Faking Sick

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Q&As and disclaimers to start your Monday Loading...

Have you sent me an e-mail and I haven't written back? I try to respond to as many e-mail as I possibly can, but with the deluge that often comes to my mailbox it simply isn't possible to reply to everyone. Rest assured that I read every e-mail that I receive, though I ask for help with the big words.

Remember, the opinions expressed in Loading... are not necessarily those of TenTonHammer.com, it's partners, affiliates, South Park characters or NASA scientists. I do speak for Vin Diesel.
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While reading Coyote's 100th Blog entry I had to wonder how many Loading... blogs had been written. Amazing as it may seem, this is the 440th edition of Loading..., most of which are archived in the fertile ground that we call TenTonHammer.com, the place where this all began.

I can't take credit for all of them, or even the good ones which were written by Jeff Woleslagle or Phil Comeau, but I must be up there in the 420 range. I'm stunned, amazed and in some ways appalled that people are signing up to read this in greater numbers every week. 57 acolytes to the MMOG gospel have signed up in the first two days of October. It's a crazy world.

There are still a number of miscreants who sign up and then don't confirm their e-mail address. There are also a few who sign up using their company e-mail address which in most cases blocks this piece of daily scripture as spam or as better yet as vulgar. Where do you people work that this is considered vulgar? @#$% you corporate censors!

It's Monday and that means most of you are faking sick to stay home and play games anyway, giving your censor happy bosses what they rightly deserve, a day with a temp and I don't mean a temp like Lara Flynn Boyle either. Those don't exist. Twin Peaks indeed.

Remember if you need an excuse you could just let your boss know that Ed McMahon sent you a letter asking you to stay home to collect your "Winner's Check!"

If that doesn't work. Just use this little gem that appears to be made by the same folks who invented the X-ray glasses.

Very high-tech and guaranteed to get you out of the office and into your MMOG of choice in minutes.

As you can see, it is "A Totally Disgusting Laugh Riot".

Not only that, it's "Great Party Fun". You can fake sick, stay home and have a party. It's all right there on the package.

I'm just not sure why the people on the package seem to be confusing it for pizza. The guy looks like he is going to grab it and eat it.

Friday's blog took a poke at a gentleman who felt he was being discriminated against because he was not allowed to use the name GayRevenger in City of Heroes.

One of our faithful readers, Jim had this to say;

"Although the page would not open for the article about the player in City of Heroes who named his characters Gay..., I found the page and the article by deleting some of the ending of the link. Interesting article. It appears that no one, including other gays or lesbians agrees with what he did. Although one person thought that perhaps the games policy was discriminatory, she did agree that he knowingly broke the games rules. I do not wish to appear un politically correct, but I thought it was somewhat ironic that one of their advertisers, who had a large banner ad, was the National Fatherhood Initiative. Interesting!"

Thanks for the quick pick-up on that Fatherhood Initiative ad and of course for pointing out that I screwed up the link to the story. I never said I was going to make things easy for you folks.

World of Warcraft continues to march towards world domination. Next stop on the subjugation train is South Park. Blizzard has posted a sneak peak of the first episode of season 10 of South Park on the official WoW site.
Are you faking sick today? Let me know

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Every good guild needs a home. A home free of gold ads, secondary market farmers. Look no further than GuildPortal.com.

Exclusive new TenTonHammer.com Content!
Let us entertain you or at the very least waste some of your time at work.10.02.2006 Exclusive Content Op/Ed: Planting A Seed
"Seed, a dev-described "non-combat, roleplay centric MMORPG" announced its imminent closure at the end of September. More than just a lamentable end to Danish developer Runestone's dream, the event has sparked questions about the viability of an MMOG apart from the WoW model, and specificly whether or not a non-combat "cooporative puzzle" style MMOG is viable. Ethec attempts to answer that question in this week's editorial." Dungeons and Dragons Online: The Seed That Wouldn't Grow
"In the wake of the failure of a MMO based around social interaction and politics, Ralsu examines what drives the MMO market. Then he looks at DDO lack of meaningful social game play and Turbine could use faction to advance lore, explain player-vs-player combat, and make Stormreach more immersive." Gods And Heroes: Gaming For The Gabby
"Social interaction is pivotal for a lot of MMO folks. RadarX takes a look at social interaction, and explains why an MMO based entirely on it won't work. He also gives support to "chatters" and provides sympathy to those who aren't." Vanguard: MMOs And The Magic Formula
"This past week, Runestone Game Development announced that it is filing bankruptcy and closing the doors on its innovative roleplay-centric MMO, Seed. What was wrong with Seed? Perhaps nothing, other than the fact that it didn't buy into the tried and true magical MMO formula that made World of Warcraft such an enormous success, and makes Vanguard: Saga of Heroes look like a contender for the market share. But is that formula starting to lose its potency? Was Seed a bad idea, or just a poorly executed one?" Warhammer Online: The Road To 7th Edition - The Army of Rat-Ho-Tep
"Finally a new entry for the Road to 7th Edition! Having completed his recent move across the city, with only two days of Internet downtime, Ratboy has posted his third in what will no doubt be an epic series of articles. This week Ratboy has finally decided which army he will be playing in 7th Edition and has even got a sizeable start on it." World of Warcraft: Planting A Seed
"This week's comment content editorial is about the recent failure of a promising upstart MMO known as Seed. Seed was an open-ended roleplaying game that allowed players use the environment to do whatever they wanted, from politics to trading. Recently, Runestone Game Development (the creator of Seed) filed for bankruptcy and announces that Seed will be permanently closed. This begs to question, is there room in this industry for a non-combat orientated MMO? Our very own Aureal answers that question in this week's editorial: Planting a Seed." Vin Diesel Fact of the Day - If at first you don't succeed, you must not be Vin Diesel. Now from the real world. You can't make this stuff up. Peckerwood Grocery
...Insert your own tagline here. Mobile Phones Get High-Pitched Theft Alarm
...Oh, I hope somebody steals one in a movie theatre. Moosehead Donates Beer To Canadian Soldiers in Afghanistan
...Now go out and buy yourself a case to support this fine brewery.

As always, thanks for visiting TenTonHammer.com,
-- John "Boomjack" Hoskin