Monthly Archives: March 2011

I should get hacked more often

Posted on March 31, 2011 by SynCaine

Remember this little encounter? It seems Trion thinks that ‘delayed’ response is worth 30 days of game time AND all of the weapon boost tokens you could receive from various pre-order deals. Just another day in a clone themepark. Basically. … Continue reading →

Posted in Rift, Site update | 24 Comments

Rift: World event quick hit

Posted on March 31, 2011 by SynCaine

The first Rift live event kicked off yesterday (along with the 1.1 patch), and for day-one of a major patch things were very smooth. Patching was quick, the servers stayed up, and no major bugs were introduced. The event itself, … Continue reading →

Posted in Inquisition Clan, Rift | 1 Comment

The apples taste like oranges

Posted on March 30, 2011 by SynCaine

I was in Stillmoor finishing up some quests when a raid-level quest opened up. About 30 minutes or so later, someone was advertising in zone-chat that they are putting together a raid for the quest. I sign up, and in … Continue reading →

Posted in MMO design, Rant, Rift, World of Warcraft | 24 Comments

The PvE Sandbox

Posted on March 29, 2011 by SynCaine

Whenever a Darkfall update is features on Massively, odds are good someone is going to comment on how they would love to play in such a world, just without the FFA PvP. Now it should be pretty obvious to anyone … Continue reading →

Posted in Darkfall Online, MMO design, Random | 9 Comments

Guild Wars 2 just cured cancer, world peace is next

Posted on March 29, 2011 by SynCaine

Dear world, Guild Wars 2 won’t solve your every issue with MMOs. It just won’t. It will, at the end of the day, be a PvE-based MMO with some PvP end-game, that’s overall pretty damn similar to what you see … Continue reading →

Posted in Guild Wars, Mass Media, MMO design, Rant | 32 Comments

Rift: On the doorstep to 50

Posted on March 28, 2011 by SynCaine

Things are progressing nicely in Rift. I’m currently halfway through level 47, while others are just a few bars away from 50. We also have a nice ‘second core’ of people around the 20s and 30s. A few more members … Continue reading →

Posted in Combat Systems, Inquisition Clan, PvP, Rift | 9 Comments

Amateur hour

Posted on March 25, 2011 by SynCaine

The kids, they grow up so fast. Shadow’s post before the one linked above was his original (even weaker) attempt, and while it’s pretty fail at a FBW starter, it does (slightly) manage to raise one question: if you’re a … Continue reading →

Posted in Blogroll, Darkfall Online, EVE Online, PvP, Rant, Rift, World of Warcraft | 22 Comments

One hit wonder blogging

Posted on March 24, 2011 by SynCaine

As readers here might remember from my yearly blog review posts, the busiest day for this blog was way back on September 6th, 2007, thanks to the BBC’s tech site link-quoting one of my posts. As with most of these … Continue reading →

Posted in Blogroll, Rift, Site update | 10 Comments

Bring back the server queue

Posted on March 23, 2011 by SynCaine

Last Sunday night I logged into Rift and waited in a three or four minute queue. In vent I joked about how this is totally unacceptable, but in a way it validated the fact that I was on a populated … Continue reading →

Posted in MMO design, Rift | 6 Comments

Souls > Trinity

Posted on March 22, 2011 by SynCaine

If everyone can be a tank/healer/dps, do you still have a holy trinity? Games with skill systems, rather than class systems, don’t have the holy trinity problem. You don’t stop a fleet action in EVE because your tank is afk, … Continue reading →

Posted in Combat Systems, Darkfall Online, EVE Online, MMO design, Rift, Ultima Online, World of Warcraft | 21 Comments