Professor Beej

I was just poking through Massively when I ran across quite the doozy of a news snippet.

Apparently, a group of indie developers, the Multiverse Foundation, are beginning work on what they hope will become a Firefly MMORPG.  I know what you’re thinking–OH-EM-GEE!–because I am, too.  But we have to be careful not to get out hopes up too high.

Like was mentioned in the comments of the original post, don’t hold out for your dream game here.  Don’t think it’s going to be the Firefly resurgence we’ve all waited for.  If it ever comes to fruition, there’s a good chance be like the Battlestar Galactica browser-MMO that I’ve never even bothered to install.  More likely than that, the IP will be denied.

Still a nice thought, though.

On the other hand, we Browncoats have to decide if we’d even want a Firefly MMO.  Much of the adoration of the franchise comes from the quirky characters, the appealing actors, and the tack-sharp dialogue.  The universe, the actual guts that would make up the game, while interesting in its sci-fi/western hybridity, is only set-dressing for the real content we love.  Without being able to watch Nathan Filion, Alan Tudyk, and the others’ shenanigans, would the game even feel like Firefly?

Keep an eye out, but my gut tells me this is about as likely as Fox suddenly giving us a second season.

Hello there, bandwagon. Mind if I hop on for a second?

My RSS feed is just chock-full of people writing their New Year’s posts, and I figure that I would follow suit. I’ve neglected this blog (and other projects) for too long, and this is a good way for me to outline my plans for the year.

Also, to discuss a slight reworking of the way I approach the blog.

So first thing’s first: the blogroll. I purged it.

Let me apologize to anyone who didn’t make it to my short list. It’s nothing personal. I figure that the blogs I link to ought to be the blogs I can’t keep myself from reading. The blogs I always read every word of.  Every entry, even if there’s a backlog.

There aren’t too many of those, but the few there are, are fantastic. In some way, they’re also all in some way inspiration for my new approach to Professor Beej in 2012.

• Terribleminds – Chuck Wendig is a penmonkey with enough wit and insight to either counter or enhance (depending on your preference) his foul-mouthed wordsmithy. He drops the f-bomb like he’s a postmodern Enola Gay with a quill, but that all part of the charm. His “25 Things” posts are fun, and he’s realistic about indie publishing, unlike many people. If you’re not reading him, start.
• Whatever – John Scalzi runs one of the longest-running blogs on the Internet. He’s been blogging almost daily since 1998, before most of us were even aware that blogging was a thing. He’s a hell of a writer, and he drops a lot of writerly advice. The thing is, he also posts pictures of his cats, talks about politics and religion, and in general, says whatever he damn well wants. I’ve found more good reads from his “The Big Idea” series than I have almost anywhere. He’s a smartass and more than a little knowledge of the industry, practical knowledge. Keep your eyes open.
• Bio Break – Syp has it all figured out. The man balances being a full-time gamer, writer, and father in ways that I cannot even begin to fathom. He always stays positive about his life and his hobbies, which is a unique, shining spot in the MMO blogosphere. He updates all the time, even if it’s just a neat picture from his current game of choice or a quote from a good article to show its author some link love. If you game online, drop yourself into any kind of avatar, and like to support all-around nice guys, keep up with Bio Break (and his columns over at Massively).
• Tobias Buckell Online – One thing I like from an author is candor. If someone shoots me straight, they have my respect. Tobias shoots straight about writing and publishing, posts neat videos and articles that pertain to all aspects of speculative fiction, and publishes more short fiction than anyone I know about. He experiments with media, and his own writing is just different enough from typical SF that if you don’t have an eye on him, you’re all but walking around blind.
• A Newbie’s Guide to Publishing - I don’t particularly like Joe Konrath, at least from what I read about him. He’s egotistical, full of himself, and his blog posts are full of so much rhetoric that he should be writing presidential campaign speeches. But I still read every blog he posts. Despite being sensational and over-the-top, there are nuggets of goodness that indie authors can glean from his stuff. However, go in with your bullshit detector at full-strength. He speaks in absolutes, and he’s good at it. Just be aware that whatever sounds too good to be true…
• We Fly Spitfires – Gordon’s a good guy. He doesn’t update his MMO blog nearly as often as he used to, but pretty much every time he does, there’s a good idea in the post. He plays a lot of games, and he writes about them with an analytical eye. Where most MMO bloggers fall into the fanboy/hater dichotomy, Gordon stays a realist. If he likes a game, there are reasons. If not, there are reasons. And they’re well explained and interesting to read.

