SWTOR: First Days

I love that new game smell. Those first days with a new toon. Mmm…mmm…level 1! Since I’m playing catch-up here, I thought I’d just give you my thoughts about playing Star Wars: The Old Republic so far. This is my first Star Wars game as I’ve been pretty resistant to games that are linked to some big name-brand franchise as they are usually synonymous with “utterly suckful.” The same friend who dragged me into Aion convinced me to come with him to SW:TOR (godammit!) a few months ago. I had sworn off more MMOs due to RL time commitments, but I was a sucker for the trial–I enjoyed myself so much–and ended up making Jaam’rek, a Sith Inquisitor (force lightning FTW!!!) and subscribing. I find it kind of funny that her name means “Do you have peace?”

I tend to play alts simultaneously (I get kinda bored otherwise), so I wondered what it was her Force-using counterpart was like on the Republic/Jedi side and made Rafet’naa, a Jedi Consular:

The thing about SWTOR is that each class has its own involved storyline, that has a very movie-like feel to me. They are unique enough that you almost kind of want to play each class, just to see how they are different and play out. So I made a Bounty Hunter named Alexadriana, ranged dps with heal skills:

And an Imperial Agent named Xelanawal, who is more ranged dps, whose storyline is my favorite so far:

But, my fave overall is my Sith Warrior named Nangadef (“How are you?”), a pureblood Sith. Pure dps fun:

As with Aion, I am really enjoying myself so far. The difference is how soloable this game is. You can group with others for instances (Flashpoints, Heroics, Worldzone PvP), but it’s not such a integral thing to advance in the game itself. However, if that’s your thing, it’s not as easy to get a group, but they are remedying that in a future update with a group finder. There are also space missions, a rail-style shooter that is easy and fun (to me). Sure, it could be more intricate and involved and I hope that is something they will improve upon in the future with more input. There is open world PvP, but honestly, even on one of the most populated servers, you don’t really encounter the other faction to the extent that it happens often.

Population is also something they are working on, with upcoming server transfers. I don’t view such things as a bad thing in this game as I don’t think it is dying. I see it more as consolidation to help the community that’s already there. Like Aion, there’s certainly enough “ugh” quirks to the game to make me sigh (like a feeling sometimes of “Just let me get through this damn planet already!”), but it’s not enough to make me stop playing. I’m no fangirl of the game itself, but I’m a fan of the movies, so I enjoy playing this game. There’s just something about wielding a lightsaber that’s a joy.

Aion Free to Play…Okay?

I’ve played Aion for quite a while, almost from its original release back in ’09. I’ve been through rampant goldsellers, server merges (especially as my Elyos…Fregion Forever!), the Great Twink Gankfest that changed it’s PvP in future updates, the everlasting “Soon” of NCSoft and now the release of Aion 3.0 (A free studio apartment! Yay!)

Honestly, I don’t see where it has affected me or things too much–yet. NCSoft now has a shop where you use “NCoin” (aka RL money) to buy ingame items. Coming from SL, where Lindens translate into RL money and vice versa, this didn’t bother me too much. There is a fear though that items sold in the shop could give an ingame advantage. They opened a new server (Kahrun) and merged mine Zikel with mine (Vaizel) to create Tiamat. Aion’s now down to four North American servers. It’s still got its grindy elements, but I’ve gotten used to that. I’ve come to find killing 60 piggie things kind of calming. As far as I’m concerned, it’s still really gear dependent and the AP loss from PvPing is still a suckful mechanic–among other things that I don’t feel like sighing about. I’ve never been one to QQ or gripe about the game, so don’t get me wrong. Besides, it’s just a damn game. And, I happen to love PvPing. I’m not great and usually undergeared, but it’s just another aspect of the game that’s fun for me.

I’m playing this game for the sheer fun of it, taking my time reading the NPCs and their lore, enjoying the beautiful graphics, crafting and questing at will. I’m still with my same fun little guild and I play when I can play. No pressure. My cleric has a helluva hat collection. One thing for me though, now that it went f2p, an unintended effect is that I don’t play as often. My paid subscription is at Star Wars: TOR now, so that’s my priority game.

Aion, I still love you though. For now.

Who Wants to Be the Loser?

