jdodson | Cheerful Ghost

Travel The Orion Trail With Warp Weasels In Space

Orion Trail is a new Kickstarter by Schell Games that mixes the classic Oregon Trail mechanics and throws them into orbit. It's no surprise that I loved the recent Oregon Trail with Zombies remake, Organ Trail and Orion Trail seems to continue the movement. Orion Trail sports some pretty pixel art as well as some really interesting in game encounters with Warp Weasels and SPACE DYSENTERY.

"Before you begin your voyage, it's important to know that bad stuff can (and will) happen. For example, an unexpected Singularity Fissure could open up in the Deck 12 Latrines, making for an unpleasant bathroom break. Maybe someone could accidentally leave an airlock open as you jump to light-speed, making the inside part of the ship the outside part. Or, your Away Team could inadvertently incur the wrath of a Grobulous Rex while exploring an alien jungle. We're not sure what will happen with that last one, but it's probably not good."

Like all modern Indie games I love, Orion Trail will ship on Linux, Mac and Windows.

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 02/06/2015 at 06:19am

That video is funny! I first laughed when I saw that one of the captains was Grumpy Cat, then I noticed the Star Trek-looking bridge. I also thought it was funny watching the different Star Trek-looking crew members doing things, like dancing at the very end. I haven't played Oregon Trail in very many years. It's been so long that I think the last time I played it was on a Commodore 128D or an Apple IIC. I think an space-aged Oregon Trail makes sense and this game looks funny! I may have to keep my eye on this and figure out this Kickstarter thing.

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 02/06/2015 at 06:20am

Oh, look! There's a demo!

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 02/06/2015 at 06:25am

A demo? Awesome. I might check that out.

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 02/06/2015 at 07:11am

Yup! Check out their official site. The link for the demo is in the upper-right hand corner for Mac, Linux, and Windows.

AdamPFarnsworth wrote on 02/06/2015 at 03:56pm

Is "Trail-like" becoming a genre now? :)

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 02/06/2015 at 04:20pm

Seems like it. "Trail clone"

AdamPFarnsworth wrote on 02/06/2015 at 04:41pm

That said, I wish I have $500 to back this one!

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 02/06/2015 at 06:36pm

"There's always room on your Visa."

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 02/06/2015 at 08:09pm

I played the demo once this morning and made it to the end.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 02/08/2015 at 10:32pm

I played the demo too. It's an interesting game and I hope they build on it for the final release.

Travis Admin wrote on 02/09/2015 at 03:57am

Huh, come to think of it, FTL is kinda Oregon Trail in space.

If you want to join this conversation you need to sign in.

Florian Working On Binding of Isaac Wrath of the Lamb Update

Florian Himsl is the incredible other half of the team that brought us the original Binding of Isaac. In a bit of awesome news he is updating the original Wrath of the Lamb update with even more content. Now that The Binding of Isaac Rebirth is out I wasn't expecting more content for the original, but I can't say I mind it!

This is one part of Indie Game Development I appreciate as it's fairly rare for this to happen on the other side of the house.

Star Wars Force Chokes It's Way To Humble Bundle

Recently GOG picked up a ton of classic Star Wars titles that were previously a bit hard to track down. If you were waiting to pick those up on GOG you might want to checkout the latest Star Wars Bundle. All the games come with Steam Keys with PC ports and Knights of the Old Republic, Jedi Academy and The Force Unleashed are also available on Mac.

So far you can unlock all the games at $12 and more will be added to the bundle later, making this a crazy great value.

https://www.humblebundle.com/?starwars_bundle

vdogmr25 wrote on 02/04/2015 at 04:12pm

I want this, but if I have working copies of KoTOR again, I may never leave my room.

scrypt Supporter wrote on 02/04/2015 at 07:40pm

This is a great bundle. I wonder what the mystery game will be? O.o

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 02/04/2015 at 09:40pm

I hopefull it's GAMES and will be... Tie Fighter or Podracer.

Travis Admin wrote on 02/04/2015 at 09:58pm

I bought the big-ass Star Wars bundle on Steam in a sale ages ago for like $20, so this bundle means little to me, but it's a hell of a deal. Jedi Outcast alone is worth the price.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 02/05/2015 at 03:36am

SWEET. I think I missed that for whatever reason, I love that these bundles keep rolling. As far as I am concerned why not keep selling if people are buying?

Travis Admin wrote on 02/05/2015 at 03:51am

Definitely. And the Lucas games are generally really good. It's a guaranteed good value.

Timogorgon Member wrote on 02/05/2015 at 06:17pm

I might pick this one up because I've been wanting to get Kotor 2 on PC so I can install the missing content mod. I have Kotor 2 on Xbox and loved the game even though it was very apparent that it was an unfinished product.

If you want to join this conversation you need to sign in.

Super Mario World Completed in 3.07, New World Record

SethBling just posted the new world record for completing Super Mario World in an astonishingly quick 3 minutes and 7 seconds. The run takes advantage of getting the game into a strange memory state and then pausing to warp all the way to the ending credits.

