Hi Guys,
Brief PSA today to let you all know that I’m now writing a bi-weekly column at MMORPG.com. It’s called The Tourist, and every couple weeks I’ll be hopping into a new game and sharing my thoughts. This week I played a fat husky dog in TERA. I’m really excited to dig into this thing and very thankful for the shot they’ve given me, so head on over and give it a read!
Thanks Guys,
Chris
Like many of you, I’ve been waiting anxiously for Darkfall: Unholy Wars so I can finally sink my teeth into a good, old school fantasy MMO. For a while there, things looked promising. The game was slated to release in December but it was pushed back into the new year to address bugs and get itself ready for Steam after a two-day Greenlight process (people don’t want this kind game anymore, right guys?).
Except the NDA was slated to drop a month ago and it never did. Nevermind that surprise betas are, well, surprising to we players, but I’m suspecting that Aventurine got some feedback that made them second guess how prepared they really were. With such a huge scope of gameplay, I thought it was crazy they weren’t planning for a beta in the first place.
Then again, the reports I’ve heard repeatedly indicate that the biggest issues have been addressed and that the game is in OK shape or at least better than it was before Greenlight came into the picture. So where’s the update from Aventurine? Even players in the beta are starting to worry that we’ll all have moved on when it’s finally ready for sale. That might be the case for newcomers, but I think a lot of us will still check it out when it’s time comes. Still, squandered opportunity.
When they announced, the hype wave was big and bold, and the Unholy Wars box art was surfing proudly on its crest. Come buy me… it called, over and over, and we wanted to! Then the wave changed course and flowed far down the shore. Months later, that wave is barely a ripple we’re still searching the weeds hoping the box will turn up again. The fans will search, the spectators will drift off, maybe saying “huh” when they read about it in the paper.
I really wish someone would help Aventurine with their PR. Their lack of communication hurts them more than any problem with the actual game ever has. And now more than ever, the MMO world needs a game like Darkfall, and we need it to be quality. To that end, we can probably all lend them our blessing in refining things. Just tell us so we remember we’re worth your time.
... in freshly dyed armor.
Talk about radio silence! Sorry about that, guys. It’s been a busy week and time has been sucked away from me at every turn. Thankfully, it’s been mostly gaming doing that, since the schools were closed for mid-winter break in New York. I’ve used that vacation as it was intended, to relax and veg out in front of my computer.
So, RIFT. It launched. Just about everyone has commented on the queues, so I won’t go there. What I will comment on is this: this has been, bar none, the smoothest launch of any major MMO I’ve seen post-WoW. Lag has been non-existent on my server and performance has been top notch. As I was playing, I didn’t even consider the lack of lag until a good two hours in. I had to stop myself and note just how much further RIFT really feels than being in headstart. This is, no hype included, the new pinnacle for where an MMO should be at launch.
Okay, I will comment on queues. I wasn’t going to, but I will, and just to say this: please stop complaining about them. I’ve heard people deride Trion about it multiple times and it’s all a bit silly. Honestly, I’ve played every major release in the last four years and every… single… one of them had queues. It’s a fact of launch. You should be worried if there AREN’T queues. Now, that being said, I sat in one for four hours yesterday. That’s not cool and is almost certainly a result of the big miss-step of not releasing server names until two days before. It reminds me of the expression, “fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.” If you’re not logging in earlier than you actually want to play at this point… As long as you’re able to, that is.
Moving on…
I made a Cleric to capitalize on their all-aroundiness. Open Beta really showed me how much fun healing can be, so I wanted a strong option there, while also being able to tank. I wound up going Purifier/Druid/Cabalist with Cabalist being my main spec. Purifier is mainly for some light off-healing and instances and rifts. Cabalist is turning out to be a blast, however, since they have some great nukes with inherent AoE. In dungeons, I start off nuking with my druid bombs and then switch off to cabal when the tank has threat. Right now, I’m level 17 and falling behind the rest of my guild. I’m pretty much used to that, though, so I don’t mind.
