Month: April 2006 (Page 2 of 2)

Being Loved Long Time – Virtually

April 11, 2006 / Damion Schubert

1Up has discovered that there are prostitutes in Second Life! Of course, if you’re reading this blog, you probably already knew that. MMO Prostitutes have been around forever. In Meridian 59, taking off your chain mail shirt to show the ratty brown undershirt underneath was about as sexy as you could act, yet we had our first virtual prostitute day one. World’s oldest profession indeed.

Still, there’s no doubt that the culture of SL takes this to the next level. Scott recently linked to the Second Life Escort Ratings (which the article mentions, and is definitely worth a read). What I found more interesting is people working to solve the primary problem when selling this particular… service. Continue reading

Pardon Me, I’ll Be Camping The Wicked Witch of the East

April 9, 2006 / Damion Schubert

So, you got yourself the Wizard of Oz license! Congratulations!

Rule one of working with a license: understand, deep at your core, what your license is about.

Don’t, for example, turn Dorothy into an Antonia wanna-be.

Oh, wait, too late.

Vote Me For Most Successful Game Blog!

April 8, 2006 / Damion Schubert

I’m hoping to get into Guinness. Seems that they no longer need any sort of actual metric, just someone to throw some cash their way to put an ad in their good book. From GameSpot.

Lara Croft has today been awarded a Guinness World Record that recognises her as the “most successful human video game heroine.” The Tomb Raider star won the prize for “transcending the boundaries of video games and becoming a recognisable figure in mainstream society”.

I See Ugly People

April 7, 2006 / Damion Schubert

A conversation, last night, in the computer den, while playing WoW.

Me: You’re ugly.
Fiancee: What?
Me: Really, you’re like the most hideous thing I’ve ever seen.
Fiancee: …..
Me: Um, I meant in the game! Really!

Apparently, a bug last night made it so the player portraits you were seeing didn’t accurately reflect your groupmates, so it turned her spunky red-headed dwarf into a blonde, hag-faced dwarf-like beast with two black eyes. On her machine, my gnome had a different mustache. Continue reading

Touchscreen, Tabletop RTS Control

April 5, 2006 / Damion Schubert

I want one of these so bad.

Will Work for Food. Plus Salary, Benefits, 401K.

April 4, 2006 / Damion Schubert

So the astute might have noticed that I haven’t been posting much lately. There are a couple of reasons for that. Continue reading

More Proof Localization Is Hard

April 4, 2006 / Damion Schubert

I’ve frequently pounded on the desk and said that localization means more than turning ‘Yes, Mister’ into ‘Si, senor’, and being sure your font draws the tilde. Localization means actually understanding how that content must be changed to capture the hearts and minds of different territories.

Why is this hard? Because it’s hard to understand who likes what, and why. For example, CSI: Miami is the #1 American TV show on the worldwide stage . It’s #12 here, and I think most people who watch it do so because, well, it’s so bad it’s snarkworthy. I know that’s why I watch it – usually in the background while going through bloglines. Let’s just say for me, I’m actually a little happy when our cut-rate DVR accidentally deletes an episode. And this is the #1 American show worldwide?

Other monster worldwide hits include Baywatch and Dallas. Which is to say, while the rest of the world hates Ugly Americans, apparently they love to watch them on the telly.