The Importance of Casuals

Over the last week we've seen a bit of fallout with the release of Street Fighter V. There are quite a few people who feel that at its core, SFV is a solid game: good mechanics, works great. However, it is severely lacking in features, especially play modes. For the hardcore fighting game fan, this isn't really an issue. As it stands, the game has what they want already: a decent-sized roster of characters and an online versus mode. Be that as it may, a lot of people are upset by this, ie. everyone else who isn't hardcore aficionados of the genre. There are quite a lot of people that get these games with little to no intent of ever playing against another human being. They want a story, cool characters, maybe some other interesting modes tossed in, and if they can successfully pull off most of the moves along the way, so much the better.

Given the bare bones state of Street Fighter V's launch, these casual fans of fighters are a bit miffed. It doesn't matter if there's more content coming down the line. They plunked down $60 and they aren't finding a whole lot that they want to do with the game. The worrying, and not entirely unexpected, thing about all of this is how a vocal quadrant of hardcore community lashed out at the casuals voicing their concerns about the state of the game. It really goes to show that there are some impressively narrow-minded, myopic individuals who are utterly lacking in foresight.

The diehards of any given hobby are always comprised of a very small, vocal minority. They have very specific things that they want and they'll make a bunch of noise until they get it. This isn't just the case with Street Fighter. We can see it in most genres. Look at the last 10-15 years of MMORPGs. There was a time when raiders, another small, noisy group of people, would shout and stomp their feet on a game's message boards until they got what they want. The problem was that there were a lot of other people playing the game, quietly enjoying regular dungeons, leveling alts, dressing up their characters, or being silly with friends in a hub town. As the tiny group of raiders were increasingly catered to, everyone else was feeling left out when it came to new content. Sure they could raid, but if they're generally uninterested in such activities, it seemed silly to force one's self to. So, over time, as the casual set was increasingly left behind, they let out a collective, "Okay, bye, I guess..." and quit these games. This resulted in a sizable loss in customers for these games, and their publishers began to worry, scrambling to find ways to win back these people who unbenounced to them, were actually a larger source of revenue than the smaller, noisier group of "hardcore" players.

This could be translated to one genre after the next. How many people love competitive Starcraft? A decent amount, sure, but how many more view stuff like custom maps and clicking on units repeatedly so that they say silly things as highlights of the game? A lot more. This is one of the things that is nice about the game. Hardcore folks get their ladder and off they go while the casual crowd can just go off and do as they like in these custom modes or just enjoying the story. The game stays accessible to new players and those that have no interest in playing at a high level while also being good to go for the more competitive crowd.

There are some folks that shout on the internet about how they play competitively and think everyone else should as well, and it's turned into a bit of an echo chamber where these people get together and start thinking it's the natural order of things without stopping to think that there are quite a few people out there that don't feel the same. Whether it's hardcore members of the fighting game community, MOBA players arguing about normal matches vs. ranked, or MMO raiders, they just start talking among themselves, earnestly agreeing with one another while shouting down descent.

For a time, it may well seem like what they're doing is working, but often as the months and years pass we see less and less casuals entering into these games because they just don't want to deal with any of that and the games don't offer features or game modes that they're interested in. Moreover, this leaves a limited pool of hardcore folk, and that cohort of people inevitably shrinks as its members get older, their priorities / life circumstances change, and they find themselves leaving the scene. Then what happens to these games? Their publishers are businesses, not charities. If they aren't making enough money to support their product or they think future games in the genre won't sell well, the suits that make all of the big, money-related decisions at the company may not greenlight future projects.

So, hardcore gamers need to think long and hard whether they want to put these walls around the games that they love so much. If they can support them financially on their own, great. However, if that isn't the case, casuals are an absolute necessity for many games to continue to exist, never mind flourish. Shouting at the "filthy casuals" may score brownie points in their little circles, but it may well actually kill off the games these people love if they aren't careful.

