jdodson1

Joined 01/23/2012

I'm an Engineer and built the video game community Cheerful Ghost and text based mini-MMO Tale of the White Wyvern.

2757 Posts

http://a.dilcdn.com/bl/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2015/03/aftermath_new.6.red_-1536x864-986319531640.jpg
As I am a big Star Wars fan I am happy to report on some interesting news out of the new Star Wars-verse. Since the old Star Wars Universe was rebooted in favor of the new Star Wars Universe, Disney is pretty hip to release all manner of new stories that take us from the events of Return of the Jedi to the upcoming The Force Awakens. Today they dropped some news about an upcoming series I found pretty interesting.

"The second Death Star has been destroyed. Rumors are flying that the Emperor and his enforcer, Darth Vader, are dead. A new government is forming to replace the Empire. But the galaxy is a big place, and the fallout of this cataclysm will affect different worlds in different ways. Does everyone accept the fall of Imperial rule? Has everyone even heard the life-altering news? What rushes in to fill the vacuum the Empire has left? And who will try to stop them? Those are some of the themes we’ll be exploring in Aftermath, and as a lifelong Star Wars fan, just writing those words gives me chills. I can’t wait for our first canon glimpse into the state of the galaxy after the Battle of Endor."

Star Wars Aftermath drops September 9th and I am fairly certain I will pick it up on release. I've really enjoyed many Star Wars books including Timothy Zahns Thrawn trilogy as well as Star Wars Bounty Hunters and hope this is just as good.

Are you interested in filling in the backstory for the new Star Wars Universe up to the new film?

http://www.starwars.com/news/what-happened-after-endor-find-out-in-star-wars-aftermath


In this recent episode of Game/Show Jamin asks "Why can't Link be a girl?" And whereas that's not a bad question, i'd rather flip it to ask why Zelda can't be the hero of a game named after her? She seems capable and I bet Link could use a vacation. Jamin asks the question if people may be turned off by Link being a female and as I thought about it I imagine some would be. That said those people are more rare these days and getting a great Zelda game featuring Zelda or Femlink would be too interesting to avoid.

I was talking about this the other day with friends and one of them mentioned Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon as a game that features Zelda as the main character. I mentioned that terrible games shouldn't count for much AND that it wasn't made by Nintendo anyway. Not to say it doesn't officially count in the Zelda-verse cannon, I would just prefer a good game to come out of Zelda as the star.

What do you think, should Zelda or Femlink star in her own game or should we keep getting everyone favorite Kokiri?


If you love Portal 2 and by some chance missed the writers of Portal 2, Chet and Erik do a post mortem of Portal 2 at GDC I highly recommend you watch it. They cover the original designs of what Portal 2 was supposed to be and how it became the game we all love. They give some hints at some secret mechanics of a future Valve title called "F Stop."


YouTuber Andrew Colunga recently created a new series of FTL cartoon shorts called FTL Kestrel Adventures. They mix up some original pixel art and in game FTL game captures to propel the story. It's a bit of a mixture of Machinima and original art, which is really neat to watch.

Episodes 1 and 2 are available to watch right now. Episode one is linked above, you can watch episode two by clicking below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7lZi-39UQ8


Recently I completed the single player campaign for Starcraft 2 Heart of the Swarm again. When I was a young pup I used to replay games constantly. I'd speed run the original Mario Brothers (before I knew that was a thing) try and figure out how to complete the Legend of Zelda Link to the Past dark world dungeons in strange orders. When your video game library consisted of a handful of Super Nintendo and Nintendo titles, if you wanted to play games you played what you had. If I simply played games in Steam I haven't installed yet i'd be playing for years. Still, I love to head back and play games again. Last year I replayed Portal 2. I also reinstalled the original Dungeon Siege and really enjoyed the experience. Roller Coaster Tycoon was just as much fun as I remember playing years ago.

In age of seemingly infinite game libraries do you head back and replay titles or it always on to the new?

As an aside, here are a few titles I would love to replay this year. Romance of the Three Kingdoms 2, Portal 2 & Command and Conqueror Red Alert.


Gabe Newell was on hand at GDC to talk about all the things Valve was talking about. If you wanted information about the PC, Steam Machines, Online Gaming and the Source 2 engine you should check it out. Come for the Valve information stay for the puns at the end of the video.


Counter-Strikes Dust2 is one of the most popular multiplayer maps in gaming history. PC Gamer recently interviewed the Counter-Strike map creators Sal "Volcano" Garozzo and Shawn "FMPONE" Snelling about why they think this is one of the greatest maps of all time.


http://i.imgur.com/fX6YZYS.jpg
Imgur is a great photo sharing site that has quite a lot of video game related content. Recently I found these photos of some cool art with a retro gaming twist. I love seeing those Goombas fishing but I don't want cheep cheep to take the bait. Flip the boat cheep, flip the boat.

http://imgur.com/a/q2Ur6


I found this totally awesome old Genesis promo video for Street Fighter II Special Championship Edition. So much amazing 90's cheese. Plus it's also fun to watch an old take on a classic game the time it came out even if it's from the horses mouth.


http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/74/The_Lost_Vikings_SNES_cover.jpg
Blizzard has been making games for a long time as as such has amassed a catalog of classic games. They have been releasing their old Super Nintendo Games a bit at a time available for free on PC for download. They recently added The Lost Vikings & Rock N Roll Racing to the list of classic games available on Battle.net. While they were at it they also added a Mac port of Backthrone, a title previously made available. The SNES ports of all three titles are superb and Blizzard also took the time to re-translate the menus so that the in game text reflects the new PC keyboard control scheme.

It seems Blizzard is starting with porting it's earliest titles and moving forward so it's just a matter of time before we see Warcraft Orcs & Humans, Warcraft 2 & Diablo ported.

You can download Blackthorne, The Lost Vikings & Rock N Roll Racing(scroll to the bottom of the page) by clicking the link below.

https://us.battle.net/account/management/download/

For a list of all Blizzard classic titles check the link below.

http://us.blizzard.com/en-us/games/legacy/