Linux Updates

Trying to keep up with relevant Linux news is tough, as most of it is just a dog and pony show for the top distributions. Most of that news turns out to be a battle between which camp can come up with a more retarded name for their Linux package (Ubuntu I'm looking at you).

However, we have a very positive Linux gaming tidbit to cover today. BeyondUnreal has a short e-mail confirming Linux client and server files for the already-in-demo-stage Unreal Tournament 3.

Heh, thanks. The dedicated server should be along very soon, but the Linux client won't be here tonight, for those waiting for it. I have set up a mailing list for UT3 linux and mac discussion, and I'll be announcing things there when they become available. Send a blank email to ut3-subscribe@icculus.org to join the list. Thanks, --ryan.

I love this sort of news!

On the non-gaming front, Linux and the Mac OS may both be susceptible to a flaw that Windows is currently in the process of patching. Instead of trying to do the tech dance, I'll just quote the relevant information:

In fact, Nathan McFeters, one of the researchers who has been studying the problem most closely says he hopes to present more details on how other Unix-based operating systems like Linux and Mac OS X may also be susceptible to what are known as URI (Uniform Resource Identifier) protocol handler flaws at the Toorcon hacking conference, being held next week in San Diego.

Well that is all I have for right now, so please enjoy.

Team Fortress 2 Initial Impressions

I normally try to post my initial impressions of a game as soon as I am done playing it for the first few times. I am pretty good about getting into a play, post, play, post rhythm.

However, for Team Fortress 2 I have been fairly silent with my initial impressions. Why? Because it is such a great game that I don't want to waste a single second blogging instead of playing! I do have a few minutes now, so without further ado, my first impressions of Team Fortress 2.

The first thing any player will note about TF2 is the graphical styling. It is stylized and cartoonish in nature, but that is what makes it so great. In an interview with Rock, Paper, Shotgun (a curiously refreshing gaming opinion site), Valve developer Charlie Brown stated:

Funny stuff just happens. So when we started, we knew what kind of weapons we wanted, we knew the physics, we knew we had really fast movements speeds and not all our weapons were realistic, and so it was pretty easy to see during testing that these funny moments happened way more frequently than they did in our other games. That was one of the reasons we chose this art style in the first place. We said, let’s just embrace the exaggerated funny things that happen. We used that to our advantage.

With over the top graphical stylings, comes over to top gameplay. Gameplay is definitely where TF2 shines. At the base, it is a class based shooter that attempts to meld several unique play styles into a team setting. Every class has a job to perform and in most cases, when that job isn't performed, the team knows it.

The best part of the class system is that there is a class for every level of gamer. Players do not need to be twitch gaming superstars to have fun or be competitive in TF2. I have friends from every corner of the gaming universe playing this game and they all are finding a class that fits them.

Not being able to shoot straight makes a player find other avenues for success and in TF2 that often leads to a better team player. This is a refreshing change of pace from the pinpoint click fests found in other FPS games. The point I want to emphasis is that TF2 is not a shooter for shooters, it is a shooter for everyone.

Part II
Part III
Part IV
Final Thoughts

EA Purchases Bioware

Holy fuck, EA To Acquire BioWare Corp. and Pandemic Studios.

REDWOOD CITY, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ:ERTS) today announced an agreement with Elevation Partners to acquire VG Holding Corp. -- the owner of both BioWare Corp. and Pandemic Studios. This acquisition gives EA a strong competitive position in key genres in interactive entertainment: action, adventure and role-playing games. The two studios have been recognized for creating some of the highest-quality games in the industry.

BioWare Corp. and Pandemic Studios have ten franchises under development, including six wholly owned games. BioWare Corp. is currently developing the highly anticipated Mass Effect, which will be published by Microsoft in November, and is in the early development stages of a massively multiplayer online game. Pandemic Studios is redefining open-world games with its upcoming Mercenaries 2: World in Flames™ and Saboteur™, in addition to several unannounced projects.

This one is completely out of left field. This really makes me want to run and grab that tinfoil hat I tossed in the closet. The main question I have, did EA buy them for their upcoming online games or for their ass-kicking single-player games?

The Orange Box

The Orange Box, from Valve, deserves all the 10/10 reviews that Halo 3 paid to get. IGN only gave it a 9.5/10.

Team Fortress 2 Tomorrow

Valve has confirmed that the Orange Box will be available tomorrow in stores and that pre-purchasers through Steam will have the game unlocked "shortly after midnight" Pacific Time on October 10.

The most interesting part of this package for me is Team Fortress 2 (TF2). The game is already receiving rave reviews. The pre-order beta was so successful that it flat-out crashed Steam, Valve's digital distribution and community software. The gaming news industry may still be ogling over Halo 3, but Team Fortress 2 is where the real multiplayer FPS action will be found this year.

FPS games are just better on the PC. Period. No discussion needed. If you want proof, plug the best Xbox Halo players into a PC through a Microsoft Xbox Controller and watch an average PC gamer, with keyboard and mouse, wipe the floor with them. Computers gave birth to the FPS, and console gamers damn well better remember to respect their elders.

Anyways, I will hopefully be playing tomorrow with my pre-order. If you will be getting the game, lets hook up and frag out.

I Hate People

I absolutely hate people that try and argue that World of Warcraft's Player vs. Player (PvP) is balanced. It is not, will never be, and can never be. Why can it never be? Gear, levels, and most of all because it is a class based system revolving around the heal, damage, and tank trinity.

It is inevitable anytime that I have a bad day in World of Warcraft that I get into an argument about its PvP balance. The conversations almost always end in the infamous quote: "lrn2play". Translated, it means "Learn to play your class better."

Well, I play a Shaman and have played one since the late stages of WoW's beta. I play my shaman better than most and have continually topped DPS and kill charts in game to the amazement of supposed "top DPS" classes. I do all of this without conforming to the "flavor of the month" Shaman builds or gear setups. I do it because I know what works for me as a player and build accordingly.

Today, the "lrn2play" phrase was thrown out by someone claiming to have a level 70 Shaman. According to them, shamans are a good class and shamans like me just need to "lrn2play". To top it off, the player was actually playing a Mage at the time, and said that anytime I want a lesson about Shamans just let them know.

This threw me over the edge, because I have more time on my Shaman than most people have playing World of Warcraft. I played a Shaman before this certain player even knew World of Warcraft existed. Sure, I'm not level 70, but that is because I don't chase expansions and levels on a hardcore pace anymore. However, level should NEVER be taken as an indication of a player's skill.

