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 :) ...
Apologies to Randall Munroe Yes, I really do believe you can’t honestly review an MMO without investing yourself in it for a fairly substantial bit of time, so that any oddities with controls and stuff become second nature and you can understand the core of what the game developers were striving for. A 1999 EverQuest review could have written all about the low polygons and stiffness of the character models, the laughably sharp-cornered world and so on, and missed the forest for the trees. You have to play a MMO long enough to see and appreciate the forest before you stamp a score on a review. ...
Day 2 of the Wizard 101 Name the Turtles contest! My site stats show that well over a THOUSAND wizards have come to this site to choose a name for the Marleybone turtle. I think we all know the turtles are going to end up being named Raphael, Michelangelo, Leonardo, Donatello and Master Splinter. Soon-to-be-shuttered, PvP-centric MMO Shadowbane is Wizard 101’s ancestor in spirit. MMO Gamer has the story of how the Wizard 101 devs went from designing a no-holds-barred, kill-or-be-killed MMO to the kid friendly, brightly colored MMO of wands and wizards we play today. ...
Because the Mabinogi movie has the really annoying habit of bursting into song when all you want to do is read the article, I’ve hidden it beneath the fold. So click through to read how EQ2 could take some lessons from Mabinogi in making their world seem fun and inviting. EQ2 horse movie: Mabinogi horse movie: Both games have horses. They’re even pretty similar horses. But one tells a story, and one looks a whole lot better than the other. Granted, the EQ2 movie is from EQ2’s beta, and Mabinogi is a much newer game, but can you imagine EQ2’s stellar gameplay matched with an art style that’s a little more fun? ...