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The Fansite debate: aftermath

February 15, 2011 by

Just a quick follow-up post after a very interesting few days debate on my take on the fansite issue. The main platform for debate has been a thread on the official forums, MMO Champion, and Game Banshee. Darth Hater has a small thread as well.

Summarising debate across a range of forums is always risky, but from my biased standpoint, opinions seem to fall into two broad camps:

1. Those who see the fansite agreement as being too prescriptive, with a focus of angst being the advertising ban. This includes those who didn’t read the intricacies of the argument and assumed things were worse than what they are.

2. Those who see it as a storm in a tea-cup / overreaction / rightful stance by Bioware. This includes those who felt Bioware should be left to do their thing as they see fit. There was even one person who was angry the issue was raised as it was taking Bioware’s community team away from valuable time working with the community.

So overall? The split to me seemed 70% concerned about the issue, 30% not fazed / in favour of Bioware’s agreement. As I said though, I’m biased and would love your thoughts in the comments. I think a debate on the issue is overall a positive thing.

What’s interested me the most about it all, is the near silence from the fansite community. TOR Wars and SWTOR-UK have mentioned it, but that’s about it.

It could be that most sites don’t have an issue with it. Or it could be that no-one wants to speak out for fear of repercussions. I don’t believe the latter scenario is one to be concerned about i.e. as far as I can tell, Bioware don’t mind dissent. They rightfully want to minimise it, but to date they’ve allowed the debate on their forums, and I can confirm no horse heads have appeared on my pillow. So if you’re a fansite that has a concern, then now would be the time to flag it prior to game release. The larger sites or smaller ones like these that take a journalistic bent, have some clarity i.e. we are treated as press sites. I’m not so convinced that clarity is there at a wider level.

As Spectus says on the SWTOR forums:

Rather than close off all such loopholes individually on a case-by-case basis, BW/LA simply takes a broad approach, and forbids fansites from generating ANY income from ANY source.

Is that wise? Maybe; maybe not. But that’s why executives get paid the big bucks — to make such decisions.

If you’re impacted by that broad approach, then perhaps you might like to speak up.

And for the cynics, here’s how much ad revenue I generated in the big bump in traffic over the past few days as the debate unfolded:

Maybe we should have signed the agreement after all 😉

Again – would love your comments / thoughts.

Filed Under: News, Opinion Tagged With:

The Fansite Conundrum

February 12, 2011 by

This story is a difficult one to write, as it has some significant implications for this site more broadly, but it needs to be written. It’s a lengthy story but one well worth reading if you’re interested in the relationship between the media, MMO game developers and those who blog / tweet / discuss those games on forums.

The boundary between ‘media’ and ‘blogs’ has been blurred, if not removed, for years now. This site is essentially a blog, but its founder, and writer of this article, is a freelance writer / journalist of more than ten years standing. Over the past 18 months, Bioware have certainly fed information out to those interested on a regular basis, albeit with an unsurprising bias toward the US market. Over that time the word ‘fansite’ has sprung up repeatedly, used as a catch-all term for any site devoted to covering SWTOR. It’s fair to say I’ve struggled in a big way with the term ‘fansite’, as I for one am not sure I’m a fan of SWTOR – my job is to make that call when it’s released and report both the positive and negative aspects of the game and any wider issues surrounding it. Sure, I’m excited about its release and yes, we have writers even more excited about it – but to categorise broadly our discussions as those of a ‘fansite’ isn’t valid.

It’s in that context that I was a little surprised at an email I received from David Bass, Bioware’s Senior Community Coordinator.

Let me reproduce it in full, as sent to an unknown number of ‘fansites’ – essentially anyone that’s downloaded the fansite kit:

Details of email to fansites removed at request of Bioware

This agreement does contain a bunch of reasonable stuff around intellectual property, trademarks and hate speech etc. There’s no argument there and Bioware, LucasArts and EA absolutely have the right to protect their commercial interests at that level. What has surprised me with the email is the assertion that those who don’t sign the agreement will receive no official promotion from Bioware. They of course don’t have to promote anyone, but what they’re saying here is that even if you write the most glowing review of SWTOR in existence, if that review is on a site with advertising, then it won’t be linked to.

It also ignores the fact that most mainstream gaming sites are commercial interests, so I’m assuming Bioware will not be officially promoting IGN’s review of SWTOR, or a Wired Magazine feature on any impact SWTOR will have on MMO gaming culture. If such promotion does occur, then the so-called ‘fansites’ cop a double-whammy from Bioware. First. they have to agree to not make any money from their site and second, their larger competitors get a free run. Yes, I understand that for most ‘fansites’, trying to take on the big players is not the focus. It certainly isn’t for this site, but it’s probably safe to say most sites want as many people to read their work as possible. A percentage of those may like to at least cover their costs, or like yours truly, raise enough revenue to pay more writers and/or increase the very modest pay of the current writers. That’s my gripe – and the basis for me today shooting some questions off to David Bass at Bioware, with a very prompt response:

TOROZ: Are you requiring mainstream sites such as IGN, Wired etc etc to sign the agreement? If not, why do smaller sites with a journalist on staff such as mine, need to sign an agreement preventing running a game- specific site as a commercial concern? Put another way, aren’t you preventing competition by restraining small sites that rely on word of mouth when compared to the mainstream sites.

David Bass: There’s a big difference between press and fansites. Fansites are those who cover SW:TOR exclusively, as TOROZ does. IGN and Wired are press, and therefore they have a completely different process (and have to go through EA and Lucas in order to get anything). The benefit of being a fansite is that you get a direct line to BioWare (i.e. Me).

TOROZ: Given the requirement of signing the agreement in order for Bioware to link to a story, what mechanisms will be in place to ensure fairness in promotion i.e. isn’t there an inherent risk that sites critical of the game will receive minimal coverage officially anyway and those sites who unquestionably repost Bioware info get all the traffic?

