Travis4

Joined 01/23/2012
  Admin

Web developer and all-around geek.
https://travisnewman.me

547 Posts

The State of the Wyvern, August 2019
Welcome to another installment of The State of the Wyvern! The State of the Wyvern is a monthly post we'll be making here to share round up the new additions and changes to the game, as well as give you a tease of what's to come.

Current Player Leaderboards

The current player power ranking leaderboard top 5 players are led by Rather Dashing, Marixu Cas, Nelun, Tiberius and M’hael! The top 5 PvP leaderboard rankings are Tiberus with 27 kills, Maverick with 26, MyDude with 19, Button Smasher and Caz with 16!

Over the past few days, many players defeated the Wyvern for the first time. Congratulations to Tiberius, Maverick, MyDude, Bina Marie, Golok, Duncan Idaho, Zehronioud, Ktara, Declan, GregoPeck, Button Smasher, Caz, Conan, Friday, and Marixu Cas for all killing the Wyvern. The Wyvern is a feisty foe and seems to love dying to let’s keep sending it back to the other side!

Recent Updates

Every month we wrap up all the large updates in a State of the Wyvern post here on Cheerful Ghost, but if you want to know what’s changing a bit sooner, check the Wyvern Changelog. Each time we update the game we update the changelog so you can stay on top of the latest updates that might effect how you play.

https://thewhitewyvern.com/game/1/changelog

Beyond a slew of bug fixes we’ve also changed and added the following things:

  • Primrose Park & Hero Shrine: Primrose Park is a new location in Other Places. It currently only has the Hero's Shrine that will honor the first 5 players to defeat the Wyvern in this game.

  • Forest Fights: We have removed the "troll" monsters or lower level monsters in high level fights that wouldn't give you very much gold or experience. All monsters at high levels are now appropriately scaled.

  • Forest Fight XP & Gold Drops: Experience and gold drops for level 10, 11 and 12 monsters in the forest have been increased by 30%.


  • Random Forest Events:

    • If you are fully healed the healing event no longer shows up.

    • A new random encounter in the forest has been added, so you can now find 1 or 2 gems, whereas before there was only an event for finding a single gem.

    • The random gold find event now gives you gold based on your level.

    • You can now be pick-pocketed by a thief in the forest. Make sure to deposit that gold!



  • NPC Interactions: Originally if you interacted with the NPCs Scarlet, Crugg and Jon Boyd they all awarded you the same amount of experience depending on the amount of charm you had. Now NPCs grant you benefits differently:

    • Interacting with Scarlet grants you experience.

    • Interacting with Jon Boyd grants you gold.

    • Interacting with Crugg grants you forest fights.


    As always you can only interact with one NPC per day, but now you now can make a strategic choice based on what you want to gain for the day.

    Jon Boyd still remains different in that you can have him sing a song every day on top of all this. As you gain more charm, the experience, gold and forest fight benefits from the NPC interactions grow.

  • The Outhouse: The Outhouse is a new location in Other places. We don’t want to spoil the fun, so we aren’t telling you anything else about it, go check it out!



What’s Coming Next?

For a bit more depth on what's coming next, check out the State of the Wyvern Cheerful Ghost Radio episode (embedded above), but from a high level we are going to offer more accessible Cheerful Ghost memberships and set the stage for a bunch of really cool new game updates.

Thank you for playing and let us know any feedback or thoughts you have on the game in the comments.

If you haven't played Tale of the White Wyvern yet, head over to https://thewhitewyvern.com/ now to play for free!

No Man’s Sky: Beyond Out Now!
No Man’s Sky: Beyond is rolling out now, and this is the biggest update yet. It seems as though every system in the game has been improved upon, on top of the new additions it adds.

I won’t go into all of them here, because there are so many. But here are the highlights.


  • Expanded multiplayer, allowing up to 8 players per session on console, and 32 players on PC.

  • VR support, for various PC VR systems and PSVR. And you can use standard controls or motion controls.

  • Heavy optimization, including switching to Vulkan rendering on PC. This one is huge for older PCs and AMD cards, and Vulkan has many other benefits for optimization across the board.

