As mentioned here, my laptop has been angry with me for going on 4 months or so. This cause me to retreat away from my usual comfort space of Team Fortress 2 and MMOs, and try to find ways to amuse myself. I went two totally different directions – Facebook games, and diving back in the Xbox 360. It’s come back now, in time for me to test SW:TOR and get back in to WoW for Cataclysm, but the damage has been done.
Facebook games are what they are. I found a couple nice card based ones that occupy me well enough (Eredan and Urban Rivals, primarily, though Clash and Tyrant are in there too). It’s the 360 part that’s really interesting to me….
Been meaning to respond to Enrique’s comments on what appeals to us in games for awhile. Finally found a moment to breathe and decided to post this up rather than, you know, breathing.
It’s a breakdown of what I see as the four core tasks that constitute most gaming experiences. I’ll leave a link to the full article, but for a tease, here’s the Cartesian graph that finally let me start wrapping my mind around where I was going.
One of my guildies recently posed a question that boiled down to “Is it weird for a 42 year old guy to play DnD with 20 year olds?” He wanted to get back in to gaming, didn’t have a group, signed up for the friendly local Comic Book Store’s open gaming. Group was young, his coworkers are hassling him, he’s confused.Â
This annoys me. It’s reflective of the nature of this site, sure, but come on. If he’d gone to a gym and gotten in to a pick up game of basketball with a group of 20 year olds, it’s not a thing, as long as he can keep up. If he’d gone to a bar to watch a sporting event of note, and there were 20 year olds there celebrating, and they started high fiving, it’s not a thing. If he’d joined a community theater group and been Claudius to a 20 year’s Hamlet, and they hung out, it’s not odd. But if he games, it’s weird?
So it’s not a new thought – I’ve had it before, and posted it before (hell, maybe here – I’m too lazy (no, no, too inspired) to check), but I’m thinking about the costs of games again. So here comes a rambling discourse on stuff.
There are a lot of different ways to pay for your games nowadays. Apparently there are people out there that pay a sum of money, and receive some sort of physical device they keep for ever. It’s odd – I’m going to test this idea out in a month or two when I do that sort of transaction for Borderlands, Dragon Age (CE) and Alpha Protocol. So, say you pay $60 for an RPG type game or a shooter, and get 120 hours of enjoyment out of it. Then you play it again later for 30 hours or so. You’re looking at $.40 per hour of entertainment. If the game is something shorter, you start to get less, but even if it’s a 12 hour game, that’s $5/hr, which is movie price.
Then there’s the ever popular renting of console games. I’m pretty fond of that one. Pretty much I buy RPGs and Rhythm games, and that’s about it. Everything else is a rental. From a cost/hour perspective, that’s probably your best bet (assuming you actually play it once you get it – I’m horrible about renting them and turning them in a week later unplayed). If you get a good game, you’re looking at anywhere from 8 hours to 40 hours for a rental price, which is $5 to $10. So you’re anywhere from $1.25 to $.15 per hour in cost. Pretty good return.
Then you get an MMO. Initial investment is the same as a game, or less. First month, you’re probably playing 2-3 hours a night on average, assuming you enjoy it. Now you’re at $1/hr, which isn’t bad, but isn’t great compared to the other types. But then next month, you’re still enjoying it. Now you’re getting 60 hours for $15 – $.25 per hour. The difference is that if you play less, you can’t make it up – you bought a game, if you play 5 hours now and then 50 hours later, it’s 55 hours. In an mmo, it’s by month. So you lose value if you don’t play it. Shamus (shamusyoung.com and escapistmagazine.com (no relation)) has a bit on this that says it well, and is what prompted me to do this.
And then there’s free to play. More and more, I’m coming to be a fan of free to play (which is really microtransactions). You can play as much as you want, and if you want to spend some money, you can. But you can get by just fine without doing it (in a good f2p at least). DDO is doing it perfectly, imho – f2p with purchases, or just subs – best of both worlds.
But people complain that you can’t really play unless you pay. I call bs on that. If you’re lazy, or you need the shiniest and best, then you can’t (ironic, coming from me). Take my current f2p obsession, Wolf Team. It’s a shooter. You earn gold for doing things, and can buy gold or AP. Gold is used for weapons, and a couple other things, AP are used for stuff that makes you better – stronger wolf, can’t blow yourself up with grenades, etc. If you’re lazy, or not very good, you might need better weapons – having the basic stuff may mean you can’t play. And items have a duration. But really, they give you a sniper rifle. They give you a machine gun. They give you an uzi. The sniper rifle you get takes three shots, or a headshot. The sniper rifle you can buy is basically one hit. So if you pay, it’s easier. If you’re skilled, you’re fine. I’m playing with the basics only on purpose, to get better.
DDO is the same – people whine like crazy, but you don’t have to buy a damn thing. You get a lot of stuff for free, or you can spend $5 or $7 every month or two. And you’re doing a hell of a lot better than an MMO still.
Course, there’s a multiplier effect of some sort – $.50/hour for a game that’s okay is probably worse than $1/hr for a game that kicks ass, but I think there’s a limit – there’s mediocre, and there’s good, and there’s awesome. But paying $1/hr for good and paying $2/hr for awesome come out the same in a lot of people’s minds, I think. It’s hard to argue that an MMO is superior to a single player game in most cases. But a single player game isn’t significantly better. Unless it’s KoTOR, you’re getting enough fun for a good price. And that seems to be the key.
