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    ‏إظهار الرسائل ذات التسميات The Ancient Gaming Noob. إظهار كافة الرسائل
    ‏إظهار الرسائل ذات التسميات The Ancient Gaming Noob. إظهار كافة الرسائل
    Pandemic Binge Watching and Some More Shows Wilhelm Arcturus The pandemic is still here… and it has been getting worse rather than better of late… so we’re still spending a lot of time at home in front of the TV consuming huge servings of streamed shows.  You can look at the Binge Watching tag to see this and other posts on the topic. Billions – Showtime We started watching this because it had a bit of the same vibe in the ads as Succession, the HBO series that we both enjoyed. It features the ongoing struggle between the CEO of an investment firm, played by Damien Lewis, and the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, played by Paul Giamatti. Unlike Ascension, which was about a rich and powerful family being horrible to each other, and fully deserving it most of the time, Billions tends to be more about the rich (Lewis) and powerful (Giamatti) abusing their power for their own agendas, which is less fun, being closer to the reality where the everyday person just gets crushed if they get in the way. Also, the show doesn’t really go anywhere.  There are four and a half seasons available on Showtime and when we got to the end of season four I commented to my wife that after 48 episodes everything was pretty much back where it started.  A lot of details changed, but the essential conflict remained practically as it began. The redeeming grace of the show is the supporting cast, who are often more fun an interesting than either of the two primary characters. Counterpart – Amazon Prime A science fiction series originally aired on Starz, the premise is that in the late 80s in Berlin some scientists broke through a barrier and discovered a parallel, identical Earth.  Or maybe they created it, as everything was exactly the same there.  And everybody has a double on the other side that is an exact copy of them.  But then the two worlds began to diverge. 30 years down the road, the two worlds are very different, with research and technology having progressed differently.  The two worlds maintain embassies with each other and negotiate trades of information, but the relationship is tense.  Both sides distrust the other and spy while trying to keep their own secrets.  The whole thing has been kept under wraps from the general public and is run by a group referred to only as “Management.” It only runs for two seasons, which I suspect may have been due to a lack of “stars” to bring in an audience.  I mean, I like J. K. Simmons a lot, but stars maybe don’t do insurance commercials. But the two season thing turned out to be a bit of a benefit.  I think they knew going into the second season that they would have to wrap it up, so they did.  The first season brings you into the conflict between the two worlds and sets a plot in motion.  The second season resolved the plot, answers a bunch of questions, and tidies things up at the end, making it a 20 part story.  And it is all kind of fun because a lot of the actors get to play two versions of themselves. Long Way Up – AppleTV+ Ewan McGregor is back with his childhood pal Charley Boorman for another motorcycle adventure.  It has been a long time since they did Long War Round and Long Way Down, but the two are back again for another adventure, and one I figured they would do eventually. Sort of. I figured Alaska to Tierra del Fuego would be a natural.  However, that is another “down” journey, so they decided to start in Tierra del Fuego and go north, thus the title. The big twist, besides everybody being older, grayer, and less spry, is that they decided to do the ride on electric motorcycles.  They got two prototype electric motorcycles from Harley Davidson for the run.  And, to go with them, were two prototype electric trucks from Rivian. (An old friend works for them, so I’ll have to ask if he got to meet Obi-wan.) That is kind of an interesting twist, but it also meant that the first three episodes were largely focused on battery life charging time, and whether or not they have the right plug adapter.  The vehicles all run down at some point, but they have a van and a generator truck on call at times. After that it settles down into the usual routine from the earlier shows, where they alternate between cool local sights and culture and figuring out how they are going to overcome some obstacle or make it in time for a ferry. Also, they don’t go all the way to Alaska, settling on LA to end the trip, which is where Ewan lives.  Driving up Interstate 5 to Canada and then the ALCAN Highway to Alaska is probably less exotic than they wanted. Basically, if you like the first two shows, this is a bit more of the same. Utopia – Amazon Prime I didn’t have any background on this one, but it had John Cusack in it, so we gave it a watch. Starting off it felt very much like a comic book adaptation, with the over the top graphic violence and crazy conspiracy theories… oh, and it revolves around a pair of comic books which a group of “enthusiasts” believe foretold and can foretell disease outbreaks in current times. But it is actually a remake of a British show of the same name from seven years back.  I suppose the source material doesn’t matter, but it felt like what it felt like. Anyway, conspiracies are true, diseases are planned, and an evil corporation has an evil plan to remake the world in a way that at least two Bond villains would approve.  The whole disease and vaccine and media influence aspect of it was very on the nose in 2020 I guess, but after a crazy and sometimes shocking start, the whole thing felt a little flat by the end.  It is only eight episodes, but it was no Umbrella Academy. Kim’s Convenience – Netflix In the middle of the pandemic and the election and all of the rather tense shows we’ve been watching, it was nice of Netflix to import four seasons of silly sitcom for us. The show feels straight from 70s/80s mold of family sitcoms.  It features the Kim family and centers around the convenience store they run.  The parents immigrated from Korea, but their two kids have grown up in Toronto and are much more Canadian than Korean in ways the second generation often are as part of the immigrant experience. Light, airy, and easily digested in 22 minute doses, we ran through all four seasons pretty quickly.  It isn’t Derry Girls hilarious, but it is pretty funny.  You can get wrapped up in whether or not the ethnic humor aspect of it should be a thing, but at its core it is a family sitcom with many of the same setups as sitcoms from bygone days. Also Mr. Kim, Paul Sun-Hyung Lee, got his own sneak attack, appearing in last week’s episode of The Mandalorian. https://ift.tt/3pa8wxm

