June 2017 in Review

The Site

Another month of quiet decline in traffic.  I can hardly blame people though, I haven’t been writing about all that much which might generate traffic.  But if all I wanted was traffic I would write about World of Warcraft and Pokemon every day… or I’d be angry at EVE Online.  That is always a draw.

So not much to say there.

I do have one item that is related to the site, which is why I have never bothered to get a custom domain.  Part of that is because I couldn’t get the domain I wanted, tagn.com.  Well, not without paying a lot of money in any case.  Four letter domains are in demand.

But the other is persistence.  At some point I will tire of this and stop blogging.  But that won’t mean I will want all of this to disappear into the void.  I’d like to be able to find it in another ten or twenty years.  But am I going to keep paying for a domain?  Maybe not.

The same goes double for self-hosting.  While I would like the control, I am way past my interest peak in blogging, so the expense and the effort would be a deterrent.

All of which comes to mind because of Darren.  Back in the day he wrote the blog The Common Sense Gamer and did the Shut Up, We’re Talking podcast.

Header from the past…

He hasn’t written regularly in ages, but his RSS is still in my feed.  Suddenly, a couple weeks back, after a long, long time of radio silence, there was a post.  And then two.  And then several.  Was Darren back?

No, Darren is still done with all of this.  However, he self-hosted and was done enough to let his hosting service lapse.  Somebody else scooped up the domain name and started another gaming blog of the same name.

Is not Darren

And so all of my links over to Darren’s blog… mostly about ten dollar horses… are all broken.  Ted Nelson was right, this hard coded web address shit sucks.  I even mentioned this issue a couple of years back.  And so I will endeavor to prevent that by sticking with the address WordPress.com gave me, even though they seem set on making me get a domain of my own.

Meanwhile, I’ll have to find some time to fix those ever-so-important ten dollar horse links.  I can at least still find Darren over at the Internet Archive.

Clearly I need a tool to convert links on the site to a given domain to the Internet Archive version, as this is likely to continue to be an issue.

Edit: Turns out Darren did not self-host, so his blog is still available at tcsgamer.blogspot.com.  My links remain broken however.

One Year Ago

Daybreak’s Landmark finally went live just a few days short of summer.  However, it was the end of the road for PlanetSide and Legends of Norrath.

There was also the launch of the Isle of Refuge free trade server for EverQuest II.

There was a Newbie Blogger Initiative, for which I put up a post.

It was reported that Minecraft had sold more than 100 million copies.

Minecraft put out the Frostburn Update, version 1.10.  I was building the last stretches of what would become the 22km rail loop.

I also reflected on a year of playing Minecraft, then added in some statistics.

Blizzard had the Warcraft Movie open.  I didn’t like it, nor did that many people outside of China.  Meanwhile Blizzard was also explaining that WoW expansions were just going to take time.  While WoW Legion was still weeks away, my daughter and I went back to finish up Warlords of Draenor and get ready for the new expansion.  Meanwhile the whole Nostalius thing was still simmering.

And I was playing EVE Online.  There was the YC118.6 update, which brought us more overview tabs and the Shadow of the Serpent event, among other things.  Recurring opportunities, in which you could earn some skill points by undocking and shooting an NPC, were removed after their short run.  DX9 was also dead in EVE.  And there was Blog Banter 76, which was about FC’s and how vulnerable they should be.

But mostly I was flying in fleets out of Saranen as we kept up the tempo of operations in what would become the final full month of the Casino War.  There were just too many posts about that to try and sting them together in a single paragraph narrative, so I will just list them out:

• Scenes from the Saranen Undock – June 1
• A Carrier Dies in Deklein – June 2
• Titans and Jams on Saturday – June 6
• RAZOR Leaves The Imperium – June 11
• Not Enough Nagas – June 13
• Hurricane Massacre – June 14
• Thrasher Holocaust – June 22
• Foothold in Pure Blind – June 27
• A POS Shoot in Saranen – June 29

Five Years Ago

I was asking people about voice software again.

I went on about the ridiculous nature of material tiers for MMO crafting.

My daughter finally found a game she liked on the PS3.

I was ranking how I liked to get my gaming news.

The first Civilization V expansion came out offering, among other things, a performance boost to those who paid.  Meanwhile, the story about the decade long game of Civ II came to light.

Everything we knew about EverQuest Next was declared obsolete.  It wasn’t all that much really.

On the Fippy Darkpaw server, the Gates of Discord expansion was finally unlocked, but not before there was a tie vote.

Turbine announced the Riders of Rohan expansion, the first LOTRO expansion I declined to buy.  For somebody still in Moria, it seemed to offer few benefits for its increased price relative to past expansions.

In Rift I hit level 50, which is a special thing in game, and started tinkering with the then new instant adventure option.  Trion also announced the Storm Legion expansion, a sign of success for most subscription based MMOs.

In EVE Online I hit 80 million skill points and was playing Lemmings in DBRB’s fleet.  We also ganked a Chimera that was scammed into jumping to the VFK beacon.  This upset people.

And, finally there was Electronic Arts which, as part of its ongoing mission to be seen as the most arrogant company in gaming, tried to tell people that Origin was the Nordstrom to Steam’s Target level business model, unintentionally insulting Nordstrom, which actually cares about customer service before the fact, not just after it has screwed the pooch yet again.  EA says they “get it” but I have my doubts.

Ten Years Ago

I got all Buddhist on the subject on the raiders vs. non-raiders rift. I think what I said could be applied to some current controversies.

I ran down my list of complimentary comment spam.

