Conference Call

GWJ Conference Call Episode 75

God of War PSP, Spanking Team Fremont, Two Charming Gentlemen From Turbine Join the Show and Discuss the Future of MMORPGs!, Your Emails and more!

This week Cardell Kerr and David Lennon from Turbine join us to talk about new Lord of The Rings Online features and the future of MMORPGs! We also have a special segment from The Lord of Leisure (samfisher) and plenty of your emails to go around! Special thanks to Daniel Lawrence Walker and Eiko Ishiwata for the new music in the last couple weeks!

To contact us, email [email protected]! Send us your thoughts on the show, pressing issues you want to talk about or whatever else is on your mind. You can even send a 30 second audio question or comment (MP3 format please) if you're so inclined.

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Show credits

Music credits: 

Intro/Outro Music - Ian Dorsch, Willowtree Audioworks

"Luna Machine" (Benoit Casey) - 0:25:09
"Garibaldi" - Ayco (Eiko Ishiwata) - eikoishiwata.com - 1:27:00

Comments

Woot! A MMO show!

Just wanted to pubicly thank the Turbine guys for AC. That game jump started my MMO addiction. Now let them outta the room before my girlfriend finds them!

listening to the show right now, really like it so far (especially the audio Gears ad at the beginning). It had me in stitches!

Good show guys... i think my question was taken a little the wrong way. I was looking more towards knowledge of what we can expect. I accept that a game will never be bug free - that's the nature of media; books have typos, TV/DVDs have bloopers or missed continuity issues etc.

I was actually looking towards gamers being able to know what is being foisted upon them in the same sense as the Sony DRM rootkit issue. The reason why we can't return PC games even directly to the publisher/developer - allowing rogue publishers/developers to get away with publishing bad games with no demo that are ultimately broken.

Thanks for the ribbing guys

[edit] Also, no outtakes?

Great Show!! I think I may renew my LOTRO account and look for you "goodjers" on Landroval. With Sam Fishers audio ad are you opening audio sponsorship of the Games You Can Play Right Now segment?

Duoae wrote:

[edit] Also, no outtakes?

There weren't any last week either. DO NOT LIKE. Go screw up more in a funny-like manner, m'kay?

Poppinfresh wrote:
Duoae wrote:

[edit] Also, no outtakes?

There weren't any last week either. DO NOT LIKE. Go screw up more in a funny-like manner, m'kay?

This may sound a bit weird, but as we get better at doing the show we just don't flub as muchl. Nothing worse than pre-meditated outtakes, so sometimes they just don't happen. You'd know if we were faking it!

Certis wrote:

This may sound a bit weird, but as we get better at doing the show we just don't flub as muchl.

Ah, there we go.

You'd know if we were faking it!

Like Burt Reynolds n sh*t.

Great show.

I HATE Burnout Paradise! Franchise killer!

That conversation about the cutting-room floor for games really brought back a lot of memories for me - specifically from back when I followed game magazines' hype. Anyone remember HL2's big blue hydra tentacle thing? Or the boat level it was supposed to have? The Valve guys have since let us know that they were dropped for practicality and playability issues. The books and such about HL2's development process were awesome for neat things like that, outtakes and what-have-you, and that's something I wish more developers would do.

More transparency in the creative process really just builds interest in my opinion; I know making-of's aren't for everyone, but there's a reason that outtakes and behind-the-scenes are popular inclusions on DVD's.

Thank god for the guests, or I wouldn't be feeling nearly as warm and fuzzy as I am now.

Certis wrote:

You'd know if we were faking it!

Many women would say that the mostly male audience of this establishment might have some difficulty with that.

Yes, I too look forward to watching people hug as they're getting hurled around in a MMO.

Rabbit yelling "just go put it in Vista!" made my inner immature 15-year-old chuckle.

And they should have put in a whip-snap sound for "p*ssy-whipped."

samfisher wrote:

Certis, you simply must except Rock Band will haunt you forever, I could start talking about it when it finally reaches the UK if you want? :)

Yes! All of us non-North-American listeners should bombard the show with audio emails when Rock Band finally makes it to our shores.

Loved the show guys, great to not only hear about another MMO besides WoW - but having the LOTRO dev's was just awesome!

I have added a thread in the MMO section for peeps thinking of returning or new players.

LOTRO tips for returning and new players

Funny that you guys mentioned 1942 during the "SHMUP" email, 'cause Capcom just announced an XBLA/PSN remake mere hours ago.

http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/858/...

