VirginWorlds MMORPG News Host: Brent VirginWorlds is a weekly news podcast covering Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPGs) such as World of Warcraft, EverQuest, Guild Wars, City of Heroes, Eve Online, Vanguard, Lord of the Rings Online and many many more. The VirginWorlds MMORPG Podcast is the flagship podcast of the VirginWorlds MMO Podcast Collective found at http://www.virginworlds.com
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This week Brent works through a couple pieces of MMO news (Star Trek
Online and Ultima Online) and then breaks into miscellaneous news,
listener mail, dev profile of the week, beta key updates and more.
Topics:
-VirginWorlds milestones
-Website updates
-Star Trek Online's various shortcuts
-Ultima Online's 10th Year
-Lineage's next update
-WoW Voice Tools
-CCP continues to ambulate
-Gollum begins to ambulate in LotRO
-SOE is getting ready to launch the launcher
-Guild Wars for Digital Download
-What I'm Playing
-Dev Profile of the Week: Matt Firor
-Listener mail
-PotBS beta keys
-Wrap up
'Star Trek Online' by James Submitted on 2007-10-01 14:17:37 CST I really hope Perpetual doesn't laze their way through STO like you were speculating, Brent. Unfortunately, it seems like MMORPGs based on successful IPs tend to rest on the laurels of their money-making namesake rather than push the boundaries of the genre any further then they have to. The fact that they're saying, "That would be really difficult to do" and ending the conversation there rather than saying, "That is a real challenge, how can we make it happen?" this early in the development doesn't leave me with much hope though.
'PotBS Stress test' by Azzurri Submitted on 2007-10-01 14:27:35 CST They've just announced that PotBS will have a stress test for FilePlanet subs.
'You're voice registers a 6.8 on the Richter scale' by Psyik Submitted on 2007-10-01 22:35:58 CST I know you asked for this last podcast, but I didn't get to respond then. I like the quality of your new mic, but it amplifies the bass way too much, especially under 300 HZ (which I didn't know was within the human speaking range).
Oh, and I've played Puzzle Pirates. It's not a big deal to get a dozen or more players on the same ship, you just need to ensure that people of varying levels can work together. But that's hard work, making a system in which a level 5 isn’t rendered inconsequential in the presence of a level 50. But that’s what the shows are about. Ensigns and Lieutenant and Captains working together on the same ship toward the same goal. Bridge crews. And that’s why we want to play games based on IPs. To get into that world. We all know this. We’ve said it close to a billion times. But Perpetual didn’t figure this out until we all started yelling at them to do it (which shows you how well they know the audience and IP), and now it’s too late. Too much money has been spent going to wrong way (which is also the easier way), and it’s easier to keep going and release the wrong game than it would be to go back and fix it. And comparing PP to STO isn’t like comparing apples to oranges. They’re both persistent, online, multiplayer games. PP involves people of varying levels a ship working together. STO can too.
And on UO... Brent, I’m sorry for asking you and Brenden to give it a try last year. Everything that made this game great is gone, and it’s only slipping further and further down the drain. EA has no intention of revitalizing it, cause that jeopardizes the current player base; who stay only because nothing changes. And this expansion is only more of the same. New graphics (which look decent but are poorly integrated) but no substance. And nothing will change. EA is more than content to let it fade away slowly, making them a couple million a year for a bit longer, than to risk loosing it all now. Oh well, at least we still have the private servers.
'DDO is not a Dungeons & Dragons MMO' by Shalimar616 Submitted on 2007-10-02 09:08:27 CST I was so excited when I heard that DDO was going to be published. I have been playing D&D for more than twenty five years, and in that time I have worked and publiished on three modules and expansion books for the AD&D IP.
With that said, I was utterly horrified when I downloaded the trial game. What I quickly discovered is that DDO is not a Dungeons & Dragons MMO, beyond their name. I have to wonder if the guys who worked on the project ever played D&D. I am equally puzzled how Wizards of The Coast ever signed off on this drek.
If you are going to call it D&D, it has to have some semblance of the pen and paper game. What you play online is a schizophrenic representation of the greatest fantasy game ever published.
