I finished up a huge project over the weekend, and have been working on another one of moderate size since last Friday for tomorrow … so I’ve been a bit off.

I wanted to take a sec to throw back some links, though, because I’ve gotten a lot of love recently. Actually (and don’t ask me why) the posts from last week got a really warm reception from folks - I even got email about them. I never get email about MN.

• I’ve gotten LOTS of feedback on my Bullet Point List, which I am not too surprised about. I jotted it off in a hurry, probably should have thought more about it. Still: fun to write. The -gards of 38 Studios commented on the post (thanks, guys!), and Grimwell even offered up a way to make my dreams of shard-free gaming a reality.
• My back-of-the-napkin poking at numbers got a lot of good-hearted flack (though nothing like poor Cameron got back in the day). My favorite comment about this post wasn’t even here on the site; Angus made it the topic of an entire post. I didn’t even know Angus knew about MN. (Heya Angus!) It’s really hard to dislike someone disagreeing with you when they do it so *well*.
• My post a while back about Microsoft and Sony’s duel over console MMOs has reappeared on CMP’s network, polished up a bit and wearing a bowtie. Make sure to read the comments; Sony hate knows no professional boundaries.
• Stephen was nice enough to mention me on the MTV Multiplayer blog after he, myself, and Chris Grant had a spot of the GTA IV multiplayer. Y’know, I think you should ignore what everyone else is saying … it’s actually a pretty good game.

Thanks for reading, folks.

I had the inordinate pleasure of sitting in on Shut Up We’re Talking #25. Darren and newly-dubbed co-host Karen were incredibly kind to have me on again, despite the rude and disreputable way I acted on show #17. 

I got to talk about my deep non-homosexual manlove for Van Hemlock, because he was on the show with us! So close and yet so far. I had a great time and I really needed it; haven’t laughed that hard in a while.

Thanks again for having me, Darren and Karen. Hope you’ll give it a listen.

 

Ryan put up a thread on the Nerfbat forums a long time ago that’s still getting traction. I keep meaning to respond but at this point my post is just going to get drowned out in the noise. Here’s the kickoff:

What 10 features would exist in your ultimate MMO? Features that currently exist and features that don’t currently exist are all fair game. Discuss. Note: You can list them all in a few words or elaborate as much as you want. I’m just interested because I know everyone has an opinion on this sort of thing.

If you have time, why don’t you drop a few bullet points of your own in the comments?

Read more

As happens every week, prepare yourself for video and six scenic screenshots from my past week of MMO play. This week I’ve got a pair of videos, each with a tale associated with it.

The first (a regrettably silent film), shows myself and the Shortiez taking on the last threat in the long quest chain in Permafrost known as the ‘Statue Quests‘. Each one is obtained by clicking on a statue in this great room with a table and huge horn in the center. We did the last one this past week, ending with The Horn Sounds. Unfortunately we had to do it four times over because killing the four giants that spawn only counts for one person as quest completion. Lame. Sauce.

The other video is kind of a weird one. I meant to take a screenshot during an Arathi Basin match, and hit the video capture button instead. What I got is a sort of madcap caper flick as I try to defend a flag, get assaulted by a Paladin while futzing with my UI, and basically witness the end of the match (the 1800 resource howl). It’s actually pretty funny … check it out.

Read more

This week’s WoWE is all about the people behind the behemoth:

Day after day, hundreds of thousands of people across the globe play Blizzard’s ridiculously popular game. It’s kind of awe-inspiring to think about, the sheer number of humans all inhabiting the same virtual space.

Most are content to enjoy the experience of leveling up a character, raiding with their friends, or engaging in Player vs. Player combat. Some, simply by their actions or position in life, stand out of the crowd. Their influence has changed the face of the game, and in some cases shaped the game itself.

The word player, of course, can have more than one meaning. In this case, we’re talking about the movers and shakers that have made Azeroth what it is today. From literal individuals on the Blizzard development team, to player-run organizations, to other massively multiplayer games entirely many hands have shaped World of Warcraft’s success.

Massively Speaking Episode 2 runs down news and features from Massively.com for the week of April 14th-20th. Shawn and Michael are joined by blogging regulars Akela Talamasca and Jonathan Northwood to talk about the next LOTRO Book, the Epic Villain Archetype video, and (of course) Age of Conan!

Get the podcast:
[RSS] Add the Massively Speaking Podcast feed to your RSS aggregator.
[Digg] Like the show? Digg it.
[MP3] Download the MP3 directly.

While I was working on that What You Should Know Before You Roll article the other week, I became interested in incorporating race/class popularity into the piece. I figured interested onlookers would want to know how common a race is, to add that data point into the mix of attractiveness/style/class choice, etc. To do that I referenced the Warcraft Census over at WarCraftRealms.com.

The census gets its data from a plugin, meaning that the information is from a self-selecting group. Only the folks who deigned to get the plugin were counted. By the very nature of WoW addons, I’m going to posit this means overall Warcraft Census has collected data from a more dedicated group of players. The average WoW player (less than 20 hours a week, no 25 man raids) probably doesn’t have any plugins installed.

That said, I thought it was useful enough information to include a few conclusions in that post. Data from over 6 million characters is still a decent-sized set, even if it is self-selecting. I find datamining endlessly fascinating. With that in mind, I thought I’d make some more obvious statements fueled by the service and try to guess at why some things are the way they are.

Read more