PSO2 Anime: Best Unintentional Comedy of 2016?

As much as I adore Sega, there will forever be this small pit of animosity that I'll harbour toward the company for never releasing Phantasy Star Online 2 in the West. There's not even much point arguing it anymore, as it just isn't going to happen at this rate. If I want to play it, I'll need to just use the English patch and never be able to give Sega any money for it since the game doesn't accept foreign credit cards in-game.

So, imagine my surprise when I found out that an anime based on the game was in the works, and not only that but it would be getting simulcast on Crunchyroll. It really made me wonder if some part of the cosmos was mocking me, rubbing salt in my wounds knowing how much this would get on my nerves. Sega can't be bothered to bring PSO2 our way but screw it, they'll greenlight an animated series pretty much designed as a glorified advertisement for their game to be shown in the West. Up yours, Sega. Do you seriously think I'm going to watch this and open myself up to wave upon wave of heartache as this show constantly reminds me of a game that will never get an official localization?

Of course, I'm going to watch it. This is the sort of self hate that Phantasy Star fans routinely inflict on themselves. The first episode is up, so it's time to hop on board this train.

Not surprisingly, the show is quite bad. There's probably worse out there, but I don't usually go out of my way to find bad anime. PSO2 doesn't have any standout qualities to it. If anything, it feels like the show's main character, Itsuki Tachibana, is a metaphor the the show. He's touted as someone that is "just okay" at everything. He gets okay grades and helps out with lots of activities around the school in an "okay" manner. The guy isn't good or exemplary in anything, merely adequate. The anime is just like that with everything about it being "just okay." Even the soundtrack manages to be "just okay" which is flabbergasting when one considers how good the music in Phantasy Star games normally is.

Actually, there is one area in which PSO2 excels, and that's in how bad the story is. Obviously, one shouldn't go into this show expecting much. It's basically a 12-episode advertisement for an MMORPG. Nonetheless, the unabashed way in which this thing flogs the game is pretty embarrassing and I've seen porn with better mechanisms to justify advancing a plot point than some of the stuff PSO2 pulls.

In the first episode, it basically introduces the main characters, beats viewers over the head telling them how great PSO2 is, then somehow the student council decides to recruit Itsuki to fill in the role of vice president because the girl who usually occupies the that post is studying abroad for a year. Then the show informs us that his sole responsibility as vice president is to play PSO2 because apparently it's what the school is doing to test how good its Wi-Fi network is. Call me crazy, but there are probably much better ways of going about that.

With that, Itsuki installs the game on his PC and plays it for a bit where we see him get into a battle and meet a CAST player named Soro, formally introducing the game to viewers. After he'd finished, he had to write a report on his session for the student council and submit it. The president said, "Good job!" and earnestly reminded Itsuki to make sure he kept his grades up while working on this project.

Looking back, I don't think I've ever in my life cringed and laughed in such a way as I did. The whole thing was such a mix of brazen product flogging and bad writing that I'm pretty sure my brain shut down multiple times during the show as a defense mechanism to protect me from all of the stupid. The crazy thing is that we have eleven more episodes of this, and part of me is darn tempted to keep on going down this rabbit whole to see just how bad things gets. This really could be something amazing for all of the wrong reasons.

Guild Wars 2 Going Free to Play, Kinda

Subscription-based MMORPGs are becoming a very rare breed. Off the top of my head, WoW, Final Fantasy XIV, and EVE Online spring to mind, then it's a laundry list of games that went from subscription to free to play or were the latter from the get go. Guild Wars has been a franchise that up until now has managed to do alright for itself by going its own route: buy to play. Players fork out the cash to actually buy the game, then they can play it as much as they like without having to worry about a subscription.

Now Arena Net are dialing things back a bit. Anyone who is interested in playing Guild Wars 2 will no longer have to buy the core game. You could mosey on down to their site right now, create an account, download and install the game, and you're off to the races. This is probably in no small part because the game is getting a major expansion in the fall, and that players will still need to actually pay for if they want to experience it, but it's not a bad way to generate some hype for the game.

