Stop Cheating!!!

OK, I don't know the ins and outs of this story but the sentiment of this post remains the same.

So according to the website Cinema Blend, Microsoft have been gaming the numbers in an online twitter poll in order to make the Xbox One seem more popular that it actual is in America.  You can read the article right here.

http://www.cinemablend.com/games/Xbox-One-Caught-Cheating-Twitter-Poll-Gains-60-Votes-With-Bots-58927.html

You can see in that article there is a bunch of dummy accounts spamming votes for the Xbox One to make it look more popular than it really is.  Now it's not really a big deal, it's just a an online poll, but that's exactly the point.  Instead of focusing on fixing the massive fuckup that is the Xbox One, they are spending resources on having people set up a bunch of bots to spam hash tags on twitter.  If they spent more time on actually making a good system and less time trying to damage control their shitty piece of hardware then the votes would come naturally anyway.

Xbox isn't the only one potentially doing shit like this though.  There is a number of rumours flying around the internet that Riot Games are padding out their Twitch TV viewer numbers with bots sitting around various channels just so that the numbers look higher than that of their competitors.

Rather than trying to cheat people and game numbers, why not just make a quality product that people would enjoy?  Hell, in the case of Riot games they don't NEED to game numbers on twitch because there are already shit tons of people who love the game, who cares if there are more people viewing on twitch compared to DotA or whatever?

Just stop it! Twitch viewer counts don't matter! Twitch polls don't matter! Stop it and focus on making things good!

Stop Making MOBA Games

If there is something which could quite easily be described as pointless, it would be making a new MOBA game right now.

So we have DotA2 which is the big one, one of the most played games on steam and has a massive user base that includes people who have been playing since the days of the old Warcraft 3 mod and people who have recently picked it up.  On the other side of that you have League of Legends, a similar game with simpler mechanics and a more newbie friendly approach to things and this game also has a massive userbase.

Before that we had Heroes of Newerth, which was a game that was basically trying to be DotA but with it's muddy art style, crap characters and awkward transition into a free to play model, it was quickly forgotten.  Then on top of that there have been quite a few other titles which have been trying to take the crowns from DotA and League.  Stuff like Bloodline Champions, SMITE and a few others are all there and available to play but very rarely do you see anyone talking about them.

So you would think at this point people would be like "well shit, guess we're not taking them down anytime soon, guess we better go make a different kind of game" but you'd be wrong.  There has been talk for fucking ages of "Blizzard DotA" although I have no idea what that's going to be like and then more recently we have this thing called Strife made by the same guys who did Heroes of Newerth.

This is a terrible idea because what do you expect happen, really?  These games will get released, be played for a few hours by a small group of people before being binned and ignored for League or DotA.  These developers should be channelling their efforts into making something different, something new or original, but instead we're just getting shit games that'll be forgotten within a few months.

We've seen this exact same thing happen with MMO's thanks to World of Warcraft, and it's happening again now with this shit.  Stop making these games because getting people to switch or even just take interest isn't really worth the time or money.  Maybe in the future, once DotA and League have lost some steam, but doing it now is the epitome of pointless.

A Problem With MOBAs

Forgive the image, it was one I used in a post a long time ago and it was easier just to use it again, this is not a DotA vs LoL post.  Also I know there are people on the net who don't like the term MOBA but I'm sorry, it's just the term I've known for the longest time

Anyway, today I was playing some DotA2 and I was trying to think why this genre more than any if notorious for having such a toxic, aggressive community.  It wasn't too long before I realised the reason why.

You don't even have to think that hard for the main reason why there is a significant chunk of the player bases for these games who just don't seem like very nice people.  A game of DotA or LoL or anything like that tends to take about 35 minutes or so at least (or 20 if it's a quick surrender in LoL) and that's quite a time investment for someone with a busy day.  Even if you're not busy, if you're not having fun, 35 minutes can feel like fucking forever.  So, if there is someone on the team causing the game to go poorly then it's pretty obvious that the reaction to that person is going to be quite negative, their lack of ability basically renders the entire duration of the game a waste of time.

Now what I'm not saying is that people who are new shouldn't play, because that would be just completely fucking stupid, but what is a newbie to do?  Well the common argument is "go play against bots!" but I don't really buy into that.

You see, bot games are all well and good for learning the basic mechanics of the game and how your character of choice works, but let's face it, bots don't play like real people.  You could play bot games all day but when you start going up against real people who do things differently and behaving in different ways then even with all the bot practice in the world you're still going to get rocked.

It's not so bad in a game like Starcraft because that is only 1v1.  If you suck in a game of Starcraft, the only persons time you are wasting is your own.  But if you suck in a MOBA game then you are wasting the time of 4 other people, and people don't like having their time wasted on stuff that isn't fun for them.

Unfortunately though, I don't have a solution because the only real way to get better is to keep practicing in real games so that you can eventually get to the point where you can play effectively.

So really what I'm trying to say is that people who play these kind of games need to chill out and just accept the fact that there are going to be people who suck.  There isn't a need to get mad, because it reflects badly on the community and you're not helping the sucky person get any better.  So help them out, teach them a thing or two about what to do, who knows, maybe something will click with them and you'll be able to turn around a losing game.

If you are on the receiving end of the abuse, don't rise to it, just ask for help because maybe the person yelling at you might calm down when they realise that you are just genuinely new and need pointers.  Calling each other "fucking noobs" all game doesn't help anything now, does it?

I've singled out this genre because it's pretty well known for having ragey arseholes but this goes for other team games too.  Chill out, it's not like that one loss on your record is going to ruin your life and maybe you'll help improve someones gameplay so they can score their own wins further down the line.

