GoldenEye 007

Yes, GoldenEye for the Nintendo 64. Before there was Halo, before the Gears of Wars, and the Call of Duties. Heck, the old XBox and the Playstation 2 weren’t even out yet at the time. During my Freshmen year of college, I was decent at Physics, Calculus, and Chemistry, but was pretty good at GoldenEye.

The Tournament

My college held a video game tournament my Freshmen year, and I participated in it. The games which were involved were: Mario Kart 64 (N64), Tekken 3 (PS1), Tony Hawk 2 (PS1), and GoldenEye 007 (N64). The way the tournament was set up was that each game will have their own individual tournament, and the winner of each game will play each other in neutral game in the next round.

I, of course, played in the GoldenEye bracket. Me and my buddies all entered the GoldenEye bracket, and each of us made it pretty far in the single elimination style bracket (sometimes having to eliminate each other). I was the only one who made it into the final round. They randomized the weapons this time, and it was Remote Mines. At the moment they picked that, I turned over to my friends, smiled, and gave them the thumbs up.

I was one of the few people in that tournament who knew (at that time) how to remotely detonate the mines right after throwing them (in mid-air). I completely destroyed my opponent with the score of 25 – 2, in a 10 minute match.

GoldenEye 007 Winner: Me

World Class Track Meet

There were now four finalist, the winners of each of their individual games. We were now to face each other in a game none of us were expecting. World Class Track Meet for the original Nintendo (NES). The one which uses the Power Pad!!!

We were paired up with our opponents. Me vs Mr. Mario Kart, Mr. Tekken vs Mr. Tony Hawk.

At that time, I was fairly in shape (not saying much about now). I played a lot of basketball and football among friends all throughout High School. I also did a lot of swimming which help me rid of my Asthma. My opponent, not quite in shape. So I was quite confident I could beat Mr. Mario Kart in the 100m Dash, 110m Hurdles, and Long Jump.

The best part though was, when my opponent yelled out, “I… *huff* don’t… *puff* have… *huff* enough… *puff* stamina…!” during the 110m Hurdles. The room broke out in laughter.

I won my Power Pad match pretty easily and watch the other two guys face each other in their Track Meet. I’m not sure who won, but I’m going to just say Mr. Tekken won because it’ll be faster to write. So it is just me and Mr. Tekken left as we head into the final round of the tournament. After having to play on the Power Pad in the last round, I was curious of what they had for us to play in the final round.

Double Dragon

Yes! A game I remember playing many times during my childhood on the NES. Double Dragon had a 1-on-1 versus mode I remember playing with my friends a lot. My chances are good.

The told us it was best out of 3 matches, and the character select was only to be set to Billy and Jimmy Lee (main characters). The match started, and at first it started off slow. I took my time walking around, getting used to the controls. While Mr. Tekken was chasing me around with a knife. B attack, A jump. Okay, I’m ready!

I did a jump kick and picked up his weapon, and started chasing him around. Then I remembered something! You can throw in this game! The rest of the match was him trying to run away, only to get a knife thrown at him, and me picking the knife back up, and doing it all over again. I won in the first 2 matches, winning the entire tournament.

Entry Fee: nothing, Free Pizza: nothing, First Place Prize: $200

Oh wells… Download. Restart. Update. Restart. I sign in and take a look at the features.

Games on Demand

This is a pretty awesome feature they added. You were able to purchase and download some of the original XBox games before, but now they added a few XBox360 games to the library. There are a few games from the Greatest Hits category that I saw on there.

Normally I like to have a physical copy of any game I purchase, but being able to play any game straight from the hard drive would be pretty sweet. You won’t need to swap out discs when you want to change games anymore. Man… this is just going to make players lazier and lazier.

The price for each game are around $5 bucks more than the price you would see it at Gamestop or Best Buy. So what you are paying for is the convenience of not having to go out and buy it yourself. Also, you won’t have the problem of getting your discs scratched or lost anymore.