David Bass: There are no “mechanisms” in place to ensure fairness; everyone’s entitled to his/her own opinion, of course. Clearly we’re not going to link to an article that’s four pages of non-stop bashing of SW:TOR. But if an article is detailed, well-written, and fair, there’s no reason why we couldn’t promote it.

TOROZ: Will sites who sign the agreement have preferred access to new information from Bioware i.e. different embargo times, earlier briefings etc?

David Bass: No.

__________

So there you have it. For what it’s worth, it seems I’ve already signed this agreement because I downloaded the Fansite kit. That said, TOROZ definitely doesn’t meet the benchmark for compliance given we run advertising (to pay our writers and cover costs). Therefore, we’ll have to work that little harder to keep up with those who are compliant as we’re not guaranteed the same degree of responsiveness from Bioware. That may not always be a bad thing.

Over to you: do you think Bioware’s fansite terms are reasonable? I’m particularly interested to hear from the already burgeoning SWTOR fansite community, a proportion of which run advertising. What will you be doing in regards to the agreement?

UPDATE: After some robust discussions with the ever-responsive David Bass, I can vouch that there’s a real willingness to look at these issues and in the case of TOROZ we’ve chosen to take the route of being classified as ‘media’. Every site is different obviously. The response overall to the story so far has been mixed, with around half of people saying we should have just negotiated to take the media route initially and that we obviously weren’t careful enough in reading the Fansite Kit terms. The other half agree with our stance and that sometimes the boundaries between the media and consumer aren’t as clear anymore. Either way, these are issues that are best sorted prior to launch so that the ground rules for coverage are clear. In our case, Bioware have now provided that clarity.

Filed Under: News, Opinion Tagged With: ,

What do we really want?

January 30, 2011 by

THIS!

We want more exotic dancers in Star Wars The Old Republic! Uh… maybe?*sigh*

So many people have so many different ideas about what the game will be. We are getting a lot more information now, some of it dribbled out to us on a weekly basis and some gleaned from interviews that we find with staff members. And most of it looks very cool. But what are we looking for in a Star Wars Old Republic MMO? I mean besides seeing a young Carrie Fisher in a metal bikini again? There are a gazillion things that we want, but…seriously.

Well first of all, we want a cool story. Just a thought, but I think they have that covered. No matter what anyone may think of Bioware, they do tend to have cool stories. The twists that they throw at the players are legendary at times. I mean, how many people knew who the primary character was in Knights of the Old Republic before it was exposed? Yes, they seem to have a have a pattern they follow, but it works for them.  The bottom line, as always is simple. People buy the games and enjoy the games, so they must be doing something right. Even people who hated MDK, Mass Effect and Jade Empire had to admit that the stories were well done for the most part. For many games, story has always taken a backseat. After all, what kind of story was in Asteroids, or Donkey Kong? Now players want more. We want cool stories with intriguing characters, plot twists that take us completely by surprise, and a sense of completion at the end of the game. We don’t want ‘Oh, we have to wait for the sequel to find out what happens. Grr.’.

Second, we want action, but there are stipulations. The days of mashing the shoot button down and running through a video game are over. We want to feel heroic or evil depending on our preference. One problem with today’s games is that action seems to have become the single most dominant factor. Games that were stealth based, such as Splinter Cell, are now about how fast you can kill people. In MMOs, action was almost always there, but it could be hard to find. You had to walk all over the place to find those blasted gnolls/orcs/undead/demons/whatever, to kill them to finish the quest. Once you found them, you had the chance to fight, but you had to find them first. Now most games seem to be going the way of Call of Duty or Medal of Honor. Shoot now, shoot later, shoot some more and then try and find the mission objective after you blew up the building it was in. Oops, it was a hostage. Oh well, they deserved to die for being a hostage. That seems to be the mindset of many games these days. Maybe it is just my own perspective, but that is what I see.

Star Wars video games have always had action – The Empire Strikes back for SNES. Star Wars: Battlefront 1 and 2 in particular were fun. And yes, you had to shoot fast and straight to survive. It didn’t help a lot when you got hit by the blast from a Walker, but it was fun. And that is the final thing we want. We want fun. The problem is, everyone has a different definition of fun. My definition of fun is sitting in a hole a long way from the battlefield and shooting bad guys in the head from long range. Boom! Headshot! Evil, yes, but fun for me. Other people want to get into vehicles and shoot big guns and crush their opponents under treads, mechanical feet, whatever. Yet others want to run into a melee with knives/swords, whatever and duke it out mano a mano. For each type of player out there, there is a different definition of fun.

So, for Star Wars The Old Republic we want story, action and fun. And we want it all with the feel of Star Wars. Star Wars Galaxies pre CU, may it rest in peace, (Yes, I know it still has active servers but it is dead to me. Let SOE rot in the deepest level of Hades!) had that feel. You were there, when the bugs/glitches and sheer stupidity of the SOE execs did not ruin it. Not every Star Wars game that has come out has been able to do that. Most of them have had the characters, the ships, or something right. But few of the games managed to get everything right. The original Dark Forces did a great job in delivering what we wanted. Bioware delivered with Knights of the Old Republic.

I don’t know about anyone else, but I am very optimistic about this game. MMOs are designed to cater to many different kinds of players. I will be able to play a ranged combat specialist. Others can charge into battle with lightsabers and the Force. I cannot help but expect cool stories from Bioware, given their track record.  Just seeing the in game footage that we have seen so far, the action looks amazing and very ‘Star Wars-y’. The ability to take on multiple bad (or good) guys at once is very, very cool. And as for fun? Big guns and the ability to use them! What more could I ask?

Is there anything specific you would want in the game? (Keep it family friendly please…)

Picture one of many at http://www.supershadow.com/pictures/princess_leia_gold_bikini.html

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Science fiction or Science fantasy?

