Reilly2040's Blog

Ok, first things first.  This blog is not dead.  Its merely resting.  Real life at the moment means I’m not getting as much chance to write random musings on tech, comics and games as I’d like too, and the blog is probably the main place where that’s most obvious.

That said, I’m still going to try and churn out the odd post.  There’s a lot of good stuff to talk about at the moment, such as my rediscovered love for the Spider-titles over at Marvel (largely thanks to Dan Slott’s brilliant work in Amazing), the great first two issues of the Kaine-starring Scarlet Spider book, or even the ongoing new 52 over at DC, where the Flash continues to be the relaunch the book’s been looking for for years, Animal Man continues to impress as the breakout “I wasn’t expecting it to be this good” book, and I’m still struggling to get used to some of the changes (I miss the previous Superboy, and I’m still not convinced by some of the costume changes – specifically Superman, and Hal’s new shoulder pads).   There’s the upcoming addition of Earth-2 and World’s Finest, which I find I’m very excited about too.

And then there’s gaming.  We were really spoiled for great games towards the end of last year, and I’ve been having a great time playing Old Republic, Skyrim, Battlefield, Arkham City, and even going back to Star Trek Online for the long-awaited return of their featured episodes this last week.

And (once things settle down), I’ve also got the reviews and podcasts I submit to Outpost Skaro on the go too.  I’m still greatly enjoying the stuff Big Finish are producing, having listened to some of their Sherlock Holmes plays in addition to the Doctor Who releases.

However, one aspect of my blog is changing. For the time being, due to the combination of my lack of time to spend on the blog, and an increase in the amount of spam getting through the filter I’ve disabled the comments in the blog.

To be honest this is just temporary. While I know this isn’t the biggest blog on the internet, I do still enjoy the times I get responses to my posts. So I’ll probably look to add capchas or something and see if that helps matters.

However that’s just a bit unfortunate. In the meantime I want to get back on track with my posts and finish up some of the drafts I’ve had sitting for ages.

So, a follow up to my Spider Island post.  I must admit, this has really surprised me, but this year will see not only the return of the Scarlet Spider, but he’s getting his own monthly.  And even more than that, he’s a clone of Peter Parker once again.  Wow.

Now, the Scarlet Spider ID has been used previously since the clone saga, turning up in Avengers: The Initiative where an elite unit of 3 Scarlet Spiders were discovered to be a secret part of the Initiative (and appropriately enough, clones of another character), as well as in the MC2 universe.  However this is the first time the identity is making a big return to the main Spider-Man franchise itself since the Clone Saga wrapped up (to the best of my knowledge).

This time, in a bizarre twist of fate, its Kaine that’s under the mask.  Having been cured of his degeneration (and subsequent mutations) during the events of Spider Island, he’s relocating and finding himself with his first honest chance at a normal life since he was first created.   However, while he may not possess Peter’s memories, the spirit of Peter Parker looms large in his life, and its not long before he finds himself donning a costume of his own.

I must admit, despite the fact that I’d really love to see Ben Reilly back (it’ll never happen), I really like the idea of Kaine taking over the role.   And the setup actually harks back to the old “Lost Years” era of Ben Reilly, which was such a big hit at the time.   Like Ben at that time, Kaine finds himself on the road, and struggling with who he is.  Both are clones, and both live in the shadow of Peter Parker.   But while Ben was on the road purely to escape Peter and avoid Peter’s life, Kaine is genuinely on the run since he was previously arrested for various murders he committed both before and during the Clone Saga.

Its a setup that seems to be borrowing heavily from what made Ben successful as a character, so I’ve got high hopes for the series.  The fact that it seems to be specifically targetting that “Lost Years” vibe really appeals to me, as does the idea of Kaine trying to figure out who he is.  He’s definitely been played as a more sympathetic character since his origins as a clone were revealed, despite his murderous tendancies during the years he tormented Ben, so it’ll be interesting to see how they address that side of the character.  With the degeneration gone though, its a real fresh start for the character.

The only thing I have to say against the series so far, is that I’m not a big fan of the new costume.  I do really like the black mask with red eyes, but I’m on keen on the fingers being a different colour to the rest of the gloves, and I do kind’ve miss the hoodie Ben wore (a nice nod to it in the Point One book though, pity they didn’t keep that look).  However its not nearly enough to kill my excitement for the book.

Roll on issue 1.  Can’t wait

Wow.  Cracking little prequel this one.

