Stay tuned..

I had several things I wanted to touch on today, but it looks like I am going to be moving my blog. It is going to take a day or two, when I do I'll make sure to re-direct there. Tons of work to do :(

Just some issues I'm having atm, wanting to do more with my writing.
Please check back in tomorrow or Tuesday! I hope to have everything situated by then!

-kaozz

What makes an MMO good to YOU?

What makes you want to log into your favorite MMO? What makes it enjoyable for you? For me one of many things can be the people.

Lately I've been trying to stick to WoW even though I'm bored overall. I was thinking, what would make the game more enjoyable to me in it's current state? It seems my friends list grows a little 'dimmer' each time I log in. I've seen so many friends come and go (playing for five years this year..). It it wasn't for my husband, son and a few friends, I probably wouldn't even log in besides the holiday events. Really there's not many people I know, on anymore, to do anything with. Better yet logged on at the same time!

I miss having a good 'community' to be part of, a good guild and all that jazz. I've had a hard time picking a new guild out even though I've had several offers, either it's a silly application asking questions they don't need to know or just guilds that are not very active.. yeah always a reason. I was pretty burnt by the last one I suppose, just tired of the BS. It is clear that this is what makes this game more enjoyable. Because if you don't have a guild, you pug. Pugging isn't fun. :(

I have a friend from WoW that plays on my server in Aion which really is nice. I hope to make more friends as I start grouping more soon and joining a Legion. I keep hinting to my PvP loving husband Aion is right up his ally. Maybe he will try it one day. In the meantime I'm going to try to make the most of Aion while I'm playing it. It's fresh it's new, plenty of time to get rolling and catching up to others.

I do tend to solo a lot, but there is a big reason I like MMOs, I like that there are other people out there to play with. Do you feel the people you play with make the game for you?

Safe Adventures Everyone- kaozz

WoW: Jaina gets a make-over.. I want one too!

Lots of cool things are incoming to WoW in the near future. Jaina and a few other NPCs get make-overs, really nice ones at that. It makes me wonder, do we need new skins for our character models? I didn't think so until I saw this picture. Now I think I was wrong! Well done Blizzard Art team. Now get back to work on MY new model!

Soon there will be race changes available in addition to the current faction changes. No word yet but this is a pretty cool feature. Blizzard always goes the extra step to keep customers happy. Although the waits can be long, players have many options available that many other games just don't offer.

Tier 10 items are already being shown off on many websites. MMO-Champion has quite a bit of info on it. The 3.3 patch is looking very interesting. More things to do which is always a good thing.

I'm still itching to see Cataclysm. Though there is still a lot of cool stuff before then I suppose. I am very excited about the Hallow's End event to start on the 18th! Also I want my new
turtrey
turkey for the new Pilgrim's Bounty. I also notice Day of the Dead has been added this year, no description is available for it. I don't recall seeing this one before.

I was just telling my brother earlier tonight I want a pet pug in WoW. I have a my own very real pug Gizmo, still it would be so cool to have a pug in WoW too ;) MMO_Champion and Warcraft Pets have listings of a perky pug being added as an in-game pet. /swoon!

I've been hopping onto WoW more lately doing some heroics. Trying to decide which I should play as my main these days, Paladin or Priest. Aion is still fun, however I always miss my WoW. And that's about all I have to jab about today.

I also wanted to send out a HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my little brother A.D.! Happy 21! May all the birthday lewt be phat!
-kaozz

Away from the norm, Dark Age of Camelot.

If you come here often or if you just pop in on occasion you may have noticed I have been in the process of doing some reviews on games you don't see many reviews for, or up to date reviews. Today I decided to go over Dark Age of Camelot. So lets get started!

Dark Age of Camelot
This game is not one you see in stores anymore. In 2007 I found this gem of a game in Best Buy. It was the only copy on the shelf, the only one I have seen since. I had always wanted to try it, I had just been too into Everquest when this game was more mainstream. So I decided to try it.