IMAGE(http://xbox360media.ign.com/xbox360/image/article/858/858836/1942-joint-strike-tba-20080311110748098_640w.jpg)

Nice job samfisher, I hope you do somemore girl voices for certis.

LOTR guys were great and it was nice to hear what they had to say.

blackboxme was right, my FFXI should have been talked about even if none of you guys liked it.

Yet another MMO-cast where no one mentions Final Fantasy XI. Much bigger than your EQ or your City of Heroes or your Star Wars Galaxy, but it gets no attention. It stands along with LOTRO as a MMORPG that actually made it on the basis of a license.

And it covers so much ground too. Multilingual play, appealing to the Japanese market, three platforms playing together, a near EQ level of ball-busting.

Anyway, good show guys. The Lotro dudes were very sharp. It's healthy to have a real dev on the podcast.

blackboxme wrote:

Yet another MMO-cast where no one mentions Final Fantasy XI. Much bigger than your EQ or your City of Heroes or your Star Wars Galaxy, but it gets no attention. It stands along with LOTRO as a MMORPG that actually made it on the basis of a license.

And it covers so much ground too. Multilingual play, appealing to the Japanese market, three platforms playing together, a near EQ level of ball-busting.

It's true that FFXI deserves mention due to its size and unique features, but I wouldn't classify it as a 'license' game. It's a game built on IP and trademarks of previous games, but if that's how you're setting the standard, then WoW, EQ2, CoVillians, AC2, etc are too. There might be some basis to that, but it's probably better to use the term for games that are adapting IP from a different area to gaming, like LotRO, D&D Online, Champions, etc

Great show again guys and I'll add echo the sentiment that snagging developers really enhances the show, which you undoubtedly realize since you keep doing it.

Heh. Let Tabula Rasa be a lesson for all developers. Not sure what that lesson is...but I'm sure there is one to be learnt.

Next time I'll say oogaba for you Rat Boy!

And I enjoyed the banter with the Lord of the Rings devs, at least they began answering about some of the issues with PC gaming which have been floating around recently, the only real reason I don't play LOTR aside from doing naughty with real life issues, is that I'm not a lord of the rings fan. If you fall asleep to the first film, that's not a good sign basically.

Certis, you simply must accept Rock Band will haunt you forever, I could start talking about it when it finally reaches the UK if you want?

edited: sorry it appears I cannot use the correct word any more. I need a holiday!

Great show guys, samfishers ad had me nearly wetting my pants and the guests were very interesting. 'You beat them because you love them' I laughed, then felt bad.

I'm actually waiting for my LOTRO special edition to be delivered then I will be online on the EU servers.

Wait. How was Burnout Paradise not taking a chance? They took a tried and true formula and basically ripped it up in favor of putting faith in gamers enjoying their open world. I've grown to love it. I just think it takes spending more than a couple hours with it. Spend a couple hours with it and you may get annoyed it isn't Burnout 3. Play it a few hours more and you may find that the new Burnout game they made is something special. Either way, how did Criterion not take a chance with Burnout?

Wait. How was Burnout Paradise not taking a chance? They took a tried and true formula and basically ripped it up in favor of putting faith in gamers enjoying their open world. I've grown to love it. I just think it takes spending more than a couple hours with it. Spend a couple hours with it and you may get annoyed it isn't Burnout 3. Play it a few hours more and you may find that the new Burnout game they made is something special. Either way, how did Criterion not take a chance with Burnout?

I agree completely. Burnout Paradise doesn't really open up until you've played enough to know the city. Once you know the city and the turns you'll crash a lot less and have more fun. Like Ninja Gaiden: Black though, it's not for everyone.

JoeBedurndurn wrote:

It's true that FFXI deserves mention due to its size and unique features, but I wouldn't classify it as a 'license' game. It's a game built on IP and trademarks of previous games, but if that's how you're setting the standard, then WoW, EQ2, CoVillians, AC2, etc are too.

OK, but EQ, City of Heroes, and Asheron's Call, were all IP that were born as MMOs. There's a difference between a sequel to an MMO and turning a pre-existing brand into an MMO.

Talking about individual MMO's (aside from their own) wasn't really the point, guys. Not sure why we would have wanted to spend a bunch of time talking about games they didn't make and don't really influence the direction of their future projects.

Well, it was a cast about the MMMORPG genre, and where it's going. One place it's going? Consoles.

Bah, I'm just being a grumpy old FFXI veteran. It was a really good show.

I kind of miss the old style of podcast, where a new mini window pops up whenever I click the link. I can't recall how many times I accidentally terminated this podcast.