January 17, 2011 by


We all know what Star Wars is, right? Swords made of light, a mystical energy field that pervades all life, spaceships, heroic (and not so heroic) good guys and dastardly bad guys – all of these are part of what makes Star Wars. The word science rarely comes up when talking about Star Wars. Star Wars is entertainment. It is not even remotely supposed to be factual in any way. So why do some people insist on calling it science fiction?

First we have to define these, and bear with me as I spout more dictionary stuff again. According to Wikipedia:  Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with the impact of imagined innovations in science or technology, often in a futuristic setting.

It differs from fantasy in that, within the context of the story, its imaginary elements are largely possible within scientifically established or scientifically postulated laws of nature (though some elements in a story might still be pure imaginative speculation). Exploring the consequences of such differences is the traditional purpose of science fiction, making it a “literature of ideas”. Science fiction is largely based on writing rationally about alternative possibilities.

The settings for science fiction are often contrary to known reality, but the majority of science fiction relies on a considerable degree of suspension of disbelief, which is facilitated in the reader’s mind by potential scientific explanations or solutions to various fictional elements.

So, science fiction is, in a nutshell, writing about something that is plausible. It may be totally improbable, but it is POSSIBLE. Spider Robinson, Robert Heinlein, Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov, all of these people wrote science fiction. There are two basic categories of science fiction, hard and soft. Hard science fiction is where every single thing a writer writes is not only plausible, but probable. Jules Verne was laughed at by some critics when he wrote ‘20000 Leagues Under the Sea.’ Who is laughing now? Submarines like the Nautilus are science fact now. How about ‘From the Earth to the Moon’? Laughable that a man might get to the moon in a capsule. Right? Um, tell that to Neil Armstrong. Jules Verne wrote science fiction, and many writers have taken up his mantle, with great writers and not so great writers all over the charts. Soft science fiction on the other hand, places less emphasis on science and more on the actual story. Heinlein’s work is a bit out there. Anyone who has read ‘Stranger in a Strange Land’ will likely agree. Modern day, most writers mix hard science with story and plot devices when science can’t cover things.

George Lucas did not write science fiction.  What he wrote is best described as space opera or science fantasy. This genre also has its roots in the early twentieth century. Also according to Wikipedia:    Space opera is a subgenre of speculative fiction that emphasizes romantic, often melodramatic adventure, set mainly or entirely in outer space, generally involving conflict between opponents possessing advanced technologies and abilities.

Perhaps the most significant trait of space opera is that settings, characters, battles, powers, and themes tend to be very large-scale. Sometimes the term space opera is used in a negative sense, to denote bad quality science fiction, but its meaning can differ, often describing a particular science fiction genre without any value judgment.

So, by that definition, Star Wars is space opera. But is this a bad thing? We see enough real life marvels in our daily lives, cloned sheep, cars that use no gasoline or that can swim or fly, and other things that would totally astonish someone from less than a hundred years in the past. Take cell phones. The whole idea of having a phone in your pocket was ludicrous until the late 1980s. But now phones are not just phones. Now they are cameras, music players, datebooks, miniature computers with internet capacity…indeed some even have word processing functions. What was fantasy fifty years ago is reality today in many ways. We expect more, and many times more than real life can give us, so we look to entertainment.

Back to Star Wars. Star Wars is, to me anyway, a willing suspension of disbelief. I want to travel to ’A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.’ I want my bad guys to look and act like bad guys. I don’t want the bad guys to act like good guys until they turn around and kill my family because they can. I don’t want to quibble over what tenets of the Mandalorian Code seem out of place or stupid. I want the Mandalorians to be harsh, brutal and at the same time, somewhat honorable. I want them to be worthy enemies, not wimps. I don’t want to get in a long winded argument with someone about how hyperspace would not look like a long blue tunnel, or how parsecs are a unit of distance not time, or how elite troops are supposed to be able to shoot straight. I want to watch Jedi fight Sith and not have to worry about how the heat from the blades would melt the handles. I want to see starfighters fly and not think ‘Why did that X-wing just make a banking turn in outer space? There is nothing for it to bank against…’.

I want to be entertained. I want to have fun. Reality is good, but a smattering of the illogical, of fantasy, is necessary in today’s world or we get jaded. There is too much bad that is seen in today’s world, we need to relax, we need to have something simple that anyone can understand.

George Lucas gave us a simpler view in 1977. Empire was bad, Rebellion was good. Sith were bad, Jedi were good. Things have changed significantly since then. Some people may call the changes good or bad. Personally, I think they are somewhere in between. The Old Republic will likely turn a bunch of our preconceptions of the roles of Jedi and Sith on their heads, and that will probably be a good thing. We need shaking up every so often or we get complacent. And we all know what happens when the good guys get complacent, right?

In conclusion, some people may say Star Wars is science fiction, but they are in error. Science fiction is plausible. Star Wars is not plausible by our ways of thinking, and according to our knowledge of science. But that doesn’t really matter. It is FUN. And that is all that matters, isn’t it?

Picture from: http://paperart.deviantart.com/art/C3PO-and-R2D2-Cubees-122368801

Filed Under: Community, Opinion Tagged With: , , ,

WHAT did that being just say? Profanity in SWTOR

January 7, 2011 by

We all know what profanity is. None of us were born yesterday. But…what is it exactly? And why does it exist in Star Wars? Star Wars is a fanciful setting, filled with fanciful beings, so why have such a gritty, not very nice aspect to it?

According to Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Profanity “Profanity are words, expressions, gestures, or other social behaviors that are socially constructed or interpreted as insulting, rude, vulgar, desecrating, or showing disrespect.

The original meaning of the adjective profane (Latin: “in front of”, “outside the temple”) referred to items not belonging to the church, e.g., “The fort is the oldest profane building in the town, but the local monastery is older, and is the oldest building,” or “besides designing churches, he also designed many profane buildings”. Over time, this meaning changed to the current meaning.

