MMOs of the FUTURE

...are not coming yet.

So the things I'm looking at in the MMO future-possibility space:

Age of Conan:
Already out, but falls into this category as, in my eyes, its still far to broken. I'm sure people will (actually the won't) be savaging this and saying its teh awesome, but a) they'd be drowned out by number 3, and 2) it is. Also, I don't care for games that go "look, look, we're mature!", even if thats not what they actually do. Seriously, marketing guys. Also, twitch MMO, no thanks.

Warhammer Online:
Don't care.

Wrath of the Lich King:
Will buy, but I think this is Blizzard's last gimmie expansion. People bought Burning Crusade because yay more WoW. The same will happen with Lich King, but if its the same marginal increase that TBC was, I don't think the third expansion will sell as well. It'll still sell like hot cakes, but less of the everyone buying it.

WAR:
Actually, I do care; I like Warhammer (more a 40k player, but whatever) but I think it'll translate horribly. There's all the fuss about 3 way PvP games being better than 2 way PvP. Warhammer is, by default, 15+ way, where there can be infighting. This is my fanboyism within the GW space showing, but I think Warhammer Online would've been better served by Mordheim Online (or similar). It'd be more like EVE fantasy version, what with the free-for-all-ness and reliance on guilds (in this case, warbands), but thats not exactly a bad thing. It'd still have a focus on PvP, and you wouldn't end up with the horrible lore-fest that is Destruction. Whatever. Don't care.

Chronicles of Spellborn:
Will buy. Its like Guild Wars, only with more shiny. Also, seems to be lacking in the ricockulous hype that every other MMO release ever seems to be getting, which is probably a good thing. Looks to be heavily instanced, which usually turns me off, but tell that to Guild Wars. Maybe I can mention Guild Wars some more.

Guild Wars 2:
Heh. I'm interested, but haven't heard too much. Might buy. Depends on what they do with things. The main draw of GW is the tactical skill bar building (if only for comedy builds), and the lack of levels (protip: to make me buy a game, make it less level dependent. Also, EVE, you managed to fuck something up as I can't like you, much as I want to. Maybe I should try a free trial again at some point and microblog it). If GW2 keeps these, I'm likely to at least try it.

So looking forward, thats one expansion, and one or two games that stick out to me that I want to buy. I'm sure there are more upcoming games, but nothing sticks out to me. For now, I'll stick with my leisurely leveling WoW characters, my comedy build designing in GW, and social play in CoX.

Is that too many anyway?

No internet and no beer make cbob... something something

And so my brief sojourn into the mythical RL ends. Two weeks after moving in, modem, isp and phone line align, and my third arm (or something) is reattached. And I get to play MMOs again, yay!

During my downtime, I finished Half Life 2: Episode 2 (although no gnome yet), and am in the last, insanely hard part of Cave Story, a whimsical little platformer in the vein of Metroid and Castlevania. I've also nearly finished writing up my one level D&D adventure, and have started playing Exalted, wherein I am a pirate armed with huge hammers, and a kinda-vaguely-roughly Russian accent. Who can jump 30 yards at a time. It's all very odd and very anime. Which is fun.

I was also a guest on the Van Hemlock Podcast 13 at a chili fiesta, where I severely damaged my tastebuds, and put forth some controversial opinions on things. Have a listen, its good fun.

I also have a couple of interesting things I'm poking at, that should see light here at some point, as well as a couple of posts brewing on topics I listed a couple of posts ago, although not fully fleshed yet.

But for those who care about such things, despite my absence I aten’t dead quite yet