    Pandemic Binge Watching and Some More Shows Wilhelm Arcturus The pandemic is still here… and it has been getting worse rather than better of late… so we’re still spending a lot of time at home in front of the TV consuming huge servings of streamed shows.  You can look at the Binge Watching tag to see this and other posts on the topic. Billions – Showtime We started watching this because it had a bit of the same vibe in the ads as Succession, the HBO series that we both enjoyed. It features the ongoing struggle between the CEO of an investment firm, played by Damien Lewis, and the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, played by Paul Giamatti. Unlike Ascension, which was about a rich and powerful family being horrible to each other, and fully deserving it most of the time, Billions tends to be more about the rich (Lewis) and powerful (Giamatti) abusing their power for their own agendas, which is less fun, being closer to the reality where the everyday person just gets crushed if they get in the way. Also, the show doesn’t really go anywhere.  There are four and a half seasons available on Showtime and when we got to the end of season four I commented to my wife that after 48 episodes everything was pretty much back where it started.  A lot of details changed, but the essential conflict remained practically as it began. The redeeming grace of the show is the supporting cast, who are often more fun an interesting than either of the two primary characters. Counterpart – Amazon Prime A science fiction series originally aired on Starz, the premise is that in the late 80s in Berlin some scientists broke through a barrier and discovered a parallel, identical Earth.  Or maybe they created it, as everything was exactly the same there.  And everybody has a double on the other side that is an exact copy of them.  But then the two worlds began to diverge. 30 years down the road, the two worlds are very different, with research and technology having progressed differently.  The two worlds maintain embassies with each other and negotiate trades of information, but the relationship is tense.  Both sides distrust the other and spy while trying to keep their own secrets.  The whole thing has been kept under wraps from the general public and is run by a group referred to only as “Management.” It only runs for two seasons, which I suspect may have been due to a lack of “stars” to bring in an audience.  I mean, I like J. K. Simmons a lot, but stars maybe don’t do insurance commercials. But the two season thing turned out to be a bit of a benefit.  I think they knew going into the second season that they would have to wrap it up, so they did.  The first season brings you into the conflict between the two worlds and sets a plot in motion.  The second season resolved the plot, answers a bunch of questions, and tidies things up at the end, making it a 20 part story.  And it is all kind of fun because a lot of the actors get to play two versions of themselves. Long Way Up – AppleTV+ Ewan McGregor is back with his childhood pal Charley Boorman for another motorcycle adventure.  It has been a long time since they did Long War Round and Long Way Down, but the two are back again for another adventure, and one I figured they would do eventually. Sort of. I figured Alaska to Tierra del Fuego would be a natural.  However, that is another “down” journey, so they decided to start in Tierra del Fuego and go north, thus the title. The big twist, besides everybody being older, grayer, and less spry, is that they decided to do the ride on electric motorcycles.  They got two prototype electric motorcycles from Harley Davidson for the run.  And, to go with them, were two prototype electric trucks from Rivian. (An old friend works for them, so I’ll have to ask if he got to meet Obi-wan.) That is kind of an interesting twist, but it also meant that the first three episodes were largely focused on battery life charging time, and whether or not they have the right plug adapter.  The vehicles all run down at some point, but they have a van and a generator truck on call at times. After that it settles down into the usual routine from the earlier shows, where they alternate between cool local sights and culture and figuring out how they are going to overcome some obstacle or make it in time for a ferry. Also, they don’t go all the way to Alaska, settling on LA to end the trip, which is where Ewan lives.  Driving up Interstate 5 to Canada and then the ALCAN Highway to Alaska is probably less exotic than they wanted. Basically, if you like the first two shows, this is a bit more of the same. Utopia – Amazon Prime I didn’t have any background on this one, but it had John Cusack in it, so we gave it a watch. Starting off it felt very much like a comic book adaptation, with the over the top graphic violence and crazy conspiracy theories… oh, and it revolves around a pair of comic books which a group of “enthusiasts” believe foretold and can foretell disease outbreaks in current times. But it is actually a remake of a British show of the same name from seven years back.  I suppose the source material doesn’t matter, but it felt like what it felt like. Anyway, conspiracies are true, diseases are planned, and an evil corporation has an evil plan to remake the world in a way that at least two Bond villains would approve.  The whole disease and vaccine and media influence aspect of it was very on the nose in 2020 I guess, but after a crazy and sometimes shocking start, the whole thing felt a little flat by the end.  It is only eight episodes, but it was no Umbrella Academy. Kim’s Convenience – Netflix In the middle of the pandemic and the election and all of the rather tense shows we’ve been watching, it was nice of Netflix to import four seasons of silly sitcom for us. The show feels straight from 70s/80s mold of family sitcoms.  It features the Kim family and centers around the convenience store they run.  The parents immigrated from Korea, but their two kids have grown up in Toronto and are much more Canadian than Korean in ways the second generation often are as part of the immigrant experience. Light, airy, and easily digested in 22 minute doses, we ran through all four seasons pretty quickly.  It isn’t Derry Girls hilarious, but it is pretty funny.  You can get wrapped up in whether or not the ethnic humor aspect of it should be a thing, but at its core it is a family sitcom with many of the same setups as sitcoms from bygone days. Also Mr. Kim, Paul Sun-Hyung Lee, got his own sneak attack, appearing in last week’s episode of The Mandalorian. https://ift.tt/3pa8wxm

    نوفمبر 08, 2020 0

    The pandemic is still here… and it has been getting worse rather than better of late… so we’re still spending a lot of time at home in front...

    Sunday WoW Items Before Shadowlands Wilhelm Arcturus We’re into November, and a bunch of stuff is coming up in World of Warcraft, not the least being the Shadowlands expansion.  But that is out on the 23rd, and a few things are in between then and now. The November 1 calendar entries Darkmoon Faire It is the start of the last Darkmoon Faire before the expansion, and the first one since the big level squish.  You can get a final five points in any of your Kul Tiran or Zandalarian professions before Shadowlands profession updates arrive.  My main is just 3 points shy of finishing engineering, so I’ll be in there with him.  You have until Saturday night to get that done. I’m also going to see if I can figure out the deal with heirloom gear.  Most of mine seems to be useful only through level 34 now, which isn’t so useful in a 10-50 alt leveling context. Day of the Dead It is also your chance to run the Day of the Dead event.  Get on this right away though, as it is a single day event. Anniversary Event World of Warcraft turns 16 this year, and the anniversary of the initial launch coincides with the launch date for Shadowlands.  I guess they did not want the two events interfering with each other or confusing anybody, so the anniversary event starts today and ends on November 22nd.  The 23rd is reserved for Shadowlands. End Date The event itself is a modest example of the genre.  You get a package in your mail box with some time warped tokens, a quest starter for a time walking event, a firework, and the usual xp boost token. 16 years means 16% boost I am going to guess that Blizz doesn’t want to go into Shadowlands while giving people an xp boost.  They’ll save that for later. The Headless Horseman’s Mount Once again I queued up for the Headless Horseman.  I was half-hearted when Hallow’s End started, but was motivated by Belghast’s post about going all out for it.  Having done an audit of all of my characters, I knew that I had 18 characters who were level 20 or higher after the squish, the minimum level to run the Headless Horseman’s instance. The first couple of the days I just ran with the dozen eligible characters on the paired servers, Eldre’Thalas and Korialstrasz, that I think of as home.  At the end though I dug out some old characters, spec’d them up, and ran with anybody I could get in the queue. But, after the final run this morning as the event wound down, I found myself once again without the mount. Not mine Lots of masks, a lot of candy, a few rings, one sword, but no mounts. On the bright side, I didn’t do horribly with the rando alts.  I’d probably go back and spec a couple of them to tank specs just to shorten the wait in the queue, but I didn’t do too bad.  I only had one bad group along the way, which wiped on the event three times before I bailed.  I was tanking that one with a level 50 pally and was putting out more DPS than the rest of the group combined. Next year in Scarlet Monastery I guess. https://ift.tt/369a1Dl

    Sunday WoW Items Before Shadowlands Wilhelm Arcturus We’re into November, and a bunch of stuff is coming up in World of Warcraft, not the least being the Shadowlands expansion.  But that is out on the 23rd, and a few things are in between then and now. The November 1 calendar entries Darkmoon Faire It is the start of the last Darkmoon Faire before the expansion, and the first one since the big level squish.  You can get a final five points in any of your Kul Tiran or Zandalarian professions before Shadowlands profession updates arrive.  My main is just 3 points shy of finishing engineering, so I’ll be in there with him.  You have until Saturday night to get that done. I’m also going to see if I can figure out the deal with heirloom gear.  Most of mine seems to be useful only through level 34 now, which isn’t so useful in a 10-50 alt leveling context. Day of the Dead It is also your chance to run the Day of the Dead event.  Get on this right away though, as it is a single day event. Anniversary Event World of Warcraft turns 16 this year, and the anniversary of the initial launch coincides with the launch date for Shadowlands.  I guess they did not want the two events interfering with each other or confusing anybody, so the anniversary event starts today and ends on November 22nd.  The 23rd is reserved for Shadowlands. End Date The event itself is a modest example of the genre.  You get a package in your mail box with some time warped tokens, a quest starter for a time walking event, a firework, and the usual xp boost token. 16 years means 16% boost I am going to guess that Blizz doesn’t want to go into Shadowlands while giving people an xp boost.  They’ll save that for later. The Headless Horseman’s Mount Once again I queued up for the Headless Horseman.  I was half-hearted when Hallow’s End started, but was motivated by Belghast’s post about going all out for it.  Having done an audit of all of my characters, I knew that I had 18 characters who were level 20 or higher after the squish, the minimum level to run the Headless Horseman’s instance. The first couple of the days I just ran with the dozen eligible characters on the paired servers, Eldre’Thalas and Korialstrasz, that I think of as home.  At the end though I dug out some old characters, spec’d them up, and ran with anybody I could get in the queue. But, after the final run this morning as the event wound down, I found myself once again without the mount. Not mine Lots of masks, a lot of candy, a few rings, one sword, but no mounts. On the bright side, I didn’t do horribly with the rando alts.  I’d probably go back and spec a couple of them to tank specs just to shorten the wait in the queue, but I didn’t do too bad.  I only had one bad group along the way, which wiped on the event three times before I bailed.  I was tanking that one with a level 50 pally and was putting out more DPS than the rest of the group combined. Next year in Scarlet Monastery I guess. https://ift.tt/369a1Dl

    نوفمبر 01, 2020 0

    We’re into November, and a bunch of stuff is coming up in World of Warcraft , not the least being the Shadowlands expansion.  But that is o...

