brianna-royce-tdg
Latest
The Daily Grind: Do you prefer content celerity to quality?
Gamers love to mock Blizzard Entertainment for the "glacial" pace of content updates to World of Warcraft. Patches and expansions seem to trickle out so slowly that players have time to unsub and resub multiple times between updates. Trion Worlds, on the other hand, seems determined to push RIFT patches through on a monthly basis, as if to show WoW how it's done. And yet there are trade-offs to speed. All other things being equal, more time spent on content means more polished content. And content released at break-neck speed can wind up launching more quickly than subscribers can actually digest it, leading to players who find themselves lost and languishing in the wake of a game that's effectively lapped them. That leads us to today's Daily Grind topic. We often clamor for more content and faster updates, but is that really what players want? When it comes to your content, do you prefer celerity or quality? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: Will Pandaren lure you back to WoW?
Blizzard Entertainment is taking a gamble on its next expansion, Mists of Pandaria. World of Warcraft is still on top, but since Cataclysm it's nevertheless taken a beating. Some players attribute recent subscriber losses to games like RIFT; others blame it on natural gamer fatigue. Still others point to blunders in Blizzard's game development decisions. Wherever the blame lies, there's little question that MoP must deliver, especially with a few other likely blockbusters just beyond the horizon. But on WoW's official forums, existing players aren't exactly united in praise for BlizzCon's reveals. While some fans are happy for the new race, class, and zones, others complain of cute-overload and yet another massive do-over for talents. And on non-WoW sites like Massively, gamers are already suggesting that the expansion is jumping the shark. What do you think -- are Pandaren Monks, a new Asian-inspired setting, and new dungeons enough to lure you back to WoW? Or is there nothing Blizzard can do to win you over? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: Should more MMOs implement sidekicking?
Back when Ultima Online was young, gamers didn't have to think about things like levels or content walls. Regardless of our skills or how long we'd been playing, we just joined up with our guildmates and went dungeoning. Throw enough people at a lich lord or a demon and that sucker's going down! But with the rise of level-based themepark games, the gap between time-rich and time-poor players has widened -- you aren't going to accomplish much if you're level 15 and your friends are all 50 and knee-deep in the endgame. To help alleviate that problem, games like City of Heroes and EverQuest II pioneered "sidekicking" and "mentoring" systems, which allow highbies to partner up with lowbies, effectively boosting the noobies' levels and enabling their access to high-end content. Other games shun such systems, perhaps because they're difficult to balance and allow players to (at least temporarily) skip grindy level-based content that's meant to slow them down and keep them paying. What do you think -- should more MMOs implement sidekicking systems? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: Are MMO sequels doomed to fail?
Massively's Justin Olivetti has been covering the late great Asheron's Call 2 in this month's Game Archaeologist series. In it, he and his interview subjects suggest that the early closure of the game was due in part to the fact that AC2 was a sequel -- and worse, it was a sequel to a game that was still running alongside of it. It isn't as though all sequels are failures; EverQuest and EverQuest II are both still around, after all, though EQII has never quite risen to the relative prominence of its predecessor. And Guild Wars 2 is right around the corner ("when it's ready"). But we can certainly point to other sequels that never even made it to launch, like Ultima Online 2 and Ultima X: Odyssey, which were canned specifically because the developer believed they would hurt their big brother, classic Ultima Online. What do you think? Are sequels generally a bad idea, too risky, doomed to fail? Are GW2 and EQII among the few exceptions that prove the rule? Or should we embrace a modern, graphically enhanced "re-envisioning" (as PlanetSide 2 is putting it) of old and beloved games? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: Do you prefer historical settings?
This week, Massively's Karen Bryan attended a GDC talk by Charles Cecil, the creator of Broken Sword, on the topic of writing games that employ history and historical themes. Cecil wisely noted that historical themes tap in to the audience's shared mythology to generate a compelling game and to serve as the foundation for accessible puzzles relevant to the storyline. And yet strict historical themes in MMOs, even when not diluted with more fantastic elements, can also betray immersion -- would it really make sense for a game about the American Revolution to allow female characters to become military generals? Dark Age of Camelot certainly saw its share of success pairing real-world European legend and modern 20th-century fantasy, while its cousin Imperator, set in a futuristic Roman Empire, was canceled in favor of another Mythic game. World of Tanks thrives off historical realism, whereas the upcoming The Secret World is making an art-form of layering myth over mundane. Still, history-flavored games are very much in the minority, perhaps because they allow studios much less freedom of lore design. What do you think -- do historical (or pseudo-historical) MMOs work for you? Do you prefer pure escapism, or would you rather play in a "home-turf" setting whose real-world backstory is your own? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: Are you obsessed with jumping?
