Posts Tagged ‘Fallen Earth’

So “why The Back Page?” you might ask yourself.

Simply put, ever morning our local paper features all its heterogeneous miscellany on its back page.  As what we wish to write about today are only loosely related, at least for today, we will have the same bent.

First up…Fallen Earth

We have noted a few concerns in the blogosphere lately regarding Fallen Earth and what the virtual residents of post apocalyptic Arizona know as “sector 3” (there are three sectors total).  Apparently, there are those among Fallen Earth’s high level residents who have felt a bit of a dearth of PvP activity.  There is, of course, a problem with those who manage to summit to the heights of any game’s level cap early in the game’s life cycle and this is it:

Fallen Earth hasn’t even been out for two months yet. As a result we will just bet “dollars to donuts” that the bulk of the participants are still making their way through S1 and S2, stopping to smell the virtual roses and cope with their virtual antagonists. This will not always be the case, of course – As the population ages you will surely find more pvp action in S3. 

This of course leaves the same question that always seems to arise in pvp orientated games or sectors of games that have pvp: That is why do players pvp? For what Richard Gariott calls “Inventory management”? (In other words the ability to gain better and better gear).  World of Warcraft has proven that concept works. As we have always said, never underestimate the staggering drawing power of materialism.   Do people pvp for the enjoyment of it? Julie does, but we think she is in the minority. What about artificially instilled allegiance to one faction or the other?  That didn’t work out so well for Warhammer Online, but perhaps if there had been more than two factions (as seems to be the case here) it will work out better.

The danger, of course, is that in comparing any newly developed game to a well established game you hold the new game to a higher standard than is its due.  Every game that comes out has a few rough spots as the devs continue to find out exactly what the community wants out of the game. That, of course, is a tough process to begin with, as many times what some players want out of a game is in direct contravention to what other players want out of a game.

Next up…

The Associated press recently featured a review of Call of Duty, Modern Warfare 2 (MW2) entitled “Who Needs Plot?” written by one “Lou Kesten”.  About half way through the review, the author bemoaned the lack of a better plot, saying the following:

“MW2 is filled with such mind-blowing settings, from the slums of Rio de Janeiro to the snowy mountains of Russia. It’s in getting from one set piece to the next that developer Infinity Ward stumbles.”

The author goes on to say the following…

“Granted, the plot isn’t much more ridiculous than typical season of ‘24’”

The reviewer’s comments put us here at the No Prisoners, No Mercy team in mind of some of the reviews of Transformer 2: Revenge of the Fallen.  One local critic, Dann Gire, described the movie thusly (see excerpt below):

“The plot, treated here as an optional element, involves the emergence of the evil The Fallen (voiced by Tony Todd), a Decepticon that can only be destroyed by one of the seven Autobot Primes, except that last one, Optimus Prime (voiced by Peter Cullen), sacrificed himself to save Sam’s life.” – Dann Gire

Film Director Michael Bay had the following response to some of the negative reviews, as reported by the Los Angeles Times.

“I think they reviewed the wrong movie. They just don’t understand the movie and its audience. It’s silly fun,” Bay said over the weekend of the many ‘Transformers’ critical detractors. ‘I am convinced that they are born with the anti-fun gene. The reviews are just so vicious. A lot of them are more personal than anything else.’” – Michael Bay

After a spate of negative reviews, the movie ended up being a box office hit, pulling in $400 million.  This is when critics tried to save face. Dann Gire responded (in part) with this:

“Our job is not to say if a movie will be a big box office hit and everyone should go see it because it’s a big box office hit. Our job is simple and direct: to assess the quality of a motion picture.” – Dann Gire (see online comments here)

Locally at least, Paramount Motion pictures responded by blocking “professional” motion picture critics from an advanced showing of “GI Joe” and only let in select bloggers.

Faulting Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 for lack of a plot makes about as much sense as the same feeble attempt at faulting Transformers 2  for the same reason.  It’s like reading “The Bobbsey Twins at the Sea Shore” and faulting the author for not being Shakespeare. My response to author Lou Kesten is the same as my response to author Dann Gire: If you want depth, go rent an Ingmar Bergman movie.

So while Lou Kesten is waiting for the “Tell Me a Story” edition of Modern Warfare 2 and Dann Gire is busy renting an Ingmar  Bergman movie, pass us the popcorn, the videogame controller and the remote control: we’re going to have a little fun.

And last, but certainly not least…

You may have noticed from the recent direction of this site, our show, or our recent guest (none other than Cryptic Studio’s own Bill Roper) that we have been playing a good deal of Champions Online lately. Yes, even dyed in the wool World of Warcraft devotee and No Prisoners, No Mercy co-host Sister Fran has been dipping her toe in the super hero water. But not all of our heroes wear spandex – some of them wear cover alls.

