For some reason I have random lyrics and snippets from Oliver! in my head. Why.
Anyway, set up a new blogroll linking category to cover off a few of you called Playas, ‘cos y’all are. Which led me to checking a few places which leads me to pimpin’ ya out with linkage and quotage. Continue reading
Lovely moment of serendipity today. I was looking at this Massively post, asking the question ‘Is user generated content the future of MMOs?’ and thinking ‘Hmm, I’d like to comment about that on the blog’ and then Matt Miller goes and drops Da Bomb in his 4th Anniversary Address for City of Heroes:
Similar in concept to our character creator, [this future feature] allows you, the players, to create missions and story arcs for your characters and others to participate in. You’ll be able to pick the map, villain group, and objectives, as well as write the dialogue and any clues needed for the missions. When you are satisfied with it, you can upload it and have other players across all servers play it and rate it. Fame will come to the players whose stories rate the best overall. It is features like these that we never dreamed of including when we first shipped, but are excited to be able to offer players very soon.
Happy Anniversary, indeed.
I was aware that this was coming – I certainly didn’t realise that it was going to be talked about so soon, so I had a ‘Woah’ moment when I… Continue reading
I’m not here! I’m in a lovely hotel in Portland, Oregon, with free wifi. (Hotels of the World: wifi should always be free. It’s like hot and cold water now, people.)
But, if I was here, I’d want you to know that the second official podcast wot I did (with help, of course, from my guest Melissa ‘War Witch’ Bianco and the indispensable editing of Chris ‘Aero’ Siddall) is now available to listen to online, download, or even read. Whatever you like.
Also: it’ll be on iTunes soon. I promise.
By the way – here’s a little secret. We had so much material for Episode 2 that we’re jamming it into (effectively) an Episode 2.5, which will be out Soon. TM. I’ll let you know when.
Comments welcome as always!
Day Three. Three. Three days. I’m telling you, writing this is almost the same as doing it all over again. Well, not quite.
The big difference between the Ultimate Heroic Weekend (MiniCon, same thing) and any other show we do was simply time. At most shows, we spend an entire day on the show floor, but then with a usually audible sigh of relief (or more likely, cheer of elation) we pack up and go out – or go home.
(The one exception is The Show To End All Shows; the Games Convention in Germany. It’s five days long. Proud monuments stand in the aisles of der Leipziger Messegelände, honoring the booth workers who have fallen there.)
At Omega Sektor though, while we did leave the venue, we never really left the show. So by Day Three… it was starting to wear us down a bit.
No early morning realisations of doom for me on Sunday, but instead just straight down to breakfast when I really would have preferred a lie-in. Generally at shows I try and ‘rally the troops’ a bit at breakfast, get them ready for the day, or just talk… Continue reading
Want to know about the in-game advertising that’s going into COH/COV? The internet to the rescue once again….
I didn’t listen to it live – probably because it went out in the middle of our night – but if you missed it too, The Cape Radio have a downloadable version of the interview they did with Brian Clayton (General Manager of NC NorCal), Matt ‘Positron’ Miller (Lead Designer) and Lighthouse (Community Relations Manager), where they talk primarily about in-game advertising.
Haven’t listened to it myself yet either, but if this Massively article is anything to go by, it’s all good stuff.
Finished the Freakalympics story arc on my MA/Regeneration Scrapper last night – this would be in City of Heroes, if you’re just catching up. Seems like I’ve had that arc on my list for-ev-ah, but that’s more an indication of how little time I get to play these days than any problem with the arc itself.
The last mission – bust Mistah (sic) Static and crew – was cool. It takes place inside a customised map and really felt like a challenge as I was doing it solo, usually taking on five or six bad guys at once, although I’d levelled up in the previous Ourour… orobo… damn, still can’t spell that… in the previous time travel mission against some Rikti. So it wasn’t too bad.
Having said that; if I glide through the next 19 levels and never see another Freakshow, I’ll be happy. (I know, it won’t happen. But dang, that resurrection stuff gets old, especially when your other half is calling for you to come to bed.)
I warn you: this post is long. Like, epic long, Task Force long… long. So grab a drink, maybe some popcorn, sit back, relax… and hear the tale of the 2008 Omega Sektor MiniCon, Day Two: Saturday.
Saturday started bleary-eyed in bed, where I woke up at about 6AM with half a hangover and not enough sleep. Both were my own fault, so I couldn’t complain.
I remember lying there in bed savouring the quiet time before I knew I had to get up, when out of the blue, some part of my semi-awake consciousness asked me a question:
“Hey Stephen; can you remember the PIN number for the credit card machine?”
Instantaneous reply: no.
“But if you don’t know the PIN, how are people going to pay for stock, merchandise and/or make charity donations with their credit (and debit) cards, hmmm?”
My eyes snapped open. A cold sweat broke out. Great start to the day.
I hopped out of bed and sent a text to Chris, who replied immediately – a mistake, because now I knew he was up. After a quick phone call, we agreed that neither of us knew the PIN for certain.… Continue reading
If you’d like to hear all manner of NCsoft staff talking up a storm (plus Draw the World Together artists like David Nakayama and Andrew Wildman, to boot) then Split Infinity Radio and MusicWorldRadio have you covered, baby.
I had the pleasure of talking over the weekend with Riff, AKA Scarlet Shocker, of MusicWorldRadio, and also with Simon, AKA DJ Villain, of Split Infinity. Both had plenty of questions to ask and I hope I answered ‘em well. I’d like to thank them both for taking the time out to come down to the event and do the interviews – I hope you had a good time guys, and we’ll definitely see you next year!
Keep reading for all the links and information you need….
First of all, Split Infinity have a bunch of different interviews live. You can get to an index of all of them from this news story, but if you prefer you can download the MP3s directly. The links below are all separate MP3 downloads, so you can get each one easily. The interviews include all of the following peeps:
Massively has a report up about the MiniCon from Adrian Bott, who sadly I didn’t get to meet during the weekend – well, I didn’t even know he was coming, so that makes it a bit harder. However, I might be making up for it with an interview for them, we’ll see.
Adrian has a good overview of the event, and also a few choice quotes from Melissa that I hadn’t heard myself – as well as one of our favourite pictures of the event. (I wonder if ‘Super Noob‘ was related to him!) Our official Flickr feed will be updated next week by the way – our photographer needs rest too….
Favourite quote of the article has to be this I think:
What with developers who care passionately about the game, staff who went well out of their way to ensure a good time for everyone, artists working long hours for charity and professional Omega Sektor operatives on hand to help out, the level of magnanimity and sheer goodwill were enough to make a cynic shrivel up like a salted slug.
Thanks for the coverage, Adrian (and Massively)! Let’s make sure you make it there for all four days next year….
… on video, and show inside the first minute that once again, relying on Wikipedia for facts isn’t always a good idea.
(Or at least, it’s not a good idea to mention that you’re relying on it.)
Things pick up a bit after that, and Melissa gets some good answers in. Anyway, it’s here to watch. Also: Andrew ‘Draw the World Together’ Wildman.