It Happened

So here we are Wednesday is here which means it is the middle of the week and it is time for me to make a list. Now what is the list about this week? Well for awhile I have been asked to do a list about the worst things which could possibly happen while playing a video game. So here goes.

5. Game Won't Auto Save

This is a feature in many modern games, but what happens when it isn't working. The worst part is when you have been playing the game for hours and don't remember when it was working. Then realize you can't save directly and know you have to finish the game or you are just screwed.

4. Wii Remote Breaks TV

Can't say I have ever done it, but have seen it happen. Sometimes Wii Sports gets intense and that remote just goes flying right through the tv. Those straps exist for a reason.

3. Save File Deleted

Not as much as an issue today as it once was. Plenty of times I have had my save files saved over by my little brother or have someone wipe my memory card because they weren't sure it was still being used.

2. Internet Goes Out During Online Play

It is one thing to lose or die when it happens because of something you did. It is another thing when it happens due to something completely beyond your control. Yes this sucks.

1. Power Goes Out During Final Cutscene

So you beat the game most of the time after an intense boss battle and you are finally going to see what the end of the story is. All that time you put in, all that effort wasn't for nothing, and then all of the sudden it was...

There you have it this week's list. What are your worst things? As always if not let me know in one way or another.

Hearthstone Reader Rage

Well it is Friday and you may be wondering where the week has gone, but it doesn't mean that you aren't happy about it. Also the same can be said about the new Hearthstone expansion. You don't have any clue what the meta is yet, but you are having fun playing it. What is funny though is every time I consider a Hearthstone topic for a Reader Post it happens to be someone ranting about something. Today is no different from Eloar who sent me a direct response to my C'thun post. Have a read.

I don't think C'Thun is particularly OP -- it kind of means you have to win by turn 10-ish. Obviously if he comes out, it usually means you lose -- but that doesn't necessarily make him OP.

With that said, I do hate the card, and I do hate standard. I hate that blizzard created standard as a way to keep the meta "fresh", and WotOG is the least diverse expansion released yet. There are way too many cards that have overt synergy. Standard feels dumb and simplistic in a game that was already suffering from dumb and simplistic mechanics.

WotOG puts on display the overwhelming lack of creativity blizzard has with respect to this game. Hearthstone needs more variation, and more interesting card mechanics. For example, having neutral cards restricted to being minions only is so boring -- classes are stale; if I play against any class, I am never surprised by the deck they play -- Hearthstone is stale, and it has been for a while.

A big part of the problem is card pool -- which is why I won't play much of standard; but another issue is the lack of variability a class can have. Anyway, these issues are largely known and discussed so I won't reiterate them here -- but we all know the issues, and nerfing a handful of Druid cards (and Leper Gnome?!) won't fix any of it.

I do think Hearthstone will continue to do well, though; in large part due to its mass appeal and the fact that it competes in a vacuum. 

If Magic The Gathering would put out digital content that didn't have an idiotic user interface, and if it wasn't developed by some garbage 3rd party, then maybe Blizzard would have to actually innovate. But until someone comes out swinging... I know I'll still play -- and so will many others that are tremendously dissatisfied and hungry for something else, but just accept blizzard's mind numbing nonsense as a means to satisfy our gaming wants

Well? Wasn't I speaking the truth? Maybe I just appreciate a good Hearthstone rage and complaint session every now and then. Or is that people just have this passion for Hearthstone that just isn't comparable. Who knows, but at least it is entertaining.

It's A Bad Game Because I Don' Like It

So here we are on yet another Friday with yet another choice to make for this week's Reader Post. Now normally I like to pick posts which interest me or that I think would get interest from others. Sometimes though I get entries that just deserve to be read because they try to make arguments and points without actually stating what this exactly are. So that brings me to this week's post from Darkzone who thinks "Hearthstone is a Bad Game" why? well because he says so for reasons he doesn't want to fully explain. Enjoy!

I have many personal reasons why I don't like hearthstone, I don't believe significant amounts of RNG belong in a game, and I do think that that's one of the factors that makes it a bad game. Though I can understand the appeal to make it more casual/fun focused (why they embrace competitive play when they have cards purely relying on RNG is beyond me.)