    Farewell Commander Bond Wilhelm Arcturus I woke up this morning to the news that Sean Connery had passed away. Sean Connery had a long career in film. He was well paid and played many roles over the years.  But for all of his other work, both excellent and regrettable, he will forever be associated with James Bond. About to say his famous intro, ‘Bond, James Bond’ for the first time in Dr. No In the 60s he helped cement the James Bond franchise.  By the third film, Goldfinger, the style and required tropes, from the opening, to the required plot points, to the nature of the villains, of any James Bond film were set in stone.  And with that he became the benchmark against which any future actor taking on the role would be measured. He played Bond five times in the 60s in Dr. No, From Russia with Love, Goldfinger, You Only Live Twice, and Thunderball.  He came back again in 1971 in Diamonds are Forever after replacement George Lazenby declined to play the role again, lest he be typecast, and once Cubby Broccoli threw enough money at him. And then he returned once more to the role in Never Say Never Again, a remake of Thunderball, and outside of whatever continuity the EON produced Bond films have.  So that is seven total appearances as the character, for which, by the end, he was paid more than most actors will ever see in their lifetime. But the appeal of Sean Connery was him being Sean Connery.  The role might have been James Bond, but he made it his. There are actors who get lost in roles, who become different people with different scripts.  Actors like Daniel Day Lewis or Meryl Streep.  They can morph into what the script needs them to be. With Sean Connery you got what you got, a tall handsome Scotsman with an oft imitated accent and a brash, confident demeanor.  The character was molded to fit him.  A Soviet submarine commander, Indiana Jones’ father, a Kipling hero, a Irish Chicago cop, a Franciscan friar, or a post-apocalyptic “brutal,” all of those roles ended up on him like so many tailored suits.  They clothed him, sometimes quite well, but did not change what you were getting. While he had been retired from acting for almost two decades, he still casts a long shadow, especially for anybody taking on the role of James Bond.  He leaves behind a legacy on the big screen that will endure. https://ift.tt/37ZzwJO

    Farewell Commander Bond Wilhelm Arcturus I woke up this morning to the news that Sean Connery had passed away. Sean Connery had a long career in film. He was well paid and played many roles over the years.  But for all of his other work, both excellent and regrettable, he will forever be associated with James Bond. About to say his famous intro, ‘Bond, James Bond’ for the first time in Dr. No In the 60s he helped cement the James Bond franchise.  By the third film, Goldfinger, the style and required tropes, from the opening, to the required plot points, to the nature of the villains, of any James Bond film were set in stone.  And with that he became the benchmark against which any future actor taking on the role would be measured. He played Bond five times in the 60s in Dr. No, From Russia with Love, Goldfinger, You Only Live Twice, and Thunderball.  He came back again in 1971 in Diamonds are Forever after replacement George Lazenby declined to play the role again, lest he be typecast, and once Cubby Broccoli threw enough money at him. And then he returned once more to the role in Never Say Never Again, a remake of Thunderball, and outside of whatever continuity the EON produced Bond films have.  So that is seven total appearances as the character, for which, by the end, he was paid more than most actors will ever see in their lifetime. But the appeal of Sean Connery was him being Sean Connery.  The role might have been James Bond, but he made it his. There are actors who get lost in roles, who become different people with different scripts.  Actors like Daniel Day Lewis or Meryl Streep.  They can morph into what the script needs them to be. With Sean Connery you got what you got, a tall handsome Scotsman with an oft imitated accent and a brash, confident demeanor.  The character was molded to fit him.  A Soviet submarine commander, Indiana Jones’ father, a Kipling hero, a Irish Chicago cop, a Franciscan friar, or a post-apocalyptic “brutal,” all of those roles ended up on him like so many tailored suits.  They clothed him, sometimes quite well, but did not change what you were getting. While he had been retired from acting for almost two decades, he still casts a long shadow, especially for anybody taking on the role of James Bond.  He leaves behind a legacy on the big screen that will endure. https://ift.tt/37ZzwJO

    أكتوبر 31, 2020 0

    I woke up this morning to the news that Sean Connery had passed away. Sean Connery had a long career in film. He was well paid and played m...

    SuperData Says September Superb for Crusader Kings 3 Wilhelm Arcturus It is time for the monthly look at SuperData Research’s digital revenue chart.  The September version was made available last week and it heralds another banner month for video game revenue. Digital games earned $10.7B in September 2020, up 14% year-over-year. Games earned more across all platform types than during the same period in 2019. Mobile revenue was up 9%, PC rose by 8% and console earnings increased 40% as major fall titles began to hit the market. The chart itself shows some of those fall titles. SuperData Research Top 10 – September 2020 On the PC end of the chart, the usual order has been restored to the perennial top four, with League of Legends back on top. However, it is fifth place that is interesting, as it sees Crusader Kings III from strategy game developer Paradox make it onto the list. Crusader Kings III from Paradox broke records for PC strategy games, selling 1.1M digital units in September. The medieval dynasty simulator sold more units in its launch month than either Total War: Three Kingdoms from Sega or Sid Meier’s Civilization VI from 2K. Crusader Kings III did earn slightly less at launch than its closest competitors because it was priced at $49.99 instead of the more common $59.99. A pretty big deal for what seemed like a slow motion medieval reality TV simulator to some (okay, maybe that is just me), but it is good to see it break into the list on launch. I’ll be interested to see how it fares in the Steam charts come the end of the year. Following CK3 was World of Tanks, returning to the list after a month away, Roblox, in seventh place as it last month, and World of Warcraft, which moved up two spots since August, no doubt due to anticipation related to the coming expansion… anticipation that was thwarted when the expansion was delayed. After that comes Fortnite and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare to round out the list. On the console column NBA 2K21 drove to the top of the list. NBA 2K21 was the top-earning title of the month, selling 1.9M digital units. Digital console sales were up 19% over NBA 2K20 at launch, and in-game revenue similarly increased by 8%. The game benefited from the rescheduling of the delayed NBA postseason. In August, NBA 2K20 also performed better than usual thanks to the return of the NBA on TV. That was followed by the remaster of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1 + 2, proving once again that nostalgia pays. Nostalgia was a powerful sales driver in September. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1 + 2 from Activision Blizzard sold 2.8M digital units, a significantly higher launch figure than the publisher’s previous remakes of Crash Bandicoot or Spyro games. Also in September, Nintendo’s Super Mario 3D All-Stars sold 1.8M digital units, which was by far the biggest launch ever for a Mario title on Switch. Then there was Marvel’s Avengers, which also sold a lot of units, followed by Super Mario 3D All-Stars, mentioned above along with Tony Hawk. With a pack of new titles dominating the console chart, Grand Theft Auto V fell to tenth position, the lowest I can recall ever seeing the perennial survivor. On the mobile end of the chart there is Free Fire, the title from Singapore that popped onto the charts in third place back in July, then moved into second in August, now at the top.  Pokemon Go held in strong in second place, still ahead of Honour of Kings and the Chinese version of PUBG Mobile, Peacekeeper Elite.  Candy Crush Saga, my bellwether title, came in at seventh position. Here is where I would normally put the NPD top ten in order to compare the above to US console and PC retail sales.  However, NPD has stopped sharing that data.  I am going to guess that the pandemic, which has pushed digital sales, had something to do with that.  They missed a couple of months earlier this year and now appear to have decided to stop sharing altogether. So, instead, I will just wrap up with two additional bullet points from the September report: In September, the mobile version of Among Us reached nearly as many players as Pokémon GO did during the peak of its popularity in August 2016. While the indie game originally launched in July 2018, interest in the game skyrocketed during the past summer as popular Twitch streamers took up the game. However, the high player numbers have remained subdued as in-game spending was limited to a handful of cosmetic items and the ability to remove ads. The game’s mobile revenue was not enough for it to break into the top 40 on mobile. Earnings were, however, still extremely high for a game made by only three developers. Rocket League’s transition to a free-to-play business model paid off for developer Psyonix (now a subsidiary of Epic Games). Player numbers nearly tripled in September, up 193% a week after the shift. Revenue-wise, total digital sales from September 23 to 30 (when the game was free to play) nearly matched the three previous weeks. The game’s esports ecosystem should also benefit from a boost in potential viewers on streaming platforms such as Twitch. That one about Among Us is timely, since on Saturday I was posting about some rando from the games industry who wanted streamers to pay to stream games.  This shows the power that streamer can have. https://ift.tt/35QpCam

