[11] No Way Home

console

< Piro >

"sugoi!"

Thursday - September 7, 2000

Wow, what a week. I have had no luck whatsoever getting ahead (I finished Wednesday's strip around 2:00 in the morning) but the response to Megatokyo this week has been, well, unbelievable. I'm rather floored. I'd like to thank everyone who's dropped by,and to those who keep coming back. For the record, there should always be a new strip every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. I'll also do what I can to improve the art - it's not as good as it could be. I'll work on that.

Largo and I are sorta new to the scene. I really have no clue as to what I am doing. Neither does largo (don't let him fool you). With that being the case, I'm even more floored by the fact that such established strips as Penny Arcade, PVP and Real Life have mentioned us on their sites, and even said nice things about us. Gee wiz, thanks guys. We are not worthy.

I'm havin a little bit of a brain lockup today - it's a combination of being too tired and having too much to do in my day job. ^^;; The image of Rabi-en-Rose from DigiCharat seemed aptly appropriate today for some reason...

DigiCharat is a really great series based on the cute little mascot Digiko (or Dejiko) for a chain of stores in Japan called Gamers that sells anime and game stuff. She became such an icon that she finally got her own show. :) The show itself is nuts. It amazes me how much cuteness and insanity can be packed into 4 minutes (yes, each ep is really short). The opening song "Only One Number One" has to be one of my all time favorite tunes.

Rabi en Rose is actually Digiko's archrival at the store and has a bunny outfit that she wears while working at the store. Digiko and Puchiko are aliens, but Rabi is a earth girl. When not at work, she dresses conservatively and wears glasses and a long braid. The pic above is actually a younger Rabi watching her bizarre parents abandon her and take off for America. ^_^ Kawaisou, Rabi-chan...

I suppose that's one of the things I like about Rabi. She has sort of a double life. Look at her in her school outfit and you'd never guess she dresses like this most of the time. Kinda the way that most of the people I work with have no idea what i do in my spare time. God help me if they find my Puchiko neko cap...

Ack... another 'megane-ko' - what is with me lately, this thing about girls with glasses? Rabi-en-Rose doesn't even wear glasses usually. Believe it or not, 'meganeko' is actually a category in Japanese CG art circles. Does it have something to do with the fact that I wear glasses? I don't know, this is kind of a new trend with me... well, actually, it has surfaced in the past.

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< Largo >

"pay for play"

Thursday - September 7, 2000

[Largo] - 00:00:01 - [link here]

Well, as expected I was burned in effigy this week due to my admitting my love for the X-Box. I still haven't been able to finish answering each email I received due to monday's rant. With that in mind I may need to stick to something less controversial for today's rant, something more tame, like abortion or nuclear weapons.

We decided to make a higher resolution version of last friday's episode 'Speak l33t', due to the number of requests we received to have this done. Look for the image in a future rant.

For those interested, the beta signup for Sacrifice is going on over at the many planeted gamespy. Now if only my Tribes 2 beta application wouldget approved...

Speaking of planets, I've been doing some thinking about the near future in regards to the flood of MMORPG's that is the tsunami about to hit our fragile island. I'm always up for competition, but with these games, which all require a monthly fee, many people will only be playing one or two of them at most. So the question is; which one to play? The current list of front runners seems to be Anarchy Online, Shadowbane, and Ultima Online 2. I can only speculate on which one will come out on top, but it's safe to say Origin has the advantage for now. Since all three of these are going to ask it's players pay a monthly fee, it reasons that most gamers will have to choose which one they want to play. I think we'll end up seeing the same thing we did with the last batch of MMORPG's; UO, Everquest, and Asheton's Call. That is that players will typically stick with whatever game they first get heavily involved into playing. MMORPG's have a nasty edge to them in that players will continue to pay their monthly subscription fee's long after they quit playing the game itself for fear of losing what they spent months of playing to attain in the event they ever want to play again. This is especially so in the case of Everquest, which has only helped to give it the deserved nickname of Evercrack. Now perhaps I'm jaded, but I can't help but feel there is now a business model out there to capitalize off of a gamer's addiction to their online characters. Regardless, it's obvious a lot of people enjoy and will continue to enjoy MMORPG's, regardless of the amount of time they suck away from a person's family... career... sanity...

Considering all of the above, personally I'd suggest everyone just go with Neverwinter Nights, There is something to be said for unlimited distributed worlds, and local controls and customization... but hey - that's just me.

Update: Shawn wrote in today to remind me about two other MMORPG's that I seem to have been ignorant about, these are Horizons, and Neocron.