While writing this I have actually considered playing it again in the future, it was that good IMO. It is by no means a dead game, just because games may be older doesn't mean they are not any good and nobody plays them. Most of the players you find are dedicated people who know what they are doing. That is a good thing! Communities are closer and nicer for the most part.

Whats so good about DAoC?
First off I had heard it was RvR (realm versus Realm), specifically. Well no PvE for me right? Wrong. This game also has a Co-Op Server where the main focus is on PvE. If you like RvR or PvP it offers a lot towards that crowd too. Also there is a 'Classic' Server for the 'old timers', which I thought was pretty neat too.

Mounts! Everyone loves mounts. This game offered some of the best ideas I have seen in ANY game when it comes to mounts. Horses of molten rock, unicorns and so on. I just thought they were fantastic.

Player Housing along with guild housing. I loved the player housing! It was great, you could even store things in the house, extra armor, or your trophies. You could design the inside as well as the outside! Putting flowers and trees on your plot of land. You could stand outside and look at a house someone had taken time to transform into their liking.

Game Play
There are solo type dungeons, solo play to an extent, raids, groups and many different types of PvP (RvR).

PvE was quite fun. I joined a guild at the young level of 4 or so! I was very lucky that someone had taken me under their wing explaining my class to me in depth and offered to invite me to join the guild they were in. This guild made the game one of the most enjoyable game experience I have ever encountered. We went to dungeons, we traveled all over a vast amount of places in the process of my leveling. The world was a beautiful place. At times I miss this game.

Dungeons, we did a lot of those. We had DPS, tanks, healers, if we died we usually had a good laugh about it. It was just so much fun. I didn't quest in this game much due to being in a guild I grouped with all the time. It was much like my days of Everquest. There were quests to, solo dungeons, do this or that. So don't think the game is just a grind fest.

Something else worth mention would be once you hit the max level 50, you get a free level 20 character. So you get to skip a bit of leveling. This may not sound like a big deal but keep in mind that the level cap is not all that high considering the steep levels in most games today. You also gain ranks after the level cap, so there is something to work towards once you hit the cap.

Also there is an auction system which was very handy!

Classes and Races
Classes do have specific roles in this game. The game offers a truly massive amount of classes and diverse choice of races to pick from. Solo play was much much easier for some classes than others. I am not going to sugar coat it and say "Oh yes everyone can solo fine!", that wasn't the case. Specific classes such as the Necro it was cakewalk for. There also were some classes I have never seen in any game that really were very fun.

Listed here are the three Realms and the classes available to each, as you can see for yourself the list is large.

Races
Albion: Avalonian, Briton, Half-Ogre, Highlander, Inconnu, Saracen, and the Korazh.

Hibernia: Celt, Elf, Firbolg, Lurikeen, Shar, Sylvan, and the Graoch.

Midgard: Dwarf, Frostalf, Kobold, Norseman, Troll, Valkyn, and the Deifrang

Classes
Albion: Armsman, Cabalist, Cleric, Friar, Heretic, Infiltrator, Mauler, Mercenary, Minstrel, Necromancer, Paladin, Reaver, Scout, Sorcerer, Theurgist, and Wizard.

Hibernia: Animist, Bainshee, Bard, Blademaster, Champion, Druid, Eldritch, Enchanter, Hero, Mauler, Mentalist, Nightshade, Ranger, Warden, Valewalker, and Vampiir.

Midgard: Berserker, Bonedancer, Healer, Hunter, Mauler, Runemaster, Savage, Shadowblade, Shaman, Skald, Spiritmaster, Thane, Valkyrie, Warlock, and Warrior.

PvP offers group, battlegroup and solo. Realm versus Realm is the main focus of Dark Age of Camelot however on the Co-Op server you can opt out of this play style if you chose to.

Graphics
I want to go over the graphics even though I have mentioned them a bit. This game is older but it really does have lovely graphics. If you are into the Warcraft type look of a game it is similar to that. The castles were impressive, I wish I had all of my screen shots still to show off! My computer quit on me around this time and I lost everything.