  • New story elements have been added to stitch together the multiple stories that have been added since launch.

  • Crafting, tech learning, and language learning have gotten a significant overhaul to make them more accessible and give players more choice. For example, the tech you learn is now in a tree, where you can pick and choose which path to take for what is important to you at the time.

  • The space anomaly is now a player hub, and Nada and Polo now have a bunch of new friends with them that can give you new story and missions.

  • NPC animations have been improved, they’ll now walk around and interact with the environment.

  • You can now ride some of the creatures you find on your travels.

  • Base building has been overhauled, and they’ve added powered objects and logic to the mix to make some more advanced bases.

  • One of the most requested features (though probably as a joke) has been implemented: you can now sit in chairs.


But really, this isn’t nearly all. If you’ve seen it in the game, it has probably been tweaked in some way. Check out the full patch notes here:

https://www.nomanssky.com/beyond-update/

DuckTales: Remastered Leaving All Digital Storefronts This Week
https://i.imgur.com/R5bHGfA.png
If you've been putting off buying DuckTales: Remastered, it's time to make a decision. Unfortunately, it will be leaving digital storefronts in a few days. Steam and Xbox will lose the game August 8th at 8PM EST, and the Wii U shop and Playstation 3 will lose it on the 9th at 8PM EST.

Bonus, it's getting a 75% off sale most places as a farewell sale. For under 4 bucks, this is a steal.

It saddens me that this game is leaving. There's no reason stated, but it's likely licensing issues with Disney. That's a common thing with licensed games. If you want to read more about my thoughts on this game, I covered those here... six years ago. Wow, it's been that long!
https://cheerfulghost.com/Travis/posts/1543/life-is-like-a-hurricane-here-in-duckburg

Full post from Capcom:
http://www.capcom-unity.com/capkel/blog/2019/08/06/pick-up-ducktales-remastered-on-sale-now-before-it-leaves-digital-storefronts-starting-august-8th

The Original Hype Launch Campaign: Get Your Free Wyvern DLC!
https://i.imgur.com/SsQ52ZG.png
Jon and I want to thank everyone for checking out Tale of the White Wyvern, it was an incredible amount of fun! Now, after giving you all a taste of the game, we are going to be sharing the game with the larger world, and if you help us you can earn some free in-game DLC! Starting today, if you retweet or share the game on Facebook or Reddit, we will send you an Original Hype DLC code for 500 gold, 2 gems and the Original Hype player title!

Cheerful Ghost Tweet to RT:
https://mobile.twitter.com/_cheerfulghost/status/1155849834366156800

If you shared the game on Facebook or Reddit let us know in the comments and we will message you the DLC code privately here on Cheerful Ghost. If you re-tweeted and we didn’t see it and DM you the code, comment here and we’ll square you up.

Once you redeem the code on your Tale account you can head in game to activate it on your player in-game. One cool thing about Tale of the White Wyvern DLC is that it will work on each Tale game you play. Some parts of the DLC will only redeem once per game like the gold and gems, but you can get the player title on each Tale of the White Wyvern game you play.

Make sure to grab your DLC because the Original Hype pack will only be available to players until October!

If you haven't played Tale of the White Wyvern yet, head over to https://thewhitewyvern.com/ now to play for free!

Play Tale of the White Wyvvern Right Now!
Tale of the White Wyvern is a text based, high fantasy, sword and magic adventure mini-MMO that you can play with your friends, and is finally here and ready for you to play by heading over to https://thewhitewyvern.com! We’ve spent the last few months working hard on the game and are happy you can finally play it! We also wanted your first day in game to go smoothly so we created a Let’s Play you can watch above to get a taste for what to expect in game!

Tale of the White Wyvern is in open beta, so let us know if you have any questions or run into any bugs. We have instructions you can read before you play from the game menu, and we also offer tips along the way to make things easy to understand. That said, the world of Tale of the White Wyvern is large, secrets vast and foes dangerous so tread carefully!

https://thewhitewyvern.com/

Cheerful Ghost Member Benefits

Cheerful Ghost Members will receive exclusive in-game cosmetic rewards, such as the “Cheerful Patron” and “Ghost Friend” titles. They will also get two in-game color themes “Cheerful Ghost” and “Cheerful Ghost After Dark” and access to alternate weapon and armor sets. I want to note that these alternate weapon and armor sets are cosmetic only and are the same cost and power level as the normal sets.

