MMO Weekly 25/11/08

Greetings, fellow MMO fanbois and fangurls, and welcome to this, the very latest edition of MMO Weekly!

In this week's column, we explore what it means to put your 'game face' on, whether or not Josh Drescher is a spy or a plague doctor, why no one should ever listen to Richard Bartle, why Jack Thompson is still all testy and, last but not least, the man who gave a kidney to play Wrath of the Lich King. And yeah, every one of these stories is pretty much worth reading. So here we go...

A journalist for the New York Times decided to do a photo essay in which he took pictures of gamers as they played. It's an entertaining little piece, particularly because of the context: there is none. If you can see, or hear, a video game, then the facial expressions we make as players make perfect sense. Without the context, the facial expressions appear oddly angry, surprised, or simply blank. Truth be told, we have no idea what game they people in the pictures are playing. Is it WoW? Halo? A platformer? Runescape? We're never given a clue – and that's part of the pictures' charm. Overall, the gamers in this quick little article (most of whom are kids) have some great expressions as they play.

As it turns out, the writer took things a little further, and videotaped gamers playing. The same principle applied – there is no context. Thus the video is actually even more entertaining than the photos that preceded it, as the kids make funny face after funny face in response to an unseen game. Epic.

Josh Drescher is many things: gamer, blogger, Warhammer developer, and outlandish personality to name but a few. But the investigative journalists over at Wandering Goblin have have learned an astonishing truth. He's a spy. Either that, or a plague doctor. And he likes to party.

Richard Bartle is considered an authority when it comes to MMOs. That's because he invented an early text based massive underground dungeon, which was given the innovative name MUD. Bartle is often cited as an authority abut MMOs because of this work, and recently ranted about a quest in WoW in which players are asked to torture information out of someone. This disturbs Bartle to no end. He's really, really bothered by it.

As a gamer, I have several problems with both Bartle and his rant. First off, he actually didn't invent MUD at all; he simply came to administer it. Second, he hasn't done anything significant in gaming since the early 1980s. Third, every single time I hear Bartle's name, it's associated with some negative criticism MMOs, or of gaming overall. For a guy who has the most unfounded 'authority' and celebrity status in the industry, shouldn't he be a little more positive?

Last, but not least, Bartle's rant about torturing someone in game is simply flat-out zany. It's not in any way a noteworthy quest. What's more, WoW is a game in which every single player has brutally killed literally thousands of other NPCs, sentient species, human avatars, and even other players in PvP. And Bartle, gaming authority and celebrity that he is, starts foaming at the mouth over a quest with the word 'torture' in it. You're being just plain goofy there, Richard.

While on the subject of absurd concerns, there's this little ditty: someone apparently feels D&D is an intrinsically racist game. Why? Because the writer uses a lot of very selective and highly subjective evidence to support his point and...actually, who cares why? It's a deeply silly attempt to stir up some nonexistent controversy.

Talk about goofy...there's this article. However, calling it an article is an injustice: this is a magnum opus, and it's all about a mathematical model for estimating the number of people playing a given MMO. It goes on for an eternity, page after page of formulas and graphs and methodologies ....zzzzzzzz... oh, sorry, you can read this fascinating piece of MMO research for yourself right here!

The video production department over at Wandering Goblin is a little slower than most others, and that's why their video coverage of the launch events surrounding Wrath of the Lich King went up this past week. Never mind that everyone else's coverage was a full week earlier; Wandering Goblin's got interviews with lots and lots of WoW-playing geeks, including a balloon lady, and a guy who got out of the hospital a couple of days early to be at the WotLK launch. There's also interviews with newfound 'line buddies', some epic banner makers, and a guy who might just be getting some lovin' from a hottie simply because he has a warglaive. Oh, and then there's the confession by the guy who urinated on the throne of the Lich King. Yes, really, he did.

Sadly, this past week we learned that both Lively, Google's odd attempt at something MMOish, and Tabula Rasa, Richard Garriott's attempt at something scifi-ish, are both going the way of the dinosaurs. TR will be shutting down in February, but NCSoft is giving everyone some lovely parting gifts. These are designed to keep subscribers both happy and involved in NCSoft games. I respect any company with that kind of dedication to marketing in the face of adversity.

This week's MMO Report features two things: the first is Casey Schreiner being his ever-amusing self as he explores the latest LOTRO expansion. The second is Casey Schreiner repeatedly over-pronouncing the word 'Moria'. It's like he took a class in how to speak Elvish or something. Egads.

Speaking of pronunciation, how about this sweet baby: Ozzy Osborne in a WoW commercial. Ozzy mumbles, he rants at the director, and he confronts Arthas over who's the 'real' lord of darkness. Watch it and laugh.

Do you find Athene, the self-described “best WoW player in the world” amusing? I know I do. I discovered this week that I also find his mother amusing. This is particularly true when she is threatening to “kick Blizzard's ass.”

By the way, Jack Thompson isn't finished being agitated at being disbarred. He recently sent the state bar a cheque for more than $42,000 in payment for his disbarment hearing and other penalties. However, he also emailed Chief Justice Quince of the Florida State Supreme Court, reminding him to cash that check. Jack just wanted to angrily remind Quince that he has no intention of paying interest or penalties if they continue to hold his cheque.

It seems the president-elect, Barack Obama, has appointed a WoW-player to his transition team. Kevin Werback is apparently no ordinary player, but the leader of two guilds. After establishing all this geek credibility, Kevin did mess it all up by saying this about the game:
"What the game does is provide an incentive for people to develop new software and ideas for collaborative production. Many of those ideas will translate to other group activities, including those within the business world. I think [massively multiplayer online games] will be, at a minimum, a significant test-bed for these new technologies, because users see a direct benefit and are willing to experiment with new things."
We love you, Kevin, but that quote was really boring.

Probably the best single thing in virtual space this past week was Warhammer's Heavy Metal event. Mythic does not disappoint; when they put on a special event it's pure awesomesauce. Heavy Metal is a series of quests and live events, including a special battleground, that allow players to earn achievements in-game. The ultimate goal is an unlock...of new character classes. Two new classes are currently scheduled to be introduced into the game this month, but players who complete the Heavy Metal events can unlock them, and play them, before anyone else. If you are interested in playing the foppish but deadly Knight of the Blazing Sun, or the David Bowie-esque Black Guard, a good while before anyone else can, this is your chance.

And that's all for this week, friends. For now, ciao!