[Mother 3 Fan Translation!]

As a big fan of the quirky SNES game Mother 2 (EarthBound in the States), I was hugely excited at the announcement of a sequel being made on the GBA. I was equally let down when, even after a fan letter campaign, Nintendo chose not to release it in english.

But never fear! The great folks at Starmen.net have finally finished their fan-translation of the game! If you loved the original EarthBound, you'll want to check this out. =)

[User-Created Content and the WoW Killer]

Tipa of West Karana has made a post about my own pet topic, user-created content, and ties it into the whole 'WoW-Killer' speculation discussion. And I agree, that the greatest threat to WoW would be a game of equal quality that also allows players to customize their own experiences. The Shut Up, We're Talking podcast has a great segment on it and on the feasibility of freeform user-creation in MMOs and the future of content in the genre.

[The RL Grind]

I've talked about this before, how the continued emphasis on heavily-scripted game content instead of developing tools for user-created content is a bad thing for WoW. Basically, that the constant race to create new scripted content for people who chew through it 100x faster than it can be produced is a destructive, unwinnable cycle. A quote from a recent interview with Frank Pierce has confirmed my opinion:

Question: How interesting has it been for you to watch the success of World of Warcraft?

Frank Pearce: I don't know if I'd describe it as "interesting" as much as exhausting. We've got almost 3000 employees worldwide now, and the majority of that growth is due to the success of World of Warcraft.

As a company we've found ourselves spread very, very thin - because the World of Warcraft community has a voracious appetite for content. That development team is 130 people, they're working on content patches, they're working on an expansion set, they've got their hands full - and then we've got the other development teams that we need to continue to support as well.

So it's great, it's a great problem to have, but it is a lot of work. We've learned a lot, made a lot of mistakes along the way. It's been good experience for us, I wouldn't say that we've regretted it... but "interesting" isn't how we'd describe it necessarily.

And they can't ever lessen the breakneck pace, until they shift the focus of their development to longer-lived mechanics that allow people to make their own content and experiences. As long as WoW players are stuck waiting for handouts from Blizz for their fun, that 'real life grind' won't end, and I worry about potential burnout of the devs.

[Hardcore Gone Haywire]

Holy gawd... one of the strongest bosses in FFXI, Pandemonium Warden, held a hardcore raiding guild at bay for over 18 hours:

A linkshell (guild) called Beyond the Limitation recently faced off against Pandemonium Warden over an 18 hour period, but the NM was still going strong. The NM shapeshifts into multiple forms, making it even more of a challenge to defeat; Beyond the Limitations fought Pandemonium Warden through twenty of his possible forms, some of which took hours to kill. Pet Food Alpha, a Final Fantasy XI community site, quotes a member of Beyond the Limitation stating: "People were passing out and getting physically ill. We decided to end it before we risked turning into a horrible new story about how video games ruin people's lives.

Yeah... that's a little too 'hardcore' for me. I'd almost think the encounter has to be bugged -- no sane dev would think a boss that takes days of nonstop combat to defeat is in any way a legitimate design.

[Multiple Personalities in the Gaming Community]

The Escapist does a great write-up wondering why 'the Troll' is such a popular online persona for many gamers:

"It's difficult to play popular shooters like Halo or Team Fortress 2 on public servers without encountering racial or homophobic slurs. On websites that cater to gamers, visitors routinely spam comment threads and message boards with unhinged, bigoted troll posts. Our self-contradictions become more obvious as gaming matures and absorbs more people into the fold. The ubiquity of intolerant language and belligerent behavior raises troubling questions about what truly lies behind the mask of online identity."

[The Relationship Dynamic in 'Braid']

A fascinating discussion on the time-bending game Braid, and how it deals with the old Princess/Rescuer plot device. What message is the story trying to convey? It's not exactly clear, but very thought-provoking nonetheless.

(Spoiler warnings in effect for those who haven't played it yet.)