Getting back to WoW's PvP balance, I just want to state that I fully feel that WoW has turned into the most unbalanced PvP game on the market. There is no game that has worse class balance. No, not even Dark Ages of Camelot was/is this bad. DAoC had a single major class imbalance and only for a brief period. WoW has had a class balance issue since day one and has done nothing to improve it, and Blizzard couldn't improve it even if they wanted too.

WoW is a gear driven game at max level. It is a level driven game until that point. Thrown into the mix is the fact that it is a class based game. So, WoW's issues start to appear as certain classes scale better with gear (Warriors) and other classes have almost no reliance on gear at all (Warlocks). Warriors, for example, are powder puffs until they are sufficiently geared. On the other hand, warlocks are a terror regardless of their gear level and just become more insane the farther they climb.

These are very base examples, but this is a rant and I don't feel like going deeper. Anyone that plays WoW knows these two examples are spot on and the only people that argue otherwise are Warriors and Warlocks.

This is getting long, so let me sum it up. By observing the results of Arena matches, any player can determine which classes are overpowered. On top of this, any player and most definitely Blizzard should be able to realize the overpowered combination of classes and skills. But all of this is mute data, because World of Warcraft will never change from a gear centric game and therefore can never hope for a semblance of PvP class balance. Without an "end" to gear levels there can never be a point to start balancing.

Blizzard will continue to tweak classes here and there. Sometimes it will improve a class. Sometimes it will not. Eventually, it will lead to a class becoming overpowered and maybe that is the best thing that can happen to World of Warcraft. Instead of having a few dominating classes and skills, WoW can have a 100% insanely overpowered epeen fest that ends fights even faster than the current average of 30 seconds.

Turbine Fires Jeff Anderson?

News from Warcry:

Turbine has undergone a corporate shake-up, according to sources within the company and some quiet edits to their own website. The official company page now lists Jim Crowley as President and CEO, removing all mention of Jeff Anderson.

I guess that is what Mr. Anderson gets for basically lying about Lord of the Rings Online's massive subscription numbers and LotRO's complete and utter dominance over that other MMORPG. I don't know much about Jeff Anderson and I don't care too. Turbine was blessed to work with two of the most important fantasy IPs in history, Dungeons and Dragons and Lord of the Rings. Having played both games, it is my opinion that they failed and someone has to pay.

Steam Community Group Formed

I have gone ahead and created a Steam Community Group entitled Heartless Gamer. If you have a Steam account feel free to go over and join up so we can keep tabs on each other.

This is mainly a test to evaluate the value and functionality of a Steam Community Group. I have bigger ideas than just this group, but I need to start somewhere.

Tabula Rasa Delayed

Bad news for any Tabula Rasa fans, it is being delayed; again. The plan now is to launch Tabula Rasa at the end of October to pre-order customers and a live launch on November 2.

The development team wants some more time to test a recent overhaul of the crafting system and give beta testers the chance to test out the new high level areas. In any case, it means another delay added onto a long list of delays that have kept Tabula Rasa out of gamer's hands.

Personally, this kills any chance I would be interested in playing the title. Team Fortress 2 is almost officially here (it is in pre-order beta atm) and if a certain other beta invitation ever goes through I will have another MMOG to play around in. Sorry, Tabula Rasa. Wrong place, wrong time, and a complete failure to turn me on.

The Media Does Not Understand Gaming

The mainstream media does not understand gaming and it is truly sad when they try. Click here or view below for proof.

Does The End Game Really Matter?

This post over at MPOGD.com has me thinking; does the end game of an MMORPG matter at all in its ultimate success or failure?

If you take the raw number of players that actively participate in end game raids in World of Warcraft and simply remove them from the total number of subscribers, World of Warcraft would still hold several million players. So, doesn't that mean that World of Warcraft would be popular without that end game content? Seriously, it is estimated that less than 2% of WoW's NA/EU user-base has actually stepped foot into an end game instance.

World of Warcraft is just one example, both of a game and of an end game model. What other models are there and what do they mean to the game as a whole?

Please discuss.

Dear Blizzard, PvP is a Mess

Dear Blizzard,

PvP in World of Warcraft is an absolute mess.

Players that were not fortunate enough to participate in the first two Arena seasons are now at a distinct disadvantage. E-Z mode epics are no longer attainable for lesser geared players to become competitive. Alas, the tried and true MMORPG rule, exploit early, exploit often (or abuse early, abuse often), is proven once again.

Also, the Arena system is severely imbalanced towards OBVIOUSLY overpowered class and skill combinations. It does not take a rocket scientist to look at the number of each class represented in the top 100 teams to recognize the problem.

Yet, for two full seasons these problems have been ignored and players have been allowed to gain superior quality items with little effort. But now, anyone coming into the system will not have the same opportunity.

The battlegrounds are in no better shape. Warsong Gulch is a bore fest; either ending extremely fast or going for hours on end. Eye of the Storm rarely actually fills with enough players for both teams and usually ends due to lack of players.

Alterac Valley has been designated an AFK zone for Horde players. Patch 2.2.0 was supposed to fix this, but alas your "AFK flagging" system was a broken design that is now punishing honest players while AFKers simply "buff a guard" to collect honor. On top of this, the map in Alterac Valley is still heavily skewed towards the Alliance.

Fortunately, Arathi Basin is somewhat balanced and still fun to play. Unfortunately, all the fucking rewards for battlegrounds absolutely fucking suck compared to the Arena rewards. Would it be so hard to update the fucking rewards?

Sadly, open world PvP is the worst aspect of World of Warcraft PvP. There is almost no point to playing on a PvP server. Rarely do you find any PvP in the open world that is not just someone getting ganked. Ganking is not PvP. Very little honor is gained for open world fighting compared to the immense amount that is given for battlegrounds. Also, most of The Burning Crusade objective-based PvP encounters are boring and exploitable.

Blizzard, you suck at PvP.

Yours truly,

Heartless Gamer

PS. Warlocks really need another way to make players run around helplessly as they die.

Down With The Sickness

Everyone seems to be getting sick lately. My boss was sick, my co-worker is sick, two of my instructors are sick, and everyday friends are dropping. Hell, even our dog was sick (but because of surgery, not the flu). Even the mighty Zonk may soon fall!

Worst of all, I am sick and it's been up and down for two weeks now.

World of Warcraft Patch 2.2.0 Today

World of Warcraft is patching to version 2.2.0 today. I will hopefully post links to WoW Patch 2.2 downloads later.

The biggest new feature is voice chat:

Voice Chat - The new Voice Chat feature is now available in game. Players will need to go into the options menu under Sound & Voice to activate it. Volume sliders are available for the microphone, speakers, and game-audio fade (which automatically lowers the game audio when a voice communication is received), as is a “push-to-talk” setting. Right-clicking on a player’s name now includes the option to mute or unmute that player. Muting another player blocks all voice chat from him or her; the ignore feature now blocks both voice chat and text chat from that player.