So while we are busy pointing out how unenlightened one Associated Press author is on one game, let us  pour praise on Ms. Barbara Ortutay (also of Associated Press) for her recent article on one of our favorite super heroes.

“You might call him the Mickey Mouse of video games. He’s reminiscent of a doughnut, round and sweet and comforting. He’s also a vessel, devoid of a real personality so you can live vicariously through him. Mario, the potbellied Italian plumber with a penchant for rescuing princesses, collecting golden coins and gobbling magic mushrooms, has been around for nearly three decades, And even though he hasn’t changed much, the latest game he stars in, the newly released, ‘The New Super Mario Bros. Wii” , is one of the holiday season’s top titles.” – Barbara Ortutay, Associated Press

In fact there are some members of the No Prisoners No Mercy team that will admit to being a fan of the little Italian plumber since his only nemesis was Donkey Kong. So we too would like to join (and thank) Ms. Ortutay in a shout out to our favorite plumber:

Look, up in the sky, it’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s…

 SUPER MARIO

When a game isn’t your cup of tea

A few days ago the subject of a Fallen Earth review came up over “Clan Chat” (In Fallen Earth a clan is the same thing as a guild) about a lack luster review that was plagued by being greatly mundane and perhaps even possessing a degree of mendacity. Upon reading the review it struck me as being uncharacteristic for the site that carried it.  Now mind you, I too have had to eat a portion or two of crow in my time and I have made it a point to apologize in person and on the air to the devs I have wronged.  The most recent dev on that list is Bill Roper, but you will hear more of that on Show number 50.   As the review appears to have been removed from the web site (at least it no longer comes up on my browser) I will save the author the embarrassment of naming him. I will point out, however, that after lambasting the game and regaling his readers with how blasé he seemed to find it, he finished the review with the following:

“Yet despite its glaring errors, Fallen Earth remains oddly compelling.”

The irony, of course, is that the statement refutes the balance of the review almost as if the author said, “But on second thought I think I’m full of dingo dung – ignore me.”

In show number 49 (which is nearly through the editing process) one of the subjects that reared its head in conversation was the matter of  how (or even if) judgment should be passed on a game.  I say the subject “reared” for the brave manner in which Tipa (who returns as a guest next week) introduced it…listen to the show when it comes out and you will hear what I mean.

Sadder still are those reviewers who forget that by proffering a negative review they are, ostensibly, affecting the jobs of the people who made the game in the first place (no small matter in these economic times). Even worse are those times I find myself reading through a review so stale it belongs in a box of year old saltine crackers.  After all, if a reviewer is going to blindly cast caution to the wind, completely forgetting that a keen sense of quality, carefully honed by a decade or so of mind numbing bouts of drunkenness and endless “jiggly” movies might not…just MIGHT NOT…reflect the tastes of videogames of the remainder of humanity they should at least do it with a modicum of style.  My grandfather called such a use of rapier like wit as “telling someone to go to hell and making them like it.”

If, however, a reviewer is willing to allow that merely because they enjoy their tea made with a crap infusion, there are others of us that prefer our tea made a bit differently – or even (perish the thought) prefer coffee, perhaps reviews would approach a degree of objectivity.  There is (or course) a tale told by American poet John Godfrey Saxe (1816-1887) that exemplifies how games are often seen by reviewers:

 

It was six men of Indostan

To learning much inclined,

Who went to see the Elephant

(Though all of them were blind),

That each by observation

Might satisfy his mind
The First approached the Elephant,

And happening to fall

Against his broad and sturdy side,

At once began to bawl:

“God bless me! but the Elephant

Is very like a wall!”

 

The Second, feeling of the tusk,

Cried, “Ho! what have we here

So very round and smooth and sharp?

To me ’tis mighty clear

This wonder of an Elephant

Is very like a spear!”

 

The Third approached the animal,

And happening to take

The squirming trunk within his hands,

Thus boldly up and spake:

“I see,” quoth he, “the Elephant

Is very like a snake!”

 

The Fourth reached out an eager hand,

And felt about the knee.

“What most this wondrous beast is like

Is mighty plain,” quoth he;

” ‘Tis clear enough the Elephant

Is very like a tree!”

 

The Sixth no sooner had begun

About the beast to grope,

Than, seizing on the swinging tail

That fell within his scope,

“I see,” quoth he, “the Elephant

Is very like a rope!”

 

And so these men of Indostan

Disputed loud and long,

Each in his own opinion

Exceeding stiff and strong,

Though each was partly in the right,

And all were in the wrong!

Source of the poem online.

