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PA comic: Wed. Sept. 14, 2011
Bogey
I'm back, baby!Santa Monica, CAModerator mod
I'm back, baby!Santa Monica, CAModerator mod
Work Ethics
Wednesday, September 14 2011 - 12:00 AM
Gabriel and Kara have been investing themselves in Crimson Alliance, investing of themselves and perhaps even of their holdings. They will even farm old levels, trying to use the game’s combo system to secure incredible virtual wealth. It’s got the hooks in, apparently.
The comparison that generally gets made is to Diablo or Torchlight, but the actual experience of the game doesn’t sustain that: its heritage is much more Gauntlet, right down to the color-swapped Wizards. This is an action game that, having been created in 2011, must heap tribute upon the Altar of Progression. This isn’t a game where you spend a lot of time twiddling between marginally distinct gear. It may appeal to whatever chittering rodent cortex these other games do, but it’s trying to do something else.
The other thing it does, and others have talked about this as well, is that it incorporates some exploratory free-to-play concepts. There’s no evidence that it leverages any kind of customized framework for the model, which is supposedly under development at Microsoft and is more or less an open secret. It gets there via in-game purchases, the currency exchange mentioned in the strip, and multiple tiers of entry that I suspect confused a non-trivial portion of its audience.
They call the game’s demo the “Full Version,” which allows you to play any of the game’s three classes in an early portion of the game. You can purchase a character for use in the entire campaign for ten dollars, which might make you think this was the first thirty dollar Xbox Live Arcade game, but you can purchase all three characters at once for fifteen dollars. That’s the normal price for a game these days, so it’s unfortunate that they didn’t tread more boldly in their experimentation.
We play wargames on Mondays, Warmachine is what we’re into now but I’ve played (and invested) in my share, and paying for only what you play with is the norm in that context. Maybe that feels weird to most people, but it goes hand in hand with the commodity/service obsession that’s asserting its dominance.
(CW)TB out.
(instrumental)
Bogey on
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1. I didn't understand exactly how to read it, since it appears that Gabe's comment is between the two of Tycho's, but the panel bar implies it would be read last. Does Tycho say everything and then Gabe replies? The way the bubbles are laid out, with Gabe's above some of Tycho's and crossing over the panel bar, makes me want to read it as Tycho-Gabe-Tycho, even though the panel bar and the way the joke is laid out works better the other way.
2. Until the end I didn't pick up on Gabe having only bought gear for himself, because I thought Tycho was dressed pretty fancy as well, with all the gold and such. I guess that's just the look of this game?
Twitch: KoopahTroopah - Steam: Koopah
I've been waiting for the thread to appear to say the same thing. Aside from the fancy gold trim, Tycho's large size and proud posture also make him seem, if anything, a superior character to Gabe's, who is diminutive and cowering. I still got the joke, but the "ha ha" moment wasn't there because the visual gag was missing.
I can't find it in the archives, but that old comic they did about levelling in World of Warcraft was pretty much the same joke, and the person who had been levelling on their own was very obviously superior, with a giant mount and fancy equipment.
The WoW comic was that they had agreed to level together and one person had obviously pulled far ahead.
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/12/31
here it is, re-un-stolen from some shitty web page that stole it
There is only one way to settle this objectively: We ask George R.R. Martin to describe their outfits, and allow page length to determine who is fanciest.
I thought Crimson Alliance was about biplanes.
It actually makes the comic even funnier to me, like Tycho is some kind of demented bully.
That's Crimson Skies.
we were all like "oh, I see where the guild fund went..."
and then like 2 weeks later everyone had them.
That right there looks more like regular old level 60 dungeon blues. A matching set, to be sure, but not particularly expensive.
Every comic needs more Flava Flav clocks.
you might be thinking of Crimson Permanent Assurance