The Bloody Kos : Chapter 1 : The Arrival has been posted.

I have posted the first chapter in a series entitled, The Bloody Kos. Chapter 1, The Arrival, can be read here.

I like to write, so stay tuned for more :)

SOE hires IGE, Part II

Cuppycake over at Cuppytalk has a problem with what I had to say about SOE in my previous SOE hires IGE posting. Apparently I am not looking at the situation from a business point of view? I must admit; she caught me red handed. I am not looking at this as a business person, because I'm not.

Don't get me wrong here, I am a firm believer in game developers being a business first and a developer second. The companies that fail to adhere to this principal have fallen by the wayside, a great many vaporware titles being left in their wake. However, believing this principal, and talking about it, does not mean I look at developments within companies with a business eye.

I am a gamer. I am the customer. This is where I draw my opinion from. But, for a moment here, let me turn a more analytical eye to this.

Once again, the main issue, is the fact that SOE already operates Station Exchange servers. They are trying a new business model. Cuppy may applaud them for the effort, but I do not. As I've stated, it legitimizes a practice that directly effects the game and more importantly, it's community. As long as I know that a developer does not support RMT, I can dismiss the actions of the RMT participants. As soon as a developer starts dipping their hand into the RMT cookie jar, I as a paying subscriber, can no longer justify anything I achieve.

The next point of contention is that SOE didn't just hire this guy. They created a position for him! In the business world that usually means they hand picked the person well before the hiring. If that isn't a red flag, then I have a car you might be interested in buying.

The basics of this situation stink, and we all know what they say: if it stinks like fish; it's fish. SOE created a position for a former IGE big-wig. SOE has been exploring RMT business models for their games. If any players want to avoid developer-sanctioned RMT, avoid SOE games at all costs.

SOE hires IGE

David Christianson, former Vice President of Business Development for IGE, will now be the Vice President of Business Development & International Operations for Sony Online Entertainment. SOE's official press release states that "prior to joining SOE, Christensen served as Vice President of Business Development for IGE where he drove the company’s relationships with the massively multi-player publishing community."

This news is beyond interesting. SOE already runs Station Exchange servers, which basically legitimizes the practice of Gold Farming, Power Leveling, and Real Money Trade(RMT). The ramifications of such are heavily debated, but I have yet to find a non-SOE voice that actually believes services such as Station Exchange are good for a game and it's community.

This may seem like just a RMT issue to most people, but a little research into IGE will show a slew of unethical, and questionable business practices. It would not be surprising to wake up tomorrow, and see IGE being investigated on money laundering charges. Why would SOE even think about hiring a former IGE employee; let alone an employee so entrenched within the company? This hiring speaks volumes about the business politics of SOE and their money first mentality.

This strongly supports my opinion that SOE just wants your money. Everything they can charge you for; they will. They don't give a damn about you as a player, and I doubt they ever will. Sorry Grimwell, I had to say it.

Bye-bye Labels

I have removed the label section in my sidebar. It was getting a bit unwieldy to look at, so I removed it. If anyone absolutely can't live without it, let me know and I can bring it back. You can still click any label attached to any post to browse other articles with the same tag.

Turbine, Get Your Head Out of Your Ass

Turbine Inviting Over 1,000,000 Players to Play Lord of The Rings Online.

Lord of the Rings Online will never hit one million subscribers. It will never even get to the 500,000 mark. The game is not that great, and it definitely offers nothing new or exciting. These are all bold statements, but if Turbine can spew some, then so can I.

I have no idea where Turbine has gotten the idea that Lord of the Rings Online will be joining the Million Player club. Before beta even started, they were trumpeting the idea that they were going to hit the one million player mark. This misleading headline is just another notch on the pole of misleading quotes from Turbine. There is no evidence, either provided by Turbine or from any other source, that says there are a million interested players in the market looking for a new game. To hand out a million beta invites is nothing more than a spam rush on our already spam ridden e-mail accounts. Shame on Turbine.

The most popular MMORPG of all time, World of Warcraft, didn't even break the one million mark in beta. It was amazing that they hit 500,000 without the servers melting in a fiery cataclysmic event. WoW surprised most of us and went on to become a smashing success beyond anything we could have imagined. However, it was a Blizzard product, so a million+ copies being sold was not unrealistic. Can anyone name the last Turbine game that shipped a million copies?

Turbine is quickly transforming itself into a spin machine, drudging up emotions reserved for the likes of SOE. Turbine, get your collective head out of your collective ass.

I'm back!

My Internet connection has been down and out for the past few weeks so I have done very little. I did manage to get a good amount of time logged in the Lord of the Rings Online beta, but I was not impressed enough to play it more than an hour at a time. Nor, would my Internet connection let me play it for more than an hour at a time! I will have my impressions posted sometime next week (hopefully).

I have started back into World of Warcraft. My little brother uses my account most of the time, but I am sneaking back in here and there for a few minutes. He has upgrade the account to The Burning Crusade so I may try and level to 70 over the next few months.

Other than that I have just been busy with house projects, school work, and job searching.

HBO to Turn 'A Song of Fire & Ice' into Fantasy TV Series

There is not very many TV news headlines that catch my attention, but this was definitely one of them.

