Launch Day

Yesterday, we officially launched WAR. There was a gathering outside, complete with bubbly and beer. We toasted our success, picked up our Collector's Editions of our game, and went back to work.

Warhammer Online Collector's Edition
Work. Yeah, right.

The fact that WAR is an MMO means that our work has only just begun. Not counting any additional products that we might release in support of the game, there's always going to be a continued polish of systems, quests, code. Patches will come and go.

I'm on a new team. We've spent much of our time brainstorming and coming up with new ideas for top secret stuff. It's fun. The rest of the time, we've been playing our game.

I always sort of figured that WAR would be the last thing I'd want to play when I got home from work. Nothing could be further from the truth. I've been playing the game way too much. Amy loves it. My friends that have tried it have professed that they, too, enjoy it.

So there it is: my first launched computer game title. This is why I uprooted my wife and kids, left all our friends and family behind, and moved across the country. I've made plenty of other sacrifices (some of them by mistake) in the intervening 14 months.

The majority of my team is likely out today. I hear they were out late, drinking in celebration of our game's launch. They're probably laying comatose in bed, or gurgling in pools of grain alcohol-flavored vomit. Good for them. They deserve it.

Me? I'd probably be playing WAR right now, except that the servers are down for maintenance. Instead, I'll brew coffee and turn on a movie.

Nope, I ain't diggin' ditches.

Tunnel. Light at the End of It.

Launch approaches. Life goes on. Less than two weeks until WAR is being played by hundreds of thousands (maybe even millions) of folks worldwide. It's exciting; people really seem to like the game. Being so close to the content, it's sometimes hard to look at the game through anything other than a microscope.

So, yeah. Exciting.

I'm a bit preoccupied with a number of little things, including my kids (ATM). My wife is in California for the weekend, and she's left me in charge of our offspring. They're being pretty good, overall.

I had the chance to play 4E about a week ago. It seems like a good game, but like many people before me have said: it doesn't feel like Dungeons and Dragons. Add another game and edition to my grognard list.

I suppose I'll try and get a little bit of the WAR beta in today, between dirty diapers and mealtimes.