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With the NDA now lifted on Wrath of the Lich King, I can happily report that I’ve been playing it since the Friends and Family Alpha.  While there are plenty of sites rambling on about mechanics, balance, and talents, not too many are yammering on about the lore.

Here it all is in two and a half words… it’s awesome.

I don’t know if the guys and gals at Blizz actually read that forum post of mine or came upon it themselves, but the immersion has definitely been cranked up a few notches.

Examples?  I’ve got plenty (minor spoilers ahead). Read the rest of this entry »

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As most of you already know, Diablo 3 was announced just over a week ago at Blizzard’s Worldwide Invitational.  There’s not much to say at this point, other than it has been 7 years since the last Diablo game was released, so it might be time we all beefed up on our Diablo lore.  Fortunately, it looks like Blizzard thought the same thing, as the lore page on Diablo 3’s official website is insane.

I’m actually surprised, since Blizzard has often been rather… odd with their lore support.  Read the rest of this entry »

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Leveling up in Age of Conan, I was reminded of something I hadn’t experienced since 2004 when leveling up my first World of Warcraft character…

Money, back then, was epic.  And with AoC, 1 Gold once again means something.  These days, in WoW, 1 Gold is what you give beggars to piss them off with how stingy you are.  It’s like throwing them a penny and shouting, “Have a night on the town!”

The difference, of course, is that AoC is brand new while WoW is four years old.

But that’s just it.  Why does money have to stop feeling epic?  Why do the days of, “One Silver?!  YES!!” have to stop?

It doesn’t.

You may wonder why I’m prattling on about game economics.  I’m, what we’re ultimately talking about here is lore. Read the rest of this entry »

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So where have I been for the past two weeks? Playing Age of Conan and it is awesome. Yes, it has its flaws. Yes, it still has bugs to work out. And yes, it could use another coat of polish in some areas. But this game, above all else, nailed immersion. You want to see what the heck I’ve been harping on about? Play AoC for the first 20-30 levels.

Even the character creation process is part of the immersion. From the get go you feel thrown into the middle of a story, and better yet, the game does this without making you feel confused. There’s no “Super Mario Bros.” Hellgate laziness or “Hey, I’m standing in the middle of a camp and have no idea how I got here!” nonsense we have in WoW.

As I mentioned previously, the game is single player for the first few levels. My big question before release was, “Will this work?” The answer, I’m happy to say, is an emphatic YES. In fact, you won’t even notice it’s single player. Let me say that again, because this is no small feat that Funcom has accomplished. You won’t even notice it’s single player. How? Storytelling. You start out on a beach in the middle of nowhere. Your first five levels are spent running through the jungle to reach the nearest town where all the people are. Why is there no one around? Because they’re all near the town! And where does the multi-player area begin? Right where you’d expect to start seeing people, a few minutes before reaching the town. Very well done. Read the rest of this entry »

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Rougly a week ago, a whole slew of information was released for “Wrath of the Lich King“. Among this information, was our first real, meaty taste of the new Death Knight class Blizzard will be debuting within the expansion.

At Blizzcon ‘07 it was suggested that the Death Knight class would start out in Stratholme and have to break his or her way out.

Along with the announcements last week, it was revealed that Death Knights would begin in a floating Necropolis similar to Naxxramas. Their initial quests would involve teaching the player the basics of the class.

Here’s what I’m hoping…

Read the rest of this entry »

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As some of you no doubt already know, I’m a stickler for proper immersion. It’s the difference between feeling thrown into a living world and a game that starts the same way 2D side scrollers did in the 80’s *cough* Hellgate.

Age of Conan is doing something different. Heck, I think it’s flat-out fascinating.

The game is single player until you’ve hit a few levels. It’s so simple, yet I can’t think of a better way to grant the storytellers 100% control over a brand new player’s environment for those first few all-so-crucial levels. Read the rest of this entry »

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Alright, lets lay some cards on the table. What’s going to happen with WoW? Not WoW2 as we tend to discuss, but WoW.

Will we run out of characters? How many expansions will there be? How long will it go for?

The answers are, No, Five, and 2013.

Here’s the time-line with a history thrown in as well.

11/2004 - World of Warcraft released. End boss, Kel’Thuzad.

01/2007 - Burning Crusade Released. End boss, Illidan/Shade of Kil’Jaeden.

Okay, here’s where we start to speculate…

11/2008 - Wrath of the Lich King. End boss, Arthas. We also know from Metzen that there’s an Old God in the spider kingdom. You’re probably wondering how I came up with that release date. Here’s how. Read the rest of this entry »

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You might remember awhile back when I suggested Chris Avellone needs to do a “Post Nuclear Apocalypse” MMORPG.  Videogamer.com today announced that Interplay is looking to raise funding for a Fallout MMO as part of its two pronged growth strategy.

Personally, I of course think they should license the project to Obsidian Entertainment.  When you need the game to be good and you already have a chunk of the developers who made it great still together under one roof, how could you not give it to them to run with?

Popularity: 26% [?]

Games could learn a lot from Web 2.0.

Ars Technica had an interesting story today about Grand Theft Auto 4 you can check out here.

To summarize, here’s how it works. In GTA3 and the upcoming GTA4, when you’re in your car you can listen to the radio. Here’s what’s awesome though, it’s not muzak. It’s not elevator music. It’s actually music you’ve heard before, enjoy, and might actually own. If you play GTA3 or GTA4 on your PC then it gets even better, as one of the radio stations becomes your MP3 directory. So yes, you can steal cars and cause havoc to your own soundtrack. I personally prefer the Benny Hill theme song. The big news is this. In GTA4, if you hear a song you like, you can hit a button and it’ll link you to a site hosted by Amazon.com where you can buy a DRM free MP3 of the song. This kind of feature is amazing, and it made me think of how you could apply this to game lore.

Read the rest of this entry »

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I recently finished the book Cycle of Hatred by Keith R. A. DeCandido. It’s decent, and if you’re into books set in the Warcraft universe I’d definitely say give it a look. There’s one reason though in particular that I bring it up here. It pushes the Thrall/Jaina lore that has been lacking.

As some of the more regular readers of this site will remember, I’ve gone off in the past about Metzen hinting he’d toss out years of story-set up for some gimmicky, “Teehee, lets hook up the coolest male orc with the coolest female orc!” *Snore*

Read the rest of this entry »

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