Incredibly, who comes up with this stuff?

Travis Admin wrote on 01/31/2015 at 06:24am

I watched a video the other day, like a week ago, where this was exploited for a 6ish minute run. 3:08 is insane!

scrypt Supporter wrote on 02/02/2015 at 03:58pm

Is finding an exploit that takes you to the end credits what qualifies for completing a game these days?

AdamPFarnsworth wrote on 02/02/2015 at 08:08pm

I kinda agree with Script, but wow, that was interesting and impressive.

Travis Admin wrote on 02/03/2015 at 04:00am

These generally don't count for "legit" speedruns. There are various levels of speedruns. This one wouldn't compete with a more "legit" speed run.

It's kinda like Magic: The Gathering. Some cards are just too powerful and get banned from the game, even in Legacy, but there's always the all-in formats where nothing is off the table.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 02/04/2015 at 02:19am

I'd say that this does count for a speedrun in that you can do it in the game as you normally play. Your right in that it isn't a traditional run of going through it. Like Travis says there are more traditional runs and then these kinds of bugged runs.

Travis Admin wrote on 02/04/2015 at 03:08am

Yeah, it's not tool-assisted, so it's a legit speedrun, it's just not a "legit" speedrun. I couldn't think of a better way to put it! Traditional doesn't exactly describe it. I can't define it but I know it when I see it! :)

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 02/04/2015 at 04:12am

Glitch free?

scrypt Supporter wrote on 02/04/2015 at 07:58pm

But it's still an exploit, right? Hypothetically, if Super Mario World was another game released in today's market, it might likely be patched to fix the bug. Should exploits like this just be considered "part of the game"?

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 02/04/2015 at 09:42pm

It is part of the game, yet not designed at all. So i'd say it's valid for this version of the game YET think that separating bugged from traditional is a good point.

There was a Zelda Links Awakening bug that if you did the magic right caused you to warp to the other side of the screen which meant you could easily clip and get past areas they didn't intend. They did release a patch to fix it in later karts so I imagine some runs are shorter because they don't have this exploit.

That said a traditional run wouldn't be impacted.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 02/04/2015 at 09:44pm

And since I had to bring back my memory of it, here is a video showing it off.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hbs0bcg9U68

Travis Admin wrote on 02/04/2015 at 09:45pm

Every Super Mario Bros. speedrun uses glitches though. Little things like being able to stick to the wall if you hit it at the right angle and jump again. That's why I didn't go with "glitch-free" as a description because they're widely used. There's a line somewhere, I just don't know where!

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 02/04/2015 at 09:49pm

I saw a Half-life speedrun that was using clipping like crazy. It seemed a bit out there but it seems the census it's legit if it's non tool assisted.

Timogorgon Member wrote on 02/05/2015 at 06:58pm

I'm by no means an expert, but I think there are four generally accepted types of speed runs: With glitches/bugs, Tool assisted, any percent, and 100% completion. I have no problem with someone using and abusing glitches/bugs for a speed run, especially since this sometimes requires a very deep understanding of how the game code works. But I do think there needs to be separate world records or whatever for people who do and don't use them. :)

If you want to join this conversation you need to sign in.

Torchlight 2 Coming to Mac February 2nd As Hell Dethaws

Do you remember when Runic said the Mac port of Torchlight 2 wasn't too far away and then a few years passed? I do and because of that was really happy to hear that it will be coming to Mac in four days. In four days our Mac sisters and bothers will be able to bask in the Torchlight 2 goodness. The wait wasn't lost on Runic either because the Mac port video addresses that in a funny way.

That said.

And I am trying to say this with as much niceness as possible. But. You know.

Can we get a Linux port too? /ducks

Cheerful Ghost Is Three Years Old

Three years of Cheerful Ghost? Yep.

I want to thank everyone for taking part in the site by reading it regularly, commenting, posting or allowing me to publish your game(looking at you Wick). Not only did we publish Starship Rubicon but, for me, the site really clicked as a place that I come to talk about video games with friends.

Raising my glass to another year!

If you haven't already, check out Starship Rubicon below and also make sure to vote for it on Steam Greenlight.

www.starshiprubicon.com
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=331311253

Travis Admin wrote on 01/30/2015 at 04:27am

It's been a blast, except for that guy Jon. He's literally Hitler.

AdamPFarnsworth wrote on 01/30/2015 at 05:31am

Congrats! I definitely appreciate the site breaking up some of my day at work.

scrypt Supporter wrote on 01/30/2015 at 03:21pm

I'm glad I stumbled across you ghostly folks. Congratulations on three years!

Timogorgon Member wrote on 01/30/2015 at 05:22pm

It's been a fun three years! Looking forward to more awesomeness! :D

hardeyez wrote on 01/30/2015 at 05:29pm

Wow, years fly by fast. Feels like yesterday we were walking around talking about this "game list" project you were going to start... :)

hardeyez wrote on 01/30/2015 at 05:30pm

Big CONGRATS!!

