Tattered Page

I’d delayed this post until I had some time to write something more engaging, but I got caught up in the “spirit of the season (revised)” (read: mad frantic running from place to place in a desperate attempt to get things accomplished) and never had the time to craft anything notable. 

I’m going back to the old (true) spirit of the season now.  The one that focuses on the people around the tree, not the presents under it.  The one that makes us smile a little more as we give a holiday greeting to strangers as we pass.  The one that makes me feel like a kid all over again.   The one that makes me feel better about myself and humanity. 

May you have a Merry Christmas, a happy New Year,

and may that Christmas feeling remain with you every day of this new year to come. 

Ok, maybe not cubicle hell, but while I’m sitting in my monochromatic 8×8 cell (desk included) I’ll be thinking of these guys at Three Rings Design. 

I knew I took a wrong turn at Albuquerque.

I figured Google Streetview would be a regional novelty for quite some time… I still do… they just (more or less) included MY region in that novelty.  My friend over at ShinyObjects just noted that Google’s got Streetview running in Pittsburgh, PA now.

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Work’s been rather nuts.  Jenn & I are still playing City of Heroes.  Issue 10 still seems fresh to us (and only a few of our characters have been able to go through most of the content) but the Halloween event is soon upon us and Issue 11 has entered into closed beta.

Issue 11: A Stitch in Time adds time travel to the game.  The community team did an awesome job leading up to the announcement: news stories in the Paragon times that tell of different outcomes to events very familiar to the players as well as cryptic clues in the player-run City Scoop! newspaper.

It also inspired my own Teaser Comic leading up to the event.  Time travel & Superheroes.  What did you expect?

I mean, really… WHY?

From the Cryptic Studios Blog:

What if life were a video game? I know I’d want some cheat codes. Here’s what other people at Cryptic said they would want:

It comes complete with an image of a whiteboard scrawled with ideas. Some of my favorites:

• Ctrl Alt Del
• Mario coin blocks (that’s gonna cause some nasty head injuries)
• Hookers restore health
• Double XP weekends
• Hot Coffee Mod
• Doughy 40-something guys can look like supermodels.

Me?  I can’t find a single thing to add…. as long as they make sure jiggle physics are still included.

Well, I got my prizes from the Comic Book Contest.  I figured that, with City of Heroes’ Issue 10 on the way, I’d give the new software a run doing a comic book based “guide” to the issue.

My goal was to mix a brief overview of the features with a little humor.  I hoped to make it target the casual City of Heroes player- no hard numbers or DPS stats- but also make it understandable to the curious outsider… maybe enough for them to want to give it a trial run.

Anyway, it’s currently available through hypercomics as well as .pdf here.  Let me know what you think.

If anyone’s more out-of-touch than I am, you might not have seen this yet.

1-18-08

Trailer launched with the Transformers premiere.  That’s not the movie title.  It’s codenamed “cloverfield.”  There’s a great deal of speculation.

Seems like a monster flick taken by an alternate perspective, but others aren’t certain. Is that roar’ a monster or just a skyscraper’s structural groaning resonating through the city after a quake.  Other… events… seem to make it clear that it IS a monster flick, though one with a different enough perspective that it warrants further attention (for me, at least).

(Sigh) I hear all about game developers’ insane schedules.  I believe them.  I just can’t figure out how all these guys maintian their blogs so well.  Things go a bit nuts here at work and I’m out of commission for over a month.

How the heck do they do it?

Ok, it’s not just work.

So… what’s been going on here?

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Well, the City of Heroes Comic Book Creator contest prizes are announced this week.   I’ve spent quite a bit of time exploring some comics there, and while none of us would probably be “professional grade” there are some real noteworthy achievements out there.

When I started my entry, I had some aspirations to winning it- now, I don’t really care- there are so many entries over there that deserve some attention… so many with just a dozen or so views.  I just want all the participants to feel their entry is worthwhile.

I first tried this over in hypercomics’ blog, but I’m re-posting here.  Sometimes a story just drives me to give it a little more attention. It may be the humor, or the style, or the message it delivers. It just might resonate with my mood of the day. When it does, I’ll write about it here and share why.

“Not a Hero” is such a comic. Go read it now. There may be some spoilers ahead.

