School and Contests

So school started for me today, taking dual credit courses (Calculus, Comp, and Listening to Music) as well as the honors course Great Books, so I'm probably going to have a lot on my plate haha, my blogging might suffer. However with school coming also means that I'm laying down a schedule for myself, who knows, I may end up blogging even more frequently :)

Anyhow, the flyffish thing I wanted to talk about in this entry is the contests in flyff. Flyff is the only mmorpg I've played that has multiple weekly contests with very nice prizes. I think this mostly stems from the tight-knit community that makes up flyff, but I certainly like it. Ever since I learned about these contests (not that long ago), I've been entering to see if I could win something as well (no I haven't been successful yet). It constantly amazes me how creative the many people that enter really are. Take for example the latest maintenance contest (a contest that runs usually 10pm-1am PST on Tuesdays). The goal was to make a model flying machine for your flyff character, and one entry that particularly impressed me was a spaceship. It was made entirely out of a Pepsi can and box, but that wasn't the impressive thing. The impressive thing was that it looked crisp and professional. I honestly thought it was a professionally made toy until I saw the Pepsi symbols and the person's comment. Not to mention the insane ideas people come up with for the screenshot contests. It can be really amusing and also kind of inspiring looking at all the entries and seeing what people have come up with.

That's one of the main reasons I'm playing flyff actually. Though I'm not an incredibly active forumer, the times I do get on are a joy for me, and I find myself simply surfing the forums when I have free time (though my flyff character's level has suffered). The community is unique and very entertaining, enabling many to simply use flyff as a chatroom (as GM Sloth commented long ago in an interview) with the option of leveling if you get bored. I know as I start to level a bit higher, I tend to use it as such, logging on simply to see if a friend is on or check some shops before logging off again. But this also helps many players who would otherwise quit to stay on the game. If you get tired of the grind, you can just go hang out and chat with some people at the arena or simply browse the local darken shops. It makes it a joy instead of a job to play, which makes sense, a game isn't supposed to be work, or at least not in my definition.