Some interesting MMORPG newsbits for the MMORPGers...

New game on the horizon!

So, who's excited about this game? I know I am, boy howdy!

And...

A 'new' free game!

I'm not quite sure what their new buisness strategy is, but shadowbane is now free to play, it seems. This is apparently not a trial offer, either, but 'for real'. It wasn't the best game, but for free, it's not bad.

Thanks for the heads up on Shadowbane. I'll be checking it out for sure. I've always said the downfall of MMORPG's will be that no one can afford to play more than one or two of them at a time, and sooner or later the market for them will inevitably saturate and crash. If Ubisoft has found a free-to-play business model that works, I'm all for it, and they're my new favorite company for having the guts to do it. If it's successful, hopefully other companies will follow suit.

As for the Chinese communist game, all I can say is propaganda comes in all forms, sometimes scary, sometimes laughable (like the upcoming Batman vs. BinLaden sorry excuse for a comic book), sometimes amusing, and sometimes bewildering. By the description, that game sounds like a mix of all four. It's hard to put into words, the feeling that article gave me. I didn't know whether to laugh, scratch my head, or be deeply concerned.

well at least its a change from those FPS gorefests that help indoctrinate young republicans on the art of blowing muslims away and feeling good about it afterward

propoganda is fun, and the best is not recognized for what it is

(yes that was a pat on the back for Carl Rove)

America's Army is actually about the only FPS game I play... I can only find "rocket launchers" that fire like a machine gun and strange room-clearing weapons that somehow don't hurt YOU in the slightest fun for so long.

But not all FPS games are about killing muslims, Mulch...

Some are about killing germans! Those are even more fun.

my point was FPS help make you immune to the negative effects of blasting people at point blank range (like feeling bad about it)

which makes it easier to transition to meat puppet/cannon fodder for whatever invasion and occupation the war party has cooked up for us this week

Would you call America's Army Propoganda?

and for the record, I am not claiming FPS make people kill, only its an easier transition with that background to actual soldier, one must only go into video game mode

I don't exactly agree with this logic, myself. I would kill in self defense, or even to defend others, but do I think it would be 'easy' to live with myself for it? No, I think I would probably be permanantly traumatized. And I've played a lot of violent games.



Certainly! Not in the "We're your friends, trust the computer" type way, which is kinda the vibe I get from the commieMMORPG, but the army has always been very honest... its a recruitment tool, basicly. I think you could probably count on both hands the number of people that it has got to join the army, would be my gut feeling, and in the meantime... Hey, it's a damn fun game that my tax dollars payed for, so I'm going to play it.



Honestly, I doubt that to a large extent. "Real" soldiers in a "real" army aren't going to be living anything like a video game life... Most computer geeks would be horrified at the thought of 12 mile marches at 3 am, which a highschool friend of mine in the army now assures me happen with disturbing frequency at times.

As for the actual combat... Every book I've read from any war vetern that describes combat can be summed up in a very few ways... Mostly something to the effect of "lots of boredom, a few minutes of pure terror". The run-n-gun mentality a video game would condition a person to would only be good for meat-sheilds. I suspect any soldier who comes from an FPS background has just as much break-down and rebuilding in store for him as any other recruit.

maybe im wrong, I just know that for my taste, FPS are a little too violent and a little too up close and personal, kinda dehumanizing

and my first thought was Americas Army, although I could not remember the name until you brought it up

I find FPS games a wonderful valve for frustration. Grand Theft Auto isn't exactly a FPS, but I count it much the same... There's nothing so satisfying after six hours in Detroit traffic as to finally get home at 1 AM and take a minigun to a line of vans and SUVs.

I used to be kinda the same way about FPS games... Dunno what changed, I just realized one day that they weren't humans, just blobs of silly pixels. Nowadays I look at most FPS games kinda like a martial art... I appreciate them for the skill they take, not the gibs they show.

Well, I loved America's Army. Yea, it's a recruiting tool. But what I like about it is, No Team Killing for shits N giggles - that ruins many a game. You get shot, you're out - No respawn 10 seconds later. No bizarre, otherworldly weapons! And it actually takes some skill, patience & teamwork. You really DO have to work towards gaining a rank!

Now if I wanna go blast people away & not suffer any consequences, I'll go with other games like UT2K4, Postal 2 (SOooooo fun!), Half-Life2 Deathmatch, and Battlefield 2.

And playing these games don't make one a "perfect" killer. First I think you'd have to have that synapse in your brain already messed up. 2nd- just cuz you can pull a trigger doesnt mean you can deal with the after effects.

Of course not. There's no mouselook or WASD in RL.

What Democrats don't play video games?