Two interesting reads I ran across recently (PHEAR MY FeedDemon!), both from “insiders”. I’d also like to state for the record, that I really prefer when devs remain a faceless malice instead of normal people who aren’t necessarily the spawn of the devil. If they start posting pictures of babies or kittens, they’re off the FeedDemon.

I may comment on these further some day … say, for example, I run low on ingame asshats to bitch about … ergo, I preserve linkage here for posterity:

First, Jeff Freeman’s list of MMOG features that will be become more typical and those that won’t. I’m not really mourning any of those listed on the “shouldn’t expect to see” list other than Instant Travel. I hate that running all over the countryside crap; it’s exhausting. And god help you if you forget a game errand in Remote_City_08.

Second, Ubiq’s Zen of Design list of launch day snafus. I’ve seen all of those launch problems; new players scream “class action suit”, but old gamehags usually just shrug. (And you see the problem when They aren’t a faceless malice? I have a little bit of sympathy. Very little, but sympathy nonetheless.)

Only one launch pissed the ever-living hell out of me, and that was Anarchy Online. For weeks, everyone’s system was grinding to a halt in the more populated cities (from a memory leak or something, not my area). After denying there was a problem, Funcom advised that we all turn down the view so we wouldn’t see other players in the cities.

They were serious. So was I — I cancelled that bitch after a few weeks and didn’t look back.