Speaking of my guild, Immortal Council has been flourishing. My co-host, Jeremy, on Rift Watchers is the leader and we’ve had an enormous response — over 100 applicants within 2 days of head start! Everyone is forming groups, talking in vent, and really putting in the extra effort to make this guild a fun place to hang out. What’s more, and this is noteworthy, the amount of complaining is almost non-existent. In just about every new MMO I’ve played, new players go through the honeymoon-normal-annoyed-unsubbed pattern pretty quick. Everyone’ s been hitting it pretty hard (we have many players over level 30 and into the 40s already) and no one is hitting that wall we’ve found in other games. It’s really pretty enthusing.
Aside: I’m being pulled lots of different ways for the first time ever. There are two other guilds I plan on rolling with — Ferrel’s and Keen’s — but I’m hoping everyone understands I have an obligation to make the RW guild my priority. After all, it wouldn’t be very nice for me to help invite everyone over and then leave them! 
Last night I got into Iron Tombs for the first time. How neat! I loved how atmospheric the place was. For being a first dungeon, it was no cakewalk either! I mean, we did well since the group was made of veteran MMO players. Still, fights were more than than tank-and-spank and even the in-betweens could be a little tough (ghosts and orbs, I’m looking at you!). It was a blast, though, and one of the most fun-and-fresh dungeon runs I’ve had in a long time.
Okay, more than just RIFT for this post. NEXT up…
Cataclysm. I think I’m pretty much done. Not because of RIFT, per se, but more because I’ve found myself at a point where I’m only logging in to raid. I’m hesitant to call it quits, however, because the Happy Fun Guyz are really an excellent group to play with. I’d honestly miss a lot of the people there (shout outs to Evalisa, Blarg, Alphaah, and Kotton). Still, I’ve been putting some serious thought into how much fun I’m having if I can’t bring myself to log in. The reward stream has slowed to a trickle and with it my motivation has dried up. Stay tuned for updates.
Lastly, my PSP. I’m using it again! Well, I’ve always used it for late night RSS reading (I don’t have a smartphone yet), but I’m actually using it for games again! Someone finally came up with a way to run emulators and ROMs without hacking the console and putting on custom firmware. I am finding it so satisfying to play some of my old favorite SNES and GBA games again. I put a good two hours into Metroid: Fusion today and it’s like stepping into the past. Those games were so good and really captured something modern games don’t have. I can’t link to any of the stuff here on how to do it, but if you’d like to know how to get ROMs running on your PSP without any modifications, shoot me an email.
Anyways, that’s been this past week. Oh, and Assassin’s Creed 2. Gotta love that.
I’ll have more to talk about this week now that vacation is done. That radio silence really is a downer.
Psychochild has an interesting article up this morning dealing with the problems of sex in MMOs. Essentially, it boils down to America not being ready to accept sex out in the open; we’re too prudish to accept and express our sexuality, so any game emphasizing it is destined to fail.
I wouldn’t argue with this, but, obviously, there’s a perceived demand for something to push these limits. Take Age of Conan for example. The fact that you can remove the top from a female avatar spawned quite a bit of buzz in the blog-o-sphere. Check YouTube and you’re sure to find a video of someone fighting totally nude in-game.
Uhh... Evony? Someone stole your ploy.
It’s also interesting that, though we’re skiddish about explicit sexuality – and, no, I wouldn’t want it in my game, either – we still buy into the whole sex theme. Look at this ad for Allod’s to the right. Heck, look at almost every major release with character art on the box. There’s a good chance it will be a scantily clad female. I personally don’t see much sense in it – I’m not playing an MMO for a sexual thrill. What do I care about some artist’s rendition of a fantasy creature in nothing but bikini armor?
But, the fact remains: sex sells. That’s been true in every entertainment field since it became acceptable for women to show more than elbows in public.
And it’s not the only adult theme the industry has been exploring recently, just the most risque. We’ve also seen more games emphasize gratuitous violence, which, as Psychochild points out, we really don’t care about in America. Age of Conan comes up again with its “You never forget your first decapitation” ad campaign.
But, do these themes really add anything to the games? I don’t think so. Actually, I think they do more harm than good.
Let’s start with violence. At best, a good fatality might be satisfying – if you catch it. Most of the time, it’s just gimmicky. Take Dragon Age: Origins (non-MMO but stay with me) for example. Before release, people were excited by the prospect of huge blood spatters and heroic death animations. In practice, it became a joke. Characters would go through dialogue sequences completely covered in blood. It might have been funny once or twice but the joke gets old fast.
