Archive for the ‘Article Archive’ Category

“I beamed back onto my ship and hailed Star Fleet to report my progress.   In times gone by there would have been such a thing as “being kicked upstairs”. After all, those who wear the Admirals insignia rarely fly anything but a desk.  But these are not those times; these are desperate times.  When Benjamin Sisko first flew the U.S.S. Defiant through the Bajor Wormhole he had no idea what the future held – and what a furor it would unleash…” Rear Admiral 1 of 9, Tertiary Adjunct of Unimatrix 01

As soon as my character hit rear admiral 3, Leonard Nimoy’s voice rang though the computer’s speakers with a very familiar “congratulations admiral”.   I was “hailed” by Star Fleet and Admiral Quinn gave me a mission summoning to the Gamma Quadrant – now I know what that transwarp conduit located just outside the Sol System is for. 

Welcome to the Gamma Quadrant

Exiting the other end of the transwarp conduit to the Gama sector found me in the midst of a Federation Fleet, with a Klingon Fleet camped on their doorstep.  Another liberated Borg, much like myself, welcomed me to the front lines.  Those who stay in the Gama Quadrant will not find themselves on a leisurely stroll through the corridors of Earth Space Station or the promenade of Deep Space 9. Any needs the new rear admiral or her crew (you have to be rear admiral 3 to get the quest that gives you access to the Gama Quadrant)  are served by individual ships who serve particular needs, found by winding your way through a central corridor that runs through the massive fleet of ships.

One of the early story line quests gave me the mission of rescuing colonists whose world had been beset by the Borg and Species 8472 (known as the “Undine” to you non-assimilated types out there). In the process of rescuing the colonists and simultaneously battling both Borg and Undine, a desperate colonist ran up to my bridge crew and I.  “Help us,” she cried out, “We’re being invaded and it’s like being caught in the middle of a battle between two giants.”  The first image that came to mind was a scene from the movie Time Bandits where Napoleon, portrayed by Ian Holm, is seated between two of his generals and exclaims, “With you on one side and him on the other it’s like being at the bottom of a bloody well” – and that aptly portrays the theme of the Gama Quadrant. 

Players find themselves in the midst of a titanic battle while trying to protect the interests of the Federation.   The player will find daily exploratory missions to an adjoining expanse, the reward for which are medals which garner very rare items once enough are accumulated, at the rate of five per day.  There are story missions and an abundance of patrol missions.   This quadrant is also the site of the new “raidisode” (read five person raid/instance for all you World of Warcraft players out there).   When it says “five players required” believe you me it means it.  No matter how good you are, no matter how well equipped your ship, the solo player will find the Borg that make up the antagonists in “The Infected”  will simply laugh at the even the toughest shield strengths and blast away the individual player in seconds.  This is one time where there is no substitute for a team.  This is not to say there is no room for the solo player.  The lone ship and her crew will find it possible to complete the missions by themselves. The Borg and Undine in this case are far from being easy, even in the case of a well shielded, heavily armed ship.

One of the many pleasures in Star Trek Online (STO) are the continuation of story lines that were started in the many Star Trek series.  STO being set beyond the latest time line covered by any of the Star trek shows or movies, it is a common occurrence to meet the relatives  of, or those influenced by characters that the fans are familiar with – and the Gama Qaudrant in Star Trek Online is no exception.  One of the earlier storyline missions has the player rescue a ship, only to meet the “son of Q” (the Q played by John Delancie) that was born during the Star Trek Voyager years.  Having once rescued the ship this new Q has you complete the rescue “with feeling this time.”  Having completed the same rescue mission a second time the New Q is still not satisfied and has you do it “again as if your life depended on it.”   It is then that the player is given a chance to go back and participate in a famous battle from Star Trek lore.

If Star Trek Online is your game, and you are ready for a challenge (aside from letting the Klingons drive you into the ground like a tent stake in pvp) you will find it in the Gama Quadrant.

See you online,

Julie Whitefeather

(posted for Julie Whitefeather by the Webmaster)

Update:

Side Notes

Let me add a little update here.  We have managed to obtain an interview with a member of the team that brings us all my favorite mmo.  I am always afraid to put the cart before the horse, so I will let you all know tommorow.  Much can happen between now and the scheduled recording time.

Also, in catching up with some of my favorite blog sites we found a very nice endorsement over at Kill Ten Rats (see below) Thanks Ravious for the kind endorsement!

