Richard Bartle is irrelevant, but many of his opinions are not. That’s right, I’m getting involved in the storm that began with an interview on Massively and continued everywhere else on the interwebs. The fact is, whether Bartle is a senile old man with no true understanding of what it takes to make a modern MMO (or to play one), or if he’s the elder deity of all that is MMOs, some of what he says is quite insightful. Continue Reading »

So the reason I’ve been quiet all week is… Age of Conan! Yep, it came out, and it’s better than I expected. I wanted to wait to get a good impression of the game before I posted anything about it. I’ll probably stick with it for a while. If you want to play on a PvP server, I’m Luckbad (level 20 Conqueror) on Tyranny. I’m with the Nocturne guild, which is a great group of folks that I played LotRO with.

The May 2008 Boston Post Mortem is tonight (Wednesday, May 14) at The Skellig in Waltham. This month Kurt Reiner of Demiurge Studios will talk about developing “Brothers in Arms: Double Time” for the Wii in conjunction with Gearbox Software. Haven’t decided yet if I’m going, but I’ll have a 38 shirt on if I do. More info on the Boston Post Mortem website.

You might think that, as a game developer, I’m all for anything that can help against piracy. Piracy is bad, and can even cause companies to shut down when it runs rampant. But, how far is too far? Well, I think we’ve found out how far is too far. Now when I go purchase a game at the local video game store, I don’t even own it. Continue Reading »

With all the absurd controversy about GTA IV and video games being responsible for destroying the world, there’s a whole lot of inanity out there right now. But, Wil Wheaton is my hero of the month. “Yeah, it’s always about protecting The Children, which leads me to wonder where The Parents are, and if these people are so serious about making the world better for The Children, why they don’t invest the same amount of energy and resources into securing quality healthcare and world-class education for them as they spend wringing their hands over video games that aren’t even supposed to be played by The Children in the first place.”

Truthfully, these things probably go unnoticed. But, it doesn’t hurt to try. If you believe in video games as free speech, and you don’t want to see time and money wasted on trying to impose national regulations on them, let the presidential candidates know (I believe that parents are responsible for parenting their children, not the government). How? With a pre-written letter for all of us who are lazy! I added “Video Games: ” to the beginning of the subject when I sent mine for the sake of clarity.

Ever want to be part of an online community in which you can be a criminal or part of the solution? I just started playing a game called MafiaMatrix and I’m having a blast. It’s a free massively multiplayer web game. I’m currently a banker (though sometimes I shoplift) and I regularly launder money for gangsters. Check out MafiaMatrix if you’re interested (that referral link benefits me somehow). Latest Character: Luckbard in Miami (Luckbad and Bard were whacked).

Sorry for the late notice on this one, but I doubt anyone relies on me to tell them when the local game developer meetings are. The April meeting of the Boston Post Mortem is tonight at The Skellig in Waltham. The topic is “Exploring the Exploitation of Online Games: Real Money Transactions,” which will be driven by Alex Engel from Turbine. I’m tempted to go, but it’s probably better for me to stay as far away from it as possible.

Good question! The short is that it’s a thematic art contest. The long? Well, Joe Mirabello of 38 Studios explains in an interview at TenTonHammer about the international multi-forum contest. Several of the artists at 38 are entering the competition, as are hundreds, if not thousands, of others. You can see some of the art on the Dominance War website. All of the entries have to be in by April 12, so I imagine they’ll all be up shortly thereafter (and I’ll try to compile a list of all the 38 Studios artist entries).

Crave has an article up entitled The 30 dumbest videogame titles ever. I’ve renamed it to something more appropriate, because these are perhaps the 30 awesomest videogame titles ever. Gems like Leisure Suit Larry 3: Passionate Patti in Pursuit of the Pulsating Pectorals, Ninja Hamster, and Rex Nebular and the Cosmic Gender Bender. Seriously, those are kickass titles for games. If you don’t like them, you are probably over 50 or have a permanent chip on your shoulder. Check ‘em out.