    SuperData Says September Superb for Crusader Kings 3 Wilhelm Arcturus It is time for the monthly look at SuperData Research’s digital revenue chart.  The September version was made available last week and it heralds another banner month for video game revenue. Digital games earned $10.7B in September 2020, up 14% year-over-year. Games earned more across all platform types than during the same period in 2019. Mobile revenue was up 9%, PC rose by 8% and console earnings increased 40% as major fall titles began to hit the market. The chart itself shows some of those fall titles. SuperData Research Top 10 – September 2020 On the PC end of the chart, the usual order has been restored to the perennial top four, with League of Legends back on top. However, it is fifth place that is interesting, as it sees Crusader Kings III from strategy game developer Paradox make it onto the list. Crusader Kings III from Paradox broke records for PC strategy games, selling 1.1M digital units in September. The medieval dynasty simulator sold more units in its launch month than either Total War: Three Kingdoms from Sega or Sid Meier’s Civilization VI from 2K. Crusader Kings III did earn slightly less at launch than its closest competitors because it was priced at $49.99 instead of the more common $59.99. A pretty big deal for what seemed like a slow motion medieval reality TV simulator to some (okay, maybe that is just me), but it is good to see it break into the list on launch. I’ll be interested to see how it fares in the Steam charts come the end of the year. Following CK3 was World of Tanks, returning to the list after a month away, Roblox, in seventh place as it last month, and World of Warcraft, which moved up two spots since August, no doubt due to anticipation related to the coming expansion… anticipation that was thwarted when the expansion was delayed. After that comes Fortnite and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare to round out the list. On the console column NBA 2K21 drove to the top of the list. NBA 2K21 was the top-earning title of the month, selling 1.9M digital units. Digital console sales were up 19% over NBA 2K20 at launch, and in-game revenue similarly increased by 8%. The game benefited from the rescheduling of the delayed NBA postseason. In August, NBA 2K20 also performed better than usual thanks to the return of the NBA on TV. That was followed by the remaster of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1 + 2, proving once again that nostalgia pays. Nostalgia was a powerful sales driver in September. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1 + 2 from Activision Blizzard sold 2.8M digital units, a significantly higher launch figure than the publisher’s previous remakes of Crash Bandicoot or Spyro games. Also in September, Nintendo’s Super Mario 3D All-Stars sold 1.8M digital units, which was by far the biggest launch ever for a Mario title on Switch. Then there was Marvel’s Avengers, which also sold a lot of units, followed by Super Mario 3D All-Stars, mentioned above along with Tony Hawk. With a pack of new titles dominating the console chart, Grand Theft Auto V fell to tenth position, the lowest I can recall ever seeing the perennial survivor. On the mobile end of the chart there is Free Fire, the title from Singapore that popped onto the charts in third place back in July, then moved into second in August, now at the top.  Pokemon Go held in strong in second place, still ahead of Honour of Kings and the Chinese version of PUBG Mobile, Peacekeeper Elite.  Candy Crush Saga, my bellwether title, came in at seventh position. Here is where I would normally put the NPD top ten in order to compare the above to US console and PC retail sales.  However, NPD has stopped sharing that data.  I am going to guess that the pandemic, which has pushed digital sales, had something to do with that.  They missed a couple of months earlier this year and now appear to have decided to stop sharing altogether. So, instead, I will just wrap up with two additional bullet points from the September report: In September, the mobile version of Among Us reached nearly as many players as Pokémon GO did during the peak of its popularity in August 2016. While the indie game originally launched in July 2018, interest in the game skyrocketed during the past summer as popular Twitch streamers took up the game. However, the high player numbers have remained subdued as in-game spending was limited to a handful of cosmetic items and the ability to remove ads. The game’s mobile revenue was not enough for it to break into the top 40 on mobile. Earnings were, however, still extremely high for a game made by only three developers. Rocket League’s transition to a free-to-play business model paid off for developer Psyonix (now a subsidiary of Epic Games). Player numbers nearly tripled in September, up 193% a week after the shift. Revenue-wise, total digital sales from September 23 to 30 (when the game was free to play) nearly matched the three previous weeks. The game’s esports ecosystem should also benefit from a boost in potential viewers on streaming platforms such as Twitch. That one about Among Us is timely, since on Saturday I was posting about some rando from the games industry who wanted streamers to pay to stream games.  This shows the power that streamer can have. https://ift.tt/35QpCam

    أكتوبر 30, 2020 0

    It is time for the monthly look at SuperData Research’s digital revenue chart .  The September version was made available last week and it h...

    The Sprite Darter Transmog Set Does Not Fly Wilhelm Arcturus Icy Veins tells me that the Spriter Darter Transmog set introduction video might be the official WoW video with the most dislikes ever with, as of this writing, 3K likes and 25K dislikes.   That is some serious negative response to what is an optional $20 cosmetic item set in the WoW Store.  This isn’t the first over-priced cosmetic fluff option they have put up for sale.  But there is more to it here.  This is also the reward for subscribers who opt for the six month plan. An enchanting opportunity For a limited time*, when you sign up for a 6-month subscription to World of Warcraft, you’ll also receive the gift of the Sprite Darter’s Wings, immediately available in your in-game appearance collection. If you’re currently on a 6-month recurring subscription with a future renewal date, you’ll receive Sprite Darter’s Wings as a gift in your Battle.net desktop app at no additional charge no later than October 30, 2020 (must be redeemed by April 30, 2021). So it is something you get for choosing that plan… but it isn’t a mount, and therein lies the rub.  The whole every six months reward structure that started back in late 2018 has featured a “free” mount for people on that plan.  The pattern seemed to be set. I know I moved from the three month plan to the six month plan largely due to that.  I like mounts, though I am at a point where I have collected so many that I couldn’t name close to half of them from memory, even vaguely. So, this time around, a few mounts in, there was a change up and we got a cosmetic set instead.  I found mine waiting for me to collect in the launcher.  If you’re already on a six month plan you just get it. Sprite Darter Set I doubt I’ll wear it… but who knows.  Like my mounts, I couldn’t even begin to explain how many items I have in my transmog selection from just playing the game.  I don’t go out of my way for them, yet I have accumulated many items.  So one more set isn’t going make much of a difference for me.  We’ll see.  I’m not going to change my subscription plan over it.  In the end, if you play for the full six months, which I have, that ends up being an economic win. But I bet next time around we will get a mount. https://ift.tt/2TosOEt

    The Sprite Darter Transmog Set Does Not Fly Wilhelm Arcturus Icy Veins tells me that the Spriter Darter Transmog set introduction video might be the official WoW video with the most dislikes ever with, as of this writing, 3K likes and 25K dislikes.   That is some serious negative response to what is an optional $20 cosmetic item set in the WoW Store.  This isn’t the first over-priced cosmetic fluff option they have put up for sale.  But there is more to it here.  This is also the reward for subscribers who opt for the six month plan. An enchanting opportunity For a limited time*, when you sign up for a 6-month subscription to World of Warcraft, you’ll also receive the gift of the Sprite Darter’s Wings, immediately available in your in-game appearance collection. If you’re currently on a 6-month recurring subscription with a future renewal date, you’ll receive Sprite Darter’s Wings as a gift in your Battle.net desktop app at no additional charge no later than October 30, 2020 (must be redeemed by April 30, 2021). So it is something you get for choosing that plan… but it isn’t a mount, and therein lies the rub.  The whole every six months reward structure that started back in late 2018 has featured a “free” mount for people on that plan.  The pattern seemed to be set. I know I moved from the three month plan to the six month plan largely due to that.  I like mounts, though I am at a point where I have collected so many that I couldn’t name close to half of them from memory, even vaguely. So, this time around, a few mounts in, there was a change up and we got a cosmetic set instead.  I found mine waiting for me to collect in the launcher.  If you’re already on a six month plan you just get it. Sprite Darter Set I doubt I’ll wear it… but who knows.  Like my mounts, I couldn’t even begin to explain how many items I have in my transmog selection from just playing the game.  I don’t go out of my way for them, yet I have accumulated many items.  So one more set isn’t going make much of a difference for me.  We’ll see.  I’m not going to change my subscription plan over it.  In the end, if you play for the full six months, which I have, that ends up being an economic win. But I bet next time around we will get a mount. https://ift.tt/2TosOEt

    أكتوبر 25, 2020 0

    Icy Veins tells me that the Spriter Darter Transmog set introduction video might be the official WoW video with the most dislikes ever wit...