- Julie

“No Prisoners, No Mercy – How could anybody not like a podcast about MMOs run by two nuns?!  Not only that, they are great journalists snagging tons of interviews from across the board for game companies.  Sister Julie Whitefeather and Sister Frances  have a good format with some interesting discussion.  A lot of time and love is put in to this podcast.  Butter doesn’t melt in the mouths of these two ladies.” – Ravious, Kill Ten Rats

The link for the show is on the right or you can listen here.

The early release of the No Prisoners, No Mercy show 55 is live, for those of our listeners who demanded the ability to hear it before the show goes public to ITUNES and the Virgin Worlds collective.  After all, Saylah, of Mystic Worlds fame and a regular guest, tells me it is one of the only three podcasts she listens to.

Now many of you may see the picture above and think we have become an Age of Conan podcast. However that isn’t the case. Some of our long term listeners will remember that we actually started out as an Age of Conan podcast entitled “Age of Conuns” back “in the day” as they say.

This time, the picture is actually in honor of this weeks guests, who are Glen Swan and Oliver Kunz, two of the community managers from Funcom.   The community managers talk about many topics, including where the name “Famine” in Glen “Famine” Swan comes from, they talk about the new Age of Conan Expansion, debunk some of the opinions  by the blogging community about the decisions made in the development of Age of Conan, and talk about their new mmos (including The Secret World) as well as other topics.

We hope you enjoy listening as much as we did producing the show.

We live in an era of economic downturn when, sadly, the closure or reduction of staff numbers at game development studios have become all too common place.  When we hear of another member of a game development staff that has been set adrift it is certainly cause for concern.  But when the biggest game publisher in the country kills the geese that laid the golden egg, the Modern Warfare Games, it is likely to raise a few eyebrows.  When it does so before the royalties due Jason West and Vince Zampella, CEO and CTO of Infinity Ward until just recently, are paid…

Well there, as the immortal bard once said, “lays the rub”.  For those of you not already in the know, I give you paragraph 32, page 10 of the law suit brought against Activision by Mr. West and Mr. Zampella, (via Indie Game Developer, you can read the entire article here)

Activision conducted the investigation in a manner to maximize the inconvenience and anxiety it would cause West and Zampella. On little notice, Activision insisted on conducting interviews over the President’s Day holiday weekend; West and Zampella were interrogated for over six hours in a windowless conference room; Activision investigators brought other Infinity Ward employees to tears in their questioning and accusations and threatened West and Zampella with “insubordination” if they attempted to console them; Activision’s outside counsel demanded that West and Zampella surrender their personal computers, phones, and communication devices to Activison for review by Activision’s outside counsel and, when West and Zampella asserted their legally protected privacy rights, Activision’s counsel said that doing so constituted further acts of insubordination.

For those looking for some additional background into the matter you can find it over at Jakeworld:  The IW/Activision Spat )

Beyond the two infinity ward former studio execs violating  Non-disclosure agreements (NDA) and their Contracts, Activision has been silent on the matter to date.  On the face of it, everyone outside Activision/Blizzard (and at this point that is everyone writing about the incident) will read about “interrogated over six hours in a windowless conference room” and Activision Interrogators bringing Infinity Ward employees to tears and feel outrage.  We can read about Activision counsel demanding that “West and Zampella surrender their personal computers, phones and communication devices to Activision” and it will, no doubt, summon up images of criminals in 1960’s black and white film, in darkened rooms, with searing white light shining in their faces.  However, without knowing the other side of the story, just developing an opinion based half the facts has the very real possibility of leaving any author writing about the issue with a heaping pile of crow to eat, depending on the outcome of the lawsuit.  While many of us will point out that everyone is entitled to “due process” it is easy to forget about “just cause.” 

It is at this point that many people will instantly leap to the defense saying, nothing justifies treating employees or anyone in the manner described in the law suit.  Keep in mind, however that anyone can ALLEGE anything, factual or not.  And before you say “nothing justifies” keep in mind what the circumstances may or may not be.  Yes, it could be as much of an outrage as circumstances appear.  However, what if Activision, as tight lipped as it always is about their business, has a whole deck of Aces up their proverbial sleeves?  

Still, it leaves a question that goes begging…do the professional and personal actions of someone in any aspect of the entertainment industry affect how we feel about their work?