The goal in MOST competitive card games is to make consistent decks that work no matter what you draw, as well as 'deck-fixing' by guaranteeing you get certain things. Cards like "Burnished Hart" from MTG being an example how how a game employs fixing.

You can also employ fixing in your own deck by putting more of a card, or specific type of card in your deck, and thereby reducing the extent to which RNG influences your games. So ultimately, card games are not about the RNG in the sense that we should embrace it, but in the sense that a good deck doesn't care about RNG. (Especially over a set of 3 games.)

My biggest gripe with hearthstone is the fact that the game just doesn't work. Card effects that seem like they should work together don't, and card effects that seem like they shouldn't work together do. The word "draw" means different things on different cards and the order selection of triggered effects may as well be random for how much control you have over it.

I don't really think you can call your game good when it doesn't even interact in ways that make sense based on card text or scenario, a lot of this comes down to thoughtless coding, no doubt, but it's a big deal and doesn't really make any sense to me.

So ya Hearthstone isn't MtG, and I like MtG so that makes Hearthstone a bad game because it isn't MtG. Makes sense eh? Have a good weekend!

Hearthstone Rage Break

Here we are on yet another Friday and I am going through posts of what I think should be this week's Reader Post. Now I am often accused of picking posts that go in line with my thinking or never go against some of my favourite games or companies for "reasons". With that in mind while I don't take the extreme approach to the subject that Rehtael does in this week's post. I do agree with his thoughts on nerfs and bug fixes. So as this post is a bit of a rage rant it is well thought out and a good read.

I needed to express something, and that the Hearthstone dev team finds new ways to disappoint me every time an update comes out.

I've been playing since closed beta and have been an active member of the bug report forums.  I'm just tired of it. I'm tired of developers that don't seem to listen to the community, that spend ages working on patches that break more things than they fix, not addressing the quality of life issues that have been brought up thousands of times, (seriously, more than 9 deck slots will NOT confuse anyone who isn't already very easily confused) and overall, it feels like they're just out of touch with the community.

And no, this isn't about card balance, at least, not primarily. This is about every time an update or a patch comes out, in adds another game-breaking feature, such as charge not working, Nozdormu burning into opponents' turns, tracking not causing the timer to go off, and that's just naming a few. Knowing that they're pushing tournaments without first addressing bugs like these is a huge problem. The lack of a better reconnection feature, the lack of a better collection sorting system, the little things that players have been asking for, for years are just adding up and what was a few minor complaints have grown substantially over time, and seem to be ignored. 

It's not that I think that Team 5 is lazy, or doesn't care, or is just stupid, I just don't know what the case is that causes patches to be so slow in the presence of some really bad issues. And I respect the team for all they do, I know that they have a VERY difficult job, I myself am a game developer for a small indie company, but I just can't play this game anymore.

Something simple like letting people chose their card pack from the arena might pull me back in, but for someone who took a hiatus and fell behind, they've made it horrifically difficult to gain new cards. (I've been free to play since CLOSED beta. Refused a Golden Gelbin just on principle.)

And the "tactical nuke" approach to nerfing cards has killed some of my favorite decks. For example, Starving Buzzard. I was one of the pioneers of the Buzzard Hound deck, and the solution to fixing that deck was so VERY simple. All they had to do was change Buzzard's text to read: Whenever you play a beast, draw a card. But no. We get a useless 5-cost 3-2. Meanwhile, Warrior is in a place now where it's possible to deal 36 damage in one turn from hand with an empty board. (That's happened to me, I'm sure it's happened to others.)

The solution to bringing the weak cards in line would be taking advantage of the unique online platform that Hearthstone has. You could have buffed Booty Bay Bodyguard and Magma Rager. Why would this be better? Because arena exists. There are enough garbage arena cards without some being objectively awful, and instead of making two new cards which still aren't going to see any play, you could have included other minions which would have had a more meaningful impact on the game.

All in all, I love Hearthstone. It's just too painful to experience these days. The questing system at the moment punishes players for not playing multiple classes, which really doesn't need to be the case.

At any rate, that's enough from me.

Was I not right?

Enjoy your weekend everyone!

You Fail At Raging If...

Fail Day! This is normally where I would say this is the day where you feel better about yourself because of others failures, but today isn't an ordinary fail day. How you may ask? Well that is simple. You see there is times while you are gaming that you get upset, slightly pissed, and then there are those times you rage. Now today is all about how one could possibly fail at raging.

