I have once more ventured to the immature world of online gaming via Xbox Live. Xbox Live as you know is a paradise for kids who have been picked on their whole lives to finally take some of their aggression out on others. They then of course proceed to run their mouths knowing full well they are in the safety of their living room. What is it about anonymity that creates monsters? I know Soda used to say, “Next thirteen year old I meet I am going to punch him in the face”. If you have online gamed or been on Xbox Live before haven’t you ever wanted to ask a random kid if he has an Xbox Live account? You know full well if the answer is yes, then that innocent looking freckled faced epitome of insecurity is in fact one of the many that make your online gaming a preverbal hell.
Splinter Cell Pandora Tomorrow is one of these games, the kind that takes you to that hell, or paradise, depending on how good you are or how much a dick head you are. I have yet to run into the now infamous “unpluggers” though. The “unpluggers” for those that have not met them are the people who bail out before a loss in order to preserve their rank and stats. You remember him from Warcraft and Starcraft right? Yeah, he’s fucking back.
The gamers of SC II just know how to completely rock your world. I would strongly suggest against playing outside your friends list if you are not in fact great to ungodly at this game. A rank of three means almost certain embarrassment. I know many would read this and simply say “get better” and that is a valid point, however you must start somewhere; and when a spy makes his way to the spawn point and uses gas then proceeds to thump every time you regain conciseness until you die is beyond the scope of the game, one would assume that is. Then again assumption is the mother of all fuck ups (thank you Under Siege II).
Yes its fun. No do not play with people you don’t know.
I will speak more on Hitman Contracts here soon; just know that I play it with style!
Ill see you suckers on Xbox Live when I am Maddening your ASS!
I have to go out and get another PS2. For those that dont know I got rid of my PS2 a while back because it would not play any games. Typical. However now La Pucelle Tactics is coming out from the makers of Disgaea and of course I have to get it before you cant find it! This genre is growing real fast, and personally I have loved the Tactics games for a while now. Only thing is that releases do not number many so after a month or so the fan boys pretty much own all of them. Make sure you pick one up at EB Games (Huebner that is)or preorder it like RIGHT NOW. May 11 is the release date.
A new article is up; I know we have not put up much in the way of reading since we took to a more community approach. The sections are still there and we will utilize them. I would like to see more people submit reviews though, then again I plan on doing a marketing campaign here soon now that summer is in session and I have a great deal of free time. The article is fairly straight forward, check it out.
It is not so much strange but haunting. Much like the addict searching for the euphoric sensation of his first binge, I am searching for that feeling of an open environment. Morrowind is guilty of creating. I speak of an environment where I make all my decisions good or bad. I had to suffer from these decisions, and in essence I was really roleplaying for the first time. I was roleplaying the very character I created. I was in charge of his direction, style, persona, every little tidbit of what I wanted my character to be. With Morrowind however came a nagging disdain for the character design. The dated models do not bother me too much; however the game designers took many liberties to create a very organic and insect inspired world. I admire vision very much, however Morrowind’s did not appeal to me, actually, and it turned me off. I turned my sights towards the open world of MMO RPGs.
Before I go too deep into my ramblings allow me to make one thing very clear. I do not log into a MMO RPG to role-play with other players. I have given up on my romantic visions of players actually roleplaying in the environment that the developers have created. Instead I am accustomed to Online Gamer in all his glory. Online Gamer and his urge to purchase a game intended for role-play and butchering it to the point of unrecognizable stature. It is not “his” fault, Online Gamer is not a role-player, he is just that, a gamer. I do understand this, and yes it still gets to me.
My fascination with MMO RPG is that I am a character in a world. A world open to do anything I feel like doing, much like the sensation that Morrowind first gave me but could not finish delivering. Perhaps this is why I ache for Fable already, so that I can have that feeling again this time in a setting that I do find stimulating. In the MMO RPG I very much quest alone, building my character to my liking. I have a vision of what I want him to look like, and how he should act. Unfortunately the MMO world is not based on a single player effecting events or attitudes but it serves as a gateway for questing only. There is not real plot or point other then leveling up, so again I feel that something is missing.
I do want to enjoy a role-play setting like I have experienced in Neverwinter Night’s Online Multiplayer Servers. I want to log in and just converse with another player who will tell me his character’s back story and maybe some tales of what he has done. Then we go and quest and share in spoils. I do think that a MMO RPG setting is a perfect chance to role-play, however I have yet to find that role-play, even in Dark Age of Camelot’s roleplaying only servers. Instead I meet a person very much playing the person PLAYING that character, and that is very different from meeting a person playing THAT very character. I don’t know why, but I do cringe when I see the player named “Crazydutchguy” or perhaps a drug reference thrown in his name. It is just, not right.
I would have to say that even to this day I not satisfied with the opportunity for real role-players to converge in a setting that is indeed truly open. I, in short, want Morrowind online with players that want to role-play in a world that reacts to the role-play. Since I can remember I have been an idealist. I do know that when I do find that that rare role-play on a MMO that it is only for a fleeting moment. Bottom line is that I want to take full advantage of what I paid for, and continue to pay for each month. I do not know if that is too much to ask.
