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Choose My Adventure: Life as an Arisen in Allods Online
The Massively community answered loud and clear when I asked who, what, and how I should play in Allods Online. Voters in last week's Choose My Adventure poll sent me along the path of the Empire in the shoes of an Arisen and equipped me with a Psionicist's dagger along the way. The community also favored the subscription server over the free-to-play server, with some voters claiming Allods is too "pay-to-win" on the free-to-play server and others simply expressing curiosity about whether they'd see a difference between the paid and free versions of the game. With those voted handled and counted, my adventure had officially begun.
PlayStation Blog reveals Game of the Year winners, as chosen by readers
It's that time of year again! No, not when we gather with our loved ones and take a break from working. It's Game of the Year season, meaning we've got a great excuse to look back on games we played in 2013 and tell everyone about our favorite experiences. The PlayStation Blog finished tallying up votes from its readers yesterday, announcing the Platinum through Bronze-worthy victors in a blog post. In regards to their shiny new PS4s, readers most enjoyed their relaxing, sing-along journeys on Assassin's Creed 4: Black Flag's Caribbean seas. The Last of Us won over the hearts of PS3 users, presumably for the knee-slappers that came out of Ellie's joke book. Vita fans were most enamored with Tearaway, Media Molecule's crafty platformer made out of paper. Lastly, Housemarque's voxel-jumbling shooter Resogun was voted as the year's best digital release. Looking forward to 2014, fans are most anticipating Infamous: Second Son, the smoky super hero story based in Seattle, which you can expect on March 21. If you're curious about more than just the winners, the full post also lists runners up for each category as well as personal picks from the PlayStation Blog staff.
Choose My Adventure: Against Allods
Last week's Choose My Adventure poll turned out to be something of a landslide. A couple of tweets and forum posts were all it took for gPotato's Allods Online to emerge the very clear winner of a race that included titles like Guild Wars, Champions Online, DC Universe Online, and Defiance. And now, with the winner chosen, it's time to leap into the fray and start smashing things in the face with fireballs or mallets or whatever it is one smashes with in Allods Online. But of course, this is a community activity. I can't simply create a character and start questing. No, dear readers, I need your help in deciding where and how this adventure begins. So let's get it started.
Choose My Adventure: The weather outside is frightful
December is here, which means it's about time to throw some logs on the fire, grab every blanket in the house, and collapse under the mantle in a freezing, sobbing heap. This week's arctic blast has left the United States feeling a lot like Northrend, but for those of us in certain parts of the country it's just the beginning of what's sure to be a long, hellish winter. However cold it may be outside, there's always a warm, toasty inn waiting in our favorite games. MMOs also provide sunny vistas, hot deserts, and steamy swamps, all of which make great places to escape nasty real-life weather. Even when it's cold in an MMO, it's still warm at our desks. In this edition of Choose My Adventure, I'm depending on you to help me hide from the snow that's piling up outside of my window. You don't have to send me somewhere warm, but I'd appreciate it if you send me somewhere fun.
Choose My Adventure: Neverending Neverwinter story
Of all the things this trip to Neverwinter has shown me, the ability to continue a character's story beyond the quest that Cryptic provides stands as the greatest thing I think any online game can give us. Although I don't believe that Neverwinter (or any other game, for that matter) gives me everything that I ever hoped for, the Foundry does allow those who enjoy dungeon mastering in the classic Dungeons and Dragons sense a chance to test out their skills at creating a story within a realistic development environment. Most writers would love to have a blank slate, a platform to do whatever they want to do, but realistically, that never happens. Every development environment contains its own limits and challenges content creators have to overcome. Sometimes the engine doesn't allow writers to do what they would like. Sometimes budgetary limits constrain the creative process. Sometimes writers forget that they are making a game and not a novel, so "fun" adds its own limits. As a writer and a gamer, I have been given a taste of what it takes to make an enjoyable quest for a gaming community.