Other words commonly used to describe profane language or its use include: cursing, swearing, expletives, dirty words, sentence enhancers, cussing, blasphemy, and irreverent, obscene, foul, indecent, strong, pejorative, choice, bad, or adult language.”

Profanity has most likely existed for as long as long as spoken language has. It is not always a bad thing. Interjections are used in sentences to indicate extreme emotion. Also according to Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interjection In grammar, an interjection or exclamation is a lexical category used to express an isolated emotion on the part of the speaker (although most interjections have clear definitions). Filled pauses such as uh, er, um, are also considered interjections. Interjections are typically placed at the beginning of a sentence or in a sentence by themselves.

The word “interjection” literally means “thrown in between” from the Latin inter (“between”) and iacere (“throw”). Interjections are generally uninflected function words and have sometimes been seen as sentence-words, because they can replace or be replaced by a whole sentence (they are holophrastic). Sometimes, however, interjections combine with other words to form sentences, but not with finite verbs. When an exclamation point is not needed, a comma can take the place.

Interjections are used when the speaker encounters events that cause emotions. The emotions are often strong (surprise, disgust, joy, excitement, enthusiasm, etc.), but are not necessarily so (boredom, irritation, mild surprise, etc.). However, several languages have interjections that cannot be related to emotions.

The point of this language lesson is that profanity is probably one of the few things that can be recognized in almost any language. It is almost universal. Now, we might not understand what someone says that is profanity in another language, but likely we can get the gist.

It is worth noting that some of the better known science fiction series had profanity that resonate even today. Battlestar Galactica, both the original series and the newer version, had ‘frak’. Example: ‘That frakking piece of frakking junk just frakking frakked up’. Farscape had ‘frell’ which filled the same role, being profanity that would not anger anyone. It is obviously profanity, but it is not any that anyone would know, and it does not call into question anyone’s ancestry, beliefs or any of the other aspects that are usually impacted by profanity.

Star Trek, as it was originally envisioned, did not have profanity. They were supposed to be beyond that. But then, the Klingons came along and they had to have some form of insults for everyone. Calling someone a ‘P’tak’ who is not a Trekkie will probably just get you an odd look. A Trekkie may or may not reply in Klingon and possibly draw his dagger or Bat’leth. Or they might just laugh, depending on the Trekkie.

But in Star Wars, why would we want profanity? Profanity is not nice. But then again, many of the situations in Star Wars are not nice. But at times, being polite is better than being insulting. After all, would you call the real Darth Vader an ‘***hole’ to his face?

I didn’t think so.

Profanity adds a level of realism to the game. Real people, when they drop a wrench on their foot, generally do not say ‘Oh darn that hurt’. Well, not any of the real construction people I used to work with anyway. What they had to say in that kind of situation was not for any kind of online forum anywhere. Many people react in stressful circumstances with profanity as a stress reliever or a distraction of sorts. Soldiers in particular had a reputation for being profane, and it is one that if fairly well deserved. I once heard a master chief petty officer in the United States Navy curse for three solid minutes, without repeating himself. He had cause, mind you. A lower ranked seaman had done something dumb and put civilian lives in jeopardy, mine included. From the dawn of history, soldiers have used profanity to express displeasure at situations, officers or orders. Only in recent years has there been an attempt to curb the use of profanity in the ranks, a more politically correct military, which is an oxymoron if I have ever read one.

Profanity is seen a lower class thing, but that is not always the case. Anyone can use profanity, but it is not usually accepted in the higher levels of society. For instance, there had better be a very good reason for a President say, so speak something profane during a live TV broadcast.

In some cultures, profanity is more accepted than others. For instance, some parts of the Maritimes of Canada seem to have the F-word as a normal figure of speech. It shocked the heck out of me the first time I heard a six year old talking that way and his mother leaned over to me and said “It’s okay, that is just how we F-ing talk up here.”  You could have knocked me over with a feather. It is not insulting; it is just part of how they talk. That kid had no clue what it meant. It was just part of how he had grown up. My own mother would have literally washed my mouth out with soap at that age for saying that. She did it to my sister for that exact word.

In Star Wars, it is supposed to be a family friendly series and it shows. DarthDerriphan on the TOR forums actually put together a list of profanity that was used in the movies, shows, books, comics, etc. Swearing in a galaxy far, far away… It’s a long list. It helps add character to various beings in the Star Wars universe. They can act like real people.  Real people get emotional, get angry and say things that they sometimes regret. But sometimes not. Jabba the Hutt calling someone an ‘Echutta’ is obviously not a compliment. Boba Fett calling Han Solo ‘Son of a Barve’ likewise.

It adds another level of immersion to the game, to the story, when the characters act like real people. For instance, in Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2, Joker is NOT politically correct, but he more than makes up for it in piloting ability. If he drops profanity all the time, no one minds, because he is the greatest piloting things since sliced bread.

I personally think there should be a language filter for any game that children (Under the age of 13 when they likely know all of the words and more) will play. But I am old fashioned. Or am I?

What do you think? Profanity in Star Wars or no?

Image courtesy of: http://blastmagazine.com/2010/08/04/dj-qbert-joins-dj-hero-2-lineup/

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For the Republic!

January 1, 2011 by

Come GET some!

Wow! Not since the ‘Hope’ trailer have I been this jazzed.  Troopers ROCK!

Some people recently asked me what the heck a trooper was, and I was like…what? Then I had to think about it. Besides the iconic stormtrooper/clone trooper, how many people actually know where the original word ‘trooper’ came from? According to the Oxford English Dictionary, a trooper is a private soldier in a cavalry or armored unit.  Almost anyone who has seen movies has seen images of cavalry, right? John Wayne’s works like ‘She Wore a Yellow Ribbon’ and ‘The Undefeated’? You know, the guys on the horses? Charging in to save the day in the nick of time? What? You DON’T? Sheesh…what do people learn these days…?