You Fail At Raging If...

• You simply start over when your save file is corrupted
• You just start laughing when those baneling landmines blew up your marines
• You have never had some ask if you were ok when you screamed so loud the pictures fell off the walls
• You don't have a shrine of broken remotes
• You have never punched a monitor
• You have once thought about if you could snap your keyboard in half over your forehead
• You have never needed "time" to walk it off
• You never just leeroyed shit just so everyone else would feel your pain
• The words "Oh that's awesome" are said when your Black Mage gets berzerked
• You keep smiling when your legendary weapon refuses to roll a socket
• You whispered that hunter congrats for stealing your two-hander
• You have words to describe being top decked Flamestriked
• You don't have a story for all the random marks on your walls

And finally

• You just stand up calming turn off the machine and walk away with a smile on your face

There you have it. This week's edition of failure. Hope you all got a good chuckle at yours and other expense.

To Rage Or Not To Rage

So I have been playing Heroes of the Storm most of this week. Trying to level myself up to 30 so I can get into ranked games and see what that has to offer. Now I enjoy the game quite a bit. It is very fun and entertaining and I think it bleeds new life into the MOBA environment. I have gone over these things before so I won't get into it again. What I will talk about is what the community is doing.

Now for anyone has played other MOBAs you will understand that the rage players have is really next level. People always have something to say about others players at anytime. Regardless of what is going on. They will chirp their teammates to no end for the simplest things because they are, of course, the worlds greatest player and you should know better.

I thought Heroes of the Storm would be safe from most of this because of the team oriented gameplay and all of that fancy stuff. Was I ever wrong. Now there was some of it when I was playing the Alpha, but ever since it has gone to Beta and I will say since the Founder's Pack became available it have been completely different. People are raging on every corner. Telling everyone to do this and do that and raging over the dumbest possible things. This is making me always always want to either play with a group of friends or play with a single friend just for the purpose of trolling the rager which is rather humorous if you get the chance to do so.

So my thought on this matter is this. Is this because of the style of gameplay? Is it just par for the course for a MOBA game. I really don't understand why this has to be the case. I have played countless team games online over a variety of platforms and I will say nothing is worse then MOBA games. Now granted Heroes is not as bad as other MOBAs currently out there, but maybe this is just because the player base is still small.

Some would say because it is a game focused on Esports and the applications of it. Then I say no to it because there are plenty of other Esport games which teammates don't want to kill each other. Or maybe it is the combo of Esports and free to play. No clue, but I am trying really hard to understand.

Well Your Mother

Friday! Meaning the end of the week is approaching and we can relax because the weekend is coming! WOOT! With Friday's though you should know the Reader Post comes with it, and this week I have quite an interesting one for you. It comes from Mundo who has something to say about Toxic communities and player basses. It is quite an interesting read and for the most part I think he speaks the truth. So have a read

Now let's begin;

I'll probably bust someone's nuts right here by saying this. but 
F2P = more toxicity and age =/= more or less toxicity. 

I've been part of forum groups for more then 6 years now. both F2P and payed. and the results have mostly been the same. Free to play games tend to have more toxic players and Payed games tend to have less.

Why's that?
Well, let's take league of legends for example.

You heard about a cool game, you want to check it out! hey, it's free to play! awesome.
You register, you download and instal. and you start playing.
Easy right?

A bit to easy...

You see, the main issue with free to play games is that, you don't need to pay for a game, in order to play.

What that means is, that your uncle may play, your grandson may play, your kid can play. Everybody who has access to the internet (sorry Nkorea) can play the game without spending a penny on it.
And here's the issue right there.
and let's pause right here.
It's not bad in any way that everybody can install and play a game for free. But it's the genre of game, that is the culprit of bad behaviours.

What? Yes, you heard me.
The more individual skill a game requires you to have. the more toxic a game community becomes. 
Why? And what are games that require such skill levels?

You're playing one of those games right now.

Any real time games, FPS's, MOBA games, Even strategy games. They require much more skill then tabletop games or card games. Because those games tend to be well balanced. 
Balancing is a key factor in behaviour in players. because like in LoL. People become frustrated when somebody plays something they consider "overpowered". Like a gun in a shooter, a champion in a moba game, or a unit in a strategy game. The more frequently, or better said how popular it becomes. the more chance people will become frustrated about it.