Making the core of GW2 free will in the very least revitalize the low level zones. If there's one thing that bugs me when hopping into an MMO late, it's plowing through all of the early areas and finding them dead. I may see the occasional other player wonder by but on the whole, it's tumbleweeds as I steamroll through content telling myself that things will get better at level cap a month or so later. Of course, that's assuming I make it that far, and don't just say, "Screw it" and stop playing because I've lost interest in the lifeless world sprawled out before me. With what Arena Net is doing here, it'll help alleviate this problem.

I was pleased to see that some limitations will be placed on the free version of the game, but not in an annoying, "If you want more, head to our in-game shop!" kind of way. These roadblocks are being implemented to make things difficult for RMT folks from spamming free accounts and bombarding the real player base with tells, as well as making it difficult for assholes to make a slew of smurf accounts then proceeding to troll higher level areas. I guess for the latter, if they're really dedicated dicks they can slog through the levels and do it anyway, but at least they're being slowed down a bit.

On the whole, I think it's not a bad way to go three years into the game. When an expansion comes along in an MMO, the core game's value declines as late comers largely want to get to the most up to date, relevant content as soon as possible. Why not just make the core game free, and charge for the expansion instead? It's taking things to an extreme, but it's perfectly viable. All the while, new players may well spend money at the in-game shop. There is tons of cash to be made from folks buying mounts, pets, cosmetic gear, and the like when it comes to MMORPGs.

Even today Guild Wars 2 is well worth a look. I haven't played it in a few months, but it's a game I do still like to pop into periodically. The sheer amount of exploration in each zone, platform puzzles, and departure from the trinity of tank, healer, and DPS have always appealed to me. If making the core game free will draw in more players, and maybe even retain them, so much the better. I'd like to see this game succeed well into the future.

How Relevant is Raiding in Today's MMOs

There was a point in the evolution of the original Everquest where the idea of raiding became a thing. At least that's the first time I came across the phenomenon while playing a game. Large groups of people would team up to take down super powerful enemies. Depending on what zone I'd be in there'd be people shouting to come help them. The more the merrier. As time passed, we started to see this element appear in other games whether it was high notorious monsters in Final Fantasy XI or World of Warcraft's Molten Core. By the time we hit 2010, it seemed like raiding was an entrenched part of end game in a lot of these titles, and if a game was somehow lacking this there would be a chorus of people complaining about nothing to do. It always left me wondering, though. Was that really the case or just a very vocal minority moaning on message boards? Somehow I was still having a ton of fun exploring, leveling alts, being social, and generally futzing around in these games without ever stepping foot in a raid.

Blizzard sort of removed the veil of mystery when they started to explain why they were trying to make raiding more accessible. They did view it as an important part of the end game experience, but also felt that they had to make sure it was something that a reasonable portion of the community would want to participate in. The company brought up the original Naxxramus raid as an example of why things needed to change, as they had spent a fair chunk of change developing the thing but the number of people who could actually be bothered to do it was minuscule. There comes a point where companies have to justify expenditures to shareholders, and the return on investment for places like Naxxramus and The Temple of Ahn'Qiraj was becoming a pretty tough sell.

So, right from the get go one has to wonder just how vital raiding was to the game, and arguably to the genre as a whole. Even with the activity gaining increased popularity in subsequent years, especially during Wrath of the Lich King when accessibility was getting pushed hard, there were no lack of people quietly running around leveling alts, doing PvP, and generally not lining up to learn a dance to explode a loot pinata. There's an appeal to it, for sure, but I have to wonder just how skewed the online conversation was and is with regards to how integral raiding is to the MMORPG genre. It's hard not to come to the conclusion that proponents of it have been by and large part of a rather vocal minority.

