Community Bannings
We had our largest set of banning ever last week with close to 300 accounts banned in one day. Most of the account we banned where due to account theft and identity theft, which is why you should never share personal information about yourself online.
Watching our servers and talking with security professionals, identity theft definitely is one of the fastest growing crimes. Unfortunately videos games are a ripe target.
Too many people trust players that they have never met before online. Use caution, stay away from spyware that might contain Trojans, and be careful what mods you use. Never create an account where the username is the same as the password. More importantly, never share information about your self online. If someone is asking you what the name of your dog is, or your mothers name, they could be fishing for account information.
Photos from Around Ensemble
We are going to be moving offices in the near future to a new super double secret location. In memory of our current office I am going to take a few photos of our offices between now and when we move and share them here with everyone.
Here is a photo from one of our music and sound studios. We have 2 other smaller sound studios in the offices but this is the largest. This is where all of the music for Age of Empires, Age of Mythology, and Halo Wars has been put together as well as many of our sound effects. It is Chris Rippy’s primary office as well.
The photo below is part of the arcade on our 16th floor. We have birthday parties, and holiday parties here. There may have even been a wedding reception or 2 held up here. As far as arcades go we use to have 14 machines on the floor including one I was lucky enough to purchase. Now the number of machines is lower but we also have an console gaming area that we go to challenge each other to different games..
Age on wikipedia
Age of Empires was the featured topic on Wikipedia 3 weeks ago. Digging through the site there is quite a bit of information about Age of Empires and Ensemble Studios on Wikipedia. I have added some of the information myself, but most of it has been generated by our fans. It is really cool to see that much information on Wikipedia about our studios and games. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_Empires
Milo Interview
MrMilo is a relatively new employee here at Ensemble Studios and the youngest member of our team, but he makes up for that with enthusiasm and a professional attitude. He is not only one of our moderators and he is also a professional player. I sat down with him to chew the fat a bit about working here at Ensemble and professional gaming.
How long have you been playing Ensemble Studios games?
M: Since I was about ten years old. I first played AoE on a computer of one of my mom’s co-workers with a list of all the extra resource cheats and I’ve been hooked ever since.
Have you always wanted to make video games or is there something else you wanted to do?
I'm still at an age where it's hard to say what I really want to be doing in the future, but being a part of the process - and particularly the creative process - that goings into making video games is definitely appealing to me.
Have your thoughts changed at all about how games are made since you have started working here?
M: Definitely. I’ve learned a lot more about the patching process and all of the steps that anything in game development has to go through in order to be OK’ed. I’ve also developed a more aware eye of what is valuable to me in gameplay and how I can articulate that to others so that my ideas are understood.
If you could sum up your time last week at the WCG, what was the best part of the United States event?
M: As cheesy as this answer may be, it’s meeting the people you play online with and playing with them in person. Because this tournament was only one day, I didn’t get to talk with people as much as at past tournaments, but that element is still definitely the highlight of the event. =)
What are your thoughts on the future of competitive gaming?
M: I really hope that the field of competitive gaming continues to grow, especially in the United States. I’m partial to RTS, so I think it would be very cool to have a high awareness across RTS, and “Age of”, communities that their games are being played at a really high level that can provide even more entertainment to them then they’re already getting playing the games.
If there was one thing you could tell our fans about Ensemble Studios, what would it be?
M: Just what a positive and fun place to work it is. And no, all you cynical readers out there, this is not a required answer. I’m continually surprised, although at this point I really shouldn’t be, at what a loose and encouraging atmosphere we’ve got going. I hope this shows in the games and I try to keep a similarly light attitude when I go about my moderating work.
Tell us about the first time you came to ES. What where your impressions?
M: I think my first impression was simply awe. It was really exciting to just be at the office, which for those of you who don't know is decked out like a space ship, where the games I'd loved to play for so long were made. After I settled in a bit, I'd have to say (at the risk of sounding like a broken record) everybody's friendliness really made an impression on me. I had come down to do testing on The War Chiefs before it was released, and I knew that the ES guys with whom I was working were definitely under pressure to get things done and make progress, but the atmosphere was still a really fun one to be in.
Mainstreaming the Meme
Some of you might ask, “What the heck is a Meme”, and the quickest answer I can give you is any piece of cultural information that can be transferred via repetition through audio, video, or word of mouth. For more detailed information here is a link to a Wikipedia article. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meme They have been compared to cultural viruses, kind of like the song you can’t get out of your head (by the way if you can’t get a song out of your head try singing it in your head but changing the notes, it sounds crazy but it works for me).
With YouTube giving everyone the ability to create their own audio and video content there has been an explosion of meme’s in the last few years. To continue the infection metaphor, if Meme’s are a virus then YouTube is Typhoid Mary.
Now that we have been living under a constant meme barrage for the last few years something interesting has happened. These short viruses have evolved beyond YouTube and are now part of mainstream culture. How did this happen you might ask? Well these videos get millions and millions of views. They get shared and stored and sent to friends, and eventually become a common part of the culture.
Once a meme makes that jump, from cultural irrelevance to water cooler conversation piece, it has become a part of the culture. To make the jump to mainstream it has to make an even bigger jump into popular culture. In the last 2 months there have been 2 major break outs to popular culture.
South Park who created an Emmy award winning episode based on World of Warcraft has created a new episode this season with the major theme of meme’s. The episode Canada on Strike has a great 2 minute fight scene where all of the most popular meme’s fight it out in a battle royal. It is bloody and over the top. You can check it out on the southparkstudios.com site. It is mature content, so you have been warned.
The band Weezer, which I used to listen to on my way to Junior High in my friends beat up Geo Metro., has created a music video that not only features Meme’s but has most of the original creators from these Meme’s in the video. It is pretty sad that I knew every single reference they had in the video. As I write this the video has almost 6 million views.
Weezer – Pork and Beans http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muP9eH2p2PI
So where does that leave us? Will our diet of Pork and Beans be healthy for us in the long run? Is this the height of video entertainment, able to travel around the world quickly infecting everyone that watches them? Or is the main streaming of these short video clips simply just another way we parody our own behavior?
Small disclaimer: As I write this I am wearing a blue T-Shirt with the famous Dramatic Prairie Dog on the front. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jHjFxJVeCQs
E3 blog within a blog
Graham Devine was sending us photos from E3 every day while he was at E3. There are some really nice shots of our team showing off Halo Wars. A few old friends dropped by as well to say hello.
http://graemedevine.typepad.com/
Next Time – Getting to know your moderation staff and more post E3 news