I will keep my passwords secret, I will choose complex passwords, I will not allow people to tailgate on my keycard access, and I will inform IT security if any of my corporate devices goes missing. I will do all of this, but I will not be your security guard, there are people who do this who are much better at than I could ever be...
You're close to fulfilling your responsibilities. Just add "challenge strangers to present valid credentials" and "report suspicious activity" to your list. You don't have to risk your physical safety to do those.
Can I borrow your phone?
Talk to the hand.
I would love to see game developers leverage iOS devices and the Apple TV to come up with new types of games. A board game with each player on an iOS device showing their unique player screen, linked to an Apple TV showing the board/world, player stats, standing, etc.
I agree, but getting everything to work harmoniously takes a serious commitment to tinkering.
Our house has A Roku, an Apple TV and a 360 used as a Media Center Extender to a Win 7 PC used as a DVR. A Windows Home Server hosts pictures, movies, and music to all devices. The house also has other Windows machines, iPods and iPhones. Email, contacts, and calendars are accessed with Google. I wish they would all just get along!
Issues:
1) No universal music format outside of the venerable MP3, which is what all my music is ripped to. Playlists do not play nice.
2) Windows Media Center and Windows Home Server don't run iTunes.
3) iTunes and the Roku can't see or play native WMC TV recordings.
Workarounds exist but require file conversion apps, which is a turn off for most consumers. If there were some third party media aggregator that was platform agnostic I'd be all over it. Google, Amazon, or even Logitech (their remotes work with everything) could step in here since Apple and MS don't seem to hate them as much as each other.
It's not optimal for everyone, granted. But if your goal is quiet the 360 isn't the only offender. And I suspect the Slim model closes the gap quite a bit.
Along with my Home Server and its external drives, the Comcast HD DVR (Scientific Atlanta) was very noisy as well (hard disk constantly spinning up and a constant hum), and got the same treatment as my 360 (into the closet) before I finally dumped extended cable after Xfinity's move to encrypt everything. The only visible devices are the receiver, DVD/Blu-Ray and the Wii for Rock Band and games for the younger kids. The loudest sound is the Wii when it accesses the optical drive.
Good idea. If our 360 was just for WMC that's what I'd do. But we use it for games and Netflix, too. I can update my Harmony remote to put the WMC button on the first screen (it defaults to the second screen). That will probably do the trick.
Do you find your media PC wakes up sporadically on its own, even when it's not recording a show? I'm backing mine up to a Windows Home Server, with the media extensions enabled. Between that and WMC it seems to wake up often.