I prefer to solo xp, group in PvP, and I enjoy trading on occasion.
Am I allowed to play an MMO? Or are you really saying that I have to engage in your XP rituals your way in order to play?
-Jeff
P.S. Note that I have had more interaction with my guild then the PUG I was with on more than one occasion. Grouping together for XP is not the heigh of interaction by any extent.
First off, I'm in agreement. There's no need to point to nationality here.
Second of all, it's nationality, not "race".
Third of all, just to play devil's advocate, if a particularily large segment of farmers are operating under the protection of their nationality (can't touch them because they're in China), then that could be a reason to raise the issue.
Again, just to be clear, I don't think we need nationality here. But I could see a case where it could be an issue.
The horde "looks evil", but honestly they are the better of the two. Consider:
1) The elves are responsible for bringing evil to the world, and it was they who destroyed the troll kingdoms.
2) The gnomes, despite their cuteness, are the amoral scientists who went too far and poisoned their home.
3) The humans are the greedy conquerors who have broken the treaty and settled in the western continent.
4) Dwarves are stripmining (look in southern barrens, where they don't belong).
5) Undead are evil. Well, we can argue a different perspective, but I'll be simple.:-)
6) Orcs are honorable. They honored their agreements, and fought to repel evil.
7) The trolls are an outcast race, who follow the honorable orcs.
8) The tauren are as good as good gets in this game. They have that whole "at peace with nature" thing.
In the large scale, the humans are breaking their word to the orcs and launching the invasion of the western continent. Anybody who follows them is on the side of wrong here.
So who looks good? Alliance. Who is good? Horde?
People who pick alliance pick style over substance.
Just apply what you wrote to life, and you can see what life really sucks for most of us. If only real life gave us fun ways to get what we wanted, then we wouldn't have to powergame just to get gold just to buy things.:-)
Then I think this man is right on. I don't think he will succeed, mind you, but if you want to make money, you need to be popular.
FWIW - I loved the crafting system. I despised the entertainment nonsense. I thought combat was simply broken and needed to be fixed. I also felt the entire game was, as they put it, the "Uncle Owen" experience, and that bugged me too.
I really wish they had thought through things better to start, and kept the core game system (skill trees), and just balanced it out better. I also wish, like many people, that they had set this in a timeframe when you could have tons of Jedis running around.
At $14, that's two tickets to a movie with no popcorn. Given that he said he liked the game, and that $14 wasn't much in his eyes, he's basically saying he didn't play more than 5 hours a month (rough number).
The pricing model wasn't for him, I guess, but I don't think a new one is needed.
Buy a game because it's good. You can find this out within days by reading through the reviews. That's not perfect - nothing in life is - but it's a very useful step.
Regarding the supposed "racism"; it wasn't racist, it was stereotyping. To be simplistic, the former is "evil" the latter may be "ignorant". However, in the real world advertising, marketing, and specifically entertainment are all targetted to stereotype groups. It's quite normal to speak of games, tv shows, or films appealing to certain ages, genders, racial groups, or some combination thereof.
I think the article writer showed poor discretion in writing what he did, but I don't think we can jump to racism either.
It's not that fear is the basis of everything (though I do think it's the root of a lot more than you give credit for), but that it's hard-wired.
Fear is rom. Rational thought is ram. Fear is fast...instinct, reaction. Rational thought is slow, complicated, takes time, and still is not always correct.
To be honest, I suspect that removing fear from the equation would result in truly bizarre behavior.
If they ported city of X and guild wars over to a console, that would give me a strong reason to buy a console. Right now I use my PC for gaming, but I am getting increasingly tired of playing the driver game. I would much rather have a simple mac laptop for email and browsing, and use a console for my gaming.
"Hell, if Detroit would invest half the money into BEV technology that they spend on marketing for the H2 and Grand Cherokee....."
Prove it. Seriously, you're speaking like a manager here: life isn't that simple. All the money in the world will not change physical constants, and there isn't always a way to do the things you want.
I've talked with my Dad (engineer, rocket scientist) and various friends on this. Everybody would love a better battery. The person who makes a significant advance with batteries could be our next billionaire (or the soulless corp that owns him or her ). But it may simply not be in the cards.
Anyways, be carefull: "money=results" is managements way of looking at the world. It's not always correct.
I left SWG for many reasons, most talked to death long-since so I won't re-hash.