Nowadays we are seeing games try to find other stuff for people to do besides raids. World of Warcraft has been fiddling around with it for a while introducing things like pet battles, world bosses, and garrisons, not to mention the ever present PvP modes which have long served as one of the biggest alternatives to raiding. On top of this, we have games like Final Fantasy XIV which sometimes feels like a bottomless pit of things to do, the vast majority of which doesn't involve raids. In that game we have several story-intensive side quests (Hildebrand and the postal moogle), the Golden Saucer, Triple Triad, sightseeing logs, and crafting is pretty much a mini-game unto itself. Meanwhile, there is The Secret World which largely eschews many MMO conventions and has an extremely narrative-heavy mindset. So, the feelers are out there and companies are finding alternatives to raiding with varying degrees of success.

It seems like a logical path to take as well, as I have to wonder to what extent folks will want to embrace raids in the future.  Ten or fifteen years ago, when MMORPGs were largely in their infancy the player-base was a fair bit younger with quite a few more people in their 20s, single, with all of the free time in the world. Now, looking at the present, while there are still plenty of young people in their teens and 20s playing these games, I'm also noticing a considerable number of players who are in their late 30s to early 40s. They're often times the same people who were playing these games back when Everquest and WoW first came out, enjoy them still, but don't necessarily have the time to set aside each week for raiding, or have simply burned out on it after doing raids for years and years. There's something about the genre that they still enjoy which keeps them coming back, however they are at a different point in their lives now and for whatever reason raids just don't appeal to them anymore.

With that in mind, it makes a lot of sense to find ways to keep these people entertained. While raiding is likely here to stay, one does need to question just how integral it is to the whole "MMO experience". If people want to do it great, but the question still remains as to whether there are enough to warrant such large development costs on these dungeons instead of directing the money toward other avenues, whether it's making the leveling experience more rewarding in and of itself, mini-games, or something entirely new as an alternate focus of endgame for some people. In any case, I do question just how relevant raiding is to today's MMO. There'll be people shouting on forums and whatnot that it's the biggest, bestest, most important thing ever, but for all of their bluster I'm not convinced that they're representative of the majority of people who play these games.

So, WoW's Next Expansion is Bringing Back the Burning Legion

Looking back, Warlords of Draenor really wasn't a bright spot in the history of World of Warcraft. From the standpoint of subscription numbers alone, the game certainly took a pounding. When it launched, things were looking rosy, but only recently we've learned that those numbers have tanked, and are only a bit over 5 million now. To put that in perspective, WoW hasn't seen its subscriber rate that low since Vanilla. That's eight years ago.

The lore looked alright from my perspective, as I've always been a fan of the Outlands. It was basically an alternate timeline remake of a lot of people's favorite zones from the Burning Crusade. What's not to like about that? Just about every other aspect of the game, it would seem. Lots of dungeons with baddies many didn't seem to care about, the orc leaders didn't impress as much as was hoped, and the whole garrison system did tend to trivialize aspects of the game to the point where people had to ask themselves why they were playing, and it would seem many found the answer to said question given the drop in subs.

Demon Hunter hero class announced

So here we are now with the newest expansion announced, and very quickly at that with Legion. By the looks of things, Blizzard took note of a lot of what they did wrong with WoD and are trying to steer the game away from that. Firstly, they're bringing the biggest of the big bad in the Warcraft universe back with the Burning Legion. I don't think we'll see Sargeras or anything. That would be like fighting the devil, and as strong as characters are made out to be in this game, it's always felt like Blizzard has wanted to keep him just out of reach of players. That doesn't mean we can't smack his armies and lieutenants around, though.