Well, the NDA got lifted in time for this weekend’s big stress test inviting on pretty much anyone who was interested in getting a beta code, so I can finally talk about how much I’ve been loving Star Wars The Old Republic.

Being a huge fan of the previous Knights of the Old Republic games, I’ll be honest,the news that Knights of the Old Republic 3 had been canned in favour of a new MMO that wouldn’t be continuing that story was a bit disappointing.  Set 300 years later though, there’s still nods to the previous games (specifically the leader of the Jedi Council Satele Shan being a direct descendant of Bastilla, and rumours that Revan’s eventual fate will be revealed by the game), and it retains the same kind of strong story telling that you’d expect from a Bioware RPG.   Truthfully, I think they’ve done a great job of taking the gameplay of the first two games, and turning it into an MMO.

Its reported that the game may be the most expensive ever made, and to be honest it shows.  The environments are rich, with my character recently arriving on Coruscant to some brilliant visuals of its impressive skyline, filled with traffic, and the appearance of the familiar Senate Hall imposing.

Of course, a lot has been said about the fact that all dialogue has been recorded as voice over, and again its brilliantly done.  The voice acting is top notch, and it really helps to immerse you in the world.  The cutscenes whenever you pick up or hand in a mission serve to move the story along and involve you more fully in events than the usual basic text would’ve done.   By the end of it, you really start investing in the characters and it breathes life into the world.  Again providing a great balance between a single player RPG and an MMO.

I’ve also been incredibly impressed with the amount of content on offer.  In the game there are the two factions (Republic and Sith Empire) as you’d expect, and 4 classes within each of these, including all those you’d expect with Jedi, Bounty Hunters, Smugglers and Sith.  However each of these 8 classes has its own unique storyline, just begging you to roll alts in order to get the full story of what’s going on.  For example, one thing I loved is that something you stumble across in the opening mission as a Jedi Knight actually forms the main story if you’re playing a Jedi Consular.  And likewise a throwaway detour to a Twi’lek village as a Consular forms a big part of the Knight’s storyline.  And each of the areas is filled with side quests, so you’re never short of something to do, and that’s before you get into group events like Flashpoints, or PvP.  Neither of which I’ve actually tried yet, as I’ve been so engrossed in the main stories and trying out different classes.

I’ve been fortunate enough to have been playing for a few weeks now, and I’m totally hooked.   I’ve been at a point  where my game time in Star Trek Online has been decreasing due to the lack of updates over this last year.  and there just seems to be so much more to do in Old Republic.  I can see me being hooked in a big way once it properly goes live.

Its safe to say that over the last few years, we’ve been bombarded by various events from the big two comic book publishers.  And even within this year there’s been plenty to talk about, with Fear Itself, Flashpoint and the new 52.

However, for me, without a doubt Spider Island has been the event of the year.  Heck, to be honest I found it the most enjoyable comics event I’ve read since the Sinestro Corps War.  For me it was pretty much perfect.  And as someone who fell out of love with the main Spider-Man books years ago, it really felt brilliant to be picking them up again and enjoying them that much.  So be warned, what follows is a bit gushing.

Ok, I’ll admit, as someone who got into regularly collecting comics during the Clone Saga, in many ways Spider Island felt like a love letter to fans like me who got into Spider-Man during that time.  Ever since the Clone Saga ended, and Marvel adopted its “lalala we’re pretending it never happened” policy, it had always felt like they were ignoring the good elements of that story.  Throwing the baby out with the bath water.   And as I’ve talked about before on this blog, over the last few years, its been a joy to see that policy slowly be reversed.

And its affects were no more apparent than in Spider Island, with the Jackal returning to orchestrate events, infecting the inhabitants of Manhattan with a virus that gives them all spider-powers.  Throw into the mix Kaine, recently further mutated by the events of the Grim Hunt and the Jackal into a spider monster called Tarantula, and there’s a lot to appeal to those fans of the clone saga.   Especially in the final issues, when Kaine is finally cured and joins the fight by borrowing Peter’s stealth suit (before leaving town to head towards his own new series, as the new Scarlet Spider).