Ok, back to basics. Cavalry units, that is soldiers who fought from horseback, were generally thought of as elite forces, separate from the rank and file of infantry, artillery, etc. That fits this new update from Bioware to a ‘T’. These soldiers of the Republic are anything but common. And the video… I won’t ruin it. Just…watch it. Watch it NOW! Even if you plan to play Empire, you need to see this stuff:
[Read more…]

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Finally: a good bad guy!

December 23, 2010 by

What is it with the bad guys always becoming weenies? I mean, come on, Darth Vader was the ultimate bad guy. Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi were notable films in a lot of ways, but the main focus was always Darth Vader. He was big, clad in black and very scary with his mechanical breathing and that nasty little thing that he did when someone displeased him. ‘I find your lack of faith disturbing’. THAT is bad guy. Sure he wimped out at the end, the love for his son undid him, redeemed him and let him die a Jedi. That was the whole point of the Star Wars story, Episode 1-6, the fall and redemption of Anakin Skywalker. But… Why are all the other bad guys only bad guys for a while and then become weenies?

Ok, let’s look at Exar Kun. Jedi who becomes a Dark Jedi, bad news bad guy, right? Wrong. Sure he wreaks havoc for awhile, and then his base is discovered, he gets obliterated and turned into a Force Shade. And then what happens? Several thousand years later, he gets beaten and destroyed by a group of student Jedi, not even full blown Jedi Knights. Talk about going out with a whimper… *sigh*

Lets look at someone different, a non Force user. Mitth’raw’nuruodo, more commonly known as Grand Admiral Thrawn. He was probably the best bad guy ever created for Star Wars. He didn’t need the Force, he was just that good, always three or four steps ahead of everyone else. He was not about fighting for the sake of fighting. To quote one of his subordinates, ‘Thrawn always stood for order’. He wasn’t a proponent of the New Order, he wanted a stable galaxy, and the Rebels upset the galaxy. So he fought the Rebels. The only time that he was outfought was when two of his enemies outsmarted each other and wound up working together against him in the novel ‘The Last Command’. And then he died knifed in the back? By his bodyguard of all people…? Aw COME ON…! *Double sigh*

I am not even going to go into Isard, Prestage, Zinj, the list goes on and on… They are all weenies. Dangerous for a time and then they went out with whimpers. Whatever happened to bad guys you feared? Darth Vader was scary, Emperor Palpatine was scary in Empire Strikes back and Return of the Jedi. Malgus at least seems scary at the moment, but will he too go the way of the weenie? I hope not.

Ok, we come to last week’s update. A new timeline, ‘Rebirth of the Sith Empire’ and a new bad guy. The first Grand Moff Odile Vaiken, is long dead by the time of The Old Republic, but his legacy is the strong and overwhelming Sith military. Born on Korriban, and utterly loyal to the Sith, Vaiken seems to be a new direction in the evolution of bad guys.  He is skilled, intelligent and loyal. He was not in it just for himself, he wanted his empire to succeed. And to die the way he did, on the bridge of a Star Destroyer in battle, well, that was anything but weenie like. Wait a sec… Star Destroyer…? Hmmm… *evil grin* Very few problems cannot be solved with a Star Destroyer in orbit.

We had some good news this Friday as well. It looks like we are going to see more of Darth Malgus now, with the announcement of a new book, based on him. I truly hope they do not do what they did to Anakin. I don’t care if the man has issues. I want evil. I want blood! I want guts and horror and war and carnage! I want my bad guys to be bad guys! Not weenies!

To sum it up, Sith and servants of the Sith have always had to lose in Star Wars. The good guys always win in Star Wars, maybe not right away, but always in the end, the good guys win. But… Um… Who ARE the good guys in The Old Republic? The Republic with its fractional corrupt government or the Empire with the Sith leading it and all the stuff they do?  With the massive amount of reviews that were dropped on us recently, we have received some hints that there may not BE any ‘good guys’. It all may be shades of gray. And that is typical Bioware, always the moral choices with lots of room for interpretation. I for one can’t wait.

If Odile Viaken is any indication of the sort of people who follow the Sith Empire now, well… I look forward to fighting them as Republic and fighting beside them as Empire. They will make great allies and enemies. Memorable ones, and that is what we want. We don’t want weenies.

Well, what do you think? Are the bad guys going to go out with bangs or whimpers? And bad guys may be either Republic OR Imperial.

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Yay! Wizard is out!

December 12, 2010 by

Wow. What an update a week or so back. Bioware seems to be really making sure that fans of The Old Republic are salivating. Well, first of all, they renamed Jedi Wizard. It’s about freaking time! Of all the choices they had, Jedi Sage was probably the best, but most of us knew that already, right? But then, the crew skills explanation… Whoa… I can see a whole bunch of people’s eyes going huge at that.

The advanced Jedi Consular class name of Jedi Wizard was apparently a placeholder title. Personally, I doubt that it was a serious name. I mean it, come on, this is Star Wars, not Dungeons and Dragons! The Sith may have Sorcerers, but that is what they are- Sorcerers. They use Sith alchemy and Sith magic, or at least they do in the Expanded Universe. Jedi are not, and never have been the wizard type. They have been called that on occasion, but it was almost always an insult.  Yes, they have mystical powers like wizards. But where wizards usually seek power for their own ends, be those ends noble or selfish, the Jedi do not seek power for themselves. And the name Jedi Sage is much more suited to a consular type anyway. A consular is supposed to be a teacher, negotiator, diplomat, truth seeker, not some half crazy man or woman in a pointed hat with stars all over his/her robe. We don’t need fireball spells in Star Wars. We have orbital fire support for things like that. I was pretty sure that the name Jedi Wizard was going to vanish and it did.

