How does one start a blog? with your motivations or intentions for writing? the subject material? a picture of tubgirl? The first post has to be the hardest, as I’m currently finding out. Do you write like you’re writing to yourself, not caring whether anyone else might read it. Or do you write as if thousands of people will be reading, potentially making yourself look a little delusional when no one does. To go some way to fulfil some of these questions, this is a blog about my gaming experiences, which will be mainly MMO focussed, as that’s what I am. Because I’ll most likely be the only person to read it, always remember, you’re awesome.

As this will be mainly MMO focussed, I figure it would be good to start off with a brief history of my gaming experiences in the MMO world, as a stepping stome from which to start all further observations. Read on if you’re bored…

My first real experience with MMO’s, aside from an hour or two of Everquest, was FFXI. Being a long term fan of the FF series trying this game seemed like a no brainer to me. With little real knowledge of what an MMO was, and no comprehension about just how much of my time this game was going to take up, I jumped straight in. As with any other MMO I’ve tried since, I went through several different jobs before I settled on my final choice: Bard. Quite how I managed to level up a character in this game I’m not sure. Levelling what was at the time one of the most (if not the most) desired jobs for groups, I still found the levelling process to be far more time consuming than I’d enjoy. At the time however, I knew no better, maybe if I had started playing the game after the European release rather than before, Id have had more grouping opportunities at reasonable hours.

Finally I got my little bard levelled up, and started taking part in “end game” activities. Dynamis, Gods/Kirin, Merits. I hated having to stay up until 4-5am to fit in with my LS’ time zone, but I enjoyed the way the large battles worked, and thoroughly enjoyed myself for a short while. By the time people started getting access to Sea, I’d had enough, and my game time slowly petered down until I stopped playing all together.

Around this time I tried a number of different MMO’s, none of which held me for more than a couple of weeks: Everquest 2, City of Heroes, Matrix Online to name but a few.

Next came WoW. After a few years of playing a game that basically revolved around foreign time zones, and required ridiculous amounts of time to get anything done, this was a breath of fresh air. I started my character within an hour of a new realm opening, and levelled my priest to 60 in what I believe to be a fairly efficient way for a first timer.

As a student with lots of time on his hands, raiding was a convenient progression for me at this time. My time was spent in a PvP premade during the day (pre cross realm BGs), doing world dragons in the afternoon, and raiding at night. In retrospect, there was not much school work being done. Whilst WoW occupied as much of my day as FFXI used to, I was happier due to not having to stay up until 5am a few times a week, and actually being able to get on for an hour or so and actually achieve things.

Finishing university and getting a new job coincided nicely with the release of TBC, along with a general feeling of burn-out with the game. at this point I decided to stop playing WoW. The guild was the most progressed on the server, currently at Twin Emps in AQ40 (it was a fairly young realm) so I’d experienced most of the raid content in the game, if not quite all.

Predictably, all work and no play made me a dull(er) boy, so upon it’s release I picked up a copy of LOTRO. Levelling with a friend I’d played both FFXI and WoW with, I started a Guardian and was soon speeding through the levels. Questing as a duo in LOTRO was fun, and allowed us to do pretty much anything as a Guardian and Minstrel with little problems. The game is undeniably beautiful, the high res textures look awesome the first time you see them. However after a couple of months the various shades of grey, brown, and black become a little tiresome. Eventually I found myself doing one or two of the lv50 5 (or was it 6?) man instances, before getting bored. I tried a few alts, but in the end the game was just too sensible/realistic/boring/grey for me, I stopped playing within a week or two of levelling my character. 

Me and said friend, we’ll Call him Dan (because that’s his name) then randomly decided to try TBC as neither of us had played it, and hopped back into WoW one day on a whim (yes, I am an MMO ‘flake’). I decided to level a Blood Elf Paladin, as I’d been a loyal Horde player, and therefore had not tried the Paladin class before TBC. I found paladin somewhat uninteresting to level, but the sturdiness and safety and being nigh on invincible made watching tv easy while levelling. So I stuck with it. This quickly progressed past 60 and I took my first steps into TBC content. 

The zones were a welcome change, and the expanse of quests made levelling through to 70 semi enjoyable. Upon reaching 70 I found myself at a cross-roads, to heal or to tank. I tried a bit of both, realised I didn’t actually enjoy paladin that much, and ended up dropping the game for a while.

You can probably see a pattern emerging here. Level up, get bored, start again in another game. Rinse and repeat. The way I see this is a change in playing patterns and free time, but without the accompanied change in mind set. Working 40 hours a week, playing for an hour or two a couple of times a week, but still having the mind set of someone who can play as much as hey like/want and feeling like I should be taking part in what I considered “end game” content. Being MMO free for a few months helped me realise this, as most of my time was spent either working my way through the Half life 2 episodes, or playing Team Fortress 2 for instant gratification.

Around this time I discovered Warhammer Online was getting closer to release, and looking at some of the features its touting made me think it was the next game for me. The public quests, meaningful world PvP, and tome of knowledge unlocks seemed to suit my new “casual” (oh how I’d never thought I’d call myself that) play schedule, and the game generally just looked new and shiny. So I applied to beta, started reading the forums and newsletters when they came out, and eventually ordered the collectors edition. Then came AoC, which I picked up upon it’s release. The combat system in this game was very fun, but I found the UI and general feel of it somewhat unsatisfying. What I did get from this game however was confirmation of my new “casual” play style. In about 3 weeks I managed to get to lv20, playing a hour or two a few times a week, with maybe a bit more at the weekend. This was enough for me, and I wasn’t bothered that I hadn’t got to lv40 yet when I probably could have, and didn’t feel like I was “getting behind” if I didn’t play for a few days. Ultimately once I got off the beginner island the game just didn’t interest me enough to keep playing, so I cancelled my subscription before the first payment was taken from me.

So, with the boredom setting in, and a few more weeks of TF2 under my belt (yay for new Pyro weapons!) I’ve picked up WoW again. For the third time… have no real motives for playing this time, other than having something to tinker about with something for a bit until WAR comes out. I’ve got a level on my now lv69 rogue, done some PvP on it (read: leeched some AVs as a lv68) and done a few BGs on my Paladin. I then picked up an old Shaman character that I’d made years ago, which was sat at lv28. Having 4 days free from both work and other obligations, I’ve had my first proper gaming session in a good while. With the recent exp changes, I’ve quickly levelled from 28 to 42, and my little shaman can now dual wield, and kick a fair amount of ass. Even if I do say so myself. While under no illusions that I’m going to start raiding with this character, I am quietly trying to edge it towards 70, so that if I decide to play WoW when WotLK is released, I’ll have a few options which can be take straight into the expansion content.Right now though all my focus/excitement is on WAR, especially considering I received my pre-order pack from play recently. As soon as the European beta centre registrations are open, I’m there!