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Topic: Guys. I needed money - got a job writing about games. (NCSoft/Midway news too) (Read 115468 times)
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Rishathra
Terracotta Army
Posts: 1059
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"...you'll still be here trying to act cool while actually being a bored and frustrated office worker with a vibrating anger-valve puffing out internet hostility." - Falconeer
"That looks like English but I have no idea what you just said." - Trippy
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stu
Terracotta Army
Posts: 1891
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I'd rather be a competent Community Manager.
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Dear Diary,
Jackpot!
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Trippy
Administrator
Posts: 23657
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schild
Administrator
Posts: 60350
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The move is a bit like a top Hollywood producer quitting the movie business for an obscure online-video startup; it’s such a big jump, you want to know why. No, it's not. I think I've railed on James years ago though, so it's not really shocking he's still peddling his exaggerated wares. |
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justdave
Terracotta Army
Posts: 462
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Christ, that guy is still emitting his spoor?
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"They started to resist with a crust that was welded with human brain and willpower."
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WindupAtheist
Army of One
Posts: 7028
Badicalthon
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Because Blizzard ate everyone's fucking lunch. They brought big-money production values and an actual "release it when it's finished" business philosophy to the table, and raised the bar for everyone. And when faced with this raising of the bar, the chucklefuck establishment that had been taking the genre on a slow ride to nowhere with years of unfinished releases and general bullshit looked at the challenge, rose up as one, and said "Uh... we didn't want that business model anyway." Everytime someone in the industry goes on about how browser games for twelve-year old girls represent the real wave of the future, all I can hear is "World of Warcraft made my company's butthole hurt!" WoW cost $50 million according to that article, and does upwards of $1 billion per year. Meaning that even if you went hog-wild and spent as much as Blizzard, you'd only need to do a small fraction of their business in order to be rolling around in piles of cash. But nobody else can even pull off that fraction. I don't think anything else has even managed to match peak EQ1 numbers, and how long ago was that? Bah. |
"You're just a dick who quotes himself in his sig." -- Schild
"Yeah, it's pretty awesome." -- Me
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schild
Administrator
Posts: 60350
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Christ, that guy is still emitting his spoor?
I see you are well-trained in the ways of Au-Bullshit. We'll have your membership card out shortly. |
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UnSub
Contributor
Posts: 8064
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I think the problem in going "WoW ate everyone's lunch for sub-model" is that MapleStory has eaten everyone's lunch for the RMT-model. Just looking at the market leader ignores that a lot of sub-based MMOs have lived for a very long time. I'm not sure of the life-span of an RMT model MMO, but I'd expect it to be shorter.
And all that ignores that it isn't the sub-model that is to fault - it's spending tens of millions of dollars over 3 years on a horribly complex set of proprietary custom-designed systems for a game that might fail the simplest fun test. While an RMT model MMO might have a lower cost, it doesn't mean it has any more likelihood of success if the title overpromises and underdelivers.
I fully believe that the $15 per month sub-fee market's days are numbered, but sub-models are always going to have a place. Why? Because WoW has shown just how effective such a revenue model can be. Personally I think combination low-sub fee and RMT revenue models are the way forward, but they still need a decent game to hang off if they are to work.
To some extent it comes back to what the developers of Sins of a Solar Empire said: stop aiming to develop for the AAA market; develop for a profitable niche instead.
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Merusk
Terracotta Army
Posts: 27449
Badge Whore
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Damnit, WUA, I don't agree with you often but when I do it's nearly completely. "Woah, woah.. fuck we have to run like a BUSINESS? We can't just be crazy game makers? Fuck that I'm going to flash." I think the problem in going "WoW ate everyone's lunch for sub-model" is that MapleStory has eaten everyone's lunch for the RMT-model. Just looking at the market leader ignores that a lot of sub-based MMOs have lived for a very long time. I'm not sure of the life-span of an RMT model MMO, but I'd expect it to be shorter.