Avatar Marketplace

Oh god… they added a marketplace where you can buy stuff for your XBox360 Avatar. Wow, what a waste of money (via Microsoft points). Let’s see… 2000 Microsoft points costs $25. So its $5 for 400 Microsoft points. $1 for 80 Microsoft points. That is pretty much all you need to know if you want to convert Bill Gates money into American dollars.

So how much would these Avatar clothing going to cost me? Buying my Avatar hats would cost me from $1 to $2. There are hats with Halo emblems, some with Gears of War emblems, some hats from Fable II. Meh… I’m not gonna spend a dollar to buy my Avatar a Gears of War baseball cap.

Next we have T-Shirts, oh boy! Same as the hats, they come in various designs base on some of your favorite games. Like the hats, I’m not going to bother. There’s shoes too, pass. Rings!? Pass. C’mon, give us something cool!

Hmm… the Big Daddy helmet from Bioshock for 2 bucks. Looks pretty cool, but not for me. COG Armor from Gears of War, 4 bucks for the suit, 2 bucks for the helmet. Looks pretty cool, but not $6 cool. Maybe if you’re a big Gears fan. There is a similar suit thingy for Halo ODST too for 5 bucks. Still not for me.

Oh joy! I can buy pom poms for my Avatar for $2! Or sandals for a buck! Sneakers for 2 dollars each! You could be buying a game for the price of dressing up your Avatar!

Jeez… this Avatar Marketplace thing has to be one of the biggest joke Microsoft has ever come up with. Who in the right mind will ever spend money on something so ridicu- HOLY SHIT A LIGHTSABER!!!

Totally worth the 5 bucks!!!

*ahem* Like I said, the Avatar marketplace has to be one of the coolest feature Microsoft has ever implemented for the Xbox360. Fans of any game will find new ways to show their support for the games they love.

Summary: I got a freaking Lightsaber! That is all.

Starcraft

After merging my WoW account to my Bnet account, I went through my closet to find all my old Blizzard games to register them. I found my Starcraft, SC: Brood War, Warcraft III, WCIII: Frozen Throne, and my DII: Lord of Destruction cds. I couldn’t find my Diablo II cds though. After registering them, you now have the option to download the install for those games at anytime.

Yay I can play Starcraft again even though my cd has been scratched up beyond readable! After watching a few videos of the upcoming Starcraft II game, I decided to re-learn and master the Protoss race. I got a few of my friends to reinstall Starcraft again also, and we’ve been playing it like 3-4 days a week. So much fun for a game so old!

Speaking of Starcraft II, if you haven’t done so already, go opt-in for a chance to participate in the beta test- whenever they decide to start that.

Heroes of Newerth

Thanks to someone awesome, I got an invite to beta test the new Heroes of Newerth game. If you are familiar with DotA (Defense of the Ancients) from Warcraft III, this game is pretty much a graphical update of the game.

Still very addicting, and still very fun. Of course the players you play with are pretty much the same mean assholes you find in DotA as well. Some immature, some very foul mouthed, some both. Don’t worry, you’ll find some normal nice people on there sometimes as well.

I agreed to some “don’t leak pictures and stuff about the game” agreement, so I can’t really show you what it looks like, but if you just google the name of the game, you can find some around the interweb.

I also have a few extra invites I could give out as well if anyone is interested.

Marvel vs Capcom 2

OMG it’s Mahvel Baybee!! Still one of my all time favorite fighting game to play. Sure it is riddled with tons of glitches and there is barely any character balancing. But it is still so damn fun to play.

The game is pretty much a direct port, but this time there is online play. For a game where any bit of lag could kill you, online play isn’t as bad as you think. Sure there will be time where you KNOW you were blocking low and you still get hit, but it is still very fun to play- especially if you have friends that also grew up on this game like me.