It should definitely be a good week for WoW parody websites, WoW comics, and most definitely for the guys over at Ventrilo Harassment. However, for me it will probably be more than a week before I even have a new mic to use. I was never a huge fan of voice chat, but it definitely has it's advantages and I can't deny that I will probably be using it.

Oh, and a side note, they nerfed Shamans again:

Earthbind Totem: This totem will no longer break Rogue stealth.

Because all the Shamans in WoW know how useful totems are for popping rogues. I just don't know what to do as a shaman with half of my crowd control now somewhat nerfed.

Green Bay Packers

I am a huge Green Bay Packers fan. I was born near Green Bay and my blood runs cold, dark, and green.

The Packers took home a win today against the San Diego Chargers and in the process, Brett Favre tied Dan Marino's all-time touchdown mark. Congratulations Brett. I will always be a fan.

Following Failure With Failure

It seems that closing the doors on Auto Assault isn't the only thing Netdevil is up to these days. MMOsite has the news that Netdevil has announced another post apocalyptic MMOG, entitled Warmonger. The basics: Warmonger will be an action-oriented MMO FPS set in a post apocalyptic future.

The kicker? It won't just be vehicles this time. Players can blow shit up and stuff, but not with vehicles. Understand?

The bigger kicker? It will be available for digital download on October 16th, 2007!

So, why will this be a failure? Because it is built around the AGEIA PhysX processor, perhaps the most worthless piece of computer hardware ever invented for gaming. Don't get me wrong, I am sure all 250 people worldwide that own an AGEIA PhysX processor will be just tripping over themselves to download this baby.

Fortunately, the AGEIA PhysX processor has dropped to somewhere in the neighborhood of $130, not terribly unreasonable. Players will just have to pretend they are buying the AGEIA PhysX card for access to it's vast library of enabled games. It worked for FFXI and the hard drive for the Playstation 2!

Why Is World of Warcraft So Popular?

People will always argue about the reasons behind World of Warcraft being so popular. Some argue that Blizzard just spent a ton of money. Some argue that Blizzard has a massive following who will buy anything they put in a box. Some argue that WoW benefited from word of mouth. Some argue that WoW just got lucky.

Wash all of these reasons from the chalk board. Then, sit down, and play World of Warcraft for five minutes. The controls and camera are absolutely smooth. The UI is clean and simple. Tasks and goals are laid out from the start. There is almost no decisions to be made until level 10, when a player receives their first talent point. If a player dies, they run back as a ghost with no experience or item loss. The game NEVER punishes a player until that player is willing and able to avoid the situation.

Fundamentally, WoW is just a pleasure to sit down and play. Take all the reasoning for why WoW is so popular and compare it against this question. If this is truly the reason, then why do people sit down, play, and continue to play?

For WoW, the devil is NOT in the details.

RIP Robert Jordan

Author Robert Jordan, whose "Wheel of Time" series of fantasy novels sold millions of copies, died Sunday of a rare blood disease. He was 58.

Jordan, whose real name was James Oliver Rigney Jr., was born and lived in this southern city most of his life. He died at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston of complications from primary amyloidosis with cardiomyopathy, his personal assistant, Maria Simons, said Monday.

UPDATE: Check out TarValon.net for a great tribute.

Metaplace is Official

Raph Koster and company have made it official: Areae unveils Metaplace, Web 2.0 with a bit of MMORPG mixed in.

Hello, everyone, and welcome to Metaplace.com!

It has been incredibly hard keeping quiet about this for a whole year. Everyone here on the team is really excited about what we're making. And we're really honored to get to launch this site as one of the TechCrunch 40.

Right at the outset, when we launched the original Areae, Inc. website, we told everyone that we were out to reinvent virtual worlds, and to make them work more like the Web does. We also told everyone that the cartoon on the website was our business plan. It's been amazing to watch the speculation out there about what exactly we meant, but now you know: we meant it completely literally. Metaplace works how the web does, just about top to bottom.

Our goals are sort of idealistic. We think there are all kinds of things on the Internet that would be improved if anyone could have a virtual place of their own. Right now, there aren't enough good games, for example, and they all seem to be about elves in tights or soldiers in battle armor. Metaplace allows more diversity. Right now, there are lots of people who want to use virtual worlds for research, or education, or business, but it's just too darn hard to get one going. Now you can create a world in just a few minutes and start tailoring it to your needs. Basically, we wanted to democratize the process of making online spaces of all sorts.

As part of that, we also committed to an open markup standard for our network protocol - anyone can write a client for any platform they want. We decided to use Web standards for everything we could, which is why you can have a game world that is also a website, or use Web data to populate your world. The scripting language (we call it MetaScript, of course) is based on Lua. You get the idea - no "not invented here," no closed proprietary approaches.

We knew it was all coming together when one of our team made a game in a day and a half. And then stuck that game on a private MySpace profile. You can inherit someone else's world (if they let you) and use it as a starting point. You can slurp whole directories of art and use them as building blocks. Cut and paste a movement system or a health bar from one world to another. Use an RSS feed for your NPCs. We made puzzle games, RPGs, action games... and set up doorways from one to the other. Basically, coming to work in the morning is a lot of fun.

This isn't all hypothetical, either. We fully intend to be customers of our own product. We've already started work on our first big game - a "worldy MMORPG" with what we hope will be a ton of fun game play. What's more, we figure that some of you who have been looking for a game like that might want to help us build it.

We have a lot of plans for the future, and we hope you'll check back every week to learn what we're cooking up. As you can see, we're taking alpha applications. We expect to ramp up the number of testers a lot over the coming months. So keep an eye on the site - it will be growing a lot.

Overall, I think what we are most looking forward to is surprises. We can't wait to see all the amazing things you will build with the Metaplace platform. It's time to see what the world really wants from virtual worlds.

We'll be updating this blog at least once a week. In the meantime, see you in the comments thread!

Right before leaving work, my co-worker and I discussed what was potentially coming from today's announcement. We both agreed; this is pretty much what we and many others expected. Areae is building a better Second Life. A Second Life that makes sense. A Second Life that doesn't treat players like caged chickens.

I guess the real kicker is that this is more of a service, than a game. So, it is a bit hard as a gamer to get any excitement out of this announcement. Until I get to see some of the games in development for the service, I will have to hold comments on the gaming potential.

What worries me about Metaplace, is the fact that most user generated content is just absolute junk. I've played Neverwinter Nights 1 & 2. I've played countless MUDs that allow for user submitted content. I've played countless video games where players could make and contribute something to the community. I can count on one hand how much of that content has actually been worth my time.

