Goodbye Asheron's Call 2

If you're a fan of Massively Multiplayer Online Games (MMOG), then you've no doubt heard of Asheron's Call and it's sequel Asheron's call 2 (AC2) by Turbine.

Asheron's Call was serious competition for Everquest (EQ) when it launched. Turbine wooed lots of dissatisfied EQ gamers to their world by running live events and actually offering updates every month. Asheron's Call was a success.

A few years later, a jaded MMO community is looking for something new. Anarchy Online bombed. WWII online was bug ridden. Then the community heard about a sequel to AC in the works. Ads started appearing in magazines - the graphics looked awesome. The magazines touted it as the next great MMO. I, at least, was excited.

AC2 landed on peoples hard drives with a thud. I bought the game on release day, and even bought my girlfriend a copy. We installed it and played it like we do every MMO that launches. The graphics were fantastic, and it ran smooth as silk on my box. After completing a few quests, we left the newbie area and began to explore the real game - and discovered that nobody bought AC2.

The first town we ran to had 5 people in it, I'll never forget. They were all standing around playing virtual music on virtual instruments. We laughed and joined in the band, however we all knew the game was dead out of the gate.

Somewhere down the line, news from the BETA had leaked to the community. Scuttlebut on the net was that the game wasn't finished, and having played it I can tell you they were right. What a lonely place AC2 was, not just with subscribers but non-player characters too. The cities in the game were not populated at all, giving players no reason to go. The entire world felt like a ghost town.

We played for a few months and my experience with the games is one of my fondest gaming memories. The design was sound, and the world was fantastic albeit empty. AC2 was the only game I can remember to have a narrative woven deeply into the gameplay and cutscene movies that played after you completed a dungeon. Every month, content updates made seasons go by and events happen, but no one was there to see it.

Today I read that AC2 is closing it's doors on 12/30/05. It's another chapter in MMO history finished. Turbine is working on Lord of the Rings Online and Dungeons and Dragons Online (both set to be major releases), but Aheron's Call as a franchise is finished. Here's to a good game that no one played.

On a side note, MMO sequels appear to be terrible ideas. AC2 killed both AC and AC2, and more recently, EQ2 hurt EQ1 while EQ2 is slowly and painfully dying.

World of Spycraft

A Massively Multiplayer Role Playing Game (MMORPG) is a game in which a large portion of the players play on the same game server. Usually, they are built more like a persistent world rather than a more traditional game, creating an environment to live out your virtual fantasies.

World of Warcraft (WoW) is a great MMORPG. Me and my girlfriend have been playing WoW for 7 or 8 months now, and we've enjoyed every second of it. However, there's a bit of controversy in WoW's world of Azeroth.

Recently, it was uncovered by the gaming community that the game executable was scanning the end users computer for hacks used to cheat in the game. Blizzard, the game company that created WoW, issued a statement to quiet down the backlash. Here's a shakedown of how things transpired.

A post appeared on the WoW General Forums exposing that the scans were taking place. In the same post and many others, the players often refer to the End User License Agreement. Basically, the EULA is a contract that the player must sign in order to play the game.

Hidden deep within the Terms of Service, which is part of the EULA that the gamer has to agree with, I found these:

B. Blizzard Entertainment has the right to obtain certain identification information about your computer and its operating system, including the identification numbers of your hard drives, central processing unit, IP addresses and operating systems, for identification purposes without any further notice to you.

C. Blizzard Entertainment has the right to obtain "non-personal" data from your connection to World of Warcraft in order to make certain demographic assumptions regarding the users of World of Warcraft without any further notice to you.

D. In order to assist Blizzard Entertainment to police users who may use "hacks," or "cheats" to gain an advantage over other players, you acknowledge that Blizzard Entertainment shall have the right to obtain certain information from your computer and its component parts, including your computer's random access memory, video card, central processing unit, and storage devices. This information will only be used for the purpose of identifying "cheaters," and for no other reason.

Blizzard is a game company that I trust wholeheartedly. The company itself has nothing to gain from stealing anything more than what they say they are looking at; heck they already have our credit card numbers. However, this sort of practice is something that makes me uneasy.