It was recently released as an XBoxLive arcade game, and for 15 bucks it was a steal (for me at least). You can find me on XBoxLive if you ever want a match.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ooh! My WoW client has just finished updating. Guess i’ll sign on and update my mods and stuff. Will Patch 3.2 have enough to get me hooked on the game again? We’ll see…

How to Unlock All Characters:

The easiest and fastest way to unlock them is to set the difficulty level to “Easiest” and set the number of rounds to “1″. Then meet the requirements for each character.

Sakura

• To unlock Sakura, you have to beat Arcade Mode on any difficulty and with any settings, using Ryu.

Dan

• You must have Sakura unlocked.
• To unlock Dan, you have to beat Arcade Mode on any difficulty and with any settings, using Sakura.

Gen

• To unlock Gen, you have to beat Arcade Mode on any difficulty and with any settings, using Chun Li.

Cammy

• To unlock Cammy, you have to beat Arcade Mode on any difficulty and with any settings, using Crimson Viper.

Rose

• To unlock Rose, you have to beat Arcade Mode on any difficulty and with any settings, using M. Bison.

Fei-Long

• To unlock Fei-Long, you have to beat Arcade Mode on any difficulty and with any settings, using Abel.

Akuma

• You must have Sakura, Dan, Gen, Cammy, Rose, and Fei-Long unlocked.
• Beat Arcade Mode on any difficulty and with any settings, using any character.
• Must have at least 2 Pefect Rounds before defeating Seth.
• Cannot lose any matches and use a continue.
• Defeat Akuma.

Gouken

Here is a quote from Capcom:

1. Complete Arcade Mode playing as Akuma and watch (not necessary to watch everything) an ending.
2. Then, unlock Gouken as an opponent, and defeat him.

Necessary conditions to unlock Gouken as an opponent:

– Play with any characters with which you watched the ending once (so play using a character you have already beaten the game with)
– Do not continue at all.
– Do not lose at all. Not even one round (easier if you only play 1-round matches)
– Achieve certain number (or more) of “Perfect” rounds. The number of Perfect Win you need to achieve are:

If you play on
– 1 round match: 1 time or more
– 3 round match: 2 times or more
– 5 round match: 3 times or more
– 7 round match: 4 times or more

– Achieve certain number (or more) of Super Combo -OR- Ultra Combo Finishes. Super and Ultra finishes both count toward this number. The number of Combo Finishes you need to achieve are:

If you play on

– 1 round match: 3 times or more
– 3 round match: 5 times or more
– 5 round match: 7 times or more
– 7 round match: 9 times or more

– Achieve certain number (or more) of First Attack (this means you must score the first strike in a match—the screen gives you the “First Attack” message, and you can mostly do this without even noticing):

The number of First Attack you need to achieve are:

If you play on
– 1 round match: 5 time or more
– 3 round match: 10 times or more
– 5 round match: 15 times or more
– 7 round match: 20 times or more
– Then Gouken will appear. Kick his butt to unlock him!

Seth

• You must have Gouken unlocked.
• Beat Arcade Mode on any difficulty and with any settings, with all other characters.

Looks like the final character roster is out for Capcom’s next sequel to the Street Fighter series is out. The arcade version has been out for quite some time now, and there will be many addition characters added for the console version, bringing the total characters up to twenty-five.

Returning Characters:

• Akuma
• Balrog
• Blanka
• Chun-Li
• Dhalsim
• E. Honda
• Guile
• Ken
• M. Bison
• Ryu
• Sagat
• Vega
• Zangief

New Characters:

• Abel
• Crimson Viper
• El Fuerte
• Gouken *not playable*
• Rufus
• Seth *not playable*

Console Exclusive Characters:

• Cammy
• Dan
• Fei-Long
• Gen
• Gouken *playable*
• Rose
• Sakura
• Seth *playable*

You can view images of all the characters HERE via Joystiq.com

Achievements make you play a lot more than you would normally. They make you do ridiculous things, just so that it says you did it, on a list. They make you waste an enormous amount of time you could have spent being productive elsewhere. Achievements are evil, and it was a smart move on Blizzard’s part to add it into the game.

