Why Magic Online Will Suck 219
An anonymous reader sends us a link to this funny dissection of online gaming. The writer obviously speaks from bitter experience. :)
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Why Magic Online Will Suck
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A complex system that works is invariably found to have evolved from a simple system that works.
You won't see the players (Score:5, Funny)
Online version just won't have that for a draw.
-Pete
Re:You won't see the players (Score:4, Funny)
The most interesting thing I saw in my Magic days was the adult that showed up at a tourney. A "real" adult, not a "gamer" adult: neatly-trimmed gray hair & beard, nice clothes, no body odor (let me repeat that: the guy had obviously bathed in the last 24 hours), and an awesome handmade wooden box that he kept his cards in. He lost pretty quickly but obviously this was a guy who occasionaly left his house for reasons other than playing Magic.
For a second I thought I had entered a parallel universe where Magic was a normal leisure activity like any other, where diverse people could get together and play a fun and challenging game.
My fantasy was quickly shattered by a piercing obnoxious nasal laugh from the 300-lb woman in an undersized "I Grock Spock" T-shirt....
Re:You won't see the players (Score:2, Funny)
Yeah, that would pretty much shatter any fantasy.
Re:You won't see the players (Score:3, Funny)
Makes me wonder.... (Score:3, Interesting)
"Oh, so you're The Verminator... I'M GONNA RIP YOU STINKIN' HEAD OFF!!! NOBODY TALKS ABOUT MY MOTHER LIKE THAT!!!"
Hell, I'd pay just to watch....
Re:Makes me wonder.... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Magic games suck anyway (Score:2)
Magic online is nothing like that. It's a completely faithful reproduction of the game rules and does an excellent job of enforcing them. That said, there's no way in hell I would pay full price for virtual cards which I do not own unless I somehow manage to spend enough money within a set period of time in order to collect a full set, which I can then redeem for real cards at Wizards of the Coast's discretion. Screw that.
gotta agree (Score:2, Interesting)
cardboard crack.
I was hooked big time, but the thing I liked the best was the interaction and watching your opponents face when you whipped out that killer combination on them.
I tried the software version and it left me cold. The AI stunk and there was no joy in owning rare cards (anyone wanna buy my REAL cards, PLEASE?!?).
The online version can only be better as far as gameplay, but given the number of enterprising hackers, they'll ruin any chance the online version has for success.
I think I'll pass...
Re:gotta agree (Score:1, Offtopic)
I would buy them. I still enjoy playing, but more importantly, am now a collector. Drop me an email by clicking the email link at the bottom of my website, Missing Left Socks [missingleftsocks.com].
Re:gotta agree (Score:5, Funny)
Hi. My nick is Prior Restraint, and I'm a Magic addict.
("Hi, Prior!")
It's been four years since my last game, (applause) but I still have to take it one day at a time.
("Amen!")
I can still remember how it all started: I joined a gaming club in college because -- surprise! -- I'm not a very sociable person. At first, it was all RPGs, which was "okay". I mean, I had dabbled a little in high school, even ran a campaign once, and it didn't affect me, right?
Then, suddenly, I found myself going to cons. Talk about your unwashed masses! (cynical laughter) That's where I met The Pusher. He was doing free demos, trying to set up tourneys with the con coordinator, that kind of thing.
And I ignored it. I mean, it's a card game; it was beneath me, you know? But not everyone did, ("That's right!") and you know what? I started seeing it in my club's office.
Show of hands: How many here got their first deck for free? Quite a few, I see. That's how I got pulled in. My former S.O. had been into this... this "game" -- and don't think that word wasn't carefully chosen to make you think it's safer than it really is. ("Preach on!") My very own S.O. handed me a deck after I asked what all the fuss was about. Blue-green, as I recall. Even came with a Sol Ring and a Wall of Flesh.
I got in at the worst possible time: revised edition had only been out for a little while, and popularity was sky-rocketing. I began learning strategies, and we all know where that leads -- say it with me, now: "I just need one... specific... card".
Oh, but those... Pushers... at WotC know better than that. Oh, yes they do. Suddenly, revised is going out of print, and fourth ed. is on the way. Now what do you do, my friends? I'll tell you what I did: I found myself debating the merits of doing without a couple of textbooks in order buy a full set of dual lands! That is what Magic does to people, ladies and gentlemen. First, you give up certain luxuries, like eating on campus instead of ordering pizza. But it's a slippery slope, my friends, ("That's right!") and pretty soon, you're eating ramen noodles twice a day; drinking Pabst, or worse yet, Milwaukee's Best; and living in contested gang territory for the lower rent!
("Don't hold back!")
And the rule changes! Cumulative upkeep? Of course! Cooler cards need that sort of balancing. Buried vs. destroyed? Sure! I can probably muddle my way through it.
I stuck by my new master all through fourth edition. This time, it was green-black. I joined a group that played for ante. When I lost my Sorceress Queen to a rookie mistake (I failed to make good use of my Pestilence), I knew I had hit rock-bottom.
But, my friends, that was the turning point for me. For the first time, I was truly seeing my situation as it was. Now, I'd like to tell you I tossed out my cards and never looked back, but... we know that only happens in the movies.
("Tell it like it is, Prior!")
*sigh* And so, I kept playing. I stopped with the ante; I no longer considered going to tournaments, and that was good. But I kept playing, anyway. I couldn't shake it, because I kept telling myself I could control it. Despite everything, I still said to myself, "Self: you've got a decent deck. Nothing too fancy, but it can hold its own. You can play with it 'just for fun', and still avoid the treadmill that has you chasing after cards".
