Wizard 101, why can’t I quit you?
I spent most of the night last night working on my LittleBigPlanet level. Well, almost. I spent most of last night feeling like an idiot. A frustrated idiot.
Since LittleBigPlanet is based around a physics engine, everything you make there has to actually work to some degree. I started working on a sorta free-floating player system as is used in the hugely popular Gradius level, and got it kinda working, but I didn’t like it. Then I decided to make a game set not in space, but underwater, and the space ship becomes a submarine — or a bathysphere, really, since the thing has to be connected by chains to a hidden, remote-controlled trolley which handles the mechanism of bringing the bathysphere through the level.
First part of the level, you control only the depth of the bathysphere as you negotiate a maze of twisty passages, all different, looking for treasure and prizes. Then comes a boss fight where you’ll have to hit various buttons with the bathysphere to defeat it.
Second part, you control the speed, but not the depth. Your depth will be adjusted by lifts that will bring you up and down, ending in another boss fight. Not sure how you’ll defeat that boss.
Third will be a shooting level, along with mazes and lifts and stuff and a bigger boss battle and again, dunno anything about that because after about three hours work last night, I’d only just managed to get the bathysphere working and under player control. (I’d spent some time running levels in LBP before I got started).
Now that that’s working, making the first part of the level will be pretty easy; just drawing in the maze and placing the traps. But I bet it’s harder than it looks.
I’d love to get back to Befallen but it’s beyond my ability to make levels yet. I have to work up to it. I am hoping this will do the trick.
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After that, I logged in to EverQuest 2 with my necromancer and grouped with Said’s conjurer in Ruins of Varsoon. That worked out amazingly poorly. Lots of death. So we decided to head over to Loping Plains and see if the Haunted House was still open, but it wasn’t (got Said some druid rings and the Butcherblock griffon towers, though), and by then, it was getting a little late.
So I thought I would just log into Wizard 101 for a COUPLE OF MINUTES to try and farm the clockwork spider from the haunted towers before their Halloween event ends today. Turns out there are three towers, and they aren’t all the same. I soloed what turned out to be the baby, easy tower about a dozen times — no pets. Maybe another tower, oh look, this one is a teensy bit harder but still no pets. What’s this? A THIRD tower with rank 4 mobs in it?
Oh, that’s the one with the pets. It was also fairly tricky. There was a level 12 wizard hanging around, so I recruited him and we ran the tower three times. We got some imp pets (I got two), but no clockwork spiders. I ran it again this morning and still, no spider.
I hope to run it a couple more times before it ends tonight. I only just found out YESTERDAY that this tower has a rare pet in it, so I’m a little late to the party.
But the takeaway lesson from all of this is that, even though I’m at the end game and there really isn’t much more I can do to progress my character (I could make an alt, I guess), I am still in love with Wizard 101.
I’m not that hard to please. If you make an MMO both fun and challenging, I’ll give it a shot. W101 is both.
Plus, out of all the MMOs I play, W101 is the one that works best on my computer (as did WoW when I played).
9 thoughts on “Thursday gaming: LBP, EQ2 and W101… again.”
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You know, Wizard 101 looks kinda cool. I have been following these stories for a while now and I think that I may like it. There was a game out a while back that was a fantasy game that was 3D, and had card based combat. They made a sequel and it was by a french company, but the name escapes me now. If I can find a game like that but where it counts and the content is online and generated and changed, I would play it IN MY WoW off time. Like in the mornings.
I may have to give this a go. It only took you months of writing about it.
Oh and this statement:
“But the takeaway lesson from all of this is that, even though I’m at the end game and there really isn’t much more I can do to progress my character (I could make an alt, I guess), I am still in love with Wizard 101.”
Is exactly what I am talking about today in my post. Hang in there with your game. If you really like it, you WILL find things to do, and WoW is no exception
It’s all about finding your MMOGroove and sticking with it. When it gets a little old, try something new. Moderation in all things = zen.
Anyway, Tip. Head over to freerealms.com and sign up for the beta! Now! Quick! I did… anxious to have my niece and cousing come over and see how it works for a 7 and 9 year old with a passion for Webkinz.
Since I was at the Fan Faire, I should be automatically in it anyway, but they apparently don’t believe I was there or something. So I signed up for it.
I was not overly impressed by what I saw at the Fan Faire. Combat is just like combat in every MMO (as well as being optional; but if you choose to fight, it’s just like everything else). But I’ll try it out for sure, if given the chance.
Playing Free Realms is like watching a Bugs Bunny cartoon in slow motion. Even having seen it, I still don’t get why Zonk, et al, are so excited by it.
While watching it be demoed, and looking at all the different professions you could collect, I got to thinking how awesome Nethack would be if turned into a 3D MMO by the Free Realms art department.
Nethack had some pretty kooky professions as well.
That was sort of my impressions from the trailers and such as well. Though I do think it’ll strike a big cord with pre-teens.
I think I am going to download Wizard 101 and try it this weekend. I got ALLLLL day Saturday
If you need a helping hand, email me in the afternoon (going to visit my son in RI in the morning) and I’ll come by. Having additional people in the group, no matter what their level, does not diminish the xp or loot of anyone else. It’s a nice thing.
Yeah, that’s one of the features I wish more people would use. It’s a major deterrent for casual grouping for a lot of folks who want to maximize their progress in a level-based game.
I dig W101 myself… haven’t played it since live though. I have a dungeon run (Gunbad) at 2pm Saturday, but perhaps we could all meet up earlier on? My evening’s shot as I have a concert to attend.
bildotheirish at hotmail dot com for my MSN and my home e-mail. Shoot me a line, guys. I’ll be going in blidly, Tipa, as I’m sure a lot has changed since beta. But we could use Skype so you could talk Hud and I through it.
Yeah, I have Skype — ID unsurprisingly is tipadaknife — usually hang out in Xfire though. I’ll send y’all an email when I get home Saturday afternoon.