I was exposed to the Black Mesa project a few months ago in frenzy of its initial release. Black Mesa is a fan recreation of the original Half-Life built on top of the amazing Half-Life 2 Source Engine. Since I never quite finished the original Half-Life I decided to give this version a shot and potentially complete the original Half-Life as it stands atop a list of games I need to complete. I loved Half-Life 2 and both episodes so coming back to the franchise is a pretty cool notion.

After booting up the game the visuals look really fresh compared to the original. The original looks good, don't get me wrong but atop the Source engine it looks fantastic. I played about half of the original Half-Life and compared to my memory the game feels like the original. In fact, if you played and loved Half-Life I seriously recommend nabbing Black Mesa and installing it simply to see how well they recreated it.

Check it out, its free and is very very cool.

http://www.blackmesasource.com/

I just recently downloaded and listened to the Black Mesa score from the fan re-visioning of the original Half-Life game using the Half-Life 2 source engine. I really like the takes on the original score and new directions they decided to go. The score is free so no reason not to pick it up.

One song, "Apprehension" is featured above. The score seems to paint pretty awesomely broad strokes for what game scores can be and it inspired me to give Black Mesa a shot.

http://www.blackmesasource.com/soundtrack.html

Very cool talk Gabe Newell of Valve gave at The LBJ School of public affairs. 9 minutes in and HAD to share this!

What do you think about his thoughts on economics? Found it really interesting some artists have "real jobs" at big game studios but make more money selling hats in TF2. I agree with him, post-internet many corporations are changing for sure!

I just played a new game called UrNotAHero by Peanut Butter Fingers. I heard this game buzzing around some Indie Channels and it looked really interesting. It has an almost Bonanza Brothers vibe and after playing it some, it seems to totally be in that style but takes it up 50 notches.

The idea of the game is that you partake in missions where you save hostages, diffuse bombs, steal stuff and kill gangbangers. The play control is rather simple as you can, walk side to side, go up stairs, shoot your gun, slide/duck/take cover and use grenades. The alpha provides quite a lot of gameplay and if you want some really awesome fun, you need to try it. You can alternate between a few characters that pull from the action movie trope. The first character looks quite a bit like Bruce Willis there is a guy with a shotgun and a big heavy with a minigun that looks a lot like Arnold Schwarzenegger. So all told, totally awesome for this kind of game. Oh right and the game is free in Alpha.

http://create-games.com/download.asp?id=8812

Windows only at this point. The game is fairly simple and could totally work on mobile too, I wish these guys well because id love to see the final release of this one.

To keep the run up to the release of Heart of the Swarm going, Blizzard released another video covering the new social features. Being able to create an in game group or clan is a pretty fun idea. I plan on creating one for Cheerful Ghost for the people that will be playing this at launch.

I am going to run another Cheerful Ghost Terraria game server for us to all play starting next week on the 4th of February 6PM PST. We had such a fun time playing last time and I opened the game up recently and realized it would be run to play with people again.

Like last time I will keep the server up for three weeks and afterward hand out the world file so we can all have it for historical reasons. It will run 24/7 and be locked down for awesome Cheerful Ghost people like you and your friends. We only have a few simple rules, don't mess with other peoples stuff, no stealing, no greifing and have fun.

I created a new large world and the screenshot is above. Like last time that is the starting house people spawn in with a sign housing the rules. I recommend everyone start new characters to make the game more fun, I will be. Well, I might start with the mirror that warps you back to town, but everything else about my character will be new.

The Details:

Game will start Feb. 4th @ 6PM PST and last for three weeks.

server:
terraria.cheerfulghost.com

password:
Ask me or any player and we will hit you up with the details.

Excited to play this again with everyone, see you Monday!

To celebrate today's Retro Tuesday I decided to write about an aspect of Final Fantasy VI that I had rolling around in my head. Its odd to remember when I was still surprised by things that happened in video games. One such event happened when Kefka causes the world to become out of balance and it falls into ruin. The sequences as the world breaks were pretty shocking to me. Many people died as the world broke up and I remember being really shocked by the carnage it showed. By today's standards it is pretty tame as it was in glorious 2D, but lately I have been thinking about how powerful that sequence was and how I responded to it at the time.

After that destruction sequence you play as a relatively side character to that point and "start over" on a small island. The game continues this bleak trend for a bit as you nurse a friend back to health and, like many things in Final Fantasy VI it doesn't turn out well.

I think the game gets a bit more interesting after the World Collapses though, as maybe in the end I find hardship to be something easier to latch on to. The relationships get more interesting, some of the most unique characters come out of the wood work and the game opens up a lot more. I enjoyed Link to the Past in that you could always warp back to The Light World from the Dark World, something Final Fantasy VI doesn't allow. But I think that works to its advantage as then the destruction and change of the World wouldn't have been a permanent thing. For Kefkas actions to have weight things had to change.

