Marek

Mindblowing quote. I love it.

At work I'm doing a bit of research on games that incorporate machinima, purely as part of our very broad investigations into various topics. I was wondering if anyone had any good theories as to why The Movies failed to sell well (that was my impression anyway) and why The Movies Online didn't quite become the phenomenon that Lionhead expected it to be. I had a few theories but I didn't think they fully explained why The Movies wasn't a huge success. I know this is an old title but I'm curious if anyone played it and what they thought was good or bad about it. Basically, I'm too lazy to do my own market research.

I'm watching Million Dollar Traders, a BBC series in which a group of ordinary people from different walks of life are given a million dollars and two months to run their own hedge fund. If you are in the UK, you can see it on iPlayer. It's pretty interesting/entertaining. Almost every participant in this series refers to stock trading as a game, and of course it blatantly is. It really is hard to come up with aspects that are NOT gamelike about it. Basically when I watch this series I can't look at the people other than a bunch of gamers having a LAN. (A horrible nightmarish LAN.) Anyway, it's a 'reality' type show that you may enjoy watching. It's also a bit depressing as it really exposes you to the horrible cancerous financial trading metagame sitting on top of our society. It's got very little to do with the actual production of goods and services or long-term investment in ideas or companies or the true value of things. It all comes across as a big virtual gambling game where shares are sold and bought based on little theories about where the market will go depending on short-term news or mostly superficial perceptions. It's a game that I really wish would be stopped. (Also the graphics are a bit shit to be honest.)

Hah that's awesome. Did you use the movie creator much? It always struck me as a pretty limited feature, in that you are mostly choosing between presets rather than having very open-ended tools at your disposal. Is that an accurate impression?

Hey! It took us a while, but here's a new UK edition podcast... We start out by discussing MMOs, which has kind of become a tired genre... we talk about what's wrong with MMOs, but what also rules about them when they get things right. After the break we are joined by Rusalka (yufster), and we have a chat about Metal Gear Solid 4 and Pokemon. Finally, we pitched some stupid game ideas to our friends from the games industry (on this forum as elijay and Pirate Ben) . Games Discussed: WoW: Wrath of the Lich King, EVE Online, Star Wars: The Old Republic, Ragnarok Online, Planetside, and like every MMO ever. Also: Metal Gear Solid 4, Pokemon Diamond Edition and My Whores & Me. http://feeds.feedburner.com/idlethumbs-uk http://www.idlethumbs.net/ http://podcast.idlethumbs.net/UK/uk_idlethumbs_podcast_2.mp3

I worked at NCsoft's now-defunct European dev studio on unannounced stuff that was unrelated to any of the known NCsoft games/franchises.

I guess what I'm saying is not really about The Old Republic, and it's my mistake to use that game as some kind of poster child for my personal issues with the MMO genre. Having worked at an MMO company I have a lot of pent-up frustration with how pretty much all MMOs are designed, and I'm taking it out on this particular game because, at least on first impression, it seems to venture furthest in the opposite direction of where the genre as a whole has the most to gain. To be clear I don't think Bioware will do a disservice to the other pillars. I'm expecting them to do a very competent job with it and I know they're going to discuss them in the future. I'm definitely planning to play The Old Republic, and I believe it has the potential to de-throne WoW as the most popular MMO experience. I just think that across the board there are much more fundamental issues with MMOs that should be addressed, whereas storytelling is of relatively minor importance in advancing the genre of massively online games beyond what is already offered by current MMOs or singleplayer games. Blackboxme: OK I see, that's cool. I don't follow the Bioware fan community, but I can imagine that "going mainstream" or "dumbing down" have been recurring issues there ever since they started making games for consoles as well. I didn't mean to make a connection with that. I'm just ranting on a seperate path.

