How I got into MMO's

Today I thought I'd do a rough history of how I got into MMO games in the first place. It all started when I was going into highschool and one of my friends younger brothers was playing Everquest. The first one. I loved video games, but all I had was a computer, no console systems. And beyond that, I didn't even actually own any computer games that you paid for. I got Diablo one christmas, and then a year later finally got the computer able to play it. Up until that point I had been surrounded with Commander Keen 1 and 2, Duke Nukem, the original Doom, Tie Fighter, and a lovely little CD called Games for Daze, which had over 60 demos of various games on it. Half of them didn't actually work, but the ones that did... magic carpet ride... oh man. Anyway, that's kind of turning this short history into a long one.

So I saw him playing Everquest, and I sat down and played for maybe 10 minutes. I enjoyed it, it was strange, a new computer game. None of my friends were into computers, just this friends younger brother, and it was great to play a new game on the PC. So did I go out and buy EQ? Hah... no... still haven't actually paid for any games up to this point. To be honest, I never made it past killing a couple rats. I think I died once too. To rats.

The years went by, I'm at their house a lot, and he's playing a new game called Dark Age of Camelot. Wow... better graphics, a much smoother interface, hey, I can actually play this game. I couldn't stand the FPS mode of EQ. At this point I had started playing a few other games, Diablo, Comand and Conquer Red Alert, as well as got my first console system, a Sega 32 bit I think... maybe it was 24 or 64 version I can't remember. I loved Dune on that thing...

So I sat down and played some DAoC, I actually managed to hit level 16, and since I was so used to copying games over back and forth I nabbed a copy of his files and stuck them on my computer. Once again, my computer wasn't capable, so I missed out and didn't play anymore. He eventually leveled my level 6 Paladin thing, I forget the name of the actual class, all the way to max level and he used it as his main. Dysideron was its name. That later became how I started using the name Dyse, not because of Dice, but because Dyse was a feminine version of Dysideron.

Well... I've got the internet by now, I didn't originally though I left out when I did get it, and I'm playing WC1 and WC2, games I also didn't pay for. Well, Warcraft 1 was the demo version, and WC2 was a gift I got about the same time WC3 was about to be released... So I'm reading up, checking out game sites, what have you, and lo and behold, a Warcraft MMO?!

I don't even try to get in the beta, I don't know enough about what's going on to do that. I just read the beta forum boards, daily, for like, ever. I wanted to post so bad. I probably make up for it now that I actually can post, how badly I wanted to tell those idiots how wrong they were. They're in the beta, I'm not even in the beta, and I know more about the game then they do, it was so painful.

So I go over to my friends house again this one winter, and his younger brother has WoW installed on his computer. He doesn't like it though, goes back to DAoC, and me? I get his account for free, plus 6 months paid, for $20. It was... awesome. WoW was awesome. And that's how I got into my first MMO.

Well, I spoke too soon

About the druid buffs. They get a Maelstrom weapon in the upcoming patch, but they also just got infected wounds fixed, so it's properly removed, and nerfed for PvP. Though apparently it is a PvE buff since it had a conflicting issue on mobs with a DK's Icy Talons.

I've got a new Aion article up over at MMORPG.com, not sure if I'm supposed to talk about that really 0_o but oh well, I doubt it matters. It went up yesterday, so look for it if you want, it just goes over the different starter weapons available to the different classes, and how to use them. Focusing specifically on the second tier of starter weapons, so players don't make mistakes and take the wrong one.

Besides those wonderful personal issues, I've got to say I love the thought of these new contacts. I can't wait until we can just use the headsets for true 3d immersion in games. A headset plus a controller and first person view, or even 3rd person just more screen space. They've done studies that having a screen closer to your eyes is not a bad thing, you just need to make sure that you're not watching in the dark. Close up screens can give you bad headaches apparently as well though. I'm grabbing this info on eye care from another CNN.com article, I just can't remember the link. You don't even need a round screen, the front of the headset can be large and square, the screen just has to be close to you. Gaining the ability to use full peripheral vision just sounds amazing to me.

3rd person view from not too far back from your avatar sort of works, but then the screen feels way too cluttered because you're missing out on everything in front of your avatar. Perhaps the best solution is to have an avatar that is liquid, so you can see through yourself. That would be great for shooters, not so much for MMO games since seeing your avatar is so important for that genre, but I think it could work. Why no one hasn't just kept the normal FPS mode, but moved the camera about a foot back behind the body, but then ignored the body to the player so all they see is their see through hands holding the gun, is beyond me. Blur the edges, get your peripheral vision on.

Empire: Total War

I think the gaming companies have finally developed the perfect way to prevent pirating. Release their games broken and then slowly fix them over the next couple of months with patches, so that every time somebody finishes a complete upload of the game, a new patch comes out and the people trying to create the hacked versions have to either do it all over again, or just fix the hacked part. Granted patches are usually hacked in a timely manner, when a company releases patch after patch after patch almost once a week, well... I can imagine even the most devoted hackers would get tired of redoing the same thing over and over.

The game looks great to play, the reviews talk about how great the game is, and yet I still haven't gone out and bought it. $50 just does not feel worth it to play a game like Empire: Total War. Though honestly I'm surprised they aren't charging $70 or more yet, considering everything else has inflated over the years, while the price of computer games has seemed rather stagnant for the last decade. I want to play it. But I can't think of when I would have time to play it. I don't even raid in WoW right now and my time feels better spent enjoying free forms of entertainment, and thankfully legitimate ones through Hulu.com. What a wonderful site, for now. It will probably run out of entertaining content quickly, since I don't like sitcoms. If only they had the History Channel and not just Nova. Nova is great, but... you go to watch an episode on ants, and it's not actually about ants, it's about this guy who used his study of ants to explain social patterns in society. I mean come on now... teach me more about ants! The last 15 minutes or so of the episode didn't even involve ants at all, it involved monkeys on an island!

WoW Update: I cannot arena at the moment because my arena partner xferred servers and I have not been able to follow yet. So I am stuck, not doing arenas, BG's get worse every week, and raiding has stopped completely. I don't need to spend 16 hours a week raiding, not when finding a guild is rather laborious and often a fruitless pursuit. The last one I was in lost the raid leaders, and then two of the three tanks, and then the 2 guild masters that caused all the drama went AFK again after messing everything up. I don't know why the raid leader didn't just remake the guild, but whatever. So WoW is incredibly boring right now. Ulduar is an impenetrable road block unless you're in a serious guild, 10 man raids don't offer any gear upgrades from what I already have, and PvP is stagnant and hasn't changed for 5 seasons, going on 6. I can't wait to find a new game. Sad to say, I am mostly looking forward to new Blizzard games. Diablo 3 and their currently unannounced MMO.