7LockMuffinman's IMVU Blog

Morning Day 301
By Ryan Brandstetter
Justin idly sat at his cubicle computer staring at his monitor. Half dead to the world, any passer by who could somehow manage a glimpse of Justin's face would say that he was dead. Justin looked at his watch; 6:20 a.m. Sighing, he pulled up the company database; part of his daily faade he put on to make it look like he was doing work. From the other side of his cubicle wall, Justin heard the rapid mouse clicking of his facing neighbor, one he didn't associate with. He was an odd sort, this neighbor, as he didnt say much and kept to himself for a good portion of the day. He spent most of the time at his cubicle only leaving to make an hourly run to the restroom. Justin knew that almost everyone at the office knew how to bypass the companies internet filters; he knew this neighbor couldn't possibly have to urinate, or whatever, EVERY hour. Unless, of course, he was part of his daily water cooler crew who stood around the blessed jug for a few hours chatting away and downing large quantities of H2O. No, this neighbor of his was up to something else in these bathroom visits, and it didn't seem kosher to Justin at

City of Heroes and the future.

While the upcoming Mission Architect in Issue 14 proves to be an innovative feature not only in City of Heroes, and MMORPG’s as a whole, this author is left to wonder just what exactly does NCsoft have up it’s sleeve for the future of this super hero MMO.  As cool and fresh as the Architect sound, I still have to firmly believe that this feature will lose most of its shiny appeal and luster after around three months after its introduction, if not sooner.  While the Architect allows users to create their own storylines, villains, and contacts, the fact is that players will be stuck doing these user created storylines using the basic mission goals that City of Heroes has been using for around four years now.  Kill the boss, defeat everyone, find the shiny, lead the half-witted person to the door, we all know these mission objectives and some know them a lot more than they would care.  The Architect does allow a lot of creative freedom when it comes to editing text, the Architect still locks us out of a few things that would’ve been most welcome; most notably controlling where your spawns appear, ambushes that a

After seeing a number of those World of Warcraft commercials featuring prominent stars such as Mr. T, William Shatner, Verne Troyer, and Jean Claude Van Damme, I was left wondering if Stephen Colbert played any MMO's himself. I know he mentioned he used to be some sort of Dungeons and Dragons nerd in his youth, so it wouldn't be surprising, but I did play a MMO today that I know Colbert never would.

It's called The Chronicles of Spellborn.

You may be thinking why, probably not, but maybe. Why wouldn't Stephen Colbert play this game? I mean, it looks somewhat decent, right? Truth is, after seeing all those WoW commercials, I'm thoroughly convinced that Hollywood's top talent just wouldn't give a “freemium” (sub-if-you-REALLY-want-to) MMO a chance. Nay, these big names are too...big for that. That wasn't the reason why Stephen Colbert wouldn't play TCOS though...

The Chronicles of Spellborn also has bears...lots of bears.

Confused? Perplexed? Somewhat interested in the rest of this article? Read on about my first few hours in Acclaims next attempt in the MMO market as I lace up my boots, put on some camo, and knife me some four footed o

Issue 14 of City of Heroes finally hit open beta March 17th, finally letting its voracious subscribers a first look at the Mission Architect. Was the wait worth it? Was all the build up for this “new and innovative” feature really justified? Read on as I boot up the test server and give the architect a whirl in this City of Heroes Issue 14: Architect review!

The Architect Building

The first thing I asked myself after I logged it was, where exactly do I find this architect? As it turns out, theres one in almost every zone you'll come across. My character, a villain, was in Pocket D at the time. It wasn't long before I received a message from one of my friends that I should hurry to Port Oakes, where he was, to check out the Architect for myself. I got the impression that he was flipping out and going crazy, (as much as one can through text, at least) so I boosted up Super Speed and ran my evil ass from the D to the Architect in Port Oakes in record time. This was made easy; just open up your map and look around for a blue and white “AE” icon somewhere on your map. Upon getting close to my mark, I was somewhat surprised to see

With the baseball season just around the corner, Games Campus is looking to bring a baseball MMO to fans who are looking for a little more action than their fantasy league can offer. Combining some parts fantasy league management and the game play of a baseball game for you console, MLB Dugout Heroes could be a home run for people that enjoy baseball games, but are looking for some more player to player interaction.

Unlike Ultimate Baseball Online, where players would control an individual player on the field, MLB Dugout Heroes lets players control their whole team. After creating an account and logging on the first time, you'll be prompted to select an official MLB team to field. These teams will have the official 2009 rosters, and I would suspect these will change as the years progress. After selecting your team, you're also prompted to name them. This may seem odd, but other people may be playing the same team in the game, and this helps distinguish them from one another. Though two players may have selected the Pirates for their team at the start, however unlikely, over their career and their owner's choices, the two won't be so identical. The players on your ro

Ah yes, the good old shoot 'em up. Who could forget classics such as Galaga, Gradius, or Raiden. The challenge of trying to pilot your ship through barrages of enemy fire, collecting power ups to down ships faster, and always trying to achieve that high score. While the shoot 'em up, or shmup as some fans would call them, isn't as popular as they were back in the heyday of arcades back in the 80's to 90's , theres still a devout community of fans who can't get enough of the genre. More interesting still, theres some game companies that still produce them from time to time. These companies do realize that their fan base is relatively small, but that fan base appreciates it when such shmups like Ikaruga hits the scene. NC Soft may seem foolish to try and market a micropayment/free2play MMO based shmup since MMO's usually rely on a somewhat large player base to keep them running, but Valkyrie Sky (Valkied Saga) is sure to appeal to that fan base and, hopefully, draw in some more to keep it alive.

If you already haven't guess, Valkyrie Sky plays largely like any other shmup you may have played, but adds RPG elements such as levels, stats, and gear to the mix.