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Breakfast topic: I wish I knew then what I know now
A simple topic, but so difficult to figure out the answer to. If you could go back to when you first played WoW and give yourself some advice (WoW-related only, you can't tell yourself not to date that skeezy dude with the '80s hair from the Rockford), what would you tell yourself? In retrospect, I probably would have advised myself not to make a Rogue as my first character to level. They're a nice class, but having a primary Rogue made it difficult to get into groups and raids. I would have made a Druid or Priest instead. Additionally, I would have never tried to level in Silverpine Forest, entered Stromgarde Keep, or tried to solo all the seven billion elite quests before Outlands. I would have never tried to raid hardcore, and generally spent less time thinking about loot and more time cooking deviate fish. What would you do differently if you started WoW again?
Is ignorance of class changes bliss?
Ahhhh, how I love the Elitist Jerks forums, the home of the most intelligent, informed, and well-written players of WoW. EJ produced another gem of a topic recently that made me think a bit about the purpose of sites like ours, and what function they serve in the overall scheme of WoW. Malan, who plays the tauren shaman Keiji on Skullcrusher, recently posted in a thread on the shaman forums about an upcoming patch. Rather than complain about shaman mechanics, however, he asked the community manager Nethaera an important meta-question: If most WoW players don't read the forums, and the forums are the main way the developers and community managers tell new information to the player base, then isn't there a huge gap in communication for most players?
New WoW Insider directory page
New to WoW Insider and want to know what's in our back catalogue? Looking for our more reference-oriented posts? We know stories and features drop off the front page all too quickly and search isn't always the best way to find something, so we're always looking for ways to give you access to some of our older content that's still informative. We've started a new WoW Insider directory page to help you find some of our best guides, resources and original features. Is there a guide we haven't done yet that you'd like to see? Let us know what you want to know in the comments! WoW Insider directory
Breakfast topic: Has WoW had a positive or negative impact on your life?
There's a fairly familiar troll thread on the WoW Europe forums -- the usual "people who play WoW are wasting their lives" spiel. "I am worried that people are, and will, lose the best years of their real life to WoW," writes Anti. "... In my experience, between 18-21 are the best years of your life, partying, girls, going mad, you get the idea...those years can never be replaced ... Most people WILL look back at some stage in their lives and regret the real life they threw away to play Warcraft. And if they dont think it was wasted time, and still regard it as time well spent, their present life at that time must be sad." The thread has a lot of responses, from people regretting the time they've spent in WoW to celebrating that they didn't waste their youth drinking and partying. So that inspires me to ask: Overall, has WoW been a positive or negative force in your life? Do you regret the time you've spent on WoW, or consider it a good investment? I've been playing WoW for two years now, and I don't really regret the time I've spent on it. I don't neglect my real-life responsibilities to play, I haven't become a lump attached to a keyboard, and in many ways, WoW has actually enhanced my real life. I've met tons of people who I would never have occasion to meet out in the world. I visited a new city to meet some guildmates, and liked it so much that I ended up moving here. WoW helped me get a writing job and opened up new career opportunities. Heck, WoW even helped me learn French, although most of what I learned was raid instructions and curse words. Sure, I sometimes get scared when I realize my /played on all my characters is in the triple digits, but if I hadn't played WoW, I would have just watched TV or stared at the ceiling. What about you? Has WoW been a good thing or a bad thing for you?
X3F/Joystiq reader meetup today in Santa Monica
If you live in the Santa Monica area or if you're in town for E3, be sure to take time to attend the X3F / Joystiq reader meetup. This will be our first meetup EVAR, so we want to make it extra special for those who attend. There will be free food and drinks, and the first to show up will receive free Joystiq T-shirts. Not only that but we'll be giving away lots of spiffy swag that we've accumulated this week. If you've got the time, we'd love to see you there. It's an all ages event, so don't hesitate to bring the tykes.When: 6PM-9PM on Friday 13thWhere: Mahalo HQ, 902 Colorado Ave. Santa Monica 90401 (Google Maps link)In case you've already seen this post, we'll be moving it up throughout the day so we can get the word out. And no, you haven't gone crazy.
