Games – Page 7 – Geir Ove Alnes

Free, everlasting Age of Conan trial

Out of pure self-interest, I’m going to blatantly promote Age of Conan by mentioning the press release just released (duh, obviously) that announces the offer of a free, everlasting Age of Conan trial (aka “Unlimited Free Trial”).

Basically, if you sign up for a trial account, download and install the game and then log in at least once before January 1st 2010, the trial account will never end and you can keep on hanging around in Tortage (level 1-20 area) for as long as you want.

Some limitations apply to the trial accounts (out of necessity due to the potential abuse by spammers/gold sellers), though; no trade with other players, no use of in-game mail, no public chat channels, no forum-posting access.

Anyway, that’s this year’s Age of Conan (Available in a retail store/webshop/Steam near you!) promotion (Buy now! Don’t hesitate!) from me (Buy your friends a copy too! And your mom!). Now going back to my regular schedule of updating this blog at random intervals.

Start to Crate-times in MMORPGs

Note #0: It’s been a while since I posted anything at all on this blog. Just to let you know, I haven’t completely given up on it just yet, I have just been busy(TM) with other stuff.

In April 2000 a revolutionary methodology for reviewing video-games saw the light of day at the Old Man Murray-website; the Crate Review System. The basis for this new reviewing-system was very simple; since virtually all games contain crates, all games could be judged empirically on those crates. The longer you could play a game without seeing any crates (wooden or otherwise), the better the game. Or to put it in completely different terms: The shorter the time (in seconds) from the start of the game until the first crate is found, the worse the game. This unit of measurement was dubbed “Start to Crate” (StC for short).

I had forgotten about the above until recently, when I came across (through another blog, but unfortunately I can’t remember which!) an old Gamasutra-article by Ernest W. Adams (also listed on his “No Twinkie Database“-page). The article was not only an interesting read (along with everything else in the No Twinkie Database), it also contained a link to the Crate Review System at Old Man Murray.

While I was reading the old crate reviews there, I started thinking about how well this system of reviewing games would apply to MMORPGs, which are a very special breed of games indeed. With only one way to find out, I put on my research hat and started downloading numerous free trials, as well as re-activating some of my old MMORPG-subscriptions, determined to check the StC-times in an ungodly amount (Thirty-one in total) of MMORPGs.

Note #1: The original system didn’t differentiate between crates and their cousins, the circular crates also known as “barrels”. I check for both separately, and thus ended up with StC and StB values for each game.

Note #2: Some of the games I tried had multiple starting locations. In those cases I visited all the available starting locations and timed the StCs and StBs for those one by one. Unless I didn’t like the game, or I was distracted by food/TV/all the walls that keep staring at me. In those cases I only did one starting location.

Read on for the results of my research.

Continue reading “Start to Crate-times in MMORPGs”

One-button action-game: Canabalt

I haven’t posted in a while, but the following game has finally brought me out of my current post-drought: Canabalt (WideScreen version)

Found this on Raph Koster’s blog, and it has probably been posted elsewhere as well, but I really need to post about this game myself. It’s to blame for the most fun I’ve had in any game I’ve played in recent months, despite being a 2D sidescrolling platform-game made in only 5 days, with pixel-artwork, requiring only the occasional press of a single button to play.

My entire lunch-break at work went past in a Flash (hoho) while playing this game, where you take on the role of some random dude who starts running from within an office building or some such, jumping over a couple of chairs – and then out through a window and onto the rooftops, where he promptly takes off running again all by himself, leaving it up to you to bring him (with your one-button press) from rooftop to rooftop. Your character will gradually run faster and faster, and if you avoid the various crates (which will slow you down if you hit them, intentionally or not) scattered across the rooftops, eventually he’ll run so fast you’ll have a hard time reacting to what appears on your screen, whether it be a window you need to jump through (into a building and out another window on the other side), debris from a rocket(?) you need to jump over, or buildings collapsing under your feet.

Long story short, I’ll be playing this game all weekend to try to beat my co-worker’s record run of around 11370 m… my own record stands at a puny 6838 m :(

Games like these really bring me back to the good old days, when the gameplay mattered and graphics was something you did as an afterthought… nowadays it seems to be all about presentation, Presentation, PRESENTATION! As long as the graphics are good and the interface fancy enough, it doesn’t matter if the gameplay sucks hairy donkey-ass, as the screenshots will look still look good and sell many boxes.

Last bit of advice – do not under any circumstances play this while at work. It can be hazardous to your productivity. Or so I’ve been told.