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The Broken Economics of Diablo 3’s Auction House
One of the most heavily discussed features of Blizzard’s eagerly awaited Diablo 3 was its introduction of an auction house to facilitate trading between characters. The random nature of Diablo’s item generation system quite often left players with an item that would be useful to someone else, but not to them directly. The auction house promised to replace the confusion and inefficiency of players trying to arrange direct player to player trades through chat channels dominated by ads and spam.
Better than free dungeons
What’s better than free? Well, I have to admit, there are few games that offer better value than the free alpha version of Desktop Dungeons. I probably racked up at least 40 hours on it, divided by zero dollars… That’s tough to beat. But if anyone can do it, it’s the team behind Desktop Dungeons, and attempt it they have with the new paid version of the game that is currently going through beta testing.
Beta - Now with more whimsical graphics!
A Diablo fan’s perspective on Dungeon Siege 3
No hidden biases here. I’m laying it right out there. I’m a big fan of Diablo, and its more recent spiritual brother, Torchlight. While normally a fan of slower turn-based strategic games, there’s something about the frantic slaying of monsters and gathering of loot that keeps me coming back for more. I had never played the Dungeon Siege series, but reading the description it sounded like it would provide more of what I love, and I set out eager to enjoy it.
Now, about 8 hours into the game, I find myself torn between progressing further, or taking another romp through Torchlight. For a reason that I found difficult to put a finger on, Dungeon Siege just didn’t grab me in the way Diablo and its kin have. So, what is it that differentiates Dungeon Siege 3? Am I just the wrong audience for an otherwise fine game?
Why should I pay for that game?
In a world where most media forms are available as illegal, free copies before they are even available legally, people are constantly faced with the decision of whether to purchase legal copies of their games. For some people, the fact that pirated games are illegal is a sufficient reason to avoid them. But as one of our newer users, Sandeepan, asked recently, are there other reasons why gamers should purchase legal copies of games rather than pirate them? Answers from several different users made a compelling case that yes, there are.
Miniature Dungeons Aplenty
A fledgling rogue