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World of Warcraft Endgame Analysis part IV

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Parts: I | II | III | IV | V

Hardcore Instance Running

Ok, you’re a l33t powergamer. What is there for you when you hit 60 th level? Find 39 other friends and you’re ready to form a raid group for the baddest of the bad:

Red
This lovely lavafront property can be had for a cool $499,999. Dragon not included

Molten Core
The “original” hardcore dungeon, Molten Core was the first 40 man dungeon available. However, because it has been around for so long, it has been successively “nerfed” (made easier) in difficulty as new content has become available. As a result, at this point in time, the hardest part of Molten Core is finding 35-40 other people to get together at the same time and go raid it. →  I’d buy that for a dollar.

Weekly News We care About Wrap Up – 3.31.06

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Must miss
I did my part to support UMD movies by buying 25 copies of this classic story about a girl who wakes up a slut.

UMD movies failing
Is it possible Sony somehow is responsible for a failed format? Of course it is, they love failing, and I love to see their new formats fail. This is a good sign for those of us who want game systems to focus on playing games. To read more complaining, read this.

Blizzard sued by some guy who wants to sell Warcraft guides on the internet
This is a very interesting and possibly important lawsuit. The guy suing Blizzard sold his guides on eBay until Blizzard complained and they were taken down. They say he is trying to make money off of their good will and recognition they’ve built with their games, whatever that means. →  Jet fuel can’t melt videolamer.

Weekly News We care About Wrap Up – 3.24.06

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PS3 to be region free.
Woohoo. Now I can buy RPGs I can’t play without getting the system modded. I expect this will increase the number of gamers who import titles from Japan, but also eat into sales of Western releases by a little, which is part of the reason console manufacturers always used region encoding.

GameStop makes huge profits.
Buying your competitors and selling used games as new really works.

Errrr
This pic of Representative Keeley is really a stronger argument against her position than anything I could write.

Jack Thompson and Delaware Representative try to brand violent games as obscene, thereby getting around that pesky First Amendment.
According to them games are not speech so they shouldn’t be protected. Since when did artistic expression need to be in the form of spoken words? →  Tokyo Xtreme Reader: Drift 2

Weekly News We care About Wrap Up – 3.17.06

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OMG itz a remote control!11111

Miyamoto confirms the new Zelda will use the Revolution controller.
Though in what regard, we are still not sure. If it’s simply for mini games or something silly like that, many fans may pissed off. I think Nintendo painted themselves into a corner with this new Zelda game. They wanted to release it as a GC game but then there are no other big games coming out on that system… possibly ever. So instead of supporting their own dead system they decided to launch it with the Revolution. Making it a Rev launch title makes sense, but then Nintendo would just alienate more fans because the game was originally promised for the GC. So now they’re trying to dress it up like a Revolution title to sell the system. →  Screw Jesus, this article’s the real deal

Aborted game autopsy 2: Suspicions confirmed

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Besides learning some valuable lessons while working on my game, some things I already thought to be true were reaffirmed.

Suspicions Confirmed:

Kierga
The cliched plain female archer nearing a mid life crisis.

Games take zillions of man hours to make. Any game of substantial size cannot be completed by six people. Any game using more than a few 3D models requires more than one guy who knows how to do 3D modeling from classes he took. Any game with a few hundred characters needs more than one talented conceptual artist. And any game that has a 150 page plot and also wants to have dialog should have more than two writers.

Since I already mostly understood why development teams are so big and games cost so much, we’ll say that now these facts are burned into my brain. →  READ3R

You never forget your first one

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PSO Ver 1 case
The future is colorful.

I really enjoyed Phantasy Star Online (PSO). I was there when it launched on the DreamCast. I was there for the DreamCast launch as well, but that’s a different story. There was just “something” about PSO that grabbed me. I’m not sure if it was the lineage of the earlier games, the sci-fi rpg trappings, or the Diablo II elements. Knowing me, it was a combination of all three.

I got hooked when I started playing the online component of the game. Initially, I was dialing in using the DreamCast’s integrated modem. When I first started playing, it was fine. Then I wanted a bit more.

After savagely beating a roommate for picking up the phone during a run of Caves-2, I ordered an ethernet adapter. →  This better not be as bad as everything else here.

Flash game review bonanza 1

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There are a lot of flash games on the internet, and most of them suck harder than a hooker on Christmas. So, in order to avoid having to write six angst-riddled reviews of six horrible games, as well as give the set of games I review some feeling of cohesiveness, I’ve decided to provide reviews for the top six rated games at the infamous flash portal at www.newgrounds.com. Enjoy!

Raiden X

Creator: Go0gley
Genre: top-down shooter

Water attack
Laser of Doom- $5000. Futuristic air force jet- $20000000. Getting your neighbor’s kid to draw your backgrounds – Priceless.

Synopsis: Raiden X was developed as a tribute to the Raiden games. It is a garden variety vertical shooter. Certain enemies will drop power ups that allow you to upgrade one of three types of weapons: a blue laser beam, red machine gun fire, or a purple lightning type energy.

 →  Up to 6 billion readers.
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Learning from Japanese Synergy

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Synergy is not a word to be recklessly tossed about. It is a seriously proactive relationship between outside of the box marketing and paradigm shifting branding that can result in untold of revenue for your company. The video game market has created new opportunities for the realignment of business models in this post category killer Ted spread. Tracing this synergy to its roots leads us across the Pacific.

The Japanese consumer will buy anything. Despite saving more than Americans, the Japanese are extremely hardcore in their loyalty. People who follow an anime will buy any worthless product tie in, people who like school girls will spend money on used school girl underwear, and people who like a game series will buy food and drinks as long as it has the series logo on it. →  Read like G did.

Gold Farmers: Destroying the Fun (and economy) of MMORPG’s

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If you have not read Billy’s take on gold farmers, you may want to now.

Anyone who plays World of Warcraft knows them: they often have strange names (Ihugirls, Jobsister), but they may also have a name unnoticeable from others. Their guild tag might be your average WoW lore fluff, or it could be something along the lines of “Knightsofthepiratekitty.” They play as much, if not more, as any hardcore addict: 8-12 hour days. But rather than roaming about the game’s many dungeons and zones, you find them in them alternating between the auction house and the same hot spots: Winterspring hunting herbs, camping elites in Tyr’s Hand, or patrolling Burning Steppes for rich thorium veins. Every hour of the day. →  The only thing we have to read is read itself.

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The Ethics of Farming part II

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Continued from yesterday’s part I…

  • If you buy gold, you support Chinese sweatshops.

You’d think people on computers made in Chinese sweatshops would catch the irony of their argument. They don’t though, know why? It’s because they don’t want Chinese people on their servers period. It isn’t about keeping the game servers clean of trouble, it’s about keeping out people who don’t speak English or live in a country they like. Here is the truth though. There are no gold farming Chinese sweat shops. I have spoken to gold farmers in person and in the game. I was curious about the way they operate so I am always asking questions. Here’s what I have learned. There are no sweatshops; the majority of the gold farmers are college students. →  You lost me.