It does open the door for some fun lore with these guys on the scene, and to thicken the plot a bit more we still have Gul'dan running around and we're in a universe where Illidan is still alive, so we'll get to kill him again by the looks of things. So, we'll have some exciting bosses to actually look forward to here. I don't know if Illidan will have a new Black Temple, but it's just nice to see everyone's favorite demon hunter make a return. It does make me wonder if they can find a way to bring back Kael'thas once more just so we can kill him once more for old time's sake. Whatever the case, we're getting a central figure from Warcraft lore once again with Illidan, and even some yet untouched folks like Azshara making an appearance. So, Blizzard seems to be trying to go back to really big name characters that the fanbase cares about.

In terms of gameplay, it looks like the game is trying to make classes feel unique again, at least to some extent. For years, now, there has been a gradual homogenization of the classes in WoW. From giving more and more healers a battle rez, to making tanks feel more and more alike, to giving mages their own Bloodlust there has been a steady shift in classes to make them feel more and more alike. Blizzard's mantra during this time was to, "Bring the player, not the class" which was largely to help prevent certain classes from being sidelined as the meta shifted, but at the same time it also made them feel a lot less special. With the introduction of class halls and artifact weapons, it seems as though they're trying to make classes at least somewhat unique again. I don't know to what extent this will be, and how much players will go along with it (for all we know, everyone may just check online for what the "best" builds are and copy them anyway, eliminating much of the potential uniqueness), but at least it's a step away from the rampant homogeneity that has become prevalent in the game.

Illidan is back!

While we're on the topic of classes, we'll also be seeing the introduction of a new hero class, the demon hunter. So, just as the death knight allowed us to run around and be little Arthuses, now we can run around and be little Illidans. The class will be limited to night and blood elves, so it won't be like so many other classes where just about anyone can do it. There'll also be a number of special aesthetic choices for them like having horns and tattoos, or none if you prefer. It will have two specs to choose from where one is DPS and the other is tank. You'll even be able to double jump with the class, which could be interesting. I'm curious how they can make this meaningful while playing, and not just something for billy goating while exploring areas. In any case, demon hunter actually strikes me as an exciting class to play as.

There's other stuff getting tossed in as well, like a new zone (with Dalaran as a neutral central hub!), increased level cap, and a change to the honor system, but really, the big selling points are the return of the Burning Legion, Illidan, demon hunter class, and the possibility of classes becoming somewhat unique again. Will this be enough to repair any of the losses that WoD suffered? I don't know, but I do think it will certainly get fans to keep an eye on things rather than simply dismiss the expansion out of hand.

Heading Heavensward

Warning: There will be a few plot spoilers in this article. If this is a problem for you, stop reading now.

As some of you may know, I'm kind of a big fan of Final Fantasy XIV. The amount of time that I poured into A Realm Reborn is disgusting, so it was only a matter of time before I got around to playing the expansion. I wasn't there for the early bird pre-order stuff, instead opting to wait a couple of weeks and then hopping in so I could enjoy the game without it being a mad house of people running around everywhere. So far it's been a lot of fun. Square-Enix have done a lot of things with the new content that has improved on the original game, there are some massive zones, and some new features that I've been enjoying. That isn't to say it's all smiles and sunshine. There are a few elements of the game that have me concerned, but those have been far outweighed by all of the good stuff.

Players need to take their characters through the main scenario quests via a combat job if they want to get anywhere in the game. A big reason for this is that all of the new zones allow for flying mounts but in order to do so you need to unlock aether currents. Some of these can be found via a compass that you're given early on, but each zone has five currents that can only be unlocked through completing quests, some of which are part of the main quest line. I was a tad disappointed by this, as I was hoping to level my crafting and gathering jobs first, but at the same time this approach does make sense. It's just like what Blizzard has been doing with many of their expansions for World of Warcraft where players are forced to use land mounts when first questing through the new content before being granted flight at or near the new level cap.