But despite all this, this story wasn’t about Dan Slott showing some love to the Clone Saga.  Not at all.  This was about him celebrating the character and his history.   All of Spider-Man’s friends turn up to help contain the situation in Manhattan, as criminals are also gaining powers, and later, as the population start mutating into monsters.  Peter’s scientific mind is at the fore-front of the story as his new job at Horizon Labs finds him in the middle of trying to find solutions to the plague (and infact, Peter eventually saves the day without throwing a single punch).  Its about Peter being free to use his powers publicly without fear of recriminations.  To let him be himself without hiding behind a mask (although, in true Spider-Man style, it does eventually backfire on him).  More recent stories play heavily into things as well, when the main villain who the Jackal is working for is revealed as the Spider Queen, and of course, it wouldn’t be a Spider-Man story if the old Parker luck wasn’t around to kick Peter just as things are going great.

And as a fan who was never impressed by the One More Day thing (to be honest, its something that I suspect will be more successful over at DC, due to it being a line-wide reboot, rather than the more specific changes Marvel brought on Spider-Man – also the reasoning works better without damaging any of the characters in the same way), seeing Mary Jane get a big role was a thrill as well.  Initially stuck on the side lines as everyone around her gets powers, the issue where her own powers finally kick in was a lot of fun.  While they may still be split up,seeing the two characters working together in the story, and drawing on that past relationship strikes me as exactly how things should be handled.  Despite not being a fan of the break up, and having previously tried an failed to get into the Spider-books post One More Day, their relationship here really worked for me.

Of course, being a cross over, the other Spider-characters all have their own part to play in the story.  I must admit, I was a bit light on picking up the other tie ins to this story line.  I haven’t much interest in the current Spider-girl, or the Cloak and Dagger stuff, but I did like Julia Carpenter as the new Madame Web in the story itself.  However one book I have been picking up was Rick Remender’s Venom series which has been excellent.   Thrown into the middle of the Spider Island events.  Remender still managed to stay focused on the character arcs he’s been telling, especially in terms of Flash and Betty’s relationship.  I’ve been greatly enjoying this new take on Venom, and thought the big role he ended up playing in Spider Island was great.   Likewise Eddie Brock became an important part of the story and events in Spider Island make me wonder what they’re planning next for the character.

So, as I said, pretty gushing.  But then, I did really love the storyline.  Unlike many of the longer stories I’ve read over the past few years, it kept up the pace throughout, with no real filler jumping out at me.   The love to the history of Spider-Man felt great, with Jameson, Spider slayers, and the Clone Saga all playing their part, and there’s loads of interesting setup in place, while still feeling like the last issue was more concerned about wrapping up the storyline (a particular complaint I’ve had with DC events).  Dan Slott’s always been a writer whose work I’ve enjoyed, but reading this has made me keen to not just keep collecting Amazing Spider-Man, but also to go back and grab the issues of his run I’ve missed.  Great stuff.

The other new title added to the Green Lantern stable with the new 52, replacing Emerald Knights, is The New Guardians. Providing a spotlight to the other Lantern Corps, and starring Kyle Rayner, this to me made a lot of sense for a new book.

I’ve talked before about how I didn’t really understand the decision to launch the Red Lanterns over the other Corps into their own book. Instead here, we get a member of each of the other Corps getting involved. I really like the idea that this book will allow a spotlight across the different Lanterns. What’s happened with the Blue Lanterns since they lost their Guardians? Likewise the Star Sapphires since their power source went kaboom?  That’s the kind of thing this book will hopefully address. I’ve also talked about how the Corps have slowly become less distinct in their powers since their introduction, and that’s also something Tony Bedard has talked about wanting to address here. There’s already a hint of it in the first issue, as Fatality’s constructs always appear to be made out of crystal rather than just energy.

And, of course, I think its great that Kyle’s the main star and Green Lantern of the title. To be honest, I’ve never particularly felt Kyle was left by the side once Hal came back, as many suggested (he’s never been close to the way Wally’s been airbrushed out of the Flash franchise) and enjoyed the Rann-Thanagar appearances, the Ion series and finally him being in Green Lantern Corps.

Now granted, I wasn’t necessarily a massive fan of how Kyle was used in Tony Bedard’s Green Lantern run. The combination of him and John Stewart was never one I particularly felt Bedard had a handle on, up until the final Aftermath issues, in which I really thought he did a great job on the characters. This series gets off a great start, with a nice recap of Kyle’s origin, showing long term readers how its been tweaked to compensate for the removal of the JSA from continuity. Rather than Alan appearing after Alex’s death to tell Kyle about the Corps, Ganthet is the one who gives Kyle a brief background to the ring and the Corps before he vanishes off.  Its a nice, logical tweak that I imagine will play in later to the run, as it establishes the relationship between Kyle and Ganthet nicely (one thing that I think has been ignored since Hal came back – so nice to see its use here).

