Soo... Terraria 2



and a possibility for a Halloween update.

In the mean time, there is some bugfixing: http://www.terrariaonline.com/threads/1-2-0-2-changelog.108344/

Do you guys remember if monsters dropped good armors and weapons prior to 1.2? Cause tonight I got a Shadowy Armor from a simple Soul Eater.

On the bad side Meteors do not summon so many minimeteors around anymore, so getting the ore and then bars is somehow easier:

That never happened for me in either 1.1.1 or 1.1.2. That armor is otherwise created through crafting so likely a bug.

Will they be adding portals to 'definitely not the Nether'?

http://www.gog.com/wishlist/games/terraria
http://www.gog.com/wishlist/games/terraria_2

Well, regarding this, I have encountered other enemies that drop armour, and all items are labelled as Ancient. Also you have to kill many enemies of the same type in little time so the items appear, I think.

Patch v1.2.3

http://www.terrariaonline.com/threads/terraria-1-2-3.132539/

Awesome news :D

An excellent article. A pity that your comment about the Humble Bundles has since become invalid.

It's lame that it took them this long to allow the menu setting once you've entered a game not to mention sound settings but I'm glad they finally implemented both.

That was quite well written there but I've some points I would like your opinions on.

I suppose the whole point of modern strategy like Steam is to make everything mainstream to keep a low cost and high accessibility at the cost of consumer control so that we can appease everyone, you know, we can't allow anyone to be "violated" in the civilized age. We are trying to close up on poverty, liberty will have to wait in essence.

So regarding your Fallout scenario (I've read it before but laid out differently) is that people assume that the only thing would be required is electricity (personal generators?) and then all the open hardware and software will work with a little bit of magic and all that. There's no gurantee however power will be available and not to mention time as after an actual fallout (let's say at least 1 b.omb in every major city in the world) and not to mention time. We'll lose the access of all the nice stuff a capitalistic (see the modern strategy Steam borrowed) economy can provide so working will likely be horrible and required much more to survive.

My point is that to assume you will be able to play Wasteland 1 in your little bunker 20 minutes a day when you're not off fending looters, making sure your food doesn't spoil or whatever work you have available is taken care of for the day is a little concern to the general public. Gaming is a luxury, even in an modern age. It's not like we can take for granted to use it then.

I also am curious as to your stance against the "one legit, one illegit". You give up your principle yet you get what you want but you won't change anything. I'm assuming that's what happened with Terraria but I might have misunderstood that particular part. Even a better question regarding one of your comments you received in that blog post that if you ignore EULA, why not ignore DRM so why not purchase the game legally but then download a crack or a fix?

What was the developer's reaction after you explained that Steam is inherent DRM? That they couldn't do anything about it or they might in the future?

Last thing. What exactly did you want out of Terraria and hoped it would turn into? I haven't played Minecraft enough to know about the hunger difference but I've seen others lay out complaints how Minecraft was brilliant in the beginning for some mysterious reason about lack of content (or specific lack of content).

*nod* ...though not completely invalid. They still stake their reputation... it's just staked on labelling individual games clearly while they mess up the naming of their product lines:

Humble Indie Bundles:
The original project line. Everything except little extras like graphics demos must be ported to all three platforms. Everything must be DRM-free. Along the way, "soundtracks must be included" was added as a rule.

Humble Indie Themed Promos (my name for them):
Same rules as the indie bundles but named after the game or vendor they spotlight rather than numbered. Examples include things like the Botanicula Debut and the Frozenbyte Bundle.

Humble Android Bundles:
Like Indie bundles except Android is also on the list of mandatory platforms.

Humble Mobile Bundles:
Android-only but otherwise like the Indie bundles.

Humble Charity Steam Sales (my name for them):
Stuff like the Jumbo, WB, and THQ bundles which we complain about. These really belong in the Humble Weekly Sales tab.

Various experimental lines:
Stuff like the Music, eBook, Audiobook, etc. bundles.

If you look at it like that, it doesn't look so bad. Yes, the naming is a mess, but:

1. Aside from risking a slippery slope by allowing Brütal Legend, Horde, and Monaco to get away with stubbing out their only multiplayer option without adding a raw IP address dialog, every product line has remained the same or improved.

2. They added "official soundtrack" to the list of required components for every game line I follow, meaning that Humble extras are often more appealing than GOG extras. (eg. Giana Sisters)

3. They sometimes include eBook extras now, like the Giana Sisters comic, The Making of Karateka, and Trine 2: Complete Story.

If they can't even implement a DRM-free filter option on the store, which seems like a no-brainer, I'm not going to punish them overly much for being incompetent at naming their product lines.

Yay! Thanks for sharing.

I've been wanting named chests for a while. Womannequin's funny, but a good idea - I'd quite like to see busts too (by which I mean mannequin heads just for displaying helmets).

I wonder if a new boss is in the pipeline. That would be nice.

It's just an illustrative example. I freely admit that I'd probably have a nervous breakdown and eventually commit suicide if society fell.

The key point is that I can use all functionality (including multiplayer) without any outside entity being able to cripple or revoke it in the future, whether through action or inaction.

