Getting back to video game reviews, but focusing on some blockchain games

In the past, I have done a lot of video game reviews for websites such as Vox Ex Machina, where I work as the assistant editor, and GameOgre.com, where I was a game correspondent. My primary focus has always been massively multiplayer online games, but now I'm thinking of looking at how blockchain gaming is affecting the industry.

For a simple explanation, blockchain technology uses cryptography and distributed ledgers to create an immutable record of transactions by building up a "chain" of transactions where each new link in the chain depends on the status of the last link. This means that anytime a previous link is changed, the links after must also be changed, this makes blockchains tamper-evident.

Blockchains are useful for gaming because they allow for the creation of currency tokens that can be actually owned by players -- the person with the cryptographic keys to a set of tokens is in control.

Originally, these tokens acted a lot like premium currency in games, such as gems or similar used for in-game microtransactions. However, with protocols such as ERC-20 in Ethereum, it is possible for tokens to represent individual virtual objects as well.

This way, it is possible for an in-game item such as a weapon, a piece of armor, a space ship, a chair, a house, or even a plot of land -- this list can go on -- to be represented on the blockchain as an entity that can be provably owned and traded between players.

This fact has not been lost on the gaming industry at large and I would love to provide a better analysis of how it is being embraced and adopted.

More thoughts and analysis coming.

A Harrow warframe giveaway in honor of Vex Harrow

Yesterday, Warframe – a massively multiplayer third-person shooter developed by Digital Extremes – released a new warframe called “Harrow.” With it came a distinctly and beautifully done horror quest line that pits players against the psyche of things best left untended.

While playing mine today, I ran into another player who really wanted one. Having some extra platinum in my account, I bought him one. And then I realized that the warframe has the same name as the surname as Vex from Mill Avenue Vexations.

So here’s the deal. If you are a Warframe player (on PC) and you want a free Harrow warframe send me the answer to a bit of Vexations trivia:

What is Vex Harrow’s childhood nickname used by her father?

I will gift a Harrow warframe to the first three people who properly guess that answer in a PM to me on Twitter at @kytsune.

This deal lasts until August 31, 2017.

= = =

And… for the first person to correctly guess what Vex Harrow’s middle name is: I will gift you the full “Harrow Collection” on PC Warframe.

This last one is much harder than the former. You can actually discover Vex’s childhood nickname by reading Vexations, but Vex’s middle name has never been published.

BURN gathers in GW2 city Hoelbrak to support gravely ill guildmate

[This article was originally posted on the Vox Ex Machina gaming news blog by Kyt Dotson under the moniker Helvetica.]

Today, visitors to the Norn capital city of Hoelbrak in the massively multiplayer online (MMO) game Guild Wars 2 will find a group of friends gathering in support of one of their own who is currently in the hospital.

Desertfox, one of the leaders of Dragon Slayers aka [BURN], is said to have been fighting cancer for years and recently went to the hospital for surgery. According to guild members, Desertfox’s condition took a turn for the worse during the early hours of the morning.

Current BURN leaders, Enlightened Queen and Nikki Fayre, spoke during the vigil and numerous guild members gathered both in GW2 and the guild's TeamSpeak channel.

Although this morning’s prognosis gave him mere hours to live, news at the moment is that his condition has improved. As a result, guildmates have been waiting for further updates.

“We’ve been chilling waiting for updates and we got another update that he was doing a little better,” said Monoui, an officer in BURN who helps newbies and greets people.

Monoui put together the vigil shortly after waking up and learning the dire news. After posting information about the gathering held in Hoelbrak it didn’t take long for members to jump into the game.

BURN guild members and others gather in the Norn city of Hoelbrak in Guild Wars 2.

Guild member and former guild leader X J U S T I N X has been advertising the gathering in the city in map chat with well-wishes for Desertfox. The guild also set up a guild keg, fireworks, and several buff banners for passersby to enjoy—and maybe stay a moment to honor Desertfox.

According to guild members, Desertfox took over as one of the leaders when JUSTIN stepped down. He joined almost eight months after the beginning of the guild and is best known for heading up decorations in the guild hall as well as leading the guild’s World vs. World efforts and running guild missions.

BURN was named for some preliminary information about Tequatl the Sunless, a major world boss in GW2 that was changed dramatically late 2013. According to JUSTIN, the name refers to the “burn phase” of the boss.