Then there’s sexuality. To date, I don’t think we’ve pushed this past nudity in any mainstream game (not counting Second Life). Nudity is often introduced under the guise of realism, ala Mortal Online. The end result, however, is a bunch of 14 year old boys going about their business totally naked. Women wind up getting harassed. When I logged into the beta for MO, I quickly came across a female avatar completely boxed in by naked men. Because of hit detection, she couldn’t move to escape. She had the choice of taking her clothes off or logging out.
Honestly, I wish MMO companies would worry less about pushing the envelope and more about making good games. Virtual boobies and red paint don’t entertain anyone for long. The fact is, we’re in an age where pornography is readily available to anyone who wants to find it. Why would people turn to video games to get their thrills?
The way I see it is this: adult themes should be a feature not a selling point. If a company is leveraging blood or butt over solid gameplay, their MMO is probably lacking. The most successful games out there don’t reign because of their mature aspects. They’ve won their spot because the game is fun to play. Everything else is just window dressing. And that’s exactly what adult-themes should be.
Word on the recommended system requirements for Final Fantasy 14 (dropping Sept. 30th) has been spreading like wildfire across the internet today. Here’s a direct link to the source, but I’ll repost it here:
The following PC specifications are required to run the game smoothly with our stipulated in-game settings.
Window Size and Display Mode 1280x720 (Windowed)
Ambient Occlusion OFF
Depth of Field ON
Shadow Detail Standard
Multisampling 4x MSAA
Buffer Size Window Size
Texture Quality High
Texture Filtering High
Recommended System Requirements
OS Windows® 7 32-bit/64-bit*
CPU Intel® Core™ i7-920 2.66GHz or higher
# AMD Phenom II X6 1055T
RAM 4GB or more
HDD/SDD Installation: 15GB of free space
Download: 6GB of free space on the drive containing "My Documents"
Graphics Card NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 460 or better with VRAM 768MB or more
# ATI HD 5830 1GB or better.
Sound Card DirectSound® compatible sound card (DirectX® 9.0c or higher)
Internet Connection Broadband or better (always-on)
Resolution 1280x720 (32-bit) or higher
DirectX® DirectX® 9.0c
Others Mouse, Keyboard, Gamepad
Wait, what? A core i7 and an nVidia 460? That’s quite a step up from 2GHz Core 2 Duo and the 9600 that the minimum reqs stated. Looking at price alone, the card will run you $200 and the processor $289 ($450+ if you need a motherboard to support it). If you’re buying a pre-assembled PC with these specs, be ready to pay over $1000. And that’s to run the game smoothly on high settings. In my opinion, this just reeks of unoptimization. Just like Vanguard and AoC before it, if Square-Enix comes out and asks for a $500 investment to see the game in all its glory, it’s going to flop. No one wants to do that — and only a select few of even the most diehard FF fans would consider spending so much to upgrade for a single game.
This kind of information is an absolute shot to the foot for the game. The benchmark was so poorly done that it gave people with some pretty beefy rigs poor scores. Then this? It’s a shame. While we might know FFXIV is different than XI, a lot of people don’t. This is just more reason for people to write the game off before it ever hits store shelves.
Let’s be realistic here, though. Those settings are pretty high up. 4X antialiasing? I almost never do that. I would bet that turning it down to even 2x would drop those requirements significantly. Drop shadows a touch and you’re in the clear to run the game with a moderate to average gaming pc (or at least one with a decent video card) — while still seeing a game that texturally looks beautiful.
So, unless the game needs 4x antialiasing, why would they release inflated figures like this? The only answer I can come up with is that they want to overshoot it to keep people from complaining on launch day.
The general lack of buzz surrounding the imminent release of this AAA game is deafening. It gets regular coverage in a few select areas only. Dodging performance complaints from a few over enthusiastic players shouldn’t be a concern at this point. I think the company would be better served by expanding on the potential audience and stirring the pot a little bit. People like to get excited for upcoming games. Like Syp says, it’s half the fun. Right now, FFXIV looks like it’ll release with a whimper.