And all that ignores that it isn't the sub-model that is to fault - it's spending tens of millions of dollars over 3 years on a horribly complex set of proprietary custom-designed systems for a game that might fail the simplest fun test. While an RMT model MMO might have a lower cost, it doesn't mean it has any more likelihood of success if the title overpromises and underdelivers.
I fully believe that the $15 per month sub-fee market's days are numbered, but sub-models are always going to have a place. Why? Because WoW has shown just how effective such a revenue model can be. Personally I think combination low-sub fee and RMT revenue models are the way forward, but they still need a decent game to hang off if they are to work.
To some extent it comes back to what the developers of Sins of a Solar Empire said: stop aiming to develop for the AAA market; develop for a profitable niche instead.
None of the RMT (Runescape, MapleStory, that penguin one and DungeonQuest) games have kept my daughter's attention beyond a week or two. The only reason she ever logs in to one nowadays is if her mom and I are already playing on WoW together, so she can't login on one of our accounts. Even at nearly 10 the production values aren't enough to capture her attention. She prefers Wow because "it looks better" and "It's more fun." I haven't had her try Dungeon Runners yet, though, so we'll see how that goes. Yeah, it's anecdotal but I find it noteworthy that her attitude mirrors that of other, older gamers. |
The past cannot be changed. The future is yet within your power.
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WindupAtheist
Army of One
Posts: 7028
Badicalthon
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You know, it's not that I expect anyone else to beat Blizzard, or even seriously contend with them. It's the fact that no one else has even beaten EQ1, and EQ1 was only that big thanks to lack of competition. WAR is going to come out with it's cut-down two capital cities, get crushed and hobble along with a couple hundred thousand subscribers like everyone else, and then the failure of the first real post-WoW generation of MMOs will be total.
Frankly I'm content to have them all go make Flash games or whatever and just abandon the traditional MMO market to Blizzard completely. Sooner or later SOME new player will come along with $200 million and a hard-on to challenge the king, even if we have to wait ten years for it to happen.
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"You're just a dick who quotes himself in his sig." -- Schild
"Yeah, it's pretty awesome." -- Me
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Aez
Terracotta Army
Posts: 1369
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I'd only be content if they were making good flash game. That War Web project sounds horrible.
Why can't we even get one good version of the basic successfull game type?
Collectible card online
Empire building online
Persitent FPS online
Monster collecting/training online
etc...
The business model sells himself. With basic RMT or a low monthly subscription and 100k player you'd be making tons of money.
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naum
Terracotta Army
Posts: 4263
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Why can't we even get one good version of the basic successfull game type?
Collectible card online
Empire building online
Persitent FPS online
Monster collecting/training online
etc...
Y, I just can't believe in 2008 there's not a decent online CCG to play. MtGO was like almost there, but unfortunately it wasn't to be… |
"Should the batman kill Joker because it would save more lives?" is a fundamentally different question from "should the batman have a bunch of machineguns that go BATBATBATBATBAT because its totally cool?". ~Goumindong
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Slyfeind
Terracotta Army
Posts: 2037
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Naum's avatar makes me smile.
This is way too much a hit-driven business because it's forced itself there, and I don't know how or when it happened. Still researching that one. I think it happened around the time EA bought OSI, because around that time people started spending way too much into games and making way too little on them. So now there are too many people out there not spending money on games, so designers are chasing them because Blizzard got everybody else. Either that or people are still convinced they can beat Blizzard at their own game. So it's a question of, how much can you make just off one month of subscribers? If you can sell a game, and get 100,000 people to subscribe for one month, aim for that then sell the whole damn thing. Or sell the whole company. Or do whatever it takes to keep making games as long as possible. Break apart then make a new company. Rinse and repeat.
Or you could get in on this Flash thing which seems to be working pretty well.
I want to play Aez's games now. To be more specific, I want to pay money to play them. I hope someone lets me do that soon.