Although the guild started out as a Tequatl raiding guild, it has since become more of a social guild where members mean more than achievement.

“Some guilds are really about the grind, getting the best gear, best stats… But we always approached gaming and the guild like a family,” said Monoui. “It’s not like about the next raid or the next fractal but how we can help each other.”

“Primarily a social guild,” JUSTIN added, “we do have excellent players here, but it’s primary about people here.”

This coming together of membership is a testament to the guild’s people- and social-centric commitment. The vigil in Hoelbrak continues, at time of writing, to bring together members of BURN and other guilds who know about Desertfox.

Guildmates describe Desertfox as a person who is coarse but a very deeply caring person. He is said to have a dry sense of humor but one that sparks laughter and adoration from his peers. He is described as a man of few words, but of good intent and action.

Amid the stories told about Desertfox's exploits include running every jumping puzzle in the game--and oftentimes dragging others along to help them. He also attempted to take up residence in one of GW2's secret areas that contains a reproduction of fictional pirate One Eyed Willy's ship from the movie The Goonies.

The location was chosen because Desertfox’s character in game is Norn and the Hall of Legends is the place where stories are told about Norn heroes.

“We’re here celebrating him in true Norn fashion, telling stories so that his memory lives on forever,” said Monoui.

Je suis Charlie Hebdo #JeSuisCharlie #IAmCharlie

This week, French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo was attacked by masked gunmen and 12 people murdered. The gunmen used religious slogans and speech in order to make it obvious that they were Muslim and that they chose to attack Charlie Hebdo’s office because of satirical cartoons criticizing many religions including Islam, the Islamic Prophet Muhammad, Islamic states, and similar geopolitical issues.

Below is my reaction to these murderers and their attempt to silence dissent.

To the terroristic murderers:

You may be Muslims; but not for a moment do I believe you represent all Muslims. You may be French; but you certainly don’t represent all French people. In the same way that you are human beings and do not represent all human beings. And, because you are people like me, the responsibility for this bad act falls on your head and I stand with everyone else in the expectation that you will be found, tried for your crime, and preferably imprisoned for it.

Do not for a moment think that you’ve scared me as a writer into not criticizing what I find problematic in the world—and that does still include Islam, in whole or in part. I am not afraid of you; I am disgusted.

You cannot defend a sacred idea in this era by committing murder.

I do not take seriously your religion because of what you did; instead, I take seriously your acts of murder.

I will remember you as people who committed horrific acts in the name of a religion, and the people you killed as artists who tried to bring the world’s attention to afflictions very similar to what you’ve done.

The shirt from #ShirtGate is not just ‘little stuff’

Sexism and misogyny is a systemic problem present in multiple cultures throughout the world. Bad behavior that dismisses and extinguishes the accomplishments of women is so prevalent that it’s atmospheric across every strata of Western society from the home, to the street, to the workplace. So when the European Space Agency landed a space probe on a comet (an amazing event in of itself you should read about) and scientist Dr. Matt Taylor wore a shirt covered in pin-up women in provocative poses it wasn’t an act that represented the ‘little stuff.’

The reason why Taylor’s shirt is a problem arises not only because it was grossly inappropriate to wear during a broadcast about a scientific accomplishment, nobody should have been wearing that shirt in a professional environment where women are already commonly treated as objects. That shirt was already the reification of how women’s accomplishments in science are often boiled down to their bodies and appearance.

The shirt was already bad before it appeared on TV. When it appeared on TV it became the perfect example of why it’s unacceptable.

To his credit, Taylor apologized for wearing the shirt. And, while certainly he’s socially accountable for choosing to wear the ambient misogyny of his profession literally on his sleeve, he and the European Space Agency staff have done the best they can do in the aftermath of their insensitivity to a problem they were only making worse.

Social media made the problem obvious

To answer foolish responses and silencing people who were not happy about the shirt: “You misunderstand what ‘little stuff’ is if you think people shouldn’t talk about it.”

The “little stuff” is aggregate. Little stuff is the pebbles moving in the avalanche; little stuff is the droplets of water battering down in the tsunami. When you are buried beneath “little stuff” it’s organized together into “big stuff.”

Every little act that makes me feel like less of a person in any space where I should be welcome as a person adds up to an atmosphere of ill will. That ramps from little stuff such as making jokes about women’s sexuality in the workplace all the way up to dismissing their accomplishments. A group of people who spend their time thinking about, talking about, and treating women like they exist only as abstract “things” have the foundation that makes ignoring their deeds an afterthought.

