I'm kind of curious how many other gamers are like me and like to play games with their significant other.  Delilah and I really like to play games together, but haven't really had many opportunities lately.  You would think this would be easy, but the big catch is that we don't really enjoy competing against each other so that rules out most multiplayer games.

Why don't we compete against each other?  I create games for a living and play way more games, so I'm usually better at them.  So it's no fun for either of us if we are competing directly.

So anyways, we have played a lot of games co-op (Diablo, Star Wars Lego, etc.).  Some singleplayer games we have played together by switching back and forth who is actively playing (Zelda).  We have even gone as far as starting games, saving instantly, and transferring the saved game to the other person's computer so we could play in the same game (Civ games).

So back to my questions.  Anyone else out there that plays games with their significant other?  Anyone play primarily co-op with their SO?  And finally anyone else go through so much trouble to do it?

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So I'm going through the news of the last couple days, and not one but two RPG companies have gone out of business.  Both Iron Lore (Titan Quest) and P2 Entertainment (Gods and Heroes) have shutdown.

It sucks when any company goes out of business.  Even if you don't like a particular company or their products, there are still a bunch of individuals involved that don't deserve to lose their jobs.  Hopefully all of their employees will land new jobs in the industry pretty quickly. 

But neither one of these are really surprising.  Typical retail game developers start and usually stay in a really bad business position.  Most developers can't survive without a publisher contract paying their current overhead and typically the contract ends when your current game ships.  So if you can't sign another contract soon enough after the first game ships, you tend to go out of business.  They basically live paycheck to paycheck and the paychecks might stop at the end of each game.  I have no idea if this happened to Iron Lore, I just know it is extremely common.

As for P2, what does everyone expect?  All of the MMO people seem to be trying to compete directly with WoW.  This not only means you are trying to beat out WoW which is very unlikely, but you are competing with the other tons of companies trying to do the same thing.  It's just common sense that most of these companies are going to fail.

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Reflexive has posted some numbers of piracy on one of their internal games (Ricochet Infinity) over on Gamasutra.

The short version is they found out that 92% of the games being played were pirated.  Let me state that number again - 92%.  I've said this before, but this is one of the big reasons why more and more companies are moving towards console or MMO games.  It is hard to survive when 92% of the people playing your games aren't actually paying for them.  This is only a single game, so hopefully this is really higher than the industry as a whole though.

And before anyone says that pirates aren't lost sales because they wouldn't buy the games anyways, when Reflexive put in a fix to obsolete existing exploits and keygens their sales went up 70%.  That doesn't actually cover very many of the people that were pirating the game, but getting a 70% rise in sales is huge.  This unfortunately is exactly why most companies feel that they are forced to use DRM these days. :(

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I posted about Depths of Peril being a finalist for Wizards of the Coast's/Gleemax's Gleemie awards on our main news page the other day because it is important news for Soldak and Depths of Peril, but it is also really cool from a personal level.

Considering that I have owned at least 3 different generations of D&D books, played D&D for years when I was yonger, have played countless D&D computer games over the years, have read over 70 Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms novels, and even played Magic: The Gathering for a while, I'm kind of a fan of TSR and WotC. :)  So even just being a finalist for an award from them is just plain cool.

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Jay over at Rampant Games has decided to start a question of the month type interview with several indie companies that make RPGs.  I'm one of 10 different indie people that answered this months question: Why Indie RPGs?

I'm apparently getting wordy in my old age, since my answer is the longest (it's near the bottom).

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Taxes. :(  I swear every year my taxes get more and more complicated.  My 2007 tax return was the most painful yet (doing them, not what I have to pay).  The sad part, I already know that 2008 is going to be even worse.

I don't think it would be good for the economy, but a straight federal sales tax with no income tax is starting to sound really good right now for some reason.

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One of our players started a meme a little while back for Depths of Peril, so I thought I would join in.  Click on the comments link at the bottom if you want to see other people's answers or if you want to answer them yourself.

Are you male or female?

• male

What is your favorite character, the one that you play the most (short version, pls: name, type, lvl)?

• I have too many characters to count, but I usually like warriors the most these days.  One of my favorites, although I haven't played him in a while, is Jarrow a level 25 warrior.

Who does that character travel/party with?

• Lately, who ever is the highest level and I constantly replace the lower level recruits unless they are just awesome.

What type of monster do you hate the most?

• None of them really, but what do you expect from the designer. :)

What type do you like the most?

• Depends on the day.  Right now the imps because they have 2 types with different personalities and they have a cool story about them.

What terrain do you like the most (ie: forest, desert, underground)

• The areas that stand out the most like Black Forest and Red Death. 

Do you like day or night the most?

• Night.  It is a little more dangerous, but has more loot.

What is your favorite type of quest?

• Hidden treasure and recruit quests.

What is your favorite fighting tactic?

• Wade right in and start killing everything, use lots of food and potions, and run when necessary.

Do you collect treasures during a fight or after?

• During for easy fights and after for harder fights.

How do you explore new territory (above ground)?

• Usually around the outside and then the inside.

How do you explore new territory (under ground)?

• No real technique, wander towards areas that I haven't been.

Do you use keyboard hotkeys or click icons?

• Hotkeys.

Do you end the game when you've beaten the other covenants, or play further to win more quests?

• I'll finish up any good quests I have and then start a new game.

Does your character have any quirks that you've made up?

• Depends on the character.  My warriors tend to always go for straight military wins, whereas my other characters are much more open to diplomatic options.

What are your five favorite tips?

• Certain monsters should be killed quickly: scavengers, plaguebringers, dimensional gates, and liches.
• Keep your relations up with at least a couple of the other covenants so you have some friends and the covenants aren't all enemies.
• Solve as many quests as possible.  They give good XP and influence.
• Try to always have your skill points used up.  You can always buy them back if you want to change them.
• Tell all of your friends to buy the Depths of Peril also. Ok, I had to sneak at least one of these in here. :)

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Can all of the companies making RPG games please, for the love of all that is good and holy, please stop naming their games Dungeon X.  I can't even keep track of them any more and I probably pay way more attention to the genre than most people.

I mean in the last few years (or upcoming) we have had Dungeon Explorer, Dungeon Siege (1, 2, and a couple expansions), many Dungeons & Dragons products, Dungeon Cleaners, Dungeon Delvers, Dungeon Hero, Dungeon Lords, Dungeon Runners, and probably others that I have forgotten about.

Now I don't expect D&D to change, but can everyone else please stop naming their games the same thing?

Is everyone else tired of this practice and starting to forget what game is what or is it just me?  Maybe I should have called Depths of Peril, Dungeon Peril instead. :)

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