I had considered calling this article “everyone has buttons” and you will soon see why. Read on…

You might recognize the desert that this particular troll is standing in – it is the post apocalyptic Arizona desert, about 150 years from the current date.  Now why, you might ask yourself, does a troll standing in a desert “push my buttons”? Well lets be a bit less obtuse about it then…

One of my “buttons” in this case are players who, having decided they don’t like a game also decide that no one else should like a game as well. Not long ago I read a forum troll for one of the newer games on the shelf that started as follows:

“Am I the only one who doesn’t feel like logging in any more?”

My immediate thought was, of course, “Yes, you are the only one. The game has just come out and some of us are actually enjoying the game.”  Fortunately, many of the games today are solo friendly and the solution for those who rushed to the level cap and have no guild mates to play with is easy: Re-roll a new character and solo it through the content again…put another way, go play with yourself and leave the rest of us alone.

Now there are some of our long time readers who at this point will remember the phrase I am wont to use, and that is “Hell hath no fury like a gamer whose game has been scorned.”  Yes, in this case, the phrase does especially apply to yours truly. But why get so defensive about it?

Well it might be that the folks at Icarus studios are some of the nicest most considerate game developers we here at No Prisoners No Mercy (NPNM) have ever had the pleasure of meeting…but that isn’t it.  It might be that, as an independent developer we  here at NPNM wholeheartedly agree with the discussion we had with Dr. Richard Bartle not long ago when he was a guest on our show – that even if you don’t like a game, if it accomplishes something new that it is worthy of praise.  After all, no matter what anyone thinks (including the imbecile we read on the Internet who thought that Fallen Earth was copied from Star Wars Galaxies) Fallen Earth has given players a new game world, with alot of virtual world thrown in, that breaks the same tired old fantasy world mold.

But none of that is the “it” in question.

There are some causes that just strike a nerve, push a button, or hit home if you will, and one of those causes is independent game developers.  It’s just in my nature, and trying to champion a cause doesn’t always mean the members of a given community wish to have anything to do with me.  There was a time in my not too distant past when I belonged to a social action organization that simply tolerated me to have the membership dues. More is the pity, because of all the members I was (for reasons upon which I will not expound) in a better position than any to get changes made for the given social issue.  Still, that doesn’t stop me from taking a particular issue to heart; from feeling defensive about the matter.  There is even an old tale that explains why I feel compelled to champion the cause of independant game developers: It’s in my nature.

One day, a scorpion and a frog met by the side of a river.

The scorpion wished to cross the river, but it was too wide and swift for him to do so. Not being able to cross the river himself, he decided to enlist the aide of the frog:

“Mr. Frog!” said the scorpion, “Would you be so kind as to give me a ride on your back across the river?”

“Well now, Mr. Scorpion! How do I know that if I try to help you, you wont try to kill me?” asked the frog hesitantly.

“Because,” the scorpion replied, “If I try to kill you, then I would die too, for you see I cannot swim!”

Now this seemed to make sense to the frog. But he asked. “What about when I get close to the bank? You could still try to kill me and get back to the shore!”

“This is true,” agreed the scorpion, “But then I wouldn’t be able to get to the other side of the river!”

“Alright then…how do I know you wont just wait till we get to the other side and THEN kill me?” said the frog.

“Ahh…,” crooned the scorpion, “Because you see, once you’ve taken me to the other side of this river, I will be so grateful for your help, that it would hardly be fair to reward you with death, now would it?!”

So the frog agreed to take the scorpion across the river. He swam over to the bank and settled himself near the mud to pick up his passenger. The scorpion crawled onto the frog’s back, his sharp claws prickling into the frog’s soft hide, and the frog slid into the river. The muddy water swirled around them, but the frog stayed near the surface so the scorpion would not drown. He kicked strongly through the first half of the stream, his flippers paddling wildly against the current.

Halfway across the river, the frog suddenly felt a sharp sting in his back and, out of the corner of his eye, saw the scorpion remove his stinger from the frog’s back. A deadening numbness began to creep into his limbs.

“You fool!” croaked the frog, “Now we shall both die! Why on earth did you do that?”

The scorpion shrugged, and did a little jig on the drownings frog’s back.

“I could not help myself. It’s in my nature.”

(source of this version of the tale)

Great Moments in Gaming – go kill ten fairies. Like you, I am a resident of several virtual worlds. As time passes, the names of those virtual worlds change. The first was called “Brittania” thereafter there followed names like Azeroth, Eden (Eve Online) and a few instances of post apocalyptic Earth. There are times in my travels that I stop amongst the gaming to appreciate a moment, whether that moment is to admire the view (even if that view is the shattered capitol building) or laugh at a sense of humor. Over the years some of the best times in gaming have been when the humor of developers has come shining through in unexpected places. For example, long before there was even an “outland” in World of Warcraft, an npc vendor (still located just outside the Chapel of Light in Eastern Plague lands) turned to me and said “I should of taken the blue pill” (a reference to the movie called “The Matrix” of course). Sometimes the references developers put in games are a bit more obtuse, but no less funny if you get the reference.