Erm what, Chris? It seems like you might be deliberately misinterpreting my post. Seriously that kind of one-liner comment is a bit annoying. Bioware has - at least seemingly - directed a lot of attention towards story in The Old Republic as that's pretty much the only thing they've discussed, and the game is being pitched heavily as "hey you like MMOs? well guess what, the master storytellers have just arrived". While it's not the only pillar it is to them a pretty freaking massive pillar. So I don't think it's unfair for me to question the importance of storytelling in MMOs relative to other elements. By the way, I think Bioware's games are generally wonderful. My skepticism towards The Old Republic has nothing to do with "going mainstream". I guess everyone missed the point of my post so perhaps I didn't explain it well at all then.

I am satisfied with that answer. P.S. Hi other forumers: we are a horrible two-person clique. I'm stepping away from this thread now.

Okay fine, you are wearing his jumper. What you did have to do for it? Punch him on the nose? Punch him in the knees? The crotchial region?

I don't think story is out of place in an MMO. It can definitely add texture to the world. But BioWare's PR-talk about story being the "The Fourth Pillar" or the final piece to finally solving the big MMO puzzle strikes me as misguided. Story has no business being the focal point of an MMO. There are tons and tons and tons of other things that MMOs need to leverage -- basically, the other three pillars aren't even fully built yet. There's so many wasted opportunities in terms of world building, social architecting, etc. that making a really big thing out of the story (a.k.a. the window dressing) makes me sad. I don't know if I explained that well. I'm also possibly picking on The Old Republic for something that's happening across the board in MMO design, I dunno.

Ken will not let you wear his favorite jumper. Other than that, the descriptions are pretty accurate.

Brighton confirmed! When they're fighting on the beach in the full episode, and in that cafeteria etc. that's like a 5 min walk from where I live. In fact, I was just there an hour ago. Sweet.

Whoa, that looks like the Brighton Marina. Maybe it is!

Huh what? Gaeta seems total dead meat to me? If he survives I'm going to be very disappointed. That would instantly make the last episode completely pointless. (Thought the episode was brilliant in every way, btw. Best episode in a very long time.) Ragarding Tyrol, apparently the ship is both metaphorically and literally tearing apart from the inside.

"This game is better than having sex while playing a game." - IGN.com

Damn that image is amazing. That's gonna be my new desktop background! (Will listen to the podcast at some point also.)

That's my favorite photo of you ever. It's also my favorite photo of Mr. Manager, as it's from the time when he was still cute and cuddly and not ruining people's lives by being a naughty rebellious cat who climbs into curtains, takes his own collar off and generally fucks shit up.

I didn't really care about BSG anymore, but yesterday's episode was really great! Wow.

You don't want to see the shit-and-seed covered bathroom. You reaaally don't. (If this pigeon is anything like the last one, anyway.)

Forum rule number 1: ignore elmuerte.

I wrote a piece for my blog which was also published on Gamasutra today, which is about trying to distinguish different kinds of creativity in games that allow for player created content. As a starting point I use some of my experiences playing with LEGO as a kid and then sort of extrapolate them into gaming as a whole. Anyway, I thought some of you guys might enjoy reading it: http://www.gameslol.com/2009/01/27/the-four-types-of-playercreators/ http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=22003

Nick: well done for spotting that. In my mind I read your post in a David Attenborough voice... Elmuerte: I'm not sure I get what you're trying to say. At one point you write that designers have no control over what 'creator types' a game attracts, etc. Then a bit further on you say that designers should provide basic tools for each creator type. So why bother with that if, as you claim, designers have no control over it anyway? Okay so, I agree with you that the specific outputs of a player community are often totally unexpected. I mean, I don't think the LBP developers specifically expected someone to make a basic calculator. However, I do think they were very consciously aware of the possibilities they enabled by putting pistons/wires/switches into the game. And... errr... fuck. I'm sorry, for some reason your post fries my brains completely. I'm so confused. Maybe I'll try again later.

Oh shit, it was probably Iceland's only economist. And look where they are now...

Clearing out my bookmarks! http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=LxF0RFqxbCM&feature=related http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=YdAIt4MgnHc&feature=related http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=cQ7J7UjsRqg&NR=1 http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=ETN1px7i4KY Also if you understand Dutch: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=cKk3To8hg8I Just some random shit. It might not even be funny. Enjoy!