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Anti-Aliased: Dr. Podlove, or how I learned to stop worrying and enjoy EVE Online
I've really been stuck in a rut lately. The only game that really appeals to me anymore is World of Warcraft because of the polish and spit shine that Blizzard put into it over the past few years. When you look at the pinnacle of game design that is WoW, most other games sadly pale in comparison. That, or they blatantly rip off of WoW in such a spectacular fashion that it makes the game almost unplayable due to the fact you will constantly compare it to the original, better source material.Lucky for me that a month back, Valve struck a deal with CCP and put EVE Online on sale for a weekend via Steam. With cash in my pocket and a song in my heart, I finally dropped the cash to pick up a game that I played at least 10 two-week trials of. It's here that I'm going to finally introduce the catch to this entire article -- I, up until about a week ago, absolutely, positively, hated EVE Online.
Will Wright on gaming and time travel
EA's Will Wright recently gave a talk at When 2.0, focusing on the interaction between players and time in games, and a video of the talk has been made available. According to Wright, games become a form of time travel--you can always restart from the beginning, starting with exactly the same state. This is an interesting point and applies to most games, but what of multiplayer gaming (where mistakes are made and forgotten in a heartbeat, or remembered by your opponents for years to come) and MMOs (where your character gains levels, but never loses them)? Repeating the same game again and again in multiplayer games is akin to an eternal Groundhog Day, whereas in MMOs you can always start a new character, but we do lose the ability to wipe the slate clean every time, to roll back to a save point and to play out multiple "what if?" scenarios. [via Gaming Steve]