Thankfully, the story has been pretty good so far. One thing that I didn't like about the main quest line in A Realm Reborn was that there was a lot of filler in it resulting in several quests that felt like a chore. A lot of the fluff has been removed in Heavensward with the story marching along at a much better pace. I was pleasantly surprised to see Ysayle play a big role in the first half of the adventure. She was by my side for much of the ride from level 50 to 55. I'd thought she would just be around for the Shiva arch earlier in the game, but apparently not. I actually don't mind that there isn't much in the way of Scions in the expansion either. None of them really appealed to me except maybe Yda. I'm assuming that they'll be back at some point as I get closer to level 60, but thus far they haven't been missed.

It is a bit worrisome, though, that new players will be forced to play through all of the content from A Realm Reborn before they can touch Heavensward. The only exception to this is the ability to make an Au Ra in the character creation. If you want to go straight to Ishgard or play as an Astrologian, Dark Knight, or Machinist, too bad. You'll have to get through all of the other content first. There has been a lot of debate about this already, as this can be a very daunting task that becomes all the more annoying for a new player trying to catch up so that they can play with friends in the new areas. A new player is probably looking at about a month of solid play to get through everything from A Realm Reborn and that's a pretty tall order. If this sort of gating continues into future expansions, I could see it being a huge turn off for potential new players and it could well cause subscription numbers to suffer.

For my first job that I'm taking to 60 I've stuck with warrior. In every other MMORPG that I've ever played, healer was the role that I gravitated to. However, with FFXIV I decided to change things up and go with a tank. It was a nice change of pace and something that I want to continue in Heavensward. Going through dungeons, the mechanics haven't been too hard thus far. I'm about five dungeons in so far having cleared The Vault the other day and they don't really throw too many curve balls.

One thing that has bothered me is that I seem to have terrible luck in finding decent healers. In FFXIV, a lot of healers try to pump out DPS when they have time. This I have no problem with. However, when one is not up to the task and people start dying as a result, I begin to get annoyed. I've probably done about 30-40 dungeon runs in the new areas so far and maybe 10-20% of the healers I've gotten have been competent. The rest just toss a HoT on me as I run into a pack of mobs to scoop them up, then expect it to be enough while they switch to Cleric Stance and DPS. First of all, don't toss a HoT on a tank when they're running in to grab a pack. Once that thing ticks, they're going to dog pile on the healer and the tank has to go out of his or her way to scoop them up again. Second, when picking up large packs the tank is going to take a lot of incoming damage. Why not actually heal during this time? Yes, we have a good amount of cooldowns we can blow through to mitigate it, but that only goes so far. Start the pull focusing on heals, and then as things get under control start DPSing to help clean up. Third, don't DPS if you're just going to tunnel vision on that, consequently forgetting to heal, failing to notice that you're standing in bad stuff and dying as a result. It's nice if a healer can DPS while in a dungeon, but not a necessity. Pay attention to how well you're performing and be honest with yourself. If you're DPSing and as a result doing a sub par job of healing, just stop DPSing. If you want to DPS so bad, level an actual DPS job.

Horrible dungeon experiences notwithstanding, the rest of what I've seen in Heavensward has been pretty impressive. I really like the new zones. They're huge compared to A Realm Reborn. I also like seeing them from the ground and re-exploring them from the air after unlocking flight, as it gives a very different view of the area. Ishgard itself looks amazing. The buildings tower overhead and have a nice Tutor-esque feel to their architecture. I don't know if I have an actual favorite zone yet as I'm still in the process of unlocking them. Sea of Clouds is pretty nice and The Churning Mists was alright.

Music has been pretty good so far as well. The soundtrack has always been a highlight of FFXIV, and that continues here. There aren't too many songs with cheesy lyrics in them. Ravana's battle was a bit bad for this, but on the whole it's more instrumental stuff. Again, I like the songs for Ishgard here and The Sea of Clouds' music sounds like something from a 16-bit platformer. I almost expect to see Sonic the Hedgehog run by when I'm in that zone.