The various Lanterns picked to fill out the cast work well too.  Bleez makes a lot of sense, as one of the most prominent Red Lanterns, and likewise Saint Walker is an obvious pick (although personally I prefer the character of Warth for Blue Lanterns).  I did really like in issue 2 how Tony Bedard started building up the relationship between Kyle and Walker, based on their mutual respect for Ganthet.  That was a really nice touch.  Arkillo is again, a good choice as possibly second only to Sinestro in terms of prominence in his Corps, and I loved the trick Tony Bedard uses with Arkillo’s ring having to speak for him.  Its nice to see his tongue being removed wasn’t forgotten or undone in the reboot.  Something I was really pleased to see, was Fatality being the Star Sapphire who turns up.  Characters introduced in Kyle’s run on GL have slowly been wiped out since Hal came back, whereas Fatality managed to hang around thanks to the John Stewart/Xanshi connection (although to be honest, that went kind’ve nowhere).   So the fact that a recurring foe from Kyle’s GL run is being used here is a great back nod to Kyle’s 10 years in the main role.

Tony Bedard’s direction for Kyle seems interesting as well, with him speaking in interviews about how he’s wanting to try and carve out a more unique role for Kyle within the franchise.  Hal is often held up as the best GL ever (as is common for whoever happens to be leading the book at the time – see The Flash and whoever is best with the Speedforce), Guy has his role as the premier troubleshooter in the GLC (and probably the main rival to Hal’s position).  How John fits into things is perhaps less distinct since his more thoughtful, introspective Mosiac-era persona has given way to his new Marine background, but the focus here is on Kyle.   And building on what Tony Bedard tried to do during War of the Green Lanterns, it seems the idea is for Kyle to be more generally adept across the emotional spectrum, rather than being an uber-GL or anything like that.  Its an interesting idea, and I’m keen to see how it works out.  Presumably we’re going to see Kyle using the other Corps rings more throughout the book.

There’s also the mystery of why all these rings are suddenly targetting Kyle.  And my guess is that this is where his relationship with Ganthet may come into play.   That background is being bigged up again, and the rings have just targetted Kyle, as the Guardians have forceably stripped Ganthet of his emotions and his personality (see my previous complaints about the Guardians being borderline villains in the franchise these days – and this act seems stunningly unforgivable even by their standards).  It would make sense to me that this is some sort of backup plan of Ganthet’s, although as to why, I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

Overall, despite my burnout on the other Corps towards the end of the last volume, I think having them in their own focused book is the right idea, and I look forward to Tony Bedard hopefully starting to play more with the differences between their powers, and how their rings affect them (I loved the out-of-control Miri stuff towards the end of his GLC run).  The Kyle focus was always going to be a big win for me, and so far Tony Bedard seems to be getting on better, with a singular main character as his focus.

The third Lantern book of the reboot, and the second returning title, Green Lantern Corps has none-the-less had things rejigged a bit, with Peter Tomasi and Guy returning to the book, while Kyle has exited to star in the New Guardians title.

While I criticised Green Lantern #1 for not coming across as much of a first issue, to me Green Lantern Corps manages to toe that line well, while also not feeling like its written solely for new readers.

From the off, a (presumably) new threat is established, when a pair of Lanterns (and their prisoner) in a sector house are slaughtered by someone who is largely kept off-panel.  Aside from a distinctive green glove, all we’re really left knowing is that they seem to be impervious to the power of a Green Lantern.

From there, its very much a shift, and one that works well as a reintroduction of the main characters.  We jump back to Earth, where both Guy and John are trying, and struggling to re-establish some kind of normal life outwith the Corps.   It was a nice move, to use their public identities in different ways.  Despite his normal bluster, Guy is actually the more reserved of the two, desperately trying to play down his role as a Green Lantern just so he can land a job interview as a high school coach (a nice nod to how the character started out).  Of course, he’s swarmed by the other candidates all desperate for pictures and hounding him with questions, which provides a neat outlet for Peter Tomasi to quickly establish the basic information any new reader needs about the setup of the Corps.