Does anyone know what lesson I failed to learn? Oh! I think I heard it in the back: I forgot about WotC's plans for me. I forgot about new editions, and new rules. So, all of a sudden, fifth edition comes out, and my deck can't stand up to the phasing and flanking bullshit cards people throw down at me. I'm right back at square one. It was the day I caught myself at the comic book store fondling the fifth ed. boosters that I knew I had to go cold-turkey, or not at all.
To this day, though, I find myself tempted. I have co-workers into their thirties who still play. Last week, I caught a glimpse of some seventh edition cards: everything's about the graveyard now. "How appropriate," I thought, and yet I was tempted. Right this minute, as I type, I know that in a box in the closet behind me are some cards I was too weak to throw out back then, and too weak to dig out right now. Perhaps someday, I'll have the strength to face them down. Until then, they are a constant reminder of the daily struggle to lead a normal life.
Thank you for your time.
Five color crack... (Score:1)
Re:Five color crack... (Score:1)
Oh, and what about a beo...
PP:)
Re:Five color crack... (Score:3, Insightful)
Of course, if you were just interested in playing the game on a friendly basis, and didn't bother attending the tourneys, there were always the counterfeit cards.
Back in Toronto, there was at least one manufacturer who's product was indistinguishable from the real thing. A complete set - that's f$cking everything that was done to date - in triplicate, used to cost ~$80 cdn.
Which is kinda frightening when you consider how many people are well into the thousands 'invested'.
As for the online game, geez, I'm pretty sure the same thing will happen. Don't think I'm in the the minority here, when I say I really hate to lose because some moron with money has a better deck than me. I like the game (any game, in fact), to be a fair competition, not who has the most spare cash in the RW.
well (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:well (Score:3, Interesting)
Of course, if they let you have cards in your client and let you upload them from your own collection...then they deserve to get "diabloed."
Re:well (Score:2)
Ultima Online had unique ID numbers for items and they still had their fair share of dupe bugs, regardless. History has shown that this is not a trivial problem and that there isn't a silver bullet to fix it. You have a large programming project that's unavoidably filled with bugs, both known and unknown, and the ratio of bug-exploiters to bug-fixers is mammoth.
The best they can realistically do is take steps to limit potential damage as much as they can.
Re:well (Score:2)
C's problem is that it will let you screw up - it gives you the power to decide "I want to do it a particular way, bcos I'm the coder and I say this is right". Rule-sets like those developed by MISRA allow you to specify that certain constructs will not be used bcos they commonly cause problems, and a reviewer (or a static checker program like Lint, for some rules) will flag up instances where they're used. It's then down to you to explain to the person reviewing your code exactly *why* this is the right way to do it, even if it's an "evil, hacked, bastardised" way (to quote id's code
The real issues are:-
1) Do you have requirements which can be individually traced from the highest level requirement right through to the lines of code, so every design decision can be justified and checked at review? and are the requirements straightforward enough that you can put a "yes/no" check in a box for meeting it?
2) Do you have code and design reviews, so no work product makes it out without every new draft and every change being reviewed against its requirements?
3) Do you test at every level that the code does what the requirement says?
People make mistakes. Shit happens. Under ANY system, using ANY methodology, with ANY design package, someone will do something wrong. The only solution is how to handle it. If you follow all three of the above, you're pretty much guaranteed to bee releasing bug-free code, and if there is a bug then you can at least have the satisfaction of knowing that even NASA probably wouldn't have found it!
Desktop/games coders have a helluva lot to learn from the embedded industry. If you really want to learn how to develop bug-free, money-no-object, look at NASA. If you want to learn how to do it within a realistic time and to a tight budget, look at the auto industry. And if you want to learn what happens if you don't follow all the above, look at any first-release piece of desktop software (MS for preference, but they're all as bad as each other). If gamers and desktop users stopped buying products which are known to have more bugs than a plague ward, maybe the manufacturers would get the message. But some stupid bastards always want to be the first ones to play Doom3 or whatever. Ho hum.
Grab.
you-know-who? (Score:5, Funny)
Yes, I did play with him. For a long time, actually - don't ask about it.
Who is "you-know-who"
Re:you-know-who? (Score:4, Funny)
My first thought was Bill Gates. But then, he and Voldemort are probably related.
Re:you-know-who? (Score:5, Informative)
Wakefield was a well known magic player and columnist who quit the game for Asheron's Call. Many magic players were fans of his articles, which were better thought out and written than this piece of tripe IMO.
If the author is consistant, he is likely to want to punch me in the skull. My email address is zaphod(at)charter.net, feel free to contact me for my physical address.
-Zaphod
Re:you-know-who? (Score:4, Funny)
Yeah, but which skull?
--Blair
Real Life and Cyber Life. Are either real? (Score:4, Interesting)
On and on he goes about how dangerous this online version will be... but here's the catch:
If you can get physical cards for your online cards then you're playing Magic Online when you play at your local store. The meta game is now the same game. How can you tell if someone's "real life" deck isn't stacked with duped cards from his online deck?
Well you can't. And guess what, the game was hacked a long time ago, in real life. Richard Garfield never envisioned people buying crates of the cards to get four of the rare ones in their deck... the game was hacked with money.
So next time you lose at Magic the Gathering at your local hobby store, you can call the guy a cheater. I mean, can he prove he actually bought all those cards?
Re:Real Life and Cyber Life. Are either real? (Score:4, Insightful)
Never envisioned it without also having visions of dancing dollar signs, you mean.
Seriously, the whole point of putting rare cards in any collectible card game is so that people will buy crates of cards to get them...