So yeah, it's been a lot of fun for the most part. Healers are a pain, and I'm half tempted to level my scholar after capping warrior so I can be part of the solution on that front. For now, though, I'll focus on getting warrior to 60 and spending a lot of time crafting and gathering after that. There's still a ton to do and a content patch just around the corner, so I have a feeling Heavensward will be keeping me busy for a while.

Futzing Around in Final Fantasy XIV

Playing as Summoner in Brayflox Longpost.

Once I walked away from World of Warcraft, I figured I was done with MMORPGs, but recently that hasn't been the case.  I've poured an absurd amount of time into Final Fantasy XIV, a game that in quite a lot of ways is very similar to WoW.  Battle mechanics and the whole hot key controls setup are very reminiscent of Blizzard's MMO, yet the game squeezes in all of the Final Fantasy-ness that one would expect from a game to bear the name.  What I'm left with is something that has totally consumed me.

When Stories Happen on Their Own

Everquest had its own stories, but the
best were those created while
playing with friends.

For the last 30 years, stories have played a big part in video games. It all started as the industry transitioned out of high score focused content a la Pac Man, Frogger, et al, and into saving princess / the world / the universe. Sometimes they could be pretty simple like in Super Mario Bros. where players helped Mario rescue Princess Peach from Bowser, other times things could be a lot more sophisticated with RPGs and adventure games leading the charge.

This has continued to the current day, but all of these have been pre-written stories laden with scripted events, dialog trees, and the like. There's a fairly fixed path laid out before the player with only so many options available to them as to how they can progress, which is a natural outcome of having a game that goes for a passive form of storytelling in the same vein as film or literature. It's been the staple of how narratives unfold in games for decades now, but things have slowly started to change as online multiplayer has cemented itself in the medium. New types of stories are starting to unfold in games, often events that developers never expected for their creations. It's happening as players make their own stories organically by naturally making their way through a game. While still in its infancy, the trend is picking up steam, and making for some very interesting experiences.

Playing Dress Up in Games

Bards are arguably one of the most stylish jobs in
Final Fantasy XIV.

Customization has become increasingly popular in games over the decades. Whether it's something on the technical end like tweaking graphic settings or an RPG where players have points to allocate to various stats on their characters, this sort of thing has been quite useful and people really eat it up. While customization has been a big thing on the practical side of the spectrum, it's also become all the rage from a stylistic standpoint. It could be something like having multiple costumes for fighting game characters, or graphically reflecting equipment upgrades in an RPG, or it could be like in MMORPGs where many games have gone so far as to allow vanity gear that players can acquire simply to make their character as stylish as they like while still retaining stats from other gear that actually is useful in battle.

I remember it being a very simple thing, back when my friends and I played Street Fighter II in the arcades during the early 90s. Get into a mirror match with someone and inevitably one of you would be stuck with a color scheme on your character that you probably didn't like. This used to happen to me with Ryu all the time. I was a traditionalist with him and many of the other SFII characters at the time, and much preferred their original colors, as opposed to the alternatives, and couldn't help but cringe when I didn't get them.

News: World of Warcraft Loses 1.3 Million Subscribers

Activision Blizzard recently announced their most recent financials, and one of the more interesting things to stand out in this onslaught of very big numbers was that one of their most important games, World of Warcraft, has shed 1.3 million subscribers. That brings the game's subscription base down to a "paltry" 8.3 million people.

Reasons given for this decline include free to play games starting to become a major competitor, especially in Asia, as well as content not coming out quick enough to satisfy players. These are certainly plausible, but there could be plenty of other reasons as well. People who got the free one year subscription for pre-ordering Diablo 3 are likely seeing their free subscriptions expiring and taking the opportunity to leave the game. Also, the game is just getting old. It wasn't going to be a 10 million+ subscriber juggernaut forever. Frankly, I'm surprised it still has as many subscribers as it does all these years later.