Eventually, Guy gets his interview, but is forced to concede that as a Green Lantern, he’d be too much of a trouble-magnet to risk being around the school kids.  Its a real gut-punch moment as the principle (who is pretty nice about the whole thing), forces Guy to acknowledge that he just can’t have a normal job and be a public Green Lantern.  John on the other hand, is quick to use his powers in his architecture job, using his ring to display designs of the building.  He’s also the one that flies off the handle a bit more readily.  When the clients complain about his building in safety measures that aren’t in the contract he’s suddenly flying them up into the air and accusing them of bribing for planning permission.  To be honest, I’ll admit that scene played a little weird to me.  John pulled the bribery angle out of nowhere.  That aside though, I did find the differences between the characters a bit interesting.  It played Guy very much against type, but I think in a good way.

Of course, its not long before both Guy and John are summoned back to Oa, and tasked to investigate the murders that opened the issue.  To be honest, at this point the story reminded me a lot of some of the one-shot issues of Emerald Warriors we had, with Guy (and John) putting together their team of kick ass Lanterns to go take out some interstellar threat when normal sector Lanterns just won’t cut it.  Not that that’s really a bad thing in this instance though, as it allows Peter Tomasi to reintroduce some Lanterns that are, of course, familiar to long term readers.  Especially with the cast being changed around again, with the book falling back into Tomasi’s hands.

Out of all the Green Lantern books in the new 52, I have to say this was undoubtledly my favourite of the four in its first issue.  It kept things firmly grounded on its two main characters, and the trick of having them trying to settle on Earth as a way to work in a primer to the GL Corps mythos worked really well.  Peter Tomasi has long been a safe pair of hands (aside from the initial Emerald Warriors storyline not clicking into place – and now seemingly abandoned anyway in the reboot), with his GLC run at times considered the superior book to Geoff Johns’ work on the main title.

That said, the second issue wasn’t quite as successful for me.  The mysterious enemies seem to be another group, trapped on a dead world after being wronged by the Guardians and are now out for revenge.  Something we’ve seen perhaps a bit too often lately, with all the focus Atrocitous has enjoyed.  The idea of them stealing elements from other worlds to restore their own though, was an interesting angle.  Less successful for me though, was the fact that much of the issue was essentially a fight scene, as Guy and John’s group attempt to intercept them at their next target.  For me, the art, and possibly more so the colouring started to let things down a bit, as the issue descended into a sea of green that started to make each panel seem like the last.  Granted, not having that happen, when you’ve got a bunch of Green Lanterns in a fight for their lives is pretty tricky, but in this issue it just lept out at me.

That said, I still feel this is probably the strongest of the four GL books coming out of the new 52.  New Guardians may grab my attention more as things go on, but Peter Tomasi bought a heck of a lot of good will off me, with a perfectly judged first issue.  And I’m really intrigued to see how he continues to handle John and Guy.  For me, Peter Tomasi has long been the GL writer who’s come across as having the best overall handle on the different Earth Lanterns (which is not to say Geoff hasn’t given them all some great moments over the last few years), and seeing how he tackles John and Guy working as a team, a pairing that’s perhaps one of the least explored out of the Earth Lanterns, is something that greatly intrigues me.

So, with the various other Corps getting a lot of attention during Sinestro Corps War and Blackest Night, it made sense that eventually DC would create a book to capitalise on this.  However, to my mind, they went with the bizarre choice of a Red Lanterns ongoing title.  The rabid animals of the emotional spectrum, we’ve seen them more than happy to kill people in pursuit of their revenge.  From the announcement I was unsure about this book, worried that it would lead to a dilution of the initial concept of the Red Lanterns (and the emotional spectrum itself really).

And unfortunately on reading the book, I found little to change my mind.  This was probably my first “drop” of the books I’ve picked up in the new 52. As I feared, they’re diluting/tweaking the concept, so the influence of the rings, turning their bearers into rabid animals doesn’t seem as potent as it once was, with Atrocitus finds himself in a moral quandry after Krona’s death, as the target of his millenia-long vengeance is finally gone.  Given that the red ring is the only thing keeping him alive, I’d have thought that even if he did lose his rage, he’d end up dead as a result.   To me, having this introspective Atrocitus, eventually deciding to become and anti-hero, bringing justice to the oppressed just takes away from the Red Lanterns as a whole.   Here we have Atrocitus making cute one-liners about people hurting his cat. I also notice the redesign takes away some of his more monstrous features, making him more of a human-like alien.  In their original introduction, the Red Lanterns were nigh-unstoppable killers.  A force of nature, tearing through Sinestro Corps and Green Lanterns alike to get to Sinestro himself, with only the timely appearance of Saint Walker saving the lives of Hal, John, Kilowog and a bunch of others.  This nicely played into many of their origins, which saw them all as ordinary people, abused and tortured by life, only then to receive a ring that just enslaves them even more.  Underneath the rage, hate and killing, they all started out as tragic figures.   So having Atrocitus as some one-liner spouting bringing of justice just doesn’t seem as appealing in comparison.

