Digital Dave

Edit: Reports are coming out noting that WAR has 500,000 subscribers registered in just a week.  The real test will be to see if those players like it enough to stay (I’ll be bailing out).

Playing this game reminded me how much I really enjoy playing MMOs, but made me realize how much time I don’t have to devote to them.  I guess the only possible way to fix this craving is to find a MMO company to work for. But then the entire atmosphere and exploration element would be spoiled. Well, considering the size of these games, maybe not.  It’s one thing to make these sort of games, but its something else to actually play them — I imagine.

If I had the time, I would probably invest it in this game… Actually, I would probably still be playing Age of Conan.  There’s nothing really exciting about WAR for me.  I do like PVP elements, but they really need to be mingled between several systems for it to work right. Players still need options.

But, EQ2 Shadow Odyssey is coming out pretty soon, and I rather not try to detail my love for the content that is being brought back to the world.  Let’s just say, I f’n love Frogloks, I miss the Guk and I’ll be bringing my bad ass Templar back into the world.

Before reading too much into some of this stuff, mind you, I am only rank (level) 9 with a renown rank (pvp) of 7…The good thing about the game is that the levels progress slowly, and not blazingly fast.

Public Quests

I was somewhat confused when I first heard about these.  Here is an example:

• You adventure into a Public Quest designated Area
• A quest like box comes up on your screen which tells you the current requirements needed
  • Stage I: Kill x/100 of MOB Y                (You could just solo this, easy)
  • Stage II: Kill x/10 of MOB Z                 (You could still solo, hard)
  • Stage III: Kill 0/1 of BOSS                    (You will need some help)
• Every kill, you begin filling an influence bar which eventually gains you specific rewards
• If all stages are cleared
  • A window pops up with all of the names (of the people who are still in the area, helping) and computes a random number as a base value
  • Adds into it a contribution number (shown as a gold, silver, bronze medal)
  • If the player has lost out on a reward for a few rounds, they get a bonus added
  • Players are rewarded a pouch (common, rare, depending on final winner placing), where they can choose a reward from (once taken, it won’t show in the pouch again)

So these can be pretty cool. The loot is actually pretty good, especially if you can manage to get a rare loot bag.

Crafting

?! Afterthought.  I haven’t dove into it, because I haven’t been introduced to it. Not that there is a whole lot to even do…  I haven’t ran into an NPC that said, “Hey! Come here! Want to learn how to craft?” And I’m not wasting my time running around looking like a goof trying to figure out how.

The Story

Once you begin, you are thrown into the story.  You complete quests in the area that you are in, and then you work through toward a new area.  Which, in itself isn’t bad, but it’s extremely linear for an MMO… Which is surprising.  You go to camp A, work toward B, C, D, E, F… Clash with PVP at the end?

While the good and evil side have a home city, you’re not even introduced to the city right away.  You have to find some specific NPC that flys you to it.

Achievements 

I love reward systems, and they could be much MUCH better in MMOs. I’m still waiting for an MMO to do something that I’ve always wanted; Medals, ribbons – in a fantasy sense.

Now I LOVE achievements.  But in an MMO, they really need to be a little challenging.  I mean, it’s an MMO. You’re average gamer plays the game for much, much longer than the average 8 or so hour single player game.  This is a great step, but the way it’s implemented makes them a bit goofy and irritating.  I mean, in one realm versus realm battle, you might see 10 achievements unlocked, blinking all over your screen, because of the extremely basic nature of them. Like… Being killed 1 time by another race nets YOU a “You Suck” award.

Uh, what?

There’s a lot of other’s.  Like dieing 10 times… 100 times… Clicked on yourself 100 times… Looted 10 times, destroyed 10 items.  You can get more of an idea by checking out this list.

The Interface

Needs some mod work done to it.  It’s got experience bars all over the place.  This feels surprisingly daunting at first by making you realize that there are several layers to the game.

If I’m not in a PVP area, do I really need to see my renown rank experience bar?  Granted, I know you gain some while you are not in a PVP area, but it’s not common enough to plaster it on my screen.  If I’m not in a PVP area, make it go away. If I gain some, blink it on my screen once or twice.

Is there a reason to put my influence experience bar on the screen if I’m not doing anything related to influence? Like, nowhere close to being in a Public Quest area?

Why can’t I zoom in on my global map?

Why can’t the quests show more detail on the map without being so damn cluttered?

Why in the world do the icons in my bar do a mind warping fading affect when I hit one of the buttons?  That’s surprisingly distracting, and makes my head hurt.  Simple fade, fade in, blink one color to bring my attention to a button…  There’s no reason to go nuts with it.

I could go on, but those are just a few off the cuff.

Guilds

The guild management tool is really decent for what they’ve got.  I really, really like the in game calender for scheduling events. REALLY.