    Bubble Wrap Plan Gets a PAPI Keepstar Anchored in NPC Delve Wilhelm Arcturus When I first came here, this was all swamp. Everyone said I was daft to build a castle on a swamp, but I built in all the same, just to show them. It sank into the swamp. So I built a second one. And that one sank into the swamp. So I built a third. That burned down, fell over, and then sank into the swamp. But the fourth one stayed up. And that’s what you’re going to get, Son, the strongest castle in all of England. –King of Swamp Castle, who only took four tries to get his castle built On the bright side, the Imperium didn’t have to sacrifice another trillion ISK in ships. Today saw the fifth attempt by PAPI to get a Keepstar planted in NPC Delve, this time in YZ9-F6, the site of the failed trap last week.  When the Imperium jumped in and warped to the structure to start the fight, we found it surrounded by 149 warp disruption bubbles. Bubble wrapped Keepstar There were also dictors putting up bubbles inside the bubbles and various groups of hostiles deployed around the Keepstar. When the timer hit zero they managed to get the Quantum Core in right away, so we didn’t even get the free hits we got away with last time around.  But there were so many objects on grid that people were getting disconnected as they warped onto grid.  There was a momentary discussion about what we should do, but the timer was ticking down in real time.  In the end, there did not seem to be a way forward, so after some small clashes we turned around and went home. Bubble fly by The battle report shows a very small amount of losses compared to previous battles. Battle Report Header I had to go in and fix the battle report to get people on the correct sides.  That is a sure sign that not much happened, when the BR tool doesn’t know where to put people. We were, of course, out numbered as usual, though not by the margin that the BR might suggest.  There was around 4,500 people in local, so the numbers on the BR are an under count of people who who showed up, since it only grabs people who were on a kill mail. 4,438 in local as the timer started If you came and left without blowing something up (or getting blown up yourself), you were not added to the tally. Bubbles in bubbles with more bubbles showing up So PAPI has their foothold in NPC Delve.  Now where will they go from there?  Have they changed their mind about avoiding our Keepstars?  Or has the past two weeks of fighting in NPC Delve convinced them that would be a bad idea?  Either way, some of us got most of our Sunday back to do other things.  But somebody had to hang around and clean up those bubbles. Other coverage: New Eden Post – PAPI Keepstar Fully Operational in YZ9-F6, NPC Delve https://ift.tt/3j78QIN

    Bubble Wrap Plan Gets a PAPI Keepstar Anchored in NPC Delve Wilhelm Arcturus When I first came here, this was all swamp. Everyone said I was daft to build a castle on a swamp, but I built in all the same, just to show them. It sank into the swamp. So I built a second one. And that one sank into the swamp. So I built a third. That burned down, fell over, and then sank into the swamp. But the fourth one stayed up. And that’s what you’re going to get, Son, the strongest castle in all of England. –King of Swamp Castle, who only took four tries to get his castle built On the bright side, the Imperium didn’t have to sacrifice another trillion ISK in ships. Today saw the fifth attempt by PAPI to get a Keepstar planted in NPC Delve, this time in YZ9-F6, the site of the failed trap last week.  When the Imperium jumped in and warped to the structure to start the fight, we found it surrounded by 149 warp disruption bubbles. Bubble wrapped Keepstar There were also dictors putting up bubbles inside the bubbles and various groups of hostiles deployed around the Keepstar. When the timer hit zero they managed to get the Quantum Core in right away, so we didn’t even get the free hits we got away with last time around.  But there were so many objects on grid that people were getting disconnected as they warped onto grid.  There was a momentary discussion about what we should do, but the timer was ticking down in real time.  In the end, there did not seem to be a way forward, so after some small clashes we turned around and went home. Bubble fly by The battle report shows a very small amount of losses compared to previous battles. Battle Report Header I had to go in and fix the battle report to get people on the correct sides.  That is a sure sign that not much happened, when the BR tool doesn’t know where to put people. We were, of course, out numbered as usual, though not by the margin that the BR might suggest.  There was around 4,500 people in local, so the numbers on the BR are an under count of people who who showed up, since it only grabs people who were on a kill mail. 4,438 in local as the timer started If you came and left without blowing something up (or getting blown up yourself), you were not added to the tally. Bubbles in bubbles with more bubbles showing up So PAPI has their foothold in NPC Delve.  Now where will they go from there?  Have they changed their mind about avoiding our Keepstars?  Or has the past two weeks of fighting in NPC Delve convinced them that would be a bad idea?  Either way, some of us got most of our Sunday back to do other things.  But somebody had to hang around and clean up those bubbles. Other coverage: New Eden Post – PAPI Keepstar Fully Operational in YZ9-F6, NPC Delve https://ift.tt/3j78QIN

    أكتوبر 18, 2020 0

    When I first came here, this was all swamp. Everyone said I was daft to build a castle on a swamp, but I built in all the same, just to sho...