So sadly, I found little to really keep me on this book.  I’ll certainly keep up on it via forums and the like to see what direction it goes in and see if I want to go back and start picking up other issues, but for now, this just isn’t for me.  I do note online that there are plenty of people that do enjoy the Red Lanterns in that anti-hero role, so I hope the book does well, but for me, its just not the direction I would’ve really liked to have seen them used in, and as I say worries me that the emotional spectrum as a concept is becoming diluted into just differently coloured Green Lanterns.  My take on this book would have probably been more of a Green Lantern entrant into the “Dark” side of the DCU.  More horror-themed tales of abusers getting their comeuppance as their victims are turned into unstoppable killers.

Or, why I cancelled my Star Trek Online Subscription…

My intention here is not to have some kind of “Wahhh!  Rage Quit!” post.  Indeed the opposite is very true.  I fully intend to keep playing the game and making purchases from the C-Store, as I still really enjoy playing Star Trek Online.  Neither is this a post about how clearly the game has failed, as its going free to play.  Nope.  Figures from various other MMOs that have done the same have shown the games are far more profitable when they lose the subscription model and rely on microtransactions, including Cryptic’s own Champions Online which has enjoyed a whole new lease of life since going free to play.  I wholeheartedly expect Star Trek Online to continue to be around for years to come, and continue to grow as a game with the new income this will generate.

So why the cancellation?  Well, some background.

Without meaning to be overly harsh, I think its fair to say this hasn’t been the best year for the game.  After enjoying its fortunes turning around with the featured episodes, and the promise of a restructure to allow those featured episodes to become a permanent feature in the second half of the year, the game was the strongest it had ever been, with loads of players turning up every Saturday to play the new missions.  Then  everything went a bit wrong.  Atari decided to sell off Cryptic, and suddenly all the hope of new staff dried up.  With no new staff, and the future of the company in doubt, suddenly the new mission content dried up as well.

I would hope its fair to say, that most of the community were pretty understanding of this at the time.  Once it was clear that there was some sort of sale of the company going on, most seemed to respect that the staff were signed to NDAs.    Eventually word came through that Cryptic had been purchased by Perfect World, and everyone was hopefull that we’d now start to see the promised Featured Episodes, the launch of the Enterprise-F, and the long-in-development Duty Officer System (something I was especially looking forward to) all start to appear on Tribble for testing.

Then the news leaked out, via a conference call that STO was going free to play.  While the game going free to play had been expected (following the success of Champions Online), I think its fair to say that most hadn’t expected it until next year sometime. However, again I think all-in-all the forums were largely understanding of the benefits that going free to play would bring to the game for everyone.

And then Cryptic released their “Free to Play Matrix“.  Now to those who don’t play the game, the differences between the Silver and Gold accounts may look reasonable, but there’s an issue.  Practically speaking for players, there’s very little benefit to having a gold account.  Sure, you get extra inventory and Bridge Officer slots, and you get a C-Store points stipend, however quickly players realised that this wasn’t really promising a lot.   As a silver player, according to some of the maths done by various people, if you invest 2 months worth of subscription costs into C-Store points, you can buy replacement inventory, bank and bridge officer slots for those lost by downgrading.  Yes, you lose Foundry access, but Silver members can still buy one slot to create a mission in, and as someone who’s played with the Foundry, but has never really released anything, I can say that this isn’t a big problem.  Sure, if you really get into writing and publishing missions, you’ll have to subscribe, but for most casual players of the game, this isn’t something they’ll particularly miss.

You do lose access to your Veteran Rewards, but again, Character and Ship slots can be purchased to make up anything you lose, other than a few things (a couple of nice veteran uniforms, a ship firework device, and a Captain’s Yacht shuttlecraft).