I did a poll asking which software people used for voice coms.  At the time, almost nobody who responded was using game-integrated voice software.  Most people were using Ventrilo.

I took a picture of my gaming setup.  Still the same keyboard, monitor, and mouse ten years later.

We heard that Pirates of the Burning Sea would not only be published by SOE, but would be available via a Station Access subscription.

We were still playing Lord of the Rings Online.  Hitting level 20… not for the last time… I was out at the Forsaken Inn… also not for the last time.  The instance group, minus Earl, finished the first epic book… again, not for the last time.  And server queues, something common at launch, were starting to disappear after just two months.  This was odd, since the last great server queue experience was with WoW, where queues went on for over a year on some servers.

Vanguard, which announced server merges… again, not for the last time… gave rise to a discussion about future proofing games.  I held that just making system requirements huge… something that was an issue with Vanguard… was not the same thing.  I did wonder what would have happened had WoW had higher system requirements back in 2004.

After letting Blizzard’s announcement of StarCraft II sink in, I put up a post about the original StarCraft back when it was our office game of choice.

Darren was all worked up about crafting being the suck, so I started trying to list out all the things that might be wrong with crafting. Then Tobold suggested the whole “figure out recipes by trial and error” idea and I ran screaming from the room.

I said nice things about “Opinions of the Misinformed.”

Also, the iPhone launched, moving smart phones from curiosity to mainstream.

Most Viewed Posts in June

1. Pokemon Lycanroc event at GameStop
2. From Alola Pokedex to National Pokedex in Pokemon Sun
3. Is EVE Online a Gankbox?
4. Where the Hell is that EverQuest Successor Already?
5. In Which I Return to Tyria
6. Ashes of Creation Kickstarter Campaign Closes Big
7. The Steam Summer Sale 2017 Arrives
8. Minecraft 1.12 World of Color Update Goes Live
9. Keepstar Down in Auga
10. Minecraft Grand Unification Theory
11. The EverQuest Agnarr Progression Server to Remain Locked in Time
12. The June 2017 Update Brings Null Sec Nerfs to New Eden

Search Terms of the Month

ashes of creation next big thing?
[I think there might be a few things before we get there]

rpm jenks speed
[Is that a VR title?]

warcraft marriage achievement unlocked
[Married in the game, or to the game?]

how much better is the hel than other supercarriers for ratting
[Oh man, did you come to the wrong blog!]

how to unlock all songs on rock band 2 wii
[Nothing ever dies]

do parrots in update 1.12 spawn in previously explored jungle biomes?
[I believe you need to explore fresh chunks to find parrots]

EVE Online

The summer of mild discomfort continues as people look for reasons to be angry at CCP, generally revolving around CCP not doing what they say, immediately, without considering the consequences.  The ignorant outsider is always a better judge of things than the people who actually know the code… says the ignorant outsider at least.

None of which has impacted me in the least.  I go on ops, do a little ratting in my Ishtar, and read about the drama.  There were new forums added for the game as well.  I got my achievement for doing the tutorial.  Other achievements are available.  Gamification of gaming forums, oh my.

GuildWars 2

Well, another month and another run at an old MMO peters out.  As with Runes of Magic the month before I just stopped logging in.  Not because I was hating the game, but I just didn’t feel much draw to keep going.  It wasn’t the zones or centaurs or the game mechanics or the personal story so much as it being just another fantasy MMO I was playing solo.

Minecraft

The server carries on and I am sporadically logging on to build things.  The 1.12 World of Color update gave me something to look into, but otherwise I have carried on as before.

Meanwhile, after a brief update about the whole Mineserver thing, that has gone back to radio silence.  Maybe we’ll hear something new by Christmas?

Pokemon

I am still pottering around a bit in Pokemon Sun, though that is clearly winding down for me.  It is probably best to give that a bit of a break given that new titles are coming late this year.  I did join in a couple of the online tournaments as a lark, and did as badly as expected.  Still, I will have to write up the results of one, as it does point to a pattern.

Pokemon Go

The big gym update hit last week.  I am not sure how much of a difference it really makes.  I still can’t beat a Blissy that is CP 2800 or higher, and if you can’t beat them then their CP doesn’t degrade and they are fixed in place.

My basic stats this month:

• Level: 28 (+0)
• Pokedex status: 174 (+8) caught, 197 (+10) seen
• Pokemon I want: Gyrados
• Current buddy: Magikarp… only 207km more to get enough candies for a Gyrados

Steam Summer Sale

The semi-annual sales event is upon us and I have actually purchased a few titles this time around, breaking the cycle of disinterest that I had shown the last couple of sales.

Coming Up

What is even going on in July worth noting?  Remastered StarCraft isn’t until August.

There is the possibility of an EVE Online patch update from CCP.  While vacation time for them has started, they usually only skip August completely.  We shall see.  Further carrier ratting nerfs are expected and the Strategic Cruiser revamp is already on the test server.

The Fantasy Movie League stuff will continue.  I am enjoying that… perhaps a bit too much even.  I now have the Variety film section in my RSS feed.

Then there is still the desire to find fantasy MMORPG happiness, but where to look?  Do I seek out an as-yet unexplored title and risk finding the ever present sameness of the genre?  Or is nostalgia what I need, one of the retro servers that Daybreak is offering up?  Am I attempting to recapture the unrecapturable he asked, just making up words at this point?

Anyway, another month looms.  But there is a holiday on Tuesday, which effectively means a four day weekend for me, so the next real post might have to wait until Wednesday next week.