Morning is not the best time to be doing the blogroll – work and everything. So I will be writing them when I get home, which might make them a little more timely as well. Expect the first tonight, but as an extra – the next two comics in Straha’s epic EverQuest comic, WTF, are up! Straha’s daughter Kaitis tries to stop Venril Sathir from wiping out her family, but is there anyone that can stop Kaitis?
Just like pretty much everyone else, I bought Sims 3 and played it for awhile yesterday. I started off in a full family with two kids, a husband and me, and it didn’t go so well. I restarted living single and had plenty of time to myself, lots of chances to learn and have fun and relax, and never once felt hurried, and in all ways my life was better without a family. But at least I didn’t make my family the cast of Joss Whedon’s Firefly. Yet. ...
I linked to a wonderful post by Jennifer of Girl, Unplugged today wondering why it was okay to have dumpy-looking male heroes but the female ones had to be hypersexy and … damn, in my hurry to get everything done on time this morning, I forgot to actually put the link in so —- Meet the Newer (Sexier) Team! Read it! It’s great AND funny! Now I gotta run to Snowhill to see the Dares in concert!
Oh, speaking of Free Realms, the band that does the theme song “It’s Your World and Welcome To It”, the Dares, will be performing the song live at E3 AND on the Snowhill stage in game (on all servers, from what I understand) at 7PM EDT or 4 PM PDT. If you West Coasters are at work and can’t see it, we’ll let you know how it went because, like, we’re three hours ahead of you. In the FUTURE. ( not the actual song name) ...
Wow, June already. The year seems to be flying by so quickly. I saw “Up” over the weekend, kind of dark for a Disney/Pixar film, but I liked it quite a lot. Gaming-wise, it was largely Free Realms along with some trips into EVE and Vanguard. I hope to make it to Antonia Bayle’s Festival of Unity sometime this week. Kasul at Shattered was at the opening ceremonies to the Festival of Unity, conveniently held at a place where evil characters would be slaughtered by good-aligned guards oops. Okay. For 2010, a Festival of Dis-unity, to be kicked off in the Crossroads in the Commonlands, okay? Naturally, this one would have to be held on the Lucan D’Lere server…. ...
Welcome to another Friday! Got plans for the weekend? I’m planning to take a short break from EVE Online and get caught up on a beta, Mabinogi, Wizard 101 and will reinstall EQ2 to see if that fixes the problems I’m having with it freezing on launch. Spinks starts us off with a long and detailed look at the power of story in MMOs, specifically, the plight of the Forsaken as they meet their maker in World of Warcraft’s Howling Fjord. Those Forsaken aren’t dead, they’re just pining for the fjords! ...
I’ve been staying away from talking about Darkfall and Free Realms lately because, what’s more to say about it? Well, Darkfall is about to launch in the US, and we can only hope that makes more waves than Spellborn’s rather uneventful splash when it did the same a couple months back. Keen thinks Darkfall’s NA launch will give the game a chance to launch in the shape it should have been from the start. It’s kind of odd, really. Is Europe becoming a kind of live beta for US players? Spellborn, Runes of Magic, now Darkfall – the Europeans pay to make the game better for us. ...
Working on a first impressions piece about Mabinogi. Will keep the self-flagellation to a minimum but really, I only do it because it feels good when I stop. On to the blogs! Are persistent henchmen the new groups? Syp thinks they might be. Star Wars: The Old Republic will have them (echoing the party you gathered in Knights of the Old Republic). Guild Wars has their henchmen. EverQuest has their mecenaries. Star Trek Online has their bridge crew. Have MMOs truly come full circle back to their single player, you+your crew of helpers, roots? Is it truly not worth the trouble anymore to be part of a group that includes other living people? ...
Had a fun weekend in New Hampshire! No gaming to speak of, but I didn’t really miss it. My stepmom and I took a hike in the back woods and saw the effects of the ice storm and the tornado they had last winter. Got bitten by deer flies, walked dogs, went to church, and what I mostly missed? Doing the blogroll? So… here ’tis :) ...
Long weekend for us in the US, Memorial Day weekend. Though meant to honor Americans who have died in wars, I remember it mainly as the beginning of school’s summer session – those last few weeks of school where the teachers pretty much relaxed and let you do whatever you liked. As a trumpet player in the school band, I always had the hope that I would be selected to be the lone trumpet that stood apart in the cemetery that also ended the Memorial Day parade and play taps as we all stood silent in prayer. ...