Recent content by IanPrice

@Paul_LRR: I, too, chose the cranberry DB5 shirt. I think it is the nicest color that was offered.

I love me my research agreements and science buildings/wonders. So far when I end up going to war, the civilization on the short end of it has always been laughably far behind me. Though my victories so far have been science and culture, and lower on the difficulty scale. It's my third game, I'm...

Yep, definitely telekinetic choke, right there in the first movie. Other force powers involved a whole lot of clairvoyant sensing (especially of other force wielders), the classic jedi mind trick, and a little bit of precognition. The second movie had more telekinesis and precognition, less...

Hat's off to you, John Funk. Oh hey, look at that - my real name's been on my Escapist account all along, right there linked to facebook. The fan community blow-up over RealID was a self-fulfilling prophecy, a closed loop, and the reason we can't have nice things.

Negative reinforcement doesn't work. Punishment doesn't work. That's not how it works when you're trying to sell something. You have to bribe your customers to pay you. Sometimes this is literal - money-back on a registered purchase, for example. Often it is figurative - downloaded benefits...

The mount-bought-for-money question has been poked at a lot. Really? It's absurd. - The slippery slope argument is a logical fallacy. - All the "free to play" MMO games out there do this in spades, and actually give real game-mechanics advantages to people with purchased options. This gives...

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned it as a contender yet, despite the fact that it's come up in this thread: World of Warcraft is the game that's done it. - it has a game structure that rewards both extended play and many short sessions. - players are encouraged to spread the game with more...

Another factor which would be hard to track: how many people hear about a game by word of mouth (and subsequently buy it) only because they know someone who pirated it? In other words, instead of "lost sales," should the video game industry look at piracy as free advertising? I can only speak...

Relaxation and fondness should be reflected by nonverbal and paraverbal cues (facial expression, posture, gesture, tone of voice, etc.). They should be joined by an "interest/boredom" scale, for sure. Implementing a conversation system like this well would create a nice form of alternative...

No other MMO has come into WoW's weight class in terms of success and subscribers. Therefore, it is reasonable to conclude (as Shamus has) that they are doing it right and your first step to beating them has to be to copy them. If you'd notice, he also pointed out at least one area that new...

He'd feel like he was playing Shadowrun.

Everyone seems to be oh-so-interested in Stardock, but I'm intrigued because this is the first time I'd heard that Gas Powered Games was involved. Their customer service is already pretty high grade, but I have especially good memories of the relationship I enjoyed with Chris Taylor's former...