Woah, two shows in one day?!?! Slow down, cowboy!

Since we had technology troubles on 23.5, we got together again to do episode 24 proper justice. On this episode, we cut out the news and extras and get right into an hour of round table. This week, we’re talking:

• Negativity in MMOs,
• Used game sales, who’s to blame?
• Half-MMOs

The show came out great and is wonderfully tangential. We use our topics as a launching point and expand, but, hey, we bring it back around, I think.

Oh, and links. Got to have links:

• Hunter’s Insight – Read it!
• Upshift Strike Racer – Play it!
• MMOV Podcast – Hear it!

We’re trying a new topic format, so let us know what you think! Also, big kudos to Ferrel for editing. It’s a bigger job than you’d think and he’s doing great with it.

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Hey guys,

Long time no see! I know, it’s been too long, but we’re back.  This episode actually demonstrates some of the technological issues we’ve been running into trying out new recorders. Unfortunately, Ferrel echoes throughout; however, the content itself was too good not to share — hence, 23.5 and not 24.

We talk about lots of stuff on this episode: the Neverwinter MMO, the LotRO cash shop, EQ Next, raiding, and more. Enjoy!

Popularity: 2% [?]

Hey gang,

Another week, another Multiverse! This week we touch on the Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning trailer, FFXIV’s recommended requirements, the cast of DCUO, and more! We have a clarification from last week, too. It seems that the reported 200k new subscribers for LotRO were actually beta applicants. Still impressive, in my opinion! Thanks to Green Armadillo and Doc Holiday for catching that. Green Armadillo also has a post up inspired by our conversation on GW2 from last week. Check it out here.

Our round table this week focused on atmosphere. After playing through a few of Cataclysm’s new starting zones, I started to notice just how immersive they felt – but not because of narrative; rather, atmosphere! We discuss what makes of breaks the illusion and what little noticed pieces we appreciate the most. Ending the segment, we answer an email from Deloryan, who writes:

Hi muliverse crew!! A lot of my friends turn off the music in wow and I don’t get it. I LOVE video game music and think it adds a lot to the experience. Do you guys listen to the music in games and do you have any favorites from the mmorpgs you play?

The last half of this show represents one of the funniest times we’ve had together. Riknas is finally shut out from the furry club. You’re in or you’re out and, unlike some kinds of club, we don’t mind talking openly about it!

Don’t forget to check out my blog of the week, Hunter’s Insight (latest post), for a great look at the upcoming Guild Wars 2. And, if you need a laugh, check out Riknas’s F2P game of the week: Arch Lord.

The ending music of this week’s show is also changed. In honor of my re-downloading the game, we’re featuring one of the most epic scores from Mass Effect 2.

Oh, and before I forget, my new year’s resolution (new year for the blog, anyways), I’m resolving to fit editing time into my Monday to get you these in a more timely manner.

Thanks for listening!

PS: We had some technical issues, so this show is a longer than usual. We’ll be back to our normal one hour format next week.

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Happy Hump Day Folks!

We’re back this week with the much delayed Episode 22 of The Multiverse: MMO Radio. We first tried this show back on the ninth – right before real names on the forums got canceled – but, as luck would have it, my hard drive crashed and the show was lost. But, intrepid podcaster and great friend Ferrel stepped up to host our return!

This week, we took a pass on the Real ID topic. Well, mostly. We don’t really talk about it but there’s a little segment at the end Ferrel didn’t want to let fade into the internet obscurity. Instead, we talk about the slew of upcoming MMOs 2010 and ‘11 promise to bring us. Is a play or not play show and I have to say that I the my co-hosts surprised me more than once.

Oh, fair warning, there may be an explitive at the end of the show. I had it noted and was ready to cover it with a great chicken impression from Ferrel but, for the life of me, I couldn’t find it again. It was somewhere around our conversation about Legos. Yeah, we cussed during the most childlike portion of the show. Sometimes, when you’re feeling like a kid, you need to feel like a bad kid. Just saying.

Anyhow, the show will get censored and re-uploaded. But, for now, we give you Episode 22.

