Category: Discussion


League Basics

Filed under: Discussion, Gaming, League of Legends by Kana-chan — Leave a comment
February 8, 2012

First and foremost, you may be thinking, “Kana! Why are you posting Wednesday morning?” and the answer to that is simply: TERA Online beta this week! Yes, the closed beta to my Monster Hunter-surrogate begins Friday. So, I’ve decided to push back both posts, though honestly depending on how much footage I record Friday may mean the post is pushed back to Saturday morning. Hoping to get some solid gameplay with at least 2 classes this test cycle. Thinking Berserker and Archer, but if there is a class you’d rather see, by all means let me know! I’d be glad to get some footage about more of what people want. Now then, that out-of-the-way…

Today I wanted to cover something a little different from game mechanics. Going to go over a few of the basic mechanics of League of Legends and how you, the play, can interact with them to improve your game. Going to covering a decently wide range of topics so we won’t dive into too much detail, but if there are questions I can always expand on them later.

Zone Control:


First, watch that. Yes, the video is old, but it’s still every bit as accurate now as it ever was. Zoning has the effect of controlling your opponent through what are essentially mind games. What you want to do is bully the enemy lane (most effective if it’s 1 enemy in the lane, but it can be done against 2) until they have to retreat, then moving into position to prevent them from farming. Even better, if you can hold them well while only last hitting minions, your minions will only push very slowly. For every minion of yours that dies in the middle of the field, as opposed to the enemy tower, is another bit of experience you can deny, gaining more of an advantage. Some champions have insane innate zone control; Ziggs can completely lock out an enemy mid just by using Hexplosive Minefield, though the large radius will probably wind up pushing the minion wave bit by bit.
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Stop SOPA!

Filed under: Discussion, Gaming by Kana-chan — 2 Comments
January 18, 2012

Mini-update today, trying to spread the word. If you didn’t know by now, there is extereme legislation in the United States’ Congress that could potentially destroy a free internet. It can be bad enough that my little hole-in-the-blog could be shut down by anyone just by using one piece of copyright material without getting approval. Even under free use, like say, a screen shot of a game. Think about what that means for gaming journalism, streamers who make a living playing games, professionals in the eSports world. We could use a very significant and important part of gamer culture if this passes. Do your part, spread the word. Fight SOPA.

If you’d like to know more about how damaging SOPA can be, or even just WTF it is, TotalBiscuit did an excellent video. Take a look, pass the word, and keep the internet open for us all.

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Playful Personalities

Filed under: Discussion, Gaming by Kana-chan — Leave a comment
August 23, 2011

Alright, today’s post is going to be a little different. Instead of looking at any one (or more) mechanics of a game, we’re going to be looking at the players themselves. Namely, their distinct play-styles. But, my dear readers, we are going much deeper than people usually go, analyzing my two distinct flavors for gaming, and hopefully getting a few of you to reflect on your own. We’ll be going beyond the position in the holy trinity of Tank/Damage/Healer, beyond the physiological classifications (Explorer, Killer, etc.) and into the specific of a single individual, just to see how similar and different we are even when fitting the same archetypes. So, without further ado, I present to you The Sadist and The Dualist.

The Sadist:

The more-or-less default behavior pattern I develop in open world games, and in any game dealing with a post-apocalyptic setting such as Fallout or Bioshock, but also in games with other players, given the character types sync up well enough. Pleasure comes from my enemies’ pain, and enjoyment from their suffering. To give a short example, think back to Bioshock 2. In a pre-established world where there are almost no detriments to your behavior in any way… I was quickly rampaging through the first level of the game, gleefully ramming the drill into targets and turning it on. A friend who was listening at the time told me to quit, demonic giggling + power drill was just creepy. Any time there is a power curve where I can gain the upper-hand, I will do so and near immediately inflict that power on those around me. Another perfect example of this: Warhammer 40k: Space Marine; you start the game way above your enemies in terms of power, and it is endless fun to pummel them into oblivion. So this means I really like big beefy monsters that maul everything to death, right? Well…
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Disconnect

Filed under: Diablo, Discussion, Gaming by Kana-chan — 3 Comments
August 5, 2011

Alright, this is a little continuation of the last post, mainly to set an example of what you should not do. Blizzard is becoming the perfect example at this, and is quickly showing that they are either incompetent at market research or out-right lying to their consumers non-stop. Neither option bodes well for them. So today, let’s just jump straight into it, analyzing some quotes and seeing just how far away from reality Blizzard has fallen.  All quotes are from Robert Bridenbecker, the Vice President of Online Technologies, and you can see the original article here.

“We can provide a much a much more stable, connected, safer experience than we could if we let people play off-line.”