Then, came what seemed to be the final straw for the forums.  The announcement that the Featured Episodes were being further delayed, as was the Duty Officer System.  Now rather than see a release to the live server, they were to be held back, and only available via the Free to Play beta server.  No new content would go live until after the Free to Play launch.  So now, the only way players would get any new mission content would be to beta test the Free to Play release. To say players were unhappy would be generous.

The forums as they stand are probably the most hostile I can ever remember them being. Even the die hard fans of the game (which I would count myself among) are struggling to defend Cryptic’s current track record of undelivered content with all the delays, and promises that such-and-such will go live once feature X is done.  Only for feature X to be released, then that same content to be delayed for feature Y.

There are also the interviews with staff. The forums are pretty much united in feeling there isn’t enough between silver (free) and gold accounts to justify the cost of the ongoing subscription. Yet the responses to this seem to make clear that the current direction favours focusing on securing a large number of free players, all buying items via microtransaction versus looking after those players who have subscribed over the last year and a half/two years. From a financial standpoint there’s no denying it makes sense, however it does feel wrong that after sticking with the game and the company throughout the troubles this year has brought, we’re being ignored. At the very least it would be nice to feel that someone was listening to the concerns of the community, but questions about the gold/silver split are quickly deflected by talk of how much money free players will bring into the game.  Ignoring the fact that the current model will see the benefits of that money go to both types of account equally.  Surely courting those players that will pay a monthly subscription in addition to buying C-Store points for extra vanity items (as many of us have been doing since the start of the game) makes sense?

And so today, after a brief discussion with my in game fleet, I came to the decision that makes the most sense to me. My account is currently paid up through to the end of December, which means I’ll enjoy and participate in the free to play beta, and in all likelyhood also enjoy at least a month of gold access once the game goes free. However beyond that, for the sake of some uniforms I just couldn’t justify staying gold financially.

Of course, when my account goes free I’ll incur an initial cost in C-store points to equip my character with the bank and inventory they’ve lost, but all my other purchased ships and uniforms will remain. Sadly my intention over the next couple of months had been to use money I’d been putting aside to buy a lifetime subscription, but that doesn’t currently make sense any more, when a fraction of that money will keep me in C-store points for a good while.

This is not me stopping to support the game. I have no doubt that it’ll continue to be one of my main games, and I fully intend to continue purchasing new ships and other goodies as they become available. However at the moment it doesn’t really feel like I’m valued as a monthly subscriber, so I’ll become one of the silver account players instead. I do hope though, that eventually things change and prior to free to play launch there’s something added to the gold accounts that make them feel more worthwhile. It wouldn’t even have to be much. The occasional ship skin or uniform for subscribers for example.  If something like that was to happen, I’d resubscribe in a heartbeat.  However, at this point, it’d be nice to at least have devs properly acknowledge the unhappiness of the community and complaints about the free to play matrix.  But they seem intent on following through on this course of action, despite whatever feedback they get.  Which seems a shame, to attempt a relaunch of the game, with a community that’s pretty hostile.

Of course, I’ll still continue to recommend the game to my friends.  After all, it is a fun game, and once the weekly missions restart, I expect to have a great time playing through whatever new storylines come our way.  But would I recommend anyone subscribe to the game?  No.  Unless you’ve already bought a lifetime, I think it makes more sense to just go free to play, and occasionally invest in some C-Store points whenever something cool comes out that catches your eye.  Which is a sad state of affairs, as I genuinely believe there’s a good team behind this game that cares about it.  But somewhere at the moment, it definitely feels like there’s a disconnect between this game and its community.

To finish with a side thought, with Cryptic currently in development of the new Neverwinter game, it’ll be interesting to see if it goes straight to free to play on its release.

In addition to trying out lots of new titles from the new 52 I am, of course, continuing to pick up the Green Lantern titles, which, much like the Bat-franchise have emerged from this reboot with tweaks to some of the earlier continuity, but their ongoing storylines unscathed.

As a result, I did have some issues with this first issue of the relaunched Green Lantern.  Namely that it didn’t really come across as a number 1 at all. There was little real sense of it being a jumping on point, with it following on so many plot points directly from the previous run.  Given accessibility is the name of the game with this whole “new 52″ push, I felt Geoff Johns missed a bit of a trick here.  While we knew Green Lantern’s immediate continuity would be largely unaffected by the reboot, there still should’ve been more of an attempt to hook new readers with this first issue.  Instead what we got was very much issue #68 of volume 4 as if nothing had changed.

