A History Lesson

While cleaning out a closet I found this huge paperback, published in 2003.  It cost $19.99 plus tax and was almost certainly purchased at GameStop.  It is essentially a walkthrough, with all sorts of character and lore information plus maps thrown in.  

How times have changed!  When the Solo MMO Player started playing video games around 2002, the xBox had been out a few months.  Many games had walkthroughs and there were a few blogs about various PC games.  Podcasts and Twitch and Discord were unheard of.  Back then you could buy game discs at Best Buy, Target, GameStop, online, etc.  Over the next 5 years, blogs exploded.  There were plenty of player blogs that had lots and lots of information about the blog writer's favorite game.  Some people collaborated on the larger websites.  Very few people were paid for this--it was a labor of love.  You can still see vestiges of this era in some of the blogs I reference here that haven't vanished or sites like The Unofficial Elder Scrolls Pages.

https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Main_Page

Gradually I've watched the main game websites be purchased and consolidated.  YouTube videos started to become more common as the verbal generation is replaced by the visual generation, then Twitch arrived with Discord not too far behind.  Games are digital only.  You don't actually buy a game, you buy digital access to it.  Now the people who write for the big websites are paid and often have only a cursory acquaintance with the game instead of being obsessed with it.  There are very few sources of information about a game in many cases.  If you need help, it is hard to find.

So the Solo MMO blog hangs on.  Hopefully some of the links I wrote about years ago aren't dead and you can still find useful information.  

RIP gaming for fun.  Corporate gaming is here to stay.

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Copyright Solo MMO Player at http://solommo.blogspot.com

Rift: World Event Chaos and Response

Rift's world event didn't go off well  Here is a summary of the event.  There's a link to what Trion is going to do to make it up to folks found in the article that I've posted as the second link below.
http://massively.joystiq.com/2011/04/16/rift-world-event-fizzles-trion-reevaluates-approach/

http://forums.riftgame.com/showthread.php?167307-River-of-Souls-World-Event-Wrapup

Podcast about the above.
http://rift.zam.com/story.html?story=26072

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Copyright Solo MMO Player at http://solommo.blogspot.com

Rift: Patch 1.1 River of Souls World Wide Event

Here's a trailer featuring the star of the event (Can you say "Dominatrix"?) and a link to a podcast focusing on the world event with a Rift employee from the Dungeon and Raid team. Basically the podcast talks about the new raid dungeon River of Souls. There are four main bosses and three mini-bosses (Dark Foci) plus mobs with a higher drop rate than usual. Non-linear and open so you can fight in any order but have to kill every boss to access the final fight with the Dominatrix Alsbeth. Same focus and difficulty (but a bit trickier) as Greenscale although you don't have to have done Greenscale to enter River of Souls.
http://massively.joystiq.com/2011/03/29/skinny-dipping-in-rifts-river-of-souls/

There's no time released for when this will happen today but the Solo MMO Player is betting around noon Eastern Daylight Saving Time. Here are the items I have collected and published here before.

Trion is planning their first Rift world event for March 30th. Here are some details. It looks like it will last a week, so get ready.

http://www.riftjunkies.com/2011/03/24/rift-erupts-in-worldwide-dynamic-conflict-march-30/

The name of the new raid zone is River of Souls. Apparently unique loot will drop during this "worldwide dynamic conflict." The happening (Patch 1.1) is in alpha now.

http://www.riftjunkies.com/2011/03/24/river-of-souls-world-event-preview-from-the-alpha-server/

Straight from the alpha, here is what Patch 1.1 will change/fix.

http://www.riftjunkies.com/2011/03/23/alpha-1-1-patch-notes/

UPDATE:  Zam has a guide to the River of Souls.
http://rift.zam.com/wiki/River_of_Souls_(Rift_Event)

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Copyright Solo MMO Player at http://solommo.blogspot.com

Rift Websites (not Wikis)

While looking for Rift blogs, I ran across several Rift websites that look interesting.  The first is HorRIFTic Intentions, which has its own Rift podcast, blog, videos, guides, patch notes, links to official Rift sites and wikis,  and articles about the game.  This is worth bookmarking to keep an eye on.  The second link is the HI blog as there doesn't seem to be a link on the main site to the blog.  I'll be exploring the large amount of content here as I have time and will mention the Good Stuff later.
http://horrifticintentions.com/

http://horrifticintentions.wordpress.com/

The second site is Rift Watchers.  This site also has guides and a podcast and a list of Rift blogs as well as interesting news articles (the number of servers at launch compared across MMOs, articles from Rift Junkies folks, the fact that a dungeon finder tool is planned, a discussion on the lost art of grouping, etc.).   I'll be bookmarking both and watching them carefully for nuggets of information that will help the Solo MMO Player and others with Rift.
http://www.riftwatchers.com/

UPDATE:  Inc Gamers has a nice Rift website, with great detailed maps, a soul builder, videos, a dev tracker, guides and a forum.
http://rift.incgamers.com/

UPDATE #2: Looks like RiftCore.com is also one to keep an eye on.
http://www.riftcore.com/

UPDATE #3:  Here's another with at least some theory crafting in some of the builds.
http://www.etherealshadows.com/

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Copyright Solo MMO Player at http://solommo.blogspot.com

Podcast Reviews

If you really like listening to WOW podcasts, you will want to head over to r9sid9nt9vil's blog and read the podcast reviews s/he's posting.  Once you arrive, click on Reviews in the categories on the right side and all the reviews will be there, latest on top.  The Nov. 24 posting talks about the methodology for reviews, so it is a good place to start.  Whether you agree with the review or not, you likely will find new podcasts to add to your listening rotation.
http://eviscerated.net/

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Copyright Solo MMO Player at http://solommo.blogspot.com

A Mage's Five Main Stats (And Why They Hate Hunters)

Larissa's guest post for Armegeddon's Coming discusses what she things are the most important stats for a mage--agility, attack power, hit rating, diplomacy and mana regeneration.
http://gnomeaggedon.net/2010/06/03/misleading-mage-posts-agility-and-attack-power-–-the-essentials-of-a-mage/

To understand the refererences to mage blogs and mage bloggers who give out misleading information, read this.  Please note that BRK didn't actually diss mage blogs, but he didnn't disagree, either.
http://www.pinkpigtailinn.com/2010/06/brk-and-assault-on-mage-blogs.html

I can see it's going to be a month of mages versus hunters.

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Copyright Solo MMO Player at http://solommo.blogspot.com

Podcast: Interview with GearScore

I almost never mention podcasts here since they rarely have solid information for players, but this one I can't resist.  It's an interview with the creator of GearScore.  I haven't listened to it so I do not know how professional the podcast is. Some are quite sophomoric.
http://www.brigwyn.com/2010/01/14/episode-20-thl-podcast-special-edition-interview-with-the-creator-and-developer-of-gearscore/

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Copyright Solo MMO Player at http://solommo.blogspot.com