DotA 2

I have a new addiction, and it's called DotA2

This is a game I previously had very little experience with despite owning it for a long long time.  Although the whole thing seemed a bit impenetrable at first and because of that I ended up shelving it for a long long time.

Recently though, I decided to give it another spin with a few buddies.  After a few games of being absolutely destroyed and struggling to figure out whats what, things started to go a lot smoother.  Once you get round all the differences from something like, League of Legends, and you begin to get a feel for how to play, everything becomes a lot clearer. 

When you first fire it up you are SWAMPED with literally hundreds of things that you have to take in all at once.  Of course, not all of these things will sink in over the course of one game, so you will need to take a little while to find your feet.  That said, once you have found your feet DotA2 is a much more satisfying game to play than League.

I'm not saying League is bad with that, but League feels very bare bones.  One of the reasons I think it appeals to so many people is that you don't really have to learn all that much stuff before you can play it with some degree of proficiency.  With League you can switch your brain off and just make things die, which is fine for having fun with, but the depth found it DotA makes it a much more satisfying after a match is finished.

Right now it's still in beta and you need an invite to play it, but if you can get your hands on one, give it a go.  But whatever you do don't give up just because you get destroyed the first few times, it WILL happen, I promise it, but once you do master it a little bit you'll be playing one of the most fun games available at the moment.

Leauge of Legends Vs DotA2

When I'm spending my time lurking around gaming forums, a common topic I see being discussed is which game is better between League of Legends or DotA2.  So I'm going to throw my opinion into the pile, even though it's sort of like spitting in the ocean at this point.

So which game do I think is better?  Well the answer is neither because this whole argument is fucking stupid in the first place, they are two completely different games, offering completely different experiences made by completely different sets of people.  Yes, they are in the same genre so there are some things you can say about similarities in style and game play, but the differences are far too vast between the two titles.

Don't take the fact that I think this argument is stupid to mean I don't like either game.  I like them both and I play both, but I play them for different purposes.  League of Legends I play strictly for the fun times, dicking around with a small group of buddies and just generally having a good time occasionally doing stupid shit.  DotA on the other hand is my serious face game.  I still have fun with it but I feel more motivated to TRY and do well in DotA than I do in League.  That's not me saying League of Legends isn't a competitive game, I just personally don't want to treat it as such.

Now the reason this argument is so stupid is because it's so obvious that League of Legends is trying to attract a completely different kind of person to DotA that if you can't see that you need to be smacked over the head with a piece of wood.  League from day 1 has always been a game that's far more accessible to new players, it's a free game that simplified the game mechanics of beasts like DotA so that everybody could have fun with it.  That's not to say the game is dumbed down per se, but things have been tweaked in the favour of those who know nothing about this genre than the hardcore fans of the old Warcraft 3 mod.

DotA on the other hand is the kind of game you really need to study to be good at.  There is so much depth to this game, and things like buying items and dying carry so much more weight that it's really aimed at the kind of person who wants a deep, challenging game rather than a quick MOBA fix.

To simplify my point further, it's like the difference between chess and checkers.  Neither are bad games, but one blatantly requires more thought, effort and practise than the other to be good at. 

But what I also see a lot of is people from DotA bashing people who play League, and this is also really fucking stupid.  It's not like the DotA scene was particularly huge until recently, but the hardcore DotA fans would love nothing more than all the new League players to just fuck off.  This doesn't make any sense!  Yes, DotA is deeper and more involving, so HELP THEM understand it and get good at it, don't shun them straight off the bat, your community will never improve that way!

Both good games, if your a fan of the genre I'd recommend both!

Note: Comparing these games to RTS games is fucking stupid, don't do it.  Also RTS players need to generally shut up about League and DotA players, because it's not impossible to be good at both genres for fucks sake.

Sometimes people make me sad

So over the last few days, I've been watching the Intel Extreme Masters tournament for Starcraft 2, a highly entertaining tournament with some good casters and a very familiar host.

I've been watching the stream of this tournament through a certain casters website, and while observing the tournament there is a chat box to the right of the stream window.  This chat box really makes me lose faith in humanity sometimes and I'm so happy there is a full screen function in order to turn it off.

Maybe it's just me, but I thought that people watching games of Starcraft 2 would like to discuss Starcraft 2, but all people seem to want to do is just argue about stupid shit all day.  The one that annoys me a little bit is the whole Starcraft 2 being better than League of Legends thing.  First, this argument is fucking stupid because the 2 games aren't even in the same genre and secondly I don't want to hear about League when I'm trying to enjoy some high level goddamn Starcraft!

I'm not going to get into this debate in any detail, but it's fucking obvious that Starcraft has more depth and requires more skill than League, harping on about it just makes you look like an ass.

But the absolute worst thing I'm seeing in this chat, is the whole USA being better than the EU thing.  Why is this even a fucking issue?  It's not like the players care, it's not like the casters care and it's not like anyone actually at the tournament gives a fuck where your from.  Even worse than that it's not even a case of "America! Fuck yeah!", the whole thing is swapped with stupid comments about how the EU is bankrupt and America is the greatest country in the world yadda yadda yadda.

I don't want to hear this garbage, I'm sure there are plenty of places where you can discuss the advantages and disadvantages of living in certain countries, but a fucking Starcraft 2 tournament chat is NOT the place to fucking do it.  Discuss the game, have some fun, but don't bring your patriotic bullshit into the fucking conversation.

Time and place people!

EDIT: As soon as the chat got filtered to subscribers only, it was filled with good healthy discussion of the tournament and the game itself!  Guess it aint all bad