Category Archives: Playing Around (w/ new games)

A Stranger in a Strange Land

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The wind just kind of pushed me this way

*imagine a disjointed computerized voice*

Welcome Foton. We knew you’d be back.

(wtf! Did you hear that?)

Why don’t you just input your credit card information now to save yourself the bother later? We know how you hate being bothered.

(surely you heard THAT!)

umm, you already have it. But, I’m just passing through.

Of course you are.

No, I’m serious. Just trying out … heh … the trial. *gulps*

You know how it is.

Of course.

It was too hot to sleep. I followed the distant sound of a Siren. The wind just kind of … pushed me this way.

(this is sure stirring up some ghosts for me.)

There’s one thing you’ve got to learn. Is not to be afraid of it.

No, I like it.

I like it, it’s good.

You like it now. You’ll learn to love it later.

Hang the rich.

(fuck the courage of my convictions. God, I’m weak.)

*/ooc bastardized from Robbie Robertson.*

Guild Wars

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Guild Wars threw open its doors earlier today for those that pre-ordered … like I did, a few hours ago. (UPS, don’t fail me now!) The rest of you wishy-washy types will have to wait until the 28th to attend the noob meet and greet.

Unlike the Warcraft opening, lo these five months ago, there really hasn’t been a huge buzz among the super-secret player societies with Guild Wars. I’d like to think it’s because THEY (meaning, not me) learned a lesson about shooting their mouths off with: this will be different! this is Blizzard! Blizzard is god! Blizzard’s stuff is very polished!

Ya, it’s polished alright. Five months later and I still have a two-second cast time on my instant-cast spells … if I cast at all, that is.

Don’t get me wrong, I have concerns with this Guild Wars game. The important difference is, I have much lowered expectations this time. One could say, I have ZERO expectations even. The only certainty is that I’m out 80 bucks. (What can I say? The in-game collector’s-edition-only doodads sound cool.)

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Vanguard

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On our guild boards, one of the dudes was asking about Vanguard: Saga of Heroes, if we were going to try and worm our way into the beta.

WTF, I thought that was years away, wrote I.

Nah, think it’s soon, wrote he.

I think he’s high because I checked around their site and I can’t find anything other than it will be “some day.” I read the FAQ. Here’s an excerpt:

1.4.1 What do you mean by a ‘third generation MMORPG’?

We usually use the word ‘generation’ more like an ‘era’… when a group of games come out around the same time, were in development mostly around the same time, and therefore couldn’t use each other as reference nearly as much as older games, we call that a generation.

Under that definition, M59, UO, AC, EQ, etc. were all first generation. They pretty much just had MUDs to look back on and be inspired.

When you get to AC 2, SW:G, EQ 2, and WoW, all of the developers are able to look back not only at MUDs but also at what worked and didn’t work with the first generation of MMOGs.

Vanguard will have the advantage of looking back at both generations, learning again from what worked and didn’t work with all of those games. In other words, we will be able to analyze EQ 2, WoW, etc. too.

That doesn’t mean our definition of ‘generation’ is ‘right’ or ‘official’, but that is the rationale we use when we refer to Vanguard as a 3rd generation massively multiplayer role-playing game.

heh. Kinda ballsy.

Seems like they missed a generation there, so they’re probably more like fourth generation, although if they take long enough to give birth to this thing, could be fifth generation. Just saying.