Enjoy!

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Hot on the heels of Episode 20, we bring you the next installment: Overhauls for Cash! For those that are a little confused, this is our normal weekly episode, on time and featuring the news and topics arising from the last week.

Our topic for this show is MMO overhauls. We’ve all seen it happen. An MMO suddenly pulls up roots and changes itself to match the market trend. It started with SWG and it continues with Global Agenda. The question is, is it a good thing or a bad thing? We also spend a little time talking about MMOs that we think desperately need an overhaul and what we’d do with them.

And we have tangents, but you’re used to that by now

To the notes!

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Intro:
What’s new this week?
What have we been playing?

Round Table:
News
- Blizzard not planning on taking WoW F2P*
- Progress being made on Torchlight MMO
- FFXIV coming out sept. 30th, march 30th
- WoW Cataclysm beta has begun!
- NBC planning a video game show for primetime

Main Topic

- MMO Overhauls – Payment models, NGE, LotRO going F2P.
- What MMOs would we overhaul and how?

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Hey Guys,

Sorry for the delay on this one. I was a klutz and accidentally deleted it from the server during press time. In any event, on this episode we crew together with the folks from the MMO Voices podcast and talk about the week’s news and more. Join us for the crossover event to end all crossover events on The Multiverse: Episode #20!

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Afternoon, gang! Another week, another Multiverse, this week headed by Gavin, Ferrrel, and I (good luck on the SATs, Riknas!). This episode we discuss the week’s new (LotRO going F2P, MMOs have no point, and more) as well as tackle a very on topic discussion: what is the point of MMOs and what keeps us coming back. Later, Ferrel and I debate about buying gold in MMOs. He thinks it’s time to move past shunning these players and for studios to start giving us their own options. I disagree and it leads to some interesting banter.

This was a good show. The chat room was booming and, at one pointed, a heated debate even broke out. Thanks to everyone who came out to listen live! We’d love to see even more people in there, so join us this Friday at 7:30PM EST by clicking the link above or checking out our sidebar.

I will say this though, we had a couple of technical problems with the stream this week and had to break to fix them. On the plus side, it allowed some very strange audio to come through on Skype. Gavin’s and my mind run amuck
and fun ensues.

Without further delay, to the notes!

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The Multiverse – Episode #19 – “In Defense of Gold Buying (and the Point of MMOs)”

Intro:

• What have we been playing/up to this past week?
  • New writers at Game by Night
• Thank you to Merric of Casual Stroll to Mordor for the 5-star review. *Sorry, I forgot to mention this during the recording. I’ll get you next time, Merric!

Roundtable:

• News:
  • Symantec analyzes stolen accounts.
    • 44 million of them! Wayi – 16 million; Ncsoft – 2 million (60,000 from Aion); WoW – 16,000.
  • Sony announces new Star Wars MMO.
    • Free to play with a subscription option to access more content. Browser based, mini-games.
      • Syp reports, “Players will socialize in hubs, meet iconic Star Wars characters, and head off together or solo for a variety of activities, including spaceship battles, tower defense, card games, droid programming and speeder bike racing.”
      • About 20 mini-games present at launch.
  • Bioware claims SW:TOR to contain “50 novels of content”
    • ““The thing that has been a challenge for us on Old Republic is that people tried to convince us these limitations were canon – that they were to be respected, you know? That you could not, in fact, put interesting bits in an MMO because that was now sacrilege.”
• Main Topic: What is the point of MMOs – why do we play, what keeps us playing, and, really, what is the point? How do we feel about Bioware’s feelings that standard MMOs are pointless and what does this mean for TOR?
• Debate: Is it time to accept gold buyers?

Host Segments:

• Chris’ Blog of the Week: Not a blog, but a column! The Game Archaeologist.