It's the whole signal to noise thing again. How much crap will Metaplace members have to shovel through before getting to the good stuff? I honestly don't see many people, myself included, willing to pay "meta dollars" for the chance to play a crappy game. Early adoption is going to be a tough hump for "armchair designers" to get over. Then its a fight to make sure your ideas don't get copied/stolen and sold for a lower price.

So, thats my negativity on the announcement, but don't let my jaded gamerness overshadow what Metaplace could turn into. Afterall, as stated, we still haven't seen the games :)

Areae Announcement Tommorow

From Cuppy:

Hey all =)

Just wanted to let you know that tomorrow Areae is making our announcement on what we are making. We were picked to be one of the TechCrunch40 and are demoing our product tomorrow.

Keep an eye on Metaplace.com tomorrow! =)

It will be interesting to finally get an idea of what Raph Koster has been working on over at Areae, but at the same time I know it will be a disappointment to many fans of Raph's previous work still holding out for a Raph Koster MMORPG. It is pretty evident that Raph is trying his damnedest to separate from the "old-school MMORPG" crowd without actually severing the link completely. I guess we will all know how far he has gone tomorrow.

Let's Help GamerDad

GamerDad, a gaming blogger who just so happens to also be a wonderful father and gaming spokesman, has suffered a heart attack.

On Saturday September 1st, Andrew Bub - the GamerDad, and my husband - suffered a heart attack. An anterior wall Myocardial Infarction to be exact. On Sunday the 2nd, he had an additional MI and on Labor Day he endured a Quadruple Bypass operation, which saved his life. He's been in the hospital ever since and dearly misses his children, his website, and all of you - his readers.

In a day and age where video games are constantly under fire and often times rooted as the cause of all ills of our children, GamerDad has been a staunch defender of the truth. Parents that game with their children are some of the best parents around. Gaming is not evil. Gaming does not ruin children. These are facts and GamerDad is their spokesman.

We can help by visiting this page and donating via PayPal.

Enemy Territory: Quake Wars - Initial Impressions - Part III

Click here for Part I of my Enemy Territory: Quake Wars initial impressions.
Click here for Part II of my Enemy Territory: Quake Wars initial impressions.

In Part II of my ET:QW initial impressions, I talked about the wonderful question: "What the fuck just killed me?" ET:QW employs a very standard scrolling chat window that details kills.

Example: heartless_ [weapon] UnluckyNewb

So, it isn't impossible to figure it out, but more often than not players will never see it coming. I guess it proves the age old; "You never hear the one that gets ya."

However, at times, this can be totally awesome. My absolute favorite weapon in ET:QW is on the Scrogg sniper class. Scrogg snipers receive flying drones. A player can launch a drone and fly it around for thirty seconds. At any time during flight, the player can cause the drone to explode. Think of it is as a flying grenade, perfect for rooting out camping snipers. The flying controls are spot on, easy, and allow for near perfect placement. The drones are easy enough to shoot down in the open, but a good pilot will use cover and height to ambush unsuspecting targets.

The flying drone is just one of many cool toys that are in the game. Honestly, I just don't have the time currently to test them all out. I said before, that there was a lot to this demo and it could be a bit confusing, but that doesn't mean there isn't a few cool surprises hiding in the game. And demos are the perfect time to play with these toys, before every single player learns how to counter them.

ET:QW offers enough new awesomeness that it should have a fairly strong following. Unfortunately, due to its more advanced play mechanics, it won't attract throngs of new players. For wily old veterans, ET:QW may just be the game they have been waiting for. ET:QW goes a long ways in providing fast and fun action. In the end, fast and fun should keep it going.

Enemy Territory: Quake Wars - Initial Impressions Part II

Click here for Part I of my Enemy Territory: Quake Wars initial impressions.

I left off my last post talking about the objectives system built into ET:QW and how, for a new player, it can be confusing. I don't want potential players to be discouraged. I am not stating that ET:QW's objectives based system is a failure. It works, but at a cost of being a major barrier to entry.

ET:QW is a tough game to pick up and have fun with right away. For the purposes of a demo, that baffles me. I expected better from this game. It feels like the team at Splash Damage wanted to highlight too many aspects of their game in the demo, instead of providing a streamlined demo to introduce players to the game. A simpler map, with simpler objectives would go a long ways to improving early opinions about this title.

Moving on, the action in ET:QW far surpasses that of any Battlefield title, in both speed and veracity. Battlefield games are notorious for having a bit more relaxed style of play with an emphasis on wide open game play. ET:QW does a much better job of focusing players onto a single objective. Spawn points are usually up close to the action, and often times will drop a player right into the middle of the fight. This minimizes the need for a team to spread themselves across an entire map. Teams and players can focus on the current area and progress from there. I have found no reason to go backwards on the demo map so far, except to grab a vehicle.

Speaking of vehicles, they are fairly well done in ET:QW. There is no "vehicle specific class", so any player should be able to hop into any vehicle and go to town. I've never really enjoyed vehicles in these type of games, so I have not tested them very much. So far, I have not been camped at a spawn point by any flying vehicles, always a plus in my book!

My final area of concern for ET:QW is the lauded: "What the fuck just killed me?" There are so many new tricks in ET:QW, that I've found myself more than once trying to figure out what just killed me. Players die fast. Once the damage starts, it rarely ends in survival. As the game play is faster, it stands to reason that players are likely to die without seeing the cause. It can become annoying, but hopefully with time players will have enough experience to know what owned them.

Part III has been posted here.

Enemy Territory: Quake Wars - Initial Impressions

The developers and fans of Enemy Territory: Quake Wars do not want the game to be compared to any of the Battlefield (1942, Vietnam, 2) games. Unfortunately, they built a team based multi-player shooter that has vehicles and unit classes, so comparisons are imminent. After all, Battlefield 1942 sort of defined team based multi-player shooters with vehicles and unit classes. It may not have been the first, but it was the most defining in my opinion.

Whether players believe ET:QW is anything like Battlefield or not, for me, there are enough comparisons to be made. Honestly, both games play the same. In Battlefield you are advancing from flag to flag. In ET:QW you simply advance from objective to objective. ET:QW has the benefit that objectives are a lot more interesting and can change on the fly. For example: the demo map has the GDF forces charging forward to build a bridge in order to advance on to securing the bridge, followed by advancing a mobile base.

Err well, I think those are the objectives. Battlefield's flag capture system may be static, but at least it is understandable to pretty much everyone. The objectives in ET:QW tend to be confusing at first and confusing in the end. Players can hit the "m" key to select a new mission (objective), but often times missions disapear as the objectives are met. As a new player, I spent most of my time confused on what I should be doing. There is little guidance to indicate what objectives need to be done or in what order they should be done to maximize effect. I guess it is up to the players to figure out?