I suspect that if you polled players about their biggest Guild Wars pet peeves, the lack of a jump ability would be toward the top. The game world just isn't built with a Z-axis. Even if you could jump, there'd be nowhere to go. ArenaNet has been quick to assure fans that the sequel will in fact have jumping. Jumping! You'd think there were no other important mechanics, like crafting or travel or guilds! Besides, if you build your world for jumping, you also build your world for falling... like off of City of Heroes' tall buildings or those obnoxious Kelethin tree platforms in EverQuest (seriously, learn2railings, Wood Elves!). Still we crave our spacebar jumping, so much that we demand it even in 2-D sidescrolling crafting sandboxes like Glitch (where jumping neither decreases aggro nor makes you harder to target in PvP, sadly). Are you one of those obsessed with jumping in MMOs, and if so, why? Is it a nervous twitch? A way to immerse yourself in the gameworld? Do you jump for attention? Or is jumping merely shorthand for an interactive three-axis world? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: Should games be region-locked?
A reader named Sam recently wrote in to Massively with a concern: He's a U.S. expat who moved to South Korea only to find he cannot log in to his North American Age of Conan account. The reason? Funcom employs region-blocking. Customers in Korea simply cannot connect to the U.S. game servers. Many games make it obnoxiously difficult for players in one country to play with friends in another. At the dawn of every World of Warcraft expansion, my own guild sees a flurry of Americans fussing with PayPal and buying boxes for our European members. But at least that's possible -- at least Blizzard isn't blocking their logins altogether. And upcoming MMOs, like Star Wars: The Old Republic, seem to be reversing this trend, forsaking region-locking altogether and letting folks play together and deal with the lag in their own way (although the company's not exactly making it easy on its customers Down Under). What's your stance on region-locking (and -blocking)? Do you think companies should insist on keeping players neatly corralled by country and language for the sake of server stability and customer support? Or do you think that such policies undermine one of the best qualities of MMOs -- the chance to play with people from around the globe? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: Should devs listen to player councils?
EVE Online's Council of Stellar Management started as an idea with good intentions, as a way to bring the players' ideas and wishes to the development staff. But the scandals surrounding EVE's CSM seem to undermine its potential for constructive feedback. Few gamers seem to believe that the Council, dominated as it is by megacorps with their own agendas, truly acts in the best interests of the game or the playerbase. And in spite of CCP Games' declarations of cooperation, few players believe that the CSM is much more than CCP's way of paying lip service to the community. But perhaps that's as it should be. What say you, Massively readers? Should games bother with councils of players reps? Are players simply too narrow-minded or corrupt to be trusted with such power? And should devs be strong-armed into listening to the mandates of such players? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: What MMO will never see the light of day?
MMO veterans probably remember DAWN, an "MMO" planned by Glitchless, which famously spawned the a company is at steak! meme before anyone called them memes. DAWN promised more features than any MMO had ever seen: permadeath, reproduction, player police and prisons, home construction, enforced roleplaying. You name it, Glitchless claimed it'd be in the game. And it would have likely been an amazing sandbox... if it hadn't been a scam meant to fool the gullible. We've all come across games that scream vaporware, even if the developers aren't exactly in on the joke. Today, we want to know what MMO out there has you convinced it'll never actually launch, and why. Is it because of dodgy developers biting off more than they can chew? A skittish publisher with a track record for early cancellations? A naive or dated pricing scheme, graphics set, or understanding of the competition? Whatever the reason, tell us: What upcoming MMO will never see the light of day? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: Are you a critter-killer?
