Welcome to the 1,188th edition of Loading...
Loading... is the premier daily MMORPG news, coverage, and
commentary newsletter, only from Ten Ton Hammer.
MMOGs are amazing. Just a couple decades ago we could have never
imagined the technology we have today. And yet, if official forums and
other outlets for pissing and moaning are any indication, none of us
are happy. Are we a generation of spoiled whiners? Join me, Karen
"Shayalyn" Hertzberg, as I try to answer this question in Loading...
Everything's Amazing, Nobody's Happy.
The Pulse
You vote with what you view at Ten Ton Hammer, and the
result is the Ten Ton Pulse (
href="http://www.gunnars.com/" target="_blank">What
is The Pulse?).
Here's today's top 5 Pulse results: href="http://www.gunnars.com/">
-
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/41"
target="_blank">World of Warcraft - href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/254">Aion href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/254">
- Dungeons
& Dragons Online -
EverQuest
2 -
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/taxonomy/term/115">Age of
Conan
Biggest movers today:
- The Secret World (UP 25 to #12)
- Fallen Earth (Down 3 to #15)
- Dragon Age Origins (Down 3 to #19)
MMO Releases
-
8/25
- CrimeCraft
(release date) - 9/1 -
Champions
Online (release date) - 9/9
- Dungeons
& Dragons Online Unlimited (release date) - 9/15
- Runes
of Magic "The Elven Prophecy" (expansion) - 9/22 -
Fallen
Earth (release date) -
9/22
- Aion
(release date) - 10/8
- Cities
XL (release date)
Releases
- 11/3
- Dragon Age:
Origins (release date) - 12/1
- LotRO:
Siege of Mirkwood (release date)
- 12/2
- DOFUS 2.0
(release date)
- Early 2010
- APB
Important
Dates
- 10/23 - 10/24
- Hero-Con
Loading... Daily
I'm afraid Loading... is coming at you a bit later than usual today.
You'd think I'd learn to save my work as I'm writing, but alas...one
stray mouse click and my entire (finished) column was lost. Given that,
and how pissed off I am about it, the topic for today's column seems
somewhat ironic.
A YouTube
video of comedian Louis C.K. made the rounds among my
Facebook friends yesterday in which he tells late night talkshow host
Conan O'Brien, "Everything's amazing right now, and nobody's happy." He
harkens back to the days of things like rotary phones you had
to stand next to (because they had a cord), and having to actually walk
into the bank and write a check to access your money. When Conan asked
him whether we take technology for granted in the 21st century, he
replied, "Well, yeah, because now we live in an amazing, amazing world,
and it's wasted on the crappiest generation of spoiled idiots. This is
what people are like now--they've got their phones and they're like..."
he pantomimes someone poking at their cell phone in disgust, "'
style="font-style: italic;">Ugh! It won't...'
Give it a second; it's going to space!"
Are we spoiled? Yesterday I noticed a
href="http://forums.tentonhammer.com/showthread.php?t=47105">thread
in our Aion forum in which people were grumbling that the
post-20 leveling grind was too slow. But just a few days prior to the
complaints appearing in this thread, a different group of community
members was ranting about potential increases to the amount of
experience given out for quests. These people contended that the pace
of Aion was just right, and that increasing exp gain by a large amount
would dumb down the game. Or they noted that NCSoft was taking the easy
way out, descreasing the leveling grind by implementing an exp boost
instead of introducing more quests into the game to make leveling more
compelling. It seems that whatever direction NCSoft takes there's going
to be a contingent of gamers who won't like it.
And that's true for any MMOG. Whenever a developer implements a major
change to their game, there's going to be one group of people who
loudly insist that change is the worst game-breaking thing ever while
another (usually less vocal) group tells them to STFU and QQ. We've
seen this drama play out time and again on official forums.
Have we become a generation of spoiled whiners? Once upon a time, we
were seemingly quite content clutching a crude controller in our hands
as we volleyed a white dot back and forth across our TV screen. My
cousin had Pong when we were kids, and we would fight one another for
the right to be one of the two people who got to play at any given
time. Then along came Atari, and soon we found ourselves defeating
8-bit aliens in Space Invaders, or swinging over pixely-looking
crocodiles in Pitfall. When Nintendo arrived on the
scene, suddenly we were Mario, bouncing off mushrooms and
crawling through drain pipes, collecting coins all the way, only to
learn that our princess was in another castle. Video games were no
longer relegated to huge consoles in arcades and, as my grandpa used to
say when he talked about eating cabbage soup
during the Great Depression, we were "thankful to have it" that way.
20 years ago few of us imagined the possibility of running around
virtual worlds, defeating enemies and interacting with hundreds, or
even thousands, of other players. Yet now we have those virtual worlds
with stunning graphics, complex mechanics, and exciting stories (a lot
more exciting than, say, playing an Italian plumber who's endlessly
trying to rescue a wayward princess), and we seem discontent. What's
happened to us? Has the explosion of technology in the late 20th and
early 21st century left us numb to just how impressive these things
really are?
I'm not saying that we should all just swallow whatever developers dish
out, or that we should buy and pay subscription fees for lousy games.
Constructive criticism, feedback and ideas from players are all
necessary elements for making good games better. But perhaps we should
take time now and again to appreciate what we do have.