Some of you may have seen the movie from 1977 called “Wizards”. In that movie, about two wizard brothers, the following dialogue takes place.

Max: Fritz! Fritz, get up for God’s sake! Get up! They’ve killed Fritz! They’ve killed Fritz! Those lousy stinking yellow fairies! Those horrible atrocity-filled vermin! Those despicable animal warmongers! They’ve killed Fritz! Take that! Take this! Take that, you green slime! You black hearted, short, bow-legged…

Fritz: Max! Max, I’m okay! I’m okay max. Just a scratch. Look I’m all right.

Max: Oh, Oh. There you go again, stepping on my lines, raining on my parade, costing me medals…

[Accidentally shoots Fritz]

Max: Oh. Oh, Fritz? Fritz, get up for God’s sake! Get up! They’ve killed Fritz! They’ve killed Fritz! Those lousy stinking yellow fairies! Those horrible atrocity-filled vermin! Take that! Take that! They killed Fritz!

Back when I played Everquest 2 (where I would still be if my Australian “mates” still played the game) I decided to take my Arasi Necromancer (sort of a really wicked fairy character) to what is called “The Enchanted Lands”. I arrived on the docks and encountered a hobbit…er…Halfling named…Gubbo Chaley. His quest? Go kill 10 fairies. One look at the picture will tell both the reason for the quest and the reference that the game dev was making. As in the movie, in this case it turned out that Fritz is very much alive and simply underneath the docks.

But there comes a time when I get tired of fairies (or anything with wings that that don’t also have air to air missiles fitted under them) or wizards with wands and I just want to take a shot gun and shoot the bad guy in the face. This situation is, of course, exacerbated by the fact that my once great beast master hunter in World of Warcraft (who has been around since the days when honor bought a title and was not used for currency) has been nerfed right down to the ground. Did I say nerfed to the ground? I mean the Blizzard devs dug a whole, told my beast master hunter to jump in, covered the whole with dingo dung and told me to eat my way out. And, based on the comments of the community manager (who I believe is still Ghostcrawler) that situation is not likely to change any time before the second coming of our Lord (which, granted, could be tomorrow for all I know but the point is made)

Fortunately, there are a few mmos out there without fairies or bunnies dancing with toilet paper. Fortunately there is at least one mmo that hands you the shotgun and point you in the direction of the zombies…

Read the rest of this entry »

If all else fails, so the old adage goes, read the instructions.  Yet ask yourselves, of all the times  you bought an mmo off the shelf (remember when the only way you could buy one was in an actual box?) how many of you even cracked open the instruction booklet?  As for me, I occasionally peruse the instructions… usually when the mmo takes a long time to patch. After all, isn’t that what tutorials are for?

It’s interesting…all the comments I have read about tutorials over the years – everything from “it’s too good” to “it sucks a pile of dead dingo dung.”  With each new game developers face multiple challenges with just the starting area:  How do you make it convey how to play the game but not make it boring? How do you make it good, but not so good it overshadows the rest of the game? (Age of Conan anyone?)  How do you do all that but make it interesting enough so players won’t say “OMG not again!” when they go through the same starting area for the third time.

Yet no matter how good a starting area is, there is no way a developer can convey all the nuances and myriad rules in the short time it takes to complete the tutorial. And there, as the immortal bard once said, “lays the rub”.  Had I had the opportunity to talk to whoever designed the crafting in Fallen Earth this weekend it might have gone like this:

Me:  “My armor crafting seems to be stuck at 28 – no matter how much I craft these stupid t-shirts my score won’t rise.”

FE Dev: “That’s because you are capped out for your level…”

Me: “WHAT! I’VE BEEN AT THIS ALL AFTERNOON! WHAT DO YOU MEAN ‘LEVEL’?”

FE Dev: “We mean that the cap on your current craft skill by area is tied to your intelligence and perception scores.”

(long pause while I think)

Me: “Why didn’t you tell me that in the first place?”

FE Dev.: “We did…”

Me:  “No you didn’t.”

FE Dev: “Didn’t we send you that wonderful autographed box?”

Me: “Well…yes.”

FE Dev: “Did you spend all your time gawking at the signatures or did you read the instruction book that came with it?”

Me: “Well…I never read those things.”

FE Dev: “We suspected as much. That’s why there is this really nice npc standing right by the exit where you start the game that answers all the questions you have.”

Me: “Oh that guy…I just sort of ignored him.”

FE Dev: “We thought you might. That’s why we sent you to the NPC to teach you about crafting and have her guide you through the process. Did you read everything in the NPC’s dialogue?”

Me: “Well…no.”

FE Dev: “Well then any time you wasted is your own fault.”

Me: “How so?”