You're all alone in the woods. You're stalking your prey. The wind rustles the leaves in the trees. The sun's beams dance on the water. You could be off grinding for epics or mining ore, but no. This target is elusive and notorious and a threat to life as we know it. You're after... the critter. What did that bunny ever do to you? Does the thought that a baby deer might be roaming the forest without a care in the world weigh heavily on your conscience? How dare that level 1 penguin show his cute little face in your leveling zone! Adorable miniature turtles in your heroic dungeon must be smashed with a large warhammer; crit numbers must be pasted in chat with glee. You'll endanger your instance-mates and risk aggro to flatten that newbie rat the devs added for atmosphere. Forget cow-tipping: You won't be satisfied until you've slaughtered the entire grey-con bovine population and seen that sweet, sweet achievement pop-up. Does this sound like you? Are you, in fact, a critter-killer? And what drives you to such action? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: Should games cut us off? [Updated]
Recently, Free Realms instituted a troubling feature for accounts belonging to minors. Parents began noticing that after they or their children played for three hours on an account flagged "minor," the interface announced that the player had entered "fatigue gaming time" and should log out to get some exercise for his health. Moreover, fatigue time reduced all in-game gains for the player by 50% and prevented him from completing quests and spinning the loot wheel. Gamers erupted over what they saw as Sony Online Entertainment's attempt to intrude upon the parental domain, and the company has since rolled back this feature and stated it was "unintended." Still, other games have implemented similar features. What say you, Massively readers? Are you happy for games to nanny you (and your kids), or do you think they should mind their own business? [Update: SOE contacted us to clarify that this feature is for the Chinese version only, as part of that government's Chinese Anti Indulgence System. It was accidentally included in the US version of the game briefly, hence the "unintended" statement. It's not in the US version of the game at this time.] Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: People still play that game?
You know the one. That one game. The one you quit since you're so ahead of the curve. The one with the dated graphics and the vintage writing and the mechanics from at least a bajillion decades ago. The one that treats polygons like a precious resource. The one that patched out the obvious perfection that was its launch state, rendering it wholly unplayable forevermore. The one clearly supplanted and bettered by every game since. You just can't believe anyone would stick around in a game so... old. And yet people do -- and they pay for the privilege! OK, even if you're not that guy -- the type who posts "people still play that game?" in every comment thread just to show how awesome he is -- there's still probably a game that makes you wonder who plays this stuff? So what's the one game you're shocked is still around? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: How do you deal with class overload?
As my guild gets around to signing up on the official Star Wars: The Old Republic website in the hopes that we can join the game as a group during the pre-order access phase, we're slowly coming to the realization that we kinda like playing the same class. As in, most of us. As in, more than half of us are planning to play Smugglers at launch, which makes for an awesome themed guild but doesn't really help us much in terms of class balance when it comes to actually putting groups together and running content. Granted, the new wave of MMOs is doing away with rigid class restrictions and holy trinities, but that doesn't mean all need for balance is dead and gone. So how do you deal with a class overload in your gaming groups? Do you embrace the theme or hope players' desire to be a unique snowflake will help them spread out their choices? Do you impose limits on classes and force people to diversify? Or do you figure your friends will figure it out on their own once they can't form a balanced group out of four Han Solos? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: What will be the last sub game standing?
Take a look around the traditional subscription MMO market. Notice anything unusual? That's right -- there aren't many games left that can really call themselves traditional sub games, and there are fewer still on the horizon. So many MMOs are going or have gone free-to-play or freemium in one form or another that traditionalists are left without many MMO safe havens -- and even most of those have given in to double-dipping microtransaction shops. That makes us wonder which game will be the last to convert fully to the modern Western-style F2P. Will Blizzard be the lone holdout, refusing to turn the aging World of Warcraft into a free-to-play MMO? Will it be a sandbox like Ultima Online or EVE Online, whose design mechanics discourage easy account creation? Or will a newer game like RIFT or the upcoming Star Wars: The Old Republic have more staying power? Which game will stay subscription-only until the bitter end? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: Do you still watch game trailers?