The character creation and advancement has no bearing on the rules. The idea that you cannot explore the outside world is utterly incomprehensible. The whole group mechanics is broken and their idea of questing was nothing like the concept I experiences in the quarter century I played the game.
I hope that Wizards of the Coast will wake up in the future and pull this from Turbine, giving it the proper and real attention that it deserves!
'Saw this on CNN Online' by Shalimar616 Submitted on 2007-10-02 09:47:02 CST http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/10/01/videogame.cheating.ap/index.html
'Star Trek Online' by James
Submitted on 2007-10-01 14:17:37 CST
I really hope Perpetual doesn't laze their way through STO like you were speculating, Brent. Unfortunately, it seems like MMORPGs based on successful IPs tend to rest on the laurels of their money-making namesake rather than push the boundaries of the genre any further then they have to. The fact that they're saying, "That would be really difficult to do" and ending the conversation there rather than saying, "That is a real challenge, how can we make it happen?" this early in the development doesn't leave me with much hope though.
'PotBS Stress test' by Azzurri
Submitted on 2007-10-01 14:27:35 CST
They've just announced that PotBS will have a stress test for FilePlanet subs.
'You're voice registers a 6.8 on the Richter scale' by Psyik
Submitted on 2007-10-01 22:35:58 CST
I know you asked for this last podcast, but I didn't get to respond then. I like the quality of your new mic, but it amplifies the bass way too much, especially under 300 HZ (which I didn't know was within the human speaking range).
Oh, and I've played Puzzle Pirates. It's not a big deal to get a dozen or more players on the same ship, you just need to ensure that people of varying levels can work together. But that's hard work, making a system in which a level 5 isn’t rendered inconsequential in the presence of a level 50. But that’s what the shows are about. Ensigns and Lieutenant and Captains working together on the same ship toward the same goal. Bridge crews. And that’s why we want to play games based on IPs. To get into that world. We all know this. We’ve said it close to a billion times. But Perpetual didn’t figure this out until we all started yelling at them to do it (which shows you how well they know the audience and IP), and now it’s too late. Too much money has been spent going to wrong way (which is also the easier way), and it’s easier to keep going and release the wrong game than it would be to go back and fix it. And comparing PP to STO isn’t like comparing apples to oranges. They’re both persistent, online, multiplayer games. PP involves people of varying levels a ship working together. STO can too.
And on UO... Brent, I’m sorry for asking you and Brenden to give it a try last year. Everything that made this game great is gone, and it’s only slipping further and further down the drain. EA has no intention of revitalizing it, cause that jeopardizes the current player base; who stay only because nothing changes. And this expansion is only more of the same. New graphics (which look decent but are poorly integrated) but no substance. And nothing will change. EA is more than content to let it fade away slowly, making them a couple million a year for a bit longer, than to risk loosing it all now. Oh well, at least we still have the private servers.
'DDO is not a Dungeons & Dragons MMO' by Shalimar616
Submitted on 2007-10-02 09:08:27 CST
I was so excited when I heard that DDO was going to be published. I have been playing D&D for more than twenty five years, and in that time I have worked and publiished on three modules and expansion books for the AD&D IP.
With that said, I was utterly horrified when I downloaded the trial game. What I quickly discovered is that DDO is not a Dungeons & Dragons MMO, beyond their name. I have to wonder if the guys who worked on the project ever played D&D. I am equally puzzled how Wizards of The Coast ever signed off on this drek.
If you are going to call it D&D, it has to have some semblance of the pen and paper game. What you play online is a schizophrenic representation of the greatest fantasy game ever published.
The character creation and advancement has no bearing on the rules. The idea that you cannot explore the outside world is utterly incomprehensible. The whole group mechanics is broken and their idea of questing was nothing like the concept I experiences in the quarter century I played the game.
I hope that Wizards of the Coast will wake up in the future and pull this from Turbine, giving it the proper and real attention that it deserves!
'Saw this on CNN Online' by Shalimar616
Submitted on 2007-10-02 09:47:02 CST
http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/10/01/videogame.cheating.ap/index.html
The world of online cheating is going mainstream!