The game itself is fantastic and has many more awesome moments but this is the part I have been thinking about lately.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kefka_Palazzo
http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/World_of_Ruin

The Global Game Jam is a yearly event designed to bring people of various backgrounds together to build video games. This year the Portland game community was one participant in this global event taking place in 242 locations over 47 countries in the course of the weekend. I was part of the initial kickoff and was able to be part of this creative digital collab-fest.

As the 60+ people converged on The Art Institute of Portland I was surprised at the diversity of the group consisting of programmers, artists, musicians, modelers, writers, classically trained 3d generalists, architects, pixel artists, film makers, illustrators and community organizers. After the keynote video the group was presented with this years Global Game Jam theme. The theme of this years Jam was the sound of a beating heart.

The event was spiced up a bit when a random passerby was forcibly removed by Police and Art Insitute security. He was not affiliated with the Game Jam as an organizer or attendee.

As the Game Jam kicked off I was able to watch some groups brainstorming some really awesome game concepts. The first group I observed were riffing on ideas for the tone of the game they were building. Wanting the game to contain tension they discussed having the main character go on a spirit quest. One person joked about putting some kind of meat front as an integral game component but it was dismissed with the quip “This is a vegan game.”

The last group I experience was finalizing the planning stages of a really interesting rhythm game. Jotting down the basic game structure in Microsoft Project this team focused on building a game that had the visual aesthetic of a cell shaded cartoon. One of the members completed the start of a heartbeat based rhythm he demoed in Ableton Live. As I listened to the surging beat I was really impressed with the creativity used by the members to bring this electronic collaboration to stage.

As the night progressed I was able to sit down with Will Lewis, the event organizer and ask him a few questions about the Portland Game Jam.

jdodson: What were some of your goals for the Global Game Jam this year?

Will Lewis: In a more general sense it was to take advantage of the resources we've gained over the last year regarding the people we've met and how many more members have joined the community. I really wanted to get people together to cold call sponsors in the area to make this event a full meal deal. My number one goal was to get meals for everybody each day. I also wanted to get prizes for people that completed certain games and achievements for Games for Change. Some people are also bringing relaxation activities and one of our members is hosting a stretch and meditation session. I wanted to focus on improving the quality of life for the Jam because a 48 hour stretch isn’t that fun sometimes.

jdodson: As PIGSquad gains more Steam in the Portland Gaming Community what are you looking forward to in 2013? Also, what are some things you want people to know about PIGSquad moving forward?

Will Lewis: PIGSquad is kind of a tough one because its a community and I guess what I want from PIGSquad is that it continue itself. Most of what PIGSquad is comes to fruition with what I do personally.

jdodson: So turning it from a "Will Lewis" operation to a community led organization?

Will Lewis: Exactly yeah. It has already done so much for the community as people have already found jobs from it and made friends through it. I don’t see it becoming self perpetuating by next year but its the ultimate goal. Another goal I have is to explore other events I have and have fun with it.

Another thing that happened through PIGSquad is I met Jeffery who had an idea for a non-profit Portland cafe games library. After being really active with PIGSquad in the community his idea evolved into a games education project. There has been so much research coming out about games and how they influence children's learning and because of that I am partnering with him in Pixel Arts. We are working on a series of workshops for kids to learn about game development, programming and art and animation. So when people ask me about goals I have with PIGSquad I see Pixel Arts as the more goal oriented one and that PIGSquad will eventually be self perpetuating.

jdodson: We all came to gaming from a particular game or set of events and I wonder for you what those were?

Will Lewis: When I was little I was really obsessed with games and my Mom didn’t trust me with a console so I only had a Gameboy growing up.

jdodson: I think a lot of parents have fears about kids spending too much time playing video games.

Will Lewis: Yeah, exactly. I used to watch King Kong by Ray Harryhousen when I was six along with The Nightmare Before Christmas. On top of that I grew up on and still live on 20 acres of woodland in Oregon City. My Dad is also a Carpenter and made me wooden swords and as a kid I would go out and cut down plants and stuff. So that environment mixed with the characters that were in these movies and such and I realized of late its the characters in games and games can allow you to explore characters better than other mediums. So I think thats where my interest in games has evolved from.

jdodson: Thanks Will, I wish you well with the remainder of this years Jam!

http://globalgamejam.org/
http://pigsquad.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_Harryhausen

1 year ago today I had a party at my house celebrating the launch of a new game site called Cheerful Ghost. The initial concept was born out of a few problems I had with gaming. I had a ton of games but no way to share that list with anyone. I also wanted to talk to awesome people about the games I loved but I couldn't find a place anywhere that made sense to do that. I also realized as I was online and read things about other games no place tied what everyone said about a game together. For instance, if I went to a game site it wasn't easy to view all the posts and information for a single game like Super Mario Brothers or Starcraft. I also didn't like gaming sites I saw as no normal person seemed to matter much. Paid journalists were front and center as the focus of many sites and as such normal people were relegated to the comments section which are often lame areas to talk about games.