There are other blogs I read, too. A lot of them. But not every post. I’m sure there will be link-love posts coming where I’ll highlight those, too, but for the time being, these are the ones you should really check out.

The Goals!

So, goals. Resolutions.

I hate these things. I always feel bad when something doesn’t work out, you know? I’ve squandered a lot of time this past year, had a lot going on, made excuses, yadda yadda yadda.

This year, I’m working on getting my head back on my shoulders, and here are a few ways I plan on doing that.

• Put the polish on Birthright and get it uploaded to various ebook distributors and start querying agents
• Work on a Kickstarter campaign to make that happen and pay for the myriad of self-publishing expenses that include, but are not limited to finding and paying a cover artist, a professional editor, a layout editor, formatter, and website designer.
• Write and finish at least 2 new short works–a faith-themed novella titled Where Angels Fear to Tread and a Birthright-universe story called “The First Day.”
• Over the summer, write the first draft of Lineage, a sequel to Birthright.
• More updates for the blog. They’ll probably be shorter, but about just about anything I want. I miss blogging, and I always have a lot of stuff to share, but not the most time to write a 1k-2k article about it. Hopefully, this will fix it.

So there it is, the new year and the new Beej. Here’s hoping it goes well for everyone.

On December 13th, I got up at 5:45am, turned on my computer, and waited to see if I was one of the lucky few who got in the first wave of early access to Star Wars: The Old Republic.

A few failed login attempts later, and I found out that I was. After a few frantic minutes of creating junk characters on multiple servers to save the three names I want to use for my primary characters (Damien, Lesser, and Beej on the server “Prophecy of the Five” if you care), I settled in for my first week of my next MMO.

And it was glorious.

SWTOR is not without its issues and bugs, but for the most part, I haven’t seen an MMO release with this much polish since 2004 when World of Warcraft sucked me away from Star Wars Galaxies. Even after just a week of early access, I can safely say that if BioWare allowed for lifetime subscriptions, I would snag one as soon as my free month runs out.

Your Own Saga

Taking a page from Syp’s book, I decided to play a single character until the level cap of 50 before even starting an alt. From the moment you start in SWTOR, you feel as though the entire game is about you.

Now, there are other people running around, and The Old Republic is very much an EverQuest/World of Warcraft-inspired themepark MMO, but the way BioWare structured the narrative, that doesn’t matter. This is Knights of The Old Republic 3 for all intents and purposes.

After 7 days of taking my sweet time, I’m level 30. The leveling has slowed down significantly over time, and the story has only ramped up. Just before the servers were taken down tonight, I hit level 30, finished chapter 1, and unlocked the Legacy system–which I’ll get to soon.

The end of Chapter 1 is intense to say the least, and it is certainly compelling me to keep playing. I find myself leaving planets before I run out of quests because I finish the class quests and want to move forward with them. I don’t think that will happen nearly as often now that I have unlocked my legacy and don’t have another narrative-oriented goal to work toward.

Overall, BioWare has done a great job implementing the story, and I fully intend eventually to go back to the planets I didn’t give my full attention initially–except for Balmorra. That place is a mudhole.

The Wyrmsbane Legacy

In Ultima Online, my character’s name was Damien Wyrmsbane. In EverQuest, it was Dammiienn. Star Wars Galaxies ushered in the days of Damiiyynn the Wookiee Jedi, and in World of Warcraft, my first character was a warlock named Wyrmsbane.