Why's that?

Frequency, that's why. If you keep dying over and over by the same guns, by the same champions, or beaten by someone that spams the same units. Then you become frustrated, without any doubt. And you'll begin to think that you are being "outplayed" by unfair odds or unfair mechanics.

"Well Yasuo has a shield that blocks everything and a passive that's unfair to the others" 
"Well, everybody spams RPG's because it's to strong" 
"well, those bradley IFV's are to cheap and easy to spam so they become too strong." 

And why's that?

2 reasons, as i said before. The more skill a game requires, the more bad behaviour occurs.
And in a game like LoL, you need skill to be successful. and if a player lacks that skill. or can't develop it well. They'll tend to resort to easier ways to be successful. 
And i'm not saying noobs stick to OP champions. Or that every single new player is bad and will resort to easy ways to dominate. I'm not saying that, but it is a factor is such behaviour.

When we look at the LoL forums.

Where does all the toxic threads come from?
or why people cry all the time?

Champions, items and other players or outside causes...

the second reason is reflecting to others.

people who show bad behaviour in most of their games is due to them reflecting themselves to others.
What i mean with that is, if they play bad. they'll be flamed by others, and thus the person begins to flame as well. and the players are TAUGHT to show bad behaviour because they don't know anything else. when we look at good players, they know how to play right? Let's put him with 4 players who are "worse" then them skill based. Let's see how he responds.
Generally, nothing bad happens. In general... 
There are of course douchebags who's ego is the size of the eiffel tower, thinks that he's the best. start bullying his team, then complains about it backfiring as they start flaming him and then goes on to report the players he first began to bully.
Is it fair? No.
Does it happen? Defiantly.

So CoD's have the same amount of toxicity, why does F2P make it worse? 

Because in F2P games, you can have as many accounts as you wish. Nobody cares.
So if you're banned. You hop to the next account and continue playing. 
And so, this becomes a cycle of bad behaviour.

because what happens now is; 
"toxic player gets banned -> toxic player makes/logins to new account -> toxic player shows toxic behaviour toward new players as the toxic player knows what he does and the new players aren't -> new players start to show the same behaviour later on."

Monkey see, monkey do.

It's that simple.

With payed games, if they permaban your account on that game. it's game over for you, you either have to rebuy the copy, or stop playing.

So people don't want to take that risk. they PAYED for that game. and by getting banned, they can no longer play without rebuying. So they'll risk money.

And the SECOND you start spending money on F2P games, the more you'll think the same.
People who get their accounts perm'd usually didn't pay a lot of money.
people who spend hundreds of euro's on skins (like myself). will not risk their accoutns getting banned because that = money lost.

Plain simple. 

So does age reflects on behaviour?
No.
As i said before, behaviour is taught. not earned by age.

You can have a 50 years old rage out the same way a 15 years old does. However, maturity does have a factor on behaviour

Take Mount and blade for example.
has a mature community, nice bunch of people who you can have a laugh with, but the rage remains to a bare minimum. and when it does happen. the community either ignores, or kicks the player out their server. That brings us to the final factor:

Moderation.

Passive vs active

Games that has servers where people can choose from. for example, mount and blade. Or CoD PC. where you can select a server of your choosing has an impact on the player.
Because dedicated servers tend to have overwatch, admins kick people who not behave or violate rules. In other words, the community becomes the judge. = it has an active community

With games that have public servers that everybody has acces too, but nobody truely actively moderates. like the lol servers tend to suffer. Because nobody can put a halt to those people. 
You can ignore them. you can report them. But those players will play more games after you've reported them. and they might not even get banned at all. You have to rely on people later on to serve justice = passive community

With dedicated servers, if an admin decides you are annoying for the other players. he'll just say; Okay lad, that's enough. Good bye *kick/ban*.It scares them. And they'll now from the second they're banned or kicked, they need to start behaving because the people don't tolerate it.

And it works. it truly does. Try to rage in a dedicated server that's full, has admin(s) and try to be an annoying brat and tell me how that worked for you. it won't end well.

Simple as that. 

