Yeah after doing my research I found that you are correct. Which really disturbs me. Because although the game may be gory and violent, how are a group of video game raters supposed to come to a conclusion of whether or not it is acceptable amount or not if they don't even see the true context of what they are rating.
If the people rating games decide to give a game a rating of AO there needs to be some sort of appeal process that forces the raters to actually play the game and work through the levels, rather than basing their opinion on "videotaped footage of the game's most graphic and extreme content." [wikipedia.org]
Star Wars Galaxies is hardly an MMORPG anymore, you cannot put it in the same category as any other games anymore since it is probably one of the worst games on the market today. Frankly, I'm astonished that people still pay to play.
In all honesty I would recommend getting your hands on a program like photoshop and just playing around with it. I taught myself how to "graphic design" by simply playing around with the programs that I use today, learning what does what, learning what combinations of effects work well together, ect. I honestly believe that doing it on your own is the best way because you are not influenced by professors and teachers that in all honesty don't even know what they are doing, otherwise they wouldn't be teaching, they would be doing. You get to learn the things you want, at a pace that is comfortable to you.
The internet has thousands and thousands of tutorials that can help teach and refine your techniques. In your situation you can honestly learn most of what there is to know for free, by simply googe'ing it. So if you truly want to learn how to be a true web developer, invest the time into learning a program like photoshop, after you figure out how to design that masterpiece in your head the next step is just cutting it up into HTML (which I'm sure you can already do).
The problem with SWG was the learning curve. For a beginner to the game it took a very long time to learn how to play and what professions were usefull for what they wanted to do. WoW on the other hand is designed for a 10 year to be able to pick up and play as well as an adult. That was the biggest problem with games like EVE Online and SWG, the learning curve was so immense that it drove people away before they really got to enjoy it. Although, once you did figure it all out and got a hang of it, SWG was the most addicting game I have ever played. Sure the game had its exploits and what not, but in the server I played on the community was one of the biggest aspects of the game play. Meaning that if you wanted to be held in high standard within the community you didn't exploit those types of things just to spite the other players. There were mutual standards between rebels and imperials that you just didn't abuse if you wanted to be considered the best. And in reality thats what the point of playing an MMO is all about, being the best and whatever task you choose to specialize in. Whether it be PVP, PVE, or even crafting.
After how bad SOE screwed me on SWG I also vowed to never play another SOE game again. Their in-game CSR's are probably the most incompident people ever, and the all around outlook has around its player base is just horrible. They don't care who they screw over whether its the veterans who have been playing the game for 2+ years to the people who just signed up, they are purely in it to make a quick buck. SWG had a strong solid player base, it may not of been in the numbers of 6 million+ like WoW, but I cannot tell you how many people I know who had 2-4 SWG accounts just because they loved playing the game in so many different ways. While the game was not a complete success, it was surely the most addicting game I have ever played. I played that game religiously for over 2 years and when the day came for me to cancel my subscription it was definately a weird experience.
A lesson that company's need to learn is that being different isn't always bad, too many companys see the success of WoW and think that if they incorporate certain aspects of WoW into their game people will love it. I dont agree with that, individuality is what seperates games from eachother, I have never seen an MMO like SWG that incorporated so much individuality into it like the way they did. If only the original creators of the game didn't sell it to SOE, who knows where that game would be today.
While I do currently play World of Warcraft (only because it is the least buggy and simply best MMO on the market right now) I favor games like old school star wars galaxies. In that game you had over 30 professions to choose from and you could customize your charcter any way you wanted pulling certain skills from those professions. Diversity is what really attracted me to that game because no two people were exactly the same, whether it was skills that they had, the way they looked, or even the outfits they wore. You could customize your character around you. In games like WoW you are totally restricted in that because within your own class you really only have 2 options to choose from and those 2 options are based around what you want to do, PVP or Raid End Game Instances. So there is no real diversity, in the end everyone is shooting for the same armor, looks the same, and has the same skill sets.
Old School SWG is the perfect example of what I consider to be a great MMO, unfortunatly with the success of WoW, SOE decided they wanted to take a chance and make the game more WoW like in hope of stealing some of their market share. SOE failed and all SWG is now is a cheap WoW wannabe with a diminishing player base.
OR...you could stop making ignorant comments by calling him a spammer and go educate yourself on what the definition of "spammer" really is...
The punishment for his actions are fine, it essentially leaves the real punishment up to his parents. Now whether his parents will actually do anything... thats a different story...