I’ve had my experience with an Achievement system already with XBoxLive. I played games over and over again trying to unlock achievements. No matter how crappy the game was, I would keep playing it until I could unlock most of the achievements. It really added a lot of replay values to every game.

Then it starts getting competitive. You start comparing achievements with your friends and online buddies, and try to unlock every achievements they have, as well as unlocking some that you would thing that they wouldn’t be able to unlock. Next thing you know, you’re renting all these games from the video store, just for the achievements. Just so that you will have more achievements unlocked than xXsephiroth314Xx and cl0ud4lyfe225.

My next project achievement to unlock…

Now with the Achievement system implemented with the last patch, World of Warcraft has taken up even more of my time. Even when there are no reward for the achievements, I still end up doing just to do it. I would sign on, and there would be players looking for groups to do Vanilla WoW raids. Half your guildmates are soloing old dungeons. Every 30 minutes or so, an achievement message pops up announcing that one of your guildies had just caught 1000 fishes, or obtained the Leroy Jenkins title.

Every time I log on now, first thing I do is open up my Achievement window, and plan out which achievement to hit up next. Currently I was in the exploration mood, and probably because it was one of the easiest to complete, but most time consuming. It also coincided with the Hallow’s End achievements too, so might as well do them now.

So far I have 2496 Achievement Points, and there are still many more for me to complete. Achievements are evil, and they change the way you play the game. I’ve fished in an opposing factions city, and died many times. I’ve killed over 50,000 horde, and now they’re making me kill 50,000 more.

Achievements are evil, and I can’t stop doing them…

The home console version that is. Kotaku has found an image of a Japanese article which confirmed that the Japanese school girl will join the Street Fighter IV rosters.

The Street Fighter 4 Arcade has been out for quite some time now in Japan, and in a few selected locations in the United States, and I have been eagerly waiting to get my hands on the game. I’ve been hoping for a few characters would make the roster, and it looks like my top choice has made it to the game.

“Sakura first appeared in Street Fighter Alpha 2, where she had begun to participate in street fighting after watching Ryu win the first World Warrior tournament. She was searching for him and wished for him to train her to be a better fighter.

She met up with many interesting people along the way, and eventually came across Ryu, who was still stressed over the Satsui no Hadou that had corrupted him—he told her he could not train her as he still had much to learn himself. He sparred with her for a bit and as he began to leave, she took a picture of him to remember him by.”

[wikipedia]

Here is a look at the trailer for Sakura which was played during the Tokyo Game Show (TGS), which took place October 5th through the 15th.

Also shown at TGS, was the trailer for Gouki, better known as Akuma in the United States. Here is a look at his trailer.

Though the arcade version of SFIV has been out since July, the console version’s release date has not been announced yet. So until then, we must settle for videos and screenshots. Unless you’re lucky enough to live near one of the few arcade locations.

Let’s see who else I would like next to join the Street Fighter 4 roster… Cammy!

Origins:

I started off as a huge fan of Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos, a real time strategy game made by Blizzard. Then the expansion, The Frozen Throne hit, and I was even more addicted to War3. Sometime during my gaming years on War3, Blizzard had announced World of Warcraft, an MMO for the Warcraft Universe. Of course I was very interested.

Beginnings:

I joined the Open Beta for the World of Warcraft along with one of my friend whom I played War3 with. I made a Mage and he made a Hunter, and we were instantly hooked on WoW. We played until the end of Beta, and contemplated on either to get hooked or not (since we were in our college years). When the game was released, and we didn’t buy it.

A month went by when I found out that my cousin had already purchased it and was already playing. That prompted me into buying the game, and I’ve been playing ever since. The journey still continues today…

The Journey:

I’ve been playing a Mage since Beta, and has really ONLY been playing the Mage class. I started off as a casual player, leveling with a couple of my friends. Questing, exploring, killing mobs. It was a lot of fun.

