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Mon, 03/16/2009 - 15:09 — SaberSnail

I've always had City of Heroes on my list of games to go back to someday. Today gauntman (a co-worker) mentioned that he resubscribed to City of Heroes, and was remembering how much fun that game is. He made it sound pretty tempting, but I'm not planning on going back to the game yet for two reasons. First of all, I'm planning on waiting at least until their next free expansion, which will introduce player-created missions. Secondly, I know if I resubbed, then Optiker would be interested too, but I suspect this would leave Hameed/Adviga out of our Saturday evening play sessions, as the lag issue would probably make things playable (unlike Guild Wars, which is at least tolerable for them).

Of course, perhaps if he hasn't already done so, Hameed should go try out the 14-day free trial to see how well it plays... Still, even if that weren't a problem (and I suspect it would be a problem), I'd like to wait at least until the next expansion.

Still, this led to gauntman and I talking about EVE Online, which is another game I've been thinking seriously about resubscribing to. I realized recently that EVE is similar in some ways to the free web game The West which a couple of us have been playing lately. I suspect that it's only a matter of time before I decide that I'm done with The West. I've already played it a lot longer than I usually play web games.

Anyway, the reason EVE came up, is that it's also a game that is extremely lag tolerent, even more so than Guild Wars is. This means it might be something that Hameed could play. Of course, it's also a game that's very different than other MMOs, which means that getting together to play on Saturday evenings might look a little different. Still, it's a possibility that perhaps should get explored. There are a couple other nice features too, such as the ability to purchase playing time (normally priced at the typical $15 per month) using in-game money (although I don't yet know how much effort such a thing would take, I have seen plenty of things to indicate that this mechanism could at least be used to reduce the cost of playing even if not totally eliminate the cost). Also there is the interesting fact that as with The West, your character can gain experience even when you are not playing. Your character does not earn experience points or level, but instead is constantly studying for a skill of your choice, even while offline.

There are a number of other interesting things about the game. Perhaps I should make that a blog post... Anyway, it's certainly something to check out. It wouldn't surprise me if I resubscribe sometime soon. Others can try out the free 14-day trial. Optiker, I'd suggest that you hold off until you guys come visit. Then if you are interested I can show you in person and walk through the basics.

Oh yeah, one other thing about EVE... Don't be put off by things you might see about unlimited PVP and such. There is plenty of things to do in that game without getting wrapped up in fighting other players. You can spend your entire life in relatively safe portions of space, and still do interesting things like production, trading, research, missions, mining, courier runs, etc. I played for 6 or 10 weeks way back when (don't recall exactly how long, perhaps it was more), and I never got killed by another player (although with less luck it could have happened when the corporation I was playing with went out hunting some people who were enemies of our alliance).

Anyway, just some thoughts about MMOs. Some of this has been sparked by our recent Guild Wars difficulties, and me wondering if we're going to hit a point where we just aren't good enough to continue... I don't know, maybe tweaking skill selections will help...

General Discussion

Mon, 03/16/2009 - 15:16 — SaberSnail