GM T Adventures at Fort Ilocandia

February 25, 2008 · Filed Under Musings, Events · 1 Comment 

Last weekend, the RF and Perfect Team were with me on a visit to Laoag for an event.

Before leaving for Manila on Sunday morning, the gang and I elected to stop by at Fort Ilocandia, now a resort but orginally built by the late president Ferdinand Marcos.

The sprawling compound is vast and luxurious. 5 star amenities like a casino, golf course, archery, shooting range and a mini zoo are just some of the many things you can do while staying at the hotel.

A photo essay of our visit after the jump

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RF Online and Freestyle Cross-over Event

February 24, 2008 · Filed Under Level Up, MMORPG News, Contests, RF Online, Events · 2 Comments 

Every once in the while, some of the members of my team will think of innovative “cross-over” events. These events are, as you may have thought, quite rare since coordination between various parties, not to mention the developers, makes it doubly difficult.

Nonetheless, this new RF Online and Freestyle crossover will take advantage of the long downtime for RF this Feb 26. That’s the date that RF Online Crimson Dawn will patch and become online.

The mechanics are simple, if you’re an RF player, register a Freestyle account, make a character, level it, e-mail us and you’ll win 50 sets of elite gems for your RF character.

Props to new FS Community Manager, Toti for bugging me to approve this and doing most of the work and coordination. Of course, many thanks also to Game Manager RD, BM Hec of the Freestyle marketing team and to the RF and Game Ops teams.

Complete mechanics after the break

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The Fine Art of Video Game Writing

February 23, 2008 · Filed Under General, Musings, Gaming, Marketing · 1 Comment 

During the Game Developers Conference or GDC 2008, which is currently ongoing (Feb 18 - 22, 2008) at San Francisco, producer and editorial director for Vicarious Visions, Evan Skolnick gave a tutorial/talk on Effective Game Writing.

At this lecture, he gave practical tips on developing story and cited specific examples as well as comparing writing for video games to film writing.

Skolnick said that “”For every medium there are conventions, challenges and pitfalls… new conventions, traps to avoid. Games have them, of course. In my opinion 80% of good game writing is just good writing. That last 20% can be difficult to solve. When you go to the rest of the talks on writing, they’ll be [focused on that last 20%]. It’s challenging, there are lots of pitfalls with game writing, such as authorial intent versus player agency…”

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How Online Game Websites Should Be Positioned

February 22, 2008 · Filed Under Infotech, Marketing · Comment 

Whenever there’s a new online game or MMORPG, the folks at marketing and brand will most likely come up with a fast website plan.

Release the website, make the game available and have a way for users to play and pay - most just leave it at that and then sit back and relax. But in this cut-throat age of competition and diversity of products, you have to innovate to survive. The old premise of “build-it-and-they-will-come” mentality no longer cuts it.

MMORPG companies should take into consideration several factors in order for the website to fit into the grand strategy, give value to the product and serve the needs of the users (community).

More about this after the jump.

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Snack Hunting in Laog

February 21, 2008 · Filed Under Uncategorized, Blogging, Musings, Events · 8 Comments 

My regular readers will probably remember my fascination on “snack hunting” whenever I go to a foreign land, or in this case, just out-of-town.

And, much like Korea, my business trip to Laoag is no exception. Although my family hails from the North, I seldom get to visit. I see and learn about northern food from TV and magazines, yes. But the actual tasting and literally - trying to hunt for these local delicacies are an adventure in itself.

More about Laog snacks after the break

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Gamer Babe Marissa

February 20, 2008 · Filed Under Gamer Babe, Girls · 2 Comments 

This month’s Gamer Babe just celebrated her birthday today… even though me, her and the other Level Up managers are currently out for corporate planning here at Tagaytay. So, I’d like to wish Marissa a very HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Marissa’s our Project Manager. Her charm and kind personality lends an air of kindness in the office. A stark contrast to the very stressful tasks and projects that she manages. Even though faced with excel sheets, a hundred forms and hard deadlines, Marissa still manages to make time for some gaming on the side to “de-stress”, so to speak.

So, without further ado, let’s all welcome Gamer Babe Marissa!

Marissa’s complete profile and interview after the jump

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[ video ] Pepsi 2008 Superbowl Ad

February 20, 2008 · Filed Under Videos, Marketing · 1 Comment 

Marketing and Advertising genius at work.

This one truly hit the spot. Message is simple and you’ll surely want to watch this one. This is the Pepsi 2008 TVC for Superbowl.

Enjoy!

Drum roll please…

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[ timewaster ] Lust of Bust

February 19, 2008 · Filed Under Uncategorized, Musings, Online · 3 Comments 

Am currently out of town at Tagaytay on official business.

Apologies for not posting. But let me leave you with a truly creative game, it’s called Lust of Bust.

The goal of the game is oogle your friend’s sister, look at her cleavage and avoid being caught. Tons of fun! It’s not as easy as it seems.

Sweet! Rawwr!

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[ technology ] HD DVD is Dead!

February 19, 2008 · Filed Under Uncategorized, Infotech, Musings · 2 Comments 

Not a rumor, folks.

It seems that the format battle between Bluray and HD-DVD is finally over. And Blu-ray will be having the last laugh.

Reuters just reported that Toshiba has just announced that they are giving up the HD-DVD format for good. A source was quoted as saying; “We have entered the final stage of planning to make our exit from the next generation DVD business,” said the source, who asked not to be identified. He added that an official announcement could come as early as next week.

This might have come from the decision of Walmart not to put HD-DVD on its shelves and focus on Blu-ray instead.

This bit of news will certainly catch the ire of Xbox 360 players who bought their devices since an HD-DVD adapter is readily availble. Now my decision on which console to buy just got complicated! Egad!

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Laoag: Level Up Game Day at the Northern Gateway

February 18, 2008 · Filed Under Level Up, MMORPG News, Contests, Perfect World, RF Online, Events, Marketing · 5 Comments 

I, together with the RF Online and Perfect World teams, went to Laoag, Ilocos Norte last Friday, Feb 15 for an official event scheduled for Saturday, Feb 16. This is in line with their annual Pamulinawen week-long festival.

The 11-hour land trip began at the LU HQ at noon of Friday. I was with RF Brand Manager Keith Morales, RF CM Cydie, RF GM Janrey, the lovely and ever-dependable Joie B – Level Up Events Manager and PW Community Manager Erick Ureta. We arrived there at around midnight just in time to check-in, have last minute checklists and some idle banter.

It’s my first time here at Laoag. Aside from managing and running the RF skirmish event and the Perfect World “Perfect Match” contest, I had the wonderful opportunity of meeting the warm and kind players of this city and its equally hospitable inhabitants. Me and the Level Up team had a blast and I’m sure Laoag won’t be seeing the last of us and our games.

More details and a photo-essay after the jump…

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