The PVP

As far as the basic mechanics of it all goes, it looks just fine.  Reminds me of watching my friends play battlegrounds in World of Warcraft (Nope, I never played).   I’m sure this gets really exciting later on.  But all in all, once that later on arrives, that’ll be most of everything that exists for people to do.  I’m not sure how that’ll be received by the people. You can jump into PVP whenever you want to do a little “battlegrounds” type of event, or you can try to take over areas in the PVE world that is contested.

I cracked open my fortune cookie today, ate each half, as I normally do before I read what the mysterious little gem that was once tightly cramped inside of it says.

“Money and luck are favorable next month”

Employment?! Gasp! The cookie Gods are toying with my mind? Or not? We’ll find out, I suppose.

So I’ve been helping (private beta) the guru’s over at StackOverflow with their latest endeavor – a free programming community wiki + experts exchange + digg like system.   It’s awesome, trust me.

Literally, you can go on the site and ask any technical question that can be answered, not just discussed, and your question will be answered within a minute.  Even if it is a tricky question, people will start jumping to try to provide some insight.

The system is based on reputation.  You ask a question, and if it’s a good question, people can mark it up (+points) or mark it down if it’s a bad question (-points).  If you answer questions, the same thing happens (+/- points).   They’ve also added a badge system to reward people for learning their way through the system.

But anyway, go check it out. You’ll like it if you’re a tech head like me.

http://stackoverflow.com

My department got a license to issue out the source engine to the students in my game programming class… Oh, dear…

First, I must thank Darius for directing Jeff toward my prior post.  From cross-posting that question to GDNet (thread&journal), IGDA, and LinkedIn, that was by far the most thought out and helpful response.  Thanks a lot.

So, my impression of Spore.

I haven’t been looking forward to this game like some people have, in regard to time at least (I <3 simulations, though).  I only really started following it about a year-and-a-half ago.  Apparently, it’s been in development for much, much longer than that… And has been delayed like any other game that wants to do well in this doggy-dog game market.

I was actually pretty excited to see another IP come out from Maxis.  Granted, it’s based on a prior IP if you consider “The Sims” aspects, but I thought it would still offer something really unique.  And it does.

The perspective.  Going from a awkward looking 2D cell, eating and surviving, eventually moving yourself in to an intergalactic bonanza at an incredibly fast pace.

But they seemed to forget the most essential part of the game… Not the tools… Not the glamor….  The… Gameplay.  What brings me back for round 2, if round one only took me a few hours?  They focused hardcore on the tool and building aspect of the game, and while I absolutely have a blast (along with my fiancee) building various creatures (not so much the buildings, ships, and boats), I don’t want that to be ALL I do for a $50 game.  The single player mode is a complete breeze (seems to be a common trait with really pretty games), and my fiancee does not like going past the creature stage because she thinks the game gets boring after you stop managing your own creature.

It’s a fun game the first run through. It should be, everything is new and pretty.  It’s semi-challenging because you’re still trying to get used to the way things work.  But by the time the honeymoon is over, nothing really drags you back into the game for a second run through… Unless you’re like my fiancee who love the first two stages.  When a game progresses so fast, replayability is essential.  I’m not buying an episodic game.

Beyond that, I don’t really have any reason to play it again.  I got my XBOX 360 power supply back from being replaced, and there are some goodies on that one.  Braid, Castle Crashers, and Geometry Wars 2 (awesome sequel!), Fable Pub Games, cheaper than Spore, and offers many  more rewards and replayability.

I’m not trying to be harsh.  I definitely recommend trying Spore. It’s an awesome concept and implementation.  It just needed more.

And, why in the world would you release a PC game in different markets on completely different dates? Pirates really bit them in the ass for that decision.  I looked on Friday and there were 30,000+ leechers/thiefs at the time.  ;\  The people who would have happily ran off to the store on launch day suddently didn’t have the option, but was taunted anyway.

Aside from the money issues i’ve been having due to some financial aid not hitting my account, things are rolling along well.

In one of my classes I have the requirement of building either a game prototype, engine, tool, or building a thorough design document for the final project.  I’m leaning toward building a tool suite of some sort, but I’m having a mental block on what sort of tools are needed for game development — beyond the obvious, a 2D/3D map editor.

If you have some ideas of tools are needed for game development, feel free to reply so I can debate on if I should pursue it.

Besides this class, I have another CIS course that is dishing out a pretty serious test tomorrow.  It’s not a good feeling when your instructors are even confused by the material that they are reviewing. We’ll have to see how it goes.

My creative writing class is going really well.  Learning about all kinds of things and the professor is doing a pretty good job so far.  I need to write 2 stories for this class, which I’ve already done.  They are a bit long, so I’ll either need to consider cutting them down or writing something completely different.