So, the new explanation of class skills. All I can say is wow. I like it. And there was a neat little thing hidden in there. Weapon types -“blaster pistols, blaster rifles, sniper rifles, and assault cannons”. Whu…? Wait a sec… Assault cannons? We get ASSAULT CANNONS? I want one! Is that the really big gun that the trooper that Malgus pulled to him was carrying in the Hope Trailer? If so, I really want one!

So, Armstech. The crew skill that will allow characters to build weapons. Speaking from personal, real world, experience, nothing else comes close to building your own weapon. Nothing else feels quite right in my hands now, besides the sword that I built. Admittedly, I built it from pre-built parts that I got from various sources, but I assembled it. No, I cannot forge a katana blade myself. Oh how I wish… That sword is mine. Every other blade I have handled, even a three hundred year old blade that my sensei let me handle once, has paled in comparison. So it just makes sense to have people build their own weapons, even if they are not the crafting sort normally. So I can build my assault cannon.

Ah, the memories. I remember pre-CU Star Wars Galaxies where the greatest of the artisans could basically demand any price for their wares, because they were simply better than anything else out there. The demands for resources were never ending. I remember being sent out to Dathomir and getting ganked there again and again just to gather rare resources for the guild I was in, so our weaponsmith could make the best polearms/swords/scythes, etc. In The Old Republic, you can just send a minion/slave/friend. But wait, there is a catch…

Do your companions like you? We don’t know if this is going to be like the approval rating in Dragon Age: Origins. We all loved slapping Morrigan around, didn’t we? I know I did. It does make sense.  A companion who likes you will work harder for you than one who is there because he or she is a slave or whatever. This is simple work theory. Happy worker = more productive worker, usually anyway. Make your workers love you (or fear you) and they will move mountains for you. Hey, it worked for the Pharaohs. The addition of rare and artifact crating ingredients will likely keep many players playing just to get some of those. I don’t know about you, but I will. I want an artifact assault cannon. Did I say that enough? I want an assault cannon!

Anyway, The Old Republic is shaping up to be a great game. Bioware has apparently learned from the mistakes of many other games, both recent and not. The crew skills and crafting seem to be well thought out and efficient. The whole system seems to be geared both to casual players and the hardcore, ‘I want it all and the best I can get’ player. People who like to build will be able to build. Those of us who like to just go out and blow things up will be able to do that and leave our faithful minions to sweat over the workbench while we are out blowing things up. With assault cannons!

In conclusion, this week’s update was a good one. Jedi Wizard is GONE and good riddance. Armstech looks well thought out and accessible even to casual gamers, which was the idea. You don’t HAVE to spend 8 hours a day playing just to get that fat loot to craft the flux capacitor to attach to your gun to make it good. Although you likely will be able to play that much if you wish, and I likely will be playing at LEAST that long a day for the first couple. I really want an assault cannon now. Have I said that enough? Give me an assault cannon! When in doubt, get a bigger gun!

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Local or central servers?

December 5, 2010 by

There is a bit of a debate now as to the necessity of local servers versus centralized ones. Now some of us will likely say ‘what is the big deal?’. What is so special about having servers that are close to the players as opposed to a central server located wherever the game developer is based?

Most of us have likely played online games of some kind. Whether they are First Person Shooters like Call of Duty and Medal of Honor, top down shooters like Alien Breed: Impact, or Massively Multiplayer Role Playing Games like EVE, World of Warcraft and The Old Republic is going to be. We have all encountered problems with transmission lag I bet. You know, when you have set up that sweet sniper shot from a long ways away, and then your character freezes just long enough for the other player to see you and shoot you. It’s annoying as hell. Or even better, when you are playing a MMORPG and you lag in the middle of a battle and your team is wiped out because you were the healer. You get a lot of irate comments.

What actually happens in online games is not very well understood by some people it seems. They seem to think that either the full game is on their system or it is some kind of magic. The actual game is NOT on your computer. There is no way most personal computers would have any chance of holding even a fraction of what is needed for a game such as WoW. What happens is that your computer, called a client, sends information through the internet to a main computer, called the host server. The host server sees what you ordered your character to do. Anything from ‘move here’ to ‘hit that orc’ to ‘heal that person! NOW’, all of these are sent from your home system to the main system. The main system recognizes that data, changes what will be represented on your screen, and sends THAT data back to the client. The systems communicate this way every second or so. The communication and changes on the screen normally takes just a few microseconds, a time frame that most humans are incapable of recognising when it is shown on a computer screen. But sometimes, well, the internet gets quirky, the transmission feeds get crossed, or Murphy rears his ugly head and it takes longer. I remember in Star Wars Galaxies how my character would get hit and run almost all the way back to a city before dying from that one hit. That was the most extreme case I remember. I was 900(!) meters from the guy when he killed me. That was one heck of a shot.

The idea of localised servers is a good one. This puts the main server closer to the players, thus minimising transmission time for information between the host server and clients. But as in all things, there is no free lunch. Servers are not cheap. And good servers are seriously expensive. So if a game company is going to want to set up localised servers for multiple different areas, say one in Europe, one in the States, one in Australia or somewhere in Asia, they need to include that in the price. Most players that I know wouldn’t mind. The ease of play more than makes up for any additional cost. They will need to charge more because they are duplicating the main server in multiple places and that costs a lot.

A centralised server on the other hand, is just what it says. The server is located in one place, usually very close to the game developer’s offices. This allows for ease of service and upgrading, usually anyway. When you have multiple servers scattered across multiple time zones, using multiple languages, you cannot always use the same patches for all of them. With a centralized server, all you need to do is keep the clients updated. Now, you CAN do that with localised servers, but it will cost a lot more. Staff costs, maintenance costs, the list goes on and on. Centralised servers are more cost effective, but have a higher incidence of transmission lag for players.