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"Role playing in an MMO is more like an open orchestra with no conductor, anyone of any skill level can walk in at any time, and everyone brings their own instrument and plays whatever song they want. Then toss PvP into the mix and things REALLY get ugly!" -Count Nerfedalot
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schild
Administrator
Posts: 60350
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Collectible card online
Empire building online
Persitent FPS online
Monster collecting/training online Out of those 4, 3 of them I've thought long and hard about. FPS is the one I haven't ironically because there's too many variables when it comes to connection and lag. But the other 3, yes. The fact those haven't been made means anyone can come into this genre and make cash. They are, in fact, ignored genres. Nintendo has no fucking excuse on the last one. Said it before and I'll say it again, Pokemonline would topple WoW in a fortnight. |
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Musashi
Terracotta Army
Posts: 1692
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You know, it's not that I expect anyone else to beat Blizzard, or even seriously contend with them. It's the fact that no one else has even beaten EQ1, and EQ1 was only that big thanks to lack of competition. WAR is going to come out with it's cut-down two capital cities, get crushed and hobble along with a couple hundred thousand subscribers like everyone else, and then the failure of the first real post-WoW generation of MMOs will be total.
Frankly I'm content to have them all go make Flash games or whatever and just abandon the traditional MMO market to Blizzard completely. Sooner or later SOME new player will come along with $200 million and a hard-on to challenge the king, even if we have to wait ten years for it to happen.
Dude, when B.net 2.0 comes out, that new player with $200 million has to give half of it up just to be assimilated into the almighty Blizzard chat room. You're right though. Lolwebgamez is not the next big thing - for this demographic at least. They keep telling themselves that though. I'll be too busy playing Starcraft 2, Diablo 3, and World of ? with the rest of the ENTIRE HUMAN RACE to notice the death of PC gaming. Perhaps the value of a game is a little more than just its gameplay? Who knew? OH YEA. Blizzard. |
AKA Gyoza
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Merusk
Terracotta Army
Posts: 27449
Badge Whore
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Well now you're just talking crazy talk. Enjoyable gameplay. Fucking nutter, you are. Nintendo has no fucking excuse on the last one. Said it before and I'll say it again, Pokemonline would topple WoW in a fortnight.
I'd even fucking play that. 90% of why I stopped playing the first Pokemon was it was just too damn easy against the AI. The game itself was a fun little experience, and I'll still steal my wife's Gameboy to get a few rounds the latest game (at the time) once in a while. Fuck, make it a webgame even and it'd kick ass. |
The past cannot be changed. The future is yet within your power.
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Slyfeind
Terracotta Army
Posts: 2037
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Lolwebgamez is not the next big thing - for this demographic at least. They keep telling themselves that though. Nobody thinks the hardcore or medium-core or whatever could ever be swayed to webgames. That's impossible. What is possible is everybody but Blizzard stops making games for this demographic, because only Blizzard can afford to do it right. Or if that's not the case now, it very well could be in the future. So we have a new Blizzard game every few years, a ton of webgames and Nintendogs and such, and whatever those has-been designers make in their spare time, like Dwarf Fortress. That might not actually be a bad thing, mind you. |
"Role playing in an MMO is more like an open orchestra with no conductor, anyone of any skill level can walk in at any time, and everyone brings their own instrument and plays whatever song they want. Then toss PvP into the mix and things REALLY get ugly!" -Count Nerfedalot
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Aez
Terracotta Army
Posts: 1369
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Lolwebgamez is not the next big thing - for this demographic at least. They keep telling themselves that though. Nobody thinks the hardcore or medium-core or whatever could ever be swayed to webgames. That's impossible. What is possible is everybody but Blizzard stops making games for this demographic, because only Blizzard can afford to do it right. Or if that's not the case now, it very well could be in the future. So we have a new Blizzard game every few years, a ton of webgames and Nintendogs and such, and whatever those has-been designers make in their spare time, like Dwarf Fortress. That might not actually be a bad thing, mind you. That argument is BS. It has nothing to do with "affording" a game budget. If a 100M investment nets you 2 million subscribers, it's an incredible deal and a great investment opportunity. It's like if everyone and their mother spent 50M developping half a car and then decided it's not worth investing 100M because no one bought their 50M half-car. |
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Slyfeind
Terracotta Army
Posts: 2037
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That argument is BS. It has nothing to do with "affording" a game budget. If a 100M investment nets you 2 million subscribers, it's an incredible deal and a great investment opportunity. It's like if everyone and their mother spent 50M developping half a car and then decided it's not worth investing 100M because no one bought their 50M half-car.