Part II has been posted here.
Part III has been posted here.

Enemy Territory: Quake Wars Demo

Enemy Territory: Quake Wars has launched a demo.

I have found two great download links:

N-Zone
Yahoo!

I should have comments up later this week.

Linux Gaming with Radeon

It is no secret that I am becoming a fan of Linux. Over the past year I have completed the first half of my Red Hat Academy courses and have begun studying for my Linux+ certification. My interest in Linux extends beyond education and work. I am a gamer, and Linux gaming is a sore spot to an otherwise great operating system.

Digging around on the Internet, I found an article showing off Enemy Territory: Quake Wars running on a Linux box sporting the new 8.41 display drivers for Radeon HD 2900XT video cards. If you need to understand one thing about Linux gaming, it is that the lack of driver support is a main cause for the faltering Linux game market. However, this is changing as the article shows.

This gives me a bit of faith that Linux may become a viable platform in the future for gamers. My ultimate dream would be to have a complete Linux distribution built completely around games. How many gamers would love to have an entire operating system dedicated to their hobby? I know I would.

Thoughts on Mythos

I have now played the Mythos beta for a couple weeks and want to share some of my thoughts.

Graphics

The game looks good, albeit simple. The idea with simpler graphics is that it will be very easy for new monsters, races, and other art assets to be created for the game. Flagship Studios, Mythos' developer, wants to be able to easily add content on the fly.

Animations are all very well done. The game runs well on my gaming desktop and on my work laptop, so the system requirements are not steep. This is a clear benefit for the game as many different levels of computers will be able to run it.

Game Play

Game play, like the graphics, is simple. Generally, players set one ability to the right mouse button and their base attack to the left. From there it is straight up hack and slash. Players plow through tons of monsters at a fairly quick pace.

My concern for the way the game plays is that the character advancement is far too slow. It takes a good bit of hacking and slashing to advance a level. Gaining a level is the only time at which you receive points to spend on new abilities. Even then, the low level tiers of the skill trees offer very few new skills. It is quite easy for a player to get quickly bored.

Mythos needs faster advancement or a system that gives new skills on a faster basis. The game is supposedly going to be free-to-play, so there is no reason that leveling needs to be arbitrarily hard or "grindy". Currently it is very grinding intensive, with little flair. Grinding isn't particularly bad in a hack and slash game, but combined with slow character progression, it makes Mythos quite boring.

On top of this, the classes just aren't balanced. Some classes receive early access to area of effect (AOE) attacks that just dominate. Classes without AOE are at a significant disadvantage as they are forced to kill monsters one at a time, burning through a ton of potions in the process. There is plans to introduce more classes to the game, but I sincerely hope Flagship spends some time balancing AOE vs. single target attacks.

Just a quick note on potions. I absolutely hate potion mechanics in most hack and slash games. Mythos, like most games of its ilk, have players quaffing potions every ten seconds. This has never made any sense to me. Why not just increase the amount of damage a character can take, or mana a character has, and save some work for the database hardware?

Loot

A hack and slash game is nothing without it's loot. Mythos operates on a random loot mechanic. Magic items drop or can be found with random stat modifiers attached to them. At any time, a fairly powerful magical item could drop. However, I have some problems with the system.

The system is a fairly standard random loot system prone to the same old problems. Most of the items that drop are worthless, as they combine stat bonuses that are worthless to a class. Plus, a lot of items drop that are not even useable by your class or stat build. I am a little disappointed that Flagship made absolutely no attempt at improving the aging mechanic. They could of made the system more intelligent, dropping loot that is more optimized for your class or build.

Fortunately, Mythos alleviates these problems a little bit with a socket mechanic for plain items. Players can purchase weapons and armors that have sockets into which they can set gemstones that give various stat bonuses. This allows for players to achieve some sense of control over what stats their items will have.

Another problem I have with the loot is that it is not very easy to compare two items. Mythos would benefit greatly if you were able to display the statistics of two items side by side. Also, a "Is this better than what I am currently using?", suggestion box would help new players immensely.

Conclusion

In the end, Mythos will be a fun game to mess around with when players are bored with their main game. Mythos is also a great casual title. Both because it is free and because its game play is rather simple. My only concern is that they will not speed the character progression up, resulting in a bunch of bored players. With a bit of polish and flair, Mythos will be a new age Diablo (minus the demons).

Mark Jacobs: Keep Fighting the Good Fight!

Virtual World News has a transcript from the Austin Game Developers Conference (AGDC) entitled: What Are the Biggest Online Gaming Opportunities?

The panel featured:
John Blakely (VP of Sony Online Entertainment)
Mark Jacobs (VP EA, Studio GM EA Mythic)
Raph Koster (President Areae)
Erik Bethke (CEO GoPets).

Moderated by: Matt Firor.

Mark Jacobs goes on the defensive and offensive about microtransactions, RMT, and garbage games that think they can make a buck. This is why I will forever be a fan of Mark Jacobs. He has always stuck to his guns about RMT and the "how can we make more money" attitudes. Many people may doubt Mark's look on the market, but few can prove him wrong.

When everyone in the world told him he couldn't make Dark Ages of Camelot, he did it. Not only did he do it, but he spurred Mythic to do it in a 24 month timeline. On top of this, DAoC launched nearly flawlessly. Sure some mistakes happened with expansions, but DAoC has held onto a relative strong player base and provided for Mythic to pursue further endeavors.

In this transcript, Mark Jacob spends a lot of time saying no. Raph Koster stays pretty centered with his ideals on Web 2.0 and his plans to capitalize on a non-traditional game. However, both Blakely and Bethke spend an inordinate amount of time demanding that they are right with no proof whatsoever.

The argument seems to be that just because something makes money it is good for the market. Jacobs smartly informs the panel that isn't the case. What's good for the market is good solid games, not developers nickel and diming customers. All the other trash will be swept under the carpet; where it belongs.

Northrend: No Fly Zone

There has been a lot of talk lately that flying mounts will not be usable in World of Warcraft's next expansion, Wrath of the Lich King. Blizzard has stated that the use of flying mounts may be restricted until players reach level 78 or higher. The reasoning: flying mounts would allow players to bypass too much content.

Flying mounts were introduced in The Burning Crusade, WoW's first expansion, but were not accessible until players achieved level 70. Therefore, flying mounts had little to no effect on leveling speed. They served as an end game treat for players to zip around the zones in Outlands.