Then when I hit 60, I got a taste of Raiding. My Philadelphia friends and I, were in our own little guild, and my cousin, with some of our friends from back home in South Jersey were in another small guild. Both of our guilds were asked to merge with another guild to form a bigger guild to run Molten Core together. I’ve been raiding ever since…

The Adventure:

I’ve been big on the Warcraft Lore from the beginning. Most likely from my War3 background. Most of the lore involves raiding, so that made me become an even bigger raider, and I have “seen” (will change to “beaten” once KJ is down) every boss in every “end game” instances made so far. I would like to continue to do so.

40 Man Raids:

• Molten Core – 10/10
• Onixia’s Lair – 1/1
• Blackwing Lair – 8/8
• Temple of Ahn’Qiraj – 6/6, 3/3 (optional bosses)
• Naxxaramas – 15/15

25 Man Raids:

• Gruul’s Lair – 1/1
• Magtheridon’s Lair – 1/1
• Serpentshrine Caverns – 6/6
• Tempest Keep: The Eye – 4/4
• Hyjal Summit – 5/5
• Black Temple – 9/9
• Sunwell Plateau – 8/9 (currently working on KJ)

20 Man Raids:

• Zul’Gurub – 6/6, 4/4 (optional bosses)
• Ruins of Anh’Qiraj – 6/6

10 Man Raids:

• Karazhan – 12/12
• Zul’Aman – 6/6

The Bonds:

I’ve always been a loyal Guildie. I’ve never left to join a more successful guild, or left because we were going nowhere. I’ve always been patient with the progression with any guild I’ve been in. I’ve also been in a couple of guild and stayed to the very end.

I still keep in touch with most of everyone whom I’ve Guilded with (if they’re still playing), and still PvP or run group instances with them. I’ve pretty much gotten along with mostly everyone I’ve played with, and hopefully it stays this way.

The End?:

Will I ever get sick of WoW and stop playing? Maybe, maybe not. As long as Blizzard continues to bring out content to keep me satisfied, I will continue to play. As long as there are people whom I consider friends still playing with me, I will continue to do so.

“Why would you want to play a game that never ends?” is a question I’m often asked by my non-WoW friends. My answer to them: “Why would you want a game that you enjoy playing, come to an end?”

My Character:

I’ve always liked the Caster type classes of any game I play. I’ve always liked the idea of the fragile little death machine. I was a Sorceress in Diablo II, a Black Mage in Final Fantasy XI, an Elementalist in Guild Wars, the Wizard in Gauntlet, and so on…

“Why Frost?” I think this goes back when I was growing up. Me and my cousin would hang out a lot. Our parents would visit each other houses pretty much every weekend. I don’t really know why or what started it, but he always went Fire and me Water/Ice. He picked Scorpion, I picked Sub-Zero. He made a Fire Mage, I made a Frost Mage. I got Pokemon Red, I got Pokemon Blue. He started off with Charmander, I started off with… well Bulbasaur, but you get the picture.

Now being a Frost Spec Mage since level 10, it was no easy task being a “Hardcore/Casual-Raider“. Fire has always been the “DPS Spec”, and I knew that. Nobody likes being told what to do, and I am no exception. I was able to use that to make me better.

Playing as the underdog Spec actually made be a better Mage/raider/player. On paper, Fire was about 2-5% higher DPS than Frost- in a perfect simulation. This meant if I had to keep up or beat them, I had to be focused at all times, and learn to take advantage of any tool I can. A good example of this is the Frost “Ghost Hit“.

Now here I am, still raiding, still Frost.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We all have stories on how we got sucked into the game. We all have reasons why we still continue to play today. We all have our own characteristics and playing style. What is it for you?

Similar Posts I Found:

• Lin of Elune’s Guidance

This topic came up while driving back home with my cousin the other day. We were looking back at all the stuff we did back then to make the game works. Some of the techniques made some sense, and some of them were just ridiculous. But hey, they worked!

Cleaning the Cartridge

This was probably the first thing people did when their game system gave them the blinking power light. Done usually with a Q-tip and a but of rubbing alcohol. Usually does the trick, but if you were lazy like me, you resorted to other techniques.

