“Country Restricted”
As you may have figured out, I play a lot of video games. While I do enjoy playing the wii (a lot) and psp, I’m not much of a console gamer. Yeah Lego Star Wars and Lego Indiana Jones is more than a little fun, especially while traveling.
The games that tie up most of my time are MMOs that have Player v Player. Yeah. I’m that kind of gamer. Just not the tea bagging, leet speak trash talking kind. PvE holds no interest for me and is repetitive. And those raids people like to talk about? Hours fighting an AI that doesn’t change? Doesn’t adapt? Bleh. I want an enemy that is constantly changing stratagy. I enjoy thinking on my toes and I’m pretty fucking good at it.
My first MMO was shadowbane. It was pretty simple and low graphics quality. However it was unbelievably fun. I was in a smallish guild and when they closed our server to merge a few, our city was the longest standing one. We’d fight 3 or more times larger armies and still not loose our city. I remember one battle when the GL ordered us to delete the walls to confuse the enemy, which worked like a charm. I remember being in the a separate group of stealthers in the battle where we’d sneak behind enemy lines and take out the healers.
In POTBS, we were the first nation who conqured the map on all servers - you had to take control of a number of enemy ports to flip the map. We were highly organized and very outnumbered and we crushed them. And I partisipated in just about every battle. During those battles, I’d be in “black group” - our sails would be black - which consisted of fast ships that would weave in and out picking off ships and causing a general disruption. We’d have nightly pvp open sea runs and I’d be what was called the tackler… the person who the group followed, would maneuver into a good wind position and attack.
I’m addicted and I highly enjoy playing MMOs, but I’ve gotten more then just a bit angry over the years of paying for shit games. Age of Conan was shit. I’d stopped playing that before I left on holiday. I’m so fucking tired of the fantasy genre and the fact that all games have the exact same issues and ideas. EQ was dull for me - I hate raiding. WoW was shit. LOTR was dull. Vangaurd had so many issues and ended up giving me wrist pain that still creeps up.
The new game of the moment is Warhammer and I’m jonzing for it like heroine junky. I had preodered it while I was away but when I tried to find out which mates were going to play it, they said not to bother so I cancelled it. But of course, when I get back I find out they are playing and loving it. Bugger. It wouldn’t be so bad if fucking EA didn’t make it so us Euros couldn’t play on US servers. I fucking hate that.
So I go to direct2drive, which has worked for me before, but on checkout even using a US credit card and address, it cancels the order stating “country restricted.” Jesus monkey fucker. That is 10 levels of wrong. I hate in this ever shrinking world that some companies force you to do what they want. I don’t ever have ping problems - which is most of the public “reasoning” behind it. I play during early US primetime, so don’t give me the bloody stupid “you want to play with others in MMOs” line.
Every fucking game does this now and it pisses me off to no end. Let me choose which servers I want to play on. Let me fucking choose which mates I want to game with.
Being away from “normal” life for 2 months gave me a different perspective on things. For one, I’d been creativly stunted all year. Partly from burn out but mostly from agnst about all the issues working in SL has. My 6 months of extreme insomnia. A shit load of RL personal issues. After wading through all that crap there was this moment of clarity within the first month. I was walking back to my parents house after getting my nails done for my mate’s wedding - that’s so not me - and I was watching Dr Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog on my ipt. Ok, not really all that safe but it’s walking through a residental part of Lincoln. It’s nothing like how I’d walk and read a book wandering through SF.
And somehow in that moment, everything was clear. I knew what I needed to do on all fronts. I knew exactly which projects I wanted to work on and how I wanted to do them. I decided right at that moment to leave London as soon as I could. I ran the rest of the way back, pulled up a new word document and started typing a list. Things I want to accomplish creativly in SL. Things I need to do for RL. Everything.
I had already gotten a few emails of “don’t buy WAR” from mates who were beta testing it so in my rush of excitement, I cancelled the preorder. I figured I’d spend the next 6 months - or until Stargate Worlds comes out - with my head burried in work. The list is that bloody long. When I got to London last week, I slept for about 4 hours and jumped right into SL. Since then, I’ve worked the majority of my waking time. And I haven’t really been sleeping all that much.
It has been great even if I’m not actually working on any of my projects yet. I’m too nice and currently helping out a mate. The problem is that there are some awkward things going on that is muddling my thoughts. Working that much is good in theory, but I really need the emotional release that MMOs and specifically PvP gives me. I need that hanging out with mates and being silly. I need the fun late night drinking games.
Yes I know I’m a geek. My creative hours aren’t currently conductive to seeing my RL friends. My most inspiring part of the day is during pub time for the rest of the country. My internal time clock is just off. So in order to hang out with someone, I have to not work much that day. It’s a bit of a mess really. Plus with my head in such an inspired place, being around mates who have no idea what I’m talking about is more then a bit frustrating.
I was voice chatting with Callie Cline this morning and she warned me of blogging rants. That I should always stay positive in public. The thing is is that I’m not a poitive person. I’m angsty. I can curse so much that it “makes sailors cry,” according to one of my mates. I may be nice and generous and what not to those who know me, but it doesn’t mean I can’t be angsty on many subjects. The idea of being positive to you all would plain wrong. If people buy products from someone based on personality then why should I pretend I’m something that I’m not?
At least my really nasty rants stay in the drafts folder :)
Cheers
Luth
