I know when I bought a Nintendo DS for my Mum I also bought a cartridge which you could torrent games and load.
I've got one of those, and while they sort-of exist for the 3ds, you have to have a specific model and firmware, or else it simply doesn't work. You can also go region free on those.
"This isn't a revolution, not yet, but powerful people with a lot of money are passing out the tech equivalent of muskets in the dead of night to prepare to overthrow the king."
Wait until the Blizz MOBA hits. That's gonna be some crazy shit...
It's going to die as quickly as Diablo 3, or faster, the game play seems to be targeted at completely casual players in a market dominated with competitive games which have casual modes already built into their games. Not to mention it seems quite simple from the video demo that I've seen.
Wait until the Blizz MOBA hits. That's gonna be some crazy shit...
It's going to die as quickly as Diablo 3, or faster, the game play seems to be targeted at completely casual players in a market dominated with competitive games which have casual modes already built into their games. Not to mention it seems quite simple from the video demo that I've seen.
I don't believe that it will.
While I cannot speak to the target demo as yet, I am willing to share a few tidbits that make me say that.
1). The game play video shown online is likely from a dev team only pre alpha build. My peeps at Blizzard were only handed a limited Alpha ~a week after BlizzCon. If it looks simple, that's likely why.
2). The rabid passion of Blizzard fans of all their IPs get smashed into one game. I know internally they debate the better merits of each IP and the fans will take that ball and run with it, I think.
3). The perception that it's casual could be a boon. Science knows I'm turned off by the idea of trying to penetrate the insular communities of LoL and DOTA2. A "bottom up" approach of letting it form casually and then adapting as the completion comes isn't a bad idea. Let the community tell you what they want that the other MOBAs aren't giving you.
4). The dev team is small. I've heard two numbers and they are both lower than 20. Now, that might change as the project picks up steam but if they can get that much done with so little investment, I think it'll persist.
5). Comparison to D3 is not exactly fair. I won't go into details but there was division on how certain things were handled with D3 and it lead directly to poor design choices in the game *cough*realmoneyauctionhouse*cough*. HoTS won't suffer all that. If nothing else, Blizzard learns from its mistakes.
2. I'm not quite sure about the how long Blizzard fans can carry the game. I'm a fan of the Starcraft 1 and 2, Warcraft 1-3 but I don't really have any interest in the characters outside of the game, their presence in the single player game is cool (and in the case of Warcraft 3 an extra management mechanic). However seeing the in a MOBA doesn't get me excited. I was personally turned off of the DC MOBA and the DC fighting game (Injustice) because of how much games based on other IP's fail.
3. Somebody who comes to this game after a month or two will face the same barrier to entry as League of Legends and Dota 2. It is not insurmountable, all you need is a few friends to try any of these games out.
4. A small team size could also mean that Blizzard is not convinced by the endeavour.
5. You would think they would make an acronym which doesn't make half their fans think of "Heart of the Swarm" (2nd Starcraft 2 expansion)
Anyhow we'll see how it pans out. I guess we all win if the game turns out to be good.
Joel had a great comment about MOBAs and the community problems on the latest Fast Karate. I'll paraphrase a bit: He was describing the innate fiddliness of the genre, and how their are just so many small steps that you can fuck up on your long journey to these 2 minutes of action in the match. When you have such a long fiddly buildup to the climax, and then fuck up one small thing, it's a perfect storm of making the player spout profanities and generally just turn into a giant asshole. It's the games themselves just as much as the players.
Joel had a great comment about MOBAs and the community problems on the latest Fast Karate. I'll paraphrase a bit: He was describing the innate fiddliness of the genre, and how their are just so many small steps that you can fuck up on your long journey to these 2 minutes of action in the match. When you have such a long fiddly buildup to the climax, and then fuck up one small thing, it's a perfect storm of making the player spout profanities and generally just turn into a giant asshole. It's the games themselves just as much as the players.
I think the frustration lies with people's lack of knowledge of the game, there is a huge amount to know that is not obvious.
I think it's more that you have a group of people that are forced into a team and any mistake they make, they prefer to blame others for the entire loss instead of seeing what they could have done better. It then devolves into a poor attitude because people apply too much worth with winning and stress themselves out. People just give up and start greifing if they didn't get to play their role or if they think someone else on the team is to blame for the enemy team getting ahead. Plus if you have someone on your team who disconnects because their Internet connection isn't great it makes it very hard for the team to win.
