In terms of engine and interface choices, you are correct. WAR did borrow liberally from WoW. Why? Because that's what Blizzard does better than nearly all of its peers: game-play and interaction. WoW's interface design has become the standard, not only because the existing player base is already familiar with (if not wedded to) it, but also because it's good. In short, WoW did a *lot* of things right; that's why it has a player base of 11 million.
What WoW didn't do right, WAR has, for the most part. I've played WoW since March of 2005, but I quit early this year because I had exhausted the game. Everything was a grind, and what's worse, the end goal of that grind, raiding, requires setting aside significant chunks of your life just to take part.
WAR so far has left that behind. The game is not about grinding your way to the max level so you can enjoy the "real" game of end-game content. With WAR, there is a real desire at times to *not* level so you can stick around a particular tier and help out with world RvR there. But even if you want to go ahead and race up the level tree, you can always reroll an alt to try out another class.
It seems to me that the game is centered around 2 hour play sessions, whether you're taking keeps, doing PQs, hoping into scenarios or just soloing the PVE content. It's an ADHD player's dream in that way. I can't tell you how many times I've been soloing, saw a group of players run past, joined their group (with open groups, *you* choose to join them, which makes group creation painless and quick), then found myself an hour later having taken a bunch of objectives and turned the tide to Order. I didn't seek that play experience out; it just came by, and I joined up on a whim.
The other thing that has me hooked on WAR is that they put a lot of importance on every player being able to not suck at RvR. Case in point: healing. Healers in WAR are generally not the most deadly of opponents, their DPS is so-so and not very bursty, but I'll damned if they aren't hard as crap to kill if they want to stay alive. Reason #1: mana. There's no such thing as mana. Everyone has the same mechanic, action points. And action points regenerate quickly (think rogues energy bars, only faster regen). This means that cloth-wearing healers can spam heals almost indefinitely at lower levels, staying alive through most anything.
In terms of leet "im gonna pwn u" PvP, it doesn't amount to much. My Rune Priest can't pwn anyone. But he can heal in RvR and not have to worry about getting assist trained by a couple players and getting slammed every time he pokes his head out like my WoW priest did. I can confidently walk into the middle of a pitched battle and start healing my guys. That is so liberating for me as a healing-oriented player that it makes the whole game more fun. In the end, those that understand basic tactics and strategy and have a better situational awareness still win in RvR (as they should), but the fact that I can take part as a healer (as opposed to an easy kill) is fantastic.
This quote from Paul Barnett has been listened to by the team at Mythic and put into play:
So then you have to say, our job then is: don't be crap. Make something what is not rubbish. So then you say, what's important? It's a weird thing, right? You talk to people about what's important they get obsessed on the product. The get obsessed on the frames per second, the colors, the brightness, the usability of the interface. And you go: "It's none of those things!" That's just the dressing, that's the just the stuff that makes you go: "Yes, yes, yes, I see, I see, I see." What is at the core of it? FUN! Fun, you FUCKERS!
WAR is not a WoW-killer. WoW will continue to have its millions for some time to come. It just won't have this one.
Who the heck cries while playing a game? I mean, it's a game. I find it hard to believe that the rehashed, hackneyed crap which passes for plot in 98% of the games today would induce real pathos. Maybe I'm just not sensitive enough.
Yes, but in those raids, you're always doing something, be that healing, DPSing, tanking, decursing, etc. It's very rare when your job is to just move to spot A and do nothing. The OP of this thread makes a good point, though I do agree that an additional coop mode on a sports game would be attractive to some.
Heartless Gamer needs to get rid of the stupid frozen graphic on the left. It turns scrolling on Firefox into a slide show and induces nausia on my 64-bit Fedora machine. Blech...
Otherwise, how can you explain the success of cable networks like TLC, History Channel, and Discovery?
Your point is still valid, in that games are well.. games. Learning is not a selling point for a game. Gameplay, graphics, story line, etc. are the primary selling points for games. Any game that is packaged as an "educational game" will not sell very well, because education is seen, rightfully so, as an obligation/duty/chore in nearly every society in the world, certainly within the cultures being marketed to for games.
FWIW, I'll be purchasing the Revo for the precise reasons mentioned in the FA. As far as I'm concerned, consoles have become too expensive and their games too repetative to be worth putting my hard-earned money into. If I want hard-core gaming experiences, I'm going to use my PC, which is where I want to spend my money. A console is supposed to be for quick sit-downs before class or relaxation or for friends at parties. The Revo offers that in spades, in fact is designed specifically for that. Nintendo has a long history of catering to those casual gamers that just want to have fun.