When Paul Reubens, otherwise known as “Pee Wee Herman” was arrested for indecent exposure in an “adult” movie theater it all but killed his career, taking 20 years to get any public “exposure” of his work.

When Tonya Harding was concerned about competition from Nancy Kerrigan in 1994 she hired someone to attack her.

When Mel Gibson was arrested for driving under the influence of Alcohol he made anti-Semitic remarks to arresting Officer James Mee, saying, “Fucking Jews…Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world” (source) .  Aside from the heinous nature of the statement (for which he later publicly apologized) this is also a statement made, ironically, by the same man who brought us the movie entitled “The Passion of the Christ”.  What do you expect from a man who obviously didn’t bother to read the gospels before he made the movie (for some twisted reason he portrayed Mary Magdalene as a prostitute – she was nothing of the kind. Read Luke 8:1-3)

In the end we must each ask ourselves if the behavior of an actor, or even a game developer affects our patronage.  Would you still see a Mel Gibson movie if he insulted someone of your ancestry?  Now that Paul Reubens is trying to rekindle his career would you let  your children see one of his performances? And what if the treatment of Jason West, Vince Zampella, and Infinity Ward employees turns out to be an overreaction tantamount to dynamiting open a can of beans? Will you still purchase any of their games? Will you cancel your World of Warcraft account?

See you online

Julie Whitefeather

(posted for Julie Whitefeather by the Webmaster)

This morning a review (see following reprint) by one “Dirk Lammers” was sent to me for comment.  As I read through the brief review the following two sentences caught my eye at the end:

Perhaps “Star Trek Online” faces its biggest challenge with its price tag. You’ve got to buy the game, and then you’ll have to shell out as much as $15 per month in subscription fees to keep playing. – Dirk Lammers, “ Star Trek Online falls short in several areas”

During recording of the No Prisoners, No Mercy show (being edited now) with community managers from Funcom one of the subjects that came up was reviews, and of course the epitome of bad reviews – where the author who penned the article played the beta for 10 minutes and wrote a two word review “It sucks.”  Aside from pointing out how proud his English professor would have been of such a lofty, and well thought out review I was brought to another conclusion. More than once I have penned a private message to the author of a review whose works I otherwise respected and found myself saying “Come on, you know better.”  Then it occurred to me that perhaps they didn’t.

Time and again, as members of the game development industry pass through our doors, the voice they tell us that they hear, the opinions that matter, are those who are actively involved in the community that make up their target market.  As one senior producer opined of professional reviewers, “They may spend one or two levels with our game before they write the review.” 

More the rule, rather than the exception, are those authors whose lack of acquaintance with both the game and mmo market in general shows in their review – and the review by Dirk Lammers is no exception.  The claim Cryptic Studios will face a “challenge” because their prospective customers will have to both buy the game and pay a monthly subscription fee so blatantly screams of a complete lack of knowledge of the MMO gaming market that is like a slap in the face with a dead mackerel – it instantly negates the credibility of the remainder of the review and anything else the author has written on the subject.

Note to Mr. Lammers and anyone else reading these words or considering penning a game review: before faulting a game developer with something you might want to at least find out whether or not it is the industry standard. In other words “look before you leap”.

Mr. Lammer’s insistence that “But the frenzied pace hits the brakes when combat moves to the ground” tells of an author who was not only determined to find fault with the game ahead of time, but tells those who really are acquainted with the work of Cryptic Studios that the author hasn’t kept current with the product being reviewed.  I can only assume that there was a significant lead time between the writing and the publication of the review.

Does the review trouble Cryptic Studios? Well you would have to ask someone like Craig Zinkievich, executive producer for Star Trek Online, that question to find out the “straight skinny”.  Based on the professional developers we have spoken with, chances are they could care less – and doubtless neither will their target market.

See you online,

Julie Whitefeather

(posted for Julie Whitefeather by the webmaster)

 Star Trek Online’ falls short in several areas

That’s a tall order for the game as it stands now, but online games can improve over time.

 By DIRK LAMMERS, Associated Press Writer Dirk Lammers, Associated Press Writer – Tue Feb 23, 7:45 am ET

Two-and-a-half out of four stars.

The “Star Trek” franchise embarks on a bold journey into the massively multiplayer online realm in a game that excels in space combat but falls short in other areas.

“Star Trek Online” (Atari/Cryptic Studios, $50 with $15-per-month subscription fee, for the PC) thrives when multiple ships crisscross through space while exchanging phaser fire and photon torpedoes. The battles look spectacular, and piloting a starship around a planet while dodging enemy fire is both challenging and enjoyable.

