Warbook (in Off-topic)

Anyone play WarBook over on FaceBook? A guy I met playing kickball turned me onto it, and it is sort of nifty. You biuld a Kingdom instead of a character, though your Kingdom has a "hero" which is like an ultra-simplified version of a minion here in CB-land. I'm haven't really sussed Warbook out yet, but it has a nice time-regeneration aspect (like CB) where mana regenerates over time and gold accrues every hour. I am sure there are a million games like it, but I am not up on my Internet gaming (CB is all I need! *smile*)

Anyway, I hadn't heard anyone mention it here, so I thought I'd be the first.

I'm sutekh137 over there, and yes, you have to have a Facebook profile to do it as far as I know.

I think Verifex does.

He sent me an invite, but alas, I didn't have the urge to join. ;)

Yeah, someone sent me a link to it, and so I decided to click on it. You know they make it extremely too easy to participate in those things. It used to be a matter of sending emails, now its just clicking stuff in a thingy.

I haven't really played it but it reminds me a lot of a standalone webgame that was popular about 5 years ago... Can't remember the name. :(

Funny, it reminds me of CB, and a guy that showed me Warbook came over here and thinks CB is way better organized and implemented. *smile*

Yeah, there's some similarities, but the acreage business seemed fairly central to Warbook and is *directly* from this other game, at least to my memory.

I played a similar game a few years ago...I can't remember the name, but it had almost identical concepts.

I caved.. Claire just got me to sign up to Facebook.

She plays some pirate game. And some fruit/flowers games. :/

"I haven't really played it but it reminds me a lot of a standalone webgame that was popular about 5 years ago... Can't remember the name. :("

Sounds like Utopia, to me. I used to play that a long time ago. :)

Anyways... I don't have Facebook, although it does sound kind of fun. Won't be playing it anytime soon, though. CB is enough for me!

> Sounds like Utopia, to me.

Yes! That's it. Although I kinda think there was a kind of "Utopia TNG" that someone did later...

I play Warbook. My hero is Xenko.

Xenko! Thanks for the trade agreement! *GRIN*

I realized one aspect of Warbook I enjoy (sort of)...

The ability to really lose something, generally by over-extending, is an exciting premise. A premise that doesn't exist here. Sure, you can lose some MPR retraining, or you can make your score rise only to see it re-reduced the next day -- but the work is in the bank. There's not a lot you can do to really lose what you have worked for. You migt fall behind at times, but that's different.

A game like Warbook makes you pay dearly for getting too big too soon or making the wrong people mad. Is that more fun? Not necessarily. But it's different. I'm not saying I don't prefer CB (4+ years of play here make the pudding positively proof-laden), but as far as base game elements go, the risk/reward of putting something more REAL on the line can be compelling.

Nope, no point, I'm just throwing that out there...

> The ability to really lose something, generally by over-extending, is an exciting premise.

That's true, to hardcore gamers. Less hardcore ones just hate it.

(The MMO trend has reflected this -- earlier ones like UO had elements like this. EQ and its generation had less. WoW still less. And the audiences have gone up.)

CB still has delusions of attracting a wider audience. If anything, I should probably reduce the worst punishments (goofing up while forging, for instance).

I agree... Obviously, a character-based game will have less heart-wrenching. I remember dying in the first MUD I ever played. I remember reading I had a scar after dying and thinking it was cool. But I was younger, and I had just started the character. His name was Kraal. Ah, the good ole days.

I disagree with saying "hard core gamers hate it". On average, maybe. depends on the implementation and what it takes to get back to where you were (and how that is presented). Here, if I retrain a huge stat, I am several days from getting that back. On Warbook, I might look at a bad day of getting sacked, but I actually might be able to get it all back in a few days too. Perception.

The concept of losing a lot does something that CB cannot duplicate right now -- hesitation. A palpable fear of action. Here, the C-Enter gets reflexive. Yeah, I remember the fear I had way back when peter and Myonax told me to unlearn something huge and turn it into Decay. I did it and I beat Spid, and it was a rush. But that's not really a part of CB any more. Actually, it's not even close. Because in the current state of CB, it takes HUGE changes to overcome the binary nature of the big battle dynamics. No one makes a small (but clever) tweak and reaps massive benefits any more.

I don't know what people want, and I don't run a game. But I think the various dynamics run deeper than you might think. Capture a good dollop of both avenues, and your game has gone from good to crazy-good.

Loss, eh?

Jon, let me point out Runescape here. Now, I know, bad game. But you cannot deny the hundreds of thousands of plays on at a given time. The millions of people who funnel their life into it. I remember reading a forum post with thousands of replies about how great it was to LOSE things. To have something to work for after everything has been achieved.

I try to think of some way to "lose" items. Most games use money, as something to be lost, but I don't think that system could work here. CP is, in a way, a sense of loss, but beyond your control what you lose, so eh.

You know.... To General!

I don't play Warbook, stay far away from Facebook and have never heard of Utopia.

But, this 'loss'-thing reminds me of a mafia game called Bara Franca and some spinoffs like Infamous Gangsters. In these games, you could be killed. Shot, to be exact :p After a day of making fun of some other mafia family, you logged in only to find this message: "We are very sorry to inform you that you have been murdered." And somehow, that was very exciting. You created another character and started asking around who killed your old char. It just adds an entire new dimension to a game.

Like most here, I'm not saying it's better. It's just different, and somehow very cool as well :p

My war book character is Ding YuXuan...anyone want to be trade partners?

Trade with a Visionary? Pah! *smile* Sorry, I have trade agreements in place already, though I admit I don't even really know what they do...

Each trade agreement gives you a 5% bonus to hourly income.

Dominion. That's the game it is similar to (at least, one that I'm familiar with).

i played warbook, but i stopped due to the fact that it took for ever to play. it was just too slow, another fun game on facebook is 'bum wars', 'battle station: mobile weapon' and a few others, but nothing beats cb, if you really made this usable on facebook im sure the fan base would grow, unfortunately it would grow too fast prob like +1mil users but the multi prob would grow exponentially and the game would just be flooded and incite chaos ^_^

> if you really made this usable on facebook im sure the fan base would grow

I was going to do this but FB quickly dropped the limit on how many notices your app can spam friends with. :)

Still probably worth doing but now re-theme is going to be first.

Booo.. Facebook suuucckksss...

I don't bother wasting my time with FaceBook, MySpace, Piczo, or any of that crap.

/me claps with Zach...

Amen, Amen Brother

It certainly won't be a requirement. :P