The Sparkle Cat and why I'm going to buy one

So SOE has followed in Blizzard's footsteps and have released the $25.00 mount, now yes this is a cat and it does have a few stats, but nothing that's really game breaking or that you cant get better in game, and I'm going to have to say the same thing I did when the WoW horse came out, if someone wants to spend $25 on a horse let them.

I do think the WoW horse is a better deal since you get it for all your alts, I think one thing that people are not looking at is the Station Cash itself. Now I've been playing the game for a long time and one thing I learned is to pay attention to things like twitter, facebook,ect, The reason I pay attention to these things is that you can find out when its advantageous to buy SC and when you can get SC for free.

When thy had the connecding promotion valid EQ2 subscribers got 1000SC, I also managed to pick up another 500SC when I attached my Pax Nora account to my Station account, also got another 500 from buying the expansion, I think i picked up some more SC thru some other promotions that I can't recall atm, but the most important thing I did was to redeem SC cards when they had double station cash promotions. So a 25$ card now gives you 5000SC, so its possible to get the mount for free or at the least $12.50.

So needless to say I have a little bit of SC and so far had nothing to spend in on, however one thing that nobody seems to have mentioned it the SC Store update is you can now buy LoN cards with Station, this could become a problem.

RGX

RPG - A controversial thought

This post is a result of MMO Voices podcast 33.  Where there was a discussion about a comment from Bioware saying that J-RPG are not RPG. I'm going to take a different tack at this discussion and what I really think people are not considering is why we consider games like FFXII and ME2, Dragon Age RPG's at all? Some people say its story, some say character development, some say choices, I'm going to say that none of that matters.

What I'm mean is the name RPG stand Role Playing Game, and it means you are playing a role, and this really describes any type of game. Every game you play you are playing a role no matter what, in a FPS you could be playing the role of a terrorist or counter-terrorist like in Counter-Strike, in an RTS you take the role of a commander of an army, I could go on but it would all lead back to the same you are still playing a role.

I believe what most people are forgetting is what the G stands for, and that's Game, at the end of the day if your having fun does it really matter the type of game it is?

RGX

Steam is my Dealer, and an EQ 2 Rant

First Ill start off by saying that Steam has way to many sales during the holiday season and I picked up way to many games, also picked up a few thru D2D as well. So I have to say, to any blogger thats a gamer and managed to play and still write, your a better blogger than I.

But enough about what I've been up to, lets move on to the main part, and thats my EQ2 Rant.

EQ2 just released their sixth expansion "Sentinel's Fate" and I want to talk a little about it.

Now I'm a big fan of EQ2, I've played since the beta and played EQ since April of 99, and I have always enjoyed exploring, questing and leveling up my character. Now that the expansion is out and I've had a few days to play and I have really been enjoying it.

Now your saying to yourself, "I thought this was going to be a rant about EQ2, if your enjoying yourself why rant?". Well this rant is about EQ2 , just not the game, its about the players.

With the release of Sentinel's Fate the level cap was raised to 90 and more AA's, now some people have already gotten to level 90(myself included), and I have no problem with that. If you want to race to the level cap thats how you play. However don't immediately say that once you get to the cap, that there is no content and start complaining. In the few weeks that Sentinel's Fate has been out have you, ran every quest, defeated every named mob, cleared every dungeon grouped, x2 and x4? Have you explored the entire new continent, have you seen the changes to the old zones, have you maxed a crafting class, gotten all your AA's?

If your purpose is only to get to the level cap and than complain, I think you should cancel your account and move on, or shut up and stop complaining.

Also the expansion created a lt of new class changes. Now I know that that everyone won't agree with the changes and thats fair enough, and if you are going to complain, at least make it a rational complaint and be able to back it up with some research. If your just going to write "necros sux now" your just wasting everyones time. If you can post something something constructive and say why you think something is wrong with your character and have some data to back up your statement, a Dev may actually take a look at your info, but just saying your character sucks just wastes everyones time.

Personally I think that once people have gotten their max lvl and maxxed out their AA lines they will probably discover their character doesnt suck as much as they thought.

RGX

Is It just me or does this seem pointless......

Last week the preorder for EverQuest II - Sentinel’s Fate was announced with 3 different versions availalbe: A Regular Edition for 39.99, a Colllectors edition for 69.99 and a digital version for 39.99.

Now I have no problems with the regular edition and collectors edition, and you know my thoughts on the digital download.

What bothers me is an item thats included in both box sets, and thats the $10.00 coupon for Digital Download at the Station Store.

You're probably asking yourself whats wrong with that, well i'll tell you. 

The last time I checked there were only 5 games availalbe for digital download, EQ, EQ2, SWG, Pirates of the Burning Sea and Vanguard. 

Now if your like me you probably played EQ, and if your care about this at all you probably play EQ2, and if your even more like me you may have even played the others, and even if you haven't bought them, you may have given their trials a go, and decided the game wasn't for you.

So for most people this coupon has no value, it also most likely will expire before the next expansion after Sentinel's Fate.

Now on the other hand if you could use it to buy LoN cards or Station Cash it would be usefully, but its just another piece of paper thats going into the recycle bin.

RGX

Guildwars - Blame Van Hemlock

I recently went back to playing Guild Wars, which I haven't done since the original game came out, even thou I bought the Nightfall CE and Eye of the North I haven't installed them until just now.

I've really been enjoying the game and its a good break from my normal MMO grind.