The average game is longer than most other online team games and there is a perceived investment and points on the line.
Compare this to Left 4 Dead as an example. That game and the community promotes positive use of voice communications. You can only get the highest score by working as a team and carrying the rest of your team when they are not as skilled or experienced. Everyone gets to play a relatively similar role.
The entire round is chopped into chapters to give a reprise.
If someone disconnects you have a bot that fills in. There is not enough time to complain about a perosn's play. Assisting your team makes you look like the best player.
If there is a griefer you can kick them.
Another example is Counterstrike, you can have a few people that are not so good and die within the first few seconds but if you're good enough you can beat the entire enemy team with just skill and reflexes. Once again if there is a griefer you can kick them. Voice comms are recommended but not necessary.
In Ranked play there are multiple warnings before you start a game and if you break the rules the punishment is immediate and harsh.
In both Counterstrike and Left 4 Dead you understand immediately that you can win the game for your team by playing optimally. This is the case in MOBAs too but the community finds it easier to ignore this option and blame everyone else on the team for anything and everything that goes wrong.
2. I'm not quite sure about the how long Blizzard fans can carry the game. I'm a fan of the Starcraft 1 and 2, Warcraft 1-3 but I don't really have any interest in the characters outside of the game, their presence in the single player game is cool (and in the case of Warcraft 3 an extra management mechanic). However seeing the in a MOBA doesn't get me excited. I was personally turned off of the DC MOBA and the DC fighting game (Injustice) because of how much games based on other IP's fail.
3. Somebody who comes to this game after a month or two will face the same barrier to entry as League of Legends and Dota 2. It is not insurmountable, all you need is a few friends to try any of these games out.
4. A small team size could also mean that Blizzard is not convinced by the endeavour.
5. You would think they would make an acronym which doesn't make half their fans think of "Heart of the Swarm" (2nd Starcraft 2 expansion)
Anyhow we'll see how it pans out. I guess we all win if the game turns out to be good.
2. Whilst you aren't necessarily movd by seeing your favorite characters outside of their given environments, many people DO enjoy it. Plus you get to settle "Superman Vs. Goku" style arguments so some extent, which most nerds seem to enjoy.
3. I'm not disagreeing. You must also remember that there will probably be an inital influx of players who are loyal to Blizzard who will play because, well, they'll play anything with the Blizzard name slapped on it. BlizzCon sells out in minutes every time they deign to have one for a reason.
4. This one I can patently say is false. They are in love with the idea. To use a bit of corperate-speak for a minute: They want to move away from the huge dev team model to a more nimble and focused model with utilizes the advantages that a small team brings. In more plain language; they see the writing on the walls and they want to be able to cut mass jobs should the need to do arise in the future.
5. If this is a sticking point, I'm afraid I can't do anything for you, Mr. OCD. =D
I'll tie this tangentially to what I said earlier about improving on what other games are doing poorly. Blizzard is VERY good at that. A new MOBA with the lessons learned to date may be enough to give a game like that a lot of momentum. Scrym have mentioned in the past that changing even one rule can change the entire complexion of a game. I wish I could remember where they said that but in any event, I agree with that assertion.
I'm actually not a huge fan of MOBAs for a number of reasons but I can't deny they are popular and are potential ATM's for their developers. I think Blizzard can make a strong play into the competitive MOBA scene. They essentially own the competitive RTS scene already, so why not another genre?
I'm actually not a huge fan of MOBAs for a number of reasons but I can't deny they are popular and are potential ATM's for their developers. I think Blizzard can make a strong play into the competitive MOBA scene. They essentially own the competitive RTS scene already, so why not another genre?
I'm pretty sure that Starcraft 2 is the only any way significant, recent, traditional RTS. Dominating that scene is not very hard when there are essentially no competitors.
Getting in MOBA scene will be harder and I believe that while HotS will have some players, obviously basically everything does these days, it will probably not be able to compete with the big 2 and will fail to get the critical mass of players and viewers to be considered a big thing, in e-sports.
It's pretty much summarized in Characteristics of Games in the sections talking about rules, penalties, cheating, etc. If I had the book on hand, I'd just point out the chapters and page numbers. And sure, you can say play to win, but I always say to win what game?
I think the more interesting discussion here is "How can the game be re-designed to where camping isn't an issue?".
