Thursday, November 20, 2003
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Coins that go jingle jangle jingle - or why loot that makes noise is more satisfying.
This is a little thing, an intangible, but I’ve noticed over the years that loot that makes noise is somehow more satisfying than loot that doesn’t.
Thursday, November 13, 2003
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The Smart Dungeon - or how to build the better mousetrap.
A vital aspect of traditional D&D, and all online games so far is combat - and dungeon crawling. Not everyone's cup of tea - but a vital and necessary ingredient to a deep full world.
Thursday, November 13, 2003
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The Power is Yours - or will you enjoy the MMO genre?
I've read a lot of the messageboards over the years. God, history does repeat itself - I wish I had some of the posts saved from 8 years ago, back in my UO days. Same problems, different day.
If you want to know how to have fun in an MMO environment, if you CAN have fun in a MMO environment read on. If you just want something to complain about, well, a good number of the folks that frequent message boards certainly don't need any help doing that, you can save yourself some time and just hit the back button now.
Wednesday, November 04, 2003
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Creativity, crafting and untapped potentials.
When designers look at crafting - there are some very basic questions they need to ask
themselves. First WHY do people do it, what is the motivation behind it.
Tuesday, November 04, 2003
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Management of Change - or too little, too late?
Reading over message boards - I am always astounded by various positions of players of MMOs. While sometimes I totally agree companies need a sound thwacking, at times players can spin off into their own little factions and lose sight of the very reasons they got involved in the message board process to begin with. The following are some examples of camps players can find themselves falling into. I often see enlightened self-interest slip away and that's sad, because I see the passion still there, you can't work up these kinds of emotions without passion as a base.
Saturday, November 01, 2003
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Immersion - the holy grail of the MMO and why bugs are bad, mkay?
This is my first article for this site for no particular reason other than I was contemplating the whys of it the other day and wanted to organize my thoughts. I've played most of the major MMOs out today, some for a few days - others for years. I've often wondered why some bugs irritate me more than others and I finally came to some conclusions.