Count me in as a future Revo fan.
I know I've stopped playing. Haven't unsubscribed, but that's only because I'd purchased a 6 month chunk of time. I just can't handle the constant lag, wait times and stupid server-side crap that has become integral to the WoW experience.
Blizzard can't handle the success it's won. I hope Hero's Journey doesn't suck.
Never ascribe to conspiracy what could more easily be explained by incompetence.
Considering the troubles Microsoft has had trying to get their product to the American market, how can you expect them to have done their homework on the Japanese market?
Your argument is predicated upon a skewed assumption.
horde guild a is geared up and has played since retail and they crush the feeble alliance pickup group.
Under these conditions, there's no solution to your problem, whether you coerce all the servers or not. The horde team doesn't need superior gear, given that, under your conditions, they'll always be competing against a "pickup" alliance group. You're also assuming that this hypothetical horde team has more cohesion than is believable. I will readily admit that horde tend to be tighter PvPers (at least on my server, which is PvE BTW), but that is really a function of necessity, not overall time spent or even gear. Nearly all the PvP raiding that happens on my server happens at Crossroads. This dynamic, one that requires horde players to be on constant overwatch for the sake of the lowbies, has produced a tactical efficiency in the horde players that puts the alliance to shame. This, I would think, is actually a kind of balance to the disproportionate ratio of alliance to horde.
So, yes, the horde might be better PvPers, but their strength is dependent upon their cohesion. If one or two of their players have to stop playing for any amount of time, it will impact their dynamic far more than the same group of alliance PvPers, who have more players (on average among all the servers) to choose from. It's kind of a question of one team having more star players in starting positions while the other team has more depth to their bench.
I am not sure what type of system you are running but I have only been dropped from the game 3 times in the last 30 days.
GeForce 5200 256M CPU AMD|2500/333 ATHLON XP BARTON R DDRAM 1GB|64X64 PC-2100 MB ASUS A7V8X-X/LAN KT400 RTL HD 80GB|WD 7200RPM 8MB
And I get dropped at least once a session. Usually more, if I'm PvPing or moving around alot. It's gotten to the point now that a boat trip is a 50/50 chance of getting dumped en route. Very annoying.
Good points. Yes, the fourth point, on reflection, is pretty much a subset of the second, but it wouldn't be a stretch to separate the two when taking the whole of the Firefly universe into account, both the fabulously wealthy Earth-centric core and the "malcontents," as you refer to them, on the rim.
I'm not quite sure what you're saying about my third point. Are you disagreeing with the truth of it, or simply refuting that the series expounds that point of view? I happen to think that the series makes it pretty clear that in Mr. Whedon's universe, a Firefly engine == a horse == covered wagon == jump gate == greyhound bus. The difference is only in scale and time period. There are no instant food devices, no holodecks.. the same want and need and emotional scars that all pilgrims and malcontents deal with as a result of their (sometimes self-imposed) exile exist irrespective of how fast their method of transportation is. Even with fabulous advances in technology, poor folk still get screwed, and it's still dog eat dog, sans those other most invaluable qualities, hope and mercy. Hope and mercy don't need technology to work their magic; they just need the will and heart to do them.
Maybe I'm reading too much into the subtext, but that's what I see in the series.
I do see your point, but I think you might be confusing intelligent with didactic. There are any number of deep concepts underlying the series.
Continuity of class structures over time
Universal nature of frontier culture
The ineffective nature of technology on the core problems that face mankind. (as opposed to Star Trek's "In the future we'll all shit flower petals and rainbows! Except for the Klingons and Borg... we still need bad guys, you understand."
The effect of scarcity and want on common morality and civility.
Mr. Wheadon just didn't use the series as allegory thinly veiled in laser beams and photon carbonificators like most other sci-fi shows have (Gallactica being the canonical example). He wanted to tell a story, nothing more, but in telling a story as honestly and thoroughly as you can, you're going to expose a philosophical framework, which he did pretty darned well, IMO.
As such, what's the point? There's functionally no difference between a char 9 levels lower than you and a char 40 levels below you. Hell, not much difference between -9 and -3, other than just mana/hp usage.
I guess they justify this as a community-building feature. Makes sense, assuming you are constantly part of a group in non-aligned zones.
