(This is the fourth part of an ongoing series of skientific infestigations into the physics, chemistry and biology of Azeroth, the world known as ‘of Warcraft’. This will probably be gibberish unless you have read part 1, part 2 and part 3 first.) The ecology of Azeroth, part 2 The strangest aspect of the animal [...]
Filed under: fantasy, game design, game philosophy, game theology, geophysics, mmorpg, online games, playfulness, rpg, science, world of warcraft on July 11th, 2008 | 10 Comments »
(This entry is the third part of a continuing quasi-scientific investigation into the nature of Azeroth, the world better known as “of Warcraft”. Here we move on from geophysics to study the local ecology. Part 1 and Part 2 of the series are still online.) The ecology of Azeroth is perplexing. In addition to the [...]
Filed under: environment, fantasy, game design, game philosophy, game theology, geophysics, humour, mmorpg, playfulness, science, world of warcraft on July 8th, 2008 | 10 Comments »
If you’ve been commenting to my last few blog posts on the World of Warcraft, or you have a scientific hypothesis of your own about the nature of Azeroth and how it came to be that way, or you have too much time on your hands and enjoy thinking about stuff that doesn’t make sense, [...]
Filed under: fantasy, game design, game philosophy, geek culture, geophysics, google, humour, information use, meme, mmorpg, online games, playfulness, science, storytelling, world of warcraft on July 4th, 2008 | 1 Comment »
(This is a continuation of the essay started here and synopsised on video here.) I note that my previous post has sparked some academic debate in certain circles relating to the validity of my research techniques and data. Therefore before we embark into a new area of discussion, I must address some of the comments [...]
Filed under: Uncategorized, environment, fantasy, fiction, game design, game philosophy, geek culture, geophysics, humour, information use, mmorpg, playfulness, science, space, world of warcraft on July 3rd, 2008 | 26 Comments »
The text that made up my Interesting 08 talk ‘Brave n00b World’ was part of a much longer document that I’ve been working on for a while. I’m not sure it’s ready for primetime—I’m not sure it’s ready for anything—but to catch the tide of interest in the video, here’s the first part of it. This [...]
Filed under: environment, fantasy, game design, game philosophy, geek culture, geophysics, humour, mmorpg, playfulness, real world, science, world of warcraft on June 30th, 2008 | 76 Comments »
Roo Reynolds, the man behind Lego is Full of Win, not only videoed my presentation ‘Brave n00b World’ at Interesting 08 but has Done Computers to it and made it available on the internest. Lo! I was originally going to call it ‘The World of the World of Warcraft’, but the Onion beat me to [...]
Filed under: conference, convention, fantasy, game design, game philosophy, geophysics, humour, mmorpg, playfulness, science, world of warcraft on June 25th, 2008 | 18 Comments »
It’s taken me a while but I finally tore myself away from WoW to start playing Eternal Sonata (Bandai/Namco, Xbox 360) today. I have been looking forward to this. It’s a JRPG set in the dreams of Frédéric Chopin as he lies dying of tuberculosis in Paris in 1849. And that is the kind of [...]
Filed under: console, emotion, fantasy, music, oh for fuck's sake, rpg on January 10th, 2008 | 2 Comments »
These two Blizzard commercials are all over the blogosphere and, no doubt, US TV channels as well. They’re your basic celebrity endorsement. SFX: OMG OMG here comes the n00bs endless September all over again. No, I don’t think so. Are these commercials to bring new people to World of Warcraft, or to get existing players [...]
Filed under: advertising, fantasy, geek culture, mmorpg, world of warcraft on November 21st, 2007 | No Comments »
You’re alone in a foreign country, on a mission of international security. Your police escort has been killed, and you’re in the middle of nowhere, armed only with a pistol and a few rounds of ammunition, most of which you’ve already had to use on malevolent locals. You’ve been captured and injected, you’re alone, no [...]
Filed under: criticism, fantasy, game design, game philosophy, survival horror, tabletop on July 9th, 2007 | 7 Comments »
I’ve spent the last week in the south of France, just outside Aix-en-Provence, drinking Banyuls and wondering why developers wait for a body to go on holiday before flooding him with emails. It’s been delightful apart from one evening when we were attacked by a scorpion in the house. We were in the kitchen when [...]
Filed under: AI, fantasy, game design, game philosophy, rpg on June 12th, 2007 | 5 Comments »