Blowing into the Cartridge

This was the most common technique used by everyone who owned an NES that I have known. This technique was used to blow any dust that had build up inside the game cartridge. It kinda makes sense, and it worked half the time.

Breathing hot air into the Cartridge

If blowing into the cartridge didn’t work, then some people went with this approach. Looking back at it now, this wasn’t the best way to “fix” the problem. Breathing hot air into the cartridge probably built up a bit of condensation, which isn’t normally good for electronics. It worked for me back then though!

Blowing/Breathing into the Cartridge through a T-shirt

I remember watching my friend pull of this weird technique and being amazed that it actually worked. He took the game cartridge and covered the opening with bottom part of the T-shirt he was wearing. He then blew through the T-shirt into the cartridge and got the game to work. Still doesn’t make any sense to me.

Jamming the Cartridge into the System

There are some people insert the game cartridge all the way, then push down really hard to lock the game in place to make it work. There are also people who insert the game cartridge in just enough so that it gives some resistance when you push down the game cartridge.

Sliding the Cartridge Left and Right

After putting the game cartridge into the system and pushing it down, sliding the game cartridge left and right usually solves the problem for a lot of people. This technique usually takes a few tries, making small adjustments to the left or right at a time, but usually does the trick.

Insert Another Cartridge on top of the First

After putting the game cartridge into the system and pushing it down, some people would take another game cartridge, and insert it on top of the other game, making it so that the first game is held down lower into the system. Sounds bizarre, but it worked for me!

Hold down the Reset Button before pressing Power

After placing the game cartridge into the system, you hold down the reset button, press the power button to turn the system on. You wait a few and then release the reset button. Then voila! The game magically works sometimes!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

At some point or another, I remember using all of these techniques in order to get my NES to play my games. I usually go with a combination of some of these techniques. This is the order that I normally use:

• Step 1: Blow into the cartridge
• Step 2: Jam the cartridge into the system
• Step 3: Insert another cartridge on top of first one
• Step 4: Hold down reset button and press power

Any techniques that I am missing? What do you remember doing in order to get your Super Mario on?

Maybe because of his game design background, he is viewing this from a different angle from how I view things (have you ever watched a movie with a film major? not too fun). So I would like to give my view on how I see things, and have some counter points to some of his arguments.

“Think about that, and then ask yourself if it was really worth all the broken friendships, drama, anger, rage, arguments, etc. that it took to get to this point.”

I myself have not gone through any of this getting to this point. Maybe frustration on some bosses, but it never anything extreme. I know it has happened to quite a bit of players, but not all. You can’t just assume that all end game raiders go through all of this just to be successful with it. I am lucky enough to not have to go through all that.

There are a lot of people who put up with all of that, and still think it is worth all that trouble. I wouldn’t go through broken friendships myself, but drama, anger, rage, and arguments I can put up with to see all this end game content. Then there are players who don’t think it is worth it, and won’t pursue the end game content grind.

As a married person, do you think it was really worth all the broken friendships, drama, anger, rage, arguments, etc. that it took to get to that point (marriage)? I know this isn’t the best comparison, but it still shows that different people find things that are or are not worth fighting for. Some people will think such a relationship is not worth all the trouble, some who believe it is worth all the ups and downs, and there are those who are lucky enough to be able to make it through without running into any sorts of troubles.

“An hour of killing trash for the “reward” of a 10 minute, scripted boss battle is like suffering through a root canal for the reward of a prostate exam. Oh, and if something goes wrong in that boss battle, you very well might be clearing that same hour of trash to take another shot at it.”

The ONLY “end game” boss encounters which make you clear “hours of trash” after a boss wipe is in Mount Hyjal, where you have to clear eight waves of trash before each boss fight (which takes about 10 minutes by the way), so I’m not sure which bosses you are referring to. All other instances allow about an hour and half of boss attempts before the trash respawns.