FE Dev: “Back in college we failed ‘Mind Reading 101.’”

Whoever designs crafting in any game has an enormous challenge. Make it too easy and it will seem like it was tacked on to the game as an afterthought. Make it too hard and the player will get bored. If crafting is both hard and an integral part of the game it will make the player feel like an animal in a trap – willing to chew off a limb just to get out of it.

Even when a developer hits the proverbial nail on the head when crafting is added to the mmo, the interest of the player is still dependant on both ability and willingness to perceive how the process is done – like reading instructions.  Fortunately, when part of that equation fails those who are fortunate (like me) have a great clan LIKE THE OLDER GAMERS who are willing to help out.

See you online

Julie Whitefeather

Side Notes

 

This last weekend I had a chance to hear a performance on taiko drums.  There may be those of you who don’t know what taiko drums are – for those unenlightened few they are, in brief, REALLY BIG REALLY LOUD DRUMS.  Now it so happens I have heard taiko drums played quite a bit.  Keep in mind that taiko drums are usually not accompanied by other musical instruments, as drums so often are in western music.

Now if I have heard my share of taiko drums, I have heard A LOT of bagpipe music.  The reason for this is simply that there is more than one hard drinking Scotsman in my family tree. That said, taiko drums and bagpipes have at least one thing in common, and that one thing is that it takes a trained ear to really appreciate a performance with either instrument. Otherwise, after the novelty of the performance wears off, reactions start to go like this:

Neophyte audience: “Hey…look…great big drums!  This is really different!”

(Drumming starts)

THUMPA, THUMPA, THUMP, THUMP, THUMP, THUMP

(15 minutes later)

Taiko Drum Master: “And now ‘Tea for two’ on the taiko drums”

THUMPA, THUMPA, THUMP, THUMP, THUMP, THUMP

Like drums, there are some songs that just shouldn’t be played on bagpipes.  Two that come immediately to mind that I have heard played on bagpipes are “Jesus Christ Superstar” and  “Stairway to Heaven”. As moving as I occasionally find the bag pipes, like taiko drums, they are best taken in moderation.  Otherwise, like our penguin friend above I find myself looking at the piper and saying, “Maybe if you quit biting it’s tail it will quit screaming”

And I used to be in a bagpipe band.

Quote of the day: This quote is from one of our “must reads” here at No Prisoners, No Mercy – Killed in a Smiling accident. This quote is from “When Once the Forms of Civility are Violated, there Remains Little Hope of Return to Kindness or Civility” by Melmoth (and is available here) The title alone is nearly an article in itself but the post is a good read. We recommend both the article and the web site.

 “Well you could do that, but nobody will want to group with you.” A phrase wrapped in wilful condescension so thick that if you spread some patronization between a couple of slices of it you’d have the world’s most bitter doorstop sandwich.” – Melmoth, on “Killed in a Smiling Accident”

The subject of the article is not DDO so much as some of the players who inhabit that virtual realm.  I must say, as a player of DDO from back when it came in a thin little book that said “chain mail” on the outside I agree whole heartedly with the following quote by the same author, from the same article:

“…every MMO has their class of players who think that they are above and beyond the plebeians who don’t play the game the way that they do.” – Melmost, ibid

The article even coins a new word that I just love, describing players who fault others for not squeezing the virtual nickel until the buffalo farts (my comparison not his, so fault me) or ensuring they have squeezed out the last .01 dps. Melmost calls them “Maxminati”. You just have to love the term.

A bit later than usual today dear readers…believe it or not I actually went outside today.  It seems that it was the perfect day for sucking a yard full of leaves. It reached the point where the neighbors called and said, “Gee you seem to have all the leaves from the neighborhood on your lawn!”   And in case you haven’t guessed, that is “neighborese” for “When are you going to rake the leaves?” However it was a good day for it – after all it was Caucasian summer…I mean “Indian summer”…I mean a warm fall day.

So if you saw the title on your reader and expected to find an article about a Cole Porter song you are, as you can tell from the picture above, mistaken.   Instead this is about a time in the not too distant future (150 years to be exact) as a rough character named “Auntie Maim” rides across a plateau somewhere in the vicinity of the Grand Canyon (that’s a great big hole in the ground in the south west area of the U.S. for all of you  out of the country readers).

So why the night and day title?

Quite simply I have had the pleasure of sampling Fallen Earth since early closed beta thanks to the kind folks at Icarus Studios. Yes, I will be the first to admit that some of the early days were rough.  But things have changed since then, and even since the opening days of the game.  And as the title of the article suggests I have found it to be a change of “night and day” by comparison. 

Lag?

Not a bit of it – and we are running it on a desk top that is a far cry from being a “top end” machine.  Even when I rode in to town with all the other post apocolyptic residents of Depot 66 around me there wasn’t so much as a sputter.