If you are attacking 5-10 levels below you, this is the way to go.
Aren't chars 10 levels below gray? If so, doesn't that mean they would be dishonorable kills?
I agree with your point.
But people who whine about being "borked" by "leftists" should keep in mind that when you lay down with dogs you get up with fleas.
If you speak nothing but French, listeners will assume you are French, or at least from some French-speaking culture. That's how the world works, regardless of whether that's good or bad.
If you rave about "completed Jews" and "family values" or "American heritage" or "western values" you will be assumed to be a neo-Nazi, or at least sympathetic to racist demagogues.
The majority of people who rant about "leftists" and "borking" are rabid ideologues incapable of independent thought. That's who you are self-identifying with in your post. If that's what you want, great. If not, consider choosing your language more carefully.
I can't believe I'm reading this.
So, if I wear gang colors, I should expect to be thought of as a gang member by the police? If I use the word leftist, I'm a neo-nazi? Is this how far it's come?
Then I give up. Every single post I made on this thread has gone up and down (some twice) from +2 to -1. Most of them through the use of the Overrated Mod. Two of them have had a (-1, Insightful). My God, who are you people? (-1, Insightful)?! Are you that rabid, that you cannot take opposing viewpoints? That you cannot respond without passive-aggression?
Give me a roudy rhetorical frag-fest any day to this group-think newspeak bullshit...
I better make this quick before the Mod-sharks bork my opinions again.
You bring up a valid issue, one that most of the leftists here are incapable of listening to. It is possible, however difficult, to keep things on the local level. Cable companies deal with the local goverments, and this is how they keep their monopolies. Take the fight to the city council, and you can see real change.
Take the fight to Washington, and you get Federalization, more hegemony, more collusion. Do you actually think that John McCain gives a flying crap about your cable bills? The man probably hasn't paid a cable bill in 20 years (if ever). He's interested in maintaining the relationship he has with the Time-Warners and Comcasts of the world. Do you really think he'd knowingly sabotage that relationship, just so you can watch Dick Van Dyke re-runs for $10 less a month?
Please. You want Uncle Sam to stop playing with the Big Boys of Wall Street? Then, YOU stop playing with them. I haven't watched cable TV in 7 years. I find my news and entertainment elsewhere. What would happen if most Americans did that, hmm? The Big Boys wouldn't be quite so Big, would they?
Slashdot Mirror
In terms of engine and interface choices, you are correct. WAR did borrow liberally from WoW. Why? Because that's what Blizzard does better than nearly all of its peers: game-play and interaction. WoW's interface design has become the standard, not only because the existing player base is already familiar with (if not wedded to) it, but also because it's good. In short, WoW did a *lot* of things right; that's why it has a player base of 11 million.
What WoW didn't do right, WAR has, for the most part. I've played WoW since March of 2005, but I quit early this year because I had exhausted the game. Everything was a grind, and what's worse, the end goal of that grind, raiding, requires setting aside significant chunks of your life just to take part.
WAR so far has left that behind. The game is not about grinding your way to the max level so you can enjoy the "real" game of end-game content. With WAR, there is a real desire at times to *not* level so you can stick around a particular tier and help out with world RvR there. But even if you want to go ahead and race up the level tree, you can always reroll an alt to try out another class.
It seems to me that the game is centered around 2 hour play sessions, whether you're taking keeps, doing PQs, hoping into scenarios or just soloing the PVE content. It's an ADHD player's dream in that way. I can't tell you how many times I've been soloing, saw a group of players run past, joined their group (with open groups, *you* choose to join them, which makes group creation painless and quick), then found myself an hour later having taken a bunch of objectives and turned the tide to Order. I didn't seek that play experience out; it just came by, and I joined up on a whim.
The other thing that has me hooked on WAR is that they put a lot of importance on every player being able to not suck at RvR. Case in point: healing. Healers in WAR are generally not the most deadly of opponents, their DPS is so-so and not very bursty, but I'll damned if they aren't hard as crap to kill if they want to stay alive. Reason #1: mana. There's no such thing as mana. Everyone has the same mechanic, action points. And action points regenerate quickly (think rogues energy bars, only faster regen). This means that cloth-wearing healers can spam heals almost indefinitely at lower levels, staying alive through most anything.