Close:

• Shoutouts:
  • Check out the new Vagary! We’re going to E3.
• Contact us at: multiversepodcast@gmail.com

Relevant Links:

• Ferrel’s Site
• Riknas’ Site
• Chris’ Site

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Welcome back, everybody, to another episode of The Multiverse. We were happy to be joined by a surprise guest this week, Syp from Bio Break and his new digs at Massively! We covered the week’s news (which lead to some extensive and great conversation), what Syp’s been up to for Massively, and entered into Blog-o-Whirl #2. The topics we pulled are:

• ITG! Is Gaikai and OnLive the future of gaming?
• Gordon asks: is in-game roleplaying dead?
• Just for fun: Tipa has a flaming Rhinocerrous
• And more!

My blog of the week this week is Nomadic Gamer. Keep up the great work guys!

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The Multiverse – Episode #17: “Ferrel Offends EVERYbody”

Happy Tuesday Folks,

Another week, another Multiverse. Riknas was under the weather this week, so it was just Ferrel and I, with Ferrel at the helm. I’ve gotta say, I kind of like being a co-host. And a harvest queen– you’ll just have to listen to get that one.

Ferrel was in rare form, too. I’m pretty sure there’s a thin slice of people he didn’t offend, but it’s hard to say. You can direct your hate mail to multiversepodcast@gmail.com and let him know how you feel. Just remember, he looks a bit like Arnold Schwarzenegger, so choose your words wisely my friends.

Without further delay, here are this weeks amended notes.

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News:
Heroes of Might and Magic Online hits Closed Beta
Fallen Earth lay offs (late but still important)
Games Workshop sues Warhammer Alliance
Obama says games are bad for democracy?

Talking Points:
Cataclysm puling players back into WoW. Are you going back and why? Why can’t we escape this thing?

“In the year 2000″ a look at MMOs that are coming up you might not have heard of: Planes of Telara, Copernicus project

Contest Winners:

Oriik
Insoo Hwang
Jeremy

Thanks for entering!

Contact: multiversepodcast@gmail.com

Popularity: unranked [?]

Happy Monday Everyone!

To start the week off right, we’re here to bring you the one-week-delayed Episode 16 of the Multiverse. Things didn’t go off a smoothly as planned but the results are a funnier show. Go figure.

This week, our main topic is what it takes for an MMO to get, and keep, our attention. Plus, any kill clauses that might come up along the way. We were joined in the tail end by Gavin of Flex Your Geek, to talk a little bit about WoW’s AVR addon.

Be sure to stay tuned after the show ends as Riknas and I share our most embarrassing childhood moments.

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Show Notes – 4/30/10 – “I am Betty White”

Introduction

• Introducing the golden girls podcast, hosted by Betty White, Bea Arthur, and Estelle Getty.

• What’s new this week?

• What have we been playing?

Round Table

• News:
  • Alganon has launched! Again!
    • Has the free to play model but looks pretty meh. Two races and “several” classes?
    • “Traditionally, massively multiplier online games have been about three basic gameplay pillars – combat, exploration and character progression,” Derek Smart continued. “In Alganon, in addition to these we’ve added the fourth pillar to the equation; a story.”
  • Guild Wars 2 released their manifesto.
    • “This time around, there’s no question that it’s an MMORPG”
    • “In GW you experience the story of the world, but the story in GW2 is the personal story of your character as well. … Then the choices you make will take the story in different directions. Each time you play through the game, you can experience a different storyline.” Moral Dilemmas that impact the story. Will this block out content based on the choice, good or bad?
    • “With GW2 there’s a third option too: you can just naturally play with all the people around you. … your interests are always aligned with all other nearby players anyway.”
    • “Our games aren’t about preparing to have fun, or about grinding for a future fun reward. Our games are designed to be fun from moment to moment.”
  • Age of Conan lets you level… offline?!?!
    • Tuesday: Active accounts get four levels they can use to bump up any 30+ character. They get an extra level to use every four days. Never stops. Level cap of 80. If you stopped leveling at 30, you could max out in 200 days, never having killed anything.
• Main Topic: What does it take for an MMO to get your attention and earn a pre-order/purchase – what marketing works, what pushes you over, and what’s too much.
  • Any kill clauses?
• Extra topic: AVR addon.

Shout Outs/Contact Information

• Email: multiversepodcast@gmail.com

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