crazy-cat-lady
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Patch 5.4 PTR: Crazy Cat Lady/Man title added
When the Crazy for Cats achievement was discovered on the PTR, the first thing players asked for was a title to go along with it. Namely, something to do with being a Crazy Cat Person. Good news! We got what we asked for: The Crazy Cat Lady and the Crazy Cat Man were both added as titles in the latest patch 5.4 PTR build. Keep in mind that you need 20 out of the 24 cats listed under the achievement. Overall, the achievement doesn't seem too difficult for a battle pet collector to earn, especially since one-third of the cats on the list are purchasable via NPCs. A few felines on the list are harder to come by, including the Nightsaber Cub and Spectral Tiger Cub from the TCG, and the Spectral Cub awarded to players participating in the Shanghai 2012 Battle.net World Championship. I'm crossing my fingers for the title off the bat when the patch drops!
The Road to Mordor: Rating Eriador
Lately I've been playing world traveler with my level 43 Lore-master as he's bouncing all over Middle-earth in what used to be the high-level zones of the game: Trollshaws, Angmar, Forochel, Misty Mountains, and Eregion. Once again, I'm struck by just how cohesive this place feels -- it's not a collection of Sonic the Hedgehog-themed areas (Green Zone 1, Lava Zone 4, etc.) but a world that connects together in a tangible, real way. Even though it's fiction. Until November 2008, Eriador was the only place in Middle-earth that we could explore, and although some criticized Lord of the Rings Online for not shipping with, well, every locale in J.R.R. Tolkien's imaginarium open for business, it was a smart decision. The devs could take this section of the world and focus on building depth and detail instead of spreading it thin, like butter scraped over too much bread. As a result, Eriador remains a wonderful starting point -- not to mention the bulk of any current player's journey -- and many of us have grown attached to these familiar sights and sounds as a result. Today I'd like to take a brief overview of all of Eriador's zones (we'll leave Rhovanion for another day) and rate them from best to worst in terms of zone design, questing, and that slippery cool-factor that's hard to define. Where would I suggest a summer vacation home and where would be an ideal spot for a penal colony? Hit the jump and let's run it down.
The design evolution of home life in the starting zones
The starting zones form a player's formative thoughts about how the denizens of Azeroth actually live their lives. These first glimpses of life-as-our-characters-know-it are key to defining what it would be like to "really" live as our characters do. When you're in a starting area, you get to see the "common dwarf" in his natural habitat. (Or human, orc, troll, and sundry other races.) Of course, there have certainly been technical limitations over the years that restrict the number of widgets and sprites available to designers. But it's interesting to see how the home life of Azeroth natives have been improved over the existence of WoW. The above picture is from Elwynn Forest. It's the home of Donni Anthania, the Crazy Cat Lady. The domicile of Ms. Anthania includes a chair, table, a couple chests, and a wardrobe. It also has a small herd of cats wandering around the floor. Interestingly, Donni is wielding a cleaver. It's unlikely that the cleaver was intended to mean Donna is hostile; instead, it's probably because she's supposed to be cooking or something. But the Crazy Cat Lady has been in the game since before there were any expansions. Technical design was a little more limited then. Let's compare this to how the blood elves lived come Burning Crusade.
APB: Reloaded blog chronicles the resurrection of an MMO
If you're as fascinated with the saga of All Points Bulletin's death and promised resurrection as we are, then buckle up, hang on tight, and cling to clichés like there's no tomorrow. We've already talked with GamersFirst about its tentative plans to tweak and reopen APB next year, but there's far more to the story than that. On the APB-Reloaded blog, GamersFirst's Bjorn Book-Larsson decided to chronicle the journey from acquisition to relaunch with a series of weekly posts. In the first such post, Book-Larsson makes the humorous observation that his company has been called the "Crazy Cat Lady" of MMO publishers due to picking up "strays" and nursing them back to health. He then dives into the challenge of balancing the game's content and play against its new free-to-play structure. This transitions to his second post, which examines the company's plan for premium (i.e., paid) players. "The goal then becomes nudging the most hardcore players into 'Premium' account status, in order to help pay the bills, while also letting people lease weapons and perform micro transactions for other items," Book-Larsson writes. So far, the blog is proving to be a great ongoing read of this high-profile situation, so head on over and check it out for yourself!
The Road to Mordor: Happy 3rd anniversary LotRO!
Every Friday, The Road to Mordor brings you the latest in Lord of the Rings Online news, guides and analysis. Three years ago, I was leafing through a computer gaming magazine and found myself intrigued at a multi-page spread for a new MMORPG called Lord of the Rings Online. The very thing that pulled at me was that LotRO, as they described, was blissfully low magic in a way that World of Warcraft's glitzy shinies was not. Instead, here was a world that was a little more realistic in scope, a lot more beautiful, and connected to a killer IP to boot. I was hooked. As we celebrate LotRO's third anniversary this week -- don't forget to log on to get your Writ of Virtue -- it's amazing to reflect on just how far this game has come. It may not be the multi-million subscriber hit that some had hoped for, but it's more than respectable in player numbers, community growth and general respect in the field of MMOs. Two expansions and several content patches later, we've walked with the Fellowship of the Ring from Bag End to Weathertop, down the long road to Rivendell, through the dangerous Mines of Moria, and out into the beauty of Lothlórien. We've experienced two new classes, housing, fishing, the skirmish system, crafting dungeons, a new player experience overhaul, the Lone-lands revamp, several major holidays, and the successful reestablishment of the Shire's postal service.
Ask a Lore Nerd: So You Think You Can Dance, Naxxramas edition
Welcome to Ask a Lore Nerd, where each week blogger and columnist Alex Ziebart answers your questions about the lore and history of the World of Warcraft. Ask your questions in the comments section below, and we'll try to answer it in a future edition.Today's Ask a Lore Nerd is best read while under the influence of obscene amounts of caffeine and sugar, and while listening to catchy J-Pop (or similar music). Tsuguru is preferred, though most anything the Yoshida Brothers have created is acceptable.Bjara asked...When you are in the DK starting area, you can have a funny little chat with Noth at the plague cauldron and you find out he really, really hates Heigan from Naxx. Do you know why? I'm still trying to find a way to work "slime and crap filled dance studio" into conversations on a daily basis.
