Friday, April 5, 2013

Camelot Unchained: A World of Possibilities





There is a unique opportunity to be one of the founders of what promises to be a fantastic MMO, at least for those of us that want something in a similar vein to DAoC. What is the MMO, you ask? Well, it's under a temporary title of Camelot Unchained and is currently trying to get funding on Kickstarter. The link, as you can see, is at the bottom of the page.

It is going to be a Tri-realm, RvR based game. It should make PvP much more interesting then it is in games like World of Warcraft where you are confined to only two factions and primarily in instanced battlegrounds. RvR has a larger effect on the world around it, and many of the statements made by Mark Jacobs and the other wonderful people over at City State Entertainment lead us to believe that we are going to be able to have a much larger impact on the world then even in other RvR based games before.

You can find more information over at their CU website, and on the kickstarter page. We need as many people to pledge as possible so that we can get this awesome game made. There are also links on their website to the unofficial forums they have set up at Reddit and MMORPG, so that you can see what some of the backers are saying, or even help to support some things that backers are trying to see implemented should you decide to become a backer as well.

There may not be an official game play video yet, but there is a lot of very interesting information. What the developers are striving to do is truly innovative. That's something MMOs have been lacking. There have been some minor innovations that have made things interesting, but nothing that is really game changing. We have an opportunity to help make these innovations in this genre of gaming a reality.

Also, if you are a role player, or if you wish to help support us, please post on either of my threads to help get us a dedicated rp server. As I've stated before, I know I'm starting early. It's better to start early and make sure the developers know what we want, then wait until it's to late to make our wishes know. Backers have to show that this is something they want. The links are below.

My thread on the CU Reddit forums.

My thread on the CU MMORPG forums.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/13861848/camelot-unchained


'Next Gen' X-box Always On?


The title is just what is suggests. There are hints that the so called 'next gen' x-box is going to require constant internet connection. This means that even games you play alone will not be playable if you do not have a reliable connection to the internet. That is -not- something that gamers want.

If any of you have played Diablo 3, then you know that you are required to have an internet connection for it. You are also required to log into your account with battle.net. Both of those things annoyed me when I first logged in, and I have not played it much because of that. When I play games like Diablo, which have always had solo aspects to it, I don't want to be online. I don't play them so that I can talk to my battle tag friends in WoW. I generally play them because I want some downtime to just completely and totally zone out to the game.

The Diablo 3 fans took another blow when Blizzard announced that it would be on the PS3 and that it would be playable offline. I've personally resolved not to play until they give an offline version to PC gamers. I'm certainly not going to purchase a separate copy, and console, just so I don't have to be online to enjoy the game.

I go over all of that to show that this is not something that gamers want. By forcing you to have a constant internet connection you are alienating players who cannot always be online. You are alienating people that may be able to purchase an x-box via tax returns, but are not able to afford the month to month payments of internet connections.

The arguments that Adam Orth, the creative director over at Microsoft for their Game Studios, made over Twitter were unprofessional, and completely missed the point. One of his arguments was to state that he wouldn't purchase a vacuum cleaner because power goes out sometimes. I'm sorry, that can immediately be torn down. A vacuum cleaner doesn't require constant power in order to run.

I think that we are going to see the death of the X-box if they don't fire him, and back off their stance of having a constant internet connection.

Thanks to Gamers book for their article and screenshots of some of the Twitter comments.

Thursday, April 4, 2013

The Frustration Continues


Don't worry about the name of this blog. It's not really all that frustrating. I'm annoyed that I didn't get my deads again, but I will next time. Unfortunately, one of my calluses came off after my 3rd pull and I had to stop. I didn't have any medical tape on me to wrap it with, and the pressure on it was just to much. I have tape now, though, so I have no doubt that I'll get it next time.

I made my squats at 215lbs, though. I have a bit of a funny story with that however. I went to low on one of them, and wasn't able to stand back up. I ended up having to bail on the weights so it made a lot of noise when they fell off the bar. The guy in the rack next to me helped when he realized that was going on, and two of the employees at the YMCA came down to make sure I was okay. I thought it was pretty funny, though.

The employees suggested that I use the clips, but since I was working alone that wasn't an option. Both I and the guy that helped me explained that since I was working along I -had- to have the option to drop the weight if I needed to. Otherwise I would have been trapped under that bar until I could get someones attention.

I ended up doing that set again and finishing it, though. I haven't decided if I will go up next time or not since I did have that mishap. We shall see Saturday. I also missed my overhead press, so I'm going to drop some of the weight from that. I am not excited about it, but sometimes there is no choice. As long as I am, in general, making forward progression then I'm happy.

Today, unfortunately, we will not be going to train. There are a couple of reasons for this and they both stem from various parts being in a bit more pain then they should be. We're going to take the extra day to rest and recover. It shouldn't be an issue for us to get in there Saturday, though.