They can keep using the same characters as long as the games keep being good. In fact, using the same characters is a damn good idea. People see it, and think, "Oh, I know that guy/girl/thing! The last game he/she/it was in was great!" and even if they don't buy it, they're a hell of a lot more likely to check it out.
And no, you can't accurately call it 'cheating,' it's just good (and practically free) marketing.
They also announced the Diablo II cow level on April 1. And everybody thought it was so funny, because it was an old joke from the first Diablo. And then it was true. Right out of the box. And then they all got to laugh at everybody else for not believing them.
In most games, you can play alongside higher level players, but you won't get any experience or any loot. There's no incentive to play with your friends if they're way up there in levels.
This is very true in Diablo II, and with every second patch or so, it's gotten more so. Of course, practically nobody's aware of this at all...I love how a stupid person with good intentions sometimes refuses to believe that they aren't helping me a bit by bringing in their level 30 character to support my new level 2. Really. I adore it.
I have faith, understand, I'm not criticizing a game I haven't played, that I expect to be amazing at release. But I don't think you can say much about the economy right now. It may work, I'm not at all saying it won't, but the fact that it's held up under testing conditions is barely evidence at all that it will work once the real game goes live. Scale is what kills the economies, and time.
Again, I have faith in Blizzard in the end, it seems they've even done a little bit of repair to the Diablo II 'economy' since the last patch, and that was never meant to be sustainable as far as I can tell.
That's part of the reason Blizzard doesn't like releasing too much info ahead of time. Back with Diablo II, they announced a few possible features way before release, and they didn't get into the final game. I remember seeing plenty of people saying they would never play they game because of it.
It's pretty small now, all the people you see that are in on it are just the ones with the most to say. It will grow, in stages, but if you didn't participate in the sign-ups you'll have to wait for the huge fully open beta to play, unless I misunderstand the plan and you won't even get to play then.
As of now, though, supposedly less than half the people actually playing the beta got their accounts by directly signing up. It's more people involved with fansites, alpha testers, and the like.
Well, Blizzard's got a history of bitchslapping people who try to make their games less fun for others. They put it in their Terms of Use. Griefers in their RTS games get banned, and I doubt this will be much different.
Also, if they'd just delayed the beta stage till the content was finished, how long would various people just end up sitting on their asses with no work to do? Core coders just sitting there bored waiting for the content developers to finish before the beta starts, and then the entire content staff just tweaking difficulty afterwards? I know the dev team's organization probably isn't quite that divided, but the problem would still exist.
My favorite song in Chrono Trigger is definitely Frog's theme, can't remember if it has another name. But a close second is Dance With Death, IMO the best music in any battle in any game, with only the Atma Weapon music from FF6 coming close.
Just personal opinion, of course, and subject to the omissions of my stupid memory.
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They can keep using the same characters as long as the games keep being good. In fact, using the same characters is a damn good idea. People see it, and think, "Oh, I know that guy/girl/thing! The last game he/she/it was in was great!" and even if they don't buy it, they're a hell of a lot more likely to check it out.
And no, you can't accurately call it 'cheating,' it's just good (and practically free) marketing.
They also announced the Diablo II cow level on April 1. And everybody thought it was so funny, because it was an old joke from the first Diablo. And then it was true. Right out of the box. And then they all got to laugh at everybody else for not believing them.
"My name is Aymie."
"Oh, A-M-Y?"
"No, A-Y-M-I-E."
"Oh. My name is Brian. B-R-I-V-O-L-B-N the number seven the letter Q!"
Pandarens are kinda real. Played the expansion?
Actually, you can get more than 600. You can mind control enemies even when you're at 200.
I don't know, I like it that way. It means you can laugh so much harder at the idiots who get all scared.
Heeeeyyy....I replaced that whole screen with porn!
This is coming from a country which makes dating sims. This sort of gameplay is a step back towards reality.
Just because dating and reality fail to intersect in you own personal life, my friend, don't be so quick to assume such things of others.
Because Pikmin just isn't weird enough.
That's anti-high-volume-mail-deployer.
In most games, you can play alongside higher level players, but you won't get any experience or any loot. There's no incentive to play with your friends if they're way up there in levels.
This is very true in Diablo II, and with every second patch or so, it's gotten more so. Of course, practically nobody's aware of this at all...I love how a stupid person with good intentions sometimes refuses to believe that they aren't helping me a bit by bringing in their level 30 character to support my new level 2. Really. I adore it.
I have faith, understand, I'm not criticizing a game I haven't played, that I expect to be amazing at release. But I don't think you can say much about the economy right now. It may work, I'm not at all saying it won't, but the fact that it's held up under testing conditions is barely evidence at all that it will work once the real game goes live. Scale is what kills the economies, and time.
Again, I have faith in Blizzard in the end, it seems they've even done a little bit of repair to the Diablo II 'economy' since the last patch, and that was never meant to be sustainable as far as I can tell.
Anyway...I hate all alpha testers. Damn you.
Step 1: Stop posting on games.slashdot! ;)
No, no, those are called Koreans. It's easy to confuse them with Starcraft players; in fact several newer dictionaries list them as synonyms.
That's part of the reason Blizzard doesn't like releasing too much info ahead of time. Back with Diablo II, they announced a few possible features way before release, and they didn't get into the final game. I remember seeing plenty of people saying they would never play they game because of it.
It's pretty small now, all the people you see that are in on it are just the ones with the most to say. It will grow, in stages, but if you didn't participate in the sign-ups you'll have to wait for the huge fully open beta to play, unless I misunderstand the plan and you won't even get to play then.
As of now, though, supposedly less than half the people actually playing the beta got their accounts by directly signing up. It's more people involved with fansites, alpha testers, and the like.
Well, you can do the 'play in your own dungeon' thing to an extent, AFAIK. You just don't get to design it.
Well, Blizzard's got a history of bitchslapping people who try to make their games less fun for others. They put it in their Terms of Use. Griefers in their RTS games get banned, and I doubt this will be much different.
Still...yes, I hate people. Immensely.
Also, if they'd just delayed the beta stage till the content was finished, how long would various people just end up sitting on their asses with no work to do? Core coders just sitting there bored waiting for the content developers to finish before the beta starts, and then the entire content staff just tweaking difficulty afterwards? I know the dev team's organization probably isn't quite that divided, but the problem would still exist.
Can you name an RPG (any type with actual distinct classes) that IS balanced?
While in beta stage, preferably, though I'll take a release version as well.
And everybody said it wouldn't make a difference!
As far as Im concerned, the gov't should just stay out of it.
Then you should vote Republican! They're conservatives, and--what? Oh. Shit.
In all seriousness, I'd love a chance to really try out a tazer, even if it involved getting mugged. Really.
"Give me your--"
*bzzt* *thud*
"AWESOME!"
My favorite song in Chrono Trigger is definitely Frog's theme, can't remember if it has another name. But a close second is Dance With Death, IMO the best music in any battle in any game, with only the Atma Weapon music from FF6 coming close.
Just personal opinion, of course, and subject to the omissions of my stupid memory.
Ah, but it doesn't compare to the Black Mages, redefining the music of Final Fantasy with the help of the FF musicman.