Ranting Against RMT

Okay, I’m about to go off the nerd deep end and rant about RMT (Real Money Trading). But even the Discovery channel has recently discussed this space, so maybe it’s not too niche. I’d even argue that this topic extends beyond gaming. Increasingly our world is being defined by goods that are easily cloneable and have to be controlled by Intellectual Property laws and the like. With the music industry scrambling to figure out how it fits in anymore, it’s valuable to look at the virtual economies happening in online video games. I’m sure there’s a great discussion to be had there, but as I said, this is a rant…

Unlockable Content

Penny Arcade’s post today stirred some thoughts on the whole concept of “unlocking” in games.

Gamasutra: Rethinking the MMO

Gamasutra posted a great article on Rethinking the MMO. If you’ve ever played one of these games, it’s worth a good read.

I’ve pulled out some quotes that spoke to me:

I can't hear you

I’ve noticed a bad trend in the FPS these days: I can’t seem to hear what the hell is going on. Oh, I can hear the action all right. The sound of the gun rattling off. That grenade detonating right next to me (whoops). Those I can hear just fine. But that guy standing next to me giving me important plot details? Mumble mumble mumble. The guy on my radio telling me what to do next? No clue what he just said.

There are two main causes of this:

How to make WoW even more addictive

My name is Chris, and I’m addicted to WoW.