There is so much wrong here I don’t even know what to say… For starters, Blizzard, how do you provide a more stable experience than someone’s computer? This is ridiculous. The most stable possible the game could be is running as a stand alone copy on a computer without any kind of requirement. Stable? Ha, let’s see. That lovely game you just bought from Blizzard is completely worthless if…
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WTB Power, PST Price

Filed under: Diablo, Discussion, Gaming by Kana-chan — 1 Comment
August 3, 2011

Well, late again to the party, as usual. I blame the dreamworld, seriously, who dreams of  Resident Evil for 7 hours and calls it a nightmare? Obviously I’m more loopy than I thought, if I’ve sunk that low. But no one wants to hear about hilarious zombie dogs and insomnia, so let’s kick this week into overdrive, starting with a little controversial piece that’s filtered down the grape-vine. Yes folks, we’re going to be going over the new auction house system in Diablo III, and why it is the most retarded and blatantly uncaring thing Blizzard has ever churned out. And if you couldn’t tell from that statement, you’re in for a caustic hate-filled bombshell of a post.

First off, I want to reiterate something that Blizzard seems to have forgotten and just to make sure no one else ever forget. Do not sell power for money. I’m not kidding, do not ever do that. Why, you might ask, should game devs not do that? Well, my silent readers, there are several reasons. Let’s go over them all here for now. First and foremost, you will shatter your player-base. Players who spend money will always be, without exception, more powerful than anyone who doesn’t pay. Now, think for a second on who the devs are going to devote time and energy into balancing the game for. If Player A has double the power of Player B, anything you design with Player B in mind is going to be slaughtered by Player A without any trouble. But anything designed for Player A will be unbeatable by Player B because of the gap in power between the two. So you have this choice; create a garbage experience for one player and a balanced experience for the other, or an ever more garbage experience (if Player B can even complete it) for one and a balanced for the other. No one wins, and no, you can’t create content for both that’s deep enough to entertain for long. In today’s hyper-graphic gaming scene, content takes ages to produce and test, and very quickly players are going to be forced into groups of who gets content and who doesn’t. Which leads us right into the next point…
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Map Awarness

Filed under: Balance, Discussion, Gaming, Gaming Mechanics by Kana-chan — Leave a comment
July 23, 2011

(Note: The following is mostly relevant mainly to PvP maps. In a Player vs. Environment situation, you can be sure the enemies won’t exploit every advantage and will perform in a fairly predictable pattern, in turn letting more varied landscapes thrive. In PvE, the world exists as a stage for the play of the characters life. In PvP, the world is merely the arena one choose to kill or die in.)

Alright, the last in this weeks balance set and we’ll be taking a look at maps. This can be the make-or-break moment for any game, as playing on unfavorable 1-sided maps can lead to bad games and lost battles just because the enemy spawned on the ‘right’ side. There are two main kind of maps, symmetrical and asymmetrical, and these are what we’ll covering today. This will probably be a short one, just because of the massive amount of variance between games. You wouldn’t play a game of Starcraft II on a map that was designed for Team Fortress 2, and you would probably be pretty bored playing a Team Fortress 2 map on a massive sprawling map were engagements are few and far between. Before we get into the two main categories, let’s cover the basics.

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Elixirs, Tonics, and Toxins; Oh My

Filed under: Balance, Discussion, Gaming, Gaming Mechanics by Kana-chan — Leave a comment
July 20, 2011

Right then. I know it’s a day late, but I’m hoping not a dollar short. It’s that bloody 12 hour car ride, I thought today was Tuesday. Well… whoops. Yes, tomorrow will be a regularly scheduled blog post, and of the normal variety. Today’s will be more of a discussion piece, hopefully getting some gears turning as you read. Back to back posts! I must be losing it to put myself through that. Anyways, on with the show.

Today is going to be a fun one, since this is something that can be found in virtually every game ever. That’s right, items! Various flavors and forms, items are the quintessential backbone of certain types of games, often being both the reward and means to an end. In order to make sure this post actually ends sometime this century, we’ll be mostly talking about items like potions and elixirs, and looking at how they can be balanced for the game in question with a variety of unique and engaging ways. Tomorrow will be the other side of the item world: weapons. For now, let’s get started with the most common potion variant: defensive.
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Artistic Gaming

Filed under: Amnesia, Art, Discussion, Fallout, Gaming by Kana-chan — Leave a comment
June 25, 2011

Well, it was only a matter of time before I did something high-brow to look like a smarty art type who knows what she’s talking about, so let’s get on to it. I’ve a lot to say, and a lot of ground to cover. To start with, go watch this (Or scroll to the bottom). And if you don’t normally watch Extra Credits, check it out sometime. They cover a great number of topics and go over the state of the industry. Always a joy to watch an episode. Now, after that episode went up, there was another post were the writer of EC, James Portnow, had a friendly argument with Thomas Grip of Frictional Games, who you might know for the game Amnesia: The Dark Descent. You can read the entire conversation here, but I’ll be talking about my main views with quotes here, so don’t worry about having to read the whole thing before this.

NOTE: While I intensely disagree with Thomas Grip, I respect his own philosophies. Do not try to twist this into me going off on someone, or I will hit you with a frozen tuna. Maybe and old mail box. You get a cookie if you can name the game that reference is from. Now, without further ado, let’s begin.
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