Slashdot Mirror
I seriously just got done laughing for about the past 5 minutes ... so wish we could mod this more than +5 lol
Yeah after doing my research I found that you are correct. Which really disturbs me. Because although the game may be gory and violent, how are a group of video game raters supposed to come to a conclusion of whether or not it is acceptable amount or not if they don't even see the true context of what they are rating.
If the people rating games decide to give a game a rating of AO there needs to be some sort of appeal process that forces the raters to actually play the game and work through the levels, rather than basing their opinion on "videotaped footage of the game's most graphic and extreme content." [wikipedia.org]
Out of curioisty where did you come across this information?
Star Wars Galaxies is hardly an MMORPG anymore, you cannot put it in the same category as any other games anymore since it is probably one of the worst games on the market today. Frankly, I'm astonished that people still pay to play.
In all honesty I would recommend getting your hands on a program like photoshop and just playing around with it. I taught myself how to "graphic design" by simply playing around with the programs that I use today, learning what does what, learning what combinations of effects work well together, ect. I honestly believe that doing it on your own is the best way because you are not influenced by professors and teachers that in all honesty don't even know what they are doing, otherwise they wouldn't be teaching, they would be doing. You get to learn the things you want, at a pace that is comfortable to you.
The internet has thousands and thousands of tutorials that can help teach and refine your techniques. In your situation you can honestly learn most of what there is to know for free, by simply googe'ing it. So if you truly want to learn how to be a true web developer, invest the time into learning a program like photoshop, after you figure out how to design that masterpiece in your head the next step is just cutting it up into HTML (which I'm sure you can already do).
The problem with SWG was the learning curve. For a beginner to the game it took a very long time to learn how to play and what professions were usefull for what they wanted to do. WoW on the other hand is designed for a 10 year to be able to pick up and play as well as an adult. That was the biggest problem with games like EVE Online and SWG, the learning curve was so immense that it drove people away before they really got to enjoy it. Although, once you did figure it all out and got a hang of it, SWG was the most addicting game I have ever played. Sure the game had its exploits and what not, but in the server I played on the community was one of the biggest aspects of the game play. Meaning that if you wanted to be held in high standard within the community you didn't exploit those types of things just to spite the other players. There were mutual standards between rebels and imperials that you just didn't abuse if you wanted to be considered the best. And in reality thats what the point of playing an MMO is all about, being the best and whatever task you choose to specialize in. Whether it be PVP, PVE, or even crafting.
After how bad SOE screwed me on SWG I also vowed to never play another SOE game again. Their in-game CSR's are probably the most incompident people ever, and the all around outlook has around its player base is just horrible. They don't care who they screw over whether its the veterans who have been playing the game for 2+ years to the people who just signed up, they are purely in it to make a quick buck. SWG had a strong solid player base, it may not of been in the numbers of 6 million+ like WoW, but I cannot tell you how many people I know who had 2-4 SWG accounts just because they loved playing the game in so many different ways. While the game was not a complete success, it was surely the most addicting game I have ever played. I played that game religiously for over 2 years and when the day came for me to cancel my subscription it was definately a weird experience.
A lesson that company's need to learn is that being different isn't always bad, too many companys see the success of WoW and think that if they incorporate certain aspects of WoW into their game people will love it. I dont agree with that, individuality is what seperates games from eachother, I have never seen an MMO like SWG that incorporated so much individuality into it like the way they did. If only the original creators of the game didn't sell it to SOE, who knows where that game would be today.
Just food for thought.
While I do currently play World of Warcraft (only because it is the least buggy and simply best MMO on the market right now) I favor games like old school star wars galaxies. In that game you had over 30 professions to choose from and you could customize your charcter any way you wanted pulling certain skills from those professions. Diversity is what really attracted me to that game because no two people were exactly the same, whether it was skills that they had, the way they looked, or even the outfits they wore. You could customize your character around you. In games like WoW you are totally restricted in that because within your own class you really only have 2 options to choose from and those 2 options are based around what you want to do, PVP or Raid End Game Instances. So there is no real diversity, in the end everyone is shooting for the same armor, looks the same, and has the same skill sets.
Old School SWG is the perfect example of what I consider to be a great MMO, unfortunatly with the success of WoW, SOE decided they wanted to take a chance and make the game more WoW like in hope of stealing some of their market share. SOE failed and all SWG is now is a cheap WoW wannabe with a diminishing player base.
OR ...you could stop making ignorant comments by calling him a spammer and go educate yourself on what the definition of "spammer" really is ...
The punishment for his actions are fine, it essentially leaves the real punishment up to his parents. Now whether his parents will actually do anything ... thats a different story ...