World of Warcraft

I’m not gonna say anything snarky about Michael Jackson. When he died yesterday, millions of people all over the world played his music loud and sang along; people gathered to remember him. When you and I die, how many people will even remember we lived? Nobody will remember us for how many max level characters we had or how many nights we spent raiding. We’ll only be remembered by and because of the people whose hearts we touched. Beau Turkey finds the most memorable moments in MMOs are not the levels ground out, but the coming together of friends to work on something as a team. ...

Hey, didja hear the news? Mark Jacobs is leaving Mythic and Mythic is being merged into Bioware! Jacobs was the public face of Mythic for so long, I can’t think of one without the other, and I can’t think of an upside to his leaving for the game I once loved, Dark Age of Camelot. Keen thought EA was past absorbing studios for their properties and then squeezing out the help. Snazfg urges people not to pillory either EA or Jacobs until more is known. Heartless_ said he knew it all along (I guess he did!). Ardwulf wonders if this means Mythic will be getting some Bioware resources (don’t count on it). Tobold suspects the merge came because Warhammer did not meet the goals Jacobs promised. Stropps agrees. Abalieno at Cesspit would have preferred this ended differently, with more learning and caring. Werit detects an air of schadenfreud among some of the commentators. And Scott Jennings reminisces about Mark and happier days at Mythic. ...

Yes, we’re back to the Daily Blogroll. Another allergy attack has left me asleep by 9PM, which really shortens the nights for me. Is Aion too derivative to be successful? Tobold thinks so. In fact he wonders why people would pay full price (US$15/month) for a WoW-like like Aion when they can get the real thing for the same price, or a free WoW-like in Runes of Magic. He also doesn’t hold out much hope for Fallen Earth, calling it too much like failed MMO Tabula Rasa “just working less well, being less fun, and having less good graphics”. So that’s that. ...

A lot of commentators in yesterday’s blogroll felt the changes to boss battles in Wizard 101 are bringing the game away from its casual, kid-friendly roots. It’s important to remember that even easy games like World of Warcraft would seem difficult if the solution to every single quest, instance and boss mob weren’t carefully explained to people. Soon every single quest, instance and boss mob fight will be figured out and carefully explained to every W101 player, and these will be easy again. Thomas of The Friendly Necromancer noticed that there is now a huge forge outside the Grand Chasm (Malistaire’s lair, forge pictured above), and harvestable items throughout the instance. It’s not too much of a stretch to assume that the new Malistaire fight consists of crafting certain treasure cards which would nullify or reflect his constant progressive AEing. ...

Between allergies and traveling, hasn’t been a lot of writing being done. When I got back home Sunday, there were nearly 200 messages in the my feed readers. Ugh. Lots happened! <– You’ll see over on the left that we now have a guild on Free Realms. Let me know if you want to join ;) On to the blogs! ...

A few days ago, the MMO blogging world burned with the news that rock star MMO developer turned lonely exile, Brad McQuaid, had returned from his lonely, sparse existence of playing video games, racing cars and sports bikes and feeling sorry about the harsh hand life dealt him to urge people to play more Vanguard. Some people were skeptical, but have come to believe. Others forgive him for his sins. ...

Yup, back in Florensia for a second try at it. Because, hey, be a pirate on the sea and an adventurer on the land, build your own ship, hire a (NPC) crew, two separate career paths, and it costs nuttin’. The cash shop only has some potions… I dunno how they make money in this game. The general chat is about what you’d expect, though. Big news today was that ex-EverQuest and Vanguard helmer Brad McQuaid was ending his self-imposed exile of idyllic days spent racing cars and playing games to jump back into the spotlight with his very own blog. Or did he? Genda believes the whole thing is a hoax, someone (possibly drummer Keith Sharward) just having a bit of fun. The actual Brad McQuaid doesn’t seem to have taken the steps of building up his LinkedIn profile in awhile, anyway. ...

Marissa Spiritcaller about five minutes before she became a smear on Lord Nightshade’s floor This was the weekend I didn’t do very much. My allergies had left me feeling drained, and I decided what I mostly needed to do was turn off the computer and go outside. To my balcony. I hauled out one of the wooden chairs I’d finished when the kids were little and read a book, guarded by the cat. I realized that this could be a better day if the old wooden chair was a lawn chair, and the book was a black raspberry ice cream cone from Friendly’s. A visit to Target and Friendly’s, and I was back in an hour, sitting on the lawn chair, eating some ice cream. ...

Yeah, I know it’s not a HUGE stretch to announce that Velious will be EverQuest II’s next expansion when pictures of dragon-turtles pulling ice barges are easy to find, but yeah. Velious. Velious and Kunark are often grouped together, in the minds of old EverQuest players, as the “core” game, beyond which it got more achievement focused. The first thing you saw when you went to Velious, landing in Iceclad, was the black and spiky Tower of Frozen Shadow – an absolutely wonderful dungeon, built so that each group could find their appropriate level, thick in lore and unique loot. The promise of that first dungeon was kept throughout the expansion – even the raid zones (Sleeper’s Tomb, Dragon Necropolis, Planes of Growth and Mischief, the Temple of Veeshan and the three faction cities, Icewell Keep, Kael and Skyshrine) had plenty of spots for single groups to play, and plenty of wide open spaces for kiting soloers. ...

It started out like a normal day. Then Turbine announced that it’s Dungeons & Dragons Online MMO was going Free to Play, and Twitter ignited and MMO bloggers the world over ran to their keyboards to pound out the news. Subscribers were now VIPs! And the new “unlimited” players were (by comparison) NVIPs! Or VUIPs! (Sorry if I didn’t link to the announcement on your blog; after awhile I stopped saving the announcements). ...