Don’t do this people

Finally, if you responded to people who had a problem with the shirt with an image that says anything like: “Ask me what I was wearing.” (A thinly veiled wink towards how rape victims are often asked what they were wearing when they were attacked.)

You are a bad person and you should feel bad.

Taylor is not a victim in the reaction his shirt generated. Wearing that shirt demonstrably adds to an environment that is already harmful to women and by wearing that shirt on TV he simply managed to make it obvious there was a problem.

He is most certainly not a rape victim (re: the shirt) and borrowing the language used against rape victims is profoundly contemptible.

Taylor was called-out for his choice of expression because it communicates, reinforces, and buttresses a massive, recognizable problem.

In the end, Taylor is also much more adult than many of the people outraged that he was called-out for the shirt: he acknowledged the problem and apologized. People who use rape-language to comment on the reaction to the shirt belittle Taylor’s own autonomy and dignity by acting as if he is not a moral agent who can make choices.

Upcoming review of Star Trek Online's Benthan Assault Cruiser

The Benthan Assault Cruiser is a new lock box ship that bears witness. It's a strong cruiser, with a staggering amount of firepower, and I enjoyed my career with the ship. She may become my liberated borg's new vessel for a while.

I think I know that idoru with Dave Letterman

This caught me by surprise when I saw that Hatsune Miku appeared on The Late Show with David Letterman. She's an idoru, or a virtual pop star, and extremely popular in Japan. Although the technology for virtual pop stars isn't exactly science fiction level yet, the phenomenon has been around for a while for the Japanese.

I've even written about her before, in article about how a programmer used augmented reality to give her a second life (in his virtual reality specs). Western audiences are certainly not used to this sort of show.

According to Polygon, David Letterman wasn't quite ready for it either.

I wonder what it would be like to have Hadaly from Black Hat Magick projected into my living room. I think she'd be amazing company.

Just put The Holocaust Star on Amazon Kindle

Right now I am waiting for this book, a sequel to The Byzantium Outcast, to publish. I will have to let everyone know when it goes live.

This Vexations novel has been a long time in the waiting. It’s never been quite ready.

Time to re-edit Black Hat Magick vol 1 Dread Vote

I’ve finished vol 2 of Black Hat Magick, which means its time for me to get back to work on vol 1 and make sure that it’s up on Amazon.com as an e-book.

I didn’t really like how I ended vol 1—I’m not going to go into that here because the end of the story is entirely a spoiler. I did what I needed to point the readers (and Elaine) in the right direction, but there’s a long laundry-list of things that were just kruft and not really displayed as much.

When I went to vol 2, I had learned a bit more about how to plot the short of story that a BHM story is.

Now I’m thinking bout vol 3 and that might mean League of Legends players, gold sellers from MMORPGs, and potentially a serial thief stealing virtual items. It’s a good time to bring up Bitcoin again—something I expect Elaine to intersect with often—but I don’t think it’ll be about that technology entirely.

I’ll let everyone know when I finish editing vol 1 and vol 2 and have them on Amazon.com.

I do look forward to starting on vol 3.

Thanks for keeping up and be sure to check out Invincible and Vulnerable on Amazon.

Review: Vulnerable

Vulnerable by Kyt Dotson
My rating: 5 of 5 stars



View all my reviews

Ferguson protests and gamers?

I’ve been reading way too much Ferguson news lately. It’s a stressful story about a city and population essentially under siege, journalists accosted and harassed by police, and the slow semi-transparent wheels of justice…

Even though I heard about the news of Darren Brown’s death the day it happened (and the night of the first protest) it’s taken a while for the news to finally reach the national stage.

With Twitter leading the way with most of the on-the-spot news of what’s been happening, I’ve long wondered how gamers and the MMO gaming community has reacted so far.

Looking at Google and the Internet at large, and a dearth of articles on the subject (from said community) I’d have to say I agree with Helvetica at Vox Ex Machina in that the impact is little seen.

How has the Ferguson news affected the MMO gaming community? (Not much) | Helvetica | Vox Ex Machina

I’ll be keeping an eye out for news to tip the people I know who write about this sort of thing, but I’m not holding my breath. If anyone notices any gaming groups making an effort to spread awareness -– through in game rallies, their own blogs, Twitter, etc. -- let me know and I’ll pass it along.