What about that tutorial?

One of the regulars that writes in the our little corner of the blogosphere (no names please – except to say it isn’t anyone from the Virgin Worlds collective) faulted Fallen Earth’s tutorial.  They said that they felt dumped out into the world by a tutorial that had no resemblance to the rest of the game.   Before the changes to the new player experience I still thought that it was a great way to introduce the game mechanics to the players.   I always appreciate devs who try and make the new player experience interesting and involve me in a story right from the get go. After all, consider the alternative from some of the games that have been around awhile – in those “other” games a dwarf hands you a rusty axe and tells you to go kill ten wolves.  Exciting eh?

Even though all that was added to the tutorial was a series of optional quests once you hit your first town (where you first appear in the game after the tutorial and you have selected your starting town) they made a big difference.  Before I still felt a bit lost after the tutorial but not this time.  The beginning quests showed me around town, introduced me to how the various systems work like crafting and combat. I even ended up with a horse from square one, rather than having to take half of forever to earn the darn thing in those “other” games.  O.K. so the horse was an “old nag” but by the end of the second play session, as you can see above I sat astride a much higher priced model.

And speaking of horses…

One of the things I am sure you all heard us talk about  with Keen on show number 47 was games that have a bit more “virtual world” in their “game world” (for a difference between the two see our earlier articles about our discussions with Dr. Richard Bartle).  One of those nice touches that really impressed me was the fact that horses don’t “disappear” like the mounts in so many other games.  In every other game I have ever played you get off your horse, turn around and say “who the heck stole my horse”?  In this game you get off your horse, walk into the local store, and when you come out your horse is still waiting there. (no worries, no one can steal it),

So when I am online the rest of the weekend, most of it will be riding across the plateau of post apocalyptic Arizona.

If you see Auntie Maim say hello!

See you online,

Julie Whitefeather

Among the many jobs I have worked at, one of them was in a factory. There is an old expression that stuck with me from those days – no matter how tired you are, come quitting time on Friday, everyone has energy.  It’s Friday, welcome to the road to the weekend edition.

The Road to the Stars…

If you haven’t read the running conversation under this week’s “Game You Wish You Could Love” article, it’s all about Eve Online. But there is one game that we here at No Prisoners, No Mercy love even before it hits the shelves: Star Trek Online. Now mind you, these days we take anything that comes out of Eurogamer with about a truckload of salt. They are reporting, however, that Cryptic Studios has announced the official release date for Star Trek Online, which they are saying is February 5, 2010. Now mind you we are well aware that if there is anywhere that Murphy’s Law rears its ugly head it is producing games; and so that date may not be set in stone. However, at the risk of jumping the gun (for even in the world of interviews things change) we have the perfect source to ask…

Mr. Bill Roper who has kindly agreed to an interview about one of our favorite games  – Champions Online. The accompanying article prepared by our own Fran has been completed but we are going to make you wait until the audio portion is recorded.  While Fran and I are busy winging (or in my case teleporting) our way across the skies of Millennium City it occurred to us that while CCP is still talking about “walking in stations” everything we have seen from Star Trek Online so far (and that is only what we read) tells us that players in Star Trek are already footloose and fancy free instead of floating around in a pod full of primordial goo.  We only have one question left…

Who do we have to bribe to get a beta code (we missed out on the lifetime offer for Champions Online)

Dragons Age…

Dragon Age Origins has finally arrived and with it, an article over at arstechnica.com entitled “Dragon Age Launch Fails” (available here). If the article is to be believed, there are problems – here is a quote:

 “The problem? EA and Bioware require you to sign into their own websites, with their own accounts and login information, to allow you to access the bonus content from your purchase. That process, it seems, is broken for many users.” – Ben Kuchera, Arstechnica.com

I am not sure why the good folks at Arstechnica are having problems but no one at the modding group I belong to called “The Engineering Guild” (available here)  seems to be troubled at all. In fact everyone at The Engineering Guild has been planning their mods for Dragon Age Origins since long before the game came out.  And one thing is for sure, no one can say the devs at Bioware are not on the ball where the modding community is concerned – the tool set was released with the game and is available here.

Getting Hammered…

It was not that long ago that my goblin shaman finally retired from Warhammer Online for good…but maybe someone might follow in his place. Why? Here’s why..

