April 30, 2013

EVE Universe: Origins & Stellar Council Update

The CSM Vote 2013 (CSM 8)

CSM are Players slected by fellow players to represent our interests to CCP

April 29, 2013

The Right Wing Cult Machine Exposed

April 25, 2013

"Paul Ryan's Personal Video Diary"

April 25, 2013

Wall Street Journal Review:Dead Island Riptide: As Fun As a Real Zombie Apocalypse

Dead Island Riptide is a first person hacking-and-slashing game about killing zombies. Like many video games that involve zombies, it uses well-worn tropes from the undead archive in its story. Every so often when I was exploring the vast, gorgeously rendered tropical archipelago that constitutes the game’s open world, for instance, I’d come across a hapless survivor.

“Help me!” they would always shout from atop some barricade as their less fortunate, brain-hungry brethren nipped at their feet from below. Post-apocalyptic stories inevitably prompt the question, “What would you do in the face of such horror?” and since I like to imagine that I’ll be on the morally defensible side of the zombie apocalypse, I would make sure to help. At least at first, because every time I did help one of them, something strange happened. One middle-aged man who looked like he hadn’t slept for days thanked me profusely, telling me that he needed to go find his family. Then he sat back down on the roof of the mobile home from which I just rescued him and stared blankly forward. Another barely finished thanking me before he demanded I go find his camera. When I returned with it, he took the staring blankly route too.

Eventually I stopped helping these people, but still they would appear. A blood red notification “Help Megan” popped up on the screen every time I accelerated my motor boat around a dangerous turn in the island’s river, hoping that none of the zombies noticed me long enough to divert their attention away from her. I felt bad about abandoning this virtual victim the first time I passed by her, and told myself all of the ugly rationalizations that befit me as a player. I was going to save an entire village, I reasoned, and getting trapped knee-deep in a murky river with nothing but a baseball bat and a slow-moving motorboat wouldn’t help either of us. The ugliness of Dead Island’s moral universe worked, in other words.

http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2013/04/23/video-game-review-dead-island-riptide/

April 23, 2013

Dead Island Sequel "Riptide" Released today

The Orginal, fantastic Dead Island Trailer -As good as any Horror movie trailer, if not better

April 23, 2013

Could we have an MMOG Group?

With the number of gamers, a MMOG (Massive Multiplayer Online Games) Channel/group I think such a channel would get alot of use. It would allow for guilds and other-ingame groups to comunicate.

April 20, 2013

Jita Burn 2.0 Eve Online Live Stream THIS WEEKEND

http://www.twitch.tv/daopa

http://www.livestream.com/live2030

For quite some time, the Jita solar system has been the most populated solar system in EVE Online on a sustained basis, having organically risen as the main player trade hub in game due to its location and the basic human need to gather together and trade stuff.

It's had a varied reputation as [wretched hive of scum, villainy and scammers], [representative product of EVE's emergent sandbox game design], [indefatigable cog of economic prosperity], and [rallying point for impassioned protestors].

And, starting last night, it was on fire.

Actually, Jita itself wasn't on fire, but thousands of players who normally find it a "safe" haven of trade and economic gameplay found their ships on fire - everything from a lonely hauler on up to the simply massive, highly-armored freighters moving thousands of USD equivalents of ships and goods.

As you can see from the below "kill" heatmap of the EVE universe (where each dot is one of the 5,431 solar systems in EVE's known universe), it was a pretty big deal.


And it all happened because a few players wanted to make it happen and then, after convincing thousands of others to join them from around the world, they made it happen.

"BURN JITA"

For several months now, a coalition of thousands of players have been planning the "Burn Jita" event, aimed at disrupting the biggest trade hub in game in order to wreak some terrific, universe-wide changes by shaking the very pillars of EVE's economy at its metaphorical heart. Surely there was some sort of larger, meta-economic objective that likely would cause them great profit. This planning happened both in game and outside of game, via voice over IP chat, secret forums, Twitter and more. A sci-fi plot of the new information age if there ever was one.

Using game mechanics and some very impressive logistics, the coalition, lead by a group known as Goonswarm, amassed a tremendous amount of manpower and ships in a concentrated effort that would probably make many real life military strategists jaw-drop. Bravado-saturated propaganda was also a pretty big part of their plot.

Fast forward to Friday: Player fleets comprised of high-damage-dealing ships began to destroy high-value industrial ships during a sustained campaign with single, coordinated volleys, sacrificing themselves in waves because the in-game "police" warps in almost immediately with harsh, reprimanding justice.

Amidst this orchestrated chaos, opportunistic salvagers profited from the wrecks left behind and EVE's deep, talented player community began blogging about, filming, screenshotting, livestreaming and celebrating/decrying the event. Some opposing fleets rose up to fight the invading hordes as well - to mixed success.

All of it occured in the same framework of unrestricted player movement and limitless player choice in a single, shared game universe. As our senior producer put it "f*cking brilliant". As a participating player put it: "There’s just something special about building 15,000 spaceships and loading their guns with 1 round of ammo to shoot. And doing it right in front of the police."

As developers we watched in awe at another amazing thing our players brought to the universe we created. Yet there was a lot more going on behind the scenes on our end besides popcorn and a comfy chair...

THE VERY TECHNICAL SIDE

Since the "Burn Jita" event was announced well in advance and CCP wants to support player-driven events (as long they are within the rules of the game), we reinforced the Jita solar system on our beefiest hardware, further reinforced all neighbouring systems and set out to monitor the event and provide the best experience we could to willing (and unwilling) participants. Then things started to unfold a day earlier than announced on Friday morning. We gathered data and fine-tuned the systems and as CCP Veritas put it: "It's okay, didn't want that Friday night anyway."

April 20, 2013

FLASH: Authorities On Alert As Hundreds Of Crazed Sociopaths Enter Congressional Chambers

Federal, state, and local law enforcement officials are reportedly on high alert today after a group of dangerous sociopaths entered the chambers of Congress, posing what sources are calling "an extreme risk" to the U.S. federal government and the nation at large.

April 19, 2013

Suspect just sat up in the boat. Is Flailing about. Still alive as of 18:40 Central standard

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/ma-rt-9-window-cam

18:41 Cops are moving in.

18:42 sitting up again, fence side sitting center of the boat

Map
6http://www.bing.com/maps/default.aspx?q=67+Franklin+St.%2c+Watertown%2c+MA&mkt=en&FORM=HDRSC4

18:46 Flashbang preparing to be deployed

18:47 ALERT Do not return fire. Flashbang going out.

18:50 Flashbang hit forward of subject. Subject not moving.

18:50 Fire on boat has gone out.

18:52 multiple flashbangs. No movement.

18:53 Victor 11 Element is near boat

18:55 Elements in Boat

18:57 negative movement, on his back

April 19, 2013

This New Zealand Politician Unleashes One Of The Funniest Gay Marriage Speeches On Record

Maurice Williamson: 'Rainbow across my electorate'

#!
Pakuranga MP Maurice Williamson has parliamentarians roaring in their seats during the third marriage equality bill reading.