Dev Diary: Skirmish Video Diary

Today there was released a short (3 minutes 40 seconds) video on YouTube with both Zombie Columbus and Jwbarry giving a brief overview of the Skirmish System taking a look at the system up to Volume 3.1.  While there’s not a lot of new information, I like the trend that this might open up to future Developer Diaries.  I am much more prone to watch a video than to read a long post.  Plus there were quite a few videos from in-game as well which I thought was a good way to keep the flow of the video going.  Putting it on YouTube instead of in some java/flash/proprietary player on the LOTRO.com site was a good move as well.  While I think that there should definitely be a post on the LOTRO.com site containing the imbedded video from YouTube; having it hosted on YouTube makes this accessible to the general public.

Now for the criticism.  This diary really feels like it should have been released earlier.  I know that this might have been a learning process and lord knows I’m not the most punctual on my video or audio editing, but this took a really long time.  I would suggest that if the editing and approval process cannot be shortened, that the recording take place earlier to time the release better.  Also, although the video kept the flow of the diary going, a lot of it was re-used from previous videos.  Now I don’t think it’s reasonable to expect all-new footage, but maybe 70% new?  I don’t think that’s asking too much, especially considering how long this took to release.

Regardless of all that, I think this is a good step forward in developer diaries.  Granted, not all Turbine employees might enjoy being filmed, but I would hope that they would put that aside for something like this.  This extra step really makes me feel more connected to Turbine.  Bravo!