I’ve been playing Aion for 9 months now. I love the game, but frankly…there have been some boneheaded moves that has its community up in arms. I’m not going to go into the grindy gameplay or how gank-style PvP makes folks want to ragequit, I’m going to talk about how ignoring the community is not a good thing.

I like to read the main forums and AionSource despite the complainers, know-it-alls and trolls mainly because despite it all, they tend to be on point about the problems. Quite a while ago, Asmodians complained that it seemed that Elyos have it easier with more world bosses and opportunities to achieve better gear. In a gear dependent game such as this, their dominating the Abyss main PvP area made it even more evident as abyss fort instances = more AP for better gear. If you are locked out from accessing it by the dominant faction…well…

A lot of people were initially turned off around launch by the slow response to goldsellers and bots, and then later by the twinking of alts (which I honestly think 2XP weekends only made easier) for full daeva geared 30 lvl rifters to make leveling a pain. As the months wore on, NA and EU servers across the board started to show a trend: the Abyss was green. I noticed that in the forums, those who commented on this were dismissed. The community started clamoring for server mergers hoping for a better balance and economy, but there were also some who said “If that happens, how will faction dominance be handled?”

As it turns out? Not well. Not well at all. After the merger, most of the servers are Elyos dominated except for one–Vaizel–which is Asmo. My original server where I started and my Asmos are, Israphel, which had been more or less balanced pre-merger, instantly became Ely-dominated. My other server where my Ely characters are–Vaizel–became Asmo-dominated. I could only sigh as I was screwed either way. But to add insult to injury in what they must’ve thought was a fun thing, NCSoft West had a “Dash of the Daevas” contest to be the first to achieve certain things ingame. On Israphel, that meant the Elyos taking Divine Fortress–one of the game’s most important–within 3 days, sending Asmos into a demoralization like no other. The same would later happen on Vaizel in reverse. And as if the stompdown wasn’t bad enough, NCSoft West offered free server transfers at the same time, causing folks to flee in droves to where their faction dominated. NCSoft West realized this and cancelled transfers, but damage has been done.

Is the game bleeding subscriptions? Probably. Is there an easy way to fix this? No, not really, short of starting new servers and begging people to go to them as they monitor faction numbers like they used to in the beginning. What about folks stuck on servers away from friends, legions and families though? Who knows. I love this game and really don’t want it to die, but it really boils down to a very simple thing: Who wants to be the loser?

Oh…here’s my theory about the NA server mergers: I could be wrong, but I think it had nothing to do with dominance/balance, but with the lore. They were grouped by the respective Lords. Ha!

Mirror’s Edge

Since I got a PS3 (and a XBox 360) for Xmas, I’ve been playing catch up game-wise. One I had really wanted to play was Mirror’s Edge, so I picked it up and um, well, I love it.

The first person POV as you run through the city leaping, sliding, climbing and vaulting over things is very cool and fluid. Well, it is if you do it right and when you do it right, it’s a joy to play. It kind of reminds me of a 1st person POV Prince of Persia due to its protagonist Faith’s acrobatic movements.

I’m just glad that it being 1st person didn’t have this effect on me.

Elle in Aion: Taking on Black Claw

There’s something to be said about a race of hostile kitty-folk. In Aion, that would describe the Black Claw Mau. Sure, you probably “could” go into their village solo if you are under a certain level, but you had better be ready to die. The first time I ran it, I went with 5 members of the Cruor pro Cruor legion and it was a lot of fun…This time, I got my friends and one of our other Carpe Noctem legion members to come run the Black Claw missions with me, as I really needed to get past the two I had left at the moment. Dear God, there were a lot of them, but we did it…In there, I’m a templar…a “tank”, which means that I’m usually the first to go at the enemy and keep them mad at me because I can take a hit. My job is to essentially distract aggressive enemies from the folks who heal us. As I’ve never played something like this, I’m still learning . I’ve been finding the dynamics of how the different “classes” work and work together to be really interesting. In the end, we all agreed that we had a helluva lot of fun…

Elle in City of Eternals: Merry Zombies!

In the spirit of the holidays, I bring you a screenshot of me taking on a “crazed holiday shopper zombie” last week…

Take the stupid hamster toy already! Really!