    The Canadian Visitor Wilhelm Arcturus Warning: This is a Tales from the Blog sort of story and involves page view stats.  No video games are mentioned. I like to watch the traffic stats for my blog, less because they are meaningful at any given moment… web stats are a polite lie most of the time… but because I like to see what brings people here and the patterns of interest.  As I have said in the past, even an flawed system of measurement, applied consistently, can reveal patterns that even an accurate single data point cannot show. So when I noticed a big pop in page views a couple weeks back, I started looking at what might have caused it.  Running a WP.com hosted blog means that I do not get to see raw data, but I have a couple of avenues to check that can be lined up to indicate what was going on. The first check is usually to see who is referring traffic.  Often a traffic spike is related to the site, or a specific post, being linked somewhere with some visibility.  Every so often, for example, somebody will link the Alamo teechs u 2 play DURID! post gets linked to one of the World of Warcraft sub-reddits and between a dozen and a couple hundred people will click on that link. This is very easy to spot in the basic stats.  The referrer will be obvious and the post linked will have a bunch of page views which will push it to the top of the daily list. This time there were no referrers that stood out and no particular post seemed to be getting traffic that could account for the jump in total page views.  In fact, referrer and post stats seemed very much within the recent norm, while page views were exploding.  The second day of this saw the site get just over five thousand page views but Google, always the default top referrer, had only sent me 350 viewers, and the top post of the day only had 30 page views. Sometimes that means somebody went scrolling through the blog.  I have the theme set up for infinite scroll, so you can just press the page down or arrow key and scroll all the way back to September 2006 if you have the time and patience. But when you do that, a page view gets counted for every ~20 posts and gets attached to the Home Page view stats.  The Home Page, somebody showing up at the base URL, always has the most page views on any given day because I don’t hide post content and make people click on titles to read a whole post.  I could do that, and I am sure my page views would go up, but I don’t like that on other blogs so I don’t do it here.  As I always say, be the blog you want to read. And this might have explained all those page view.  The flag counter widget on the side bar did not show anywhere close to the number of page views that WP.com was showing me, which is consistent with somebody doing a long scroll, as the widget only gets loaded once when you do it. That is one of my checks on the WP.com stats. Also, the visitor count, WP.com’s attempt to track daily unique visitors, was very low relative to the page views.  The visitor count is very broken, more so than page views I would guess, since I can get referrals from seven different locations, which implies seven different people visiting, and WP.com will tell me I had two visitors so far.  Also, the Flag Counter widget would count a different number, maybe five, maybe seven, just to confuse the issue.  As I said, web stats are a polite lie.  But, again, if I ignore accuracy and look at trends, somebody doing the long scroll tends to widen the gap between page views and visitors. However, the Home Page only showed about 400 views, leaving a few thousand page views unaccounted for.  So nobody did the long scroll. Then I noticed that Canada seemed to be way over represented in the demographic stats.  Again, specific count is probably garbage, but trends are likely reflective of reality, and the usual daily trend tends to look something like this. Typical top five distribution Those countries tend to be in the top five in that order every single day.  That is the same order displayed in my annual blog wrap up, the fourteenth of which I posted back in September. On the peak day, however, the country list looked like this. The big day Germany was a bit down that day… they tend to trend up with EVE Online posts… while Canada was through the roof. But where was all that traffic going.  There was no referrer sending me that much traffic, there was no single page that seemed to be receiving it, and the visitor count indicated that it wasn’t a bunch of people in any case. So I drilled down in the WP.com stats.  It will show you all the pages that got traffic on a given day, with a page view count.  And there I noticed that after the usual fifty or so on a given day that get multiple page views, there was a long, long list of pages that got exactly one page view.  Hundreds and hundreds of pages with a single page view. At that point I think I figured it out.  This person, from Canada, started with one post, probably the latest one, and began viewing the all one at a time.  At the bottom of each post there are links that let you view the next and previous posts in the chronological order of their appearance. I think this person sat there and clicked through, page by page, each post using those links.  That explains all the page views, the low user count, the lack of referrals, and the fact that no single page, not even the Home Page, saw a spike in traffic. And the flag counter widget?  I thought that it would reload with each new page and count a page view there.  But when I tried it myself on my phone, it seemed to ignore the count of views if I went post to post that way.  But it is much more interested in unique visitors than page views. So this whole post adds up to the fact that one person, from Canada, appears to have paged through nearly every singe post on the site, one at time, over the course of two days.  The page views did not come in a single burst, but took time to accumulate over those two days. Or, alternatively, somebody in Canada ran a script that scraped all the content from the blog one page at a time.  So if you see another site that features a lot of familiar content, let me know.  I’d like to see where I am being backed up! https://ift.tt/355ns6y

    The Canadian Visitor Wilhelm Arcturus Warning: This is a Tales from the Blog sort of story and involves page view stats.  No video games are mentioned. I like to watch the traffic stats for my blog, less because they are meaningful at any given moment… web stats are a polite lie most of the time… but because I like to see what brings people here and the patterns of interest.  As I have said in the past, even an flawed system of measurement, applied consistently, can reveal patterns that even an accurate single data point cannot show. So when I noticed a big pop in page views a couple weeks back, I started looking at what might have caused it.  Running a WP.com hosted blog means that I do not get to see raw data, but I have a couple of avenues to check that can be lined up to indicate what was going on. The first check is usually to see who is referring traffic.  Often a traffic spike is related to the site, or a specific post, being linked somewhere with some visibility.  Every so often, for example, somebody will link the Alamo teechs u 2 play DURID! post gets linked to one of the World of Warcraft sub-reddits and between a dozen and a couple hundred people will click on that link. This is very easy to spot in the basic stats.  The referrer will be obvious and the post linked will have a bunch of page views which will push it to the top of the daily list. This time there were no referrers that stood out and no particular post seemed to be getting traffic that could account for the jump in total page views.  In fact, referrer and post stats seemed very much within the recent norm, while page views were exploding.  The second day of this saw the site get just over five thousand page views but Google, always the default top referrer, had only sent me 350 viewers, and the top post of the day only had 30 page views. Sometimes that means somebody went scrolling through the blog.  I have the theme set up for infinite scroll, so you can just press the page down or arrow key and scroll all the way back to September 2006 if you have the time and patience. But when you do that, a page view gets counted for every ~20 posts and gets attached to the Home Page view stats.  The Home Page, somebody showing up at the base URL, always has the most page views on any given day because I don’t hide post content and make people click on titles to read a whole post.  I could do that, and I am sure my page views would go up, but I don’t like that on other blogs so I don’t do it here.  As I always say, be the blog you want to read. And this might have explained all those page view.  The flag counter widget on the side bar did not show anywhere close to the number of page views that WP.com was showing me, which is consistent with somebody doing a long scroll, as the widget only gets loaded once when you do it. That is one of my checks on the WP.com stats. Also, the visitor count, WP.com’s attempt to track daily unique visitors, was very low relative to the page views.  The visitor count is very broken, more so than page views I would guess, since I can get referrals from seven different locations, which implies seven different people visiting, and WP.com will tell me I had two visitors so far.  Also, the Flag Counter widget would count a different number, maybe five, maybe seven, just to confuse the issue.  As I said, web stats are a polite lie.  But, again, if I ignore accuracy and look at trends, somebody doing the long scroll tends to widen the gap between page views and visitors. However, the Home Page only showed about 400 views, leaving a few thousand page views unaccounted for.  So nobody did the long scroll. Then I noticed that Canada seemed to be way over represented in the demographic stats.  Again, specific count is probably garbage, but trends are likely reflective of reality, and the usual daily trend tends to look something like this. Typical top five distribution Those countries tend to be in the top five in that order every single day.  That is the same order displayed in my annual blog wrap up, the fourteenth of which I posted back in September. On the peak day, however, the country list looked like this. The big day Germany was a bit down that day… they tend to trend up with EVE Online posts… while Canada was through the roof. But where was all that traffic going.  There was no referrer sending me that much traffic, there was no single page that seemed to be receiving it, and the visitor count indicated that it wasn’t a bunch of people in any case. So I drilled down in the WP.com stats.  It will show you all the pages that got traffic on a given day, with a page view count.  And there I noticed that after the usual fifty or so on a given day that get multiple page views, there was a long, long list of pages that got exactly one page view.  Hundreds and hundreds of pages with a single page view. At that point I think I figured it out.  This person, from Canada, started with one post, probably the latest one, and began viewing the all one at a time.  At the bottom of each post there are links that let you view the next and previous posts in the chronological order of their appearance. I think this person sat there and clicked through, page by page, each post using those links.  That explains all the page views, the low user count, the lack of referrals, and the fact that no single page, not even the Home Page, saw a spike in traffic. And the flag counter widget?  I thought that it would reload with each new page and count a page view there.  But when I tried it myself on my phone, it seemed to ignore the count of views if I went post to post that way.  But it is much more interested in unique visitors than page views. So this whole post adds up to the fact that one person, from Canada, appears to have paged through nearly every singe post on the site, one at time, over the course of two days.  The page views did not come in a single burst, but took time to accumulate over those two days. Or, alternatively, somebody in Canada ran a script that scraped all the content from the blog one page at a time.  So if you see another site that features a lot of familiar content, let me know.  I’d like to see where I am being backed up! https://ift.tt/355ns6y

    أكتوبر 18, 2020 0

    Warning: This is a Tales from the Blog sort of story and involves page view stats.  No video games are mentioned. I like to watch the traff...