In a war game of any kind, the optimal strategy of long range weapons is always to do something that is effectively "camping." You stay out of range of any short range weapons as much as possible. You stay hidden, so fast units can not locate and close on your location. And you use your long range weapons to pick off enemies who are not protected by cover. If you don't want camping, then you should not have any long range weaponry in the game.
Alternatively, you can make long range weaponry so weak that it does not kill enemies. In NS2 the Skulk parasite does hardly any damage. But it does just enough to soften up marines so they will go down in one less bite. So the common strategy is to snipe a parasite, then ambush.
The final way to reduce camping is with map design. You see this in Counter-Strike. Some maps are conducive to camping, some are not. Camping requires there to be a spot that you can pitch your tent. That place needs to have very few approaches, so nobody can sneak up on your tent and get you from behind. It needs to have a vantage point where you have direct line of sight to positions that are far enough away that you can hit people there without being hit yourself. It also helps if it has enough concealment so that you are not immediately spotted. If you don't put any such locations in your map, camping will be useless.
There is another kind of camping that is done without sniper rifles or long range weaponry. That is the neverending ambush. A player is afraid that if they go around the map, they will be the one who is ambushed. In the interest of survival they sit in one place waiting to be the ambusher instead of the ambushee. If both teams do this, nothing happens in the game, and it sucks.
What is the solution? Counter-Strike already has a solution. That solution is the objective. Ambushing is only reasonable for the defensive team. If they camp in this manner it is perfectly acceptable. If they set their ambush in a bad place, and the offense succeeds in bombing or rescuing, then they suck. If offense camps, and defense camps, offense loses for not going for the objective.
The problem in CS is when people don't care about the objective and only care about their own survival/score. I think an easy solution to this is to punish players individual stats for losing teams even if they survived and got kills. Make the win more important than the individual achievement. The NFL does a very good job of this. Manning had the best offensive season ever, but he would definitely give that up for the championship he lost.
The only time I've found camping to be an issue is when the mechanics make it extensively difficult to get break free of being camped and you're basically just stuck until the game ends. I think that's mostly been fixed in newer games.
Comments
It's also how most of us get around stupid shit like "low gore version".
I know when I bought a Nintendo DS for my Mum I also bought a cartridge which you could torrent games and load.
No one else I know on a day to day basis moved onto a 3DS, I didn't realise Nintendo Australia is still so silly.
- http://www.polygon.com/2014/1/14/5307584/steam-dev-days-valve-owned-future-plan
Any new word on the DC Moba?
While I cannot speak to the target demo as yet, I am willing to share a few tidbits that make me say that.
1). The game play video shown online is likely from a dev team only pre alpha build. My peeps at Blizzard were only handed a limited Alpha ~a week after BlizzCon. If it looks simple, that's likely why.
2). The rabid passion of Blizzard fans of all their IPs get smashed into one game. I know internally they debate the better merits of each IP and the fans will take that ball and run with it, I think.
3). The perception that it's casual could be a boon. Science knows I'm turned off by the idea of trying to penetrate the insular communities of LoL and DOTA2. A "bottom up" approach of letting it form casually and then adapting as the completion comes isn't a bad idea. Let the community tell you what they want that the other MOBAs aren't giving you.
4). The dev team is small. I've heard two numbers and they are both lower than 20. Now, that might change as the project picks up steam but if they can get that much done with so little investment, I think it'll persist.
5). Comparison to D3 is not exactly fair. I won't go into details but there was division on how certain things were handled with D3 and it lead directly to poor design choices in the game *cough*realmoneyauctionhouse*cough*. HoTS won't suffer all that. If nothing else, Blizzard learns from its mistakes.
3. Somebody who comes to this game after a month or two will face the same barrier to entry as League of Legends and Dota 2. It is not insurmountable, all you need is a few friends to try any of these games out.
4. A small team size could also mean that Blizzard is not convinced by the endeavour.
5. You would think they would make an acronym which doesn't make half their fans think of "Heart of the Swarm" (2nd Starcraft 2 expansion)
Anyhow we'll see how it pans out. I guess we all win if the game turns out to be good.
I think it's more that you have a group of people that are forced into a team and any mistake they make, they prefer to blame others for the entire loss instead of seeing what they could have done better.