Anyhow, the graphics of course can run on low end computers. Don't take this as the game looks like junk, it doesn't.

Community
Did I brag on the community enough yet? The people in this game were great. I feel bad that I lost out on such a wonderful game community when I quit playing. After my computer gave up on me I didn't play anything for many months. I just never made it back to Camelot.

The people were kind, helpful, and the guild I joined was so generous to me. However they spoon fed me so much that when I was close to reaching the top level I still didn't know my way around some places very well on my own. That took some learning, wandering around. So if you ever play, make sure to explore on your own also to get to know your way around. It's easy to get lost in this vast game.

Expansions and some thoughts.
The game offers seven expansions of which two are available to download free. No new expansions have come out in quite a few years.

This game has a rather older UI, if you can get past that it's pretty fun. The interface is dated, it's not unplayable, the game as a whole has a steep learning curve. Some classes more than others. You can get lost easily, learning the game and your way around takes some time. If you are as lucky as I you will meet people who can help you out with things, there are channels where you can ask questions also.

I thought this was a good solid game, it's at time a grind. What game isn't though? Travel in it is not too bad but you have to know where to go which sometimes can be confusing. Learning all this comes with time. If you are looking for something out of the norm, a good community with tons of charm you may want to give this one a try.

I like to talk about older less mainstream games that I think are worth mention, still worth playing. This is surely one of them. Mythic had some good direction with this game, it was definitely way before it's time in the way of PvP. While it is still updated regularly it seems it has fallen on the back burner at times. However it is still alive and kicking!

Interested? Some links to help you find your way!

Official Website
You can check out the website here if you are interested. There is a 14 day free trial, however if does require a valid credit card to be entered.

Class guide
Also one of the best class guides I have found would be Classes of Camelot.

Wiki
Also there is a Wiki which holds much information that I just wasn't able to cover. You can find it here.

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I probably won't be adding another review until late next week, keep checking in if you are interested in some older titles! -kaozz

What I've been playing (MMO)... and a go at the PS3.

Often as I complain about this or that in WoW it's still my main squeeze. I finally got around to patching it yesterday after being quite lazy and waiting around to do so. I have been really enjoying the Brewfest daily boss fight. So far I've got a ton of trinkets.. and a Direbrew's Remote for my Priest and Paladin. Makes life so much easier to port straight to the boss.

Other than that I've just been puttering around in game still trying to decide if I want to transfer one of my horde to alliance for a change. I played quite heavily on the alliance at one time so sometimes I miss the cities. No luck with a guild still as I don't play as much as I was. I think finding a guild would make the playtime more rewarding. I just have to find one I'm willing to log on for on a regular basis.

Aion of course my shiny new toy, I haven't had much time to play this one the last couple of days, I hope to spend some time on it this evening unless something comes up. I've had a lot of fun so far, I am taking my time with it. I came across some quick tips for Aion at Massively earlier which I thought were very helpful.

I want to play this game and stick with it as it's such a nice game. However I'm thinking about trying another class possibly. I adore the Spiritmaster class but there's a few things that bug me about it. My pet got taunt at level 13, yay! The thing is.. I have to cast it AND it has a cast time. Kind of annoying. Same thing with the pets special attack. I have to stop my dps rotation to cast that as well. I think the pet class needs a bit of fine-tuning in that area, if you ask me.

Other than that some of the quests objectives are harder to find so I have been checking out this site to help speed some of them up. I am still having fun with it, it's a great game. I'm very interested in how end game will be.

My brothers brought by the PlayStation 3 last night and decided it would be funny to watch me try to play it. They wanted to pick out a scary game that would make me jump, lol, and turned off all the lights so I couldn't even tell which button was what. So after they showed me how to use the controls I gave it a go on the game Fear 2.

I NEVER play console games. My son use to try to make me play Halo on the 360 and I was useless on it lol. The last time I can remember sitting down and avidly playing a console would be the PS for the Tekken series. Oh I loved me some Tekken!