So you can see, being able to log on early and snag Damien on a few servers and eventually unlock The Wyrmsbane Legacy is just that–my old characters’ legacy continued into a new MMO.

I don’t know exactly what the whole system entails (here’s hoping for new race/class combos so we can have Chiss with Lightsabers), but now all of my characters on “Prophecy of the Five” will have the surname Wyrmsbane, whether they’re Empire or Republic.

I’m very excited to see how BioWare expands the Legacy system in upcoming patches.

And just in case you’re wondering, the end of Chapter 1 unlocks the Legacy, which for Sith Inquisitors is right after the class quests on Alderaan. I assume other classes are similar.

Crafty McCrafterson

I hate crafting in MMOs. I can’t remember a game in which I’ve ever really enjoyed it. But in SWTOR, I don’t actually have to craft; my companions do it for me. All I have to say is “go do it” and 10-60 minutes later, they come back with loot of some kind.

Then I reverse engineer it (disenchant it, for emigants from Azeroth), learn the upgraded version of it, then send them out again to make the new and improved version. Then I repeat it until I can make the best version of that item (green, blue, purple progression).

Initially, you only get one companion. So you have to choose either to adventure without him or her or to craft. But once you get a ship, you get the failbot droid who you can send on missions while you bring your other companion with you. The more companions who join you, the more you can have out gathering and crafting for you.

But I warn you: crafting can get very expensive. I wouldn’t worry with it too much, as you will find replacements for the gear you can craft pretty regularly, but if you do it occasionally, you can get a decent Prototype (read: epic) item every few levels through reverse engineering.

Also, every character needs to take Slicing as a gathering profession. I don’t care if you think you want it or not. Take it. It’s just like you’re printing money. You send a companion (or companions) out for 2,000 credits. He or she comes back with between 1500 and 5,000 credits in a lockbox. Badabing Badaboom. Free money.

I don’t know how long the skill is going to stay like this, but right now, I’m riding the gravy train with the rest of the 1% and being able to buy pretty much anything I want whenever I want it. Riding skill for 40,000 credits at level 25? Easy. 210k riding training at 40? I had it before I was even 30.

Seriously, level Slicing. Thank me later.

Looking the Part

I decided to go with Empire for two reasons:

The first being that I thought the Sith Inquisitor storyline/voice acting was stronger than the Jedi Knight/Consular. The story is–initially, at least–full of more intrigue and politics, and that’s what I love.

The second reason was that I wanted to be a cool Darth-type character. I wanted to wear a hood and a mask that made me sound robotic like Vader or Malgus or even Revan. So I did my research, and after noticing what Dark Side Corruption looks like on various races, chose to make my guy a bald Sith Pureblood solely because of how it would look with a hood/mask.

And when I found my first mask…my hood went away. Oh, well, that’s no big deal, I’d rather have the hood. So I turn off my helm graphic and go about my merry way.

Then I find a half-mask on a vendor. It was Heavy Armor. Crap. Sith Inquisitors (or at least Sorcerers; I’m not sure about Assassins) can only wear Light Armor. I pop it into the item preview window anyway, and lo and behold, it shows up with the hood.

Cool!

But I can’t wear it. I look around, ask some folks, and the people from beta tell me that those masks don’t come in Light Armor. Not even moddable Light Armor.

So here I am, playing a character who looks a very specific way because of a costume, and I can’t get that costume. Lovely. I can’t even change the way my character looks to give him hair now. Even lovlier. I really hope they put in some kind of barber shop/image designer soon, or I’m going to be one unhappy man. #firstworldproblem or not, it’s irritating.

Problems, Bugs, and Issues

The graphics on this game are great. Really great. In fact, they’re so great, you probably will never get a chance to see them look great. There’s a nifty thread on Reddit’s r/swtor about running SWTOR on max graphics settings.

