I Have No Idea

So, as the title of the post indicates, I have no idea what to write for today's blog post, so this is going to be a more all over the place post instead of a structured one. This is the price that you all pay for my insistence on posting things weekly instead of when I have something interesting to write, and the price that I will pay in the years to come that this is on the internet for everyone to see.

There are several things I would like to write, but I haven't given them enough though to do a proper post. I've been thinking a lot about the old City of Heroes tutorial and about SSA 1, both in regards to how they went well and where things could have been done better. I've also (still) been playing a lot of Civilization V... for better or worse.

I've also been thinking a lot about MMO's in general, specifically the nature of content, story, systems, and community building. I look at my experience in playing SWTOR, which admittedly I stopped at around level 25 when I was getting bored, and Secret World, where I stopped after I finished the story. Then, I look back on my experience playing the original EverQuest and wonder what the difference there was. I was horrible at the original EverQuest. My highest level character was 22 on the race PvP server. However, I loved exploring in that game. All of the continents fascinated me, and my most memorable experiences were of me going to places I didn't belong, like bringing said level 22 character to the freaking moon to avoid people PvPing me, then getting hopeless lost in a level 30+ zone of tunnels, where said character died a grim, horrible death. I compare that to my experience in SWTOR, where I generally never felt like exploring, although I did really like the Imperial Agent's storyline; if I didn't have to play the other side quests, which felt like they were getting in the way, I would've continued... and I probably should pick it up one day, as Jeff Hamilton keeps telling me that isn't as much of a problem any more. However, the point to this long paragraph is that I've been wondering about that special formula of content, systems, and community. What are some ways of bringing all three together without it feeling forced? If you go too far in forcing it, then the game is group only and unfriendly to soloists just looking to hop in and play. If you go to far in not worrying about it, then the game is too solo friendly, a community doesn't get built, and people start to leave because they're playing single player games.

Lastly, I've been starting to get more focused on actually pushing forward the book I'm trying to write. One thing that I'm enjoying at the moment is figuring out how to make it balanced, as it is a book about super heroes. Something that always bugged me about super hero stories is how to make them dramatic or interesting when you have people that can't die because they can regen, can time travel, read minds, etc. It was my biggest beef with the show, Heroes, after season 1. It felt like they needed a game design to go in and nerf the hell out of Hiro's abilities, sort of how they did with Peter Petrelli in season 3. There's still a lot to write in the book, as I'm only two chapters in, but I'm excited to write a story in this world where no one's invulnerable, psychic, has time travel, or can regen. That premise alone has caused a lot of ideas to crop in my mind, ideas that I'm excited to write down and eventually put out into a story. Maybe if I'm actually focused, I'll finish the book and publish it this year! ... that would be nice.

Anyway. That's it. This has been the scattered around blog post which has had very little information about how to be a better anything. Sorry for anyone who was looking for that. See you all next week with a hopefully more informative post!