HBO has acquired the rights to turn George R.R. Martin's bestselling fantasy series "A Song of Fire & Ice" into a dramatic series to be written and exec produced by David Benioff and D.B. Weiss.

"Fire" is the first TV project for Benioff ("Troy") and Weiss ("Halo") and will shoot in Europe or New Zealand. Benioff and Weiss will write every episode of each season together save one, which the author (a former TV writer) will script.

The series will begin with the 1996 first book, "A Game of Thrones," and the intention is for each novel (they average 1,000 pages each) to fuel a season's worth of episodes. Martin has nearly finished the fifth installment, but won't complete the seven-book cycle until 2011.

The author will co-exec produce the series along with Management 360's Guymon Casady and Created By's Vince Gerardis.

Martin's series has drawn comparisons to J.R.R. Tolkien, because both are period epics set in imagined lands. But Martin has eschewed Tolkien's good-vs.-evil theme in favor of flawed characters from seven noble families.

The book has a decidedly adult bent, with sex and violence comparable to series like "Rome" and "Deadwood."

"They tried for 50 years to make 'Lord of the Rings' as one movie before Peter Jackson found success making three," Martin said. "My books are bigger and more complicated, and would require 18 movies. Otherwise, you'd have to choose one or two characters."

Aside from writing the most recent draft of "Halo," Weiss recently adapted the William Gibson novel "Pattern Recognition" for WB and director Peter Weir.

Benioff and Weiss were repped by CAA and Management 360.

As a huge fan of the books, I am very excited!

I've Been Invited to the Lord of the Rings Online Beta!

Since I have been talking about Lord of the Rings Online (LotRO) as of late, I guess it is time to put my money where my mouth is without opening my wallet. I have received an invite to the late stages of the LotRO beta.

I will reserve my comments until after I am done playing around a bit.

They Put Magic on My Lord of the Rings Online!

Lord of the Rings Online (LotRO) has dropped it's NDA. Tobold has his quick hit review up here. The following quote just destroyed the game for me:

"I created a hobbit minstrel as my character. You can also play humans, dwarves, or elves. And there are 6 more classes: Burglar, Captain, Champion, Guardian, Hunter, Lore-master. If you wonder why there are no "priests" or "mages", this is due to the Tolkien lore. There is no commonly available "magic" in the game. But that is only semantics, the abilities of the character classes in practice work exactly like magic spells in other games. The minstrel I'm playing is a kind of healer / bard, and plays very nicely. Besides a healing spell, an improved melee attack, and a "cry" that works like a direct damage spell, I have a series of ballads to sing. These ballads combine a short-duration buff with some direct damage to the enemy. Thus I can't buff before the combat, I need an enemy target to hit to use them. The ballads exist in several tiers, tier 1, tier 2, etc., and I can only use a tier 2 ballad if I have a tier 1 ballad buff currently on me. So keeping up all the buffs during a longer combat isn't trivial, and makes for some quite interesting gameplay. If there are still enough people remembering the original Everquest, I'm sure that this will be called "twisting" ballads, after the EQ bard gameplay."

LotRO has failed the "something here is not like the others" test. If you lined it up next to WoW or Everquest in terms of gameplay, there would be no discernible differences. What a way to fuck up the most beloved fantasy work of all time. First Dungeons and Dragons and now Lord of the Rings. Someone please stop licensing top notch intellectual properties to Turbine!

Vanguard Launch Wrap-up

Vanguard: Saga of Heroes (V:SoH) has launched and their servers have gone live. While I am not planning to buy the game, I still felt it was my duty to bring a wrap up of sorts to see what is going on in the house that McQuaid built. In order to do this, I have grabbed a selection of links and quotes from around the Internet.

From Gamebunny:

When will the suits at Sony learn their lesson? The game is in development for ages - then it’s forced out the door before being ready for its close-up. STAR WARS GALAXIES anyone?

From GameSpy:

"After getting the game to a playable frame rate, I found that on a very basic level, player movement in Vanguard feels very floaty, with characters that don't have much weight to them and whose animations make them seem like they're sliding back and forth across the ground instead of strafing. It can be painful to negotiate closed doors and cramped halls in the game's many indoor areas, and you'll need a dose of good luck controlling your jumps mid-air when you encounter things like broken stairs and assorted platforming elements. The way movement and spellcasting worked, in particular, was fun and had enormous PvP implications: You can cast spells on the run."

From IGN:

"Vanguard's environments are reminiscent of fantasy oil paintings. Sigil Games hopes that three layers of gameplay (diplomacy, adventuring and crafting) and a comprehensive character creation tool will make for a more absorbing online experience."

That is a pretty good selection of material for everyone to read through. If words aren't your thing here is a little video for you courtesy of Game Trailers.

If you are actually playing this game I want to make sure you are aware of the game's first official downtime and it's first official patch.

In conclusion: I don't know what to think about Vanguard. The MMORPG industry has made me tired and I really can't seem to get myself steaming angry about this title any longer. I want to bitch. I want to complain. I want to tell everyone what I really think, but I am going to follow my own advice. I am going to vote with my wallet.