It then devolves into a poor attitude because people apply too much worth with winning and stress themselves out. People just give up and start greifing if they didn't get to play their role or if they think someone else on the team is to blame for the enemy team getting ahead. Plus if you have someone on your team who disconnects because their Internet connection isn't great it makes it very hard for the team to win.
The average game is longer than most other online team games and there is a perceived investment and points on the line.
Compare this to Left 4 Dead as an example. That game and the community promotes positive use of voice communications. You can only get the highest score by working as a team and carrying the rest of your team when they are not as skilled or experienced. Everyone gets to play a relatively similar role.
The entire round is chopped into chapters to give a reprise.
If someone disconnects you have a bot that fills in. There is not enough time to complain about a perosn's play. Assisting your team makes you look like the best player.
If there is a griefer you can kick them.
Another example is Counterstrike, you can have a few people that are not so good and die within the first few seconds but if you're good enough you can beat the entire enemy team with just skill and reflexes. Once again if there is a griefer you can kick them. Voice comms are recommended but not necessary.
In Ranked play there are multiple warnings before you start a game and if you break the rules the punishment is immediate and harsh.
In both Counterstrike and Left 4 Dead you understand immediately that you can win the game for your team by playing optimally. This is the case in MOBAs too but the community finds it easier to ignore this option and blame everyone else on the team for anything and everything that goes wrong.
3. I'm not disagreeing. You must also remember that there will probably be an inital influx of players who are loyal to Blizzard who will play because, well, they'll play anything with the Blizzard name slapped on it. BlizzCon sells out in minutes every time they deign to have one for a reason.
4. This one I can patently say is false. They are in love with the idea. To use a bit of corperate-speak for a minute: They want to move away from the huge dev team model to a more nimble and focused model with utilizes the advantages that a small team brings. In more plain language; they see the writing on the walls and they want to be able to cut mass jobs should the need to do arise in the future.
5. If this is a sticking point, I'm afraid I can't do anything for you, Mr. OCD. =D I'll tie this tangentially to what I said earlier about improving on what other games are doing poorly. Blizzard is VERY good at that. A new MOBA with the lessons learned to date may be enough to give a game like that a lot of momentum. Scrym have mentioned in the past that changing even one rule can change the entire complexion of a game. I wish I could remember where they said that but in any event, I agree with that assertion.
I'm actually not a huge fan of MOBAs for a number of reasons but I can't deny they are popular and are potential ATM's for their developers. I think Blizzard can make a strong play into the competitive MOBA scene. They essentially own the competitive RTS scene already, so why not another genre?
Getting in MOBA scene will be harder and I believe that while HotS will have some players, obviously basically everything does these days, it will probably not be able to compete with the big 2 and will fail to get the critical mass of players and viewers to be considered a big thing, in e-sports.
Not this tired subject again. Please. I don't have it in me.
Alternatively, you can make long range weaponry so weak that it does not kill enemies. In NS2 the Skulk parasite does hardly any damage. But it does just enough to soften up marines so they will go down in one less bite. So the common strategy is to snipe a parasite, then ambush.
The final way to reduce camping is with map design. You see this in Counter-Strike. Some maps are conducive to camping, some are not. Camping requires there to be a spot that you can pitch your tent. That place needs to have very few approaches, so nobody can sneak up on your tent and get you from behind. It needs to have a vantage point where you have direct line of sight to positions that are far enough away that you can hit people there without being hit yourself. It also helps if it has enough concealment so that you are not immediately spotted. If you don't put any such locations in your map, camping will be useless.
There is another kind of camping that is done without sniper rifles or long range weaponry. That is the neverending ambush. A player is afraid that if they go around the map, they will be the one who is ambushed. In the interest of survival they sit in one place waiting to be the ambusher instead of the ambushee. If both teams do this, nothing happens in the game, and it sucks.
What is the solution? Counter-Strike already has a solution. That solution is the objective. Ambushing is only reasonable for the defensive team. If they camp in this manner it is perfectly acceptable. If they set their ambush in a bad place, and the offense succeeds in bombing or rescuing, then they suck. If offense camps, and defense camps, offense loses for not going for the objective.
The problem in CS is when people don't care about the objective and only care about their own survival/score. I think an easy solution to this is to punish players individual stats for losing teams even if they survived and got kills. Make the win more important than the individual achievement. The NFL does a very good job of this. Manning had the best offensive season ever, but he would definitely give that up for the championship he lost.