A couple of really creative Minecraft ‘work’ (edit – errors with embedding. Sorry for the ugly linking.) I can see my house Beam me up, Scotty A working 16 bit computer. Really. I need to up my standards. I was happy just tunneling.
Minecrafting
I forgot how much I love the sandbox. It even took me a while to adjust my playstyle expectations – big, random generated world that I can do whatever I want with. Sadly, I have lost the ability to post pics to my own blog (help, Joe!) – so I can’t share the sheer awesomeness…
GAMMOP – Thou Shall Not Covet Thy Mobs Gear
MMO’s have generally accepted principles much like accounting. Rules and systems that have been adopted over the years. I recently signed up to try the Age of Conan Trial (haven’t played it since I dismissed the game as ‘not for me’ in beta). I’ll most likely discuss how things have changed there in another piece,…
Secure Online Starcraft 2
Starcraft 2 cost a reported 100 million to make. Not far into the release, Blizzard bans 5000 players for cheating. I know, I know. The 1337 hackers are always ahead of programmers. Curious though, out of a 100 million development budget, I wonder how much was budgeted to make a game difficult to hack/cheat? Especially…
Can We Teach A New Dog Old Tricks?
Blizzard seems intent on taking a new direction in Cataclysm – making the game more challenging. I’m very curious if the follow through, and if they do – even more curious if they stick with it. The basis of the change, without going into too much detail, is making CC required in instances again as…
time = money / money = pizza [therefore] time = pizza
Callan hits an interesting point in the comment section over at Tesh’s musings about the value of his time. I am in Tesh’s camp here, where my discretionary budget is at an all time high, and my time budget is at an all time low. Gamers often judge the value of a game based on how…
Star Wars The Old Republic : Hopes and Dreams
I have writers block. I have 7 drafts written on various topics but am having a hard time piecing them together. Some of them are related, and I think, can I combine them? Do they make sense? I have lost my groove, and working to find it. My time off blogging was spent playing 3…
Here’s Your Answer, Tesh!
I suppose the Global Agenda ‘strike while the iron is hot’ promo is, uh, striking while the iron is hot. Last chance for APB refugees and other Shooter/MMO fans to receive discount Dear Shooter/MMO Fans: Recently, I wrote an open letter to APB Refugees and other fans of the Shooter/MMO genre. In that letter, we offered…
The Body is Still Warm…
Received this in my inbox today. An Open Letter to Shooter/MMO Fans from Hi-Rez Studios Dear Shooter/MMO Fans: The last few years have been rough for many fans of the Shooter/MMO genre. Several innovative game titles with great communities have folded as they sought to bring together those of us who enjoy the fast-action, intense…
iPhone Game Fun: Flight Control
This little doozy is addicting. The premise – land like colored planes on like colored landing strips while managing the flight space so none of them hit each other. The twists – easily identifiable planes (of the same color as well) fly at different speeds. The hook – you can’t win. It goes by total…
I has Returned
Miss me? I’m sorry I left! I had a whirlwind year where both the effort and joy of blogging had to take a backseat. It has been a very interesting year. I became a CEO (complete with the 90+ hour work weeks) I almost lost, then managed to salvage, my marriage I had a 6…
Maybe Worth The Price of Admission
Unconfirmed rumours from a reputable source about Blizzards Cataclysm expansion. I would probably buy it and try it. I have complained about not using the world of Azeroth before – 80 levels shuttled into a handful of instances for the end game. Those rumours, if true, are a brilliant move by Blizzard. That is what…
Online Reputation
A little bit of frustration is settling in with Blood Bowl my past handful of matches. No, not the gameplay (which can be punishing) No, not the randomness (which I love) – but Yes, the weak network programming. BB keeps a “reliability rating” with your account. Basically it is a percentage based score of matches…
From Russia With Love
I have been getting an inordinate amount of spam from Russia, written in Russian. Anyone else noticing this? Sadly, I deleted them all before running a google translate, but I’ll be sure to remember to fix that when I get another stack.
Blood Bowl Part 2 : When Doves Cry
Online play is pretty spectacular in Blood Bowl. No, not the interface or lobby (needs a lot of work) or the random connection errors (before starting matches – I haven’t had it happen during a match) and the matchfinding needs work too. It updates slow. After a little nudge from Syncaine from Hardcore Casual (the…
I’ll Take the Red Pill
One thing I loved about the Star Wars pen and paper game was the concept of the ‘red’ dice. SW was played with all d6 – and on your rolls you always had to had an off colored dice. That dice was the “special” dice. We called it the fate dice. It may have officially…
Pre Marketing Hype Example Gone Wild!
If you don’t have anything nice new to say, don’t say anything at all. This ‘exhaustive’ Q&A about SWTOR is just exhausting to read. To save you the clicky, I’ll paraphrase the key points for you. After the break.
Lack of Inspiration
Blargh, I tell you. Blargh! I find it extremely difficult to write about gaming when I am not gaming. It’s frustrating as I see all of you poking your noses in here to see what I’m writing about – and no doubt that comes with heavy dissapointment. Bored and Unispired Gameaholics Anonymous (BUGA) chatter, after…
Beta Fatigue
I am a very busy guy lately. Work is rediculously busy, family is busy trying to enjoy the summer, and a lot of games are getting closer to release. Since when was summer beta season? I am in 5 right now. With little time to play any. I manage to do a little in each…
A Survey request from EA/Bioware
I know a lot of people hate EA. I am in the small minority who have really enjoyed their products, and haven’t been dissappointed when purchasing their games. Of course I do a lot of research before buying games, and never buy a game by who it is from – but rather on the merits…
Building Blocks
Comic created by Masssively.com. Funny Stuff! The Cities XL closed beta started last week (I cannot confirm or deny being a part of aforementioned beta) and it has brought a lot of attention back to one of the great PC staples of the ‘building genre’, and ties a little MMO into it. I loved Sim…
Will the Real Slim Shady Please Stand Up?
Breaking news over at broken toys – the return of an old MMO hero/villain. Is Brad McQuaid back? Myself, as well as others tend to think it’s a hoax. Let’s chat about it a bit – it has been a slow gaming “work” week anyway.
Lighter Topic
I am part of a WoW guild. I have spoken briefly about it in the past in a few topics, but nothing major (you know, the one I used to be GM of, yadda yadda). It’s going through a change right now, and the people that founded the guild are mostly gone. It was a…
Don’t Be a Hater!
The lawyer-in-training is coming out (heh, no pun intended) in me today. In law school, professors hammer into us the fact that “words matter.” A lot of time and effort is spent poring over words and their meanings; often disputes will turn upon a word that you and I think has a fairly settled definition.…
Forswearing Greed – Developers take Notice
This post is inspired by the article of the same title in the June 6th to 12th edition of the Economist. A group of Harvard Business MBA students have made attempts to turn management into a formal profession. Doctors have their oath, so do Lawyers. CEO’s have always had one too – except it isn’t…