Vurtne Interview

This was an interview with Vurtne that was done in January 2011.

http://www.warcraftmovies.com/pv.php?l=vurtne

Hello Vurtne, as there might be a few newer players who do not know of you, could you tell us a little bit about yourself, what you're up to these days and what you've achieved with the community.

Disclaimer: I'm not currently playing WoW so if you expect to learn about gameplay and stuff this is probably not the right place to read it.

I'm 22, from Swe. Busy with real life atm and I haven't had any time for WoW in years. Playing SC2 really casually atm. I've made some WoW pvp movies before and had plans to make more movies later cause the previous ones were fun to make, but WoWgaming started to take up too much time even as a casual player so I gradually gave it up completly. Besides lack of time I didn't like it when Blizzard began to treat their subscribers like junkies. Of course it's not easy to be a game developer, especially when the subscribers range from the ages of 12 to 45, casual or non casual, pve or pvp. It was the pattern that they followed each patch that bored me: buff-one-patch-nerf-the-next (healers tanking 5 scrubs one patch and then gibbed instantly 1v1 the next). Game changes can definetley be interesting but the ones involving pvp was nothing but frustrating. Also, the endless grinding even as a casual pvper took most of the fun out of the game for me. If I wanna work I will go to my job and get real money.

What's your opinion on the current expansion for the potential of entertainment value in videos compared to Vanilla/TBC?

It'll not be easy considering some of the changes that have occurred since level 60. Movie standard is really high on a low standard gameplay. The best gameplay doesn't look very inviting so most good players will probably not even bother to record, knowing they will be bashed for using the "wrong" gameplay. Flying mounts, more instant spells, more HP, BG/Dungeonfinder will make it hard to find anything but indoor pvp. Spaming icelance for the third expansion in a row in a several year old battle ground is getting zZzZ.

All of the changes are very convenient both for pve and pvp and sure most people probably love it. But the dungeon system combined with flying mounts probably makes some gamers wonder if it would more convenient if Blizzard removed the world almost completly and added one flat texture instead. Players will only fly over or idle in auctionhouse anyway. It would prevent lag and save everyone some disc space.

It's been rumoured that you may return in Cataclysm, any comment?

Cata looks awesome so far (looks) but so did Wotlk/TBC on the previews. But does anyone remember the world-pvp content Blizzard introduced @ level60 in Silithus and EPL? TBC W-pvp content in Zangarmarsh, Hellfire and Terrokar? Previews looked stunning but in "reality" they sucked so bad it's hard to imagine they would ever be able to outdo themselves again. Wintergrasp again was about as much about PVP as flying mounts, but leveling and pvping in a new WoW expansion is always extremely fun. I might try a month or two as usual and see if the patches follow the same pattern as they use to.

When you played you didn't really touch arena more than to pick up a bit of gear, any reason you didn't play it or was it just the lack of time/people to play with?

I wasn't a fan of the consept of blizzard handing out charity gear for 10 games a week forcing people to do stuff they didn't really want to do. You shouldn't be forced to wear epic gear in the first place, then there's something wrong with the gamedesign. Pvp wise it was too class restricted and even if people became extreamly skilled in arena it was still embarrassing to watch "pro gaming" matches being casted when the game was tied because "WoW shoudn't be balanced around 1v1". Would be fun with some creativity in there.

When you played how did you cope with the immense amount of whispers and followers that you had, all it took was a trip to Durotar on the realm you were on to see countless amounts of Warbarbie/Vurtne clones fighting it out and begging for an invite to Total War.

It was a lot of fun and the more annoying to other people they were the funnier it was. Only ones that annoyed and still do are the Spanish ones, asking me to prove I'm me. They're persistent, so if you block one it'll be back again and again with online lexicon English.

You're heralded as a "champion of your class" in China and you were approached by Ming a few years back about writing, do you have any intention to begin writing at any point in the future?

oh the gossip.. well neh I can't write about a game that I'm not even playing. It'll waste my time and others who're expecting to read good stuff when I don't even have content. Maybe later someday but no plans right now.

One of the things that is very noticable in your videos and has not been achieved to such a degree since is the use of the camera both ingame and Vegas to shift the point of view and transistion between scenes. Having made a lot of tutorial videos yourself would you recommend future video makers to think about camera work more often and how effective it can be?

Sure. That kind of playstyle can be important but it's better to focus on actually being a good and fun player. But it's hard to be serious about pvp and have fun when many fights end with Clos+Vanish or Shadowmeld+Flightform. you just wonder WTF were the WoWdevelopers thinking?

On a similar note, we've seen some of your editing in recent productions, anything else pending?

Nothing newer than DD9. But I can give a link to my first pvp movie from 2006. The shammie I later on used in my third movie. It's so bad it's good. I was like 16 years old and you can even find spelling failures in the vid. It's a good idea to watch all of it or nothing at all cause there's a little bit of a plot going on. Quality is bad but I don't have the original file anymore.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4709270922081056473#

On Vurtne.net it was fairly common knowledge that you had an absolutely awful PC which led to you doing the Isle of Quel'danas dailies for a bit to level because even entering Borean Tundra would crash your PC, any improvement on that?

I use money to travel and not on new computer parts whether people expect new movies or not. The unfortunate thing was that I hosted a pretty big website with my poor computer and couldn't provide content. But I think people were more bothered by my computer than I was. Next time I host something I'll make sure it pays for itself.