I used a post-apocalyptic setting to prevent people from trying to lawyer around my rules with ideas like activation via phone. (In case you weren't aware, Windows XP could be activated without network access by calling Microsoft, reading off a hardware ID, and receiving a machine-specific activation key.)

I'm not entirely sure what you're asking. Could you rephrase it?

Multiple reasons:

1. The effort models (and, therefore, the "reasonable person" expectations underlying the relevant ethics) are diametrically opposed. Ignoring the EULA takes no effort while reading it requires time, willpower, and a certain level of reading comprehension. Finding and downloading a crack takes effort while, in theory, letting the DRM run its course does not.

2. Whether or not you read the EULA has no effect on whether the installer will install malware. Choosing to use or not use a crack does.

3. Often, EULAs knowingly lie. You need to be a lawyer or very well informed to understand which claims are enforceable and which are not. (eg. Copyright law does not grant owners the power to overrule the first sale doctrine, so no EULA can forbid you from reselling a piece of software. Modern DRM is used to allow companies to steal rights that were never granted to them in the first place. [url=http://torrentfreak.com/drm-entire-copyright-monopoly-legislation-lie-140209/][2] .)

4. If everyone actually obeyed their EULAs, the world would be a very different place. If a law cannot and never could be enforced, we should seriously re-evaluate whether it's the law or the society that's wrong.

From a less principle-oriented and more practical standpoint:

1. Programs are buggy enough without random monkey-patching... and that's assuming that the program doesn't have some kind of logic bomb like the "revenue lost to piracy" that happens to people who play cracked copies of Game Dev Tycoon or the unbeatable enemy in Serious Sam 3. (As a programmer, I know better than anyone that a program is so fragile that it's like a bridge which falls to rust if one bolt is mis-tightened.)

2. Things like the forums for PlayOnLinux (a Wine frontend) very clearly state that people who use cracks are on their own... even if it's the only way to get the game to work.

3. No support for people using cracks.

4. It's a pain in the ass to make sure you have the right crack, to make sure find and apply a new one after patching, to keep backups of your cracks, etc. (I still remember the days when everyone cracked, even if just to avoid annoying disc-swapping.)

Shall I go on?

They never replied

The focus is different.

Terraria is an action platformer with randomized levels, destructible terrain, and a focus on crafting so strong that it blurs the line. Minecraft is a sandbox game that has gained more and more action-adventure elements.

Terraria uses combat as a goal. Minecraft uses it as a means to an end.

(Minecraft lets you switch difficulty levels at any time and, aside from certain ingredients that can only be gathered from monsters, like bones, you can play the entire game in "Peaceful" difficulty if you really don't want the challenge of random monsters wandering around.)

It's like the difference between an RTS (Age of Empires) and a simulator (SimCity) Both have you building a town, but for very different reasons.

Originally, Minecraft was the epitome of "play it your way" and it still sort of is. Without hunger, you could explore to your heart's content. In the Adventure update, they changed things so that, instead of food healing you directly, it filled up a hunger meter which controlled whether your health regenerates, sits there, or trickles away.

That eliminates or complicates certain play styles because you have to prepare and bring a stack of food along with you to ensure that you don't get so hungry that you health starts draining.

They've also added other "adventure features" since then, such as a parallel dimension called "The End" where you can fight a boss.

Back in the days before the Adventure update, Minecraft seemed to be going in a different direction which better preserved that "Set your own goals. Choose whatever play style you want." approach.

I've been waiting for ages for them to release their official, stable modding API so I can start working on a mod to take Minecraft back in that direction. (I also want to experiment with the terrain generator when that happens since Minecraft has always had more potential to make exploration enjoyable for its own sake.)

Wonderful article, and all certainly very true, but allow me to play Devil's Advocate for a moment and present you with some (obviously problematic) arguments that DRM apologists are likely to throw at you.

"If there's a nuclear war, then you won't not only have no phones or no internet, but also no power."

"In the unlikely event there's a nuclear war, the last thing on your mind will be playing games."

Now, I know you meant this as a purely symbolic example, but in my - and I hope this isn't seen as bragging - rather extensive (nine-year) experience with arguing against DRM, not only in a personal capacity but also in business, I've found that you really need to apply more concrete, real-life examples of why DRM is a problem. Using analogies and allegories is usually just screaming for you to be bombarded with strawman arguments like the ones quoted above.

For example, I've often formulated my arguments on the basis of the fact that DRM is not a problem of having internet access, but of the publisher providing server access. This addresses the common argument that "everyone has internet nowadays". It's obviously wrong, but still (ironically, it was Adam Orth's rather bizarre tweet last year that killed this argument for good, as his timing was impeccable - just before Xbox LIVE went down for an extended period).

Then I've gone on to address the matter of when Steam et al. goes down. The usual response I get to this is that Steam will never go offline because they're supposedly making millions upon billions of dollars and are unlikely to ever go bankrupt. While you can refer to the cyclical nature of the video game business (gaming companies are very rarely in business for longer than a decade), I've found at this point that most people making this argument will often figuratively stick their fingers in their ears and scream "la, la, la, Steam is forever and therefore you are wrong", at which point it's probably just a better idea to leave the debate be and let them have their delusions.

It's once you get over the "everyone has internet" and "Steam is forever" fallacies that debates become genuinely interesting.