Endrance

You still alive, bro?

Ah the curse of the FFXI player strikes again - realising that all other MMOs just don't feel the same as FFXI is depressing. I'd still be playing FFXI myself but I'm just not in the kind of position to be able to happily sit down and sign myself up for 3 hour+ gaming sessions unless I really feel like it at that particular time. I still like to keep up with things in FFXI though so if you do encounter any of the new content (such as that Crystalline Prophecy stuff) lemme know what you think of it.

AionSource won't be/is not as interesting without you. It's a shame. Best of luck out there.

Wtf that was awesome awesome. Thanks for the vid.

Though I am so afraid to think that that is probably a guy... ;_; But wtf, he even does the turning knees inward thing, totally like a *** chick... ;_;

Cute skirt, regardless, though.

Ahh okay. Let me know what new games you try out. Spellborn is Live now I think in both Europe and NA. TERA still looks promising. Was it mostly a concern over the community here or just lack of interest in Aion itself that's driving you into hiding?

Dude what's with the new sig?

Why thank you kind sir, yeah it makes a change from my usual anime avatars, huh. You can't top that classy socialite/lady-in-red look, I find.

Umm... the current generation of RTS games focus very little on base building or dirt management. Company of Heroes, Dawn of War, World in Conflict are all about land control. Tech trees are rarely more than three tiers deep. The more land you control, the more income you gain. Its as simple as that. Yet because the game is purely about land control, the games not only put you in direct contact with the enemy early on and frequently, they force pure unit tactics.

The stair system works because it creates flow. You need to beat a boss, but you can't beat the boss until you're level 24 and the game won't let you progress to the next boss until you've beaten this boss. Invisible wall. Once you know that at any point you can skip directly to the last boss fight the game takes on an entirely different existence. Are you really going to still play through every story element as intended knowing that they are now all optional? You might, but a lot of people won't. Let's not forget that you might simply miss some. And developers aren't stupid. All events that are not key to central story progression cannot be essential. If they are essential then some people will miss them and their experience will be poorer off. Now imagine if there were no invisible walls at all. You could not have any essential elements at all. These are the problems that plague Prince of Persia, Oblivion and Fallout 3.

But that's besides the point; you've admitted we need invisible walls.

You're getting too heated here. You can play games to relax. Look at Flower for PS3. Great game. Damn good $10. I've gotten all the trophies but I still regularly play Flower to begin or conclude a gaming session. When I want to be active, I go out jogging. But when I want to kick back a little, I play games. Hence the working verb being "play" before "games" as to distance "games" from "work." I'm an incredible perfectionist. At this point, I've beaten half of Prince of Persia without getting hit a single time. Took tons of learning of tactics and move lists but hey, here I am, doing something nobody else has probably accomplished. But games are games. When I play games I am not improving my constitution to run long distances, I am not studying for my certification exams and I am not earning the bread I need to continue living. Simply put, I am not moving toward my planned end state. This defines my attitude toward games. If I can make a living off of games, then my attitude will change, but until then, games are a side venture for fun and if I can manage it, relaxation.

This is nice and all, but you missed the point maybe?

Sometimes, RPGs just have invisible walls that prevent you from playing a purely skill based game simply because if the game was built like that, the game would suck. If the game was purely skill based, there would be nothing at all to stop you from beating the game at level 1. But then what would be the point of the game? There would be none. MMOs are just like that. If you can beat the end game dungeons at level 1, what's the point of anything that comes inbetween?

The game must be built around some kind of achievement system. The most common system is obviously levels, but the system creates a series of invisible walls that prevent progression until certain requirements are met. They are absolutely necessary for the continuity of the game.

I personally loved Oblivion. It was incredibly beautiful and was just a wonderful, low key experience you could play to relax. That's right, Oblivion was an experience. Few games manage to cross that threshold onto the next level of worship.