[Column] Landmark: My Wife and the Unlikely Hero of Landmark

SBFord

My wife loves to game, but she doesn’t like MMORPGs, as a rule. So finding an MMORPG that we can play together has always been a frustrating process. Me, I’ll play anything. An entire generation of milquetoast WoW-rehashes and Korean grindfests imported via Google Translate have lowered my expectations to basically rock bottom. My wife, however, has standards. And she’d like to tell you 5 things, just 5 things, which really piss her off…

Read more of Scott Collins' My Wife & The Unlikely Hero of Landmark.

TwoPiArrrr

~9% of males (~50% of the population) plus ~0.4% of females (~50% of the population) equals ~4.7% of the total population.

 

(9/100)*(1/2) + (0.4/100)*(1/2) = (9/100 + 0.4/100)*(1/2) = (9.4/100)*(1/2) = (9.4/200) = (4.7/100) = 4.7%

 

Not that that invalidates the color blindness argument... bad math just bothers me is all... carry on.

ITPalg

Usually patch notes are just a link click away on the launcher anyway.

Arskaaa

Originally posted by DMKano

Yeah tried this with my wife - she said "that's awful".

Oh well I still play Landmark once in a blue moon - combat so far is meh

Not sure what happened recently but my Landmark fps went to crap - used to get 40+ fps, now I'm dropping to 20 near claims (i7, 16GB 770gtx)

Landmark is in a bad need of an optimization pass.

same here. had before 40+ fps and no game is 20 fps:/ guess i need buy new pc when EQN is released.

gberkhof

I fully intended to read the article i really did, but after your first paragraph... Pics Plz

Moanalisa

Right on!  Your wife hit the nail on the head with MMO's.   Is it possible to really make an innovative MMO which overcomes these issues?

Andrii

Originally posted by gberkhof
I fully intended to read the article i really did, but after your first paragraph... Pics Plz

I wondered how many comments it would take for this post to appear

Andrii

Originally posted by Arskaaa

same here. had before 40+ fps and no game is 20 fps:/ guess i need buy new pc when EQN is released.

On the new Blueprint, optimization is #1. That's what they plan on spending September doing.

Pepeq

How about having your wife write the article... this thing read more like your views than hers.  I doubt these are her words... female gamers tend to approach games very differently then men do, but this article smelled of 100% testosterone, which makes me believe it's not her words at all.

Andrii

Originally posted by Pepeq
How about having your wife write the article... this thing read more like your views than hers.  I doubt these are her words... female gamers tend to approach games very differently then men do, but this article smelled of 100% testosterone, which makes me believe it's not her words at all.

My wife and I sat down and wrote the whole together after I had her brainstorm 5 topics for me. It was a collaborative process. We actually fought about a few passages here and there.

Zodos

Yeah...my wife doesn't like mmos either, only the "easy ones", the ones without the grindfest and with a lot of features like auto path, auto chain, etc...

st3v3b0

Originally posted by TwoPiArrrr

~9% of males (~50% of the population) plus ~0.4% of females (~50% of the population) equals ~4.7% of the total population.

 

(9/100)*(1/2) + (0.4/100)*(1/2) = (9/100 + 0.4/100)*(1/2) = (9.4/100)*(1/2) = (9.4/200) = (4.7/100) = 4.7%

 

Not that that invalidates the color blindness argument... bad math just bothers me is all... carry on.

This ^-^ and this is assuming ALL 4.7% are even interesting in PC games or MMO's.

Wizardry

Originally posted by Moanalisa
Right on!  Your wife hit the nail on the head with MMO's.   Is it possible to really make an innovative MMO which overcomes these issues?

FFXI was challenging right out of the hop,no waiting around to be challenged.Normal mobs in the open world can be as challenging as other games so called BOSS fights.

FFXI used ZERO hand holding markers,none on maps no ? over npc heads.

FFXI's UI was HIDDEN and NOT cluttering up the screen, very few if any other games have done that.It also thrives on macros which YOU get to enter the commands to have them perform as you want and of course remain hidden until you want to call them up.

As for graphics,i found FFXI's to be better than Wow and the game was made for PS2.Not better technically but better because Blizzard did nothing to make the graphics look good,at least in FFXI the textures were MUCH better and the global lighting was better because it kept every bit of detail bright so i could see it and enjoy it.I hate games where i can't see ANY detail because it is all gray dark and gloomy.But NO FFXI did not have great graphics but the article did touch on the NOW and FFXIwas not made for the NOW it was made for 12 years ago.

How this whole article came across to me was nothing more than someone making it sound like Wow was the best and every other game is copying it in a poorer fashion,that is what i got from this if reading between the lines.I read soooooooo many articles and it always seem like everyone is just a WOW player and know VERY little of the "other games".Instead they look at the Wow copy cat games with budgets under 10 million and try to make it sound like the industry is weak when compared to Wow.

 

 

Andrii

Originally posted by Wizardry

How this whole article came across to me was nothing more than someone making it sound like Wow was the best and every other game is copying it in a poorer fashion,that is what i got from this if reading between the lines.I read soooooooo many articles and it always seem like everyone is just a WOW player and know VERY little of the "other games".Instead they look at the Wow copy cat games with budgets under 10 million and try to make it sound like the industry is weak when compared to Wow.

For what it's worth, both my wife and I hate WoW (although we enjoyed it immensely at one point).