In terms of leet "im gonna pwn u" PvP, it doesn't amount to much. My Rune Priest can't pwn anyone. But he can heal in RvR and not have to worry about getting assist trained by a couple players and getting slammed every time he pokes his head out like my WoW priest did. I can confidently walk into the middle of a pitched battle and start healing my guys. That is so liberating for me as a healing-oriented player that it makes the whole game more fun. In the end, those that understand basic tactics and strategy and have a better situational awareness still win in RvR (as they should), but the fact that I can take part as a healer (as opposed to an easy kill) is fantastic.
This quote from Paul Barnett has been listened to by the team at Mythic and put into play:
WAR is not a WoW-killer. WoW will continue to have its millions for some time to come. It just won't have this one.
Who the heck cries while playing a game? I mean, it's a game. I find it hard to believe that the rehashed, hackneyed crap which passes for plot in 98% of the games today would induce real pathos. Maybe I'm just not sensitive enough.
Yes, but in those raids, you're always doing something, be that healing, DPSing, tanking, decursing, etc. It's very rare when your job is to just move to spot A and do nothing. The OP of this thread makes a good point, though I do agree that an additional coop mode on a sports game would be attractive to some.
Heartless Gamer needs to get rid of the stupid frozen graphic on the left. It turns scrolling on Firefox into a slide show and induces nausia on my 64-bit Fedora machine. Blech...
Otherwise, how can you explain the success of cable networks like TLC, History Channel, and Discovery? Your point is still valid, in that games are well.. games. Learning is not a selling point for a game. Gameplay, graphics, story line, etc. are the primary selling points for games. Any game that is packaged as an "educational game" will not sell very well, because education is seen, rightfully so, as an obligation/duty/chore in nearly every society in the world, certainly within the cultures being marketed to for games.
FWIW, I'll be purchasing the Revo for the precise reasons mentioned in the FA. As far as I'm concerned, consoles have become too expensive and their games too repetative to be worth putting my hard-earned money into. If I want hard-core gaming experiences, I'm going to use my PC, which is where I want to spend my money. A console is supposed to be for quick sit-downs before class or relaxation or for friends at parties. The Revo offers that in spades, in fact is designed specifically for that. Nintendo has a long history of catering to those casual gamers that just want to have fun. Count me in as a future Revo fan.
I know I've stopped playing. Haven't unsubscribed, but that's only because I'd purchased a 6 month chunk of time. I just can't handle the constant lag, wait times and stupid server-side crap that has become integral to the WoW experience.
Blizzard can't handle the success it's won. I hope Hero's Journey doesn't suck.
Never ascribe to conspiracy what could more easily be explained by incompetence.
Considering the troubles Microsoft has had trying to get their product to the American market, how can you expect them to have done their homework on the Japanese market?
Please explain, then, why there is a flashy bit of advertising at the top of the Onion article...
How is it a lost art, when it's never been done before?
Your argument is predicated upon a skewed assumption.
horde guild a is geared up and has played since retail and they crush the feeble alliance pickup group.
Under these conditions, there's no solution to your problem, whether you coerce all the servers or not. The horde team doesn't need superior gear, given that, under your conditions, they'll always be competing against a "pickup" alliance group. You're also assuming that this hypothetical horde team has more cohesion than is believable. I will readily admit that horde tend to be tighter PvPers (at least on my server, which is PvE BTW), but that is really a function of necessity, not overall time spent or even gear. Nearly all the PvP raiding that happens on my server happens at Crossroads. This dynamic, one that requires horde players to be on constant overwatch for the sake of the lowbies, has produced a tactical efficiency in the horde players that puts the alliance to shame. This, I would think, is actually a kind of balance to the disproportionate ratio of alliance to horde.
So, yes, the horde might be better PvPers, but their strength is dependent upon their cohesion. If one or two of their players have to stop playing for any amount of time, it will impact their dynamic far more than the same group of alliance PvPers, who have more players (on average among all the servers) to choose from. It's kind of a question of one team having more star players in starting positions while the other team has more depth to their bench.
I am not sure what type of system you are running but I have only been dropped from the game 3 times in the last 30 days.
GeForce 5200 256M
CPU AMD|2500/333 ATHLON XP BARTON R
DDRAM 1GB|64X64 PC-2100
MB ASUS A7V8X-X/LAN KT400 RTL
HD 80GB|WD 7200RPM 8MB
And I get dropped at least once a session. Usually more, if I'm PvPing or moving around alot. It's gotten to the point now that a boat trip is a 50/50 chance of getting dumped en route. Very annoying.