If clearing trash is such a horrible experience to go through, then why are there so many people going on “trash runs” or deliberately wiping on Mount Hyjal bosses for the soul reason to redo the trash waves? That is because trash mobs drop very good loot, and provide a lot of rep for many players. Many guilds don’t kill specific bosses in the Black Temple so that they could return later and kill all the trash mobs over again.

In fact, there is so little trash in Sunwell, that many people wish there were more trash to clear. There is only two pulls between Kalecgos and Brutallus. None between Brutallus and Felmyst. Only two total mobs between M’uru and Kil’jaeden.

“People that get massively sucked into raiding fulfill this need through raid success. As a result, they often have less of a drive to work on their family, friends, children, spouse, job, or school. So the actually important things in their real life suffer because this crucial need is being satisfied through MMO raiding.”

Yes there have been many stories of people who have been too absorbed into the game that it has affect other aspects of their lives. This isn’t just raiding, the entire game is addicting. Ultimately, it is the player who has to do something about this. It’s not Blizzard’s fault they designed a good game.

The player has to be the one to manage their own time and set their own priorities. Monique of Girls Don’t Game has written a very good article on this from her very own personal experience.

I personally raid 3 nights a week in a guild that has progressed steadily through Sunwell and is currently on the last boss of The Burning Crusade. There are many guilds out there who raid 4 to 5 days a week, even 7 days a week. That would be way to much for me. I know where my own limit is, and everyone should figure out their own limit.

“I play games to PLAY THE ACTUAL GAME. I don’t play games to load up a web site and read a step by step strategy for how to defeat a boss. Sure, you don’t have to use raid walkthroughs, but you have to be masochistic not to. Raid encounters are generally designed to require an extremely specific set of maneuvers in order to defeat them.”

These boss guides are there to help you and provide tips for you to take down specific bosses. They give you a heads up on what abilities the boss does, and offer suggestions on how to deal with them. Things you will learn after one or two attempts on a boss anyways, so it just to save you some time and attempts. Sure you don’t have to read boss strategy, but it helps.

Knowing how to beat a boss doesn’t mean the boss will automatically be beaten. If it were so, then every guild would have Kil’jaeden down by now. It still requires a lot of attempts and practice in order to kill the boss. Just because you read up and watched videos on how to ride a bike, or how to swim, doesn’t mean you can start cycling and swimming like you were Lance Armstrong or Micheal Phelps.

“I also hate the way raiding turns people into such a tiny fraction of what their character can and should be. Most characters end up using 2 or 3 abilities 90% of the time, and in the same exact order over and over again. That gets incredibly boring.”

This doesn’t just apply to raiding, this applies to all aspects of the game. If you are leveling, raiding, doing 5 man instances, or even PvPing, you will spam the same few abilities over and over again depending on class and spec. So if you find that incredibly boring, then you are playing the wrong game.

In fact, I use more of my Mage’s ability in raids than in any other aspect of the game. There are spells I use in raids that I have never used while farming, leveling, or PvPing. That is just the Mage class though. If you are looking at Healing classes, of course they can’t heal a mob to death while farming, but in PvP, they do the same thing they do in raids, keep other people alive.

“It was something like all of our mages and warlocks had the tier 4 (something), so we had to make sure if we did a certain boss we had a hunter along. Otherwise if that token dropped it would be wasted. Having your roster decisions affected in this way is just stupid design.”

If your raid roster decisions are being affected this way, maybe this is the reason why you aren’t having much success in raids. If you aren’t killing a boss because you don’t have the right roster, and you don’t have the right roster because you changed it based on loot, then this isn’t because of stupid design, it is because poor raid decisions.

I know a lot of guilds do this to get more people geared (even my guild does it), but only if it doesn’t affect the raid. That and we only switch out players for the same class. We’re not gonna potentially wipe on a boss for hours just because one piece of loot could potentially be destroyed.