But the frenzied pace hits the brakes when combat moves to the ground.

Away missions were a key part of both the original TV series and “Star Trek: The Next Generation,” but you’ll find yourself calling for Scotty to beam you up shortly after landing on your feet.

The first away mission, which acts as a tutorial, has your character beaming over to a damaged Star Fleet vessel to make some repairs and kill a few Borg. It does little to draw you in.

But when your character is given command of a Miranda-class Federation starship (think USS Reliant from “Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan”), things start to look up.

You’re sent out to explore the galaxies with various orders such as beaming a ship’s survivors to your own vessel or destroying various targets.

Maneuvering through 3-D space at impulse power takes some talent, and angling your ship to protect the forward, aft, port and starboard shields while multiple enemies are firing at will is no easy task.

The epic battles stray far from the character-driven original series and the diplomacy-happy “Next Generation,” but they’re a heck of a lot of fun. That said, even they grow repetitive as the adventure continues.

Despite some of these weaknesses, though, “Star Trek Online” offers plenty to please die-hard fans.

The game begins with a robust character creation and customization feature letting players choose to live as a human, Vulcan, Cardassian, liberated Borg or more. You can even create your own alien species.

And inside the closet you’ll find myriad uniform styles spanning the various movies and series installments. You’ll even get to name your character and ship, which really makes you feel like it’s your captain’s chair.

Both the new Spock, Zachary Quinto from the 2009 film, and Leonard Nimoy, who originated the role, generously lend their voices, and the game does a fabulous job sprinkling in subtle and some not-so-subtle episode references throughout.

The game avoids any “Star Trek” timeline issues by setting it far into the future, which returns the Klingons to enemy status. You just can’t beat a good villain.

Perhaps “Star Trek Online” faces its biggest challenge with its price tag. You’ve got to buy the game, and then you’ll have to shell out as much as $15 per month in subscription fees to keep playing.

Communication is a wonderful thing – I love it when game developers communicate with their audience (and make no mistake we are the audience they play to whenever we log on or boot up).  When I say communication I mean real communication… Not “Electronic Arts” communication that says “maybe we should take off Securom, after all the game it was meant to protect is now the most pirated game of all time.”  I don’t mean Gpotato “over price, then sale” listen. I mean Cryptic, keep you informed, here’s a list of what we are working on listen. Even if there may be a hint of fear of market reaction, they are listening and to their customers and communicating.

What about Ubisoft?

Ubisoft is busy telling their customer’s “Let’s all play death of Edward the II” (O.K. a bit of an obscure reference – just google “death of Edward the II king of England to find out how he died).  When news that Ubisofts draconic DRM had been cracked within 24 hours they were so swift with a denial that it set land speed records – the original Edge Online article is here:

Reports suggesting that Ubisoft’s controversial new DRM platform have already been cracked are wide of the mark, according to the publisher.

As part of Ubisoft’s new anti-piracy measures, consumers of its PC titles are required to connect to Ubi.com accounts to authenticate games online each time they play them, meaning they always need to be connected to the internet.

The new scheme didn’t go down too well with some sections of the PC community, and reports over the past 24 hours have suggested that pirated copies of Ubisoft games circumventing the new protection are doing the rounds on file sharing sites.

“You have probably seen rumors on the web that Assassin’s Creed II and Silent Hunter 5 have been cracked,” Ubisoft told us in a statement this morning.

“Please know that this rumor is false and while a pirated version may seem to be complete at start up, any gamer who downloads and plays a cracked version will find that their version is not complete.”

Submarine Warfare games go back before there was an internet to play an MMO on period.  I remember playing naval warfare games when “going online” meant dial up a bulletin board.  But whether or not the digital rights management for Silent Hunter 5 has already been cracked, or even will be is far from the point.  The point is that not only is Ubisoft not interested in listening to their consumers, they are so filled with hubris that they are telling you that your opinion doesn’t matter.   They believe they know the market place, and sadly they just may be correct.  As agent K says in Men in Black “A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it.”

As much as I am enjoying reruns of the Seaquest television series on Netflix, as much as I might want to play Silent Hunter 5, I have no intention of letting Ubisoft play Edward the II with me – I am wearing my solid steel panties.