Even more disturbing to me than the scanning (hell, EBay and Amazon do this sort of stuff every time you log on) is the EULA itself. Here's the scenario that I have lived many times: The new hot game I have been waiting for arrives on store shelves. I drop up to $60 of my hard earned cash on the counter and walk out with a shrink wrapped box. After driving home, I pop the cd into the drive and install the software onto my PC. Once that's finished, I start the game for the first time and I'm presented with a bunch of legal crap. What is this? I wanted to shoot some aliens not go to law school. After NOT reading the EULA, I click accept and begin playing away.

There's several problems with the way this is working. I'll list them out in EULA format:

A. No game player in his right mind ever reads this stuff. We don't ever know what we're agreeing to. Why don't we read it? Because it's silly to have to sign a contract to play a game, and gamers know this.

B. The EULA isn't printed anywhere on the box. Lets say I just paid $50 for a brand spanking new copy of WoW. Once I get it home, I open the shrink wrap, install the game, and input the special code that's printed on the cd case or manual to "register" this copy of the game. Once I boot the game for the first time, I'm presented with the EULA. OK, I read the damn thing and decide I don't agree with their scanning policy. Guess what folks, you can't return the game. Either you accept their terms, or you ain't playing their game. Once the shrink-wrap is broken and the code is entered, the game cannot be returned. Blizzard just walked away with your $50 and there's nothing you can do about it.

C. How are they enforcing these things when minors are involved? Thanks to our good friends at the ESRB, I know that WoW is rated T for Teen - meaning that someone under the age of 18 can purchase this game without parental consent. Correct me if I'm wrong (jm11744@hotmail.com), but I don't think a contract signed digitally or otherwise by a minor is legal.

D. How does this work when the player of the game doesn't own the computer it's being played on? Little Johnny who's 15 just bought WoW at Wal-Mart. He brings it home and installs the game onto Dad's home office PC. Dad sees little Johnny playing a harmless game and thinks nothing of it. Johnny agrees to the Terms of Service, giving Blizzard permission to search a PC that doesn't belong to him. Blizzard scans some things on the PC without Dad's permission - but dad wouldn't want his computer scanned because it has all of his personal and business information on it. This seems like it should be illegal somehow.

E. Blizzard and any other game company has the right to change the contract at any time (and they do). Here's the words right out of their mouths (warning - this may be a bit long)

10. Our Administration of World of Warcraft; Changes to the Terms of This Terms of Use Agreement.

Blizzard Entertainment reserves the right, at its sole and absolute discretion, to change, modify, add to, supplement or delete any of the terms and conditions of this Agreement at any time, including, without limitation, access policies, the availability of any World of Warcraft feature, hours of availability, content, data, software or equipment needed to access World of Warcraft, the amount of, or basis for determining, any fees or charges for World of Warcraft, and institution of new fees or charges for World of Warcraft, effective upon prior notice as follows: Blizzard Entertainment will post notification of any such changes to World of Warcraft on the World of Warcraft website and will post any revised Terms of Use in this location, and may provide such other notice as Blizzard Entertainment may elect in its sole and absolute discretion, which may include by email, postal mail, pop-up screen, or in-game notice. If any future changes to this Agreement are unacceptable to you or cause you to no longer be in compliance with this Agreement, you may cease to use your World of Warcraft account and terminate the Account. The continued use of World of Warcraft by you following notice of changes to this Agreement will mean you accept any and all such changes. Blizzard Entertainment may change, modify, suspend, or discontinue any aspect of World of Warcraft at any time. Blizzard Entertainment may also impose limits on certain features or restrict your access to parts or all of World of Warcraft without notice or liability. You have no interest, monetary or otherwise, in any feature, content or availability of World of Warcraft, any Game Data (defined in Section 13(J), below) or in any terms or conditions of access to or use of World of Warcraft.

Of course, you could terminate your subscription. I'm sorry, but in the good old days when you bought a game you got to play the damn thing.

There are no real regulations or even unwritten laws concerning this stuff. Every time a game company is taken to court, it's heard by several judges each handing out different verdicts while a: not understanding what's going on or b: not knowing what to do even if they do understand.

I mean, it's a contract signed and delivered, right?