As the summer convention madness winds down, some of us in the Massively offices came to the realization that many of the upcoming, over-hyped releases aren't necessarily floating our collective boat. Though we're sure to buy all these blockbusters, play them, and love them in the end (we're gamers, after all), it's been hard to summon much enthusiasm in the pre-launch fog. Some games are making us apathetic -- in my case, so apathetic that I skipped over some of the major gameplay videos from Gamescom and PAX, even for MMOs I am planning to purchase or have already preordered. At some point, I know I've already decided to buy it. I don't need the spoilers or details anymore. How about you, Massively readers? Do you consume all the big gameplay videos and trailers like a feral fan? Or are you so over the hype that you'd rather pass up the footage and wait until you can play the real thing? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: Would you play another Ultima MMO?
The last time rumors of a new Ultima MMO flew, the Massively readership collectively drooled all over our site. This time, it's less a rumor and more a what-if: In an interview with IndustryGamers, Ultima series founder Richard Garriott stated that he has his "own very particular ideas for what Ultima can and should become over time" and that he'd be open to collaboration with Electronic Arts, which currently owns the IP. Given Garriott's current interest in social media gaming, we have to wonder whether a new Ultima game -- a spiritual successor to the still-going Ultima Online and its canceled sequels -- might someday enter the MMO arena. What do you think? Should Garriott and EA make another Ultima MMO or stick to single-player romps? And if an Ultima sequel actually made it to launch, would you play it? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: Have you ever hooked your parents on an MMO?
MMOs may be intended for kids of all ages, but that doesn't mean kids of all ages are actually playing. While we've all read about that great-grandma guild leader and the eight-year-old boy who raids alongside his father, in practice those cases seem like outliers. The stereotype, at least, is that gamers can barely keep their older relatives on the cutting edge of technology, nevermind get their parents to indulge in online gaming. My mother may have pwned my kid brother and me at Seaquest back in the '80s, but nowadays I just can't convince her to look past FarmVille for her gaming fix. So what about you, Massively readers? You seem to be an age-diverse group. Have you had any success getting your parents -- or any older relatives -- into your MMOs of choice? And how did you pull it off? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: What was the juiciest reveal at Gamescom?
Every summer, the Massively staff spends time lurching from con to con in a drunken haze of MMO reveals. And every summer, we mull over those reveals, mentally ranking each one for quality, practicality, guts, and comic-relief. Gamescom has provided another such opportunity. WildStar? 2007 called; it wants Tabula Rasa back. The Secret World in April? Ambitious. Otherland? About time. Huttball? Wait. Really? Huttball? Then again, we'll play just about anything. So you tell us: What would you deem the best reveal of Gamescom? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: Are you among the 10% who finish what they start?
Last week, CNN published an article declaring that video game attrition is significantly higher than we might have suspected. According to the post, 90% of gamers don't finish the video games they start. CNN lists several possible reasons for this phenomenon: the rising age of the average gamer (37), shortening attention spans, different life focuses, gaming platforms, game lengths, and a roster of new games -- particularly the more profitable and time-consuming multiplayer games -- that's becoming increasingly bloated. Setting aside the question of whether MMOs even have endings at all, we have to wonder whether MMO gamers suffer this same inability to see a game through to the finish line. Whatever you consider the "end" of your MMOs, do you ever get there? Are you among the 10% of gamers who finish what they start? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Daily Grind: It only ends once
"It only ends once. Anything that happens before that is just progress." After six long years, it's finally over. You've reached the end of it all. Most of the characters are dead, you're sick to death of the setting, and the lore retcons make you weep. But you don't even care anymore. You're tired of the whole ordeal. You don't want to think or talk about it. You don't want closure -- you just want an ending, any ending. You just "need it to be over." Am I talking about LOST or an MMO? Yes. TV shows -- even more than movies -- have a lot more in common with MMOs than you might think. A lot of them get canceled before they even start. Plenty of terrible ones last far longer than they deserve. And the ones that do make it to an "endgame" without being abruptly and unceremoniously canceled are nearly always a disappointment, somehow, even if you loved them along the way. No matter how amazing and revolutionary they are, there's always something you wish they'd done differently to make that experience perfect. And sometimes, you're just happy they're over -- so you can go on to the next big thing and feel that excitement and wonder all over again. So, as we say aloha to the LOST phenomenon, let's consider how it relates to MMO endings. What do you think were the best and worst MMO endings, inside the game and out? Did you quit the game, or did the game quit you? Did it end in triumph, tragedy, or blessed relief? [Note: Spoilers are possible in this comment thread.]
