Sam on Maui

Steady as she goes! The Legacy of Romulus has launched over a week ago, and folks seem to be enjoying themselves. My friends are thrilled with the new content, but it seems the post-update jitters are still there with the servers. Hopefully they'll be fixed soon, so it'll be smooth sailing from here on out

   And we have Romulans! First off, I'd like to welcome anybody who is getting into Star Trek Online with the launch of The Legacy of Romulus. Its a great game, a fun community, and one of the best MMOs out there if you're looking for something different than the norm. Secondly, I'd like to apologize! For whatever reason I didn't log yesterday's data! Eeek! I think I did, but either I forgot to save or my brain stopped working. Regardless, here comes the data!

You can read all about it here . Massively usually does a top-notch job, so I'm glad they're covering this. I'm also glad Cryptic is handling this swiftly. However, this is both causing me to restart my Astral Diamond tracking and giving me a reason to restart my Astral Diamond tracking. The vast gaps between rates means that the methodology I used for Star Trek Online is insufficient for Neverwinter right now. Maybe it'll be okay when things settle down, but for now? Its simply too volatile. I'm not sure how I'll deal with it just yet, but we'll see!

   We're inching closer to the release of The Legacy of Romulus! People are playing on test, dev blogs are coming out regularly, and seems that City of Heroes alumni Matt Miller (aka Positron) is also doing some work with Cryptic ! He tweeted: If you play # StarTrekOnline , this weekend is Open Beta for the Legacy of Romulus expansion. Followed by: And if you play, you can see what I've been up to. I worked on creating the Klingon Tutorial # STO # LegacyOfRomulus I'm really looking forward to trying it out now. Apparently its a contract gig, but hey, maybe it'll lead to a full time position. As an ex-Cryptic employee, he'd be coming around full circle! And, regardless of which game he worked on, having such an awesome developer on the team would be fantastic. Maybe they could get Melissa Bianco next? But, you didn't come here to listen to me rant on like a fanboy, so here's the data!

Cryptic’s newest game, Neverwinter, is currently in open beta. Based on Dungeons & Dragons, it takes place in a fantastic fantasy world, with an action-based combat system, a mix of overworld and instancing, and is currently diverting my gameplay time away from Star Trek Online. One of the similarities between Neverwinter and its siblings is that it has a time-based currency that can be bought and sold with Zen. Much like Questionite and Dilithium, Astral Diamonds are awarded in-game and can be used to purchase things, including Zen. Of course, right now the economy is just starting, there’s precious little in the shop, and the number of people playing is relatively low.

Won't be long until The Legacy of Romulus is upon us. Moreover, Star Trek: Into Darkness is staring down upon us. All in all, I'd say its great month for Star Trek fans. In the meantime, Star Trek Online is continuing on, the economy is still going along, and Neverwinter (now in open beta) is showing a brand new economy as it tries to find its legs.

Game Dev Tycoon is available for a variety of platforms, and is just a great little game. No DRM, even! I’ll be posting impressions later on, but for now? A little something to help you along! When you make a new combination of game type and genre, you get a  New Combo x.2 bonus for it. But, if it’s a Great Combo? Add in another .2. You’ll go from x1 to x1.2 to x1.4! To help you out, I sat down and went through the first six genres and available combinations I’ve found so far. Use the garage studio to experiment; each genre and game style has things they like during development. As such, go through the various combinations, figure them out, regardless of whether they're a one-time bonus or not. It'll help in the long run. Fantasy + Action = Great Combo Fantasy + Adventure = Great Combo Fantasy + RPG = Great Combo Fantasy + Simulation = no bonus Fantasy + Strategy = Great Combo Fantasy + Casual = no bonus Racing + Action = no bonus Racing + Adventure = no bonus Racing +...

Greetings and hello! Just a friendly reminder that today will be the last day you'll be able to run the Crystalline Catastrophe event (10am, PDT)! Its pretty short, so even folks in Hawai'i can squeeze one last attempt. Provided they're up early and eating breakfast at the same time, mind you. Speaking of which, many people have already completed the special Reputation project, receiving 50,000 Unrefined Dilithium, 1,000 Fleet Marks, and a non-combat Crystalline Shard pet. Speaking of which...