Re:Real Life and Cyber Life. Are either real? (Score:4, Informative)
Actually the creator thought that a most people would have two starter decks and 4 booster packs. The reason for rare cards was to help balance the powerful cards. No one at wizards thought that magic would be as popular as it became and there was no way to predict it. Richard Garfield thought you'd never actually see all the cards, and rare cards would make the game more interesting.
The dollar signs came later.
Re:Real Life and Cyber Life. Are either real? (Score:1)
Re:Real Life and Cyber Life. Are either real? (Score:1)
AHAHAHAHAHHHAAHHAAHA
Oh man, that had to be really cool for about a day after the movie came out, and then completely sucked. Good thing you have such a low user #.
*sigh* Man... that really is funny.
There is some hope ... (Score:4, Interesting)
I have some hope that M:tG:OL might actually work -- unlike other online games you have something serious to lose besides access -- the card collection you have built up. The biggest problem with online games, as this article points out, is the lack of repercussions to being an ass.
If you've invested a lot more that time into something (eg. bought lots of boosters) then getting kicked off for breaking the terms of use might be enough of a feedback loop to keep some modicum of control.
On most online games you just re-register under another name.
Of course then the issue is -- will they really kick off somebody who has bought $10000 worth of cards ...
Re:There is some hope ... (Score:5, Insightful)
That's 10000$ bucks for free for them. Why not?
Re:There is some hope ... (Score:1)
there is a good chance he/she/it will spend more money with them. this income would be lost if the screwed it out of the $10000.
people will hear about this and they will loose business.
class action lawsuits.
Re:There is some hope ... (Score:2)
* people will hear about this and they will loose business.
* class action lawsuits. "
I see it a bit different way. He has hacked items. If you get a big profile case (say a hacker with 2000$ worth of stolen cards), that's when the FBI comes in, seises your comp and then you have criminal proceedings on stealing.
Re:There is some hope ... (Score:2)
Re:There is some hope ... (Score:5, Insightful)
You've obviously never spent much time on AOL.
As a teenager speaking for all my peers across the planet, all I can really offer up in response is this: my peers are complete assholes, in both senses of the term. They have the common sense of your average toddler, and about the same amount of empathy for others, to boot. (DoNt FoRgEt, ThEsE aRe ThE pEoPlE wHo InVeNtEd TyPiNg LiKe ThIs.) Those two qualities, combined with the sense of invulnerability that the Internet provides, does not make for someone who feels they need to follow the TOS, even if failing to do so means a few bits on a distant server might be twiddled.
(I extend my deepest apologies to anyone reading this who is between the ages of 13 and 20 whose higher-order mental processes have survived puberty. You're a model to us all. really.)
CPU code (Score:2)
Re:CPU code (Score:2, Informative)
When you register a Windows product, doesn't it record your CPU's serial number?
It was my understanding that the Pentium III was the only CPU with a serial number. If so, it makes this scheme fairly useless.
It won't suck... (Score:5, Insightful)
That and if it is a least reasonably popular, it will make a whole lot of money, and they will be able to hire alot of coders to stay ahead of the cheaters.
Blizzard, Everquest, and games of that type are at a disadvantage because they only get like $10 a month from their subscribers, MtG subscribers will pay much more as they pay $3 dollars per pack of cards. Adding the fact that the cards can be redeemed for real cards will really draw the MtG fans as well.
As long as WotC pumps a good portion of the revenue into coders to fend off the cheaters, I don't think that they will have much problem. Bandwidth wise WotC is looking at a much more attractive position then the MMORPG's as the ping times won't have to be nearly so low to have a good game.
So lets add up the points shall we?
1. Less Bandwidth required (Less cost)
2. Higher Subscriber Revenues (More revenue)
3. Tangible product extremely cheap to produce
= a large amount of profit to pay coders
Sure their will be bugs, I wouldn't recommend trading with people in the first 2 weeks, for example. But I believe that it won't be nearly as much of a problem as this article's author seems to believe.
Re:It won't suck... (Score:1)
Re:It won't suck... (Score:3, Insightful)
There WILL be hacks, dupes, and other cheats discovered and exploited in this game. There's just no question about it: It will happen. It's just a matter of how the company will deal with it.
A deck, a brain, and a friend? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:A deck, a brain, and a friend? (Score:1)
All MMORPGs have this problem (Score:1)
If some script kiddie is pissing you off just move on, it IS a game afterall. And I would know as well as the author, the games can be addictive and all, but the fact that you'd start saying "Man, I have over $1500 in rares and skills if I sold my acount" means you think about it a little too much.
The point of the games in the end is to have a little fun, even if you do have to ignore a few morons.
This is good (Score:5, Funny)
Money (Score:1)
Not really a prediction... (Score:4, Interesting)
One of the latest hacks, for example, which I find particularly funny, can program mouse and keyboard actions so that you keep creating games and killing the same monster over and over again soley for the purpose of getting the items the monster drops. This bot works - the prices within the trading economy have already gone down about one half because of the flood of all the items from players running it.
A good online game should not be based on rewarding this kind of repetitive behavior that a bot can perform (quote stolen from LB talking about Tabula Rasa [gamespot.com].
Online or Offline, it still sucks. (Score:4, Insightful)
This continual upgrading scheme (for paper,. nonetheless) is what ran me away. I play for fun now, and spend half the time trying to figure out the stupid new variations on the original rules.
Then again, the rules change every other week. How can they update the game so that the new rules are correctly in effect? Still, Online or offline, the game still stinks these days.
