Ramification TM

Questions we've all asked in many threads.

Short answer:

The developers have abandoned developement on Mission Architect. The developers that are left will spend all their time on the incarnate stuff and booster packs.

So yeah... Guess they think there aren't enough interested in AE to devote dev time. Sorry to seem so negative. It's just the way it is...

I always thought she was inspired by this super group-

Hell that isn't arrogance. That's what AE is for! Well one reason at least . Many authors have done it and it's an opprotunity to further establish your character's identity.

People love to see themselves. Like in my arc Timeshift Vietnam I used the Doppleganger mechanic because like you said. People love playing with themself! Of course it's an overused mechanic but definitely one of the coolest.

Other than that I used my main as the nameless mastermind among the rabble in Dating Ms. Liberty. Also my main is the contact for the Origins Pack Preview.

Anyways. Some of the greatest directors, writers, and filmmakers have inserted themselves within their work. Hitchcock will probably be remembered as one of the most famous for doing so.

There's a DDR controller for MMORPG's and Footpedals.


There's also X-keys-
http://www.xkeys.com/index.php

Lot of crazy controllers there.

I like #2.

Did you know that the color orange is suppose to make you happy?

You are my sunshine! Oh did you know.... You are my sunshine!

Yeah I knew but for some reason everytime I rearrage- they go back to normal by the next login. At least for me- probably have to clear the cache I guess to keep it from happening.

Lack of vampires in comics? You guys obviously never read The Swamp Thing series, lol. That was actually the series that got me into collecting comics as a kid. My collection now collects dust in my garage. Was funny when vampires bit Swamp Thing, they'd be eeeewwww!

Besides that though I remember vampires popping up all through comics. Pretty sure I have one with Superman turned into one.

Anyway yeah the MMORPG setting kind of takes away from the overall "I'm a superhero/villain" when you have so many equals. Nothing you can really do about that though. At heart it is still a game and must function as a game where everyone has equal footing. Who'd play COH if we were all pedestrians.

There was one comic book that kind of reminds me of COH. It was called Dial H for Hero where they featured a new superhero every week I think. You got your superpowers through the phone or something, lol.

Who couldn't love Golden Age comics with such gems as these in them-

There's no children OR animals... Which just make me ask why?

They don't have to be attackable- it would just really add to the atmosphere of the game. Not to mention how many missions could be made around children and animals.

Where do they get the meat for the tacos at El Super Mexicano if there's no animals!? Tacos in Talos? I'll pass

There's got to be a carrot on the end of the stick or people just aren't going to do it. Why waste your time and efforts for nothing really?

MMORPG's in particular. The rewards vary from small to great depending upon how hard the task. Most people get a sense of acomplishment and gratification.

Why is WOW so popular? Because they understand the carrot on a stick policy all too well. Just look at their model. They roll out the next tiers of armor every 6 months to keep people in a constant gear grind. Why else would millions of people run the same dungeons over, and over, and over, and over. Not because they are enthralled with the content. They have to do it for the rewards.

On a different level COH has great missions and stories. But there is little to no carrot. I'm rolling in influence, shards, have a multi billion influence base and really have nothing left to do except reroll and do it all over again. Repetition without rewards is dreadful.

MMORPG's are an extention of yourself. Lot of people play them to escape the realities of life. They play them to do things they can't in real life. They want their character to become more powerful and naturally gain attachments for these characters. Most want to keep improving their character forever- but when they hit a dead end with no rewards. They get bored and cancel accounts.

COH seems very much designed to pull in new players and not really maintain subscribers. The COH experience is pretty much leveling up to max and the only thing left is rerolling or replaying missions without any inscentive. Just look at GR. Sure the 50's were thrown a bone with the ability to change to her/villain/rogue. But the vast majority of the content is leveled at gaining new players with a superior 1-20 experience.

Rewards are very important. People play MMORPG's for many different reasons. Social or whatever. But without rewards it's just a glorified chat room.

So much Thankfullness I feel like I should go buy a turkey again, lol.

What I'm thankful for in COH is the fun I had in AE and it allowing me to write again. Use to write lots and haven't in many years. Was fun dusting off my old authors hat and re-experience some old feelings.

Sounds really suck up, but I am thankful there's a Warwitch out there. She is like a modern day Susan B. Anthony being in such a male dominated industry. If you can't give a hats off to that- well then you need to buy a hat!

Sure whiners suck. But blind fanboyism can be very detrimental to a game. You should never be patting a developer on the back when you don't like what they are doing.

