Return to Star Wars Galaxies

About a week ago I got an email from my good friends at Sony Online. It seems they want me back in the online game Star Wars Galaxies.

I quit the game about a year ago, but in truth I hadn't played for a good six months or more before that. I really loved that game when I first started. I've always sucked at video games, but this was the perfect game for me. It was structured in such a way that you didn't need to be "twitchy" to enjoy it. It wasn't all about having a fast trigger finger and looting corpses. There was many a night in which I never fired a weapon. Instead I often spent hours surveying the land for raw materials, setting up harvesters, crafting clothes, food and medicines and selling my wares in the public bazaar. I really enjoyed that.

Sometimes I just liked to go sightseeing. You got badges for visiting famous sites, so I visited Ben Kenobi's house, the Lars homestead, the escape pod of R2 and 3PO, etc.

And when I did feel like fighting, that was fun too. One of my favorite spots was a place nicknamed Creature Village, located on a Corellian moon. I would go out there either solo or with a few buds and we'd take up sniper positions and tag the giant sludge panthers that roamed the abandoned city's streets. On a good night you could quickly level up in marksmanship, medical and brawling skills.

Ah, the good old days.

Then they fucked it up.

They decided to change the combat system. Why? I don't know. Suddenly, creatures I could kill solo a week before -- like a bantha -- were kicking my ass. My armor no longer offered the same protection. I was forced to drop some skills. And so on. People started grumbling, then people started leaving. My friends dropped off one by one.Sony tried to appease people by making it easier to be a Jedi, but that unbalanced the game. Not to mention that in a game set in the Imperial era, it made to freaking sense to have Jedi and padawans openly chilling in cantinas or chopping people down in the street.

I eventually quit, really for economic reasons, both in the game and out. $16 a month wasn't really a lot, but it certainly could be used elsewhere, especially since months would go by without me logging on. In the game, the economy was haywire. I couldn't make a living selling clothes, weapons and armor anymore through the bazaar and finding a place to set up a store was tough. Withing the first two months of the game coming online, the main cities were ringed with a perimeter of fancy player-built malls. Since I was primarily a street vendor, I was shut out. I thought about cutting a deal with some guys to put up a vending machine in their mall, but I couldn't deal with the politics of joining a guild. Let me tell you, I learned more about economics through SWG than I ever did in any class.

So, now Sony wants me back. When I quit they said that my characters would be deleted after 90 days, but they lied. The characters are still there. They're offering me 21 days free. What the hell -- I'll do it. I always regretted not taking more screen captures of the nice scenery, so at the very least, I'll do that.

I wonder if my house on Dantooine is still there or if it fell into disrepair and was condemned?

We'll see.

BTW, I hate to admit it, but I'm psyched about the Lord of The Rings Online game debuting in April. Yes, I'm sure I'll regret that one too.

A Wii Workout: When Videogames Hurt

From the Wall Street Journal:

A videogame maker has finally succeeded in getting kids off the couch and moving around. But the new approach is turning out to be more exercise than some players bargained for.

These surprisingly vigorous workouts are being triggered by Nintendo's new Wii videogames. The Wii game console, which went on sale last weekend, competes with Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Sony's new PlayStation 3. One of the Wii's distinguishing features is a motion-sensitive technology that requires players to act out their character's movements, wielding the game's controller like a sword or swinging it like a tennis racket.

The new console has been wildly successful, selling out at stores and winning high marks from critics and game buffs. But as players spend more time with the Wii, some are noticing that hours waving the game's controller around can add up to fairly intense exertion -- resulting in aches and pains common in more familiar forms of exercise. They're reporting aching backs, sore shoulders -- even something some have dubbed "Wii elbow."

"It's harder than playing basketball," says Kaitlin Franke, a 12-year-old from Louisville, Ky. She has been camped out in front of her family's TV, fine-tuning her bowling motion and practicing boxing footwork in two of the Wii's games. Almost immediately, she says, her right arm started to feel numb.

In Rochester, Minn., Jeremy Scherer and his wife spent three hours playing tennis and bowling, two of the games included with the Wii. Mr. Scherer says he managed to improve his scores -- at the cost of shoulders and back that were still aching the next day. "I was using muscles I hadn't used in a while," says Mr. Scherer, a computer programmer who describes himself as "not very active." Mr. Scherer is vowing nightly "Wii workouts" to get in better shape.

ROFL! I wonder if the sales will drop once word gets out how physically demanding the games are? Moreover, I wonder when the first lawsuits for Wii-related injuries will hit?

Read more...

PS3 Insanity

Sony’s PlayStation 3 went on sale at midnight on Friday. All over the country there were reports of people sleeping on sidewalks to be one of the first in line and people robbing the people who slept on the sidewalks (LOL!). And, of course, there’s the usual flurry of eBay activity whenever something is hot and the supplies are low.

I’ve seen a number of consoles offered up for $10k or so, only to go unsold, but here’s an auction that was actually completed. Somebody paid $15,000 for three consoles -- two 60GB and one 20 GB .

Maybe I’m the stupid one? Maybe next time one of these “must have” items comes out I should sleep on the concrete so I can get paid. When you think about it, that’s easy money.

But who are these people who are willing to pay ten times what the consoles are worth? Why do they do this when, if they just had a little patience, they could get the console five weeks from now for list price?

Beats me.

SWG: The Emperor isn't as forgiving as I am

SWG: Any illegal sympathizers or Jedi are to be shot on sight

SWG: From this day forward, no Rebel presence will be tolerated

SWG: I saw Vader on Naboo!!

SWG: Spice Warz

Okay, it was mildly amusing the first two times, but now I'm getting pissed.

I got busted AGAIN for spice last night on SWG. I was on my speeder bike heading out to empty my harvester for the first time in three days when I came across a patrol of stormtroopers outside of Theed.

I tried to skirt them but my friggin' computer was lagging badly and I heard the familiar, "Halt, citizen..."

So I tried to gun it, and guess what?

I went flying off my bike!

You know the rest -- I was searched, they found Neutron Pixie and sliced armor and they fined me, this time 1200cr.

Fuck these guys.

Gotta upgrade my CPU so I don't lag so bad and I can spot these guys before they spot me.

And, no, I'm not gonna stop selling spice. I make too much "lucci" selling to people who are too lazy to buy a crate.

Oh, and in other news, I finally completed a piloting mission. I shot down three TIE fighters with Nety, my Wookie character on the Corbantis server. I still suck, though.

SWG: Crash & Burn

I can't stay on SWG long enough to get in a good gaming session. I'm crashing constantly. In the last two days I have only been online long enough to check my cash flow and put some more Muon Gold on the market.

I've made 32K credits or so this week, but I'm running low on Muon Gold. I need to go out to one of the malls and get a few crates. I also need to empty my harvester! It may be full now.

Is it my computer? Is it my video card? I don't want to buy any new hardware. Sigh!

SWG: Open Letter to the Stormtroopers

Dear Stormtrooper:

Was it really necessary to bust me twice this weekend on Star Wars Galaxies? The people who buy Neutron Pixie only use it for medicinal purposes. I think the 1300 credit fine was harsh, but you'll be happy to know, I made it back in twenty minutes.

I noticed you were nowhere to be seen when those four jedi sliced open a guy in front of the spaceport?

Signed,

"Spice Girl" of Naboo