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Venture Beat visits Cryptic to see Star Trek Online
It's no secret that while Cryptic Studios has done well for themselves over the years, Star Trek Online is easily their biggest project yet. In fact, if successful, this game will easily attract a large amount of people who probably wouldn't otherwise look at an MMO, let alone purchase and subscribe to one.With this in mind, it's no surprise that Venture Beat's Dean Takahashi visited the developer for the skinny on everything to do with both the game and the company behind it. The videos and feature are more of a probing look into the people working on the beloved franchise's foray into massively multiplayer online gaming space than a preview on the actual game itself -- and we're all the richer for that. Getting a look at the heart and soul of the people behind any game is supremely refreshing.Check out the video coverage from Venture Beat after the break.
Is China's WoW delay politically motivated?
I don't presume to know much about trade policy or international relations, so I'll just pass you this link to a story over on VentureBeat and let you decide for yourself. You probably have already heard that Blizzard has had plenty of trouble trying to bring World of Warcraft back online in China -- they've been waiting on approval from the Chinese government's General Administration of Press and Publication, which has already mandated a few changes to the game. Dean Takahashi at VB suggests that rather than being a technical issue, the delay may actually be political and/or economically motivated: the US and China have been bumping gently lately over exports and imports, and Takahashi suggests that Blizzard's game may have gotten caught in the middle. The GAPP, he says, may be holding the game back, concerned that such a popular foreign game might be released again on their soil.Fortunately, even Takahashi says it's unsubstantiated -- WoW is likely to go back online in China in a matter of days, and the delays could just as easily have been administrative errors. But I do agree with Takahashi that it's worth watching -- China is cautious about allowing foreign manufacturers to sell to their citizens, and video games are no exception.
