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The Digital Continuum: Statistical Anxiety Separation
One thing I've taken to recently is lurking over at the Nerfbat forums, where many great minds discuss a lot of different things concerning massively games. One idea in particular has given me a spark of -- probable -- insanity in regards to something I've been giving plenty of thought to lately. The insane idea is this: What would a massively game be like if character avatars had no stats?After reading though several different concepts presented in the thread responsible for this lunacy of mine, I started to wonder why every one of them focused on keeping with the fantasy motif. To me, it seemed obvious that if you're going to delve into a massively game where the characters have no numerical (or numerical-like) levels, stats or personal equipment it, was going to have to happen in something other than your standard fantasy adventure. That's when two unexpected things came together for me and I realized something. A game where characters don't have any stats attached to them could exist with a difficult-to-design IP that's quite near and dear to me. What's the property, you ask?
The Nerfbat forums have returned!
For those of you who have been around the MMO block, this is undoubtedly some welcome news. Of course, for those of you new to the world of MMOs, but who just love the genre (like we do) this is a great announcement! Ryan "Blackguard" Shwayder, game designer for 38 Studios and custodian of the Nerfbat, has re-opened his Nerfbat forums! Originally opened in 2006, they've been re-imagined for 2008. With recent topics ranging from talking about Alts, if MMOs on Consoles and PC are able to be equally good, and other tasty poll tidbits, this is sure to be a great place to get your discussion on with other MMO fans and fiends. Added on top of that, Ryan says that he'll also periodically be putting out more "Tales from the Tavern" posts, highlighting the hot topics from the Nerfbat forums. This is especially useful if you like to read along, but just don't have the time for another forum right now. Either fully immersive or bite-sized, you can't beat a good discussion. We'll see you there!
