With the year in MMOs ending on a sour note due to the botched rollouts of both Fallout 76 and Atlas, blogger Endgame Variable is not the only one who is asking how we can fight these early access disasters.
“My personal response to these trends, as a consumer, which I began some two years ago or more–after the Landmark and ArcheAge debacles, and during that long stretch when a new survival game appeared on Steam every week: I strictly avoid buying any early access title on Steam unless it falls to $10 or less in a sale. The only exception I might make is if a game gets rave reviews from many people I trust. The vast majority don’t.”
We’ll continue this week’s tour of MMO blog essays with looks at SWTOR’s latest update, the enduring appeal of LOTRO, and appreciating a sense of grandeur in our games.
“It hardly ever snows where I live, so when I crave some proper winter weather I need to either travel a good bit in real life, or get my fix in one of the virtual worlds I also inhabit […]Â Here are some places to savour virtual winter should you ever feel like it.”
Nomadic Gamers: Christmas in Wurm Unlimited
“My alliance got together and painstakingly gathered up four champion trolls (two breeding pairs) and hitched them to a beautiful wagon that Elfin created. a kind GM gifted me one of the skins of my choosing as a thank you, and the alliance filled the wagon with goodies, and left it on my deed.”
Nerdy Bookahs: Why is LOTRO still this appealing?
“So what is it? I think the aforementioned ‘slow’ fits in nicely here. The game is slow. And I don’t mean that it takes forever to get things done or level up your character. It’s just made in a way that I don’t feel like I am missing out on anything when I hop onto a farming field and farm for coffee beans or strawberries.”
Contains Moderate Peril: Star Trek Online, the other MMO
“The episodic nature of much of the narrative content of STO means that it is a game that can be tackled in bit size chunks or at length, depending on your preference. I often play in fits and starts, when I’m between other games.”
Going Commando: Jedi Under Siege character moments
“Even the background NPCs are pure love, as BioWare inserted some great environmental chatter in the area. The above example was pointed out to me on Reddit and makes a couple of civilians state openly how a lot of SWTOR players have basically felt about the whole Zakuul story arc.”
GamingSF: A sense of grandeur in MMORPGs
“Even if MMORPG engines can rarely cope with total freedom in large zones (Guild Wars 2 is a notable exception), I appreciate when the designers take pains to at least give an impression of a more expansive area than the paths we are given to follow.”
Every day there are tons of terrific, insightful, and unusual articles posted across the MMO gaming blogosphere — and every day, Justin reads as many as he can. Global Chat is a sampling of noteworthy essays, rants, and guides from the past few weeks of MMO discourse.