Good points. Yes, the fourth point, on reflection, is pretty much a subset of the second, but it wouldn't be a stretch to separate the two when taking the whole of the Firefly universe into account, both the fabulously wealthy Earth-centric core and the "malcontents," as you refer to them, on the rim.
I'm not quite sure what you're saying about my third point. Are you disagreeing with the truth of it, or simply refuting that the series expounds that point of view? I happen to think that the series makes it pretty clear that in Mr. Whedon's universe, a Firefly engine == a horse == covered wagon == jump gate == greyhound bus. The difference is only in scale and time period. There are no instant food devices, no holodecks.. the same want and need and emotional scars that all pilgrims and malcontents deal with as a result of their (sometimes self-imposed) exile exist irrespective of how fast their method of transportation is. Even with fabulous advances in technology, poor folk still get screwed, and it's still dog eat dog, sans those other most invaluable qualities, hope and mercy. Hope and mercy don't need technology to work their magic; they just need the will and heart to do them.
Maybe I'm reading too much into the subtext, but that's what I see in the series.
I do see your point, but I think you might be confusing intelligent with didactic. There are any number of deep concepts underlying the series.
- Continuity of class structures over time
- Universal nature of frontier culture
- The ineffective nature of technology on the core problems that face mankind. (as opposed to Star Trek's "In the future we'll all shit flower petals and rainbows! Except for the Klingons and Borg... we still need bad guys, you understand."
- The effect of scarcity and want on common morality and civility.
Mr. Wheadon just didn't use the series as allegory thinly veiled in laser beams and photon carbonificators like most other sci-fi shows have (Gallactica being the canonical example). He wanted to tell a story, nothing more, but in telling a story as honestly and thoroughly as you can, you're going to expose a philosophical framework, which he did pretty darned well, IMO.As such, what's the point? There's functionally no difference between a char 9 levels lower than you and a char 40 levels below you. Hell, not much difference between -9 and -3, other than just mana/hp usage.
I guess they justify this as a community-building feature. Makes sense, assuming you are constantly part of a group in non-aligned zones.
If you are attacking 5-10 levels below you, this is the way to go. Aren't chars 10 levels below gray? If so, doesn't that mean they would be dishonorable kills?
Damn, I wish I had mod points... Nice freaking post.
does that mean Iron Forge won't be so dang laggy?
I can't believe I'm reading this.
So, if I wear gang colors, I should expect to be thought of as a gang member by the police? If I use the word leftist, I'm a neo-nazi? Is this how far it's come?
Then I give up. Every single post I made on this thread has gone up and down (some twice) from +2 to -1. Most of them through the use of the Overrated Mod. Two of them have had a (-1, Insightful). My God, who are you people? (-1, Insightful)?! Are you that rabid, that you cannot take opposing viewpoints? That you cannot respond without passive-aggression?
Give me a roudy rhetorical frag-fest any day to this group-think newspeak bullshit...
I mean, damn.
Nope. This is me.
And the Federal Government is going to make it better?
Come on. That we have to pay more and more each year for this privilege sucks and all, but hey, at least your opinion means more on Slashdot! :-)))))))
Thanks for answering your own question. Makes life easier for me.
I better make this quick before the Mod-sharks bork my opinions again.
You bring up a valid issue, one that most of the leftists here are incapable of listening to. It is possible, however difficult, to keep things on the local level. Cable companies deal with the local goverments, and this is how they keep their monopolies. Take the fight to the city council, and you can see real change.
Take the fight to Washington, and you get Federalization, more hegemony, more collusion. Do you actually think that John McCain gives a flying crap about your cable bills? The man probably hasn't paid a cable bill in 20 years (if ever). He's interested in maintaining the relationship he has with the Time-Warners and Comcasts of the world. Do you really think he'd knowingly sabotage that relationship, just so you can watch Dick Van Dyke re-runs for $10 less a month?
Please. You want Uncle Sam to stop playing with the Big Boys of Wall Street? Then, YOU stop playing with them. I haven't watched cable TV in 7 years. I find my news and entertainment elsewhere. What would happen if most Americans did that, hmm? The Big Boys wouldn't be quite so Big, would they?
So, to solve this, we are to piss and moan to our benificent Congressweebles? They will swoop down and magically [poof] insure free-market principles?
Just don't buy cable. Last time I checked, you could just not watch TV. [shock and dismay!]
Or has cable TV become another right?