Even though I find basing the requirements on settings that shouldn’t even be necessary to be a poor decision, I’m still excited for this game. I doubt these figures are accurate unless you’re adamant about your AA. In which case, you probably have the PC to support it. Final Fantasy 14 offers a lot that’s different from our usual MMO trappings. I like that innovation and think it has a lot of promise for a long-lasting game experience. Don’t let these requirements scare you off.
I predict that when the NDA drops we’ll be hearing and seeing screenshots from people with far lower spec’d computers than the above. First hand reports will be the most telling. I’ll be watching with baited breath. As much as I’d like to upgrade, I’m hoping to push out some high settings on my 260GTX and 3GHz dual core– even if AA has to be axed entirely.
Syp!
Happy Monday, folks!
To help you start your week off right, we bring you Episode 9 of The Multiverse and, in my opinion, our best episode yet. We were joined by Syp, from Bio Break (Sypiest. Episode. Ever!) and had a good time talking all things MMORPG.
Join us this week for a interview with Syp, as well as our short-term and long-term predictions for the future of MMORPGs. Of course, we also talk about the week’s news (*cough* Allod’s *cough*) and have some fun discussing games and movies past.
We also change things up a little bit and turn Ferrel’s Guild Tip of the Week into Uncle Ferrel’s Story Hour. By request! See, you can’t say we don’t listen. 
Here are the notes for today’s show:
Vagary Homepage
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Listen here:
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Show Notes – 2/26/10 – “Guest Starring: Syp”
Intro
Welcome, intro Syp, what’s been up this past week?
What have we been playing?
News
Rumor: Final Fantasy 11 Closing – Has since been debunked.
LotRO Volume I Update
Allod’s Online – The Cash Shop is a Lie
Round Table
Topic I: Syp: The Interview
Topic II: The Future of MMOs: Our Predictions
Host Segments
Uncle Ferrel’s Story Hour
Riknas’s Rant: Expansions
Chris’s Blog of the Week: The Greenskin/Snaffy’s Place – Good luck, Snaffy!
Close
Shout Outs/Plugs
Check out Syp’s blog at: biobreak.wordpress.com!
Contact us at: multiversepodcast@gmail.com
Think back with me a couple of years. Do you remember hearing this term? “Next-Gen,” a phrase that even to the ear rings of progression and advancement. The first time I heard it used was in relation to Vanguard. People were excited, because it set out to push the industry into another era of MMORPGs.
Yet, after that, the cries for a “next-gen” MMO seemed to fade. You’d hear the term used now and again, usually on job applications from big game studios. But players seemed to have given up the ghost. Now, there’s little talk of generations at all, except to reference how archaic games like Everquest were.
I see the industry now as being in a point of stagnation. That’s not to say that the games being produced and played around the world aren’t a lot of fun. They are, and we find ourselves here talking about them, when so many other things clamor for our attention.
But, look at the features list of most major games and you’ll see what really amounts to a deck of cards. Each game has its own hand, combining features x, y, and z in their own order. In WAR, it’s RvR and a low numbered PvE. In WoW, you have a Full House of raiding, battlegrounds, and fluff content. LotRO adds instanced story quests into the mix, EVE and STO space.
The point is, the current generation seems to be taking the same cards and reshuffling them to give us different flavors of the same deck. Even the new games coming out, like SWTOR, aren’t adding a whole lot that’s really new. They’re just stacking the deck.
So what happened? We’ve moved from aspirations of true advancement, taking the industry to new places, to being content with the slowest of progressions, waiting years in between even modicums of what the “us” of two, three years ago would have accepted as movement. It’s slow, a progressive mutation similar to what Gordon talked about, except what’s mutating isn’t any one game, but, rather, the glossy sheen of each card we’ve come to know in the last years.
Our last big hope for next-gen?
The truth is, I think we’ve scared off the people who would’ve brought us the changes we so desperately used to desire. The failures of the risk takers, (failures we were unwilling to accept on whole when WoW and EQ2 and LotRO were always an option) showed the investors that innovation is an equal to loss. You don’t take risks in the MMO world, unless someone else took it first. And then, my friends, we find ourselves with a purple ace of spades instead of black.