King Frosthelm’s Member Exclusive Weapon Set:


  • Wooden Sword

  • Bee Keeper

  • Plumbers Mushroom

  • Bat'leth

  • Rey's Staff

  • The White Sword

  • Biggoron's Sword

  • Phoenix Feather Core Wand

  • Newman’s Edge

  • Plasma Beam

  • The Fire Flower

  • Jacket's Baseball Bat

  • Leonardo's Katana

  • The Master Sword

  • Grumpy Old Man's Lightsaber




Asadi’s Exclusive Armor Set:


  • Brown Tunic

  • Iron Armor

  • Red Plumber’s Cap

  • Tiger Suit

  • Scavenger Robes

  • The Blue Ring

  • Joel's Yellow Jumpsuit

  • Moogle Suit

  • Newman’s Armor

  • Samus's Power Armor

  • Red Plumber's Suit

  • Jacket's Letterman

  • Hardened Turtle Shell

  • Kokiri's Green Tunic

  • Tatooine Robes



We plan on adding more Cheerful Ghost Member cosmetic exclusives over the upcoming months.

https://thewhitewyvern.com/

Tale of The White Wyvern Launches July 28th!
https://i.imgur.com/0uGOHCP.jpg
In January, Jon and I started development on Tale of the White Wyvern, one of the coolest things we’ve made together, and this July 28th you will all be able to play it! Since the launch date is right around the corner we wanted to talk to you about how the launch will happen, more information about awesome launch day rewards, some information about how gems and in-game partnerships will work, as well as special Cheerful Ghost Member exclusives!

Tale of the White Wyvern Cheerful Ghost Launch on July 28th
We want to launch the game for users of Cheerful Ghost on July 28th as a thank you for being with us for the last seven years! Truely, Tale of the White Wyvern is a love letter to the text adventure games we loved playing in the 90’s as well as a thank you for being such an amazing community. As such we are going to launch the game on Cheerful Ghost on July 28th with no wider social media push to give all of you first crack at playing it.

As soon as the game is ready to play we will post to Cheerful Ghost so check the site on the 28th and if you plan on playing on the 28th let us know in the comments!

Tale of the White Wyvern Social Push and Wider Release on July 29th
On July 29th we will start our social media campaign letting the wider world know Tale of the White Wyvern is released. This wider social push will come with us Tweeting about the game and sharing it on Facebook. To help get the game a wider audience and give you a chance to earn some awesome in game rewards starting July 29th if you retweet our official Tale of the White Wyvern tweet or reshare the game on Facebook or any other Social Network you will get the “Original Hype 2019” launch DLC!

WHAT’S THAT? AN ENTIRELY FREE DAY ONE DLC? Yeah, totally and it’s pretty neat too because not only does it come with the “Original Hype” in game title but you will also get 500 gold and 2 gems!

On July 29th we’ll post on Cheerful Ghost about the Original Hype campaign and give directions on how you can earn the DLC. We’re going to be monitoring Twitter and for each person that retweets we will direct message you the DLC code so make sure to follow us on Twitter to get the direct message! If you share the Tale of the White Wyvern game on Facebook https://thewhitewyvern.com/ just put @Cheerful Ghost in the Facebook post body and we will send you the hype code. If you share it on any other social network let us know on the Original Hype Cheerful Ghost post and we will message you the DLC code.

If somehow you shared the game launch but we didn’t get you the code you can comment on the Original Hype post on Cheerful Ghost and we will message you the DLC code.

Partnership With Other Players
We wanted Tale of the White Wyvern to be a game where people could interact with other players. We enable this through player ladders where everyone can compete on most in game player kills, wyvern kills and more! But competition isn’t the only way to interact with other players as on day one you will be able to have relationships with other players!