Choose My Adventure: Neverwinter wonderland
When I think about what separates a good Neverwinter Foundry mission from a great Foundry mission, I have to say that it's the ambiance. Ambiance ranges from sounds to lighting to special effects. I could create the best mission ever, write the best story, but if I don't create the best ambiance for the quest, my design could fall flat. What are some of the best ways to create ambiance? Which ones should I put into this Choose My Adventure? In my limited time in the Neverwinter Foundry, I have barely been able to scratch the surface of everything that the design tool has to offer. Of course, decorations such as a dining table in a dining room add to the atmosphere of the setting, but so does the sun shining through the window or the NPCs clapping in the next room. Today, I need your assistance in choosing the different types of ambiance for different parts of our adventure.
Choose My Adventure: On such a Neverwinter's day
This past weekend, I believe I've worked out all the mechanics I will need to complete our Neverwinter Foundry quest. It contains a total of three boss fights. I don't want to give any spoilers at this point, but I'll say that one of them has a very cool mechanic that I made using the Foundry story tree. I admit that at first I saw only the limitations of the Foundry, but after diving in full-steam this weekend, I've realized that some of the tools are quite robust. One of my favorite tools is the dialogue tree. There are a few limitations on what dialogue can affect, but if you think outside the box as some creators have, you can actually make varying levels of difficulty for your dungeons or even allow players to bypass some content. Today's Choose My Adventure is a bit different from the norm. I've included the first half of my script for the quest after the break. There is no poll this time, but that doesn't mean that I don't want your input. After all, we are making this Neverwinter quest together. After you've read through the script, give your suggestions on possible changes in the comments -- I will certainly consider all of them. Enjoy!
Choose My Adventure: A Neverwinter storm is brewing
Making a Foundry mission is difficult, but not because Neverwinter makes it difficult -- not yet, anyway. The number of elements used in creating a good mission is bigger than I had initially thought. However, we will stumble through it, as I did this weekend. When I initially tried out the Neverwinter Foundry, there were many elements that were just clunky. I constantly had to switch from Foundry mode to 3-D-mode just to add objects, and I had to hope that they were placed correctly. With the recent changes, I can now pop into editor mode and place objects directly into the world, an amazing step forward. The tough part comes in creating the story and building the world in which the story takes place. Today, I'd like you to help me with a few of the elements I still need to round out my story.
Choose My Adventure: Tell me the story of Neverwinter
At your bidding, I took my first foray into the Neverwinter Foundry this weekend, and it wasn't too shabby. The Book of the Dead by Magic88255 captured the melodrama of a classic supernatural horror film and coupled it with a bit of game combat. But I think the most important thing that The Book of the Dead had to teach us was about triggers and transitions. When we eventually make our own Choose My Adventure Foundry quest, we will want to keep that sort of thing in mind. Although the overarching storyline is important, I think the little things are what differentiates good Foundry quests from the great ones. During my livestream on Sunday, I tackled another Foundry quest to get a feel for other possibilities. I completed the runner-up from last week, Valerie's Dream. Although the storytelling was a bit weaker in this quest, the character development was great. Both quests were fun, so examining the quest beyond just the fun-factor amazes me. I am actually astonished overall at the quality of quests being created in the Foundry. I hope I can live up to that when we create our own. Let's take a look at some of the elements that seem to make for a good Neverwinter Foundry quest.
Choose My Adventure: If it's Neverwinter, is it Alwayssummer?
I had a good time this weekend in Neverwinter streaming the first part of our adventure on Massively's Twitch channel. The viewers even participated in creating my character with me based on the gender, race, and class chosen in last week's column. When sitting down to actually create a male Tiefling Control Wizard, I realized that many other relevant choices that could take multiple articles just to vote on. In fact, as was evident in the livestream, in Neverwinter's character creator, you could take over an hour to roll the ideal character. Eventually, the stream audience settled on a medium-red Goku-lookalike named Morthos Angelbane. I don't know how canon that name is, but this is Choose My Adventure. It's not really my decision to make. However, character creation for Cryptic's Neverwinter offers some interesting choices that I feel really set the game apart from other similar games.
