15 Aug 05 - Required Reading

Another day; more required reading for the MMO enthusiast. This is a repost of Raph Koster's, Laws of Online World Design< that he has compiled over the years. This a must read for anyone interested in the design of MMO's.

Ownership is key. You have to give players a sense of ownership in the game. This is what will make them stay--it is a "barrier to departure." Social bonds are not enough, because good social bonds extend outside the game. Instead, it is context. If they can build their own buildings, build a character, own possessions, hold down a job, feel a sense of responsibility to something that cannot be removed from the game--then you have ownership.

Enjoy the read and don't forget to leave your comments.

Update: 11 May, 2009 - Edited post, applied label, and removed broken link.

Owens

Not only do I play games, but I am also an avid NFL fan. My team? The Green Bay Packers. Green and gold runs in my blood. Packer football is what I was born and raised on! So why am I here on a gaming blog to speak about Eagles' wide receiver Terrel Owens? Because I want to connect some dots for everyone.

Yesterday, Owens was kicked out of training camp for a week for not being a team player, arguing with the head coach, and telling the offensive coordinator not to speak to him. Last year, by mid-season, Owens could be seen on the sideline arguing with McNabb, the Eagles' quarterback.

None of this surprising. When Owens was picked up a year ago by the Eagles I knew it was only a matter of time before Owens would return to being the greedy and selfish player he is. After all, that is why San Francisco got rid of him in the first place.

Moving on, Owens shares the same agent as Javon Walker, wide receiver for my beloved Packers. Javon Walker had a break out year last year and now believes he deserves more money. Both Owens and Walker decided to hold out at the start of training camp from their respective teams. However, Walker is now practicing with the team and there is no controversy left in Green Bay.

I blame their agent for the hold outs, but I won't blame the agent for Owens actions on the practice field. There is a reason why Walker is playing and practicing, and why Owens is QQ'ing in his driveway.

Donovan McNabb has sat by and defended Owens actions; even after Owens called McNabb out and took uncalled-for pot shots at his him. McNabb continually sat back saying that Owens needed to take care of numero uno and that his relationship with Owens was "fine".

What now McNabb? Owens doesn't want anything to do with the Eagles as a team. He never did. Everything was great when Owens was getting the ball, but when he wasn't, he took it out on you. Keyshawn Johnson, another loud mouth NFL reciever, made the words, "Give me the damn ball!", famous and we all know how far that took his career.

Flip over to the Packers now. Brett Favre, the undisputed leader of the Packers as a team, came out and publicly blasted Javon Walker for holding out and not honoring his contract. Donovan McNabb, facing a similar situation with Owens, came out and berated Favre, saying that Favre needed to stay out of other player's salary disputes.

Take a clue here McNabb. Favre came out as the LEADER of his team and put his foot down on a bad situation. He sent a message to Walker, reminding who's team he plays on and who will be giving him the damn ball. He put public pressure on a player who somehow thought that salaries came before the team. Walker will learn; if you put the team first the salary will come.

McNabb sent a message to Owens: "I like it!!! Give me more!". McNabb now has a team in a media circus and the Eagles will suffer because of it. McNabb had the chance to stop this situation before it escalated. McNabb needed to step up and tell Owens to get his ass in camp and show the team he was worth the extra money. After all, Owens was one of the highest paid wide receivers in 2004, with over 10 million earned in bonuses alone.

McNabb, as the leader of his team, should have reminded Owens that football was played by a team.

Update: 15 July 2008 - Edited post and labels.

Vanguard will be an Everquest rehash...

Reading up on an article over at Gamergod.com it seems that Vanguard is going to be another treadmill game. From the article I have grave reason for concern...

Jeff Butler mentioned at the demo that downtime will be making somewhat of a comeback as it's an important factor in socialization and community building. Players will have mental and physical stamina that they will need to replenish, but it will be reasonable for lower level characters.

-Holy shit! How socialization comes out of having my character sit on their proverbial ass is well well beyond me. I'm guessing these developers have no idea that players actually want to PLAY the game when they are logged in. Sitting, resting, or "replenishing" is not FUN. Remove fun and you remove me. Socialization and community come out of two things. Putting players together and having community driven goals. Both of which require as little downtime as possible.

Without details I don't want to go too overboard here, but unless they have taverns that push real beers out of my CD drive...

Another breakthrough feature is called demeanor. Each player will have to evaluate the demeanor of each NPC they come in contact with and apply their diplomacy skill to get the desired result. Vincent also stated that each class will be able to utilize different strategies for getting the same results. A rogue may choose to steal something from an NPC to complete a quest. A warrior may choose to use diplomacy to achieve the same ends. Also, the "hail" command will be back and each NPC will have something to say depending on your diplomacy level and their demeanor towards you.

-Breakthrough? Hardly. Retarded? Possibly. Most gamers I know ignore 99% of the quest text and NPC text that is dribbled their way. It is the reason games like DAoC and WoW have quest journals that abbreviate the goals on a given quest or task. Sometimes more detail is nice... most of the time it is not. Once again it comes back to the fact that gamers like to play the game... not read NPC text and hope they are persuading a NON-PLAYER CHARACTER to respond to them.

As the crafter progresses, he will eventually outgrow the village and need to move on to a more advanced town to learn more skills. This will have the effect of opening up his workshop slot to junior crafters. A crafter can pass on the location to a fellow guild member or friend. Each village will have a finite amount of crafting slots available. Also, many advanced crafting recipes will only be found in dungeons.

