Aion

Here we go again. The top 38 MMOs in the last 30 days in the USA, as reported by Google Trends.

Yeah, I like TV. I can say that now; for years I refused to watch it. Rotting my mind and all. But having just come off a marathon 30 Rock Season 2 bender, I find I really want to get back to playing MMOs because they are LESS addictive than television. With MMOs, you chat with people, group with them, make friends. With TV, it’s just sitting with the cat and a bowl of popcorn on a lonely couch. So, you know, on the scale of pathetic leisure time activities, MMOs are way above television. ...

Soooo…. how about that Massively article? Did it make you mad as hell? Meh. I had a look at my site analytics today, just to see if people were coming here to read about the so-called controversy and you know? More people came to read my view of Velious through frost-covered glasses. That reinforces what I’ve always known about MMO fans. We just want to get online and PLAY GOOD GAMES. ...

I suck at predictions, but everyone else is doing them. Luckily, I have a Magic 8 Ball. I’m just gonna list some games, and ask the Magic 8 Ball what it thinks of them. Question to the 8 Ball for all of these games: Will this game have a good year in 2011? Age of Conan: “Outlook Not So Good”. AoC released its first expansion, “Ride of the Godslayer”, last summer, and that’s pretty much the last I’ve heard of the game. I don’t think the Magic 8 Ball is correct; I think Funcom is content to support their current player base without feeling the need to go F2P. Their massively hyped launch should have helped them recoup their development costs years ago. ...

Exciting MMO news lands in my inbox; I pass it along. Cryptic is dropping prices in their “C-Store” for the holiday weekend on existing items. Emphasis on existing; they also announce that the Galaxy X/Galaxy Dreadnought class cruiser will soon be available in the shop. This is the three nacelled Enterprise-D variant that Riker commanded in the future segment of The Next Generation’s “All Good Things”, and in particular is the ship that @Longasc has been trying to earn via getting people to sign up. Well, it’ll be in the store soon. ...

Lots of people really do ask me what I DO in EverQuest? Truth be told, most of the time I am either working on my Epic 1.5 (the rogue epic quest is THE WORST of them all), do monster missions for gear and experience, or do the Boomerang! event in Brell’s Rest. It’s a simple arena game; everyone in the party chooses a team – red, blue or gold, like in Star Trek – and each is given boomerangs in their opponent’s two colors. You enter, are transformed into a gnoll of your color, and you run around and fling boomerangs at enemies while dodging boomerangs thrown at you, as well as explosive barrels that drop randomly from the ceiling. You get one point for hitting an enemy; lose one point for being hit twice and lose five points for being blown up by an explosive barrel. After five minutes, the top three get gold tokens (used to buy high level uber weapons), and everyone gets silver tokens appropriate to their point total, used to buy a wide variety of gear and augments. ...

I’ve been playing a bit of Earth Eternal since it went into open-closed beta yesterday. Since I think we’re still unable to actually show the game, here’s a picture of the upcoming stop motion/cgi film, Roald Dahl’s Fantastic Mr. Fox. Now, I don’t KNOW that Sparkplay’s gonna close down to go to the premiere, but I wouldn’t be surprised. Should kids gamble on the Internet? Evil Theurgists wonders why KingsIsle is encouraging kids to blow their parent’s moolah spinning the virtual wheels of Wizard101’s new slot machine – where you spend 15 (and up) Crowns to win the usual prize of 20 gold. You get 15 twirls a day and the rewards are minuscule so… let’s hope this is one feature that doesn’t make it out of testing. ...

Awwww, over-protective mommy ship takes cute baby alt-ship out for the first time! Yes, I’ve joined the ranks of EVE pilots with two accounts; the lure of EVE’s Power of 2 promotion and the savings in time by having a second account for salvaging, hauling, and extra drones was just too much to ignore. If you think THAT picture is just too twee, check THIS one out. ...

Aion was my entertainment of choice this weekend. I spent the better part of Friday evening and Saturday playing it. I’ve rejoined MMO comrades from the Casualties of War (COW) guild, first formed as a group of bloggers going into Warhammer Online. The guild has since branched out into a number of other MMOs, including Aion. Community Even if you prefer to solo, having a good in-game community is important. This is especially true in PVP oriented games. Being back among the members of COW is fun as always. They’re chatty, extremely helpful and generous. A good guild helps to offset the sometimes “Barren’s chat” atmosphere of newly released or heavily populated games. Your guild is your sanity buffer. ...

“It would like them much; but an ye wot how dragons are esteemed, ye would not hold them blamable. They fear to come.” – “Well, then, suppose I go to them instead, and—” – “Ah, wit ye well they would not abide your coming. I will go.” And she did. She was a handy person to have along on a raid. – Mark Twain, “A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court” ...