Star Trek Online: The Art of the Build

I know that the analysis from the Star Trek Online Winter Event survey is not done yet (and this might take a while) so this is a poor time to develop a new project, but I have a great idea for an essay and video series: STO: The Art of the Build.

I came up with this shortly after talking about the Dyson Solanae Hybrid-Technology Romulan science-destroyer warbird being released in STO Season 8.5. It comes with a set of consoles, weapons, and even different ship-costume effects that have sparked a lot of discussion on how to “build” it and its variants.

The premise is, that similar to many RPGs, STO has paper-dolls for players’ equipment--but players can also captain starships. A starship isn’t just another piece of equipment, it’s almost another character/class all on its own and players must spend time thinking of how to build them.

Not only does this come down to a choice in ship—based on specs, opportunity, and play-style—but there’s also a great deal of thought that goes into building up bridge officers, training them, equipment for the ship—from weapon layout to console choice to support weapons and abilities.

All of this collapses together alongside a large number of ships available to every faction, a huge amount of choice also exists in aesthetic effect as well as game mechanics.

To this end, the playerbase continually digests and spins out configurations, resources, and communicates on how to approach particular goals in game for PvE, PvP, and ship costuming.

Defiance: The social failure of Trion Worlds and Syfy’s MMO

Link, via YouTube.

The Social Impact of Player-Driven Dynamic Events in Firefall, Thumping

Link, via MMO Anthropology and YouTube.

Playing World of Warcraft May Be Good for Your Resume

Link, via MMO Anthropology and YouTube.

Star Trek Online Developers Gozer and Heretic Signal Resignation

Star Trek Online has seen two developers mark their calendars with a figure resignation, both Geoff "Heretic" Tuffli and Dan "Gozer" Griffis have signaled their departure from Cryptic Studio's MMORPG game with future resignations and left behind their notes on the forums.

http://www.vg247.com/2012/06/26/star-trek-online-content-designer-dan-griffis-to-depart-cryptic-in-a-few-weeks/

"Star Trek Online content designer Dan Griffis to depart Cryptic in 'a few weeks'"

Looks like Gozer is departing and above is the link to the .VG247 on the subject.

http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=278521

Also, "jumping ship," is Geoff "Heretic" Tuffli who left his mark on the STO Perfect World forums with an apology and a sad farewell to the players.

Developers have a lot of social context and currency with the virtual worlds that they develop for. They're, in a way, the architects of the aesthetic and the code that governs how the community interacts with that virtuosity and within themselves; as a result, they're often the target of adulation and scorn in turn depending on the cycle of development. Not often do they work directly with the community--but sometimes they do become part of the very worlds that they develop and design.

As a result, the departure of developers from an MMO game brings with it a different and distinct sensation than the sense of developers who worked on a static, published single box game. Certainly now we're seeing more episodic content; but MMO developers personally affect and cast great shadows over the online communities that their games support.

So when they leave, it's a bit of a big deal.

Link, via MMO Anthropology.

Star Trek Online and the Social Implications of Becoming Free-to-Play

It’s time for a new MMO Anthropology about Star Trek Online, developed by Cryptic Studios and now published by Perfect World Entertainment—it is a game in transition from pay-to-play to free-to-play.

As an originally pay-to-play MMO, Star Trek Online contains a great deal of content and an amazing eye to detail. Although, it is still buggy as all hell and sometimes those bugs really interfere with gameplay.

In this article, a discussion is brought forward about how going free-to-play will effect change to the communities present especially as players who used to pay a subscription find themselves amid players who do not. With pay-to-play communities there is a sense of risk and sunk cost to playing whereas with free-to-play it’s all about who buys what.

Star Trek Online is trying to alleviate this by making it about level-of-service as well as having cash-only ships (although they can also be had by free-to-play players by using an exchange system that allows trading reward-currency for pay-currency.)

Just see the essay for more, or watch the video for the summary.

Link, via MMO Anthropology and YouTube.

Star Wars Online: The Anthropological Effect of Bugs in Virtual Worlds

Recently, Star Wars Online had an experience where a bug arose that caused people to become invincible when they used the /getdown bug. The revelation of this created some discussion in the forums (and the removal of said topics) because BioWare wants to control information about the game and especially exploits.

I’ve seen others discuss how exploits are spread and why developers might want to suppress information about them, especially in what they consider to be the primary information source for their game. Although the blogs out there certainly represent a better news source than the forums, more people who play the game probably use the forums as their information and social source.

The use of exploits and bugs can be seen by the community in a game as a sort of cheat. Also, in the past entire games have failed due to the fears and expectations of incoming players who saw that they would not receive a fair shake. Although many were happy to entertain themselves with the tools and services provided by these MMO publishers they felt that their experience had been crimped by the presence of individuals who gained advantage using bugs in the game.

As a result, bugs like /getdown are seen as a blight on the game and developers like BioWare seek to suppress the knowledge of their existence as they fix them.

The supporting essay that outlines much of this information is currently published on MMO Anthropology and it explores the way BioWare acted and some of the community reaction. It’s still early in the life of Star Wars: The Old Republic but we might be starting to see the relationship they want to establish with their players already.

Link, via MMO Anthropology

Have a holly jolly Christmas with Dungeon Defenders

And here I thought that Christmas only affected games like World of Warcraft and City of Heroes. As the holiday season leaves us, there’s still quite a few of these gems to make appearances and look at how they soak up the cultural limelight.

Just watch out for the “Mega Snowman” who wants your tree and your Christmas presents! It’s another highlight from our friends at MMO Anthropology.

Link, via YouTube and MMO Anthropology