Anyhow it was fun we all had a bunch of laughs as I tried to use both analog sticks to control moving and turning. I shot everything else but the mobs, my husband was rolling at how bad my aim was. All those buttons.. it was some getting use to. I ran into walls and was prompted with "No turn around, go left!" Watch out for the ghost!" Um will it hurt me? However it was quite fun to give it a go. So far I've seen some pretty interesting games and really like the PS3. It's probably not for me as a gamer, but it might be something I'd play on occasion. In the end it was not so scary because everyone kept laughing at my playing ;)

All in good fun. We'd like to get one for Christmas for my son so I thought it would be fun to try it out and everyone loves to laugh at how bad I play it. My hands are molded to a keyboard not a controller. Busy weekend so that's what I've been up to with my gaming.

"Which button is triangle, it's so dark in here I can't see it!!" -kaozz

A New Everquest?! ..and WoW the five year old juggernaut.. among other interesting things.

A NEW EQ?!!
I recently had someone mention to me they heard there was an Everqest 3 in the works. I chuckled to myself, and said yeah right. I don't ever seeing that happening. I just might have to eat those words. I don't mind that one bit if it's the case ;) But I am sure it will be a wait for hearing more on that.

Zam/Allakhazam has it posted up on their site(s). I recently got around to seeing it, so the news isn't new. I do check out many other sites quite often and I saw this mentioned, just thought I would look into it. I try to keep up on things but sometimes things get past me, so no this isn't anything new.

While there is no big news with S.O.E. on it, here is a quote from the 10th Anniversary EverQuest Book written by Rusel DeMaria and Paul Lipscombe: "So you can see there's a lot to wrestle with as we begin laying the foundation for EverQuest 'Next.' As I write this, we have concept artists and game designers working hard in our studio-taking the lessons of the past, the best parts of the present and the most promising ideas for the future-to bring the world of Norrath to a new generation of players, as well as the dedicated legions of fans who made the EverQuest franchise timeless. I hope we'll see you there."

So all we can do is wait and hope for the best. As much as I liked EQ2 it wasn't a game to hold me like the original. If they were to do another, lets hope it is more like the original. It could be console based, who knows. If that was the case it would not be of interest to me, sorry I'm not much on console games unless my son badgers me into playing.

Speaking of EQ2, Shards of Destiny patch was released today. Some cool things along with it.

Chronomagic.
This works similarly to mentoring except:You do not need a mentoring target.You can only choose levels in increments of 5.You do not receive the bonuses granted from mentoring other players.

Player houses have been given an extra room!

Achievements
"The new achievement system gives players a fun new way to track their accomplishments! Most achievements will award players with achievement points that can be used to compare their progress against other players. Some harder to complete achievements will offer non-stat item rewards. The basic categories are General, Dungeons, Exploration, Player vs. Player, Quests, Raids, Tradeskills and Triumphs. Triumphs are large scale achievements that combine multiple achievements into one large one. An example of this would be to do all of the combat, quest, and exploration achievements in a specific area."

Currently there's some cool in-game events, but I'm not currently active, if I do play one of the two EQ games anymore I prefer the original. That's just me. Definitely good stuff there though.

More and more new games!
So it seems on the horizon we have DC Universe, yet another comic book style game. I'm not sure if I could stomach playing any more super heroes in the near future. I have my hands full with Champions Online. I suppose this will be the first to use real super heroes we all know and love. This is also a S.O.E. game.

Star Trek Online. This could be a Trekkie's dream game. I'm not into the space type MMORPG. But it is nice to see different types popping up. They are currently accepting closed beta applications. So head over there if you're interested. Think I will have to pass on that.

However.. I am interested in SWTOR. When I was five I had a pair of R2-D2 Underoos I ran around in the house with lol. I have always been a Star Wars fan so this game holds some interest to me. Not much news lately though :( If you have not checked out the current classes you can check them out here.