In the end, it boils down to mainly two things. Cost and player satisfaction. Centralised servers are more cost effective, generally. They are easier to maintain and upgrade. Localised servers are easier to play from, usually anyway. So the players will enjoy the game and tell their friends about the game, and then they will hopefully buy the game.

I could go into all kinds of horror stories about various companies trying different means to skirt the edges of the need for local servers. *Cough* Ubisoft! *Cough* But the need is there. Especially with such huge games as The Old Republic is going to be, to have most of the data required not on the customer’s system. The voice over files alone are going to be massive. Personally, I think that localised servers are the way to go. Keep your players happy and you do more business. If they do not enjoy the game because they can’t even move their in game avatar for the transmission lag, then they will not play it. It is as simple as that. And I can’t see Bioware being that dumb.

What do you think? Local or central servers?

Image from http://yumurtaci.wordpress.com/2008/08/07/photostock-computer-server-2-piece/

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Fan creations versus original content

November 26, 2010 by

This Op-Ed piece comes from our sister site, The Metaverse Journal, and was written by Tateru Nino – it’s very pertinent to SWTOR given its thriving fan community and the Fan Friday phenomenon. Enjoy!

With studios and publishers flinging infringement notices around about fan-based role-playing environments online, it’s worth looking at the situation from another perspective.

After all, why not just create new, original theme properties rather than basing role-play environments on popular books, movies and television shows? Why do so when official gaming environments already exist in some cases?

Well, there’s a number of reasons. Creating a fleshed-out themed environment that isn’t just a rehash of something that already exists, is actually really hard. It’s time-consuming, requires any would-be gamer to learn a lot about your specific property (which means endless amounts of documentation, lore and history needs to be written), and you generally start out without any real support. How does a gamer even know they’ll like your theme – as a non-profit effort, your advertising options are limited, and you may never attract a large enough following to make all of the effort worthwhile.

By contrast, plugging into an existing theme is easy. There’s always a wealth of pre-existing material to work from. DVDs, books, movies, fan-fiction and more. Everyone already knows whether the theme is to their taste, all the information they could wish for is widely available, and the only matter for their consideration is whether they like or dislike the software on which the environment is running, the rules and the management. Even grabbing the smallest fraction of an established fan-base can make you a huge hit in role-play circles.

When it is embraced, it can work very well indeed. I used to participate in a particular Star Trek MUSH online. Among the players were a handful of members of the crew, cast and writers for the series. It was fascinating seeing story elements from that game appearing later in later seasons of the canon television series.

That’s perhaps an almost ideal symbiosis, but all of that was happening without the knowledge of the rights-holders who probably would have shut the arrangement down punitively, had they become aware of it.

These days there’s now a Star Trek Online MMOG, but dozens of Star Trek role-play environments still exist online, and new ones still get created. Why is that?

It’s because the ‘official’ environments don’t offer the role-playing versatility and opportunities that many online, fan-created role-playing environments do. You can take your pick of game-systems. You can even find environments without any coded game-systems, simply relying on the creativity and fair-play of participants – essentially limiting play only to what players are jointly willing to agree to.

White Wolf’s World of Darkness is perhaps the single most popular role-play setting online over the last couple of decades. That property has become a part of CCP, the makers of EVE Online who are now working it up into an MMOG.

What will happen to the hundreds of role-play environments online that operate under the World of Darkness rules and/or setting? Will CCP’s lawyers come after them as the game gets closer to release? Will they only get shut down if the World of Darkness MMOG fails to attract enough usage? World of Darkness games are – traditionally – rather light on scripted game-mechanics, and trend towards humans creating their own stories and performing their own dispute-resolution, aided by administrators – a model which I do not see CCP necessarily indulging in.

A World of Darkness MMOG might simply not appeal to the tens of thousands of WoD gamers already playing in virtual environments today, and that could well put CCP on some awkward public-relations ground if it chooses to protect its rights – rights for which many millions of dollars have been spent already.

(Photo courtesy of the brilliant Evan Sturman)

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Hi ho… Hi ho… It’s off to play we go…

November 21, 2010 by

Well, well, well, what have we here?

We got a tasty tidbit in the latest update, didn’t we? Crafting is looking very good, and this is coming from a Star Wars Galaxies veteran. But it wasn’t just the crafting, was it? There were also those interesting sounding side missions for the companion characters to do. Whether it is treasure hunting, diplomacy or other types of things, it sounds very interesting. Side missions and mini-games almost always spice things up.

I think the first mini-games I truly remember, not counting the puzzles in old games such as Donkey Kong, Contra and Pitfall, were from the first Knights of the Old Republic. The gun turret scenes, the swoop races and Pazaak, ah, the memories are sweet. But… blowing Sith fighters up, while fun, did get repetitive. It brought back fond memories of flying in the gun turret of the Otana in X-Wing Alliance. Good memories of exploding Imperial ships. But even then, how many times can you listen to Carth say ‘Incoming Fighters!’ without going ‘GAH! Not again…’? Pazaak was fun, and I even found an online version, fan made of course. I have to admit I found the swoop riding annoying, but that is normal for someone who doesn’t have the best reflexes.

Bioware has introduced a number of mini-games into their regular games in more recent years. KOTOR 1 (I try to forget KOTOR 2 most of the time) had the workbench as well as the other mini games. Mass Effect had the circle that you had to pass your pointer through to unlock things/defuse things/etc. Mass Effect 2 had the bypass and hack mini games. Even Jade Empire had the flying game with the Glorious Dragonfly. But as in most games, especially in recent years, crafting is starting to take a larger role. It used to be ‘Oh I need something, I will go kill ‘x’ number of zombies/goblins/dragons/whatever to get money to buy it’. Now, it is ‘I will go out, kill ‘x’ number of zombies/goblins/dragons/whatever to get pieces to make it.’ But the time involved in crafting has always detracted from the time spent going out and playing. Unless you are one of those strange people who likes to play as a builder, you get a bit annoyed at times having to spend time crafting when you could be blasting stuff/hacking things/ etc.