Interview with CrayzECook on MMO Anthropology

An interview in World of Warcraft with CrayzECook

As it turns out, CrayzECook is a 7-year-veteran of World of Warcraft. It’s been an interesting journey for him and recently he even started leading a raid group.

Hopefully the interviews can come back to see how he’s doing and what leading raids is like in the almost decade old MMORPG game of Warcraft.

via MMO Anthropology.

Welcome to the fog of war: In #Ferguson

A particularly damning image of the Al Jazeera news crew being tear gassed has been making rounds in the media. The image of reporters fleeing from attack, followed by another of uniformed police in SWAT gear taking down the TV equipment makes for a punchy, dramatic image of journalistic suppression. However, the situation seems to be a little bit different.

It is now known that whatever police department fired the tear gas canister at the reporters may not be the same department as came back for their equipment. In fact, those taking down the equipment were assisting the reporters to get away from the gas.

One of the strange things that social media does is it produces the perception of swift messaging out of time. In times of great strife and conflict, it is difficult to get information out of a hot zone in time for context to form—this is often known as the “fog of war”. Actors in a war often use this effect to their advantage by producing propaganda or a narrative that aids their position before actual facts come to light. Social media zings facts, photos, videos, and commentary out extremely rapidly and interpretive contexts form faster than facts can catch up.

Last night, an Al Jazeera news crew got caught in a tear gas cloud and ran. Another news team caught footage of this occurring and even took footage of a SWAT team arriving at their position who then lowered their lights and turned the camera away from recording the scene.

Al Jazeera itself put out a statement condemning the SWAT team saying, “tear gas canisters landed in their proximity and police fired rubber bullets in their direction.” The statement goes on to say that the police continued to fire on the crew even as they shouted that they were press.

People on social media took the dismanteling of the equipment shortly after the crew ran as a sign the police sought to quell media presence. Not difficult to believe after reports of police ejecting media from the city, the arrests of several journalists, and—of course, the video of a tear gas canister being fired directly at the feet of reporters.

In an attempt to get out from under the obviously damning images, St. Charles SWAT spokesperson Lt. David Tiefenbrunn says that the team took down the equipment to help the crew move to a new location. They were also not the SWAT crew who fired the tear gas.

It seems that separate SWAT vehicles are involved. One that fired the tear gas and a second one who assisted in moving the equipment, who were with the St. Charles SWAT team.

Tiefenbrunn also stated he does not know who fired the tear gas.

In statements to the media, Tiefenbrunn opined that the Al Jazeera crew may not have been targeted intentionally and that the police crews in the area did not know that the lights belonged to a news crew. The Al Jazeera news crew, however, noted to the media that they had spoken to officers stationed near their position, and had identified themselves long before. In fact, as seen from the footage across the street, the well-lit position would have been easily identified as journalists setting up.

Much like what happened during the Occupy protests, multiple police departments with little coordination is leading to situations where bad actors (firing tear gas at journalists) are not going to be disciplined.

We are still waiting for the Ferguson police to identify if it was one of their squads who fired the gas canister and how it was that it ended up landing at the feet of a TV news crew.

#Ferguson police dangerous, despicable, failures—tear gas, inciting riots, endangering life

The Ferguson police have shown a reckless disregard for peaceful protest such that displays a gross disregard for human safety in general.

If the police in Ferguson do not want to be portrayed as “bad guys”; perhaps they should stop tear gassing state senators and TV crews.

After all, at least that should show some sort of restraint.

The response to a US senator chastising you, by asking if she’s going to get “gassed again,” while attending a peaceful protest is not: “I hope not.” It should be, “Ma’am, I will attend to restraining those under my command to common regard for the safety of those they’re sworn to protect.”

Stop harassing the media. Stop arresting journalists. Stop firing dangerous weaponry in residential neighborhoods. The police in Ferguson have obviously failed, in an attempt to “keep the peace,” the police have become the primary present breach of the peace.

Comic-Con does not have a formal anti-harassment policy?

I was reading an article written up in The Washington Post about Geeks for CONsent and the second paragraph leads with this:

Geeks for CONsent, founded by three women from Philadelphia, gathered nearly 2,600 signatures on an online petition supporting a formal anti-harassment policy at Comic-Con.

I am baffled. Comic-Con has no formal anti-harassment policy? I’ve known about Comic-Con for what seems forever now. It’s a massive gathering of geeks, cosplayers, aficionados, and much of nerddom in a place that emblematizes comic fandom and everything amazing about comic culture.