I don’t bring this up to tear the MMO industry down. The games that have come and gone have served their purpose and are gone for a reason. But, it’s such a dynamic shift in our fundamental philosophy of what an MMORPG is
Blizzard's next-gen MMO?
and can be that it bears some reflection. Without risk, there’s no reward. The paradox, unfortunately, is that for most investors, development risk is no reward. And where do we go from there?
The people doing things different are the little indie companies like Aventurine and Icarus Studios. These are the guys that will take the baby steps into changing what it is an MMO can accomplish.
That is, unless Blizzard does it first.
Because they’re the only company with a big enough safety net to take the risks necessary to make investors feel safe again. Their next MMO very well may meet what we would’ve considered “next-gen” more than any of the games that have come out since the release of World of Warcraft.
Simply because, they can where other people can’t.
As it stands now, the slow progression of MMOs is leading towards accessibility and in-and-out game play. If that’s the case, the “next-gen” may well be the decline of the classical MMO.
Sad? Maybe. But, the truth is, either way there’s going to be a lot of fun to be had. Our expectations may have changed in the realm of development but surely not fun. Right?
And as long as games are being made that are entertaining, noteworthy, and suck me in whenever I feel like being sucked in, I’ll still be an MMO player.
It makes me wonder though, how many other things have changed that we don’t even think about? We know there’s more than this and I’m interested to reflect on the changing face of our community more as the years go on.
Happy Monday!
It’s been a few days since my last post, so I thought I’d stop in and give you a quick update. My wife has this week off for the holidays, so we’re spending a lot of time together, not leaving much for gaming or blogging. That doesn’t mean nothing’s been happening, however. For example, we got out to the theater today to see a little movie called…
Avatar
This movie was awesome. At two hours and forty-one minutes, I was a little concerned going in. I hate movies that drag on. I’m looking at you, Funny People. My wife and I both agree, though, this is not one of those movies. I was hooked the whole way through.
The acting was great and the story was well done. Some people have criticized the film because they main bad guy is predictable. And he is, but it didn’t bother me. There’s a certain purity about the character archetypes here that heralds back to the pre-CGI days, when monsters were made in studios and not on a computer. There’s a definite, “the nineties meet modern day” vibe going on, when you consider how much of the movie is done with special effects.
Which are incredible. In the beginning, I took note of what was computer animated but after a few minutes, that visibility faded away into the periphery. It became hard to tell what was real and what wasn’t, and that says a lot for how well done this movie is.
If you can, watch it in digital 3D. It takes the experience to a whole new level and isn’t distracting like it was prone to be in the past.
Oh, and it’s a definite homage to Aliens. 100%. You can’t tell me that the helicopter and mech-warrior models aren’t meant to be a throw back.
Under the Dome
I finished this book a couple of days ago. It’s a slow starter and, honestly, I found the character dialogue fairly clunk for the first three hundred pages. Even though it’s set in Maine, lots of characters seemed to have this country bumpkin way of speaking that drove me a little crazy (didn’t becomes “dint,” and other phonetic spellings). It was bad enough where I considered putting the book down. I’m glad I didn’t though.
After the three hundred mark, the dialect became noticeably better and the book seemed to pick up steam too. By the end, I found myself both surprised and surprisingly attached to the characters. Like little Ollie Dinsmore. He played a very small part in novel, but I was touched by him in the end.
Like you would expect in King novel over a thousand pages, there are some dry spots. They’re short, however, and the rest of the novel more than makes up for them. There are also some spots of truly exquisite prose where I found myself taking pause.
I recommend this novel for anyone used to reading books that are more than a thousand pages or that doesn’t mind phonetic spelling. If you’re used to shorter books, those first 300 pages will probably seem exceptionally long. Give it a shot though. What have you got to lose?
Thanks to Professor Beej for the encouragement to read this book. His enthusiasm was infectious, especially since I was a big fan of The Stand.
Gaming
I’ve been playing a lot of Modern Warfare 2 lately. I got myself into a bit of a stride, I think, where I’m consistently in the top few players. The level progression is excellent and I love that each map seems to 
have it’s own little trick that will really help you dominate. I didn’t like the first game too much but, I can safely say, I was totally wrong in my previous post. If you’re a fan of shooters, you should own this game.