-Oh... so.... the players with no life who are logged in 24/7 get to control the crafting market? Great plan! Well guess this is good considering this game is shaping up to be powergamers'R'us.

Another inspired feature is that players can learn more exotic combat and spell skills using a skill called tactic recognition. Players can do this finding and fighting various mobs. Skills can also be learned just by grouping with other players. For example, a Thestrian warrior could learn a skill uniquely Qalian combat move just by grouping with Qalian warrior.

-Ah yes. Instead of trainers... or hell just giving us a skill tree to click on we will be scouring "spoiler" websites looking for the location of the fuzzy fuzbugger to get the fuzzy fuzzbugger attack. I'm doubting this will reward explorer types... considering that there will most likely be a line when they get there anyways.

It was important to Brad that Vanguard brings back a sense of accomplishment to players by providing a world where players can succeed by employing skill and tactics. He echoed what other Sigil staff had told me by stressing that Vanguard was about letting players make their own stories with more of an emphasis on open ended, non-linear game play.
-If it was "important" to bring back a sense of accomplishment they may want to stay far away from treadmills as possible... and clearly so far that is not the case. The old cliche of "You only won because you have no life." is ringing in my ears... and it is quite loud. If they think accomplishment = time spent... they are sadly mistaken.

True Heartless Insight... the THI effect.

Blizzard up to it again!

Reading over on the VN WoW General Forum it seems that the new Darkmoon Faire rewards that were shown on test server are being changed right before the patch is going to be released. Blizzard once again pulls the wool over the sheeps eyes. Carrot on a stick tactics that made countless people waste countless hours farming, crafting, gathering, and running around to get the required 1,000's of items to get enough Faire tickets for their item of choice.

Blizzard... masters of the bait ' n ' switch. Keep wasting your time in WoW... obviously its what Blizzards wants you to do.

Sad.T

Level 15 is the goal!

And I am at 13.9 as we speak. Going to farm up some arulite (DAoC's Catacombs expansion uber trading commodity) and then upgrade my gear all around :) Or at least I hope... never used arulite before!

Heartless out.

Aug 6th, 2005 - Required Reading

The real impacft of video games. A discussion of the morality of gaming and its effects on youth.

Highlight :

But aren't critics right to worry that gaming might make people violent? Hardly a week goes by in which a game is not blamed for inspiring someone to commit a violent crime. After all, say critics, acting out violent behaviour in a game is very different from passively watching it in a film. Yet surveys of studies into games and violence have produced inconclusive results, notes Dmitri Williams, who specialises in studying the social impact of media at the University of Illinois. And, in a paper on the subject published in June in Communication Monographs, he notes that such research typically has serious shortcomings.

Read it... Love it... comment on it!

Update: 11 May, 2009 - Edited post and applied label.

2 days and no BF2

DAoC and 12 hour work shifts have kept me offline of BF2 for the last two days... and I'm ITCHING to pull the trigger. However I am working this weekend and have other business to take are of... so I won't get my BF2 fix until Monday!

Oh the tragedy!

6 hours... 8 levels... 12 hour shifts

After fumbling my way through the new Catacomb's newbie quests on my scout, Favre, in DAoC, I finally got rolling after level three and the new Catacomb's instanced task dungeons really helped.

My impressions so far:

1. Catacombs newbie quests make 1-5 enjoyable!

2. The task dungeons are great for solo gamers like myself and can be relatively easy to complete.

3. The graphics are a good upgrade, scratch that, GREAT upgrade.

4. The community on Gareth/Albion is nice. No asshats to be found, yet. Keyword being yet. Did you get that yet???



On a side note I have switched over to 12 hour shifts 4 days a week for work. That means a lot of my gaming time is now being devoted to sleeping :( The good thing is I get 3 days off a week now... hmmm...

Update: 9 May, 2009 - Edited post and updated labels.

Favre... no not Brett!

I have rolled a Briton Scout on the Gareth DAoC Classic server. This is my first time in Albion and marks a stark change of direction for me. I am all but done with WoW. Second of all, I absolutely hated scouts when I played DAoC (considering them an "EZ mode" class to RvR with in keep or tower battles).

But here I am, playing a class I've always wanted to play. I love archers and archery and have since I started D&D pen'n'paper when I was young. A few of my friends over at Bakerton.com are setting up an Albion rogue team: scouts, minstrels, and infiltrators. We are focusing on scouts for our main attack. It should be fun.

Are you getting fun out of the game you are playing now? If not, switch to something you want to play and that will bring the fun to you!

Update: 9 May, 2009 - Edited post and updated labels.

Battlefield 2 Video - Lets Go!

I sat down and tackled the BF2 Recorder finally and here are my first results. This took approx 2 hours to film, edit, and load onto the web. It is nothing fancy... more a practice run with the tools.

Sorry for the poor quality. My computer couldn't handle recording at any higher resolutions and BF2 is a hog on system resources. At least I can record with FRAPS in BF2 unlike *cough* Counterstrike:Source *cough*

I lost my FRAPS registration info so you will have to deal with the www.fraps.com banner.

I struggled with the name of the video and also what music to put in the background. Citizen Cope - Bullet and a Target was my first choice, but it didn't work as well as it could have. Lil' John and Lets Go fits the video much better IMO.

Enjoy.

EDIT: Link updated 10 Oct 2005 thanks to Google Video!Get it here.