Marriage is an interesting feature I’ve long enjoyed in other games and Tale of the White Wyvern will allow players to obtain a in-game legal partnership with another player for a small fee with some pretty interesting daily rewards. When you are in Tale if you enter Calinda’s Hof you can send any player that is not currently partnered a proposal if you pay the 300 gold fee. Currently an in-game partnership comes with a few rewards in an extra 2 forest fights and 10 experience point gain per day. Since Tale of the White Wyvern is an open minded high fantasy sword and magic game anyone can marry anyone in-game and the only thing you need is a willing partner and the ability to pay the licensing fee.

Gems
As you fight in the forest you have a random chance to earn gems. If you save your gems you can spend them on interesting things in the game such as stat boosts, level upgrades and the ability to spy on other players.
Gem Stat Boosts: If you head to Helga's Potions and Healing, you can trade two gems for a permanent stat boost. Depending on your play style you can trade two gems for 1 Strength Point, 1 Defense Point or 3 Hit Points.

Gem Level Upgrades: Each time you level up at Tarbreth’s Adventurer Training you get a new level upgrade. Level upgrades give your class abilities more power and can give you a class use point increase depending on your class and level. If you decide you want to upgrade your class level and have 6 gems you can do that in Tarbreth’s Adventurer Training. Where to go to obtain the class upgrade for 6 gems depends on your class. If you are Mage you must train at The Magic Room. If you are a Rogue you must speak to Raynard the Fox and if you are a Warrior head to Mead Hall for your upgrade.

Spying on other Players: There is a secret area in the game that all adventurers eventually find where you can spend 2 gems to spy on other players. Each player in Tale of the White Wyvern will have a public profile with information on what noteworthy things that player has done. That said, not all information about each player will be known to everyone so if you want to know what kind of weapon or armor they have and more to scope them out before you attack them in game, you can. You will first need to get to the secret area and spend two gems to find more about the player you want to know about.

Tale of the White Wyvern Will Require a Cheerful Ghost Account to Play
If you want to play Tale of the White Wyvern you will need to sign up for a free Cheerful Ghost account. The reason why we are requiring people have a Cheerful Ghost account to play is because we didn’t want to create a bunch of games that had separate authentication to annoy people to remember different usernames and passwords for each game. The cool part is each new game we create can use the same Cheerful Ghost account to make it simple for everyone.

Cheerful Ghost In-Game Member Rewards
If you are a Cheerful Ghost Member you will earn special in-game rewards that are special to Members as a thank you for your support. We expect that the in-game rewards will grow over time, but at launch this is what Members will receive:

  • Two exclusive titles: Ghost Friend and Cheerful Patron.

  • Access to member only Weapon and Armor sets at King Frosthelm’s Weaponry and Asadi’s Armor. Members will be able to access the secret back room of the weapon and armor shop to buy and sell exclusive weapon and armor sets. I want to stress that these member exclusive weapons and armor are the exact same cost and power level as the normal weapons and armor. We’re just providing custom, cosmetic weapons and armor for Cheerful Ghost supporters.

  • Two exclusive in-game color themes.


https://thewhitewyvern.com/
See you July 28th in the game!

Starcraft: Cartooned Now Available
Well. Here’s a post I never expected to be making.

There’s a new version of Starcraft out right now, that’s been entirely tooned. The new art is done by Carbot, who has gained fame for some pretty hilarious animations based on Blizzard games.


StarCraft: Cartooned re-imagines every unit, structure, map, menu, and mission with the beloved art style of Carbot Animations. Add a whole new look to the epic single player campaign, take the cartooned mayhem online and go head-to-head on the multiplayer ladder, or join your friends for your favorite custom game – even if they don’t own StarCraft: Cartooned!


I love that Blizzard is still giving the original Starcraft some love, and this looks like a fun way to play it.

https://starcraft.com/en-us/articles/23053097

The Nintendo Switch Lite, Coming September 2019
The rumors about a new Switch version were true! In September, the Switch Lite will be released.

This new model lives up to its name in many ways

  • It’s light on price, $100 cheaper.

  • It’s light on features, as it’s portable only, with no TV output.