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 01/30/2015 at 08:03pm

I've only been a part of the site for a year now, but I've been loving it. Cheerful Ghost and GMail are the only sites I keep open tabs for in Chrome. I visit the site regularly, clicking on the logo to refresh to page to see if there is anything new (or if I have any notifications). I'm really glad to be here and glad to have met some cool people (even that weird Jon that Travis mentioned Hahaha). Thank you for giving me and others an awesome community to talk about video games and other "geek" things. Thank you also for giving me a place to write. Thank you also for giving me a cool place to find out about awesome games. I'm not sure how many games I probably wouldn't have played or known about if it wasn't for Cheerful Ghost, although I think Terraria, Starbound, and Diablo III are among them.

Keep up the good work. I look forward to continuing my membership!

If you want to join this conversation you need to sign in.

The Making of Grim Fandango Remastered

Grim Fandango Remastered dropped a few days ago and according to the reviews i've been reading, if you loved the original you will love this. This morning I found a comprehensive article about resurrecting this classic on Polygon. If you are interested in reading the story of how Double Fine and Sony were able to bring Grim Fandango back, it is well worth the read. Spoiler alert, it involved several old tape machines.

http://www.polygon.com/2015/1/27/7921837/grim-fandango-remastered-interview-double-fine-disney-lucasfilm-sony

Double Fine also has three documentaries part one is linked above, you can watch the remaining two on the Grim Fandago website.

http://grimremastered.com/#docs

Grim Fandango is a beloved cult classic of PC gaming and as such the remaster has been getting lots of attention. You can pick up Grim Fandango Remastered on the Vita, PS4, PC, Mac and Linux.

Timogorgon Member wrote on 01/28/2015 at 06:40pm

This is one game I completely missed when it came around the first time. I've had several people tell me it's one of the best adventure games out there as well as just a great game period. Has anyone from the CG community played this before? Does it live up to its reputation?

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 01/29/2015 at 05:42am

I'm like you, Tim, while I was aware of Grim Fandango at the time, I did not play it. I remember the game being on the CD of video game demos from PC Magazine, but I never played it. I did recently notice in my Playstation news feed, that the game is available.

Tungsten wrote on 01/29/2015 at 10:55am

I picked it up back in the day. It's your typical Lucas arts adventure game, reminiscent of a lot of the Telltale games now. I remember thinking that the opening act was the best and then it went downhill, but what did I know, I was like 12.

vdogmr25 wrote on 01/29/2015 at 03:58pm

I can't wait to play this. Never got the chance to.

If you want to join this conversation you need to sign in.

Brutal Doom v20 Looks Incredible, Coming Soon

Doom 4 was teased last year at Quakecon and since then there has been a ton of silence from iD on when it will be coming. We've been waiting for the next chapter of Doom for quite some time and if your tired of waiting, the upcoming update to Brutal Doom might hold you over. Adding the pump action shotgun as well as enhanced blood effects, Brutal Doom looks great. The mod creator has been testing it with Free Doom(an Open Source recreation of the Doom assets) so getting it running should be easy.

http://www.moddb.com/mods/brutal-doom

Star Mazer Mixes Up Some Interesting Elements

Back this on Kickstarter!

Star Mazer is a game new to Kickstarter that mixes up elements from Gradius, Space Ace & Maniac Mansion to create a really interesting looking game. They are looking to raise $160k and have a bit over $60k of that so if you are interested in seeing this happen, now wouldn't be a bad time to Kickstart it.

Games like this live and die on the story and tone and Star Mazer seems to have that in spades. The game will launch when it's done and the developers plan to have it out on PC, Mac and Linux as well as other platforms, funding depending.

"Starr Mazer is more than a collection of Point-and-Click segments, Shoot 'em up (SHMUP) segments and cut-scenes. The world is seamless. You’ll walk into the Holloway-Exeter docking bay, board the Starr Wolf and control the flight sequence, blasting off to space. You’ll be bargaining deals at the bar in order to afford repairs and upgrades to your Starr Wolf and using information gleaned from characters to find hidden routes while flying between destinations. Be careful which passing enemies you attack, as not all are foes, and a few could have dire consequences. Even while facing the charging death beam of a G'ell cannon, use your charisma to dodge bullets."

JP LeBreton & John Romero Talk about And Play Doom

Spacebase creator JP LeBreton and John Romero play through Doom “Knee Deep in the Dead,” in its entirety. It's fun to watch John play through the game and talk about it as he was so instrumental in creating it.

Now can we get a Myamoto playing through the original Legend of Zelda video series?

jdodson1

2746 Posts

Travel The Orion Trail With Warp Weasels In Space

Florian Working On Binding of Isaac Wrath of the Lamb Update

Star Wars Force Chokes It's Way To Humble Bundle

Super Mario World Completed in 3.07, New World Record

Torchlight 2 Coming to Mac February 2nd As Hell Dethaws

Cheerful Ghost Is Three Years Old

The Making of Grim Fandango Remastered

Brutal Doom v20 Looks Incredible, Coming Soon

Star Mazer Mixes Up Some Interesting Elements

JP LeBreton & John Romero Talk about And Play Doom