    Blizzard to Stop Working on New StarCraft II Content Wilhelm Arcturus Things have been quiet on the StarCraft II front for a while, and now we find out why. Blizzard posted an update on their site that announced they are no longer going to produce new content for StarCraft II. To the StarCraft community, StarCraft is one of a kind, and we’re committed to making sure that those of you who love this universe like we do have a home here for many years to come. With that in mind, we want to let you know about a development change we’re making for StarCraft II as we continue supporting it for the long-term. As many of you know, Blizzard continues updating its games long after the initial release—some of you will remember that we were actively patching the original StarCraft more than 10 years after it first hit store shelves. This year we celebrated 10 years of StarCraft II with one of our largest-ever patches, with massive updates to the editor, Prestige Talents for Co-op Commanders, and gameplay improvements delivered to players worldwide. We’re going to continue supporting StarCraft II in the same manner as we have with our previous longstanding games, such as Brood War, focusing primarily on what our core and competitive communities care about most. What this means is that we’re not going to be producing additional for-purchase content, such as Commanders and War Chests, but we will continue doing season rolls and necessary balance fixes moving forward. On that last note, we’re not planning a Q4 balance update given that we did one a few months ago, but as always, we do plan to continue doing them as needed in the future. StarCraft II esports, which is part of the highest echelon of professional competitive gaming, will also continue going strong as it has been through our partners ESL Gaming and GSL. We know some of our players have been looking forward to some of the things we’re moving away from, but the good news is this change will free us up to think about what’s next, not just with regard to StarCraft II, but for the StarCraft universe as a whole. StarCraft is core to Blizzard, and we’ve learned that it’s a game that can change the lives of people who devote themselves to it, whether as a player, content creator, streamer, or member of the community (or developer). The outcome of each match is in your hands 100%. To become better, you have to look inward, be honest about any flaws, and dedicate yourself to improving. StarCraft teaches us that that process of improvement can be a reward in itself, and it’s certainly taught us a lot at Blizzard over the years. You are one of the most passionate, creative, and dedicated communities in all of gaming. We’re eternally grateful for your ongoing support, and we’ll keep you updated on any and all plans we have for future voyages into the Koprulu Sector. Uhn dara ma’nakai, Rob Bridenbecker StarCrat II: Wings of Liberty, the first of the three major releases for the game, came out just over a decade back, in July of 2010. The game will still get maintenance updates and will remain core to Blizzard’s esports portfolio (unlike Heroes of the Storm) but will otherwise remain as it is. I remember when Blizz announced StarCraft II, with the “Hell, it’s about time” video.  What do we say now? https://ift.tt/356Y5Be

    Blizzard to Stop Working on New StarCraft II Content Wilhelm Arcturus Things have been quiet on the StarCraft II front for a while, and now we find out why. Blizzard posted an update on their site that announced they are no longer going to produce new content for StarCraft II. To the StarCraft community, StarCraft is one of a kind, and we’re committed to making sure that those of you who love this universe like we do have a home here for many years to come. With that in mind, we want to let you know about a development change we’re making for StarCraft II as we continue supporting it for the long-term. As many of you know, Blizzard continues updating its games long after the initial release—some of you will remember that we were actively patching the original StarCraft more than 10 years after it first hit store shelves. This year we celebrated 10 years of StarCraft II with one of our largest-ever patches, with massive updates to the editor, Prestige Talents for Co-op Commanders, and gameplay improvements delivered to players worldwide. We’re going to continue supporting StarCraft II in the same manner as we have with our previous longstanding games, such as Brood War, focusing primarily on what our core and competitive communities care about most. What this means is that we’re not going to be producing additional for-purchase content, such as Commanders and War Chests, but we will continue doing season rolls and necessary balance fixes moving forward. On that last note, we’re not planning a Q4 balance update given that we did one a few months ago, but as always, we do plan to continue doing them as needed in the future. StarCraft II esports, which is part of the highest echelon of professional competitive gaming, will also continue going strong as it has been through our partners ESL Gaming and GSL. We know some of our players have been looking forward to some of the things we’re moving away from, but the good news is this change will free us up to think about what’s next, not just with regard to StarCraft II, but for the StarCraft universe as a whole. StarCraft is core to Blizzard, and we’ve learned that it’s a game that can change the lives of people who devote themselves to it, whether as a player, content creator, streamer, or member of the community (or developer). The outcome of each match is in your hands 100%. To become better, you have to look inward, be honest about any flaws, and dedicate yourself to improving. StarCraft teaches us that that process of improvement can be a reward in itself, and it’s certainly taught us a lot at Blizzard over the years. You are one of the most passionate, creative, and dedicated communities in all of gaming. We’re eternally grateful for your ongoing support, and we’ll keep you updated on any and all plans we have for future voyages into the Koprulu Sector. Uhn dara ma’nakai, Rob Bridenbecker StarCrat II: Wings of Liberty, the first of the three major releases for the game, came out just over a decade back, in July of 2010. The game will still get maintenance updates and will remain core to Blizzard’s esports portfolio (unlike Heroes of the Storm) but will otherwise remain as it is. I remember when Blizz announced StarCraft II, with the “Hell, it’s about time” video.  What do we say now? https://ift.tt/356Y5Be

    أكتوبر 15, 2020 0

    Things have been quiet on the StarCraft II front for a while, and now we find out why. Blizzard posted an update on their site that anno...

    WoW Classic Running of the Gnomes Coming October 16th Wilhelm Arcturus The running of the gnomes is back for its second appearance in WoW Classic.  It is time to get out your pink haired gnome and make the run from Gnomeregan to Booty Bay. Some gnomes around from last year The event will take place this coming Saturday, October 16th, at 4pm Pacific time, 7 pm Eastern time, or 23:00 UTC, depending on where you sync your clock.  The official notice is here: Come run with the gnomes We did the run last year and it was pretty fun.  I have a post about it and Ula did a video to commemorate the run.  We will be back again for the run again this year. The run on WoW Classic is in addition to the run on retail WoW. (Which was this past weekend.  I have been a bit slow in posting about this, so much other stuff has been going on.)  Information about the run can be found at the official site for the event. https://ift.tt/2IpxN5G

    WoW Classic Running of the Gnomes Coming October 16th Wilhelm Arcturus The running of the gnomes is back for its second appearance in WoW Classic.  It is time to get out your pink haired gnome and make the run from Gnomeregan to Booty Bay. Some gnomes around from last year The event will take place this coming Saturday, October 16th, at 4pm Pacific time, 7 pm Eastern time, or 23:00 UTC, depending on where you sync your clock.  The official notice is here: Come run with the gnomes We did the run last year and it was pretty fun.  I have a post about it and Ula did a video to commemorate the run.  We will be back again for the run again this year. The run on WoW Classic is in addition to the run on retail WoW. (Which was this past weekend.  I have been a bit slow in posting about this, so much other stuff has been going on.)  Information about the run can be found at the official site for the event. https://ift.tt/2IpxN5G

    أكتوبر 12, 2020 0

    The running of the gnomes is back for its second appearance in WoW Classic .  It is time to get out your pink haired gnome and make the run ...

    Another PAPI Keepstar Destroyed in Delve Wilhelm Arcturus I woke up this morning to find that PAPI, the Snek Coalition, had finally decided to go for it again and dropped another Keepstar in NPC Delve.  This time they chose 319-3D as their target system. This was apparently a flash drop in an attempt to take us unawares as PAPI did not stand up their own forces until the Keepstar was deployed.  That meant our early response was able to put down damage immediately on arriving without an organized resistance ready, so the first 40% of the structure was knocked down with very little in the way of time dilation in play. By the time I got online and into the fight, the Keepstar structure was already at 42% with the timer paused at seven and a half minutes. The timer held at 7:28 As with the Keepstar fights on Monday and Tuesday of last week, the Imperium organized fleets and concentrated on shooting the structure, ignoring the hostile ships on grid.  I was able to get into one of the support fleets that helped keep the enemy distracted while the battleships and dreadnoughts did the heavy lifting to kill the Keepstar. Imperium dreads lined up to warp to the fight I kept busy and got to watch for the final three hours of the five hour flight. On grid at the fight This fight wasn’t going to break any records, unlike the fight in FWST-8 on Tuesday, but there were still between 4,400 and 4,600 people in local for most of the time. A count mid fight, tidi in full There wasn’t much in the way of drama when it came to the fight.  Having done this twice already, and having had time to refine tactics and resupply, we never had a moment where the timer started counting down again or really any doubt that the structure would be destroyed.  The enemy stayed on grid to harvest kill mails, but could not stop us from winning the objective.  This did not make the enemy as happy as you might think. Redline XIII comments in Twitch chat on INN With the conclusion forgone, it was just a matter of time before the structure was destroyed and the battle over. Early battle reports show that, while the ISK was heavily favored the defenders, killing this Keepstar cost the Imperium about half of what the fight on Tuesday cost. Battle Report Header There was, again, no kill mail for the Keepstar, so you can once again add 187 billion ISK to the PAPI side of the chart. The server seemed stable for the most part, though at one point there was a combined bombing run that made everything stop and chug along for a bit, before resuming the slow pace of 10% tidi. This time around it looks like CCP left the bounty payments system running.  I saw calls related to that throughout the fight. Bounty calls piling up CCP did say that they might leave those calls on for a fight to see how much they change server load compared to when they turned them off for Tuesday’s fight. At the end of the fight the Imperium may have lost a lot more ships, but we once again left a Keepstar wreck in our wake. Keepstar wreck on grid Now we wait to see what the enemy does next.  Will they drop another Keepstar before Tuesday’s patch?  Monday is technically a holiday in the US, though not a widely observed one (Columbus Day), so some people will be off and ready to scrap. https://ift.tt/33PoLqY