So I poked around, I found the convention policies (and code of conduct) but it’s a bare minimum of metal-on-metal “use common sense,” and “harassing or offensive behavior will not be tolerated.”

Sensible but hardly formalized.

By now, even people who do not participate in conventions know that women—and especially cosplayers—suffer a noticeable or even ambient amount of harassment. The article itself highlights complaints spoken to CONsent involving groping, being fallowed, and other forms of sexual harassment.

Yes. Much of this harassment follows women from the streets (from cat-calls to following) but in the charged environment of a convention this sort of behavior becomes even more sinister. A cosplayer wearing an outfit that restricts her vision or movement may not even be able to react to someone groping or grabbing her; and we need only look as far as the “Cosplay is Not Consent,” meme to see there’s some amplification of bad behavior going on.

While the Comic-Con Code of Conduct may have mentions of not tolerating harassment, there’s no definitive examples of intolerable harassment. There’s also no guide to the policies that Comic-Con engages in when such harassment occurs. What can victims expect from the Comic-Con staff when they bring a report to them? Saying, “go to security” is hardly enough.

Comic-Con could do a lot to set itself apart from other conventions by outlining a filled out guide to process, expectations, and policy when it comes to the treatment of conventioneers.

Why Comic-Con has not already done this feels like a massive oversight given the well-documented and widespread knowledge and continuing visibility of these issues is disappointing. Fix it already. A solid, formal anti-harassment policy, with a little compassion, would go a long way to making comics and fandom safer for everyone to participate in.

Review: Invincible

Invincible by Kyt Dotson

My rating: 5 of 5 stars







View all my reviews

Opening Star Trek Online lockboxes for fun and profit

Looks like I’ve become the proud owner of a Xindi-Aquatic Narcine Dreadnought Carrier.

Whenever a new lockbox drops in Star Trek Online, I often use my lifetime stipend to buy 10 or 20 keys. This time, opening the new Xindi lockboxes, the ship dropped from the second box I opened.

I will be flying it for a while to get a review written for this starship and try to get that up on GameOgre and Vox Ex Machina. Recently, I’ve written one review for the T’varo Light Warbirrd Retrofit and the Undine Nicor Bio-Warship (the second one is still pending publication.)

I particularly enjoy flying carriers in STO and I have a Catian Atrox Carrier as well as a Tholian Recluse Carrier on different characters. So we’ll see where the Narcine stacks up—from the look of it, with a heavy Tactical loadout, it’s a battleship designed for front line fire-support. This is especially accentuated by the fact that it comes with two hangars of frigate pets.

The frigates are also minelayers, which is an unexpected pet capability.

Just an FYI, “narcine” is the scientific name of a family of electric rays, which the Narcine Dreadnought looks a little bit like from a dorsal profile. I named mine “Sepiida” which is the order that cuttlefish belong to (a mollusk closely related to squid, octopus, and nautulus.)

Upcoming covers for Black Hat Magick Kindle-edition short stories

I am slowly working on filling out my Kindle store with e-book editions of stories I’ve written. I have quite a few and from what I’ve heard, the critical mass is about 30. That might take me a while to reach.

So here’s a pair of covers to enjoy as I work towards getting them into the Kindle store.

Fish in trees arrived by comet

So, I just learned that Ray Comfort actually asked a geologist if fish hitched a ride on comets to Earth[1]. Apparently, this was part of a question series about why there is so much water on Earth and the geologist suggested that much of it could have come from cometary bodies during the formation of the planet.

Well, if fish arriving on comets explains fish to Ray Comfort; perhaps it would also explain why there are fish in the trees to Brother Jed Smock.

The latter point comes from something Brother Jed once said to thunderstruck listeners on ASU campus, saying something about how “fish don’t live in trees,” which shortly became a meme mocking him for whatever failed point he was attempting to make.

Those fish living in the trees arrived on comets.

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[1] paulchartley, Noah Proving Bullshit Pays [Video file] , Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZeztc2rtIA

Interview: On Being a Captain in Star Trek Online

The folks over at MMO Anthropology had a chance to talk to a mutual friend of ours from Star Trek Online about what it’s like to be a captain in the game. Then I took a chance to write up an article about the interview over at SiliconANGLE. Be sure to watch the video and read the article to get a glimpse of some of what happens in STO and how it affects personal experience and expression In virtual worlds.