And there you have it. Besides the points about LoL being this game that takes a stupid amount of skill to play I agree. So to Mundo and everyone else who submitted something thank you wouldn't be possible without people like you doing so.

Enjoy your weekend everyone!

Single Player Day

So this is the week when it starts. What starts you may ask? Well the kids and teenagers are out of school and what do they have more time to do? Well play in your multiplayer games. They are not going to bed and such and such a time now they are up later and infesting your games. The know nothing about meta and they generally pull down the quality of games you play.

Now some of you are saying this isn't true or I am full of crap. Think about it for a second. Think how many CoD type players have infested your games. Think of how many people refuse to listen becasue they believe they know what is best and everyone should listen to them. Not to mention the sudden influx of "Your Mom" into the spoken language. Now the wheels are starting to turn and you are nodding your head. I feel your pain trust me.

Now this just isn't with them infesting your team it is also with your competition. All of the sudden everyone has something to say after they lose. How could they have lost it cannot be because they lacked to skill to basically comprehend the simple mechanics of the game. It to be OMFG HACKS REPORT REPORT!!!!!!!! It is like every game when I play against or with randoms has turn into a game of League of Legends.

Now we can look on it that this is a younger crowd that needs to get it out of their system. You could look it as a bunch of entitled tools who fail to have knowledge of a particular game and its mechanics because they only started playing it because their mommy bought it and such and such a friend from down the street has been playing it forever. I have learned to accept it and sure I may think otherwise and log in and play a game then it will hit me again. So then I realize this is the perfect time of year to just play with friends or enjoy some single player games in peace and quiet.

Have a happy single player day!

You Mad Bro?

Happy Boxing Day or should I say happy mindless shopping? I actually had a great time spending time with my family. Doesn't happen often when a lot of us get together because there is so many of us, but when we do it is quite an event. That though isn't what I want to talk about. You see I was playing Hearthstone the other day and I was playing a warrior deck which can basically be a one turn kill if you play it correctly. It works out like this. At least for the "super hit"

1. Get yourself down to 10 health

2. Have 1 Warsong Commander, 2 Brewmasters(the cheaper cost ones), Molten Giants 2 of them for a 1 turn kill.

Then

• Play the Commander
• Play a both Giants for free(since you have 10 health) attack since you have charge with commander
• Play both Brewmasters and return the Giants to your hand and attack with the Brewmasters
• Play one of the Giants again for free and attack him

This works out to 8+8+3+3+8 = 30 damage meaning a 1 turn kill.

Now I was doing this and then this random person sent me a Friend Request and this happened.

Let's just say they were angry. Now I know this is a gimmick and will probably be adjusted in the future, but the simple way to deal with it is to realize they are doing it. And don't let them get to 10 Health.

Just for Lightout though have you ever done this?

I think not

Rage Inducing Madness

So here we go in the middle of the week. Wednesday has turned into a day of lists. I have actually enjoyed making these lists up even if I always have people who like to have their opinions known. I am sorry I didn't make up the list like you would that is probably because it is not your list it is my list. Anyways with that in mind I decided to make a list where the games tend to generate the most NERD RAGE!!!

5. DOTA 2

You know this list is full of rage when DOTA 2 is number 5 of the list. Any team based game always seems to cause general fits of rage. If you have ever played the game you realize that not everyone tends to play nice.

4. World of Warcraft

Like I said before playing with people tends to cause rage to be created. Especially when those people tend to be in the 20+ range. I can even say myself I have had the moments when I didn't realize what I even said until later when people asks for their heads to be returned.

3. League of Legends

I don't think I have ever heard the word report more then when playing LoL. People it is almost as if they believe doing so will give them super powers. Not to mention the crowd tends to be younger in age and therefore everyone tends to have something to prove, and it all begins even before the game starts.

2. Call of Duty

The game populated by countless people who are too young to even play the game. The game where your mother is the topic of pretty much every possible conversation. The game where having a headset makes you instantly the coolest person on the planet. Oh how sweet it is.

1. The Impossible Game



What can one say about the Impossible game. It isn't the fact that other players are making you rage it is the fact the game is so stupid in concept, but so easy at the same time that when you did you just want the creator to die in a fire.

There you go the list for the week. Wouldn't it be awesome if there was rage in the comments about a rage post? Oh one can only hope.