Re:Online or Offline, it still sucks. (Score:2)
Actually, Type I is still the most popular format around the area where I live. Some of us are known as so "old-school", that I have not purchased cards to build decks with from the new sets. Old cards rule!
It's not clear what was meant. (Score:1)
I used to be a Magic tournament judge, so I had to know the rules and sets backwards and forwards. He may be referring to the Type I (Classic)/Type II (Standard) "tiers", or he may be talking about the Beginner Level (Portal)/Expert Level (current edition and expansion sets) "tiers". Clarification would be helpful, as either one works. I also haven't dealt with tournament-level Magic in three years, so take my words with a grain of salt. I used to play the pro-tour qualifier circuit (never was good enough to break through, though) before I moved on with my life...now I play casually with my friends and don't even know what edition WotC is up to or what crazy errata they've got going fo rit.
Re:It's not clear what was meant. (Score:1)
Re:It's not clear what was meant. (Score:2)
For those not in the know, in Type II, only the two most recent expansions classes and the most recent Basic set are allowed to be used. An expansion class is generally one major expansion (Ice Age was one) and any of it's sub-expansions (Alliances was one of Ice Age's sub-expansions). This means that at any time, only 6 expansions are legal. The key is that when a new major expansion comes out, 3 total expansions leave the rotation (the major expansion and its two sub-expansions). Great moneymaker.
Re:Online or Offline, it still sucks. (Score:2)
Ha. (Score:1)
Mirage was a fun set...that cycle was nice in general (Visions was one of the most underrated sets of all time). Then the Tempest block was good, then Magic went to hell. If those are the "Old cards", then they're old but good...oh for a taste of Alliances, or good old Legends...
Re:Online or Offline, it still sucks. (Score:1)
Don't forget... (Score:4, Funny)
I used to be into Magic, and still have my collection, but, if I'm going to pay for cards, I would much rather play with the whiny post-pokemon chits up the street at the card shop who throw a fit about me being cheap because my deck "isn't Type II"....Because next time when he comes up to me begging for a sweet trade for the foil whatever he got, i can smile and say "not interested." Can't do that online. at least, not with the same effect
Re:Don't forget... (Score:2)
Sheesh.
Whoa (Score:1)
I still have original icy manipulator and complete revised edition and fallen empire set.
Magic was good until they came out with a million expansions. Impossible to follow with out going broke.
Go OUTSIDE (Score:2, Troll)
Re:Go OUTSIDE (Score:2)
Re:Go OUTSIDE (Score:2)
No thanks.
Re:Go OUTSIDE (Score:2)
Real life magic players are people you respect? (Score:2, Insightful)
I don't give a damn what Geordie Tait thinks about online magic, I want to know - Where does he go to play cards? Damn, his e-mail is Canadian.
Now, Shadowfist, there's a game. I want to see an online version of Shadowfist+Necromunda. Here's how it would work:
You have a squad, ala X-Com, that fights other people's squads. In addition, you have a virtual deck of Shadowfist cards. The deck of Shadowfist cards contains cards that are tied to the stats of the characters in your Squad; so if a character in your squad gains the Infiltrate skill, his corresponding card in your deck gains the Infiltrator ability from Shadowfist (attack backrow sites.)
That game would rock.
Don't play anonymous games (Score:2, Informative)
another reason why it will fail.. (Score:5, Interesting)
Unlike most MMORPG games, MTG: Online isn't going to charge a monthly fee. The draw for EverCrack, Ultima Online, etc is that you pay your 10 bucks same as everyone else, and it's what you do in the game that makes you better or worse than everyone else. MTGO, it's all about the size of your wallet and how much you can afford to spend on getting better. Sure, some of you can say "but you still have to know how to play the game or 10,000 dollars worth of cards don't help". Yeah, true. But during the beta, I estimated that it would cost well over $500 to become "competitive" at the game, with little or no way to change that. Things would be pretty even for about a month, and then the "Mr. Suitcase" players would overwhelmingly dominate the game, much like that one guy who figured out Magic just a little too early at your local comic/card store and whipped the crap out of almost everyone on a regular basis.
My major attraction though, was Tournaments. This is where MTGO really lacks IMO. A typical tourney with 128 players (or so) can and will take up to 8 hours to finish. 8 hours! And you can't leave and go anywhere else either, cause the round might finish early and you'd default by not showing up! I tried a few of these tournaments and they don't have the appeal of a physical tournament where you can go and mess around doing other things (like side tournaments) since you have to sit at the game for a solid 8 hours (or until you lose).
Yeah, it'll suck if hackers do their thing, and if people rip other people off.. but it has to get people to play first if that's going to happen, and I don't think it will.
How's it different from RL Magic? (Score:1)
As for the tournaments, they can improve, can't they? No one of the problems you describe can't be solved by email notification or longer tournaments (1 hour a day for 8 days).
Re:How's it different from RL Magic? (Score:2)
You have to be able to collect an entire set within a set amount of time in order to be elligible to trade them in for a real set. First of all, that's really hard to do. Second, it's really expensive. Third, it's even harder to do when you have a time limit in which to do it in. Finally, the trade-ins are still at Wizards' discretion, so they left themselves an out in case they decide they don't really want to give you real merchandise since they already have your money.
Sounds like a system begging to be played (Score:3, Interesting)
He sold off all of his cards, and gave me his land / commons (somewhere I have a grocery bag full of living lands, wyrms, forests, etc) and bought two special starter packs that contained a starter and two boosters each. He proceeded to trade with people... collecting unwanted cards and trading bits here and there for things that other people wanted. He would hook people up for cards that they were looking for in exchange for a small cut, and he was a good dealmaker. Within a week, his deck was competitive again (he knew the power of common green), and within six months he was trading legends / antiquities and his collection rivaled that of his old deck... And within the year he was bored again and gave me all of his cards.