I have even gone so far as ordering the Factions CE, from Sweden of all places, the game just arrived and I'm planning on installing it this weekend.

So if your looking for someone to blame because I'm not in EQ2, blame Van Hemlock.

RGX

An answer to perserve your character

This is going to be a little different type of post for me

I listen to a number of gaming podcasts an one of the called Shut Up. We’re Talking. hit a nerve with their latest show #55. I actually had to go an listen to the show a second time just to go over everything again before I started writing this post.

The part that struck me was their first topic which was character deletion. Now like some of you, I started playing MMO’s back in EQ days, shortly after the game was released and continuously played up until the release of EQ2.

Now I currently have the all access pass so I can go back to EQ at anytime, I have even gone as far as keeping up to date with expansions, just call me crazy, but sometime I’ll have to face the fact that EQ may close (hopefully not for a long time).

This got me thinking, is there a way to preserve this data and in a way that a company will actually want to offer this service to people.

Now I’m going to talk from the EQ/EQ2 perspective(since it’s what I play the most), but this could probably be applied to any MMO.

When you start EQ or EQ2 one of the screens you have is the character select screen which displays your character in 3D with options of rotating your character and zooming in and out.

Any this is where my idea comes from, why couldn't SOE take your character data put it on a USB key and turn the character select screen into a screen saver type program that will display your character without needing to connect to the SOE servers.

You would be able to rotate and zoom in on your character, and you would also have the option to display the character creation date and number of hours played. Other things that should be included are a way to display character stats, a window that would allow the player to input a bio, plus and this is probably the most important part be able to access anything that was in your bank or that your character is carrying.

Now you may be thinking why is that important, well I’ll tell you if a person has access to what the character has in the bank and what they were carrying this gives them the option to change how their character looks, this in turn gives SOE a chance to sell you armor and weapon packs to use on your character, and the revenue stream for SOE doesn’t have to stop there other examples of content that SOE could sell is an Emote Pak which would allow the character to perform different emotes, or a spell pack allowing your character to cast their class spells, perhaps a pet pack, for people who like to collect pets, and so on and so on all little things that bring money into SOE.

But it doesn’t have to end there either, why not than add monster play, being able to fight a monster from EQ/EQ2 with your character, start off with a limited amount of monsters when the player buys the pack, and give the player an option of buying more monsters, and if you keep adding on you could eventually turn EQ/EQ2 into a single player game.

Now here your saying hang on, eventually players could want to add multiplayer option and wouldn’t that ruin the MMO version, I have to say no, because at this point the multiplay version would be the original game. The player could than go back to SOE and say ok I want to resubscribe and if SOE had deleted their character they would be able to reload it from the USB key.

Here you will probably say wait a moment what’s going to stop someone from hacking the usb key, and I would say that’s why SOE would have a way to Validate that key, and info has been changed and be able to reject it.

Another service they could add would be a way for you to update your character on the USB key if your still playing the game.

So here we are, a way for a company give players a way to preserve their character and to make some revenue at the same time.

RGX

Digital Distribution

I'll be the first to admit, I love Steam its a great way to purchase PC games.

As most people will notice the PC section in your local EB or Gamestop has gotten noticeable smaller down to one shelf section on the wall or sometimes just an isle shelf stuck in the back.

More and more people are turning to digital distribution as a way to get the latest PC game and sometimes its the only option if you don't have a EB or Best Buy nearby.

In the last couple of years Ive probably bought 20+ titles from Steam and Direct2Drive, however if you look at the purchases I have made you will notice that they were all games that were on sale.

And why do you ask why do I only purchase games when they are on sale? The reason is Digital Distribution.

Now at this point some of you may be scratching your head and saying what? Let me explain.....

When a new game comes out, and lets say its the Dragon Age: Orgins which is available on both Steam and Direct2Drive for $49.99 for the regular edition or $64.99 for the deluxe collectors edition, now if we ordered it from EB and got the actual box we pay the same price, and that's where the problem is.

When you pay the same price for the digital copy as you do for the box copy, you are better off buying the box.

Now you might be asking yourself why do you say that? Well here's why...

When you buy the digital copy that's all you get, the game downloaded onto your PC, when you buy the box version you not only get the discs so that you can install right away, (means no waiting to download the game), you have a permanent backup if your computer crashes. Now you may be saying wait, you can make a backup with Steam and D2D as well, and I say yes you can, but there maybe sometime in the future that those services will be discontinued, (unlikely at this point of time, but its a possibility). But the real value you get from buying the box version over the digital comes down to whats inside the box.

In most boxed games you will normally have a printed manual, now i know people will say but there is a PDF version of the manual with the digital version. That's well and good most box games also include a PDF version on the disc as well, how ever its not something you can go thru quickly. When I need some info on the game I'm playing I find it easier to quickly thumb thru the manual than so tab out of the game load up a PDF reader and scroll thru the pages to try and find what i want.

Secondly there are the extras that maybe in the box this is especially true if it a collectors edition. Dragon Age: Orgins Deluxe edition contain a Steel Case, Cloth Map, Making of DVD, plus a number of added digital extras.
Now the digital copy only includes the digital extras, plus the Addon called Wardens Keep, which can be bought for 7$.

Even adding on an extra 7$ for the collectors edition the box version is just a way better deal than the digital version.

So until the price of the digital download becomes more reasonable I'll see you at the store

RGX