I play many MMORPGs and my money goes where I am having the most enjoyment.

COH is an excellent game, the expansion was good but really hasn't made a lot of sense to me the more I learn about this game. Alpha slots and incarnate system are great.

Is CoX shutting down? Of course not. Just don't have that attitude of "Everything is fine here nothing to see." Because the reality is there's quite a bit of neglect going on in CoX and they're too understaffed to do anything about it.

This is a very old niche game. Now they are threatened by a new juggernaut within the same niche. To say the other game is bad means you probably haven't tried it. I'm not going to say it is bad just because I like CoH. They are both good but very different from each other.

I'm a gamer and play video games. Many video games. You should never get so involved in a game that you just lose all objectivity. It's bad for you and the game itself.

The things I want in CoH aren't being catered too and my fun is waining. My biggest love in COH is AE and it's never going to get improved. There's just many old things being neglected while they focus on the new. Do I hold it against the devs? Of course not- they are understaffed.

Like I said earlier. I go where I'm having the most fun and one of the only reasons I'm subbed right now and resubbing this month is due to the Billboard Contest. But that isn't fun. Most of the time I just find myself standing around my base with no carrot on a stick to give me incentive to do anything.

I started this game when GR came out and began in Praetoria... Not knowing jack about the lore it was a very confusing experience to say the least, lol.

Seemed to me GR should have been an expansion for high level players. Of course I understand the lore now- it is still very hard for me to get over that first experience. It's like you get all into the story of Praetoria then boom thrown into Atlas Park with my luggage.

From that point the game felt very odd. There I was level 20 dropped into the middle of the Primal Earth storyline.

I'm a die hard and stuck with the game and it's been fun. But I can easily see where new players who went through my experience would go "WTF just happened?"

Did give me a bit of bad taste though. Seen it before- delve out 20 levels of higher quality content then dropped into lower quality content. Bit of bait and switch I dunno really hard to figure out what they were thinking. If it was designed to bring in new players. Didn't they think it would be confusing as hell once they left Praetoria?

Bravo on lifting the 3 month limit!

Totally understand the reasoning. It's just trying times for AE and the people who tried to make it work.

Hard to decide on an arc to submit myself because everything I write is for solo play. Anyway!

Guess I will submit my latest and probably last arc until the next Dr. Aeon challenge if there ever is one.

The arc is called: Dating Ms. Liberty Isn't Easy # 464550

You should drop that 3 month limit really. It's your contest and everything but many people outside of AE aren't aware of its sad state.

People really into AE probably haven't written anything new for 3 months. Because there really isn't a reason to make new ones when people don't play your old ones. One of my oldest arcs has like 5 plays.

Also most of the dedicated authors have ran out of slots long ago.

I'm not even saying this for myself. All my arcs are 3 months or less old- but I am a very rare case here. Every month my arcs will get older and slowly be disqualified.

Since you aren't having a theme- then why not just drop that 3 month cutoff. Otherwise you're looking at getting very few entries. It's hard to get entries for contests without any limitations much less ones with them.

Oh there's a thread or two already on the subject ...

All boils down to AE is a forgotten building. Sometimes I wonder if the devs cover their eyes while passing by it in game.

Seriously though. There's many threads out there on AE and its much needed improvements. There's a flawed rating system which can easily be griefed, bugs, bugs, and more bugs! They won't even address the current issues much less add things we want.

Almost every mission that I've ever created ended up with me having to redo everything because of a bug.

Might as well not get your hopes up. The devs aren't interested in AE and/or its improvements. They all have their heads in the incarnate stuff. I'm sure within their boardroom meetings they consider AE a flop and not worth the time. Only explanation for their lack of communication. They won't even talk about it...

So much could be done- they just aren't going to do it. Personally wish they would merge the base builder into a way to create custom maps for your arcs. Plus all the things you've mentioned and things mentioned in the many threads before it.

One of the most under appreciated things in CoX is the music. Maybe because we hear it all the time. Far superior than the Tron soundtrack IMHO. It's copyrighted also. That fact alone makes it impossible to use without licensing fees.

Although AE has enough copyright infringements to give George Lucas a heart attack. Just do a search for Star Wars, Tron, whatever in AE. Player created or not. You can't use the names Yoda, Star Wars, etc... In a commercial environment such as this... NCsoft walk a dangerous line with this and eventually will come back to haunt them.