See you online,

Julie Whitefeather

(posted by the Webmaster for Julie Whitefeather)

Move over Ronald Regan, Cryptic is soon going to be called “The Great Communicator”.  For those of you who are not Star Trek Online fans (and why not) or are not in the know, Cryptic Studios launched a new feature yesterday called the Engineering Forums.  Now you know long have to wonder what “Goes on behind closed doors” – Now you know (see below).   As you can see below, Cryptic has divided the forum into three different arenas.  “In Testing” is something that you will normally see within 2 weeks. They also tell us what they are looking at and what is in development.

Some of the more exciting areas to me are the changes for crafting in development, the new ships at the top tier (I am rooting for some industrial ships to go along with crafting). Best of all are the new fleet actions! 

Having made admiral I am not sure whether I am happy or sad that the Crystalline Entity can no longer be “one shotted”.  It was going to be sort of a “rite of passage” for me having reached the top tier. The big decision to be made, of course, once I made admiral was to decide what sort of ship to chose.  The practical side of me said chose the recon science ship.  Then I saw the list below and realized that it would be some time before I could expect to win at pvp on the Federation side.  So throwing caution to the wind I opted for the largest ship out there.

See you online,

Julie Whitefeather

(posted for Julie Whitefeather by the Webmaster)

Testing

• Respec options
• Ground anomalies are not consistently giving the correct level resources
• PVP Queue updates
• Fleet Actions will be level banded so that players in the map are within range of each other to make scoring fairer.
• Renaming your account @name
• AI pathing and mission fixes for Cage of Fire (Bajoran Fire Caves)
• Unique items should not be allowed to be equipped multiple times on the same character.
• Klingon stores selling items for the wrong currency
• Leveling up and Promotion bugs
• Klingon skill tree review to remove reference to Fed skills
• Additional Federation and Klingon Bridges
• Klingon Star Cluster missions
• Additional Star Cluster mission types
• Klingon ship customization for T0 and T5 ships
• New Fleet Actions and Fleet Action updates for both Fed/Klingon (DS9 Invasion, Gorn Minefield, Breaking the Planet, Romulan Temple, Crystalline Entity)
• Borg Special Task Forces (For Fed and Klingon players)
• Klingon access to Borg Sector
• Multi-faction Borg Deepspace encounters (Fed+Klg players vs Borg)
• More emotes
• More Fed and Klingon ship variants at top tiers
• New Klingon Cruiser
• Race specific transporter FX
• Off Duty Outfits
• Updates to the ship selection rooms
• Removing the bug where missions would sometimes get stuck in partial complete progress
• Rereleasing iPVP maps
• Players getting trapped in geometry in the mission TRAPPED

Under Investigation

• Loading screens freezing the client
• Players will sometimes encounter mobs much higher than expected in Deepspace encounters
• Skill descriptions that are confusing or incorrect (on a per case basis)
• Latency when moving around inventory
• Long load times when entering Sol System or Earth Space Dock
• /Stuck command not working in all cases
• Objective griefing on the Borg Hunt PVP maps
• Klingon stores not selling expected items
• Weapon beam FX do not stop and attach to the player as they move around the map
• Admiral Zelle issues on the Divide et Impera mission
• Temple Offerings mission is not completing properly
• Updating the timers on Klingon repeatable missions
• Faction settings are not being applied properly and powers like “Seduce” can be misused
• Stealth powers allow interactions that bypass content
• Problems when applying pips to costumes

In Development

• Death Penalty Options
• Memory Alpha/Crafting
• Cross level teaming
• Multi-Faction “Neutral” social areas
• Improvements to Repeatable Mission UI
• Updating player status windows to show the proper ship silhouettes
• Better notification when players are at the skillcap and skillpoints are converted to BOFF points
• More non-combat mission varieties
• Options to make missions more difficult
• More replayable mission types
• Ability to trade bridge officers
• Revamp of commodity missions

When Allods Online announced their cash shop prices, the swath of complaints would have cut through solid steel.  Now, as we all know (at least those who read the news service that carries the No Prisoners, No Mercy show – Virgin Worlds) Gpotato announced changes to their cash shop for Allods Online:

 Dear Allods Community,

We are happy to announce that we will be making revisions to a majority of the Allods Online item shop. These changes will go live sometime during the week of March 1st.