I also traded in my DSi for a new PSP. Gamestop had a sale going on, so I was able to restock on games too without spending any money out of pocket. The reason, though? They put Final Fantasy 8 on the PSN Store. FF7-9 are my favorite Final Fantasy games ever, titles I know I’ll play and love, and more than justified switching up. They’re really fleshing out their download store. I’m much more impressed than when I traded my last PSP in for the DSi.
In the MMO realm, I got things sorted out with my Fallen Earth account. After a couple quick emails (they responded at 11PM EST!), they thanked me for my honesty and took care of the problem. I’ll be re-upping tomorrow. There’s something about that game, maybe the wide-openness of it, that’s hard to let go of. It seems to get better as you go too.
I’ve also been playing WoW quite a bit. I got into ToC 25-man the other night, which was my first 25-player raid ever. It was fun and I only died once. I was also able to trade the belt I won for a new set of robes and gloves to another player, on top of winning a roll on a Crusader Trophy. My brother-in-law was also kind enough to hook me up with the trophy he won, since he didn’t need it. Now, I just need 150 emblems and I’ll be up to 4 great upgrades for the one hour run.
I’ve also been working on a little Death Knight to run with another friend of mine. I went Frost, for tanking, and have found it to be very easy once you get the rotation down and learn to manage your cooldowns. Far easier than I ever remember it being on my warrior, anyways.
In the LotRO realm, my transfer was resubmitted this past Sunday so I should have my transfer back to Landroval done soon. Hopefully, nothing will go wrong this time and I can get back in the swing of things. I haven’t had much heart to log on since I submitted my first transfer request (a month ago), since I know my experience will pick up so much when I join with my new guild. I’m really itching to get that move done and over with, so I can enjoy playing again. I really like LotRO, I just seem to fall into slumps when things happen and get in the way. I guess I’m prone to mental blockages with that game more than the others.
–
Anyways, that’s the news. Hopefully, I’ll get some MMO time in tomorrow.
After the museum trip.
Until then!
Or, “Why in-game events don’t do it for me.” Enjoy!
I’m not one of these guys that rails against in-game events. But, really, they don’t do much for me. Granted, I’ll usually poke my nose around and see what’s going on, but after a quest or two, and sometimes less, I’m out. Usually, I don’t bother looking back again.
This whole topic comes to the forefront of my mind now more than ever, as our games are inundated with their “Not Christmas” Christmas events. WoW has the Feast of Winter’s Veil, LotRO the Yule Festival, and Fallen Earth is celebrating its first First Night. Each of these option gives players some quests, a couple of activities, and maybe some little extra to send them on their way. Plus, the events mean new (or slightly less seen) content, and we all love that.
So what’s the matter? My issue, and I’d bet a lot of other players who feel the same, stems from these three suggestions I have for MMO companies wanting to incorporate a live event into their game.
Be Bite Sized
This is huge. When I’m logging in, I usually have a goal. That’s the nature of the beast. I don’t want to have to set my goals to the side for a day, or even an hour, to ride a horse, find a cookie, or trick-or-treat. There are exceptions, but a good rule of thumb is to give me options to experience pieces of your event and get a good feel for it in an in-and-out fashion.
Don’t make the festival compete with my main goal. It won’t win. Make it something I can do in my downtime, or before I head out, and I’m a lot more likely to take part in the fun.
Be Unique
Another biggie. The event has to offer something that I can’t find in my normal questing/dungeon running routine. Maybe it’s a unique activity with a new mechanic. Maybe it’s some big (or at least actively progressing) story event. If I can see the same thing elsewhere, I need a reward, quick and easy, otherwise, where’s the draw?
On that same token, adding new things each year is always good. If it’s fun enough for me to want to join in the first time, I’ll probably be there again the next year. But, if there’s something new and exciting on top of what I enjoy, I’ll for sure be there the next year.
Be Rewarding, Without Being Demanding
This ties in with my first suggestion. Don’t make your event compete with the main game. The bulk of an MMO is made to give the player a rewarding experience. To win out against the actual game, the event has to give a unique reward, while also requiring less from the player.
