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The Game Archaeologist: Rubies of Eventide
I can't say that Rubies of Eventide has been on my radar, like, ever. And yet practically every time I've asked for suggestions of a game to cover in this column, it seems like someone pipes up asking that Rubies gets a little publicity. That tells me that there's some underground love for this title. There are two things that separate Rubies of Eventide from the rest of the MMO pack and make it a fascinating case study. The first is that it's one of the very few MUDs that was transformed into a graphical MMO while retaining its roots in old-school play. The second is that it had an absolutely ridiculous number of playable classes: 104, to be precise. Some days I really miss the era when game designers would aspire to reach these incredible numbers. Faced with the prospect of an early death, Rubies of Eventide miraculously survived and ran for six interesting years. Let's take a look at a MUD-turned-MMO this week, shall we?
Microsoft hires linguist in 'App Store' dispute with Apple
CNET reports that in its fight to keep Apple from trademarking the name "App Store" for its own mobile marketplace, Microsoft has hired a linguist to testify that the phrase "app store" simply means a store that sells apps, and therefore it should not be used by Apple to talk about its own platform. You can read the whole statement online in PDF form, but basically Microsoft is trying to use every trick in the book (that book being the dictionary in this case) to keep Apple from nailing down a hold on the App Store title. This isn't the only litigation around the term -- Apple is also going after Amazon for trying to use "Appstore" to name its own marketplace. And I'll throw in one more wrinkle that doesn't seem to have occurred to the lawyers yet: I also heard an echo of "Apple" in the phrase "App Store" or even the term "apps." While it technically comes from "application," of course, I always thought it was pretty lucky for Apple that the first three letters of its name had showed up in the market that's become one of its biggest money makers. [via Mac Rumors]