Quite quite. And so in addition to wanting to play your games, I now want the big wigs to do what you say here. That is, if you're saying more funding and more time for more games so we can have more awesome. (If not then I missed your point entirely.) |
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« Last Edit: August 17, 2008, 10:27:54 PM by Slyfeind »
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"Role playing in an MMO is more like an open orchestra with no conductor, anyone of any skill level can walk in at any time, and everyone brings their own instrument and plays whatever song they want. Then toss PvP into the mix and things REALLY get ugly!" -Count Nerfedalot
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Nija
Terracotta Army
Posts: 2136
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None of the RMT (Runescape, MapleStory, that penguin one and DungeonQuest) games have kept my daughter's attention beyond a week or two. The only reason she ever logs in to one nowadays is if her mom and I are already playing on WoW together, so she can't login on one of our accounts.
You need to get your fucking priorities straight, man. |
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UnSub
Contributor
Posts: 8064
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None of the RMT (Runescape, MapleStory, that penguin one and DungeonQuest) games have kept my daughter's attention beyond a week or two. The only reason she ever logs in to one nowadays is if her mom and I are already playing on WoW together, so she can't login on one of our accounts.
You need to get your fucking priorities straight, man. Exactly - with 2 extra kids, you could have your own five player raid party for WoW. Get to it! |
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Merusk
Terracotta Army
Posts: 27449
Badge Whore
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None of the RMT (Runescape, MapleStory, that penguin one and DungeonQuest) games have kept my daughter's attention beyond a week or two. The only reason she ever logs in to one nowadays is if her mom and I are already playing on WoW together, so she can't login on one of our accounts.
You need to get your fucking priorities straight, man. You're amusing. |
The past cannot be changed. The future is yet within your power.
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cevik
I'm Special
Posts: 1690
I've always wondered about the All Black People Eat Watermelons
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None of the RMT (Runescape, MapleStory, that penguin one and DungeonQuest) games have kept my daughter's attention beyond a week or two. The only reason she ever logs in to one nowadays is if her mom and I are already playing on WoW together, so she can't login on one of our accounts.
You need to get your fucking priorities straight, man. I agree, it's disgusting to see someone play online games in their free time when everyone knows the state approved free time activity is watching TV. |
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Lantyssa
Terracotta Army
Posts: 20848
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No, he needs to get his daughter her own WoW account so they can all play at the same time.
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Hahahaha! I'm really good at this!
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Signe
Terracotta Army
Posts: 18942
Muse.
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No, he needs to get his daughter her own WoW account so they can all play at the same time.
Everyone happy. Children not subjected to boring grind. Sorted! |
My Sig Image: hath rid itself of this mortal coil.