  • It’s light on screen real estate, having a slightly smaller screen.

  • It’s lighter in the literal sense, around 25% weight reduction.

  • And it’s lighter on battery use, as all these add up to less of a power drain.



This sounds like a perfect entry to the Switch family, an entry level system for people who only want to play it on the go, and don’t want to pay $300.

While I don’t do a lot of portable gaming, I could see myself eventually picking up one of these just for some of the local, multi-Switch multiplayer games.

So what do you think? If you already have a Switch, do you want this? If you don’t, is this an enticing entry to Switch gaming?

See the full specs here : https://www.nintendo.com/switch/compare/

Dr. Mario World Is Out! Here Are My First Impressions.
Nintendo's next mobile game, Dr. Mario World, released today!

It's an interesting spin on Dr. Mario, but the premise is still the same. There are germs on the screen that you have to get rid of. You use pills that match the color of the germs to remove them. I somehow doubt the medical accuracy, but it's a fun puzzle game.

Edit: This mini review you’re about to read was written too early. Be sure you read the very end.

I played through 20 levels and it's... pretty good so far. I will keep using it as a time waster but I'm not blown away.

I have a problem with the touch controls but it's honestly partially on me. You can place the pills anywhere on the board and they'll float upwards. Since you can place them anywhere, why wait? Just put them where you want right? But you can also move them laterally or up, BUT NOT DOWN, while they're out on the board. So what keeps happening to me is, I can't properly see it under my thumb and I put it in the wrong place. About 5 times that's required a restart to even finish the level because it seems like the first few moves are often necessary to get right.

And another problem is a problem I've had with nearly every mobile game. It seems like the majority of your time playing is watching the level loading screens and the success screens because you can't tap to skip through.

A new mechanic that I'm mixed on is choosing your doctor. After a few levels you can choose between Mario, Peach, and Bowser, and each come with their own special power. Which ever one you choose, you're locked in unless you unlock the others (and also non-starter doctors) purely randomly by using the in-game currency. It's a loot box system to unlock characters, and those are always a fan favorite. But as far as I can tell, there aren't any requirements on using different ones, so this doesn't exactly screw up your gameplay but it's something to note.

BUT at its core it still has the Dr. Mario mechanics and premise, with some modern puzzle game mechanics to flesh it out, and that's still fun, usually. But I don't feel a strong drive to play a ton of it. This is a 10 minutes a day kind of game. And honestly that may be a good thing. It doesn't feel like it has the same addictive loop that games like Two Dots and such have. And with Two Dots and basically every other free-to-play cash machine, they had progression halting mechanics that you had to either wait or pay to get through to capitalize on that addictive loop. Edit: Welp. That was a nice thought anyway

So far, I haven't seen anything that could halt your progress like that, however I somewhat expect there to be some powerups that are just *barely* not required to progress. You can buy these powerups with coins you collect in game, but then you have the quandary of grinding the hell out of them or paying real money.

At any rate, this is a much kinder free-to-play model than what you may be used to with other puzzle games, and it's a fun game to fill some time here and there. Twenty levels seems like a lot but it's only a drop in the bucket for what's available, so I don't know how the game might change, but it's definitely worth downloading and trying out.

Edit: Well, they got me. I didn’t notice the heart counter. I ended up on a level in the mid-20s that was giving me some trouble and suddenly I couldn’t play without waiting 30 minutes or paying real money. This is just the same free-to-play-on-our-schedule-unless-you-pay puzzle formula with some Dr. Mario mechanics and a Mushroom Kingdom coat of paint. You may have read my posts or comments here before about this kind of mechanic: when I see a pay or wait blocker, I uninstall. So I have.

Please Nintendo, and other mobile game developers, give me an option to throw you five bucks and not have this stuff happen. I love you and I’ll keep playing Mario Run (yep, I still fire that up occasionally), but this is a big miss for me.

Cheerful Ghost Radio Episode 62: Ninja Gaiden
In this episode, we're talking all about the classic NES game from Tecmo, Ninja Gaiden. This game has fueled many controller-throwing fits for people of all ages through the years, and has stayed popular with multiple sequels and different series.