Werit had an article this week  (and if you don’t read Werits blog why not? It’s good.) reporting that the new 10 day trial for Warhammer Online has been extended – indefinitely. In other words, while players are still limited to Tier one they can now play longer than 10 days. In fact they can play as long as they want.  Here is the article. Let’s hope that this is not only true, but that those who participate will max out at the top of the Tier One levels. After all, Tier One is where I had the most fun; especially in the Empire RvR lake. Either way, another one of our favorite sites, The Ancient Gaming Noob, has an interesting post this week about the possible consequences of the new trial (available here) entitled “a mass of Tier One Twinks”

Meanwhile back at the (post apocalyptic) corral:

Meanwhile the Wandering Goblin is reporting that Interplay and Bethesda (makers of Fallout 3, one of my favorite stand alone games) are still fighting it out in court for the rights to produce a Fallout MMO (which I read is set to expire this month for Interplay). The article is available here.  So while Interplay and Bethesda have been busy playing dueling lawyers I have been busy in the post apocalyptic world of FALLEN EARTH.  And if you want to know a bit more about how things have been going for the dev team over at Icarus there is nothing like hearing it straight from the “horses mouth” as it were – or in this case the project managers mouth.  Yes, Mr. Colin Dwan, project manager for Fallen Earth was kind enough to share some time with us earlier this week. The interview has been through the editing process and will be the top half of show number 48.

The folks over at Wizard 101 have been asking the No Prisoners No Mercy team to come back and play in their world again. As for me, I will be spending time buzzing through the skies of Millennium City faster than a speeding pullet and learning my way around the post apocalyptic Fallen Earth. However, I will not be playing any more Aion Online. For me I believe it is finally time to hang up my wings. I will be in good company, however as Werit appears to being hanging up a similar pair of wings and talks about it in an article here called Farewell Aion.

The last straw…

Werit’s article touched on a couple of points that, for me, were the last straw. Here are the quotes:

“Abyss.  The Abyss sounded interesting on paper, but in reality it was one big gank fest.  Allowing ranks 25 through 50 to fight in the same space, without a bolster, just was not fun.” – Werit

 ”Leveling.  It’s a long way to the top if you want to PvP.  I am a big fan of PvP leveling and Aion just does support that style of gameplay.” – Werit

“Guild.  There are quite a few CoW’s [presumably his guild] who play Aion and I will miss grouping with them.” – Werit

Pvp is  one place that place that Warhammer did it right and NCSoft  still hasn’t learned. If you are going to make a game where the focus is primarily on pvp make sure you can easily level with pvp. The interesting thing about pvp is that everyone talks about balance but what most people really mean is they want the scales tipped in their favor.  As far as balance is concerned I still like the approach Warhammer took (every class is strong against some and weak against others) as opposed to World of Warcraft’s approach (Micromanage all the classes until you manage to tick off just about everyone but rogues). And while Werit said he will miss some of his guild mates, the best thing about organizations that cross multiple games like The Older Gamers is that you will still see the same people in other games.

Stinking out loud…

There is little doubt that anyone who surfs the waves of the blogsphere has not heard about the ‘Blizzard Cash Shop” by now. Earlier this week Fran wrote about this at the end of her “Homey doesn’t like pugs” article.  John Woods echoes our (that’s the royal we) opinion in his article over at www.mmorpg.com.

“By raising a gigantic stink about this particular move on Blizzard’spart, the only thing that is going to happen is that next time, when a company actually does do something offensive like charge a subscription and offer game-enhancing items within a store, is that no one is going to listen to the horde of people that are crying foul.

By reacting and over-reacting negatively every time even the slightest thing is done that might possibly be controversial, the voices of the fans get easier and easier for game companies to ignore. This, my friends, is not good for our genre and opens the door to truly unscrupulous actions by others.” – John Wood, MMORPG.com ( available here )

Now on to the next section…

Lets start with a bit of fiction about Fallen Earth Lore.  Enjoy the story. See you on the other side of Friday.

- The No Prisoners No Mercy team

Most people have memories of their past: playing with childhood friends (or a lack thereof), parents, perhaps a sister or two. People often look back on times spent with families (and not necessarily fondly).  Her memories didn’t extend past the last half hour. In fact the only thing she could remember was her name, and that was only because it was tattooed across her upper left arm, that and a mass of Celtic scroll work. A similar tattoo adorned her right forearm, with two matching tattoos on each of her right and left leg, that went all the way up to her thigh.

Read the rest of this entry »

If it isn’t incredibly obvious at this point we (and in this case thats the “everyone who helps out with No Prisoners No Mercy we”) are big supporters of independent game developers.  As we discussed with Dr. Bartle on an earlier show, even if we don’t personally fancy the genre the fact that independent game developers are out there trying new things deserves a thunderous round of applause.  That said, while Interplay and Bethesda continue to fight it out in court as to who has Fallout MMO rights another developer has stepped in to fill the mmo gap in what is my favorite genre…post apocalyptic.  If it weren’t so I wouldn’t spend so many endless hours modding a post apocalyptic game.  So any dev of any sort that is both an independent developer and has developed a game in my favorite genre deserves not only a thunderous round of applause but shouting it from the rooftops (as I have been doing for some time now).