Metaplace Shutting Down

I got a notice that Metaplace would be closing on January 1. I took part in its beta months ago after signing up on a whim…

I’ve heard it described as “retro” and coming from SL, it certainly had that kind of feel to it, but for some reason I kept returning. I enjoyed exploring all of the little worlds that folks created out of simple graphics and items pulled from Google’s 3D warehouse. Browser-based and very easy to use, but it really did have a throwback feel to it though. The fun for me was finding worlds were people were doing interesting things, like this Victorian Jack the Ripper mystery-based one called Whitechapel 1888…

And you know that I could not resist visiting “Steampunk”…

There are/were a lot of creative folks in there who pushed the boundaries of what could be done in there, such as the “Wonka” world by Xue Mei…

Whose “Happy” was also a standout to me…

My own little place evolved during the time that I was in there and I essentially rebuilt my beloved gardens that I used to have in SL. I truly enjoyed creating this and I am sorry to see it go…

Elle in Free Realms: Family Fantasy Fun

I forgot that I’ve had a Free Realms account (I’m “Wawa Silverstar” there) for quite a while now. As it is a family-friendly web-based fantasy MMO, I originally hoped to play with my goddaughter if she was interested, but I had a good time on my own exploring the world and doing the missions.

I thought I’d go in and try it out. It has a user-friendly interface and is easy to play. For younger kids (under 13 like my goddaughter) who want to play, there are settings for them that their parents can set up. The parental controls have a restrictive chat function, which means that only approved persons and messages can be seen and transmitted to the player. I don’t know if they’ve implemented the scheduled gameplay function yet, but that would allow parents to set the time frame for when their kid can play.

For what it is, Free Realms is entertaining with almost cartoony, fun graphics. My avatar moved well and any fighting I did was fluid. I’ll admit that I enjoyed my visit. It is free, but an upgrade is available that opens up more content. You’ll also find that you get to a certain point with some job (crafting)-style missions that you won’t be able to go any further without it.

Elle in City of Eternals: Happy Holidays for Who?

OK…Hmm…well…hmm…

I was in City of Eternals and in New Valencia Downtown, one of the first areas you are exposed to in-game and came across this merchant. What made its developers think that a prostitute-looking NPC in her undies was a good idea? Holiday-colored booty shorts, a miniskirted Santa elf costume or something else wouldn’t have sufficed? I mean…anything else that would have at least been a pretense towards clothing. I don’t know…it really stood out to me.

Remember, City of Eternals is based in Facebook. It recognizes you as being male or female as soon as you start playing it, so you don’t get to choose what gender your avatar is. In other words, for the most part, female players probably really are female and I’ve seen a lot of them, myself included. One thing I’m not seeing is male NPCs standing in the snow half-naked.

So really ohai…was this necessary?

Caledon in Blue Mars

Well, I can finally talk about this now…

Desmond Shang has announced Caledonia, Caledon’s “colony” in Blue Mars. Reactions about the upcoming 4 million sq m Caledonia have ranged from “What?!” to “Oooo” to “Whatever.” Its preview will be available in a few days. As Caledon is one of SL’s significant “showcase” regions and he is one of its most well-known land owners, this is a big deal.

I’ve been a part of this project since May and for me, it has been interesting to see the evolution of a brand new virtual world. I’ve been exploring Blue Mars in general due to the fact that checking out other virtual worlds is what I like to do. I will not sit here and tout it as the end all to be all, because as I have said in previous posts, it still has quite a long way to go until it’s truly ready for primetime. In the meantime though, it is the possibility of what it can do that is intriguing.

Will Blue Mars be a SL killer? No. I don’t think so. SL has more danger of killing themselves off due to their company’s practices and general perception than another virtual world popping up. And I seriously doubt SL is going to go anywhere for quite a while. Its draw–as it was for me and for others who are content creators–is still the ability for anyone to be able to make something using its built-in tools. I’ve always loved SL and still believe in its possibilities as well. Those who like SL will continue to be in SL, or they might be like me and check out both worlds. Right now, the two worlds are like apples and oranges and it’s still way too early to guess at an impact one way or the other. In the meantime, can’t blame a person for checking out the other options out there.