The three new releases in the MMORPG Genre, how are they doing?

Champions is doing well, they recently had another patch to smooth out some kinks such as retcon costs. A free retcon is being granted to all characters created before September 22nd, 10AM UTC. More money will be dropping off mobs and from quests to help resolve the problem. I am glad to know they are keeping in touch with the players issues.

Fallen Earth did an overhaul on the female character's faces due to player request. It seems the females were not so easy to distinguish from the males. They do indeed look better IMO. You can check out some pics and more info on Massively. They also had another patch today, the full notes included; Fixed a server lockup due to actor generators. Fixed some cases where events would not update correctly.

Aion is booming obviously ;) While I have had a really easy time logging in with (HAHAHA NO QUEUE TIMES... sorry had to say it), other servers have had horrible wait times. NCsoft has stated they are keeping tabs on it. I assume it will slow down in time, I remember waiting up to 2-3 hours to log into WoW in the past when servers started getting full. Only time will tell if they will need to expand on servers, for now it is best to wait and see on this I suppose. I remember logging into WAR and not seeing more than two people before the server merges.

Speaking of server merges..
Recently SWG had server merges. This is a good thing. A game of it's age begins to need the servers merged. It helps with the community and finding more players to do things with. It does not mean "OMG THE GAME IS DYING!111" It's something that happens to a lot of older games. With the exception of one.. Before I go onto that route, I did notice SWG has a buddy/recruit system in place with rewards. Sweet.

Back to what I was saying.. Actually the game six years old, about a year older than WoW which I just noticed. But then again WoW is the juggernaut of the MMORPG industry currently. So neither is old when compared to Ultima or EQ, still not spring chickens.

Every game out now is trying to compete with a five year old game. I surely hope S.O.E. comes out with guns blazing on Everquest 'Next'! How ironic would it be for EQ to take the lead again? Oh one can dream right?

I have played two out of the three new releases (Aion and Champions), and constantly I see people talking about WoW. Compare it to WoW, ask if there are options for this or that like WoW. Is the PvP like WoW.. and so on. The chat is constantly flooded with talk of WoW either it being good or a random STFU and go back to your WoW fanboi!

It is still there, an imposing game, in a world where new games are trying to get footing. If Blizzard had any common sense they would take note that they are still in the lead and keep people interested with (yes, I am going to say it..) NEW CONTENT on a bigger scale with expansions.

Had Cataclysm come out this year instead of next would I have gone to other games? I highly doubt it. I do want to see other games prosper, it's so nice now to have more choices. Then again if Everquest used all the resources they put into EQ2 on EQ would I have left? Maybe, maybe not. I still miss the game, I just don't miss many things about it.

So Blizzard could try to top it's own game like S.O.E did and possibly fall off the top.. or top themselves. Nostalgia holds a lot of power, while newness fades quickly. Or they could get their arses in gear and start doing things to keep players.

Also I wanted to give a /salute to ixobelle the lonesome hero.


And thats all I have to say for now ;)
-kaozz

Free Realms, RoM and some Kung fu Fighting WoW Style!

This video is from Boubouille of MMO-Champion. I just love this little guy! I'm wondering how he will be obtained. I surely want to get my hands on one! Waiting eagerly for the patch to come out!
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Free Realms 5mil celebration event.
Take a Spin and See What You Can Win!! To celebrate the 5,000,000th registered player in Free Realms, a special 5M Party Wheel is available for a limited time. Log in each day and celebrate with your friends using the crazy fun party items. To participate you must log in to Free Realms between September 16, 2009 and September 23, 2009.

So it seems FR hit 5 million registrations! I just might have to log in for the celebration. It's been awhile since I checked the game out, been waiting around on the housing to check that out when it's released.
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Runes of Magic released it's new patch "The Elven Prophecy" yesterday. It offers their new race and class. I will definitely be checking this out soon.
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Just a few things I thought were worth mention today ;)
-kaozz