We would also like to extend a thanks to all of our players who have submitted constructive feedback through email and the forums. The team has reviewed each one of the hundreds of submissions we’ve received. We’ve restructured the pricing based upon your feedback in conjunction with the data we’ve reviewed and communication with our developer. Consequently, we’ve revised pricing so that more people can participate in this feature of the game.

Thank you all for your constructive feedback and support. Please continue to send us your thoughts to allods_suggestions@gala-net.com, and we look forward to seeing you in the game!

Sincerely,
The Allods Team

As nebulous as the wording of the announcement is, this just may be good news for all of you Allods fans out there.  On the other hand (see hand reaching out of toilet in the picture above) I wouldn’t exactly call this a matter of “being responsive” to the community.  This is the same “Allods Team” that originally announced the drastic increase in prices was intentional, despite the general outcry.  No doubt somewhere back in the home office, someone on the Allods Team that holds the purse strings saw the very real possibility of the game going down the toilet and decided that maybe…just maybe…they shouldn’t flush an otherwise great game down the toilet.

Thereby hangs a tale…

And thereby hangs a tale, as the immortal bard would have said.  Imagine if you will you walk into a auto dealership, or perhaps even the home office in Detroit.  You march in to the office of the president of General Motors – no appointment, no pleases, no “mother may I” and plop yourself down opposite that is, no doubt, an expansive desk so large that you could easily build a football stadium on it and still have room left over to subdivide lots.

Pointing out of what just may be a window with a view that shows the factory below it  stretching out like a vast kingdom, You look the  CEO dead in the eye and say the following…

“You see all those red cars down there, coming off the assembly line?  I don’t care if you have already run 10 thousand of them off the assembly line, call them all back. I don’t like the slope of the roof and I want you to change it.”

No, of course, there is a very real possibility that you would have been arrested simply for trespassing.  That is, of course, unless you happen to be the government representative that has been in charge of the last two bailouts of General Motors.  Other than that,  the only way you are likely to get off of the trespassing charge is by pleading not guilty by way of insanity - and the simple fact that you just suggested changing the design of a car after GM ran off 10 thousand of the same model means you just might win your case for mental instability.

Lets take it one step further, and closer to home.

Most people are acquainted with the term “buyer’s remorse”. For those of you who are not, that is when you buy something and find out shortly thereafter that the same item went on sale.  In fact, there are many people who seem to enjoy buyers remorse because you often see the same people (and sometimes across the breakfast table on Sundays) looking through the advertisements trying to see if your recent purchase went on sale.  Some retailers have become so conscious of this that they offer price guarantees.

Now imagine if you will that you have just purchased that shiny new computer.  You know the one. That same computer you have had your eye on for the last month. Yes, thats the one…the  one with speed that rivals a Cray supercomputer and more ram than the Sahara desert has grains of sand.   You finally decided to break down (and believe me at the prices most retailers offer you would have had to have a breakdown) and you buy it.   You take it, and the second mortgage that was necessary to buy it home.  The next Sunday you are in the mood for some angst and you purposefully go looking to see if it is on sale.   The results of your search show that in the ensuing week since your purchase, the pace of technology being what it is, your brand new computer, your brand new expensive computer has been replaced by a pocket calculator with more computing power.  Later that day finds you marching into the office of the store manager demanding a refund…

Only to be told that the reason you got the computer at such a “reasonable” price to begin with was that it was on sale.  Now you realize at this point that the whole reason your shiny new computer, which is now more useful as a boat anchor, was that the unscrupulous store manager was trying to unload them because he knew that in one weeks time they would be worth a load of dingo dung. Now in the real world, if the purchase really did cost the same as a second mortgage, and the retailer under such circumstances refused to refund your money, he would soon find himself charged with fraud by the local attorney generals office so fast it would set land speed records.  In more reasonable circumstances you simply found the computer that you bought for $900 dollars went on sale the next week for $850 dollars and there are a good many retailers that would give you store credit for the difference.

But make the same demand on a nation wide basis?

Well you can just kiss that demand goodbye before the words even leave your mouth me bucko, because the result would then be “business is business.”  But what if the same demand where made of a game publisher (assuming that publisher doesn’t have the name Activision in it anywhere and isn’t headed up by Mr. Bobby Kotick).  Lets say…oh, I don’t know, lets just pull a name out of the air and say “Atari”.   The good folks at Atari know that they are in turn owned by what is (at least in many estimates) a French company that just happens to be the largest manufacturer of video games in the world.  Now they know that the people who own their company didn’t get to be the largest manufacturer of video games in the entire world by putting up with low profit margins.   Needing to make a few more dollars to reimburse what was no doubt a very expensive game to produce they decided to have a sale, and as a result offer sixty days of free game time along with it.