The moral of the story... Lots of people are going to be spending lots of money on this online game. If you can spend 10 hours playing a game every day, can you really resist buying a booster every morning? I used to be one of those people. We didn't put any value into common or uncommon cards, or even crappy rares. It sounds like there will be a lot of room for friendly tag-a-longs who are willing to ingraciate themselves by not taking the game seriously... and who don't have to pay any money to play.
Sounds fun. Where can I sign up?
Virtual Cards (Score:4, Interesting)
What they should do (this is just a thought of mine) is sell the regular cards in stores, but print a unique serial number on each one, then you can enter those serial number onto your online account. That way your virtual deck can be the same as your real deck.
People guessing serial numbers shouldn't be a problem if there is a delay in entering the number and it uses a large enough base with enough digits.
Re:Virtual Cards (Score:1)
Of course, the trading-in will likely end in a few weeks when they get hacked.
Re:Virtual Cards (Score:1)
Addictive! (Score:1)
This card game is WAY to addictive. You are much better of sticking with Grass. [game-times.com]
How dare they (Score:2, Funny)
From what I can see, the online cards run the same as the paper cards, which means every damn cent you can beg, borrow, or steal.
I wonder how many people won't be able to pay their ISP bill because they spent all their money on virtual cards.. Pity we won't get to hear
Re:How dare they (Score:2)
In fact, most of their income is disposable and is spent on games/movies/etc...
That's why most advertising for luxury items like these is targeted at younger kids. They have the money and we don't. That's always been true. It's just more applicable when the economy is down.
I haven't bought Magic Cards in months. Last time we did, it was just a couple boosters of whatever the newest set is - we don't even know what the name is at this point.
We've got complete sets from Unlimited through 6th, with a large number of alpha/beta including the "big" ones.
But we gave up when 6th came out. We just couldn't keep up any more. 40,000 cards in a box and when we do play, it's with a few cherished sets that we enjoy playing.
why Magic Online will really, truly suck: (Score:1)
"Magic Online, socially, is not Magic: The Gathering. When you play Magic at your local card store, you're playing against people you know and respect. More than that, you're playing in person, against a living, breathing human being that you can interact with via flesh and sound. You can feel the warmth of that handshake."
the problems with online gaming are rampant, and include, but aren't limited to: playing with 12 year olds, playing with 90 year olds, playing with people your age who act like they're 12 year olds, playing with your mom, and finding out your mom's a l33t hax0r che4t3r.
see, that's the charm of playing games that with people sitting in front of you: there's nothing like Magic: The Gathering: FULL CONTACT. sure, you can feel the warmth of that handshake, but you can also choke the guy out, or maybe, JUST MAYBE, squeeze a bewbie.
you can't do either, online.
especially the bewbie part.
...
and if you could, what if it were your mom's?
DRM (Score:1)
Seriously though, I used to play some online MTG games, and even I did it. I'd build a dream deck for the game, when in reality I didn't own most of those cards. When I played it against my friends from "Stragtegic Gameing Club" (calling it Magic Club wouldn't look as good on college apps, so we played 'risk' once a month), I'd usig desks like the ones i actualy had. But there was a whole lot of nothing stoping me from picking on kids by using a pure type-1 tourniment winner or something.
um....no....it willl suck because.... (Score:1)
More money.
Scott
Re:um....no....it willl suck because.... (Score:1)
Interesting.... (Score:2, Funny)
He forgot something (Score:2, Funny)
The author left out the one good point to onlin MtG: you can't smell the freaks you're playing against.
Why it doesn't suck (IMO) (Score:5, Interesting)
Also, no teenager stench, which is always a bonus...
One of the nicest things (Score:1)
Penny Arcade said it best (Score:5, Funny)
http://www.penny-arcade.com/view.php3?date=2002-1
Magic Was Never Designed For This Business Model (Score:5, Insightful)
Magic: The Gathering is a brilliant game. I have played it since 1993. I have watched the development of the game from day one. Richard Garfield is a genius, and all people in the CCG industry need to tip their cap to him whenever they design any game. That said, it uses a horrible business model, one that was never intended to work on a real player level. This shows up on the tournament level and will show up in MTGO.
When the game was designed, the most powerful cards were the rarest. Black Lotus, a card that lets you get 3 mana for free (where you normally only get to produce one on the first turn and two on the second and so on), is one of the rarest of all tournament-legal Magic cards. This was done because Wizards naively believed that hardcore players couldn't collect all of the cards, so the harder it was to get something the more powerful it should be.
Unfortunately, the tournament players learned that to compete you HAD to have one copy of each of the "Power Nine," the most-abusable cards in the game. Cards quickly spiraled into the $20, $30 and even (gasp) $50 range! If those cards weren't restricted to one-per-deck (where most cards are four-per-deck), their prices would have been even higher on the secondary market.
Well, Wizards learned that those cards were too powerful and stopped printing them. Again, naively assuming that if you limit the supply that eventually things will become more fair. That wasn't what happened -- the cards became more and more expensive. Today, to get the "Power Nine," you're talking about $800 or more.
Wizards learned that having a group of "haves" and "have nots" was not good for the long-term success of the game. So they created a new tournament format that didn't use any really old cards. This was called Type II, and eventually called Standard. What the Standard tournament format did was to "ban" hundreds of cards without specifically choosing to do so. Invalidating the early players' purchases.