    Another PAPI Keepstar Destroyed in Delve Wilhelm Arcturus I woke up this morning to find that PAPI, the Snek Coalition, had finally decided to go for it again and dropped another Keepstar in NPC Delve.  This time they chose 319-3D as their target system. This was apparently a flash drop in an attempt to take us unawares as PAPI did not stand up their own forces until the Keepstar was deployed.  That meant our early response was able to put down damage immediately on arriving without an organized resistance ready, so the first 40% of the structure was knocked down with very little in the way of time dilation in play. By the time I got online and into the fight, the Keepstar structure was already at 42% with the timer paused at seven and a half minutes. The timer held at 7:28 As with the Keepstar fights on Monday and Tuesday of last week, the Imperium organized fleets and concentrated on shooting the structure, ignoring the hostile ships on grid.  I was able to get into one of the support fleets that helped keep the enemy distracted while the battleships and dreadnoughts did the heavy lifting to kill the Keepstar. Imperium dreads lined up to warp to the fight I kept busy and got to watch for the final three hours of the five hour flight. On grid at the fight This fight wasn’t going to break any records, unlike the fight in FWST-8 on Tuesday, but there were still between 4,400 and 4,600 people in local for most of the time. A count mid fight, tidi in full There wasn’t much in the way of drama when it came to the fight.  Having done this twice already, and having had time to refine tactics and resupply, we never had a moment where the timer started counting down again or really any doubt that the structure would be destroyed.  The enemy stayed on grid to harvest kill mails, but could not stop us from winning the objective.  This did not make the enemy as happy as you might think. Redline XIII comments in Twitch chat on INN With the conclusion forgone, it was just a matter of time before the structure was destroyed and the battle over. Early battle reports show that, while the ISK was heavily favored the defenders, killing this Keepstar cost the Imperium about half of what the fight on Tuesday cost. Battle Report Header There was, again, no kill mail for the Keepstar, so you can once again add 187 billion ISK to the PAPI side of the chart. The server seemed stable for the most part, though at one point there was a combined bombing run that made everything stop and chug along for a bit, before resuming the slow pace of 10% tidi. This time around it looks like CCP left the bounty payments system running.  I saw calls related to that throughout the fight. Bounty calls piling up CCP did say that they might leave those calls on for a fight to see how much they change server load compared to when they turned them off for Tuesday’s fight. At the end of the fight the Imperium may have lost a lot more ships, but we once again left a Keepstar wreck in our wake. Keepstar wreck on grid Now we wait to see what the enemy does next.  Will they drop another Keepstar before Tuesday’s patch?  Monday is technically a holiday in the US, though not a widely observed one (Columbus Day), so some people will be off and ready to scrap. https://ift.tt/33PoLqY

    أكتوبر 11, 2020 0

    I woke up this morning to find that PAPI, the Snek Coalition, had finally decided to go for it again and dropped another Keepstar in NPC Del...

    Invaders Pass on the SVM-3K ihub Contest Wilhelm Arcturus This was a weeks of first for the war.  The invaders dropped their first Keepstars in Delve.  On Monday and Tuesday huge battles broke out that led to the destruction of both structures. After falling down on that, the hostiles changed gears and achieved another first and managed to reinforce an ihub in Delve.  They went in and got the ihub in SVM-3K, which is one of the boarder systems with Querious. SVM-3K, not too far from FWST-8 On the other side of the regional gate is 8QT-H4, the current PAPI staging system.  Thus is seems like a reasonable first target, being just one gate from where their forces are marshaled. The sov contest for the ihub was set to kick off at 00:55 UTC.  The Imperium formed up some forces early, including a Rokh fleet led by Elo Knight, which I joined in with.  We actually jumped into 8QT-H4 a little after the 00:00 because an Imperium Fortizar left behind in 8QT was coming out for its armor timer.  We were bridged in and docked up, undocking when the time came to try and hold back the attackers. The Rokhs undock A short, sharp fight ensued.  Being in their staging system, the numbers were stacked against us from the start. Fight on the Fort The losses went against us according to the battle report, with us losing nearly 14 billion ISK while they suffered a little over 8 billion ISK in losses, though in the shadow of the fights on Monday and Tuesday, that is barely enough to mentioned. Battle Report Header Elo Knight managed to extract most of the fleet from the system, though some stragglers were left behind on the Fortizar, where they were safe for the time being.  We went through the gate and into SVM-3K, where we spread out to wait the impending attack.  They out numbered us sufficiently that it seemed like it would be a hard fight.  So we waited on the gate, ready to hold them off as long as we could. And we waited The time came, the sov contest began, and our hackers went out to save the ihub.  Meanwhile, nobody came through the gate.  As we watched, the contest went quickly… for an entosis run… our way. The contest almost won The invaders decided that they had better things to do on a Saturday night.  The ihub was saved and we flew back to 1DQ1-A and stood down.  Delve remains secure for the moment, though the invaders seem to be up to something this morning.  More on that later. https://ift.tt/31cpErZ

    Invaders Pass on the SVM-3K ihub Contest Wilhelm Arcturus This was a weeks of first for the war.  The invaders dropped their first Keepstars in Delve.  On Monday and Tuesday huge battles broke out that led to the destruction of both structures. After falling down on that, the hostiles changed gears and achieved another first and managed to reinforce an ihub in Delve.  They went in and got the ihub in SVM-3K, which is one of the boarder systems with Querious. SVM-3K, not too far from FWST-8 On the other side of the regional gate is 8QT-H4, the current PAPI staging system.  Thus is seems like a reasonable first target, being just one gate from where their forces are marshaled. The sov contest for the ihub was set to kick off at 00:55 UTC.  The Imperium formed up some forces early, including a Rokh fleet led by Elo Knight, which I joined in with.  We actually jumped into 8QT-H4 a little after the 00:00 because an Imperium Fortizar left behind in 8QT was coming out for its armor timer.  We were bridged in and docked up, undocking when the time came to try and hold back the attackers. The Rokhs undock A short, sharp fight ensued.  Being in their staging system, the numbers were stacked against us from the start. Fight on the Fort The losses went against us according to the battle report, with us losing nearly 14 billion ISK while they suffered a little over 8 billion ISK in losses, though in the shadow of the fights on Monday and Tuesday, that is barely enough to mentioned. Battle Report Header Elo Knight managed to extract most of the fleet from the system, though some stragglers were left behind on the Fortizar, where they were safe for the time being.  We went through the gate and into SVM-3K, where we spread out to wait the impending attack.  They out numbered us sufficiently that it seemed like it would be a hard fight.  So we waited on the gate, ready to hold them off as long as we could. And we waited The time came, the sov contest began, and our hackers went out to save the ihub.  Meanwhile, nobody came through the gate.  As we watched, the contest went quickly… for an entosis run… our way. The contest almost won The invaders decided that they had better things to do on a Saturday night.  The ihub was saved and we flew back to 1DQ1-A and stood down.  Delve remains secure for the moment, though the invaders seem to be up to something this morning.  More on that later. https://ift.tt/31cpErZ

    أكتوبر 11, 2020 0

    This was a weeks of first for the war.  The invaders dropped their first Keepstars in Delve.  On Monday and Tuesday huge battles broke out...

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