Okay, as many who read this blog know by now, I’m relocating my family to Leeds in August. We’re taking about six suitcases with us to the United Kingdom, which leaves 95% of our belongings in storage. I can’t stand my board games sitting in storage for a year or more, pieces silent and dice still. So I’m offering them to foster homes while I’m in the UK.
Kurt wanted a list of all my games, but I’m a little busy for that, so I let my iPhone do the heavy lifting. Here are all my games. Let me know if you want to drop by and use them for a few dozen months.
Gaming Together: My Uncle Ken, Cousin Wes, Me, and Dad
Okay, I may well be the closest to an actual Trekkie/Trekker on this blog. Like all aspects of my life that involve geekery, this one comes pretty much directly from my father. Let’s be honest, much of what we call preference likely exists as little more than random acts of osmosis from the fragmented habits of our parents.
RPGs? My parents started playing them when I was four. I be knighted my first character with the name of Bert and my sister Ernie. My mother promptly tried to kill us with a purple worm at 1st level. Those who have played in any game of mine might consider this insightful.
Classics and pulp? While my house frequently went dark from unpaid electricity bills during childhood, when light could be found the works of Ovid, Caesar, and Plato set nestled beside works of Lovecraft, Tolkien, and Heinlein.  My parents’ collection would never bear the weight of unread vanity texts.
Board games? I cut my teeth on Axis and Allies and Blitzkrieg. My first steps into game design involved my father and I tweaking Fortress America in an attempt to make that historic mess of a simulation vaguely fair. We, as so many before us, failed.
I should get back on Trek. My father adored Kirk and company. Between the original series and Dr. Who, I likely spent more time watching television with him than just about any other activity beyond Boy Scouts. One reason for that may well have been that he worked nights and slept days, so catching late night sci-fi provided us a rare chance to do something together on a daily basis.
My first convention was a Star Trek convention in downtown Fort Worth. Dad took Sam (not the Sam of this blog), Jason, and myself. I recall buying a Red Dwarf t-shirt and not a ton more. I’m sure Dad could recite the events of that day in detail.  That’s how it goes; feel free to take a Harry Chapin break.
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Now, I can recall numerous Channel 39 marathons of Star Trek, complete with dial-in trivia questions. I devoured the original series during these marathons. I knew everything about Kirk, Spock, and McCoy.
Maybe in part because I’m from the rural Southwest, I always adored the angry, emotional stalwartness of McCoy’s sense of determined from the gut justice. I point this out in contrast to Henry’s comment about the secondhand nature of McCoy in the original series. In no way unrelated, I also found Urban’s portrayal the most annoying in the new flick. It felt more façade then inspired re-invention—and now that the thought has arisen within this reflection, let there be no doubt, I found J.J. Abrams new film the definition of inspired re-invention.
Really, it’s more than discovering the crew on the Enterprise anew—and Chekov, Sulu, Uhura, Kirk, Spock, Bones, and Scotty will always be the crew of the Enterprise to me. Some of the true art in this film comes in how the actors who are known quantities disappear. Nero might not be a great villain—there’s really no such thing as a great Trek villain—but he definitely doesn’t scream Eric Bana. And I’m still not sure I believe Ryder was Spok’s mum. Most importantly, Chris Pine and Abrams have rescued the character Kirk from the gloriously absurd satire of Shatner’s legacy. Because of this film, I have hope again that new audiences might understand why some fans take Kirk seriously. Mostly because we knew him before T.J Hooker, Airplane!, SNL, and “I’m Denny Crane.†There actually existed a time when you could view Kirk as legit, when the original crew was legit. Abrams has given that back to a lot of us—and not just those old enough to have written letters in the 60s, but a few of us who had fathers that might have written a letter or two.
I doubt a pulp franchise could ask for anything more. Abrams might not have done for Gene Rodenberry’s Star Trek what Shakespeare did for Arthur Brooke’s The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet, but I bet George Lucas prays at night someone half as talented as J.J. Abrams will rescue his franchise someday. In a theatre far, far away (Yep, cheapest joke of the post). Since my son and I have a similar connection over Star Wars as Dad and I over Star Trek, I must hold out hope.
Oh, and as far as Trek canon and the new film. I defer to the wisdom of my father who stated, “the original series didn’t follow any canon from one episode to the next. Why should this film?â€
No reason at all. It’s too true to the original spirit of the series to care a whit about canon over character.
Now I have to sleep so that I can get enough work done in the morning to slip out of the office by 10:15. My son is dressing up as Neil Armstrong for school tomorrow and will give a speech about the journey from Mercury to Apollo. There’s a family legacy at stake, one with an eye toward the stars.
Plan on taking the kids out to Rogue’s Gallery after breakfast and the boy’s guitar lesson.
Also, a good chance for dad to sneak in and buy gaming stuff the day after payday. Mmmmm, come home and teach a new game while they read their comics. Just another day in geek paradise. Reminds me that I need to find out where the gaming/hobby shops are in Leeds. (Moving to the UK in August so that the blog can have that global feel)