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HaemishM
Staff Emeritus
Posts: 42666
the Confederate flag underneath the stone in my class ring
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You know, it's not that I expect anyone else to beat Blizzard, or even seriously contend with them. It's the fact that no one else has even beaten EQ1, and EQ1 was only that big thanks to lack of competition. Ummm, even AOC has beaten EQ1 numbers these days (465k). So did Final Fantasy XI. No one gives a shit anymore because none of them will beat WoW and there are too many games in the MMOG market space to mean shit. Oh and because sub-based MMOG's are shitty shit me-too game styles mapped onto horrible network code made by anus spelunking devs who like to blame the suits for their failures when their real failings are the inability to project manage a fucking outhouse and the originality of a Hollywood producer. EDIT: Ok, I remembered the numbers wrong. AOC retained 415k, which is damn close to EQ1's top numbers of 430k but not greater. FFXI did beat EQ1's numbers, though. |
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« Last Edit: August 18, 2008, 10:12:11 AM by HaemishM »
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Hoax
Terracotta Army
Posts: 8110
l33t kiddie
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Collectible card online
Empire building online
Persitent FPS online
Monster collecting/training online Out of those 4, 3 of them I've thought long and hard about. FPS is the one I haven't ironically because there's too many variables when it comes to connection and lag. But the other 3, yes. The fact those haven't been made means anyone can come into this genre and make cash. They are, in fact, ignored genres. Nintendo has no fucking excuse on the last one. Said it before and I'll say it again, Pokemonline would topple WoW in a fortnight. I've always imagined that they could do #4 and you could get all your VC from apple if you tied monster creation to the songs a person has on iTunes. Like that one game from ps1 where you put cd's in to make the creatures... That'd be pretty fucking dope. |
A nation consists of its laws. A nation does not consist of its situation at a given time. If an individual's morals are situational, then that individual is without morals. If a nation's laws are situational, that nation has no laws, and soon isn't a nation.
-William Gibson
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justdave
Terracotta Army
Posts: 462
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No, he needs to get his daughter her own WoW account so they can all play at the same time.
Everyone happy. Children not subjected to boring grind. Sorted! "Nah, I can't come over...I'm grounded for a week." "That sucks...What for?" "Pulling aggro." |
"They started to resist with a crust that was welded with human brain and willpower."
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Slyfeind
Terracotta Army
Posts: 2037
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I've always imagined that they could do #4 and you could get all your VC from apple if you tied monster creation to the songs a person has on iTunes. Like that one game from ps1 where you put cd's in to make the creatures...
That'd be pretty fucking dope.
Monster Rancher. Hell, you could breed web sites and see what kind of freaky critters you get from them. |
"Role playing in an MMO is more like an open orchestra with no conductor, anyone of any skill level can walk in at any time, and everyone brings their own instrument and plays whatever song they want. Then toss PvP into the mix and things REALLY get ugly!" -Count Nerfedalot
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justdave
Terracotta Army
Posts: 462
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I've always imagined that they could do #4 and you could get all your VC from apple if you tied monster creation to the songs a person has on iTunes. Like that one game from ps1 where you put cd's in to make the creatures...
That'd be pretty fucking dope.
Monster Rancher. Hell, you could breed web sites and see what kind of freaky critters you get from them. Whoever got 4chan first would always win, though... |
"They started to resist with a crust that was welded with human brain and willpower."
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Mosesandstick
Terracotta Army
Posts: 2476
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I've always imagined that they could do #4 and you could get all your VC from apple if you tied monster creation to the songs a person has on iTunes. Like that one game from ps1 where you put cd's in to make the creatures...
That'd be pretty fucking dope.
Heard of Song Summoner? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Song_SummonerYour troops are generated from your iPod's songs. |
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schild
Administrator
Posts: 60350
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It's all about vib ribbon.
Line rider should be able to do vib ribbon type stuff out of music.
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Valmorian
Terracotta Army
Posts: 1163
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Your troops are generated from your iPod's songs.
Oh if only it wasn't Square-Enix... I have yet to find a game they've made that I can stand for more than 5 minutes.. |
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Mosesandstick
Terracotta Army
Posts: 2476
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Oh if only it wasn't Square-Enix... I have yet to find a game they've made that I can stand for more than 5 minutes..
Decent game. It's something thats alright to play with if you have nothing better to do. Gameplay-wise its FFT-lite. It has the usual retarded Squeenix stylings. |
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Teleku
Terracotta Army
Posts: 10516
https://i.imgur.com/mcj5kz7.png
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"My great-grandfather did not travel across four thousand miles of the Atlantic Ocean to see this nation overrun by immigrants. He did it because he killed a man back in Ireland. That's the rumor."
-Stephen Colbert
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