With another expansion in the works, Blizzard seems to be concerned that players on flying mounts would be able to just zip around from quest to quest ignoring the vast amount of content built in between. This is understandable, as Blizzard puts a lot of hard work into building their content.

As a player who does not have a flying mount, I tend to agree with Blizzard. There is an ever growing gap between the "haves" and "have nots" in WoW. Nothing would suck worse than landing on the shores of Northrend and be forced to take the hard road as players with flying mounts zip around at 2-3x your speed while skipping over annoying random aggro.

It is understandable that players with flying mounts would be upset that they have invested large amounts of time into getting something that they can no longer use. Or not use for a certain period time. In this regard, I sympathize with flying mount owners.

However, considerations have to be made. Not just for players without flying mounts, but for the design of the content. With flying mounts, the design of both the static terrain and playable content needs to branch into a third, vertical dimension. It is not feasible that Blizzard places "flying guards" over every single quest location. The question needs to be asked, what do players want Blizzard spending time on? Getting the expansion shipped or double checking the expansion for consistency with flying mounts?

Not only is there game play reasons for turning Northrend into a No Fly Zone, but there are lore reasons as well. Blizzard has already stated they will be involving the Dragonflights heavily within WotLK. So, it may turn out that players who attempt to fly over Northrend will be downed by a "sky guard" until they reach an appropriate level and can become friendly with said "sky guard".

I strongly believe that players will be far more accepting if there is a valid lore-related reason for the restriction of flight. If it turns out that Blizzard just wants to slow leveling speed, then there will be valid room for complaints. Azeroth currently doesn't allow flying mounts, but it was also built before TBC. WotLK does not have that same luxury. Players will expect more.

No One's Talking!

Tabula Rasa is set to launch October 19th, the beta NDA has been lifted, but I can't seem to find anyone that will give a decent post about their beta experience. Hopefully, in the next couple of days we will see some great posts from beta testers.

Sadly, this just confirms my suspicions that the interest in Tabula Rasa is not that big. I'm not interested in the game and I don't know anyone that is actually set on playing it. A few of my "I play every MMORPG" friends may give it a whirl, but they will play anything.

I'm debating whether to give the game a try. It has been a good while since I gave a random game a chance. I normally stick to playing games that I've followed for months (or years) through development, beta, and launch. I have paid almost no attention to Tabula Rasa and that may have set the stage for me to play it. Unfortunately, there is that whole work, school, wife, and dog equation that I need fit gaming back into.

Bloggers Roll Call

MMORPG and gaming bloggers, I need you! I need links for a new blog roll I will be putting up. Plus, I want to find new blogs that I don't read. I plan to visit each of these blogs on a daily basis, so please drop your link in a comment.

Bye-Bye Xfire

I have removed Xfire from all of my computers and my Xfire profile link from this blog.

I will miss one-click server joining for my favorite FPS games. I will miss having a running record of what games I've played and for how long I've played them. However, I won't miss the constant desktop crashes, disconnect messages, and annoying key combinations to make Xfire work.

I will be better off without Xfire.

PvE in Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning

I'm going to do something new. I'm going to post more about some games that I am looking forward to. Today, I am going to talk about Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning (WAR) and it's PvE.

WAR, without PvE, is just a mess waiting to happen. Online games, especially MMORPGs, thrive on diversity. The more things there are to do in a game, the more players it attracts. Differences between play styles and players build communities. Community is not built through forcing players into groups. It's been said a thousand times: things get pretty boring when everyone is the same.

WAR needs PvE and it needs PvE players. However, it's not pure PvE players that will make WAR great. It is the PvE player that wants a little bit of RvR every now and then that will be WAR's key demographic. There will be plenty of full-time RvR players in WAR, but I am betting that there will be far more part-timers.

But what is the benefit of all these part-timers? Simple. Sheep. PvP combat is always better when it is wolves vs sheep. When there is only wolves, PvP becomes static. The fights start becoming far too routine with the same wolves endlessly gnawing at each other for a bit of epeen. The non-wolves, finding there is really nothing for them to do, leave. Then the wolves start complaining that there isn't anyone around to fight.

I don't want to categorize all part-time RvR players as sheep, but there will be plenty of them that are not as strong in RvR as others. This creates a great dynamic in the RvR/PvP fighting.

The sheep can form and fight together against smaller packs of wolves, but when the going gets rough they CAN go do something else other than complain and quit. The sheep also provide an interesting change of pace because most often they RvR/PvP only when they are having fun. It is immensely better to be playing against an opponent that is having fun, even if it is in a losing effort.

With the sheep mixing into the wolf pack, it offers a chance for stronger players to help them out. DAoC was great when an entire realm worked together to take keeps or relics. It was very important for the stronger guilds to work and coordinate with the weaker guilds and players to form a cohesive team. Stronger players HAD to help weaker players if they wanted to accomplish the end-game goals of DAoC's RvR.

And that was all possible, because the weaker players weren't forced into RvR/PvP against their will. WAR has the same approach, but is setting the stage for the "sheep" to get more involved in RvR. This is good for WAR.

Mythos BETA

A friend of mine sent me a beta access code for Mythos, a soon to launch free Diablo-type game from Flagship Studios. The game was built to test out the online tech for Flagship's first large title, Hellgate: London.

The game is cute and fun. It features hack and slash in it's purest form, but unlike Dungeon Runners (another free to play Diablo Clone), Mythos doesn't try and mock the hack and slash genre.

It is fun when you have a few minutes to kill, but I don't see it replacing anyone's main game anytime soon.

Update: 9 May, 2009 - Removed broken link and updated labels.

Ten Things From Vacation

10. A five-month old Doberman puppy that doesn't want to sleep in her crate at the vacation home means you better make room in the bed.

9. Gatlinburg, TN is a 50/50 split of new shiny and 1980's rundown.

8. The mountain roads are not friendly to a "four banger" from Japan carrying far too much stuff.

7. The rabbit can't be left alone for a week, so it's easier to just bring him with than find someone to rabbit-sit.

6. The cat can be left alone for a week and causes no issues.

5. The dog crate is bigger than the car trunk; something that should be noted before you start packing the car. Oddly enough, it eventually did fit.

4. Hill Billy Golf is actually run by real life hill billys.

3. Davy Crocket's mini-golf is far superior to Hill Billy Golf.

2. The first 350 pages of George RR Martin's, A Storm of Swords, is kick ass.

1. While on vacation, claiming to vacate my brain is not a key to my wife's good graces.

I'm Back

I'm back from vacation. Wrap-up to follow at some point this week, but classes and work start back up Monday.

Vacation

I'll be back in one week. Happy gaming!

Perfect Again

4.0

Three in a row. 4.0 cumulative. Enough said.

