I've never played LOTRO. Always wanted to try it, but I didn't want to pay the sub. Now that it's going to be like DDO, I'm going to play it. Hope I get into the beta.

Point is, there are a lot of great MMO's out there, and not enough people with the wallet to play it. Turbine's model is flexible enough to be profitable for the company, and at the same time offer consumers the option to pay when/if they want to.

Buying and playing an MMO is like looking for a car. An AAA title MMO is like a sports car. You pay for the box up front, then you pay monthly for the lease. If the car doesn't drive the way you like, you're stuck with it and a montly payment. And if you can't afford to pay the monthly, you lose the car.

Now what Turbine did is it allows you to test drive the car indefinitely. But only the barebones. All the parts for that car are sold by the manufacturer itself. So if you want a cassette player (that's right) or a nice paint job, you'll have to buy it from them.

What they did with DDO was give everyone the same car too. So those who paid for extra doesn't necessarily get a faster car, they just got a shinier car. You don't pay to win. In the case of DDO, you get access to different race tracks if you pay for it. Those who don't pay can still drive around a lot of places, they just can't enter Beverly Hills for example.

That's that for my car analogy.

Hope I get into LOTRO beta.

...and people are Jerks.

Well, I had a whole rant written up a couple nights ago and then I let it sit there. I realized it isn't just Eve, but any MMO game experience can turn sour due to other players. I went on and rant about accountability and other measures, but in the end people will be jerks on the internet because they are cowards. It's so easy to be mean, and very tempting too. When someone asks for help or ask a question, it's easier to just give them some generic jackass response rather than helping them. Yes people are cowards, because they can hide behind their monitor smug and secure in the knowledge that there will be no consequence for them.

With that said, the blocklist is the best solution at the moment. Jerks still make gaming less enjoyable, but that's human nature and can't be fixed.

...sighhhhhhhh. I'm just tired of running into assholes irl and in-game... especially in-game, where I go to get a break from rl.

I wonder if people ever troll or acted like a jerk on the internet and feel bad about it afterwards.

In other news,

...Tyrannis.. I need to find a real corporation to join and get into this whole POS/Planetary stuff. But then again, I like doing missions and having the coporate hanger space so I can haul junk to the market and sell heh. The last corp I was in was full of zombie players, no one talks and I hated paying a freaking tax on my earnings towards.. nothing. Hopefully I can meet some nice people in militia (so far, it's full of jerks too).

Here's the rant *cough*:

I love Eve. Use to love the community too. Now I'm starting to hate it. I tried to ask a question in the "Help" chat, and was met with snarky replies. "What are you smoking and can I have some too?"

Why do people often feel the need to reply if they have nothing helpful to say? I don't know, but I sometimes feel the need to crack a joke. Or maybe I think I'm funny. But that's usually with pals or in places where it's appropriate. In a chat channel designated to help other people, snide remarks really have no place.

Eve is still great, but I think that the more popular a game gets the more jerks it attracts. Aion, for all of it's failed hype, is a better place to hang out now mainly because everyone left. I am socially awkward, and MMO's is where I tend to meet and socialize with new people. Games that have the "block" function are awesome, but jerks really do ruin my mood.

Sometimes, I wish there was a game that would screen people. Sort of like a "matchmaking" system (the one that Halo Reach beta has +some improvements). This mean less profit for the game devs of course, but it would mean happy gamers. It would place people of similar skill together and...

The root of the problem is the Internet itself is so accessible nowadays. Even a monkey (like myself) can use it. I just wish people would mind their manners and remember that the other player is a human being too.

Maybe all the trolls are thinking:

"Yeah, it's the internet, no one can do anything to me anyways."

Internet accountability... I'll stop there. No way am I giving up my internet freedom, but who knows maybe one day a really angry senator irl will push a bill for internet accountability because his level 80 druid was ganked repeatedly by some 10 year old.