But one thing people don't mention: I don't want to be a Jedi's groupie. I don't mean the name "jedi" either (or padawan or whatever you are going to use). If there are people waving light sabers, I want to be one of them if I'm playing star wars. If this is outside the reach of casual players, then I won't play. I'm not joining a star wars game to be one of the little guys.
Don't take this the wrong way, you have every right to make Jedi's the kings of creation, untouchable by all but the few who play long-enough. But don't expect me to join up, cause I'm not playing a star wars game where there's Jedi and I ain't one of 'em.
thanks for the link, but I think you should read the bill
First, in the preamble to the bill it states that "the legislature finds that" [to paraphrase, read the language yourself] that minors are likely to be psychologically harmed by exposure to video games and that minors may perform violent acts as a result of video games. This is very tenuous position scientifically (last I checked), but now that language is a matter of law in Florida.
Second, +++"Violent video game" means a video game in which the options available to a player include killing, maiming, dismembering, or sexually assaulting an image of a human being, if those acts are depicted in the game in a manner that: 1.a. A reasonable person, considering the game as a whole, would find appeals to a deviant or morbid interest of minors; b. Is patently offensive to prevailing standards in the community concerning what is suitable for minors; and c. Lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value for minors; or...+++
Read that language carefully. I think this language can be bent by people very easily for their own purposes.
First of all, if china, all of south america, europe, whoever wants to, they can build a competing product and americans will beat down the doors to use if if they like it. I think it would be great if they did this so we can let the market shake out competing architectures.
Second of all, UN control is a joke, right? It's a club with no entry requirements: any country can join. Who in their right minds would want the UN in control of the internet? That's just a sick joke.
It's not always a question of the coder, and a bug is not always a bug. In the example in the article, for all we know the specification called for a plain-text transfer, and the coder did exactly right.
So we'll have yet more wrangling over specifications, more walls between users and developers, and more CYA behavior. That'll be fun.
"Of course, Bloody Bay has a secondary hospital area (the area in which fallen characters are revived) that's reserved for superheroes, because City of Villains will let players that own each game square off against one another in hero-versus-villain battles, which can be entered into for bragging rights (for now, anyway). Interestingly, the Bay also contains its own built-in monsters to fight, as well as missions to undertake, such as one that requires you to capture samples from scattered meteorites (while evading radioactive ghouls at the same time). However, in this mission, you'll be vulnerable to attack from ghouls and from other players, too."
First off, there's a factor beyond population size which we used to see all the time in DAoC; some realms are more PvE-oriented and it becomes very hard to convince people to go to the frontiers. Same thing in WoW: not every server has an equal percentage of people interested in the battlegrounds.
Second of all, it is Blizzard's fault. They designed a system that doesn't handle population mis-matches (whether caused by desire or physical numbers). There are ways to help deal with population issues in battlegrounds.
-Jeff
Someone's going to ask for examples, so here goes:
1) If someone drops from the 21-30 battleground, a lvl 30 guard is put in the flag room. Is it perfect? No, but it helps add balance and in a 10 vs 9 or 8 situation nobody'll complain.
2) Design battleground maps that favor one side significantly. If you can't fill out the required numbers after 15 minutes, add guards to the maps rating let the weaker side play on the stronger side of the map.
3) Allow mixed teams on some maps. Side-choice is random (groups can't come in altogether on these maps), but alliance and horde are mixed so that the sides are balanced.
There are two related forms of entertainment that often overlap: puzzles and games. People who like puzzles expect to put in time, potentially a long time, but eventually they want to solve the puzzle.
People who play games, otoh, are going to go in knowing that you win some, and you lose some.
MMORPGs right now try to cater to both, with the end result that puzzle solvers get frustrated if they "lose" and gamers get frustrated trying to "solve" the puzzle.
I hope the next big game to come out decreases the amount of puzzle and increases the amount of game.
----
As for the "dynamic world" argument; I agree in principle, but it's a lot harder to do in practice. The orc army will be destroyed through a slight exploit by a strong guild, or it'll be too strong for all but the most powerful players, or the lag will be too great for all but the most powerful machines. In the first case (powerful guild), the orc army is defeated, but it's a non-event to most of the population. That latter is a big whole in most "dynamic world" scenarios; the powergamers get to do the dynamic stuff, and the casual players get to read about it.