The Burning Crusade

I loaded up World of Warcraft's 10-day trial for their expansion, The Burning Crusade, yesterday. Today, I finished getting all the way to level 61, but a big catch 22 slapped me in the face.

In the trial version of The Burning Crusade players are hard capped from gaining a level past 60. It stops the experience bar at 1 exp to next level. It makes absolutely no sense. Here is a trial for an expansion geared for level 61+ players and the trial doesn't let you level past 60. Retarded.

Work: Day One

Well I have officially finished my first day of work at my new job. All went well. I set up my own Windows 2003 server and domain to play around with as I learn the software I will be configuring and setting up in the future.

Interestingly enough, the guy I work with is a World of Warcraft player. Go figure.

Close To Home

That terrorism thing: its real. I don't want to get into details, but let's just say that I was a wee bit close to this following story: Officials Find Explosives in Car.

Berkeley County Sheriff's department says it has arrested two men for unlawful possession of explosives. According to the Berkeley County Sheriff’s department, deputies closed Highway 176 after finding what they thought were explosives in the trunk of a car at about 6:00 Saturday night.

Agents deployed a robot and pulled what looks like a small bag from the trunk. After multiple agencies arrived on scene-- Charleston County Sheriff's Deputies detonated the suspicious material around 3:45 am.

Fortunately, I sacked out in my hotel last night and studied for my Linux+ certification exam.

A Card Game?

John Smedley's big announcement: a virtual collectible card game for Everquest players.

It’s called Legends of Norrath. It’s an MMO Card/Strategy game built directly into both EverQuest and EverQuest 2. It will allow EQ and EQ 2 players to challenge each other, or allow people to play from outside of either game and challenge people who are playing inside. The game itself is literally a part of both clients, and it’s incredibly fun to play. The first set (called Oathbound) has 375 cards. In addition, we have loot cards for each game that have some awesome in-game items, some of which are extremely rare (new mounts for example).

That's it. Nothing more. Just a little side project tacked onto SOE's main franchise.

World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King is Official!

World of Warcraft's next expansion has been officially announced.

It's official: The next World of WarCraft expansion is coming; it's called Wrath of the Lich King, and will open up the continent of Northrend to players of level 68 and above. This second expansion will focus on the return of Arthas Menethil, a.k.a. the Lich King, ruler of the Scourge, and one of the most powerful beings in all of Azeroth. This semi-sequel to the saga of Arthas (from WarCraft III: The Frozen Throne) is intended for experienced players with a couple level 70 characters in their pockets.

Breaking down the details a little: there will be a new class, a new continent, and ten new levels.

The new class will be a Hero class, entitled Death Knight. Hero classes are epic character classes that will be gained through a quest at max level (which will be 80). Once gained, a newly created Death Knight will start life at level 60 or 70.

A new continent, Northrend, will also be included with a tentatively scheduled ten new zones. Among these zones will be a new outdoor PvP zone featuring destructible environments and siege weapons. Plus, another battleground will be added. Finishing it off will be classic whack a mole zones for leveling goodness.

Finally, there will be ten new levels bringing the level cap to 80. Along with this the skill cap will be increased to 450.

If I had to describe these changes in one word, it would be mudflation. Its just more of the same. I haven't even touched The Burning Crusade, but from playing the base game for almost three years, I have a pretty good idea how TBC plays. Therefore, I have a pretty good idea of how Wrath of the Lich King will play. Blizzard does not reinvent the wheel. Blizzard makes shiny, stable new wheels and then polishes them to a mirror like sheen.

The most distressing news, is the lack of news about the good old world of Azeroth. Azeroth is quickly becoming a wasteland and nothing more than a speed bump for The Outlands and soon to be new playground; Northrend. I truly wish Blizzard would drop half the planned zones for Northrend and restructure the current zones of Azeroth.

From all accounts, Blizzard learned a great deal from the base game and made the effort to make TBC kick ass. Hopefully, they will do the same for WotLK. However, I strongly caution Blizzard not to apply what they've learned simply to new expansions. Blizzard needs to take that knowledge and revamp the original game, or the WoW community will become even more splintered.

Oh, and Blizzard, I better damn well be able to level past 60 or 70 without buying the damn expansion.

Job

I went on a job interview yesterday for an IT position at the college I go to. This was my first job interview since leaving the active duty military a year ago. They offered me the job, and I accepted. I start next week. My gaming time will be almost null from this point forward, until I finish school.


Yes, I am that damn good that they hired me on the spot.

Dreamblade: Night Fusion Preview

The official first look at the next Dreamblade expansion, Night Fusion, has been posted here.

My Thoughts

Blah. The pieces are always a mixed bag with new expansion previews. Most of the previews give little indication of how well the expansion will fair in tournament play, but they are an invaluable starting point for understanding the expansion.

What irks me about each consecutive Dreamblade expansion so far, is the fact that they just introduce more and more and more. Baxar's War, the first expansion, offered some solid pieces and very few new mechanics. Bazar's War is my favorite expansion because of this.

Dreamblade launched with a comprehensive rulebook. It was advertised as "all the rules the game will ever have". Every planned ability was supposedly listed. Sadly, new expansions have not followed this mantra.

Surely new mechanics and abilities can't be bad? I wish that was the case. There are tons of abilities in Dreamblade and Wizards of the Coast has, for some reason, made most of them completely unplayable or made abilities that are far superior. For example, Skirmish and Advance are almost required because they allow pieces to be moved around the board. Movement is king in Dreamblade and abilities related to it are far more desirable. Other abilities, which could be usable, are often attached to a creature that is unplayable or is given a cost that is infeasible for any warband.

I don't want to get off track here, but needless to say, abilities are not balanced in Dreamblade. WotC is not helping the situation. Instead of giving players new pieces that are playable with old abilities, they develop new pieces with new abilities or pieces with restricted old abilities.

The Night Fusion preview is a perfect example. Every piece has restrictive versions of old abilities. Instead of giving the game a decent Bodyguard, they develop another spawn expensive piece, but give it a damage restricted bodyguard feature. I truly wish they could just release some figures that are solid and playable with abilities that are already in the game. Screw all this new bullshit.

I guess this is one of the reasons I'm dropping Dreamblade. New expansions are just becoming bloated and overly advanced for my liking. For every ounce of good an expansion brings, there is enough garbage and overpowered pieces to make purchases a losing proposition. And WotC wonders why sales are in the gutter.

World of Warcraft Hits 9 Million

Have you ever heard the phrase; "television killed the radio star"? Or maybe this one; "The Burning Crusade killed World of Warcraft!". While television may have killed the radio star, The Burning Crusade has not killed World of Warcraft. In fact, World of Warcraft has grown: to nine million subscribers.