If Magic was an online game from day one, they could have tweaked the costs and gameplay effects of their most-broken (and most-useless) cards. But in Magic, you are stuck. Since MTG-Online must mirror MTG-card board, you get all of the drawbacks of being online but none of the benefits.
Further, when you are dealing with an online game the FIRST priority must be "how will the abusers play this game?", because if it isn't you are screwed. With MTG-card board you have tons of social gaming groups that don't have to deal with the tournament gaming scene. This is extremely unlikely to happen in MTG-Online. Again, since it is linked to a nine-year-old game with sloppy, very complex rules, problems arise.
And my biggest point: Magic is just too expensive. To play in a constructed Standard tournament with just one deck, you usually need to spend $100. Many of the most popular decks run north of $200. And these use cards that are IN PRINT! Then, when Standard has a set rotation (banning another 700 cards to make room for the new sets that have just been released) you need to buy more and more.
You can avoid this by entering Sealed Deck tournaments, but then you are paying around $20 to make a deck with a limited set of cards. I like them, but how many $20 tournaments can you enter a month? Even one every other week makes MTGO a $500/year online game.
For the record, to play any of the online CCGs that I have developed, players need to spend $10 to jump in, $35 to have a serious tournament deck and about $100 to have a full "play set" of any given expansion.
When Wizards gives up on MTG-Online, much like it has the Magic Interactive Encyclopedia and the original Magic PC game, the people who have spent their money will be left with exactly nothing. Our games allow peer-to-peer play (albiet awkwardly) such that if something ever happens to us, you can keep on playing.
Disclaimer time: I speak for Blue Sky Red Design and myself only, not for my employer, our parent company or World Wrestling Entertainment in any way.
Re:Magic Was Never Designed For This Business Mode (Score:3, Interesting)
The tournament system was ridiculous in our area. It was the same people over and over, with no qualified judge, because WotC wanted way too much time and money to certify someone. Our nearest official judge in Lubbock, TX - which meant a three hour drive for him just to sit around and arbitrate. I don't think he ever really enjoyed it and in the end, I believe he quit working as a judge.
In the end, I watched the Magic community in our town switch over to other games. It stopped being fun and the requirements of running a real tournament were too high. I think the main discouragement for me was realizing that the point system in place meant that no one from our group was ever going to get outside the county (anyone from our group would have been OK).
I don't get it - competition can be fun without being as anally organized as WotC made it. They managed to take a game that looked great and played pretty well and turn it into some sort worldwide bizarre Darwinistic system. For what? Grins? I doubt it.
I think that maybe DnD and most paper-and-pencil RPG's are more fun because you can't make a tournament system work in that way. In the end, I went back to my book games and that's where I am now.
Never again.
Re:Magic Was Never Designed For This Business Mode (Score:2, Interesting)
I stopped playing some years ago, so I don't know the new card sets and rules. Maybe things are different now. But when I was playing, I built my best decks by going to the card store and looking through the 5 and 10 cent card bins. These were the cards that 'serious players' were throwing away. They just weren't powerful enough to really cut it. No self respecting player at a tournament would play with them.
I remember one deck in particular. It was built for ~$2 plus a few common cards from my collection. There were no uncommon, rare, ultra-rare cards. And it won. My friends who were big on the tournament scene talked about 'lightweight' decks vs 'heavyweight' decks. By any standard, this should have been a lightweight deck. It creamed everything.
Was I that good? No, I was a fairly average player. Was my deck that good? Not by anyone else's standards. MtG has one of the most incredible buisiness I have ever seen. People think they can win by buying more cards - the Mr. Suitcase approach. But true to the original advertising and the original idea of what the game should be, you can win with a *cheap* deck.
I would be most interested to see a tourny in which players could buy their cards for the decks before the tourny from discount 5 and 10 cent bins. Put a price cap on it - no more than $10 for the whole deck. Maybe allow a few uncommons. No rares.
This sort of format would take some of the randomness out of sealed deck tourneys - it is entirely possible to get an unusuable deck in those sorts of situations. It would force an emphasis on deck building, creativity, and player skill rather than bank accounts. If you still want some randomness, everybody digs through the same bins. If it has to be 'fair,' give everybody a bin with the same cards in it.
And because you are deailing with mostly common cards, there does not need to be a cap on which sets are used. Opening the field up to all cards forces players to look for interesting combos that no one could ever use in the current style of tournament.
I bet the decks that came out of a tourney format like that would be some of the most fun to play. And I bet there would be be one or two every tourney that could whoop my 'unbeatable' deck.
Let's see an emphasis on creativity - as the game was intended to be played. You stop the Mr. Suitcase syndrome at the tourney level, and return to a game of strategy and a little luck. Who knows, maybe your favorite card will be lurking at the bottom of the bucket...
Re:Magic Was Never Designed For This Business Mode (Score:2)
In addition to your points, I'd add that Sanctum was designed as computer only from day 1, so it had the ability to use much more sophisticated rules. It makes for a better game.
I agree that tweaking cards in order to balance the game, although can have some effect on the value of those cards, is far preferrable to banning them altogether (making them almost worthless), or leaving the game unbalanced.
I stopped playing sanctum only because the designers didn't understand how their game was played, and left it unbalanced.
Deja Vu! (Score:4, Funny)
self regulation (Score:3, Funny)
if you've ever played tribes 2 you can vote to kick certain players out of the game. if someone's cheating it's usually obvious and they get booted pretty quick. if someone's just causing trouble by trying to boot honest players, people vote no about kicking the honest player and the troublemaker ends up getting booted next.
i'm not sure how this would work in a one on one card game, maybe some sort of point system where kick requests are reviewed by moderators but the solution is democratic self regulation by the players themselves.
it works because 90% of gamers are pretty honest people and just want to have a good time...