This little teaser from Bioware seems to have set things on their heads again. Now you don’t have to spend time at the workbench yourself. Your ever industrious companions will work for you, even when you are mean and turn the lights off on them! You can even have them working on things when you are offline!

That was always my major problem with crafting in MMOs. Either you cheat, with a macro or something, or you cannot compete with people who do things like that. I always wanted to play the game, not get bogged down trying to find the best ingredients to build the perfect set of Sith underpants to beat that nasty Jedi in some Level 15 quest. Now you can send your faithful minions, er, slaves, er whatever… to go do these things. And what you can send them to do… wow… How many other games have companions where you can send them to gather things? Larian’s Divinity 2: Ego Draconis, had runners you could send for ingredients. But for them to actually make things for you while you are not playing the game…? Whoa, that is cool.

In the update, we see the bounty hunter companions. I am assuming, carefully, that the same types of skills –gathering, crafting and mission- will be available for all classes. Now it is very likely that the missions will be VERY different. A Sith Inquisitor will likely have very different missions for his or her companions than a Republic Trooper would. But the basic idea will be the same. While you are out doing whatever it is you do, your companions will be hard at work back at your ship, or off doing whatever you ordered them to do.

I like this idea. I like it a lot. One of my gripes with KOTOR was that when I was out and about, the crew never moved from their spots. I always wondered when Carth went to the washroom and where. Was there one in the cockpit of the Ebon Hawk?

Over to you. What do you like in mini games? Are you as enthused about this idea of crafting as I am?

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It’s going to WHAT?

November 12, 2010 by

Expecting this for SWTOR?

Okay, what the heck? I was away from the main Star Wars: The Old Republic forums for a while, working on getting a book published and focusing on school and when I come back there are threads out the wazoo about how badly SWTOR is going to fail. Some of the angst that I have read has been internet trolling of course, but some of it seems to be genuine fear. But why? The game looks amazing.

Well, first and foremost in many people’s minds is the debacle that was and is Star Wars Galaxies. Sony Online Entertainment (SOE) will be forever emblazoned in many players memories as the worst game company ever created. They rushed the game out before it was completed, which is nothing new. Many game companies put out games before they are finished, but this game was… well… awful. The only reason people played it at all at launch was that it was Star Wars. The fact that for about three days the players walked around on worlds that had nothing on them, no mobs, no buildings, not even any plants, no NOTHING, was absolutely awful. But players suffered through the bugs, because it was Star Wars, and parts of it were fun. Then came the Combat Upgrade, (Or as we called it Completely Useless) where they made what was one of the most innovative and cool games out there, minus the annoying bugs, the same as every other MMO out there. They didn’t need level defined gear and enemies, but of course, WoW had it, so they must need it, right? Wrong. Then the day that will live in infamy, the day the Next Generation Entertainment hit the servers. SOE lied to their player base. SOE undid in a day what many players had spent years perfecting, tweaking, and basically having fun with. They decided not to listen to the community, to do their own thing. Why should they care if they shafted most of their players? It wasn’t SOE’s problem. Small wonder many of the most hardcore players simply left and will likely never return. I was one of those. The game is still running, on limited servers, but I for one will never touch it again, and I am not alone. SWG failed, and failed hard through no fault of the game, but through the less than intelligent choices made by SOE.

Bioware is not SOE, and while some of SOE’s employees have joined Bioware, I highly doubt that even the most jaded of Bioware’s employees could say that Bioware is going to repeat the same mistakes that SOE freely admitted they made. Second, Bioware has a formula that they use for their games. Well, yeah. How many of us, when writing stories do NOT use some kind of formula? How many of us use an outline, a plan, something? For me, it makes it clear what I need to write next and my stories are nowhere near as complicated as some Bioware games. Some people criticize Bioware for following a pattern, one that I have put as my intro picture. Bioware’s stories are not Pulitzer prize material, but they are also not bargain bin trashy romances either. There are limits to what can be done in a video game story. Admittedly, they are pushing the envelope of what can be done in game stories with what they are focusing on in Star Wars: The Old Republic. Some people have criticized Sol Invictus and others have praised him for making this chart. It is good, as far as it goes. Bioware DOES have a pattern.  But think about it, did the fact that you were following the same general pattern detract in any way from the experience in Mass Effect 1 or 2? I had no time to be thinking about that as I was blasting my way through the games.

Last but certainly not least, we come to the clincher. Many people are saying that SWTOR is going to fail because Bioware has never made a MMO before. They are known for their single player games, but a single player game, no matter how big or complex, is nothing on a Massively Multiplayer Online Roleplaying game. But, they know this. This is why they have spent so long, and such epic amounts of money, to make it. This is no Star Wars Galaxies clone. This is no WoW Clone. This probably will not be a WoW-killer, to use the internet lingo. WoW is simply too huge, too easy to play at the lower levels, for any one game to simply knock it off its pedestal. The only thing likely to kill WoW is Blizzard Entertainment, the same way SOE killed SWG with stupid choices.

To sum up – some people think SWTOR is going to fail. Some of those people are being pessimists or internet trolls. Some of them have legitimate cause for concern, after the horror that was SWG. SWTOR is a massive game, larger than any other. One wonders exactly how many DVDs will be required to carry such a game. Bioware has never made a MMO before, true. But… that also has some plusses. They had no preconceptions. The idea of full voice over for every character was laughable, until Bioware started doing it. Are there going to be problems? Almost certainly, this is a game made by humans, and humans are not perfect. Is it going to flop at launch? Doubtful.

That is my two cents worth anyway. What do you think?

Picture from Game Riot

Filed Under: Opinion Tagged With: , , ,
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