While I grant that the death penalty is a bit silly, I'm really tired of how white-collar crimes are treated like cute little misdemeaners. It's an area where our system is woefully unfair: some poor teen gets bored and robs a store; he gets hard time. OTOH, a bored rich teen in college releases a virus that causes millions of dollars in damage; he gets a stern talking to and then is lionized on slashdot for his fight against the system.
This is the culture that leads to CEOs wrecking the lives of hundreds of people and getting a few years in country-club prison.
Besides being a tactical genius and know when and where to attack, Alex had a number of basics working for him:
1) Combined arms. He had very tough infantry that he could rely on to be an anvil, and very tough cavalry that worked well as a hammer.
2) Strategic intelligence. Alexander brought scholars with him and looked for all information that would help him know his enemy. Geography, whether, customs, whatever.
The latter is obviously outside the scope of this, but combined arms won't work in civ unless they differentiate between units in some fashion, whether that off/def numbers or modifiers (all cav gets -50% def, +25% att) or whatever.
"I don't like it, you don't like it, but they have a right."
They have the right unless the gaming company says they don't. It's the gaming company's product, so they can attach pretty much whatever rules they want. If the company says you may not sell an account, then you may not sell an account.
-Jeff
P.S. The hard one to get around is having someone else play your account for your. There were services in DAoC that would power level a character to 50 over the course of a day or so (and then equip with spell-crafted armor and plop some platinum down for spare change).
Slashdot Mirror
I prefer to solo xp, group in PvP, and I enjoy trading on occasion.
Am I allowed to play an MMO? Or are you really saying that I have to engage in your XP rituals your way in order to play?
-Jeff
P.S. Note that I have had more interaction with my guild then the PUG I was with on more than one occasion. Grouping together for XP is not the heigh of interaction by any extent.
First off, I'm in agreement. There's no need to point to nationality here.
Second of all, it's nationality, not "race".
Third of all, just to play devil's advocate, if a particularily large segment of farmers are operating under the protection of their nationality (can't touch them because they're in China), then that could be a reason to raise the issue.
Again, just to be clear, I don't think we need nationality here. But I could see a case where it could be an issue.
-Jeff
The horde "looks evil", but honestly they are the better of the two. Consider:
:-)
1) The elves are responsible for bringing evil to the world, and it was they who destroyed the troll kingdoms.
2) The gnomes, despite their cuteness, are the amoral scientists who went too far and poisoned their home.
3) The humans are the greedy conquerors who have broken the treaty and settled in the western continent.
4) Dwarves are stripmining (look in southern barrens, where they don't belong).
5) Undead are evil. Well, we can argue a different perspective, but I'll be simple.
6) Orcs are honorable. They honored their agreements, and fought to repel evil.
7) The trolls are an outcast race, who follow the honorable orcs.
8) The tauren are as good as good gets in this game. They have that whole "at peace with nature" thing.
In the large scale, the humans are breaking their word to the orcs and launching the invasion of the western continent. Anybody who follows them is on the side of wrong here.
So who looks good? Alliance. Who is good? Horde?
People who pick alliance pick style over substance.
-Jeff
Just apply what you wrote to life, and you can see what life really sucks for most of us. If only real life gave us fun ways to get what we wanted, then we wouldn't have to powergame just to get gold just to buy things. :-)
-Jeff
Then I think this man is right on. I don't think he will succeed, mind you, but if you want to make money, you need to be popular.
FWIW - I loved the crafting system. I despised the entertainment nonsense. I thought combat was simply broken and needed to be fixed. I also felt the entire game was, as they put it, the "Uncle Owen" experience, and that bugged me too.
I really wish they had thought through things better to start, and kept the core game system (skill trees), and just balanced it out better. I also wish, like many people, that they had set this in a timeframe when you could have tons of Jedis running around.
-Jeff
The priest looks around, proclaims the place a "den of filth", and leaves.
The terrorist looks around, and likewise proclaims the place a "den of filth", and leaves.
The gamer catches up, and asks "What, are we too low level for The Den of Filth?"
-Jeff
At $14, that's two tickets to a movie with no popcorn. Given that he said he liked the game, and that $14 wasn't much in his eyes, he's basically saying he didn't play more than 5 hours a month (rough number).
The pricing model wasn't for him, I guess, but I don't think a new one is needed.