If this where any other industry other than the video game industry this would no doubt be considered par for the course.   But if there is one thing that the Allods debacle has given us that is that when players really do speak their mind as one and demand that changes be made they will be made…for better or for worse. 

But what if Atari didn’t back down? What if all those Star Trek Online players out there decided to raise so much hell that Satan himself would have decided he didn’t like the competition? What if they simply decided to say “O.K. everyone out of the pool” and pull the plug on the game? Never happen? Think about the game “Gods and Heroes” that was already in closed beta and being developed by Perpetual Entertainment – you know those people who were originally developing Star Trek Online – Perpetual Entertainment pulled the plug. 

I am happy that companies like Cryptic listen to thier target market; and that they are doing no matter what some detractors may say.  It’s great that game developers take action on when demands are made.  But it can go to far, because game developement by committee doesn’t work when most of the “committeed members” don’t work for the developer.

See you online,

Julie Whitefeather

No Prisoners, No Mercy show 54 allowed us the privilege of having a round table discussion…a meeting of the minds between the game development community and the blogging community.  In the course of discussion immersion in video games, one of the major subjects for the show, we discussed sound. Our friend R.W. Harper told us how he started out making sound for his games using Sound Forge and now they have recording studios for each project.  Sound, he confirmed, is one of the major ways to achieve immersion.

Many players of my acquaintance turn the sound off altogether and turn on their mp3 player. On one occasion that practice elicited a response from a guildie that was wont to repeat this practice, “You mean this game has sound?” For me, however, if the sound can’t be heard a major part of the virtual reality is gone.  It is much the same principle as a professionally prepared meal – as any good chef will tell you a major part of the meal is how it is presented.

No matter what you may personally think of Turbine Studios, or their Lord of the Rings game, whoever is doing sound for that game does a fantastic job.  Even small touches can have a large impact on your perceptions of virtual reality, even when you don’t intentionally notice it.  Try this  some time…ride your horse (or pony if you are a hobbit) down a dirt path in the Shire where the road comes to a wooden bridge.  Notice how the sound of your horse’s hooves changes when they reach the bridge and go back to their muffled state when they reach the dirt path again.

When sound becomes even more important…

As many of you have noticed, I am sure, medium wherein we enjoy our media are beginning to merge.  There was a time when a comic book was something you had to decide if you wanted to read while you head your popsicle – now they are the subject of major motion pictures.  And even the way those major motion pictures are produced has changed drastically in the last decade, finally reaching its zenith in movies like “Avatar.”  For those one or two of you out there that have not seen this amazing film, here is a excerpt from an article that tells how it was produced:

 “Recording takes place on a spare motion-capture stage called the volume. Actors wear skin-tight bodysuits with reflective makers; every movement is tracked by an array of more than 100 fixed cameras. A specialized head-rig camera records the actor’s face and eyes.

‘The virtual camera is always active,’ explained Avatar producer Jon Landau. Gone is the need for camera and lighting setups, makeup retouches and need to be shot repeatedly from different camera angles. Instead the camera data are fed into a computer that creates a 3-D replica of the actor’s every movement, and the directors can just add his camera moves – from any perspective – digitally.’” – The animated acting of avatar by Rachel Abramowitz, Tribune Newspapers

Apparently there are some members of the movie industry that do not consider the actor behind the image capture as acting.  Many people whose job it is to know better still do not consider that actor who gives life through voice and motion to the animated version of themselves as an actor at all. Here is what the talented actor who played Gollum in the Lord of the Rings movie trilogy had to say about it:

 “’If you don’t have the performance, the rest is dressing,’ Serkis said. ‘You can’t enhance a bad performance with animation. You can’t dial it up, lift the lip or the eyebrow. It has to be right at the core moment. For actors to not recognize performance capture as acting is bad and disrespectful. It’s also Luddite.’” – Andy Serkis (who played Gollum in the Lord of the Rings movie Trilogy) The animated acting of avatar by Rachel Abramowitz, Tribune Newspapers

As media merge in such an astounding fashion, where animation becomes to real that you have to study the screen to tell where the live action ends, and the computer graphics begin, Jeff Bridges gives us a view of what may be the wave of the future:

“’I’m sure they could do it not with they wanted. Actors will kind of be a thing of the past,’ Bridges [actor Jeff Bridges] told Tribune Newspapers the day nominations were announced. ‘We’ll be turned into combinations. A director will be able to say, ‘I want 60 percent Clooney; give me 10 percent Bridges; and throw some Charles Bronson there. They’ll come up with a new guy who will look like nobody who has ever lived and person or thing will be huge’ he said.” – The animated acting of avatar by Rachel Abramowitz, Tribune Newspapers

“What has this got to do with video games?” you might ask yourself.  Well, in a word – everything.  As the ability to produce ever more realistic virtual worlds progresses (and game developers these days often seem anxious to push the envelope of computer power needed to portray those virtual worlds) sound becomes more important than many people realize.  Consider the first 20 levels of Age of Conan Online.  Anyone who has ever played the game will tell you how amazed and immersed they were by those levels, and a major contributing factor was all the voice over work by talented actors.

The issue I would love to explore at some point in the future is just where the actor ends and the computer programmer’s art begins…and are the two merging in to one?

See you online,

Julie Whitefeather

(Posted by the Webmaster for Julie Whitefeather)

For those of you who can’t wait for the Itunes/Virgin Worlds release of the latest edition of the No Prisoners,. No Mercy show…wait no more! Show 54 is available on early release.  You can find this show available here.   There ios also a link under “podcasts” on the right hand side of the page.

This week the game development community meets the blogging community in a round table discussion about immersion in video games.  The week we welcome to the show game developer R.W. Harper from Lorewriter.com.  From the blogger community we welcome Saylah from Mystic Worlds, Tipa from West Karana, Syp from Bio Break, and of course, the show hosts Julie Whitefeather and Fran Kosac.

We hope you enjoy listening to the show as much as we did producing it.

Sister Frances has an expression that has always held true…if you want to know who your friends are, ask them to help you move.  Not only has it held true, but when I first became a nun, someone I had only seen at Sunday services, someone whom I barely knew, showed up on moving day and simply said, “I heard you are moving, I’m hear to help.”

That is a true friend…

But there are many other types of friends that pass through our lives, making impressions – and to them I raise a cigar (if only a virtual one at the moment) with a cheer of “Absent friends!”.  Why a cigar? Thereby lies a tale…

One of the friends  I had once we shall call Harry Yablan, mostly because that’s his name.  I doubt Harry is reading this at the moment because when I asked Harry about the internet his typical reply was, “the internet is a place for scammers to scam other scammers.”   While I don’t agree with Harry, I will say that there was, believe it or not, a time of my life when my hands rarely touched a keyboard that wasn’t connected to a word processor – and the time in my life when I knew Harry was one of those times.

For those of you who still have an imagination, and have not been bereft of it by game developers who are wont to do our imagining for us, think of that place where you have been most comfortable.  Now add to that place a ray of warm sunshine and perhaps even in your pet sleeping in the sun.  Now surround yourself with good friends and good conversation – that was Harry’s Place.  

Harry’s place was more than a cigar shop, it was a cross roads of humanity. More, it was a symposium for conversation, wit and philosophy that even the great Plato would have been proud to call a second home.  Some people have back fences, others have bowling allies, I had Harry’s place. I can think of no other place where I would be able to spend an evening with an Air force combat pilot, the Chief of Patrolmen for the City of Chicago (retired), the commissioner of Streets and Sanitation for the City of Chicago (retired), and a rabbinical student all in the same room. Each night Harry would put on a fresh pot of coffee, cigars and pipes would be lit with carefully practiced precision and ceremony, and the couches surrounding the big screen television would be occupied by people from all walks of life.

This is the point at which some of our readers may be looking for a tie in with gaming.  For those of you who need a moral, a lesson or some such purpose other than the simple conveyance of a feeling and tribute to absent friends, here it is…

In one of the Star Trek Movies (I will let you look up which one) Spock’s brother tries to heal Captain Kirk’s emotional pain.  The famous captain immediately protests, saying, “I need my pain, its part of who I am.”  Whether memories are painful, pleasant or simply the remembrance of a feeling, they are part of who we are.  John F. Kennedy once said, “The knowledge of the past prepares us for the events of the future.”  In a very real way that includes all our memories. Like Captain Kirk said, it’s part of who we are.

See you online,

Julie Whitefeather