“The reality is that each member of that 5 man group probably worked a lot harder, put in more effort, and used a lot more skill than a single member of that 25 man raid group. In that 4 hour raid, at least 20 of those 25 people probably only paid full attention for maybe 30-60 minutes of that entire 4 hours. In the 5 man group, all 5 had to pay attention for pretty much the whole time.”

I don’t believe this is true. I think it takes more skill and coordination in a raid than in a group. In 25 man raids, the mobs and bosses hit harder and more often. The players have to heal more often, and do more damage in raids than in 5 man groups. It is different for everyone, but for me, I’ve seen more “/afk” players in 5 man groups than in 25 man raids.

I don’t know how much experience you have in raiding (I know you have at least done Karazhan), but if you allowing 5 players in the raid to slack off for 3 hours in a 4 hour raid, then the fault is on the raid leader/officers. With many tools out there such as Recount or WWS, you can easily find out who isn’t doing their part in the raid, and can be easily be replaced by someone who can.

“Then one of our guild members switched his priest to a shadow priest, ran a few 5 mans to gear up, and we rolled over the Curator with ease. Adding this ONE class (aka mana battery) completely transformed everything. We had read that a shadow priest was virtually required to win, but had foolishly tried to do it without one (since we didn’t have one). The utter inflexibility of the boss encounter made it so you pretty much had to forget about success if you didn’t bring this one specific class. Lame.”

I agree that some bosses require certain types of classes in order to beat it, and it may seem unfair at times. Every raid encounter requires an X amount of Tanks, Y amount of Healers, and Z amount of DPS. They require a the right balance of classes, but rarely ever need a specific type of class. Some classes may have an advantage over other classes though. For example, bringing a Mage over a Druid for a decursing fight. Stopping DPS to decurse might not wipe a raid, but stopping heals to decurse might.

Your example isn’t a good one. The reason why you killed Curator easily with a Shadow Priest, isn’t because you brought a Shadow Priest. You replaced a healer with a DPS class, and that is the real reason why you were successful. Curator does NOT require a Shadow Priest at all. You could have brought in a Rogue instead, and have the same result.

“WoW raiding however has taken a horrible turn. It is the *only* form of end game content, it requires tons of preparatory farming, it requires *TONS* of trash killing, and the raid encounters themselves have far too much randomness/arbitrariness, too many random power immunities, etc.”

It depends on player’s definition of “end game content”. To some players, it may very well be raiding, and to others, it may be the Season 4 Gladiator title and flying mount. Many people play the game who likes raiding, many who likes to PvP. There are some who are completely content with just 5 man instances or just running Karazhan. Everyone is different.

First you bash raid encounter designs for having players go through specific actions in specific times, and how it takes no skills and players don’t have to react to anything. Then you say there are too many randomness in encounters. Which is it? The fact is that players in a raid do have to think fast, and make many split second decisions during raids.

Whatever it may be, of course it will require some sort of preparation. You wouldn’t go into a meeting or an exam totally unprepared would you? No, you would plan ahead, practice your speech for the meeting, or study your ass off for the exam.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I enjoy raiding, and have a lot of fun doing it, and I do get a sense of “achievement” when beating a boss. If you don’t, why are you even raiding? Whenever you see a video where a raid successfully down a difficult boss, you always here the “nerdgasms” at the end from everyone over vent. Yes there are many people who get a sense of satisfaction when defeating a boss, and that is good indication of good game design by Blizzard. As a game designer yourself, you would think this to be an important element in a good game wouldn’t you?

From what I’ve read from your comments, and articles, you have only Karazhan raiding experience (no 25 man raids), and are basing your arguments from only that. You can’t start bashing end game raiding if you haven’t experienced it yourself. Your views on end game raiding would be different if you were in a successful raiding guild.

Maybe you have had very bad experiences with raids, or maybe raiding just isn’t right for you. Everyone has their own likes and dislikes, and you are entitled to think anyway you want. You obviously have more MMO experiences than me, so you have other games to compare WoW’s raiding system with. My only other MMO experience is FFXI, which I really enjoyed, but thought it required way too much time in order to do anything (which is why I stopped).