Almost 61...

I have been switching back and forth between playing my baby blood elf warlock and Cuppycake (my 60 priest). So far, I'm absolutely loving Hellfire Peninsula. Other than the blinding orange color, the art is fantastic. I've been running around doing quests, reading the storylines and exploring. THIS is what MMO's are to me. The exploration part of the game is incredible, its unfortunate that it has to end at some point. I'm leveling BEYOND slow. I'm almost about to ding 61 and I've done one Ramparts instance run with my guild.

I am a little overwhelmed with the vast number of quests there are in HP though. Its almost ridiculous and a little EQ2-newbie esque in the amount of piddly quests. What ever happened to epiclength quest lines that take me on a massive exploration? I want a quest that leads me around the zone, makes me think, introduces me to a lot of lore all at once. Something that gives me xp and gold on the way up and results in a nice upgrade at the end. I mean don't get me wrong, its nice to have plenty to do....but I wish they eliminated the sheer amount of quests and instead turned some into chain quests.

All in all, I'm having a blast with WoW. I know that it will end when I reach 70 which is why I am taking my sweet time on the way up. But for now, this is the reason that I love MMO's.

WoW Signed XPS Laptops on Ebay.

For a current price tag of $5,250, one could be yours! They look pretty sweet, and of course the specs are pretty fabulous....but I don't see how any laptop could be worth that much at the rate they go obsolete. And besides - is it THAT amazing to have a laptop signed by the Dell founder and Rob Pardo? I can think of far better ways to spend $5250. And I'm thinking a brand new shiny gaming PC with a couple 8800GTX's. Mmmm.....

WoW Player Housing - A Reality?

Although promised at the game's launch, I honestly didn't think we'd ever get to see the day when WoW incorporates player housing. However, according to this interview on MTV.com with Jeff Kaplan, it seems like its going to become a reality in the future. Seriously, if Blizzard implements housing in WoW -- it might as well seal the deal for me.

My favorite aspect of Everquest II is the ability to have my own house. There is nothing more fulfilling to me than being able to have a place to call my own - complete with extra storage, pets, and my own decorations. Its also so exciting to be able to collect artifacts from completing quests, trophies from defeating notable NPC's and books explaining the lore of the game....and have a place to store all these things!

I think that Blizzard really has the potential to do player housing correctly if they really put the time and effort into developing it into something the playerbase will find unique and useful. Some ideas that I feel could really make player housing amazing in WoW are the following:

• Trophies from the arenas - earn so many points, gain trophies to boast of your success.
• Dragon heads. There are lots of dragons, lets see Onyxia's head on the wall.
• Guild housing and also arena team housing.
• Ability to use guild housing as a recruitment tool (such as EQLive's guild recruitment bulletin board.)
• Pictures to hang on the wall that depict notable events - First level 70, first guild to kill X mob, AQ gate opening, etc.
• Shared housing among accounts, or among friends.
• Added rested experience if you log off in your house?
• Pubs and taverns that are character owned!! This is a huge roleplaying idea that could be really immersive and fun.

The only thing I don't care for is how in EQ2 everyone clicks the same door yet zones into their own inn room. I know that with the number of WoW players it would be near impossible to have a house for everyone - but perhaps guilds can have their own neighborhoods? For example, I'll zone into the village for my guild and everyone will have different houses. We'll be able to customize the outside of the houses (OMG Xmas decorations?!??) and perhaps hang notes on our door telling people where we are - "Sorry, I'm not home right now...I'm out exploring in Hellfire Peninsula right now!" How fun could that be?

Lets just say - the day that housing is introduced in WoW, I will be there.

Sorry - you're not 30: No games for you!

Apparently there is a law in the process of being attempted to pass in New York that is intending to prevent anyone under 30 from purchasing games that contain the following: drug use, illegal activity, suicide, sexual violence, racism, or religious violence. Well shit, ebay transactions are going to go through the roof. Really though - 30? At 21 we're old enough to drink, drive, vote, gamble at casinos, go to bars and nightclubs/strip joints, rent whatever movies we want...but we can't purchase video games? I'd say the chances of this one passing are as slim as VG:SoH getting 500,000 subscribers.

The Burning Crusade Launch.

As expected, my weak self couldn't resist the luscious appeal of a sexy blood elf. I had to make one, and decided on playing a warlock this time around. I have played her up to level 10; and while this isn't remarkably fast leveling (in fact its awfully slow) I have been doing my best to explore every inch of the environment and read into the quests. So far, I'm enjoying this newbieland better than any of the other races thus far. I am satisfied with the amount of quests and the fact that its not quite as linear as other starting areas have been. I am stumbling across quest givers and lore in all directions, and I really enjoy the overall feel of Quel'Thelas so far. The quests do a great job of introducing the race's history with the sunwell's destruction by Arthas and Kel'Thuzad, and the separation of the High Elves from Blood Elves.

Ner'Zhul as a server has been relatively stable from what I've seen. I've been hearing from my guild that they have been experiencing more lag in the Outlands. While I've been playing I have only ran into one server restart and it was fairly quick and painless. I am hearing lots of reports of crashing servers, rollbacks, massive lag, and 1000+ queues. I am glad I don't have to deal with that monstrosity on Ner'Zhul. So far, its been a decent launch for me - and I look forward to exploring and growing with Psymetry more! =)

Number one.

Well this is the first post of what I hope will be an active blog filled with my thoughts on latest gaming news. I don't anticipate that I will have much to say, but I find that my other blog I maintain is predominately personal information and it feels weird to mix MMO/gaming news with this. I don't claim to be extremely knowledgeable about MMO production or design by any means - but I am a gamer and I know what I like. I hope that I gain a few readers and make a few connections. Welcome to my new blog everyone. =)