No, it's not talk like a pirate week, that is of course unless you logged on to PiratesOnline.com, Disney's entry into the world of MMORPG's. Now some of us have been waiting for something like this since Sid Meier did his Pirates game back in the day. Buried treasure, battles at sea, daring raids... ::sigh:: Trust Disney to take a fun concept, and grind it haltingly into the ground... HARD. Now you'd think they could have pulled it off, after all, they turned what was supposed to be a walkthrough attraction into a fun ride, that eventually spawned a movie (no one but depp could have made that movie) which had enough force to spawn 2 sequels...
But in typical Disney fashion, in the process of turning movies to games, they completely ruin them. It's not the abuse of the the storyline that killed it, it's not even the standard dumbing down that disney does to all it's games, or even the poor attempts at removing the 'violent aspects' of the game (although it was painful). Nope what's killing this game is the rush to market, it's just not ready. The content in the game is scarce, the bugs are something I'd never imagine in a game released to the public, the devs randomly take the game servers down with 5 min advance notice and no way to find out when it'll be back up, and the average lag... OMFG.
That said it does have a few redeeming qualities, it's a disney game in which you kill, destroy, sink, plunder, and pillage.... the irony alone is a reason to play. You can also gamble, but it get's better, because you can CHEAT at gambling. During the course of the game certain quests and enemies will give you playing cards which you can swap into your own hand while playing blackjack or 'Tortuga'(Texas) Hold 'em. Sadly the cards you swap out are lost. The best part of the game though is the sailing, defeating other ships, and getting paids for it. Sadly basic (free) access accounts won't ever get more than the lowest level ship, though with a little practice she's quite able, it's not something you want to stick with.
Unfortunately, for all that's good the bad sure is bad. Bugs that crash you on loading when you sail a certain ship, freezes at loading screens where the game continues but the screen doesn't, crashes on firing cannons at sea, entering certain areas, bugged quests (some of which have been completely disabled, frequently laggy servers, lack of content (try watching 15 ships swarm on the same NPC boat for a kill and see your frame rate start to be measured in minutes). Nevermind their obscene memory recommendations or the fact that you're stuck installing to your root drive (actually you can copy it to another drive manually). all this for 10$US a month? hmmm nah, I think I'll wait and see if they fix it and add more content.
But by all means check it out... it has so much potential, the problems won't seriously annoy you immediately, and really is a fun concept for a game http://piratesonline.com
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Tuesday, January 01, 2008
Kids Play
So, early in December I made (well renovated ) a child Av, for my secondlife account...
Originally I was aiming for something akin to Wednesday Addams from the movies (much creepieer than the TV show), crossed with Minoru from Chobits (Manga/Anime character, child genius), and I think I accomplished that. I also had a goal of making her an idealized me, something more happy, fortunate, and well, you get the idea... Oddly what I ended up with is so close to me as a child it's scary. Oh she's cuter and looks much better than I did as a child, but she's taken on a life of her own, and the creepiest part isn't her appearance, it's how much she resembles me as a child in action and behavior. Now some would say that's my fault, bad roleplaying etc. But the reality is that she seems so much like me because of one major aspect... she's much more adult in attitude (the child genius aspect) than her apparent age (I've settled on 13).
I know some think it's odd to play a child, some would even say it's sick. To those people I can only say, I do it for fun, to remember some of the innocence lost, and forget some of the realities of my life as it's become and just have fun. That said I'm finding that while there are alot of people that play kids, there aren't many active spots to hang out. I'd say especially at night, but frankly I just can't seem to find other kids at all... it's really disheartening, because as a kid, being alone is crappy... I'm not quite up for the virtual adoption agencies that've sprung up in SL, since I tend to just like to hang out without any strings attached, plus it kinda smacks of a virtual dating service and I REALLY don't want that. So hey if you read this and want to share some known places kid av's hang out, or if you have a child av and just wanna chat, feel free to drop me a line. My name is above, and I'm pretty friendly =)
on another note, I saw in a friends blog a link to a "Blog Readability Test", and thought hey why not, let's see what my blog comes up as.... Quite shocking really, It graded this blog with a "Genius" level. I'm not sure if that means I'm writing at that level, or that it'd take one to understand what I write (which could be good or bad). Regardless, you, the reader, should pat yourself on the back if you understand what I write... because for better or worse in my writing, Critics Rant thinks you're a genius!
Originally I was aiming for something akin to Wednesday Addams from the movies (much creepieer than the TV show), crossed with Minoru from Chobits (Manga/Anime character, child genius), and I think I accomplished that. I also had a goal of making her an idealized me, something more happy, fortunate, and well, you get the idea... Oddly what I ended up with is so close to me as a child it's scary. Oh she's cuter and looks much better than I did as a child, but she's taken on a life of her own, and the creepiest part isn't her appearance, it's how much she resembles me as a child in action and behavior. Now some would say that's my fault, bad roleplaying etc. But the reality is that she seems so much like me because of one major aspect... she's much more adult in attitude (the child genius aspect) than her apparent age (I've settled on 13).
I know some think it's odd to play a child, some would even say it's sick. To those people I can only say, I do it for fun, to remember some of the innocence lost, and forget some of the realities of my life as it's become and just have fun. That said I'm finding that while there are alot of people that play kids, there aren't many active spots to hang out. I'd say especially at night, but frankly I just can't seem to find other kids at all... it's really disheartening, because as a kid, being alone is crappy... I'm not quite up for the virtual adoption agencies that've sprung up in SL, since I tend to just like to hang out without any strings attached, plus it kinda smacks of a virtual dating service and I REALLY don't want that. So hey if you read this and want to share some known places kid av's hang out, or if you have a child av and just wanna chat, feel free to drop me a line. My name is above, and I'm pretty friendly =)
on another note, I saw in a friends blog a link to a "Blog Readability Test", and thought hey why not, let's see what my blog comes up as.... Quite shocking really, It graded this blog with a "Genius" level. I'm not sure if that means I'm writing at that level, or that it'd take one to understand what I write (which could be good or bad). Regardless, you, the reader, should pat yourself on the back if you understand what I write... because for better or worse in my writing, Critics Rant thinks you're a genius!
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