A Green Mushroom

While I don't quite feel like this , I am never the less done with World of Warcraft.  At least until the next expansion. I had fun working through all the new content with my main.  I did every Cataclysm quest except for Uldum (I thought the desert was boring).  I beat every Cataclysm dungeon on normal mode and almost every one on heroic mode .  I didn't do any raiding, because at this point in my life I just don't care about raiding in the least. I made some alts and experienced the shattering of the old world.  I took them through questlines and through low level dungeons , some of which were nicely re-done.  My Paladin alt leveled solely via the dungeon finder after level 15 which was a new phenomenon for me.  My Priest ran a lot of the new quest content to see how much had changed.  It made me appreciate the tighter quest chains in the shattering.  I had a good alt experience overall. Despite the fun and the criticisms that I had...

  Mmmmm... Bite Size This is what I envision: I boot up my computer, run my MMO of choice, and start the raid finder which pairs me automatically with a group of 9 other people.  This happens within five minutes of starting my computer. Then I am transported to a random dungeon with my group.  The dungeon has one to three bosses and the entire thing can be run in 30 minutes or less. The bosses would be randomized so that I never encounter the same boss twice.  With random bosses I would be able to create strategy instead of simply memorizing pre-set patterns.  Also, there would be no trash mobs to clear out since they only serve to lengthen the amount of time the raid takes but pose no real challenge. These bite size raids would have no lock outs of any kind.  There would be no need to wait out a timer when I want to participate in a raid.  Anytime I feel like raiding I would be able to start up the raid finder and be grouped up in a matter of...

Tobold discusses the new quest system for Guild Wars 2.  The quest system has me more excited than anything else I've heard about the game. Tobold started an interesting series this week about his perfect MMO.  The post on raiding is particularly interesting. Beej has an frustrated post about the effect of gearscore on grouping in WoW.  The post has an ongoing discussion in the comment section, feel free to join the fray. Sunday Viewing this week is a MMO in its purest form:

Blogathon 2010 is going on.  I learned this from Professor Beej 's post on the subject .  I love reading his blog because he covers the intersection of all things media.  It isn't always gaming, but if you have an interest in TV, movies, books, games, and emerging media you couldn't find a better site to read. Wordcount Blogathon 2010 is about writing a post for your blog every day of the month.  So far I tend to write about 5 times each week, but I'll try to make it 7 times per week this month.  Let's see if I can make it.  I think pre-scheduling posts is about to become my new best friend. Last week I forgot to direct your attention to a great post by Spinks on the slow but inevitable death of 25 man raiding .  She has some really good points about the way World of Warcraft raiding is heading in Cataclysm.  Her point about it being less friendly for casual players really hit home with me because I am never a hardcore raider. W...

I'm totally burned out on MMOs at the moment. So, I have a question for all of you out there currently playing MMOs.  What keeps you coming back day after day?  What makes you excited to play your MMO of choice? I need to hear some positive things about MMOs to get back into the mood.  Every time I think about them all I can think of is the grind and it's a complete turn-off from the genre. Let me know, what do you love about your current MMO?

There is a very well written post by Muqq of Ensidia about why he is leaving the World of Warcraft.  Ensidia is considered one of the very top guilds in the entire game and his post is not a rant, which are two reasons the post is so noteworthy.  I really related to the post because it spells out many of my current problems with WoW. I also want to point you toward a feature on my brother's blog.  He has started posting what he feels are the best replays for StarCraft 2.  Since watching replays is a huge part of learning the game I find his posts very helpful.  It's like having someone sort through all the crappy replays for you!  All that's left are the good ones .