What video games are you currently playing?

You need to do a real-time review or something. This is exciting. A guy who eschewed MMOs is finally jumping into one.

 

Well, there's not much to tell just yet. So far it's more of a massively single player online game -- a little more than an hour in and I still haven't actually interacted with another player. I'm working through the tutorials, which I expect will probably be the extent of my EVE playing for tonight. The interface is a little intimidating, and I suspect I have a lot to learn.

The graphics are surprisingly good for a ten year old game, and it runs well on my MBP. So far the computer is doing the heavy lifting, re: piloting, targeting, etc. I don't know if that changes later or not, but I think I can deal with it either way.

 

If it's like any other MMO, it will likely be pretty lonely for the first few missions/quests.

 

I really like the game. I've dabbled in guitar off and on for over 20 years. I've been a perpetual amateur the whole time. My main problem is the lack of a practice discipline. On one level, I don't typically sit down often enough. On another level, I don't practice long enough nor have a comprehensive enough routine.

That said Rocksmith helps fix these problems. I'm now encouraged to sit down, and each time I do, I will play the game for at least 45 min or an hour without even realizing it.

I think the game was designed with both beginners and the proficient in mind. It's just fun. It's basically jamming to music. It's a way to learn specific songs. And for the beginner and amateur there are a number of tools to help you along (riff practice, technique practice, mini games tied to techniques, etc.) And for the proficient, there are songs available that are more advanced in difficulty.

Ultimately, its appeal is in what motivates us in games: being entertained, going after objectives, reaping rewards. This game layer is what makes it different from any other means of learning, practicing, or simply playing guitar.

There's even a sandbox mode where you can gather different pieces of equipment as you unlock them in story mode. In it you can piece together your own custom sounds. It's like setting up your own amp. (It's actually just called "Amp.")

The game is not without faults though. For starters, you need to adjust to a slight delay between the video and the sound (not a difficult thing). I otherwise find it can be a bit buggy at times. The tone recognition sometimes doesn't work right. Though I think it is likely due to my crappy guitar, which has had problems with its wiring. The guitar's sound will sometimes cut out. Sometimes I swear I hit the right note, but the game will disagree (this tends to happen to me a lot in drop-D tuning). This doesn't happen enough to ruin the game though. Usually it's just a matter of fiddling with the jack and restarting the song.

Also, Ubisoft keeps releasing new song downloads, so it's getting more enticing in terms of content.

 

I think I need to stop playing open-ended or repetitive games. I'm talking about the likes of strategy games and MMOs. They seem like such time sinks—like, beyond the "Oh, but I'm just getting some R&R." I think Rocksmith is an exception because you get something substantive out of it. But games like Civ V and Tropico seem to become the same thing over and over again. Like a kind of button mashing. Like a gerbil pressing the button for the food.

I keep meaning to get back to my PS3 where I have a stack of games with linear plots (well, I suppose some of them have "webular" plots). You know, games that I should have a better time moving on from once I've completed them.

The thought of starting a new civilization from scratch is like craving a drug.

 

Well, I was playing Rocksmith these days. That is, until my crappy guitar broke again. The wiring to the jack is messed up again. It was gradually kicking out over time as I was playing the game, and tonight was its last hurrah. I was in the middle of playing a show, and the crowd was wondering why "Breed" wasn't coming out through the amp.

I knew something was up, because lately the guitar couldn't sustain a note beyond a second or so.

I don't know what I'm going to do now. I don't like the idea of paying to fix it again for the same reason.

 

I'm considering spinning this off into a thread of it's own. I'm 10 days into my trial and roughly 10 hours into the gameplay. You've described it as a sandbox, which is apt -- I'm actually still working through the dozens of training missions designed to familiarize new players with the various aspects of gameplay. I think I'm about halfway through, which would mean I've got another ten hours or so before I'm actually into the game proper.

Yesterday I found myself in need of more ammunition for my rail guns, so I went off to the market to buy some. Sounds simple, right? Maybe if you've never played Eve it does.

I'm pretty sure I'm going to commit to at least a couple of months at this point. By my understanding I can buy a 60 day time card, which will have me set up for two months of play without a recurring subscription. I think I'd prefer for my subscription renewals to be something I need to do proactively. The game provides the possibility to pay your subscription using in-game currency by way of items called PLEX, so it's possible (though, if I'm honest, not likely) that by the time my 60 day subscription expires the whole thing will have become self sustaining.

 

So, yup. Subscribed to EVE. I bought a 60 day time card, so there's no recurring charges and it won't auto-renew -- once my 60 days are up, I have to proactively decide to extend it. This seemed like the best way to do it, since it gives me a natural point to reassess whether I'm getting my value out of the game every two months.

I've spent my evening mining asteroid fields. It's actually a decent way to make ISK, for the simple fact that if you do it in hisec space you can basically just leave it running in the background until your cargohold is full. A couple of combat drones to chase of the rats is all you really need, since CONCORD will blap anyone who tries to pod you.

...Yeah, there's a whole language.

Baraka_Guru, I will not attempt to lure you into playing. But if you decide you want to, I can totally hook you up with a 21 day trial (normal trial is 14 day) and, should you decide to subscribe, I'll also give you a big pile of starting cash and we can conquer the galaxy together.

 

Yeah... As tempting as this sounds, I really can't put any time or money into this. Not at the moment anyway.

 

Eve update: In addition to mining, I'm now dipping my toe into playing the in-game market to make in-game money. My goal is to get my income up to around 600M ISK per month by April -- if I can do that, I can use in-game money to fund my subscription, and not have to pay a monthly fee to play, which was my big sticking point on signing up to an MMO in the first place. Market trading might be a way to do that -- it's a low barrier to entry, essentially following the same principles as market trading in meatspace, namely buy stuff for cheap and sell it for more than you bought it for. That's a bit more attractive than some of the other ways to make money that require a higher in-game skill investment; in-game skills train in real time, so to really start making money at some of the other "careers" in Eve, you need weeks or months invested in the game first.

I got a big chunk of cash from the guy who gave me a referral link to sign up (he got a PLEX out of it, which sells for abour 550M ISK currently, and gave me some of the dividends from that). I've put about 100M ISK into the market right now, which is about a quarter of my assets. If it doesn't work out I'm not in a substantially worse position than I was, since I still have more money than most folks starting out and I can look for other ways to build funds in the game.

We'll see how this goes.

 

Ohhhhhhh yeaaaah. Mmmm, farming.