Sound backwards? It is, if we’re talking about the normal MMO. Here’s how I see it, these events are like clouds: light, fluffy, and gone before you know it. Players like getting rewards, so give them to them without making players jump through a bunch of hoops. That’s what the main game is for. If players want to do more, make sure they’re getting something extra without making the average joe feel shortchanged.
Take WoW’s Winter Veil, for example. This is by far my favorite in-game holiday because, on Christmas Day, I know I’ll be logging in to a couple of lighthearted presents, and probably a fun vanity pet. I like that. It makes the event optional, while still including everyone. Likewise, the people who want to do more get better rewards for it. That’s the way to endear the majority of players to an event.
—
The main reason why most of they don’t hit home with me is because they ask too much. The unique-fun-reward factor has to be dialed up to get the community stirring, so I know it’s worth my time to even travel out there. Once I’m there, I need a quick hook to get me in, and quick fun to keep me going. Delivery quests aren’t it unless there’s an immediate rainbow at the end of the tunnel (Rainbow? Light? Weasel?). And that rainbow needs to be bright. No +2% chance to parry cookies please.
Overall, I love that so many games put on these little events. They’re all just “extra” and anytime a company does that, I see them going above and beyond what they really need to do. That’s awesome and, a lot of times, I think I can see a little bit of the developer’s love for the game shine through. You can tell they have fun putting these things together and that feeling makes it all the better.
Whether or not I take part in all of them, I hope developers keep cranking these events out for years to come. They’re worth the time and certainly worth the smiles.
Until next time!
To preface this, I realize that most of you come here to read about games and games only, and that’s fine. This article is aimed at those of you who are interested in becoming writers. Blogging about anything can and does help but when you’re writing about games, sometimes it almost demands an explanation when you tell people about it. That’s what this is about.
Sitting in my creative writing class today, talking about publishing and the sort, I mentioned that I write my own blog. Of course, that lead to “what kind of blog is it” and “what do you write about” type questions. In a class of writers, the response “I write about video games” comes off as much todo about nothing. So, why do I, and have I, continued to maintain a site that really has nothing to do with my goals or scholarly pursuits in life?
The answer is simple. Gaming is a small part of my life, though this blog may lead a casual reader to believe otherwise. In general, I spend maybe 6 hours a week in a game. Not much. What this space does for me though, is give me an excuse to write. Regularly.
You see, after doing this for so long (18 months…ish now), enough people stop by here for there to be an expectation of new content. That puts a certain amount of pressure on me to make sure I’m popping in to say “hi” and give you the update.
Writing about games isn’t something non-gamers see as worthwhile, but they’re wrong.
The reason for this isn’t that video games are some important, life changing hobby, it’s that the more you write, the easier it is. Since I started writing here, I write quicker and more lucidly in every area that I am called upon to express myself using the written word. Writing takes practice, and even though I’m not narrating the rise and fall of some deep character, I’m stepping into the realm of the non-verbal. Here, we communicate in the same way a story would communicate with you.
Now, I don’t want to discredit the fact that I’ve made friends from this project. I have. Or the fact that I enjoy having a place in the community. I do. There’s a certain forgiveness here, however, that allows a writer to develop who he or she is, and that is the value of maintaining a blog, any blog, even if it’s not related to what you’d really like to be writing.
I gave out this web address to a few of my classmates today who were interested in what I was doing. To them, I’d encourage them to start a website about anything, personal, non-personal, whatever, and find a community to take part in. You’ll get read. You’ll get comments and feedback. And you’ll feel all the more satisfied for it.
I’ve decided to finally work on my personal site, though. Because, as much as I can extol the virtues of any form of regular writing, it’s still nicer to be able to list off a personal, academic, literary, blog rather than a gaming one. It’s about setting, right? You, reader, are the audience that has found this space. You haven’t been sent here because your teacher or boss told you to, nor would I expect you to enjoy it if you had. But, if you were sent here in that context, you’d expect to find something relevant to from whence you came.
And that’s why I’m opening my personal/professional site. If you’re interested, I can shoot you a link but I’ll refrain from posting it here to avoid giving my full name to everyone passing through.
To everyone who makes it a point to stop by here, thanks for giving me a reason to write. I need it sometimes and it has helped my personally and professionally as a writer. Someday, when I’m grown up and published I’ll have you guys to help thank then, too.
Have a good weekend.