Digesting Free to Play

Neverwinter is another in a recent stream of free to play MMORPGs
to come out

Over the last week, another batch of free to play games became readily available to the public either as a full release, or an open beta. Those games were Ragnarok Online 2 and Neverwinter. This isn't going to be a review of those games, or the time I've spent fiddling around in either of them, but more a chance for me to try and articulate my own thoughts on the current state of free to play, and by "articulate" I largely mean prattle on incoherently. So, business as usual.

Feature: This Generation - Part III

Left 4 Dead 2

For the purposes of these features, "This Generation" refers to software found on the following hardware: Wii, DS/3DS, PSP, Playstation 3, and Xbox 360. Trends found on the PC platform will be addressed but because the demarcations between PC hardware iterations can be foggy, establishing what is of this generation is much more difficult to finalize. 

"This Generation" includes major trends or evolutionary notes that will, in this writer's opinion, be identified strongly with this generation of games and hardware for years to come.

Third  item to hallmark this period of gaming: Co-Op Gaming.

Travelling Around Tyria: My Time in Guild Wars 2

Who doesn't like shooting people in the face with a
flamethrower?

Do you like explosions and / or burning things? Then you may want to consider rolling an engineer in Guild Wars 2. Also, seek professional help because that's not normal. Recently I created a character in this class, and it's been one hell of a good time, and much a nice change of pace from my ranger. In fact, this character may wind up being the first I take to level cap in the game. I'm enjoying my time with him just that much.

News: Guild Wars 2 Headstart Officially Underway

If you're one of those lucky folks who shelled out money for the very expensive (and highly worthwhile) Collector's Edition or somewhat more economical Digital Deluxe Edition, the three day head start for Guild Wars 2 has begun.  Already, several US and European servers are full up.  Additionally, Arena.net has announced a special limited edition fashion bit for your Tyrian toons.  From now till September 12th, players can obtain a special commemorative baseball cap with the Guild Wars 2 logo on it for free in the Black Lion Trading Company, GW2's microtransaction marketplace.

Guild Wars 2 officially launches on Tuesday, August 28th.

News: Phantasy Star Online 2 Coming to US and Europe in 2013

After much wondering if they'd announce a Western release for the game, it looks like Sega will be making an official announcement today for a US and European release for Phantasy Star Online 2 according to PSO World.  PSO2 is a free to play sci-fi online RPG, and sequel to Phantasy Star Online, which debuted on the Dreamcast over a decade ago.

The game takes a much more action oriented approach to combat with three classes to choose from including the melee fighting hunter, gun toting ranger, and magic using force.  If you haven't already, be sure to check out our gameplay impressions of the Japanese version of the game.

Video: Phantasy Star Online 2 Gameplay Impressions (PC)

With the free to play MMORPG recently having come out of beta in Japan, Mr. Nash tells us a bit of what to expect while playing it.

E3: The Elder Scrolls Online - Preview

When the announcement for Elder Scrolls Online (ESO) was made, the Internet seemed to give a collective shrug.  "This has been done before," the complaints went.  "I liked this when it was called World of WarCraft."  It wasn't quite fear and loathing, but it wasn't precisely a warm welcome, either.  At E3, we were treated to a longer non-interactive demo of the game, and from what I can tell, it's not going to be another mindless WoW clone.

News: Star Wars: The Old Republic Going F2P (Somewhat)

Looks like Bioware is drifting to a somewhat free model come July for their Old Republic MMORPG.  At that point, the game will allow people to play the game for free whenever they want, but they'll only be able to go up to level 15.  So, it's pretty much the same as WoW's system of letting players futz around in low-level areas to their hearts content without paying a dime.

Of course, the question is whether this will be a slippery slope towards a full-on F2P model for the game.  Unlike WoW, TOR doesn't have 10 million subscribers to profit from, and the game has been riddled with problems like lack of subscribers, relatively unpopulated servers, and there doesn't seem to be much on the horizon that will convince the unconverted to invest their time, let alone their money, in the game.