Filed under: Opinion

Steam estimated at selling to 70% of PC market

by Kyle Horner Nov 20th 2009 at 8:00PM

Filed under: MMO industry, News items, Opinion

Where did you buy your last MMO and where will you buy your next? Chances are you'll be getting it on Steam or so the story goes according to Brad Wardell, head honcho over at Stardock. We're inclined to agree with his assertion that Valve's digital distribution platform holds roughly 70% of the PC market as many of us here at Massively have been buying our MMOs -- and PC games in general -- on the service for some time now.

So is it a good thing or a bad thing for MMO players? Our experience with purchasing games like Aion and Champions Online through the service has been positive, and so long as no complications arise via patches or other client issues we see no reason to stop utilizing the service unless better offers appear.

The only real MMO-related issue we can see is with collector's editions. Some games offer a different set of bonus material for people who opt out of the physical copy and go for the digital, but certain items like art books, mouse pads and other bric-a-brac can't be delivered through a wire... at least, not until sometime in the far flung future.

Now, as far as the Steamworks integration issue goes... Well, that's a whole other sack of fishes.

Linden Lab to raise Xstreet fees, loses vendors, products

by Tateru Nino Nov 20th 2009 at 5:00PM

Filed under: Business models, Culture, Economy, News items, Opinion, Second Life, Virtual worlds

This week, Linden Lab announced that it was going to start charging listing fees and minimum commissions on its Second Life Xstreet Web-shopping adjunct in the near future. Within hours, vendors took down thousands of products, many abandoning the service entirely in favor of alternative services.

It's unclear just how many vendors have abandoned the Xstreet SL system, but it apparently was enough to temporarily overload the Web-sites of third-party sites such as Slapt.

MMOrigins: The only living boy in Vana'diel

by Eliot Lefebvre Nov 20th 2009 at 1:00PM

Filed under: Real life, Culture, Opinion, MMOrigins

When I was still young, I was out on a walk with my father in the woods next to my great-aunt's house. The woods were an offshoot of the Devil's Hopyard state park, which meant that they were old and vast. As the family often congregated around the house, there were a number of paths we knew that wove their way through the forest, but I remember where we always stopped, and I remember the day when I asked what was further along.

My dad grinned, and we kept walking. It was about ten minutes from there to a beautiful, moss-covered waterfall that was right on the edge of the state park, with an alcove just large enough that I could squeeze underneath the falls. That sticks with me every time I start up a new game, because that was when I started to really wonder about where paths might lead. Everything leads somewhere. Finding things out is one of the things I love, probably what attracted me to video games in the first place.

Anti-Aliased: Blade & Soul > Aion

by Seraphina Brennan Nov 20th 2009 at 11:00AM

Filed under: Fantasy, New titles, Opinion, Anti-Aliased, Blade & Soul

All right, now that the inflammatory title that makes you look at my column is out of the way, let's get down to business. This week we got to see a 30-second teaser trailer from the folks at NCsoft about Blade & Soul, a game from NCsoft that has been stealthing in the background, waiting for the right time to strike and jump in front of Aion.

Blade & Soul isn't a brand new game though. In fact, the game's artwork has already made a guest a ppearance on our website. (With subsequent comments on how that woman's back is going to break in half if she should walk forward.) Plus, if you really want to see what the game has to offer, a quick YouTube search will bring you to the Blade & Soul HD gameplay video which looks, well, simply stunning.

So why am I dedicating my opinion column to a game that's nowhere close to being released? Well, because I think it has potential, and because it's my opinion column. So come along after the break, and let's look at Blade & Soul.

Why RMT won't go away

by Eliot Lefebvre Nov 20th 2009 at 10:00AM

Filed under: Business models, Culture, Economy, Exploits, Opinion

"Companies should just stop gold farmers." It's a consistent complaint in many games, with "gold" replaced by your game's currency of choice. As complaints go, it's right around "somebody should do something about all the problems" in terms of overall utility, but heck, no one likes the practice and it should just be eliminated, right? Well, as Scott Jennings has pointed out recently, it's not quite that easy.

As Lum points out, there are several common misconceptions about the entire process. Among them are the idea that the game company doesn't step in because they're getting kickbacks, which is pointed out to fail the simple test of Occam's razor. When developers want to get more money from an existing game, there are usually better ways to run it, such as the Champions Online model or the Dungeons and Dragons Online approach. He also tackles the infamous statement that the farmers are paying customers and therefore the company has even less incentive to stop them.

