REAL QUICK ANNOUNCEMENT!
Life in Aggro Forums are now UP!! Please go check them out~ There will be a number of changes to them within the next week and hopefully by Saturday I will have a more finalized topic listing, but please check it out and register if you haven’t already. Pie and I look forward to chatting with you all!

It has become increasingly popular for companies to adopt the micro transaction business model. This has opened up a lot of fantastic opportunities to market games and related items for substantially reduced prices. It also opens the door for small and independent developers to bring their ideas to life and get them seen. For the most part, micro transactions have been a great boon to the industry.

One of the biggest marketers of so-called micro transactions is companies running MMO (Massively Multiplayer Online) games. Many have offered up items in their games to supplement or replace the usual subscription model in order to reach a wider player base. Many times when these companies forgo the subscription model, they are banking on the fact that they will have a higher user base (what does the player have to lose?) and in exchange they will offer small, usually consumable, game items that will somehow enhance the players experience for a modest cost through increased efficiency or vanity items. Again, a player that has nothing invested in the game may find it easy to swallow small charges here and there at their discretion.

It has become commonplace now for companies, not just MMO providers, to offer up their small items and trinkets in hopes of snagging a few extra bucks. It has quickly escalated to an obscene amount of micro transaction shenanigans with companies offering up things that should already be in game or things that are beyond trivial in massive quantities – sometimes stemming from what appears to be pure greed. It is happening too often and companies need to start thinking long and hard what is worth putting out there and what should just be shelved. Who cares if you pay some art intern $20 to create a vanity E-Shirt that you want to sell for $1 a piece (ROFL PlayStation Home)? How about instead of banking on the fact that as long as you get 21 suckers to buy your E-Shirt to turn a small profit, you show some self respect and either not sell the item or change your business model to charge a modest monthly price for your online services?

The hatred for these small items runs deep with me. I recently completely rage-quit an MMO I had been extremely loyal to for 8 years because of the over abuse of the cash shop they introduced within the last 3 years. They broke what seems to be taboo to other MMO companies in offering items that provided substantial gains to players – items that could NOT be obtained through the game naturally. They also made it so you don’t just spend $2 or $3 bucks on an item, but you spend that much on a CHANCE to get the item. That’s right – they expect you to gamble for their shitty items. The latest offense they offered up was for people to spend $3 on this gamble box with various items with one prize that everyone looked forward to for several years. The odds you would get the item was MAYBE 10%, but to add insult to injury, they made it so that IF you got the item, it was in components that had a 25% rate of success to compound successfully. If it failed, the items were destroyed.

Needless to say I have turned into a huge opponent of the company after being so faithful and now do everything in my power to persuade friends I made in while playing away from the game to help stop business being given to such this screwed up company. Companies that have good products on their hands need to have faith that their services and items will sell and honor their customers – not milk them until they collapses into a dusty pile of bones.

Remember everyone – your biggest mechanism for voting doesn’t come from living in a Democratic society – it all stems from your buying power. If you like the way a company does business; show them by voting with your wallet. Just don’t be afraid to pull your votes when they start doing the wrong things; after all, how else will they learn?

Bear finally got the forum up guys so make sure to register and say "hello!" =D I think we'll both be really happy even if you just write a simple hello, then we at least know there are people out there who like and are reading Life in Aggro. ^_-

I've been thinking a lot about Metroid other M lately and I admit that I'm a little curious about how it will turn out though I am also still disappointed that Samus isn't the Samus I had in mind while I was growing up. I think most of my idea of who Samus is came from the Super Metroid comics in the old Nintendo Powers. Do you guys remember those? Nintendo Power used to feature chapters of comics of Super Mario World, Zelda: Link to the Past, Super Metroid, Star Fox, and others monthly long ago; the ones I mentioned I remember being most enjoyable. Nintendo Power eventually sold graphic novels of the comics at their mail-in-order store but I was only able to get the Zelda one (which I'm really thankful to this day about buying). I still think it's such a shame that I couldn't get the others though and it makes me want to get the old magazines from my brother. >.<

Since I've been thinking about Metroid lately, I decided to pop in Metroid Fusion for a bit (it's actually Bear's game. =x). I admit that I never played much of the game at all. Having Samus's ship's computer Adam giving objectives is a big turn-off. -_- I think Super Metroid really is the embodiment of what Metroid truly is to me. It's about dark exploration and powering up on an alien planet with a sprinkle of mystery. I remember it being a thrilling experience traversing Zebes, moving from room to room, from corridor to corridor, being a little scared yet excited about what dangers were around the corner. I think the game's atmosphere crept me out at the time, but it was fun! I guess that's what I want in a new Metroid game and just the idea of having other people in the game and being told where to go and what to do completely ruins the mood. I'm not sure if I'll ever play Metroid other M, but to those excited and are buying it, I hope you all enjoy it.

Bear and I recently saw the movie Scott Pilgrim VS the World with a few friends and it was really fun! XD I thought the pacing was really fast at first, but then you get used to it. By the end of the movie, I was wanting to watch it again. There're just so many things that happen in the movie that I think I want to catch anything that I might have missed and to enjoy some of the really cool and funny parts again. =)

Whenever I see or think about Brian O'Malley's "Scott Pilgrim" series, I think about how much I want to be a successful comic artist/author too. I'm pretty sure I mentioned it before, but I think it's really inspiring seeing independent developers become really successful, especially if it's in something they love to do and are doing original work. It makes me really want to start Bear's and my Chromatic Shift, but then I think how long it must take to get pages done; it takes me so long to just get a Life in Aggro page done. ._. I really gotta get faster! I wonder how other amateur artists (with no assistants) do it. '_' I'm very lucky because since a few comics ago, Bear's been helping me with coloring and doing speech bubbles. XD He's so candy!~ =F -which is probably the reason actually why the backgrounds are looking a lot more detailed lately. >.>

Speaking of today's comic, I can't help loving that running turtle thing. XD Bear and I were watching a played demo of Final Fantasy 14 from last E3 and whoever was playing did a quest where they had to kill two crabs. Lots of running ensued. XD Bear was saying comments as we watched and I was laughing so hard!~