To answer some of the questions (Score:4, Informative)
1) Cards you buy for MTGO are not stored locally, but in a large database WOTC has back at their co-lo. It is conceivable that duping/illegal card hacks are possible, but the Leaping Lizard folks have been going out of their way to make sure that doesn't happen. Of course, that setup hasn't stopped all the duping hacks in Diablo II...
2) As was mentioned in another post, WOTC is charging real-life prices for MTGO cards. Same price per pack as if you went to your local store and got a physical set. This wouldn't be terrible if it didn't lead into...
3) You don't own your MTGO cards, nor is WOTC liable to replace them beyond $15. This language was inserted into the TOS about 2/3 of the way through the beta period and caused a huge shitstorm amongst the beta testers. So let's say you've spent $1000 on MTGO cards, and there's some sort of database corruption and your account is hosed. You're now out $985 with nothing to show for it.
See, the thing is that WOTC adamantly does NOT want MGTO to compete with standard MTG. They believe that if they charge less for MTGO (say, something like $0.50 US/booster) that all the MTG players will defect to MTGO. (Never mind the fact that physical MTG is on its last legs anyways.) They're right to a degree...I do think there would be some defecting, but not nearly as much as WOTC is panicking about. As it is, a significant portion of the beta testers pledged to quit as soon as the game went live, and from what I've seen most of them stuck to their guns.
A good online CCG community model... (Score:2, Interesting)
I highly recommend it. I can't imagine playing M:TG Online.
Sanctum can be found here [nioga.net].
Regards,
Mark Norton
Sanctum was excellent (Score:2)
I have no idea how magic online works, but these games can be designed reliably.
Magic Online is pretty damned impressive (Score:3, Informative)
Even without creating an account, you can play for a few hours using 7th edition preconstructed decks to see it you like the game. You play against other "guest" users in this tryout mode which seems to not have quite all the same features as the "real" version (which is odd because it's the same program). Once you have an account, you can also go into a practice area where you can play against other registered users using the same free decks.
The system only lets you play with the most recent 1500 or so cards right now (and only with cards you've bought or traded for), but the card database and inventory system has every card ever made, complete with the art and the download is worth it just as a free card database and deck construction tool.
Two annoying things: Bink Video that plays every time you run the game and which presents you with a stupid Bink logo which will result in launching a browser to their web site if you try to bypass it, and second they download their user license and make you agree to the latest version every time you start the game so they can slip in anything they like. This can't be legally supportable can it? Also note that they don't let you not agree to the license!
You get a $10 credit to start, but you should plan on spending around $40-$50 if you want to build a deck from scratch. This makes the game cost about the same as if it were a typical retail PC game release. And of course if you get addicted, the sky is the limit
The software is very well done. I haven't played Macic in probably five years, having gotten bored with it and never could create my own decks worth a darn, but I have to say that the online version is a lot of fun. Yes, you have to pay money to buy cards, but the system manages them all for you so there's no more sorting, putting card protectors on each card to play with, taking cards out of one deck to make another, etc. I can move from computer to computer and when I log in all of my cards are there.
Back years ago when Microprose announced that they were writing a PC program to play magic against the user, we all laughed because this was an almost impossible task due to the complexity of the interacting card rules, and it took them a couple extra years to come out with a game that worked reasonably well.
Now Leaping Lizard has produced a Magic referee program that is really amazing. So far it has handled all the obscure cases perfectly, and it clearly indicates the interaction between spells, targets, things on the "stack" etc.
I think it's actually more fun to play online because the computer does a much better job of enforcing the rules than people typically do, so it avoids a lot of the arguments.
As far as online versus human interaction, you may not get to see the other player across the table from you, but then you don't have to smell them either.
As far as cheating goes, it will take a while to see if the WotC/Lizards server implementation and client protocols are really free of client-side exploit opportunities, but at the moment it seems as though it might have a chance. Currently the game prevents all typical forms of user cheating by enforcing the rules and doing things like truly shuffling the users cards, so it's much more pleasant than playing in person because you don't bother thinking about this sort of thing.
The funding model of play being free but having to pay for cards is interesting, since it's the same one that physical Magic uses. If WotC can create an environment that is robust and secure, and where people really feel that they securely "own" their virtual property, then it is likely to be a very big success. They say that they have no problem with people selling cards on eBay, etc., though they do not provide such a market themselves beyond having the basic trading functionality that you need to complete a transaction.
Some tips:
In the game rooms, you can click on the little spreadsheet icon in the upper right corner to switch from the cute but useless graphical view of players sitting at tables into a spreadsheet view where you can sort games by Status to put the people looking for opponents at the top, see the result or recent games, etc.
They don't explain the process of buying cards very well, or give you any guidance of what to buy to start out. You purchase Starter Decks, Booster packs, and Theme decks online. Thse items then show up on the last page of your inventory. You can right click to open the packs and get the cards out, but if you want to join a sealed-deck tournament then you would buy the requisite items and not open them until you join the tournament at which point the server will track the league/tournament cards to prevent people cheating or trding outside of the tournament.
If you buy a Theme deck, you just get all the cards from that deck added to your inventory. It doesn't seem (that I can tell) to know that this was a Theme deck that you bought and you have to construct a deck using the correct cards if you want to play with that deck. You don't get the little booklet that typically comes with a Theme deck either, so you'd have to get the cardlist for the deck online somewhere. So if you want to play with theme decks, just start out in the training area with the practice games that include the free use of some 7th edition Theme decks.