MagikarpsGhost

Originally posted by Br3akingDawn
Wildstar is already dying... every server is low pop with maybe exception of pergo hitting medium at peak hours.... it doesnt matter anymore to rush to endgame, not enough people to do 40mans on most server.

and here is a wildstar is dyeing post woo. when will you morons learn that their servers can hold more people then those of your typicle mmo. i play on the RP server and honestly i see people in every map. and no not 1-2 people im talking groups of them. Its the pvp servers that are low and that is because they are burnt out with trolling one another.

Xyire

Originally posted by jircris

Originally posted by Br3akingDawn
Wildstar is already dying... every server is low pop with maybe exception of pergo hitting medium at peak hours.... it doesnt matter anymore to rush to endgame, not enough people to do 40mans on most server.

and here is a wildstar is dyeing post woo. when will you morons learn that their servers can hold more people then those of your typicle mmo. i play on the RP server and honestly i see people in every map. and no not 1-2 people im talking groups of them. Its the pvp servers that are low and that is because they are burnt out with trolling one another.

The pvp servers are not the ones hurting.  Pergo - the most populated server - is a pvp server.

Unknown

this is a pretty fun game, it is getting better once they add monsters and other dangers. And well, we can help build EQNext with our creations.

 

There are a lot of twitchtv streams, that will show a lot about the game and the streamers will explain and teach anything if asked nicely.

 

 

Greymantle4

Try Terraria my wife loves it we have many hours together playing it. My wife tried Landmark and thought it was pretty bad so that is a no go. We have yet to try Minecraft were waiting on a sale that never seems to happen.

Ariel_Arilon

Well, we now know what irks her (I have my own grocery list), and you DID want to know "why".

Quote:
"So let’s see if we can figure out why. In my next article, we’ll talk to my wife about SOE’s new game."

For God's sake don't ask her to try yet another game, instead ask her to read my short blog posts, "Stripping for Game Developers" and "Dwarves in Micro Skirts".

I should very much like to read her response to those 2 posts in this thread, just to make sure I'm not crazy or going through some kind of hormonal changes.

Just leave the chocolate and wine right there and back away slowly! ; )

Frammshamm

Originally posted by Pepeq
How about having your wife write the article... this thing read more like your views than hers.  I doubt these are her words... female gamers tend to approach games very differently then men do, but this article smelled of 100% testosterone, which makes me believe it's not her words at all.

do you make it a habit to know the smell that men's genitalia gives off?

Blessings

Sounds like you need some FFXIV in your life.

drtack1

Nice article, I enjoyed reading it and both agree and disagree with points made.  Cheers!

 

Scot

"In what other genre do players have to keep up with social media to get valuable information about their game of choice? If you said “only MMORPGs”, then you get a cookie. I play your game to… play your game, not alt-tab out every 5 minutes to check on a tweet, post in a forum, or watch a Twitch stream, or look at a tutorial on Youtube. Everything I need to play your game must be in your game."

In no other genre has this obsession gaming studios have with making their games a social media phenomenon as pushed down our throats as MMOs. This links in with dumbing down our games to make them the sort of games players on social media platforms like. Players are being used as a marketing tool for the game, when will they wake up to this?

Akumawraith

One thing I would add to this list is the "minimum system specs" required to play games...

This one feature I think has really hamstrung game design as we want everyone to play our games yet don't think of what is needed to improve them and hate to face the reality... You are friggin dreamin.

No matter what realm of delusion you happen to be sitting in, there is no way to cater to the masses and be fair about it. Not if you want the best damned game that changes the genre for the better. You want people to play a super bad ass MMORPG that is in your face and a game changer? Make it how its supposed to be and let the gamers figure out how they are going to play it.

This is how it all started with the gaming industry. Developers made the games, publishers put them out and players dished out the dough to make sure they could play them.

MagikarpsGhost

Originally posted by Xyire

Originally posted by jircris

Originally posted by Br3akingDawn
Wildstar is already dying... every server is low pop with maybe exception of pergo hitting medium at peak hours.... it doesnt matter anymore to rush to endgame, not enough people to do 40mans on most server.

and here is a wildstar is dyeing post woo. when will you morons learn that their servers can hold more people then those of your typicle mmo. i play on the RP server and honestly i see people in every map. and no not 1-2 people im talking groups of them. Its the pvp servers that are low and that is because they are burnt out with trolling one another.

The pvp servers are not the ones hurting.  Pergo - the most populated server - is a pvp server.

Actually according to devs its the RP server that has the most members then pergo sadly the other pve servers are not doing as well but still not empty, i have server hoped (spent about 100 bucks) to test the other servers, and its not as bad as people think. Though most end up not raiding or pvping due to the high level of difficulty and most new gen mmo players are use to having things handed to them. I did hear from a EU friend that only one or two servers are doing good for them the rest are beyond dead. Lets wait and see what this "new tech" they have been working on it..perhaps a rift or GW2 aspect of shards/guesting?

Jyli

Originally posted by st3v3b0

Originally posted by TwoPiArrrr

~9% of males (~50% of the population) plus ~0.4% of females (~50% of the population) equals ~4.7% of the total population.

 

(9/100)*(1/2) + (0.4/100)*(1/2) = (9/100 + 0.4/100)*(1/2) = (9.4/100)*(1/2) = (9.4/200) = (4.7/100) = 4.7%

 

Not that that invalidates the color blindness argument... bad math just bothers me is all... carry on.

This ^-^ and this is assuming ALL 4.7% are even interesting in PC games or MMO's.

+1 on being irked with that math :P But, i enjoyed the article nonetheless and agree with having colorblind support.  Also, the basis of statistics is to correlate percentages of a sample with an entire populace.  If 4.7% of the entire population is colorblind, it's reasonable to assume that approximately 4.7% of all gamers are colorblind.  Remember, not 100% of the population is interested in PC games either!