I’m about to upgrade the theme this site uses. Anything could happen in the next half hour! The newer version should hopefully fix some pesky bugs that have been annoying me for a while.
I’ll try not to break anything.
Update: OK, that seems to have gone fairly painlessly. Had to tweak a bit of php to get things back to how I like them. The good news is that the new version of the theme has proper results for the “related posts” section, as opposed to random jumble, so I haven’t had to remove that section like I did previously.
The bad news is that it seems to have made my beautiful googlesearch blocks go a bit odd, with grey boxes around the individual parts. I can live with that for now, but will try to bring them back in to line.
Update 2: turns out the related posts code was still iffy with the new release of the theme, so I have tried to integrate another related posts plugin into it instead. I am horrible at php, but it seem, after about 20 tries, to look about right.
Cash earned in games in China can no longer be spent on real world goods.
The Chinese Ministry of Commerce policy aims to limit the impact of game currencies on real-world markets.
In the future, any cash earned by Chinese gamers can only be spent to acquire items or equipment in that particular game.
The move is widely seen as a crackdown on so-called “gold farming” in which players amass virtual money and then sell it to other players for real cash.
Exact figures for virtual currency exchange are hard to come by, official estimates put the figure in China at “several billion yuan”. At current exchange rates 1bn yuan is equal to about £88m.
“The virtual currency, which is converted into real money at a certain exchange rate, will only be allowed to trade in virtual goods and services provided by its issuer, not real goods and services,” the Ministry said in a statement.
The move is also likely to affect the many Chinese people who are involved in gold farming. This involves being paid to play an online game, such as World of Warcraft, with the virtual currency winnings sold on to other players for cash.
Unless I’m missing something, I think this story may demonstrate how little Governments and mainstream journalists really understand what goes on in our virtual worlds. The problem they seem to be trying to solve is legitimate companies choosing to accept virtual currencies as payment for real goods. No doubt that does have implications for the real world currencies, and I’m not surprised its being nipped in the bud. However, I don’t think it has the slightest thing to do with MMO goldfarming
One of the most popular virtual currencies in China are “QQ coins” issued by Chinese net firm Tencent. The QQ coins can be used to pay for in-game items or elements that subscribers can add to their blog. Some stores and websites had been starting to accept QQ coins in payment for low-value items.
Chinese goldfarmers, goldfarmers anywhere, receive real money, electronically transferred, usually from another country, in return for transferring in-game cash between characters who are themselves within the game. That is not information that the Chinese Government is likely to be given access to. Also, if goldfarmers were all that interested in following rules, they wouldn’t exist in the first place. Nor, in truth, do I think China truly objects to the large amount of money that comes into their nation as a result. I do not know at what point World of Warcraft, and MMO goldfarming was injected into this story (I suspect at the journalist level), but I think someone has conflated two entirely different issues.
Some very cool info from Pex about what is coming up soon. I’m particularly looking forward to the driving jobs. They’re one of the most fun things to do in Free Realms, but are woefully underused due to not giving much in the way of rewards. When I can find other players to race against, it’ll “kick drive shaft”, as Jazz would say.
It’s late, so I’ll just bullet-point what was said tonight in the approximate order of when things will be released:
* Demo Derby and Race Car driver will be able to advance to level 20!
* Each job will have 40 missions along the progression path.
* Players will be able to customize thier cars in a garage
* Soccer Star (not sure if that is the final name, or a description) will be a new job!
* Guilds will be able to have matching uniforms for soccer.
* We showed a new desert region that will be the home of the dwarves.
* A new Druid job will come will be part of this region.
* TCG – There will be a feature where you can have your character portrait added to a physical card. You can buy a bunch of cards and give them to friends who can use a digital code to add your card to their digital deck.
There should be more detailed information along in the next few days. The Druid job sounds interesting, though I’m not so much into the combat classes. If it has similar attributes to other games, we might be looking at shape-shifting, or combat pets being a part of that job.
I was just about to go through my usual weekend routine of posting this weeks Colber Report clips (in order to get around the blocking of UK folks from being able to watch them), when I discovered to my joy that we can in fact watch them again.
