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The Summoner's Guidebook: Reckless risk-taking in League of Legends
Most people who play League of Legends tend to take really silly, ridiculous risks. If you've read the Summoner's Guidebook for any length of time, you know that I always recommend playing your cards close to your chest and avoiding uneccessary risk-taking. However, being extremely cautious is not the best idea in the long-term. I'm not suggesting that taking risks all the time is good, but I do advise taking at least one or two stupid gambles every game. Calculated risk-taking is important to victory. You can't be timid and let the enemy walk all over you, but you also can't be mindless. It's important to know the difference.
EA wants to 'take some risks' on Wii
According to EA's Joe Booth, plans for the Nintendo Wii are "long-term" at EA, as the company tries to strike a good balance of titles for the popular platform in 2009. In an interview with the Official Nintendo Magazine, the senior producer for Electronic Arts' Nintendo group said the company wants to "take some risks" with Nintendo's home console."The industry has woken up to the Wii," Booth told the mag. In his own estimation, Booth -- who is overseeing Need for Speed Nitro for Wii -- feels the Wii has a lot of "new energy," which drives his group's passion. Perhaps Nintendo's energy stems from sailing high above the competition in hardware sales. Electronic Arts has a slew of Wii exclusive software planned for 2009, including EA Sports Active and Dead Space: Extraction, along with special Wii versions of its annual sports franchises. [Via Edge]
Wormhole exploration hearkens back to EVE Online's early days
EVE Online's latest Apocrypha expansion has elevated the exploration profession to new heights. The addition of roughly 2500 new and uncharted solar systems, expanding the game's galaxy of New Eden to over 7500 solar systems in total, brings what can honestly be called 'true exploration' to the sci-fi MMO. Territoriality is a major aspect of EVE and wormholes allow players to emerge in far flung regions of New Eden -- sometimes places they're not supposed to be -- leading to all sorts of unexpected near-death experiences. Players have already reported emerging from wormholes and finding themselves hunted by the local territorial powers (player alliances claiming those regions of the galaxy) or by the NPC authorities, in those cases where players are involved in factional warfare. Some pilots have found themselves deep within enemy faction territory, leading to all kinds of insane chases across the galaxy.
What draws players to EVE while keeping others away?
EVE Online is the type of game that doesn't have the broad appeal of fantasy that titles like World of Warcraft. Certainly, it attracts a number of players who are looking for an edgier game experience where actions have consequences. For some, the consequences can be steep, causing those gamers to shy away from EVE. Being wary of your fellow pilots is always a good idea, but it's not all piracy and suicide ganks. The game offers freedom to do what you want in the sandbox, but most EVE pilots stay on the right side of the law. Sam Guss is a writer at EVE-Mag.com, an up and coming site that focuses on EVE Online, who wrote a piece that caught our eye at Massively. His article is titled "Is EVE for You?" and looks at what the attraction to the game is for him, and speculates about the wider appeal of EVE to other dedicated players. If you're an EVE fan, what is it that sets the game apart from other MMOs? And for those that don't play EVE Online, what aspects of the game keep you away?
Battery recall cause for panic? Null says no
With all the sensational press about battery recalls and exploding laptops (much of it found right here on these very pages), you might think that your own notebook is a ticking timebomb set to blow at any moment (Qantas sure does). Therefore, many people have been tempted to eject their recalled batteries as quickly as possible and send them off to Dell (and now Apple) before they burst into flames and become fodder for numerous gadget blogs. But is the situation really that urgent? Former Mobile editor-in-chief and current Wired and Yahoo! Tech contributor Christoper Null sat down to do the math, and figured that the odds of your lappy going boom in, say, the next two months, are actually pretty slim. Using the Dell recall as a baseline, Null went in with the assumption that the problem is much worse than the company knows about (or is reporting), and that over the next three years, ten times as many batteries will blow as have already combusted so far. Even in such a pessimistic scenario, the odds of your particular Dell pulling a Dell in the next 60 days (1 in 1,230,000) are far less than the chances that you'll die this year from freezing to death, choking on your own vomit, and even falling out of bed. While you may disagree with Null's numbers and methodology, the point here is clear: there's no real need to panic, and if your notebook hasn't already turned into a charred husk of its former self, you'll probably be okay waiting out the initial flood of returns and sending your battery back in a few weeks. After all, if we let the defective batteries change our way of life, then the defective batteries have already won.