I am talking about…of course…none other than Icarus Studios.

Twice now it has been our extreme pleasure to have their project manager, Mr. Colin Dwan, as a guest on the show. His second appearance is in the editing process now.  That said, in the interest of full disclosure, and since it is our understanding that it is now required by law in the U.S. anyway, we wanted to share the wonderful gift that the Fallen Earth team sent along to us – signed by the whole team and suitable for framing (believe me that’s exactly whats going to happen it).

Don’t get us wrong, this isn’t about some silly bank sitting “nah, nah, nah see what we have and you don’t” garbage. Far from it.  Why this is important to us is that, after the years of writing  about games and more than a year of podcasting (all told) this is one of the first tangible “atagirls” we have received.

Now what, you may ask yourself, is an “atagirl”? 

I had an NCO (non-commissioned officer in charge) in the military who would look at soldiers and say “atagirl” [that's a girl] when ever you did something right as an acknowledgement. He would then follow up with, “but remember one ‘aw crap’ wipes out a thousand ‘atagirls’”.

And so this is our first “atagirl” if you will (or even if you won’t) from a developer. So thank you from us here at No Prisoners No Mercy to the entire Fallen Earth team for what is possibly the biggest warm fuzzy in a long time.

See you online

Julie Whitefeather

 

It has been one month since Aion Online has hit the shelves and about the same for Champions Online.   This is right about the time where a gamers mind turns to “virtual tourism”  – the end of the first free month. The following was in the recent release of the “October Community Address” from Aion Community Team:

“You’ve told us that it’s difficult to advance within certain level ranges. To address this issue, we’re planning to raise quest experience, in addition to reevaluating the experience rewards characters gain for individual kills. We understand how frustrating it can be to repetitively kill enemies. Our goal is to limit the need to mindlessly ‘grind.’” – The Aion Community Team (full address is here)

Both gamers and those who make the games expect potential customers to come and take a tour of the new game world. And it is certainly expected that not all those who arrive in that first free month of a games life cycle will make the virtual world one of their new homes.  The question still arises, however, what happens when a game fails to turn a “virtual tourist” into a new “virtual resident”.

This was one of the questions that My Co-host Fran, and I will be discussing with Tipa from West Karana and JMO from MMO Voices on an upcoming No Prisoners, No Mercy (NPNM) show.

When Paul Barnett discussed the matter with us, he likened the process to someone who leaves a girlfriend, hoping to find someone better, but always ends up yearning for the “love of their life” – whatever that first game or mmo happened to be.  There certainly must be something to that; for the “first love” of many players is World of Warcraft (WoW) and that is the game against which all others seem measured. Yet while investors and “triple AAA” developers alike hesitate to do anything other than what is expected, that can be one root causes of virtual  tourism.

What exactly do games “expect”?

Take 1 million gamers and ask them what they are looking for in a game and you are likely to get one million different answers. In the end analysis, no doubt the gamers themselves aren’t sure what they are looking for but will merely know it when they find it.  If the product you create is “approachable” as Scott Hartsman told us on an earlier there will be any one of a number of players who view themselves as the “core” of your customers and say “its too easy” (as happened in WoW after the Northrend expansion).  If it takes too long to level, for whatever reason (see Aion Online comments above) there will be yet another sector of gamers that will react as if you shot their dog. To paraphrase the great U.S. President Lincoln…

You can’t please all of the people some of the time so you had best please a few of the people most of the time.

As you will hear TIPA point out on a future show, many players take a tour of a new game world hoping to find something different and end up finding the same game they just left.  After all, who needs another WoW when you still have the WoW icon on your desktop? Mythic Entertainment started with a tabletop game named Warhammer where a great battle will often find three armies pitted against another, the survor always ready to pounce on the weakened victor. What they gave us (all considerations of art style aside) was  a game with one side pitted against the other…more of the same game mechanics used in just about every game that hits the shelves.

Aion Online, on the other hand, can’t seem to decide what it is. Yes, they have called it a PvPvE game.  An interesting approach but it is still a two sided game because the third side is controlled by the AI (the “E” in PvPvE).  If a gamer, such as myself, joins looking forward to new and innovative pvp I end up dieing on the vine as I try and wade through 25 levels until I get to pvp (Yes, I know about rifts but that isn’t pvp, that’s a slaughter).

This is why I will always applaud the independent game developer who dares to do something different.  There may be those in the gaming community who, in their ignorance, will sneer and call such games  a “niche of a niche”. What such games present to the mmo community are something that is desperately needed – someone who marches to the beat of a different drummer.  When a developer finally breaks out of the mold of game mechanics that are tried and true, we can finally go out looking for something different and find it.

See you online,

Julie Whitefeather*

*Brought to  you from a bed in a convent, somewhere in Illinois.