Choose My Adventure: Off to Never, Neverwinter land
Twenty-four hours after voting for this round of Choose My Adventure started, I had no idea who was going to win. All the games were neck-and-neck. But on the last day of voting, Neverwinter pulled out ahead of the pack with 40.8% of the vote. A friend of mine who will likely be joining me for my quest suggested that you voted for Neverwinter because I said I would make a Foundry quest with your help. I am interested in why that was your final decision, so let me know in the comments why you voted for Neverwinter too. Of course, I need to create a character before I actually step into this world. And unlike most MMOs that attempt to be balanced in every possible way, Neverwinter isn't afraid to dole out impactful choices at the very beginning. Even my character's race matters in Neverwinter. Not only does each race have its own set of abilities, but it also has its own stat bonuses. Now, I'm assuming that in the endgame that these bonuses turn into quality-of-life additions, but at the beginning of the game, they are more meaningful. And this is before we even choose my class, which we are also going to do today.
Choose My Adventure: Indecision 2013
My goodness, it's been a long time since I've done Choose My Adventure. I cannot wait to dive into it again. But first, I should probably break down the rules and let you know how my Choose My Adventure will likely differ from those who have come before me. Besides the weekly column that comes out on Wednesday, I will also run a livestream whenever I play the game. Of course, Massively's livestream sessions are abbreviated, so I cannot stream on that channel for the number of hours that it will take me to accurately get a taste of what the game is like. So I will run the regular livestream on my channel, then take over Massively's stream when I can. That also means that some of the choices made during the course of this adventure will be made on the livestream and not in this column. However, I will attempt to let the readers of this column make the major choices. So let's decide what game I'll be playing for you. After the break, I've listed five games that I am interested in revisiting or visiting for the first time. Read the descriptions, then at the end, vote on the game you'd like to see me play. I will have to close the voting on Fridays, so that I will have the weekend to actually implement the choices you make. Happy adventuring!
Choose My Adventure: Saying goodbye to Age of Wushu
During a Q and A with Grant Bowler, SyFy's leading man in its new series Defiance, the actor tried to explain some of his love for MMORPGs and gaming in general. He talked about EVE Online and how he once stayed up for 36 hours due to an in-game war. He bragged about how players often lose everything they have in the game and smiled as he explained its "learning curve." He even likened playing the game to being married to Woody Allen, a strange yet somehow accurate description. Am I comparing my time with Age of Wushu to being married to en elderly comic genius? No, but I am very familiar with the lawkeeper's description of his favorite game. It's the same description that Age of Wushu players use when we talk about the game, although I disagree with how wonderful the "learning curve" is. Still, I had a blast over these last few weeks.
Choose My Adventure: Learning and seeking revenge in Age of Wushu
Age of Wushu continues to impress and confuse me at the same time, but I can see much of the appeal behind many of the systems. As a reader noticed last week, many sandbox MMOs have the same in-depth systems and mechanics that Age of Wushu does, but as I have said many times before it is not only the specific systems that make a great game, but how the game has taken those systems and combined them in a package. Age of Wushu takes much of the appeal of many of my favorite games and wraps it in a beautiful package that can run on lower-end systems. I crank it all the way up, turn up the music, and enjoy exploring and trying to slowly figure out some of the harder-to-understand mechanics. This week I wanted to try out the two options that were put up for polls, and once again Age of Wushu Community Manager Earthquake and Massively columnist Patrick Mackey joined me to explain, hand out tips, and to help me remember how much of a newb I still am.
Choose My Adventure: I believe I can die in Age of Wushu
Wow. What a game, Age of Wushu. I mean, I have played many, many open-world, free-for-all PvP sandboxes in my time before this one, but Age of Wushu places all of those cool systems in a world that the West generally doesn't play in and then adds in little systems so that there is always something to do. Always. In fact the most common complaint I hear about the MMO is that there is too much to do but not enough explanation to cover all of the activities. I think the real frustration comes not from the lack of guides and pop-ups but from the fact that many of these "helpful" guides are localized for English-speaking audiences enough for them to make some sense, just not enough. I mean no offense here; this is just the truth: Broken English inside a game can make already complex gameplay much harder to understand. There are many small anomalies as well. For example, an NPC referred to me as a man although my character is a woman, and when a small icon indicated that I was hungry, I ate some food, but then an icon told me, "Hungry and Thirsty. HP and internal Energy Recovery speed increases slightly, but you will need some food." Huh? I just ate... I think? Now I can see why Patrick's Age of Wushu guides are so popular!