I took it’s advice, and what do I get? Pretty graphics that run at under 20fps whenever there’s anything going on. A few client_settings.ini tweaks later, and I’m doing just fine with my old 9800 GTX+. But there is still a good amount of lag when I hit the fleet and when I PvP.

I really hope that BioWare makes some improvements to the engine through patches and makes the game smoother for folks. Until then, it feels just a little clunky, but nothing games like RIFT and Warhammer Online haven’t also dealt with, too. In fact, Warhammer Online was much worse than SWTOR in terms of graphics issues.

Another issue that I haven’t experienced yet is the planet Taris has a quest tracking memory leak. I don’t know when a fix is going in, but until it is, I will be avoiding Taris except for my class quest.

Probably the biggest issue for me right now are the login queues. WIth times reaching upwards of 2 hours for some servers before the game even officially releases, I’m not exactly looking foward to seeing what they’ll look like in the coming days and weeks.

BioWare has said they are aware of the issue and are working on alleviating some of the waits, but that doesn’t seem to be happening. I wish they’d take RIFT‘s strategy and open up a ton of servers for launch and then allow free transfers or mergers once the tourist population drops to a sustainable level

I don’t care about the rhetoric about server communities and all that. I just care about being able to log in and play a game I pay for in the time I have to play it. I shouldn’t have to decide 2 hours early that I want to play a video game and then go prep for it. I just want to type in my info and go shoot lightning out of my hands.

The Force is Strong with this One

In the end, Star Wars: The Old Republic does exactly what it set out to do. It doesn’t do anything new with the MMO genre, but what it does, it does well. The emphasis on storytelling gives the genre a much-needed (for me, at least) boost of immersion and rates really highly on the Make-Me-Give-A-Damn-O-Meter.

I think I’ll definitely be sticking with this one for the long-haul, even if the end-game isn’t anything but raiding. The PvP is awesome, the crafting is actually fun, and any new story content that gets put in is just icing on the cake. With 8 individual class stories to play through, I don’t think I’ll be getting tired of SWTOR‘s main draw any time soon.

My WoW account expires in a few hours, and I just killed Deathwing and completed the Dragon Soul raid. I saw all of the content currently in the game, completed the story.  I’m done.  Finished.  I did everything I set out to do last December about this time.

And so, after seven years (I started on Malygos during release week of WoW in 2004), lots of friends, fun, and frustration, I logged out of Azeroth for the very last time.

So thank you, Blizzard, for the last seven years.  You made a good game.  A great game.  It’s just not the game for me anymore.

/logout

I don’t often comment on celebrity deaths, as I feel they get enough media attention, but when I read last night that Anne McCaffrey passed away, I felt that I had to write something short.

When I was in 7th grade, I had a hard time finding books. Being from a rural elementary school in Tennessee, our library was neither large nor well funded. However, we did have a librarian who cared enough to help me feed my voracious appetite for books–especially science fiction and fantasy.

One day, I walked in and saw three new books on the cart. Dragonsong, Dragonsinger, and Dragondrums by Anne McCaffrey. They were thin hardcovers, and the art depicted a girl with tiny dragons flying around her.

I had to read them.

And read them, I did. I finished up that trilogy, and then convinced my parents to drive me to the nearest bookstore (a little over an hour away), where they were good enough to buy me everything else that had McCaffrey’s name on it.

I read them all, too. I still have those same paperbacks on the bookshelf in my bedroom. I treasure them. I plan on giving them to my children when they’re old enough. They are artifacts that remind me of the first time that I ever fell in love with an author more than the story being told. I loved her writing. I loved her ideas. I loved her characters.

I can’t say that Anne McCaffrey changed my life. That would be melodramatic. I don’t know if those books changed my reading habits, made me a writer, or anything like that. I just don’t know.

I can say, though, that Anne McCaffrey had an impact on me. So thank you, Anne McCaffrey. Thank you.