Game-Guides
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Steam launches 'Game Guides' as part of Steam Community beta
Steam's user-generated content network/hub Steam Community has received a new feature that allows members to create and publish their own guides for Steam games. After joining the Steam Community Beta, users can utilize the Guide system's creation functionality to craft stuff like Alden's Overly Simple Portal 2 Puzzle Creator Guide.Steam's guide creation tools allow users to inject photos and videos from their Steam Cloud into their guides, as well as embed YouTube videos. Additionally, other Steam users can be given read/write access in order to aid in a Guide's construction. They could also aid in the Guide's destruction, we suppose, but that's on you for inviting trolls into the fold. We recommend a battery of background checks and drug tests before allowing any acquaintances, online or off, access to your VVVVVV Space Station 1 Speed Run No Deaths How To Guide™.
The Daily Grind: Should games offer a midpoint between pre-made builds and completely free builds?
There are a lot of different ways you can put together a character in certain games. The Secret World offers players a huge number of different options by virtue of its skill wheel, RIFT gives players several souls to choose between, and Champions Online lets you cherry-pick from a huge pool of powers. Most of these games also offer you some pre-made builds to give you a sense of how the game is supposed to work, something to start you down the path of making your own build. Unfortunately, as soon as you decide to step off the pre-made train, these games throw up their hands and declare that you're entirely on your own. There are no suggestions based on what you've picked thus far, it's either fully pre-made or fully freeform. Should these games offer something in the middle so that you can have some extra guidance if you want it? Or should they let you live or die by your decisions if you decide you want to go off the rails anyway? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: Would you use an official wiki in your game of choice?
Some of us were chatting around the Massively (virtual) water cooler yesterday and came to the conclusion that one thing a lot of MMOs are missing is a reliable, up-to-date official wiki. With a few exceptions like the Guild Wars Wiki or EVElopedia, the majority of the MMO game list lacks a comprehensive official wiki -- a central hub for update news, gear and loot details, gameplay guides, and so on. Many games have but don't maintain them, and many more don't have them at all. Is this something that should be remedied, or is the lack of supply due to the lack of demand? What do you think -- should more developers put resources toward the creation, expansion, and maintenance of this sort of thing? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Anvil of Crom: Once more unto the Breach, dear friends
Ah yes, where else but Massively can you get a lesson in both Shakespeare and Age of Conan (in the same article, no less)? Nowhere else, I tell you, and before we get to the Conan part, let's get ye olde English out of the way. Many of you have no doubt uttered today's titular phrase on your way into a particularly nasty game dungeon. A few of you may have even uttered it correctly. Here's your gold star. The rest of you, pay attention: It's unto the breach. Unto, not into. So said Shakespeare and later Olivier in his 1944 film adaptation of Henry V. And yeah, I used to say it wrong too. Anyway, on to the AoC. The Breach in question is one of two new solo dungeons added with the Unchained update, and thanks to Blood and Glory, this particular dungeon is the only one of the pair that your humble columnist has found time to sample. %Gallery-128404%
Massively Exclusive: Guide to Aion's Esoterrace instance
Massively's exclusive Aion info is back for another encore, and today we've got an in-depth walkthrough of the new Esoterrace instance for your viewing pleasure. Esoterrace is a level 50 dungeon coming to the live servers with next week's 2.5 update, and we've teamed with NCsoft to bring you the instance's first complete guide. The dungeon is designed for full groups and is accessed via a rift inside the factional fortresses of Gelkmaros and Inggison. Players will only be able to enter Esoterrace if their faction controls one or more of the Balaurean forts, so get out there and take the fight to the Asmos (or Elyos) when the patch drops next Wednesday. Esoterrace is a large zone featuring windstream transportation, a number of challenging mob types, and a final boss, Kexkra, who can be fought in either normal- or hard-mode. The zone also features a number of easter eggs and hidden treasure chests, so head past the cut to start your preparations.
A Mild-Mannered Reporter: Auld lang syne
A year ago on January 27th, viewers of the site were treated to a header image in which Mr. Swift poked hopelessly at a keyboard. This was the header for the first installment (or "issue" if you want to be thematic) of A Mild-Mannered Reporter, covering all things City of Heroes. And for those of you who are just now glancing at your calendar, yes, that was just about a year ago. Those of you who remembered my sign-off for the last column (the one that mentioned this would be an anniversary column) are in slightly better shape. These things happen once a year, and I figured one day early is better than six days late. And it's been quite a year for the game and the column alike, with plenty to talk about every Wednesday. So let's take a trip down memory lane and look back at a year of the column with another year just around the corner. If you're just coming into the column now, or if you want to look back at some old favorites, now's the time.
Librarians who play World of Warcraft
Apparently the great WoW Ladies LJ community is full of librarians (who knew?), and they've pointed to this interesting article about a panel that includes a short presentation about World of Warcraft, and how libraries can benefit from providing resources about the game. Their numbers are a little off, in terms of players and how much they pay per month, but their reasoning is right on-- there are lots of reading resources online about the game (*ahem*, that's us!), and sites like WoWWiki and even GameFAQs (fine, laugh if you want) can be perfect for getting people who don't usually do much writing to try putting their thoughts into words on a page.I'm usually iffy on using games for education, because usually the people trying to do it don't have the first clue about what games really are. But something like this-- asking a beginning writer to use their game knowledge to make a guide or analyze gameplay-- seems much more well-founded and beneficial. And if all these librarians are part of the nine million people who play WoW, then this definitely seems like a great idea-- use common ground to help teach reading and learning skills.Of course, that doesn't necessarily mean WoW Insider should be bookmarked on every library computer (although, now that it's been mentioned...). But it's cool to see librarians using their knowledge of Azeroth to help teach real-world skills.