Choose My Adventure: Age of Wushu charms and confuses
So here we are in the second week of the Age of Wushu Choose My Adventure coverage. There's no way that even a dozen weeks would cover everything there is to know about this awesome MMO, but luckily the point of this column is to show what it's like to jump into game not only while I'm blind but also when a crowd is directing my every major decision. That means that I get to act like myself and enjoy getting lost in a game that is truly a living world. Age of Wushu is fantastic for certain newbies just as it seems it is for vets. Of course, it's not all that rosy. In almost every article I have read about the game, and even in the chat room while I streamed the game live (it's embedded after the cut), I saw players who expressed their disappointment in how confusing the game is. Massively's own Patrick Mackey has been helping me along the way, and he said on the stream that the best thing to do to alleviate confusion is to "join a guild." I agree, so that's going to be one of the questions I put up for a vote. Having access to Patrick, the readers and players, and the developers themselves does put me at an advantage over typical newbies. Click past the cut and lets get to what I thought about the choices that were made last time, and be sure to vote on this week's poll questions!
Choose My Adventure: And the winner is...
Choose My Adventure is a funny column to write. At some point, you as the author know which game will likely win, but you also know that at some point everything can go wonky. I've seen games that seemed to be the sure thing get knocked off by a lone wolf or underdog. I like to poke the developers who are running the games that are in the polls in the hopes that they let their community know about the column and get the polls heating up. There's nothing like a good vote to get people excited about MMO games, and that's the way things should be. Even though I watched the poll go a few different ways, it was relatively obvious what title was going to pull it off. I started to prepare by updating the top titles and reading up on some of their systems. Choose My Adventure is not a light undertaking; it's a real adventure -- hopefully -- through an unfamiliar world. I knew I would need the community's help in deciphering the winner. And what a winner!
Choose My Adventure: The loser's circle
None of the games you are about to read about is a bad game. Don't let the title of the article fool you; these are all great games, but so far none of them has won a poll during a Choose My Adventure run. What is Choose My Adventure? Well, you wonderful readers will pick the MMORPG for me. and over the next several weeks you will also vote on what I will do in the game, which faction I will pick, which class I will have to roll, and so on. It all depends on the game -- and you. So you and I have some work to do. It will be a long road but hopefully a scenic one. With your help, I will be able to keep up the tradition of putting a Massively writer through six weeks of joy, frustration, pain, and loot. A lot of loot.The list of losers is potentially long, but I decided to keep it relatively short and sweet. If you see your favorite game on the list, go tell the game's community. Get out the vote! Or have some fun torturing me! I normally go with indie or games that do not normally get much coverage, but these losers just begged me for a chance at winning CMA.
Choose My Adventure: Final thoughts on my return to LotRO
This week marks my last time in Lord of the Rings Online for this Choose My Adventure, and I've really enjoyed myself. The game has changed tremendously since I last played it, and it was exciting to finally sit down and spend some quality time with what once was my favorite MMO. Last week, you voted for me to focus on the changes in Evendim for this last write-up, so I will not only do that but also let you know what I think of the game as it stands right now as a level 34 Warden.
Choose My Adventure: Dabbling in LotRO's skirmishes
This week on Choose My Adventure, I discover skirmishes in Lord of the Rings Online and realize that Turbine invented the MOBA. OK, not really, but I did enjoy the similarities. As voted in last week's poll, I dedicated this week to playing in a few skirmishes before I go full-force into Evendim. I dipped my feet in the skirmish waters and then dived back in for more, but was it an entirely positive experience?