You can buy Event Tickets for $1, but you don't need these for causal play (not sure when you would need one yet).
One of the things that the game does exceptionally well is to adapt to different screen sizes. It looks awesome at 1600x1200, but things scale down and are still very playable at 1024x768.
There is no provision for non-server play, and it always downloads the latest updates when you start the game. It's not clear whether you can even start the program it the servers are not responding (I haven't tested this yet though).
This really may be the revival of Magic the Addiction if Wizards doesn't screw it up. I can give Magic Online my highest recommendation if you're looking for a fun way to waste all your spare time and loose change.
G.
Experimentation (Score:2)
I was playing chess on the net the other night. (Score:5, Funny)
"What the fuck was that?"
"Ha, ha! I got the recall king upgrade! My king can teleport home to its recall square three times per game!"
All right, two can play at this game. I went over to the secure server, gave them my credit card, and bought a couple of upgrades of my own. Then I went looking for the punk.
This time I played the king's gambit, 1. e4 e5 2. f4 exf4 3. nf3 g5. I let him have it with 4. bxf4xg5.
"How'd you take both of those pawns?"
"Ha, ha, punk! I've got double dragon bishops!"
The punk's eyes widened as he realized there was no way to save the queen in his position.
Now that we're both wised up, the games are more even, so it's not as much fun any more. There's too much trivial complexity and it takes hours to play a serious game.
But we still like to beat up newbies. My favorite target is this one guy, GMKasparov. He would be an okay player except that he never spends any money for hypercastling or semi-transparent pawns or range-attack rooks. But he got me good last night with this weird "en passant" powerup. I think he must have a cheat client, because I couldn't even find "en passant" in the powerup catalog!
No worse than the RL version (Score:4, Funny)
When I heard of the online version I was breifly hopeful. I thought maybe since it doesn't involve the sale of cards it might actually be a fair game and be worth getting in to it. But then I see that, nope, its the same thing, only now you pay money to get the privlege to pretend you have a rare card (think about it - increased price through scarcity will fail utterly in an electronic forum where scarcity is completely artificial.)
Re:No worse than the RL version (Score:2)
the only way to win... (Score:2, Funny)
You would pay money for this? (Score:2, Insightful)
I think only hardcore magic fans would want to play this, seriously. Anyone who doesn't play the game in real life has no incentive to play it online, since the hardcore players will be spending so much time trying to screw over the system and other players to get those uber-rare cards and redeem them so fast that nobody else has a chance at them.
Multiplayer Online games have fatal flaws
1. Any form of RL value ("ebay")
- Fine rare item, sell it on ebay, play for 6 months sell your character on ebay, etc.
2. Any form of in-game currency or inventory/items that doesn't work on market-based principals. (IE, no license to duplicate items, each item in the world is unique and can only have one owner.)
- No generation or re-spawn should be required to keep sufficient inventory in the game. All existing games as far as I know need to "replenish" stores, or the stores are unlimited, which let's people hoard certain items.
3. Inventory period.
- Can a real person hold 300 dead rabbits? Didn't think so. The reason people can hoard anything in these games is because their inventory is so deep that it allows them to. One certain game I was playing during betatest would have 60 players surround this one shop keepers respawn point, then when the server rebooted they would quickly login and buy everything the shopkeeper had and turn around and sell the items for 100000X the price. If there was a realistic limit(like in weight/room-in-backpack) on inventory, one person should not be able to buy out 20,000 units of any item and be able to fit all that in their inventory.
4. Any form of client-side storage
Diablo I/II has this problem, as the game stores data on the client side, it's easy to make whatever item you want, even make your character have any stats you want. This is also the same problem in peer-to-peer server-less games, where the client data can be "bot"-ed. The client should only recieve game state and send actions, not do any calcuation and not send what isn't requested. "Attack player X" and server does the calculation. FPS games present a further problem since to shoot, a aiming point has to be sent, and since the client also receives the location of everyone, it makes it easy to just auto-track.
In short, why would you pay money to be part of a fictional world where you get screwed over, and over and over? This is why many RPG games don't attract the right kind of people (usually the hack and slash FPS/Diablo crowd) since the people who are used to kill everything that moves ruin the game for everyone else. (Some games have a notoriety feature that makes it so pk'ers are highlighted when they are in the area.)
will Not Caring work? (Score:2, Insightful)
I don't know much about MtGOL, but from what I've read here virtual cards will be redeemed for real ones (or at least their value). Because of this, people with good collections of genuine Magic cards can only lose. Their collections will be as valuable as the dupers' fake collection.
This is the equivalent of a government allowing virtual money in an insecure environment. If it is possible for someone to cheat the system and print their own money (or dupe their cards) with no legal recourse, it will happen, and the value of every holder of that currency will lose out.
To end this semi drunken rant, I will summarise by saying that anything's value is in the eye of the receiver. Be it cash, a Grandfather sword, or a Black Lotus card. If you can't trust the printer of the currency, don't invest in it.
Cheers,
Noims.
PS. please excuse my spelling, grammar, and keyboard (my E doesn't work right)
So that's what it's all about (Score:2)
Just talkin' smack.. (Score:2)
Online Magic should provide the same capability. If it doesn't i suggest that you adamantly request such before paying money... online != anonymous.
That's it. The perfect solution for clubs, groups, and privateers.
'nuff said.
You poor, poor ignorant peasant... (Score:2)
Re:Anyone know what's happening with Apprentice? (Score:2)
It's still available, and still as buggy as it was 1.5 to 2 years ago :)