Your Semi-Daily Dosage - 07/07/06

[Joe]

I've always enjoyed news roundups. It's a big world, and for busy, intelligent people like you and me, having an RSS reader with over 40 sites constantly trickling in news updates and editorial is just going to kill our productivity. (I mean, really, who has time to read 40 websites a day? Especially gaming websites. Certainly not me, I can tell you that [Hi, boss!].)

Anyway, if you've been busy this week, like me, here's a few headlines you may have missed.

 

[Joe]

Original Comment by: Aaron Dawson

IIn response to the article "Drudgery". I don't believe that you have encompased the vast majority of the players of MMORPGs at all. I think some people do like to brag, but the vast majority doesn't care what items you are trying to show off because that just means you have more time to spend in the game than they do.

However, in the long run, having more time to spend in the game getting something you want is not something to brag about. Its more likely that people will quickly realise that if your life didn't exist around MMORPGs you wouldn't feel the need to brag about your in game accomplishments.

Maybe the reason that people get so bored about pressing F8 and F12 is because they forget that these games, for the most part, were designed to be played a little less than 18 hours a day. Also, if you build a toon for a reason that you think will be fun then stick to that reason. In WoW I play a Feral Druid (this class does not get love from the community) because I feel that is fun. Someone told me that in the all encompasing end-game I would be forced to be nothing more than a healer with my druid. I told that person I'd rather not be part of the end game if it meant I would have to compromise what I enjoyed in order to fit in with people that expected me to behave a certain way. Granted, the developers of the game make it more difficult to play the game the way you want instead of the way that bennefits the community, and in the end there are drawbacks, but in the end, I would much rather look back at the game and realise that I enjoyed playing it instead of looking back and noticing I played the game the way others expected me to but hated every minute of it.

 

[Joe]

Yo, dude. Scroll down to post your comment next time.

MY THREAD! MINE!

 

[Joe]

Original Comment by: Carlo Zottmann

Holy crap, these squirrel ads are real? All of a sudden the VGCats strip I've read a couple of weeks ago makes sense.

VGCats: "Squirrel Please" [http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=192]

WTF are they thinking? Sony once was cool and hip (PSX, anyone?), but these days are past now. To me they appear more and more like a cornered animal.

(Yes, that animal could very well be a squirrel.)

 

[Joe]

Squirrel Please is definitely something else. The whole campaign boggles my mind, especially given how cool the original PSP commercials were (weird camera angles coupled with Franz Ferdinand). Really, I think it all went bad when they started tagging public buildings.

But to be fair, the advertising seems to be working. The PSP did outsell a lot of devices last year in the States, including the DS [http://www.joystiq.com/2006/01/19/psp-outsells-the-nintendo-ds-in-the-us-by-1-million/].

 

[Trujkin]

Wow, so here is the latest. Ads, gone. Now if only they'd have done the same thing with those horrific stereotyped "scribbles" tv ads...

News.com - Sony Pulls Controversial PSP Ad [http://news.com.com/Sony+pulls+controversial+Dutch+PSP+ad/2100-1041_3-6093116.html?tag=nefd.top]

 

[Joe]

Of course, Leeland Yee hopped in. Because, you know, advertising in Europe seriously affects the legislative process in California:

I am pleased to see Sony taking responsibility for their racially-charged ad and appropriately pulling it from the marketplace. Sony did the right thing by recognizing their insensitive mistake and apologizing for offending many of their customers.

Good to know he has his finger on the pulse, even if the heart beat is 6,000 miles away.