However, I’m not a new reader.  I’m an ongoing reader, and one who’s been a bit wary of Geoff’s run on this title over the last year or so.  And as an ongoing reader, this issue hit a lot of the right buttons for me.

It was not without its flaws.  Once again we have a reliance on the Guardians being unlikeable idiots spouting mysterious stuff to tease the next big event.  Frankly this is something we’ve seen far, far too often during Johns’ run on the title, and its really time to get away from it.  One day the Guardians will get some characterisation rather than just being an obstacle to be overcome by the GLs.  But not in this reboot.  It felt very much like things were having to be put into place, just so Geoff could explore Sinestro being a GL again.  There’s no real logic to the Guardians’ reasoning for letting him go, it just serves the larger plot.

With that done however, I found a lot to like about the issue.  One of my complaints for a while has been Hal Jordan’s guest star status in his own book.  And while he may not have the ring or the title anymore (or even the cover), he’s very much the star of this book, as Johns tries to reconnect us to Hal’s character, as he finds himself jobless, broke and eventually homeless.  Hal’s attempts to reconnect with Earth and Carol was nice to see, and I liked how he was mature enough to accept the desk job she was offering him (something I’m not convinced earlier incarnations of this character could’ve done).  Of course, that goes wrong and Carol eventually refuses to have anything to do with him (admittedly another example of characters acting in a way to push the plot along, but nevermind).  I liked seeing Hal stripped of everything, and the desolation when he reaches home after angering Carol, only to find he’s been evicted ontop of everything else was nicely done and a good payoff to the downward spiral Hal had been in throughout the issue.  Its very much Geoff Johns’ take on Hal.  He’s nothing without the GL ring.

On the flipside, once freed of the Guardians and his imprisonment, Sinestro’s story goes quite differently.  He heads straight back to Korugar, only to find the population suffering under the whims of the Sinestro Corps.  For some reason, the fact that leaving a big society of killers in charge of the planet being a bad idea had never occurred to Sinestro, and he’s appalled that they’ve not obeyed his orders to stay away from the citizens.

In general terms, while its all a bit forced, I am onboard for seeing how Sinestro reacts to being a Green Lantern once again though.  A recurring theme is that he’s always viewed his actions as a deliberate way to strengthen the Corps against coming threats, and he believes in the Corps, but not the Guardians (similar to Hal and any other GL worth listening to).  This is even nicely captured when he tells the Guardians he doesn’t need redemption.  He sees everything he’s done as necessary, with the ends ultimately justifying the means.

So to put him back into that role of a GL is an interesting move, and one I’m intrigued to see explored.  But how can he be seriously surprised by what’s happened on Korugar?  My concern is that Geoff’s leaning towards the yellow ring influencing him, which I hope is not the case.  Sinestro’s not a character who should be redeemed, especially after his actions in volume 4.   So I’m a little warier of this aspect of the storyline, but it does lead to the nice surprise conclusion at the end of the book, where Sinestro appears on Earth to confront Hal and offer him a chance to get his ring back.   An action that is exactly in line with Sinestro’s character.  He knows that Hal feels the same as himself with regards to the Corps and the Guardians, so in many ways, its in Sinestro’s best interests to ensure Hal gets his ring back.   Although, with the Guardians having fired him out of fear of his willpower, if Sinestro does help Hal get his ring back, I wonder if this will lead to Hal going rogue as was prophesied earlier in the run?

From the view of accessibility I wonder if it would’ve been better reducing Sinestro’s role and focusing solely on Hal’s attempts to get used to life on Earth again, only for Sinestro to then turn up at the end of the issue.  Issue 2 then could’ve been from Sinestro’s perspective and filled in the Guardians letting him go, his discovery on Korugar etc.  It would’ve kept the main story beats in tact, but reordered things slightly just to make things that bit more new-reader friendly.

I do like the current direction though, but I wish Geoff would step away from storyline building for a while. I really don’t need the Guardians being mysterious idiots for the umpteenth time since he took over as writer. Especially since they never show any development after they get blind-sided by the near-destruction of everything, again.  However while I may come across a bit negative, I definitely enjoyed this issue a lot more than anything in the New Guardians story arc.  Hal getting the much-needed focus was great, and I look forward to even more during this storyline.  The Sinestro as a GL is an interesting hook as well, along with the mystery of why he’s got a ring that can’t be removed, and while we have to assume Sinestro will eventually end up with a yellow ring once more, I’m intrigued to see how things get to that point.