So, with mixed feelings, I won’t be posting any more full episodes worth of clips here, at least so long as we can watch them on the official website.
Not the news I was expecting when I got home tonight.
Pop star Michael Jackson has been rushed to hospital in Los Angeles, with several US reports saying he has died.
Paramedics were called to the singer’s home around midday local time after he suffered a suspected cardiac arrest.
He was rushed by ambulance to a medical centre, with reports from several US media outlets saying the 50-year-old star has died.
In recent decades his life has been a descending spiral into ever-increasing bizarreness. Maybe it’s better for him that it has ended, as his obvious mental anguish has had an obvious affect on the upbringing of his children. They’ve been living in a grotesque parody-world. Perhaps now they’ll have a chance of something approaching a normal life. I don’t know. The whole business, his entire life, just feels like a Greek tragedy where the audience has gained enjoyment from watching his gradual meltdown. He needed a lot more help than he received.
Nevertheless, as a teenager during the 80s, his music has been a big part of my life, and I’ll miss him.
Today we have important news to share with the community. EA is restructuring its RPG and MMO games development into a new group that includes both Mythic and BioWare. This newly formed team will be led by Ray Muzyka, co-founder and General Manager of BioWare. With this change, Ray becomes Group General Manager of the new RPG/MMO studio group. BioWare’s other co-founder, Greg Zeschuk will become Group Creative Officer for the new RPG/MMO studio group. Rob Denton will step up as General Manager of Mythic and report to Ray. BioWare’s studios remain unchanged and continue to report to Ray.
Mark Jacobs, co-founder and current General Manager of Mythic, will leave EA on June 23, 2009. We thank Mark for his contributions at Mythic and wish him the very best going forward. Mark played a major part in the success of Mythic with his contribution as General Manager and Lead Designer of WAR.
Mythic retains a strong team led by Rob who co-founded Mythic in 1995. Rob played a critical role in the development of Dark Age of Camelot. In his previous role as COO, he was responsible for all day-to-day management of the studio including all development, operations and support.
Please join us in celebrating the union of these two award-winning studios.
Thankyou, but no. I shall lament the end of a fine MMO company, as it is (entirely predictably) finally absorbed into the Electronic Arts borg. The individual cultures within developer groups matter, and it will not do Bioware or Mythic any great service to be fused together like some lumpen piece of fleshcraft.
I wish Mark Jacobs all the best in whatever he decides to do next. He’s a good lad, and I hope he starts anew with a fresh company, and keeps it out of the hands of the Goliaths of the industry a little longer this time.
I also wish the Bioware staff well. They have yet to build up any immunity to Paul Barnett, so I suspect it’s going to be quite a shock to the system!
Update! From Mythic’s Andy Belford over on the Warhammer Alliance forums:
For clarity:
Mythic is not “merging” with Bioware.
Mythic and Bioware remain independent EA studios within a larger MMO/RPG group.
Thanks!
Ah, well, now I feel silly. Never mind, I can always reuse this post when EA does finally squish them together. I suspect that Mythic is going to be bled of its best talent to fuel Bioware’s Star Wars: The Old Republic, but we shall see.
I don’t see me joining a guild in Free Realms, but it is still the feature that marks yesterdays patch as one to notice.
Mysterious incidents are happening across the land. Help out any of these people, and jump in the middle of the adventure:
* A Royal Courier is in trouble in Greenwood Forest
* Impress Sal Monella at Blackspore, and see where the next adventure takes you
* Henry Farnum has trouble with the local hooligans
* If you rescue Starshine’s child, she will have another task for a hero like you
* Help Sorin out near the Bat Caves, and see where he’ll send you to, or
* Complete Ceard Bauchlog’s task for further instructions
* (If you have already helped them out, return to them for another task!)
Quests & Collections & New Content
* Guilds! Gather your friends and be one of the first to start a guild! Talk to players in your guild using /gu
Pets
* Watch how your Pets react to wandering encounters differently based on their disposition
Marketplace
* When viewing Pets in the Marketplace you’ll be able to read about their personality before you purchase them
* Check out the new tool tips in the Claim Window of the Marketplace