Anyway- Even the Pocket D club music is better. Just repetitive. Would not mind some more tunes. So much cool stuff could be done. Such as using the new Praetorian events system to bring random events to the club.

Pocket D has a lot of potential. People use it for a meeting hub but there's no real reason to go there and hang out.

Well since you played and reviewed one of my arcs. Then it seemed only right for me to do the same!

Are you new to messing around with AE Glenn? The reason I ask is due to your unbridled enthusiasm. You seem very pumped up about jumping head first into the machine.

Not too long ago I was just like you. When I first started with AE, a mere 4 months ago, I was very excited. The environment is very spirit crushing around here. Try and not let the elitists crush your spirit.

I'm only mentioning this because your arc is going to be nit picked to death. Prepare to be bombarded with unusual questions, lol. Some fellow authors feel that the lore must be applied to AE 100%.

While I am in a camp that if a person isn't 100% in the lore and what they're doing makes sense it just doesn't matter. People who aren't open minded irk me to hell and back. Sorry.

Anyway- enough of my griping. Just don't want to see you have your enthusiasm squashed. Getting plays for new arcs is very hard and there's a lot of negativity in the AE community.

Overall your story seems good. It definetly reminds me of a classic storyline that you would find in a comic book.

All the dialogue needs a run through a grammar/spellchecker. Not saying your grammar is wrong. It's just good practice. When you commented on my arc that I needed more commas. I knew you must be a commaholic. No offense is intended- but you're using too many comma's, IMHO, even though you are passing the grammar checker. My english teacher beat it through my head for years because I had the same problem.

Maybe it's just a matter of style.

M1 Intro-

Seems like you could add some more here. More descriptive if possible.

M1 Popup-

You hear the unique din of both Council and PPD gunfire.

Typo here. But was also thinking it might sound better if phrased.

You hear the distinct richochet of Council and PPD gunfire down the hall.

M1 Collectibles-

I would change the lab equipment to file cabinets/desks or something like that. Seems a bit odd to be searching lab equipment while looking for patient info.

Character descriptions -

All could use a bit of pumping up. Also would make each one unique to add to the story. Lot of the same descriptions for many different types.

Rescued nurse inactive-

Seems to be a typo here.

M3 sendoff-

I think so. If she truly is planning to build a dimensional portal, she has two ways of getting hold of a dimensional stabilizer. Raid a heavily fortified and Vanguard defended portal corp. building or attack a lightly defended secret Crey lab. I think it is safe to say where she will strike next. I am sending you in alone on this one. A PPD presence will tip her off and we do not want her to flee before we can catch her.

Something is off here. It isn't flowing plus need for capitalizations.

Here's how I'd write it-

She has the two ways of getting her hands on a dimensional stabilizer. Raid a heavily fortified Portal Corporation building defended by the Vanguard. Or attack the lightly defended secret Crey lab.

I think it is safe to say where she will strike next. You are going to have to handle this one alone. A PPD presence will tip her off. We do not want her to escape like a slippery eel.


M3 Compass-
Investigate the Crey Lab 1 Dimensional Stabilizer Schematics, 1 Head Researcher's Log, Head Reseracher, Research Assistant, Lead Technician

Couple of typos and take the 1's out. Tighten it up some.

M4 sendoff-

I liked the idea. You use the cell phone gimmick which I am a fan of myself. Think this could be expanded upon. If it were me I'd have the cell phone call as a clue and the sendoff completely different. The way it's set up it seems like the contact is the one talking.

If it were changed to a clue. They'd also get that ding simulating a cell phone. Only problem here is depending on the player to actually read the clue.

M4 Popup-

The defectors should all be meeting in this building. The security is pretty tight for a secert meeting. Oh well, fighting criminals is good exercise.

Typo.

After a long time of looking for the people to subdue. I was forced to give up because I couldn't find them.

Even tried it twice. First time I found Alex at the very end and went back trhough the entire map twice- killed everything. Just could not find the other guys.

Second time I found Alex/Sunny roughly together at the very end. But the last person couldn't be found. Really man I tried.

Only thing I can think of is a smaller map. Or see what's going on with your spawns.

Well I'll leave you with this feedback. Didn't rate it because I can see the potential- just needs some more work - possibly more unique map selections. Wouldn't hurt to see some colored text.

Just wanted to say that is a really cool poster you 'or whomever' made for your event. Looks really good.

Grats Tubster!

And Merry Christmas. I know it's your favorite time of year! Since you were cloned from Santa DNA found on a chimney