Don_W

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  1. Episode 213: On Campaign

    Also registered to the site in order to answer the "Who are these people?" question. Also an older gamer, my favorite RTS experience was playing Command and Conquer over a phone line with my brother, so long ago I believe there were still long distance charges to consider. That was also the end of my P2P RTS career, for the most part. I've dabbled here and there, but during those first games I knew that at some point, out of the fog of war, some herky jerk accumulation of tanks would appear, poorly led and little upgraded, intent on destroying my laughably pathetic defenses. And we did laugh and have a great time. My experience when venturing out into public RTS matches has been one of thinking I've just about got everything set up to begin when out of the fog of war comes brutally efficient, sneering death. I thought playing 4 v 4, or comp stomps would be better but it was way worse. Instead of dying alone, I was letting down the team, usually being reminded of it nonstop in a lot of CAPITAL LETTERS. And this was often with games I did well at against the AI. I did not, however, know things like The Best Build Order for Vasari in Sins of a Solar Empire. Seeing "WHY ARE YOU BUILDING THAT?!!" scrolling through your chat window is terrible. I now know enough to know there are best practices for build orders to basically every RTS, and know enough of myself not to learn them. The irony of Troy's remarks on the podcast is, to me, the multiplayer experience of an RTS suffers from exactly the "puzzle" or "paint by numbers" problem he hates. In order to compete at a basic level, I need to learn a specific order of gameplay and execute it within the first 4 minutes of the game or I'm finished, turning it into Temple Run. The campaign actually frees me from that, while introducing me to the world and the units. I could just skirmish, but I like the context. I'd love to know more about the Sins of the Solar Empire World, hearing the voices acknowledge ship commands makes me wonder what the hell is going on in the wider context. I also loved the Command and Conquer cut scenes, and music, and thought it all worked together as a giant, hilarious, inmate-Michael-Bays-running-the-asylum bombastathon. Which was super fun. Video gaming is a form of entertainment and art I enjoy, just like movies, not the newest incarnation of a life-long interest in strategy gaming and I wonder if that is the difference. I don't go out and buy RTS games because they are strategy games, I buy them because they are video games and I hear good things about this or that title. And though I listen to podcasts and read a couple sites to be sure I don't miss cool, story-driven indies, sometimes i just want to build giant towers that shoot lightning while bad metal plays. Finally, thanks for the podcast. As I said above, I'm not really a heavy strategy gamer, but I came over from the GWJ podcast and enjoy listening to knowledgeable people talk about stuff, even if I don't have the full context. I have not started up Crusader Kings 2 yet, but this show convinced me I should buy it and attempt to learn it. This latest episode made me think I should really try Starcraft2, even though Starcraft seems to be the distillation of all I hated about multiplayer gaming.