Steamed Boy

Steamboy arrived on store shelves this week and of course I bought it like the sheep I am. Akira was the first anime movie exposed to me, and it changed my perception of animation. Steamboy was directed by the same director (Katsuhiro Otomo) as Akira, so I was excited to see what he's been doing with his time (10 years, so the back of the dvd case reads).

The art was beautiful. Hand drawn animation in Japan is being mixed with computer animation, and they're really starting to get it right. No doubt this movie took many man-hours to perfect, and my hat goes off to them.

Unfortunately, all the drawings and doodads aside, no one involved with the picture bothered to proof the script. There was some decent ideas in there (mostly anti-war, eerily familiar with current events), but they were buried in fantastic explosions and people turning cranks.

3/4s of the characters could have been cut out all together. The most notable example is Miss Scarlet (Ray Steams quasi-love interest). I understand the concept behind her; she was a stereotype of Americans played through a character from Gone with the Wind who was herself a caricature of American culture. Great, I know a lot of people who need to be brought down off their pedestal, but this wasn't the movie for it. She served no purpose other than to stand around and bitch at everyone. What am I supposed to think about Ray Steam when he makes googly eyes at some hussy who beats her dog? No kidding, there was a 30 to 45 minute stretch where she wandered around a floating steam castle that was wrecking into London, all while yelling some dude's name. Watch the movie, and you'll see that most of the characters seem to ignore her (which, honestly, may be part of the metaphor).

While I'm at it, movie directors need to hire editors for God's sake. This movie was the longest 2 hours and 6 minutes I've ever slogged through. How long can you sit on a couch and watch people flip switches and turn cranks? How many impressively animated steam jets can you watch burst out of pipes, and never seem to burn anyone standing right in the middle of them? This isn't a problem just with anime directors; actually I think it's a habit they picked up off of Hollywood dribble like Michael Bay. End movies for Pete's sake. Yes, your animation is superb and I'm sure you are proud of it, but my ass is getting tired. Everyone thinks that because Lord of the Rings was excellent and long that endless movies are the magic ingredient to success.

I've got news for the suits responsible for movies these days - there was a reason the Dukes of Hazard TV show wasn't 2 hours long.

Mazes and Monsters

Me and my Dungeons and Dragons crew have been playing a Forgotten Realms campaign for over a year now. Recently, we've been playing and finished an adventure called City of the Spider Queen. I was curious to try a book adventure to a: give me sort of a little break and b: try out another Dungeon Master's material. 6 MONTHS LATER, we finally finished it, and the results were, well...

Just to give you a bit of background, I've been trying to feel out my DM style for the duration of our adventuring. I started off as more of a storyteller DM than a Referee DM, but I've completely made the transition now. The fun in Dungeons and Dragons is the players being the lords of their destiny rather than me leading them by the nose. City of the Spider Queen taught me how to build an adventure in the referee style.

The adventure itself was very cool and well written. It's always been my dream to coax the players into an epic underdark adventure. Besides, Drow are what the Forgotten Realms are mostly known for.

6 months go by and we're having a lot of fun. I did a really good job, in my mind, of setting up the main bad guy (Ira tsarina) as a really evil person (or elf). The players are progressing and the party becomes level 14. Finally the day arrives, the players have conquered the Undying Temple and they face Irae.

6 months they've been playing to get here, and they beat her without so much as a scratch. The disappointment in the room was so thick, you could cut it with a butterknife. They've killed epic encounters before, and after a harrowing victory they jump up screaming and excited (no lie on this one, remember the shadow dragon guys). Here they killed the ultimate leader of a drow cult and nothing. No screaming, no excitement. I had failed at a Dungeon Master's number one priority - to ENTERTAIN.

The unpredictability of D&D is what makes a true role-playing game irreplaceable. In this case, unpredictability was it's biggest weakness. What's a DM to do when 20's get rolled 75% of the time? LOL (Grats Vogl with the "loaded dice")

We'll be moving on now, and I'm going to construct my own adventures like I used to - using what I've learned in this adventure to strengthen it.

PS - The title of this post refers to an awful anti-D&D after school movie called Mazes and Monsters. If you get the chance, watch it and laugh.