marking
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Sega Alliance launched, will provide marketing and production support for indies
Sega has announced a mobile initiative that it's calling the Sega Alliance, which seems like a publishing division of Sega Mobile. Sega says the Alliance will "provide participating developers with comprehensive marketing and production support as well as creative consultation." In other words, this is Sega's version of Chillingo, where the company will find indie developers doing good work and back them up with production and creative support, as well as partnering in the revenues when the apps are released. For a lot of indie devs looking for a spotlight, this is probably good news. As open as the App Store is, it can be hard to get seen by users and the press, and teaming with Sega is a good way to do so. Jack Lumber is a new $.99 game on the App Store, and it's the first release through Sega Alliance. The game was created by Owlchemy Labsthe folks behind Snuggle Truck, and it's a game along the lines of Fruit Ninja, where you have to draw lines across your iPad or iPhone to cut wood instead of fruit. The game looks interesting, and we'll have to see how this Sega partnership helps its chances.
The strange art of marking
I like Nikol's writeup of her experiences marking targets in instances. There really is an art to laying down those icons in a group, and it requires quite a bit of knowledge to do right. You need to keep group makeup in mind, know the abilities of all the classes involved, pay attention to what individual members want to do and even how they're specced, and have a basic knowledge of the instance and how it works. There's so much that goes into it that it's basically an art in itself -- do you sheep the caster and take out the minions, or focus on the big bad first and then move on to trash? Do you have the group to interrupt and pull a caster to a trap, or do you need to get the mobs out of the way before the patrol comes through?It's complicated and fascinating stuff, and this kind of group coordination is why some players choose to play PvE rather than PvP -- because while yes, the mobs are predictable (and players aren't; as much, anyway), the fun is in the planning. And when you get a good group to go with a good planner, then things really get interesting. There is an art to laying down marks, but once you study what a good marker does, and get the hang of it, you're that much more helpful to any groups you're in.