-Jeff
Buy a game because it's good. You can find this out within days by reading through the reviews. That's not perfect - nothing in life is - but it's a very useful step.
Regarding the supposed "racism"; it wasn't racist, it was stereotyping. To be simplistic, the former is "evil" the latter may be "ignorant". However, in the real world advertising, marketing, and specifically entertainment are all targetted to stereotype groups. It's quite normal to speak of games, tv shows, or films appealing to certain ages, genders, racial groups, or some combination thereof.
I think the article writer showed poor discretion in writing what he did, but I don't think we can jump to racism either.
-Jeff
It's not that fear is the basis of everything (though I do think it's the root of a lot more than you give credit for), but that it's hard-wired.
Fear is rom. Rational thought is ram. Fear is fast...instinct, reaction. Rational thought is slow, complicated, takes time, and still is not always correct.
To be honest, I suspect that removing fear from the equation would result in truly bizarre behavior.
-Jeff
If they ported city of X and guild wars over to a console, that would give me a strong reason to buy a console. Right now I use my PC for gaming, but I am getting increasingly tired of playing the driver game. I would much rather have a simple mac laptop for email and browsing, and use a console for my gaming.
-Jeff
"Hell, if Detroit would invest half the money into BEV technology that they spend on marketing for the H2 and Grand Cherokee....."
Prove it. Seriously, you're speaking like a manager here: life isn't that simple. All the money in the world will not change physical constants, and there isn't always a way to do the things you want.
I've talked with my Dad (engineer, rocket scientist) and various friends on this. Everybody would love a better battery. The person who makes a significant advance with batteries could be our next billionaire (or the soulless corp that owns him or her ). But it may simply not be in the cards.
Anyways, be carefull: "money=results" is managements way of looking at the world. It's not always correct.
-Jeff
I left SWG for many reasons, most talked to death long-since so I won't re-hash.
But one thing people don't mention: I don't want to be a Jedi's groupie. I don't mean the name "jedi" either (or padawan or whatever you are going to use). If there are people waving light sabers, I want to be one of them if I'm playing star wars. If this is outside the reach of casual players, then I won't play. I'm not joining a star wars game to be one of the little guys.
Don't take this the wrong way, you have every right to make Jedi's the kings of creation, untouchable by all but the few who play long-enough. But don't expect me to join up, cause I'm not playing a star wars game where there's Jedi and I ain't one of 'em.
-Jeff
thanks for the link, but I think you should read the bill
First, in the preamble to the bill it states that "the legislature finds that" [to paraphrase, read the language yourself] that minors are likely to be psychologically harmed by exposure to video games and that minors may perform violent acts as a result of video games. This is very tenuous position scientifically (last I checked), but now that language is a matter of law in Florida.
Second, +++"Violent video game" means a video game in which the options available to a player include killing, maiming, dismembering, or sexually assaulting an image of a human being, if those acts are depicted in the game in a manner that: 1.a. A reasonable person, considering the game as a whole, would find appeals to a deviant or morbid interest of minors; b. Is patently offensive to prevailing standards in the community concerning what is suitable for minors; and c. Lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value for minors; or...+++
Read that language carefully. I think this language can be bent by people very easily for their own purposes.
-Jeff
a) It's wrong to take other people's property just because you want it. Built in the US, owned by the US.
b) This debate is silly; every country/region has it in their power to build their own competing systems. It's not even terribly expensive.
This is another case of a lazy world trying to take rather than do it themselves.
-Jeff
Yes, you can put that rule in the dirty cupboard over there next to the 10th amendment, on the left.
-Jeff
First of all, if china, all of south america, europe, whoever wants to, they can build a competing product and americans will beat down the doors to use if if they like it. I think it would be great if they did this so we can let the market shake out competing architectures.
Second of all, UN control is a joke, right? It's a club with no entry requirements: any country can join. Who in their right minds would want the UN in control of the internet? That's just a sick joke.
-Jeff
It's not always a question of the coder, and a bug is not always a bug. In the example in the article, for all we know the specification called for a plain-text transfer, and the coder did exactly right.
So we'll have yet more wrangling over specifications, more walls between users and developers, and more CYA behavior. That'll be fun.
-Jeff
"This isn't news. It's just becoming more well known. I don't mind that, I just wish people had more MMO history in their brain pan."
Don't get me wrong, I play and enjoy MMORPGs, including WoW.