Just one decade ago, as I was beginning to learn about online gaming, I
would've never imagined the virtual worlds I've seen, or the friends
that I'd make within them, or that one day I'd have a career writing
about these games and working to develop communities centered around
them. And yet, here I am. It's pretty amazing. And I'm pretty happy.
Are we spoiled whiners? Do we fail to appreciate how good things are?
If so, what's the cure? Share your thoughts in the
href="http://forums.tentonhammer.com/showthread.php?t=47139">Loading...
forum.
Shayalyn's Epic Thread of
the Day
From our href="http://forums.tentonhammer.com/forumdisplay.php?f=589">Aion
General Discussion forum
href="http://forums.tentonhammer.com/showthread.php?t=47092">Japanese
Voice Pack - Comedy
If you thought your character's vocalizations in Aion
were amusing (or annoying, as the case may be), you ain't heard nothing
yet. Kitsunegirl posted a video featuring Aion's Japanese voice pack,
and it's not only funny, but borders on obscene. You'll just have to href="http://forums.tentonhammer.com/showthread.php?t=47092">hear
for yourself.
==============================
Awesome Quotes from the
Epic Thread
"And I thought some of
the westernized vocalizations were a little pervy sounding. I've stuck
to the 'tough' female voice simply because she's the only one who
doesn't sound like she's achieving the Big O when she's executing a
skill."
- Shayalyn
"Defeating desert
monsters is VERY rewarding work. Just sayin."
- Savanja
==============================
Have you spotted an Epic Thread on our forums? href="http://forums.tentonhammer.com/showthread.php?t=32559">Tell
us!
6 new Ten Ton Hammer MMOG features today! 72
in October! 2,020 in
2009!
Today's New Features & Guides
-
Player
Created Content - A Look at Benefits and Dangers of Giving the Players
Control
What
if the developers of your favorite MMOG turned over control of content
development to you? What if you had the power to craft your own story
and cast a hero or villain of your choosing? Would you create a well
thought out story that many people would enjoy, or would you find a way
to abuse your new power? These are some of the benefits and dangers of
giving players the freedom to create their own content. With the
potential for abuse, is it really worth the risk?
-
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/aion/guides/world/abyssguide">Aion
Beginner's Guide to the Abyss
Aion's
player versus player combat is all about making a name for yourself,
taking on the biggest enemy, and earning the best reward. There are
several ways in which you can engage in PvP combat, but at some point,
nearly all players will find themselves stepping through the Abyss gate
and into a world unlike any they have known before. Be prepared and get
the basics of the Abyss and the rewards that await you on the other
side in this Beginner's Guide to the Abyss.
-
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/co/editorial/launchwants">Champions
Online - What Was Missing at Launch
With Champions
Onlines launch behind us, it seems like a good time to look back and
reflect on what could, and maybe should, have been present in the game
at launch. Keep your flaming torches away, this is just one crazy mans
opinion.
-
Champions
Online - Battle Royale: The Min-Maxer vs. The Conceptual Creator
Since
the dawn of MMO-time, there have been two types of players: The
Min-Maxers and the Conceptual Creators. The Min-Maxer likes to run
daily-spreadsheets and TPS reports to find the most optimum build
possible for their characters, while the Conceptual Creators prefer to
let their hearts and souls guide their hero on his or her journey. In
Champions Online, either way is a viable play-strategy, but is one
inherently better than the other? William JoBildo Murphy tries to
decide in this editorial.
-
WoW
- Gearing Up in the Post 3.2 Era
Since
introducing the concept of badges and badge gear in patch 2.3.0,
Blizzard has been dedicated to providing alternate gearing methods to
players who cant or dont want to raid. Patch 3.2.0 has taken it a
step further and the game now offers an unprecedented number of ways to
equip your character with epic quality raid or raid-ready gear. Join
Medawky this week for a quick primer into how best to spend your time
to gear up your toons with shiny new epics.
-
Freaky
Creatures: Exclusive Screens
Freaky
Creatures, a cross platform MMOG that allows you to create your own
creature to battle against friends, has released some new exclusive
screens to us, and we love to share. This unique online battle game is
launched from a flash drive that is included with the games starter
pack, you can then play for free or upgrade to premium membership
should you desire. Join us for a look at in game screenshots from this
unique and colorful game.
Hottest Content:
-
Incarna
Incarnate - An Exclusive Q&A with style="font-weight: bold;">EVE Online's Torfi
Frans Ólafsson href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/wow/newsletter/issue36"> href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/aion/editorials"> style="font-weight: bold;"> - Player
Created Content - A Look at Benefits and Dangers of Giving the Players
Control -
Can
Aion overcome
the re-subscription threshold? href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/75321/"> style="font-weight: bold;"> -
style="font-weight: bold;">EVE Online Video
Q&A with GoonSwarm Spymaster 'The Mittani' -
style="font-weight: bold;">Champions Online -
Battle Royale: The Min-Maxer vs. The Conceptual Creator href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/co/guides/bashpvp"> - Windows
7, Gaming, and Why You Should Care - Mechanics
No
MMOG Should Launch Without -
The
Rift Between Us - A Guide to Rifting in style="font-weight: bold;">Aion href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/75229"> - Ease
of Access - Case Studies
in Accessibility and Popularity -
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/aion/guides/world/abyssguide">
style="font-weight: bold;">Aion Beginner's
Guide to the Abyss href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/75321/">
Thanks for visiting the Ten Ton Hammer network!
- Karen "Shayalyn" Hertzberg and the Ten Ton Hammer
team