DS Fanboy travels Around the Interweb to whine about hard games
Siliconera has started doing these great roundtables called "From Around the Interweb" in which various game writers opine on a topic. The last one was about the DS Style series-- check it out for some interesting discussion on non-games!This week, Spencer was kind enough to invite me along for a discussion of hard games. This week's panel included Spencer, RawMeatCowboy from GoNintendo, CheapyD from CheapAssGamer, PSP Fanboy's Andrew Yoon (who has made mysterious appearances here!), and, for some reason, me! We were all able to reach a consensus on the divisive issue of whether or not hard games were, in fact, hard. I had a great time and I was honored to be in such illustrious company!
Getting to know you: The Microsoft E3 press questionnaire
One of the reasons blogs were invented was to pull away the curtain and show the reader, on some small level, what's really going on in the land of OZ. As journalists who were invited to E3 are digging their Nintendo invites out of the spam filter (yup, that's probably where it ended up), Microsoft's invitations to their briefing just arrived. No big deal, fill out the form per usual ... and then there's Step 3 of the registration. A gaggle of questions that are perfectly innocent, but just a little strange to be asked.Wondering what they are? Check them out after the break.
Can we get a rousing fanboy welcome for ...
We here at DS Fanboy would like to welcome yet another new blogger to the ranks: James Konik! James is joining us from the faraway land of Japan, and we hope to abuse his linguistic abilities round out our global coverage with a man on the ground in the land of gaming heaven. By way of greeting, he had this to say:"I'm originally from sunny England, I like most games, particularly adventure games with pirates in, and I hope to flip the lid on new and unexpected areas of the Nintendo fanboy world."Sunny England and pirates, eh? Well, at least he has a sense of humor. Please make him welcome, and give the poor guy a few days to adjust!
What's this? Another blogger?
We've got another new addition to the DS Fanboy team to parade in front of the masses: Eric Caoili! Eric is tentatively excited to be joining us here in converted outhouse The Man calls our "office," though it may be that all the sharp objects are putting him off. By way of introduction, he had only this to say:"May we never regret this."Indeed. Well, stop in, say hi and give Eric the Fanboy welcome he deserves, but please hold all tomatoes, rotten eggs, and rolls of toilet paper for at least a week to give the poor guy a chance to adjust. Two new bloggers so far! What say you, Fanboy reader? Are you pleased that our faceless stable of dancing monkeys is expanding? We dance for your amusement, after all.
Metareview: Sonic and the Secret Rings
Sonic and the Secret Rings has been released, and in what is certainly the highest profile release since the epic Twilight Princess at launch, our expectations are rather high. In what is being billed as the first truly decent 3-D Sonic game (or, at least the first one since the original Sonic Adventure), the hedgehog has the scores to prove it. IGN's was a little low, but it turns out they hate the color blue. So, you know.Who wants a little blazing-quick spiny-mammal in their lives? Gaming Age (85/100) has very little but praise for SatSR: "Sonic and the Secret Rings makes a solid attempt to fix the problems that have plagued the Sonic games over the past few years. Many of the gripes have been addressed in this newest title. The extraneous characters have been eliminated and Sonic is now the only playable character, just the way [it should be]. The horrible camera and hit detection problems of the prior games have been fixed. The speed has been ratcheted up and the action is fast and furious." Gamespot (76/100) is impressed with the visual splendor: "The graphics are great in Sonic and the Secret Rings. Each level is large and has a great sense of scale, with huge dinosaurs, pirate ships, corkscrews, loops, and other structures to run on. The visuals are sharp and colorful, and you'll have a great time just watching Sonic run because the game provides the same thrilling sense of speed that made the Sonic games appealing in the first place." IGN (69/100) dislikes things that are blue: "Players will fail to complete levels again and again in Secret Rings not because they lack the skill to progress, but because the control mechanics are too loose and unresponsive, the camera is too stupid to shoot the action accordingly or, worst of all, the level design is simply poor."