That said, I wish people knew real history and nothing whatsoever about MMOs. It would make a fascinating twist to the game we call "real life".
-Jeff
Yes, you can fight hero vs villain. They have an arena and a frontier area where heroes and villains can fight. Check out:
s .html?sid=6133023&page=1
http://www.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/cityofvillains/new
"Of course, Bloody Bay has a secondary hospital area (the area in which fallen characters are revived) that's reserved for superheroes, because City of Villains will let players that own each game square off against one another in hero-versus-villain battles, which can be entered into for bragging rights (for now, anyway). Interestingly, the Bay also contains its own built-in monsters to fight, as well as missions to undertake, such as one that requires you to capture samples from scattered meteorites (while evading radioactive ghouls at the same time). However, in this mission, you'll be vulnerable to attack from ghouls and from other players, too."
-Jeff
First off, there's a factor beyond population size which we used to see all the time in DAoC; some realms are more PvE-oriented and it becomes very hard to convince people to go to the frontiers. Same thing in WoW: not every server has an equal percentage of people interested in the battlegrounds.
Second of all, it is Blizzard's fault. They designed a system that doesn't handle population mis-matches (whether caused by desire or physical numbers). There are ways to help deal with population issues in battlegrounds.
-Jeff
Someone's going to ask for examples, so here goes:
1) If someone drops from the 21-30 battleground, a lvl 30 guard is put in the flag room. Is it perfect? No, but it helps add balance and in a 10 vs 9 or 8 situation nobody'll complain.
2) Design battleground maps that favor one side significantly. If you can't fill out the required numbers after 15 minutes, add guards to the maps rating let the weaker side play on the stronger side of the map.
3) Allow mixed teams on some maps. Side-choice is random (groups can't come in altogether on these maps), but alliance and horde are mixed so that the sides are balanced.
There are two related forms of entertainment that often overlap: puzzles and games. People who like puzzles expect to put in time, potentially a long time, but eventually they want to solve the puzzle.
People who play games, otoh, are going to go in knowing that you win some, and you lose some.
MMORPGs right now try to cater to both, with the end result that puzzle solvers get frustrated if they "lose" and gamers get frustrated trying to "solve" the puzzle.
I hope the next big game to come out decreases the amount of puzzle and increases the amount of game.
----
As for the "dynamic world" argument; I agree in principle, but it's a lot harder to do in practice. The orc army will be destroyed through a slight exploit by a strong guild, or it'll be too strong for all but the most powerful players, or the lag will be too great for all but the most powerful machines. In the first case (powerful guild), the orc army is defeated, but it's a non-event to most of the population. That latter is a big whole in most "dynamic world" scenarios; the powergamers get to do the dynamic stuff, and the casual players get to read about it.
-Jeff
You talk like you dated the company for crying out loud.
Seriuously, if you played a game that long while hating it, you are to blame and not the game company.
-Jeff
While I grant that the death penalty is a bit silly, I'm really tired of how white-collar crimes are treated like cute little misdemeaners. It's an area where our system is woefully unfair: some poor teen gets bored and robs a store; he gets hard time. OTOH, a bored rich teen in college releases a virus that causes millions of dollars in damage; he gets a stern talking to and then is lionized on slashdot for his fight against the system.
This is the culture that leads to CEOs wrecking the lives of hundreds of people and getting a few years in country-club prison.
-Jeff
Besides being a tactical genius and know when and where to attack, Alex had a number of basics working for him:
1) Combined arms. He had very tough infantry that he could rely on to be an anvil, and very tough cavalry that worked well as a hammer.
2) Strategic intelligence. Alexander brought scholars with him and looked for all information that would help him know his enemy. Geography, whether, customs, whatever.
The latter is obviously outside the scope of this, but combined arms won't work in civ unless they differentiate between units in some fashion, whether that off/def numbers or modifiers (all cav gets -50% def, +25% att) or whatever.
-Jeff
"I don't like it, you don't like it, but they have a right."
They have the right unless the gaming company says they don't. It's the gaming company's product, so they can attach pretty much whatever rules they want. If the company says you may not sell an account, then you may not sell an account.
-Jeff
P.S. The hard one to get around is having someone else play your account for your. There were services in DAoC that would power level a character to 50 over the course of a day or so (and then equip with spell-crafted armor and plop some platinum down for spare change).