From all evidence, the growth is coming from the western market, contrary to what many MMO bloggers have been posting. The Burning Crusade has not launched in China yet, where WoW pulls in a few million of the current total user base! The ten million mark is not that far off, and TBC's launch in China may just be the spur to get it there. I firmly believe, and have for some time, that World of Warcraft will hit ten million by year's end.

This falls in line with what I've been reading and seeing lately. A lot of casual gamers are completely digging the extra ten levels of content, new zones, extended professions, and more accessible end-game content. Most raiders seem to have fallen off the horse as their "perfect" 40-man guilds disintegrated upon TBC's launch. It has been a hard road for them as they restructure, regroup, and realign for the 10 and 25 man content.

So, wouldn't raiders quitting in frustration decrease the numbers? No, because raiders make up a very tiny minority (just shy of 2%) of players. Casual and core gamers have and will continue to make up WoW's majority. Building the game around them has once again proven to be successful. It is a pleasure to read some of the reports from friends that have returned to WoW.

Actually, the more I read about The Burning Crusade, the more I want to play it. And I will play it. I have some time off coming up and I plan to give the TBC 10-day free trial a whirl.

Dear Shadowbane

Dear Shadowbane,

You suck.

I pondered over the last week how to write this letter, but nothing can say it better than those two simple words. You have peaked my interest for over a decade and you never once managed to satisfy my curiosity.

I bought your box, your expansions, and resubscribed my accounts many times. Now you are free, and you still suck. You lag, you crash, and worst of all, you still force people to level. Would it be so difficult to remove your barely working PvE content in favor of an instant level 75 system? No, I thought not. That would require thought and consideration for me, the player.

I've tried to make this work. I've spent restless days trying to rip my eyes out as another bug, lag spike, or plain bad game mechanic sucked another death out of my avatar. All in the vain hope that I would some day get to the "end game" and finally get the chance to PK some newbs. Alas, I never made it.

I'm done and I'm not coming back. Once again Shadowbane, you suck!

Yours truly,

Heartless_

Dreamblade: Organized Play Canceled

It is a sad day for any fans of the Dreamblade CMG from Wizards of the Coast. WotC has decided to cancel the 1k and 10k tournaments and other mainstream Organized Play aspects. Here is the Dear John letter:

Dear Dreamblade Players:

As you prepare your warbands for Augusts’ Dreamblade 50K championship, many of you may be wondering about the future of Dreamblade Organized Play (OP).

When we designed this game, we envisioned highly competitive organized play as one of the key things that makes the game great, and we provided robust organized play with Dreamblade. Despite our best efforts however, we didn’t get enough tournament players, and we can’t continue supporting the game with the same depth of OP that we’ve offered in the past. As a result, we will no longer be supporting the 1K and 10K events. The August 50K event will continue as scheduled, as will Edge Tournaments. We love this game and we know you do too. It’s a painful change but a necessary one.

Night Fusion, Dreamblade’s fifth set, releases in September and promises to be our most exciting set to date. It includes a number of new features that we have been reserving for Dreamblade’s second year. The success of Night Fusion will be very telling for Dreamblade as we gauge demand for the future. We hope fans come out in droves to support it!

Thank you for your passionate support of Dreamblade and your patience during this time. We hope to have the opportunity to continue to bring you this innovative and revolutionary game experience for some time to come.

Does this spell the end for Dreamblade? Not yet. Local Edge tournaments will still be supported, but historically they have been hard to maintain. The prizes for Edge events are sub par. Plus Edge events are easily ruined by veteran players playing top tier warbands forcing newer players to "buy up" or "ship out".

This is not a surprising announcement, but it is a sad one. Dreamblade is a great game that only suffers from a fairly high price point and low player population.

Grimwell Interview

Allakhazam has an interview with Grimwell, the Everquest 2 Community Manager. I just wanted to quote a couple answers he gave:

Allakhazam: You worked at and ran fan sites for some years before signing on with SOE. What's it like to be on the other end of the journalistic "mic?"

Grimwell: It's a lot easier to get into tradeshows and conferences, that's for sure! I love being on the 'other side of the mic' mostly because I have not forgotten what it is like to work so hard on a fansite. Everyone who has a fansite and works on it is doing so out of passion. Yes, there are those who are lucky enough to also draw a paycheck from it, but there is also a lot of passion.

I find that my position allows me not to just remember what it was like, but also to try to provide things that I always wished the game companies would do for and with fansites. That's an advantage because it makes it very easy to know exactly why a particular site is asking for specific information on a Game Update, or an interview, or a screen shot, or any other resource for their site. They just want to do a good job covering the game.

Allakhazam: Do you feel like your background working on fansites gives you a unique perspective as the Community Manager in contrast to your predecessors?

Grimwell: It definitely works in terms of my relationship with the fansites, but it's not something I can rest my hat on and then relax. The fansites are constantly evolving and needing new and different things to meet their goals. Plus, there is a lot to being a Community Manager that working on fansites does not prepare you for. There is a huge difference between being able to say "Wouldn't it be cool if?" or "If I was ever working on a game I'd…" and being on the other side of the coin and realizing just how wide of an impact even a small design change can have.

Go ahead and read the rest.

World of Warcraft: Possible PvP Changes?

Blue poster, Nethaera, commented on the official World of Warcraft forums that there are possible PvP changes in the pipeline.

We do have plans to add more battlegrounds in the future. How many, I couldn't answer for you at this time.

There is a method to the madness, however. Mostly, it has to do with making sure there is a healthy population of people to take part in the battlegrounds. If we have too many battlegrounds, the population will thin out and queues will go up. Where Arenas are quick battles that don't need a lot of time commitment (based on limiting how many games a team may choose to play beyond the minimum), battlegrounds tend to take a bit more time and have no real downside for playing them almost exclusively if people choose to.

We have more plans in the future in general for PvP though nothing more concrete that I can share with you right now. It's common knowledge that an expansion is in the works. More on the details will come in time as to what all will be included in it.

It is interesting how the last paragraph is worded. The tidbit about the expansion is mentioned after the part about possible general PvP changes. Could this mean that the next expansion will focus more heavily on the Alliance vs. Horde battle? It may just be wild speculation, but I don't think Blizzard wants to get tagged as "lazy" by just producing another expansion featuring just ten levels of content.

However, Blizzard usually sticks to what they do best and rarely stray from the beaten path. On top of this, it does not make much sense to release a PvP expansion when so many players enjoy WoW's casual quest based leveling.

Hopefully Blizzard will be a little quicker releasing the next expansion. Even though I haven't touched The Burning Crusade yet, I still want to see what Blizzard has in store for everyone.