META seeks to push HD DVD / Blu-ray formats, features
Considering that some retailers are already implementing larger floor displays for HD DVD / Blu-ray discs, and the wee fact that we've already got a combo player out on the market to appease the fence-sitters, we suppose it follows logic that an off-the-wall group be formed to push the formats and their all too controversial features into public acceptance. The recently-formed Media Experience Trade Association (META) is hoping to "improve consumer acceptance of emerging formats" by slapping "META Seals" onto discs that clearly inform consumers of certain usability benchmarks and by "creating digital media standards" that would help the faltering iHD Advanced Navigation and BD-Java features blossom. Interestingly, the group's purpose is to simplify things and make the user "feel less intimidated," but we're not so sure that tossing extra labels and probably a few hidden dollars in the pricetag to compensate for "their work" is the best approach. Still, it looks like yet another tag will be hitting high-definition discs "by the end of 2007" if this all pans out, but if we end up getting a bit more functionality in our next-generation flicks, we won't grumble too much.
Can we get a big fanboy welcome for ...
... the latest addition to the Nintendo Fanboy staff, longtime reader JC Fletcher! He will be joining us here as soon as he gets accustomed to the chains The Man employs to keep us in these tiny, tiny cubicles. By way of greeting, he said: "Hello, Fanboy readers! I'm thrilled to be joining the team and helping to provide your daily meta-Nintertainment. I hope we can have a very happy and well-adjusted poster/commenter relationship. I promise I'll never say "Nintertainment" again."He signed a contract immediately after, proving he will never again use that word. Give him a few days to adjust, folks. After that, do what you must.And while we're at it, an update on the state of our search. If you were contacted for the second round, we are still considering your submissions, as we have room for at least one more blogger. If you have not received anything from us so far, then we're sorry -- this wasn't your time. We got a ton of great applications, though, and we offer heartfelt thanks to everyone who sent in samples.
MetaDoom: play Doom inside of Doom 3
Regardless of what it says about the merits of id's latest creepy corridor crawler, it is possible to play Doom 1 inside Doom 3. Why, you ask? It's not because Doom 3 is so dark, you'd rather play Doom 1 in the glow of a terminal screen; rather, the Terminal Doom project is a proof of concept study of "fully interactive surfaces." To that end, the mod creator writes, "In more than one respect, Terminal Doom itself is a dead end." Awww, but that doesn't mean you can't try it out. All you'll need is the retail version of Doom 3, either the shareware or retail version of Doom 1, and some patches and you're set to go. The in game arcade cabinets are pretty great also. [Via Waxy.org]
Pete speaks at Design 2.0
Yeah, we know it's a little late now, but if you happened to be in San Francisco last week you might have noticed our own Peter Rojas was one of the speakers at Design 2.0, a Core77 sponsored event that found Pete on the receiving end of a round of applause for sparing the audience the obligatory PowerPoint presentation. Oh, we also heard his Q&A session went over pretty well, too. Well done Pete!
Smash Bros. Dojo updated
Smash Bros. Dojo, the official Smash Bros. website, has updated the character section. Pit, star of the game Kid Icarus for the NES, and Meta Knight, rival to the gluttonous pink ball that is Kirby, are the first two of the game's characters to receive the star treatment with added screenshots and biographies.
Breakfast Topic: Game Over
It might not be something any of us are countenancing, but people do stop playing WoW. There are many reasons to quit--lack of time, money, enthusiasm. However, as with any MMO, the words "Game Over" never flash on your screen--how do you know when it's time to stop?We each have different goals when we play WoW. I play because I enjoy the social side of things, and my ultimate goal (if I had all the time in the world) would be to play every class to level 60, visiting every area and dungeon, finishing every quest line. I love the depth of WoW, and I like seeing the tricks that other classes can pull off to surprise me; I want to learn them all. I'm not in this game for epics, but I know many of you are. If I achieve that goal, I may stop playing, or I may have found another along the way.What's your core goal in the game? Have you left WoW and returned, or has it always had a place in your life?