So if everyone hates RMT, why is it still around? The article briefly touches upon it, but We Fly Spitfires had a recent post that articulates more specifically: more people buy gold than would necessarily admit it. Since no one will admit to it, no one ever asks, and as a result there's a large culture of silence that publicly despises it and privately takes part. In short? As long as there's a customer base, the farming will continue. Food for thought all around.

The Daily Grind: How do you like your references?

by Eliot Lefebvre Nov 20th 2009 at 8:00AM

Filed under: Culture, Opinion, The Daily Grind, Humor

We gamers do love our nods to other media. From the earliest days of gaming and software, the easter egg has been a staple, something hidden without mention in the recesses of code. These days, we're as likely as not to have entire areas devoted to a drawn-out reference, or in some cases an entire element of gameplay added mostly as a long-standing joke. Some games have elevated the art of reference almost to an art form, with major storyline characters introduced as a sort of extended cameo from their original media.

Of course, that's also the problem with references: it can sort of cheapen the game you're playing if it's subtle, and it destroys immersion if it's mind-shatteringly overt. So what do you think? Do you like little snuck-in references to books and movies, or do you like your world to be totally consistent? Do you prefer it when the inspiration is kept under the radar, or would you rather just have the whole thing out in the open? What's your favorite instance of a game calling back to something else?

Linden Lab to disband moribund mentor group

by Tateru Nino Nov 19th 2009 at 12:00PM

Filed under: Culture, Guilds, News items, Opinion, Second Life, Virtual worlds

Yesterday at the morning Second Life mentors' meeting, Linden Lab staff announced that Linden Lab's sponsored mentor group, which had been functionally closed (in all but name) for approximately a year now, would finally be disbanded in practice. The move doesn't really come as much of a surprise to observers of the Lab's sponsored volunteer programs over the last eighteen months.

Almost immediately more ex-mentor Second Life social groups than we could comfortably count sprang up, as people prepared to maintain their network of contacts without the overarching group umbrella. While there was surprisingly little actual yelling, some members of the organization feel the blame lies squarely at the feet of Linden Lab's CEO Mark Kingdon, though there's not a lot of apparent evidence to justify that.

The Daily Grind: What's a fair price for subscription fees?

by Seraphina Brennan Nov 19th 2009 at 8:00AM

Filed under: Business models, Culture, Opinion, The Daily Grind

Subscription fees are a fact of life for us MMO players. Most of our favorite games come with one, and it's usually 14.99 nowadays. Ages ago, we could remember paying the 9.99 a month for our games, before that slowly rose to 12.95 a month and then became the current plateau of 14.95 a month.

Sure, we always have the option of playing more money up front to pay a reduced monthly cost, thanks to the miracle of multi-month subscription plans, but today's question isn't about that. It's about your thoughts on the subscription fees. What do you think is a fair price to charge?

Now don't be silly and say free, because we all know servers don't run themselves and bandwidth isn't free. While we're not all in the know about the cost to a blockbuster MMO, we do know how much we're willing to shell out for our games. What's the price you'd like to be able to shell out?

Grouping versus soloing as the genre evolves

by Eliot Lefebvre Nov 18th 2009 at 7:00PM

Filed under: Culture, Game mechanics, Grouping, Opinion, Academic

Back in the day, there were two ways to play most MMOs -- you could form a group with other players, or you could stay inside the cities and wait. Those days are long gone, of course, and it's a rare game that doesn't allow a player to do quite a bit without the support framework of a group. But there's a point to be made about what's been lost in the process, and We Fly Spitfires has an interesting take on how we now have to be pushed and prodded into grouping. There was a time when people were expected to group to complete tasks, but players are increasingly opposed to the idea as more and more becomes possible to solo and we grow less and less patient for finding a group.

Unsurprisingly, Game by Night brings up the obvious counterpoint: that evolving game design has relegated forced grouping to the past. There are more MMO players now than there were back then, and the majority of them started on games such as World of Warcraft or City of Heroes where grouping was only occasionally necessary, and even then only for specific tasks. By removing the requirement, player expectations become different, and there's no longer a sense from most of the playerbase that soloing should be possible for a majority of tasks. It's a debate that's been had over and over through the years, but as the solo play model becomes more and more expansive, it no doubt will be revisted time and again -- and attitudes toward it will shift as the playerbase does.