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Nerfbat’s posted “MMO Development Lesson #16” and while I agree with the overall message, I don’t like the way the introduction feels. “Don’t be different for the sake of being different. Be different for the sake of being better.”

It is a good cautionary message- too many new developers want to come in, challenge all conventions, assume that everything in the past was somehow flawed or lacking vision and run headlong into the same obstacles that the MMO pioneers met. Still, as I peek into the betas of more MMO’s, I wonder if perhaps some developers aren’t clinging a bit too tighly to that philosophy to avoid any substantial change. “Different” is the “better” that we’re desperately missing.

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I’ve always lamented that the game with greatest toolset for self-expression and roleplaying was tied to an ever-changing combat engine that never seemed to live up to that potential.  I’m talking about Star Wars Galaxies, of course.

I don’t know whether it’s because so many people had such high hopes for it or because the bad reputation it developed through the occasionally-drastic changes it implemented, but the game doesn’t seem to get much attention anymore.  Shame, really.  They still manage some interesting ideas.

“Storyteller” is one of them.

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Ok, maybe now I’ll have time to write again.

I managed to squeeze together an 8-pager for the comic book creator contest.  It’s available at hypercomics as is my original for any interested.  I had to cut short some of the ideas I wanted to meet the deadline, so I may revisit the piece in the future (once the judging’s done- I don’t want to risk a disqualification at this point).

Now that the contest’s over, I encourage everyone to go over there, pick a random comic, and post a supporting comment.  With 320 entries and 3 prizes, the vast majority will not realize any reward beyond a comment on the page, and with so many posting and so few reviewing, even that’s not likely to happen.  Only a few dozen have any comment at all.

Some of these comics are obviously kids- or adults that haven’t tried something creative since they graduated college.  That’s a bit of a leap, but something we sould all encourage.  Give them some confidence to keep creating.  Find a forgotten story, find something you like in it, and give feedback.  It can mean the world.

Well, I decided to pass on the Lord of the Rings preorder promotion, which essentially guarantees that I won’t get the game later on.  People choosing the “preorder rate” can opt for a special monthly rate of $9.99 or a one-time payment of $200.  It’ll be interesting to see how many people took the offer and how it may affect future growth or churn trends.

Some initial thoughts:

• I’ve seen comments that those opting $9.99 instead of $200 will kick themselves if they’re still playing 2 years from now (the rough threshold for when the $200 rate will be the better deal).  I’ve been on City of Heroes nearing 3 years, now, so that’s entirely possible, but I believe that the new titles to be launched in the next two years might alter our gaming habits and make this kind of play less likely.
• I’ve seen others comment that, like myself, if they didn’t opt for the founder’s discount, they’d be reluctant to later decide to take the $15 fee.  Will LOTRO see substantial launch numbers that peak early, as those interested took the early deal and those on the fence turn away?  I’m not sure.
• What about churn?  The special $9.99 rate only lasts until you cancel your account.  That means it’s unlikely that you’re going to cancel due to a “slow month” or, as many do in City of Heroes, play a new release like mad, cancel it, then resubscribe when a new expansion’s ready for download.  Why risk losing the special rate?
• What about other games?  This fall Age of Conan comes out.  It might have been able to capture some of the early adopter market from LOTRO, but will people be reluctant to abandon their special rate after only 4-5 months of use?  Will they try to keep both accounts open or just give up on a game that doesn’t have a similar deal?

Well, the deadline for the City of Heroes Comic Book Creator Contest is fast approaching, and I’ve barely started mine.  I’ve got plenty of stories in queue, but nothing I can distill into an 8-page tale… well, one, but it’ll be a challenge to get done. 

I’m doing it again.  I cranked out the 36 pages in a few days and got good reviews, but the 8-pager is going to paralyze me.  With nearing 200 entries, I’m not expecting to win any of the cool prizes (my gaming PC can’t even handle the video card prizes). I’m just

I’m sure that a great many people feel anxious about sharing their creative side.  I was a bit nervous until the first feedback was posted(positive, thank goodness).  Well, second, really.  First could have been my mom. 

If you had the time to waste to swing by here, go over to the hypercomics site and give a few words of encouragement to the fledgling writers.  I’m sure they’d appreciate it.

Ok, I finally gnawed off the chain on my leg. Have a few side-projects that I’ll be writing on soon enough… and I have three trillion blogs to comment on but I wanted to get things in here again.

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