Massively Speaking Episode 77

by Shawn Schuster Nov 18th 2009 at 4:00PM

Filed under: Podcasts, Culture, Opinion, Massively Speaking

Massively Speaking Episode 77 is back with Rubi and Sera joining Shawn for discuss on the week's MMO news. Discussion includes: Funcom's beta promotion for The Secret World, Stargate World's new screens, Blade & Soul teaser and a ton of Star Trek Online news.

Have a comment for the podcasters? Shoot us an email to podcast AT massively DOT com. Maybe we'll read your letter on the air!

Get the podcast:
[iTunes] Subscribe to Massively Speaking directly in iTunes.
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[RSS] Add Massively Speaking to your RSS aggregator.
[Digg] Like the show? Digg it.
[MP3] Download the MP3 directly.
[VW] Listen at VirginWorlds.com
Listen here on the page:

Read below the cut for the full show notes.

The Daily Grind: Attending the 1 vs. 100 season premiere?

by Seraphina Brennan Nov 18th 2009 at 8:00AM

Filed under: Culture, Opinion, The Daily Grind

It's massive. It's multiplayer. And it's adding achievements! 1 vs. 100 is back again on Xbox Live, and the live version of the online game show where you can win real prizes is starting up again on November 19th.

While the game doesn't exactly generate a cash cow of news, it is a lot of fun to play. Plus, you know, it is free if you have yourself an Xbox Live gold account (which almost every Xbox 360 owner does, otherwise you're doing it wrong.) So we want to know are you going to be there? Will you be jumping in with your friends online, or are you assembling yourself a 1 vs. 100 premiere party? Are you going to be aiming for prizes, or are you going to be shooting for all of the achievements you can grab?

Dropping your thoughts in the comment box below and clicking send is way easier than pushing A, B, or X on your Xbox controller! (Ok, so maybe it isn't, but you should really do it anyway. It's fun!)

The Digital Continuum: LotRO's feature future, part 2

by Kyle Horner Nov 17th 2009 at 6:00PM

Filed under: Lord of the Rings Online, Expansions, Opinion, The Digital Continuum

The Digital Continuum: LotRO's feature future

by Kyle Horner Nov 17th 2009 at 6:00PM

Filed under: Lord of the Rings Online, Expansions, Opinion, The Digital Continuum

There are many wonderful features within Lord of the Rings Online, especially with Siege of Mirkwood edging upon the horizon like a merchant's ship carrying treasure chests full of shiny new features. However, for many a person, the game just doesn't click into place. Whether it's because of a missing feature or the pace of combat, some people find themselves unable to acclimate a groove.

So let's talk about features and changes that would help attract fresh blood while keeping the old guard happy -- because changing the core of an MMO is never truly a good idea, but bring in fresh blood doesn't hurt.

ReSubbed Episode 1: Asheron's Call

by Seraphina Brennan Nov 17th 2009 at 4:00PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Video, Asheron's Call, Opinion, Humor, ReSubbed

At this point in time, we probably have you intrigued enough to read this paragraph. You're wondering what this new column is, aren't you? Well, wonder no further, dear readers, as you're looking at the second ever weekly Massively video feature -- ReSubbed.

What's this show all about? Simple -- take willing saps, er, participants, and subject them to a random MMO each week while recording the insanity. It's a preview, a review, a revisit, and a drunken raid all recorded live, hosted by Seraphina Brennan. We go inside the game so you don't have to. Plus, you can laugh at our misfortune. What could be better?

This week on ReSubbed, Sera has recruited Kyle Horner as her wing man as she subjects him to Asheron's Call in honor of the game's 10th anniversary. What happens when Kyle figures out that all of his emotes are bound to the keys of the keyboard? Check it out, right after the break.

(The management would like us to inform you that ReSubbed does contain one instance of profanity this week. So, be warned, we're slightly NSFW.)

The Daily Grind: When's your MMO time?

by Seraphina Brennan Nov 17th 2009 at 8:00AM

Filed under: Culture, Opinion, The Daily Grind

We're all busy people. (Well, at least some of us are busy people.) We'd all love to play our games all day long, but we just don't have that luxury. (Plus, your eyes would probably explode out of their sockets.) So, in lieu of playing endlessly, we play for the times of the day that we have free.

So today's question is: when do you sit down to play your MMOs? Are you an after-work person? Are you more of the before-and-after-dinner type of gamer? Or do you play MMOs so late at night that you worry about Dracula breaking into your home and sucking out your blood before you get done with your raid?

You guys know the drill by now. Think up an answer, smash it into your keyboard with the help of the comment box below, and clicky-click the send comment button. We're waiting!