So starting with some simple ideas I started out to solve these problems I had. I started with a pen and paper and started drawing the site I wanted to use. I sketched out my ideas over a few weeks and showed it to my friends. After getting a good response to my drawings I spent mostly every second of my spare time over the next 4 months building the initial launch of Cheerful Ghost. I started with a few design goals but one was that the site HAD to work the same on phones, tablets and desktops. I hate using sites that suck on phones and tablets. I opened up the site for 2 week beta period and after that on January 28th I formally launched http://cheerfulghost.com.

Thinking back on what I launched with I am kind of embarrassed as the site you see now is much much better. Some say that if you don't launch a product a bit embarrassed you are launching too late. If you can imagine one thing that sucked at launch was that you couldn't see the current post stream! You had to click around twice to see peoples latest posts. After fixing that mistake I also added some new features like auto-magic adding of PSN & Steam games, a ton more post embeds, post titles, an entire visual site redesign and more.

As I look forward to the next year I have a bunch of stuff I want to do but my ultimate goal is to grow the Cheerful Ghost community. I want to thank everyone for being part of one of the most awesome parts of my life. Deciding to build Cheerful Ghost was a good idea and spending the time to make it what it is now has been totally worth it!

As I continue the series of Cheerful Ghost Community Interviews the next person up is @WhiteboySlim. I really dug this interview as we both have a similar history of games we grew up playing. I want to thank @WhiteboySlim for doing the interview!

jdodson: Are you interested in any of the next gen consoles? Wii U, PS4, NextBox or the Steambox?

WhiteboySlim: I’m interested to see what they all will offer to be honest. I haven’t had any hands-on time with the Wii U, but I would like to see it in action to see if it’s any good. I’m also very interested in the Steambox. Valve has done some really cool stuff with Steam, and I can’t wait to see what they will bring to consoles. Plus I have a lot of games on Steam that I would love to play on the TV. As far as Sony goes, I’ve owned every generation of playstation so far and even have a PSP, so I’ll be interested to see what the PS4 looks like.

jdodson: Is there any console you are interested a bit over the others?

WhiteboySlim: Definitely the Steambox because it’s new. I hope Valve shakes up the console gaming scene for the better. :)

jdodson: Why don’t we have flying cars now? What's holding back this back?

WhiteboySlim: Maybe I think this because I’m from southern California, but I think flying cars would be a bad idea. People crash into each other all the time but at least they’re (mostly) restricted to the roads. Just think how bad it’ll be if people were crashing into buildings.

jdodson: WhiteboySlim has a list of the best 5 video games of all time. Please share your list with the Ultraverse Interpipes 4000(p.s. thats whats Hipsters call The Internet).

WhiteboySlim: Oh wow, I don’t know if I could narrow it down to that small of a list. I definitely have a soft spot for the SNES era RPG’s, so games like Secret of Mana, Chrono Trigger, FF3/FF6, and Earthbound are very high on my list. I also usually play through FF7 once every year or two. I’ve been playing a lot of Borderlands 2 and I love it. Several Zelda games could go in this list. The first Disgaea is awesome. I’ve sunk hundreds of hours into FF Tactics both on PSone and the PSP remake. I’m already well above 5 games, so I’ll just stop there.

jdodson: I am curious what Zelda titles you would put on the list?

WhiteboySlim: The original, for being the one game probably most responsible for turning me into a lifelong gamer. A Link to the Past for general awesomeness. Links Awakening for the story and a bittersweet ending that actually evoked a genuine emotional response from me. Personally, I place Majora’s Mask slightly ahead of Ocarina of Time. MM tried some new things that had never been done in a Zelda game before and I think it worked really well.

jdodson: Link’s Awakening was like that for me as well. Its such a simple game, yet very powerful. As games come and go this one has stuck with me above the others, I think for its simplicity and the overall outcome of your actions.

WhiteboySlim: Very few games leave me haunted by the choices I made. In order to win the game and escape the island you have to wake the Wind Fish, but doing so means all the inhabitants disappear. Did they die? Were they ever real to begin with? It’s deep, man.

jdodson: What’s your favorite Mario suit or power?

WhiteboySlim: The Kuribo’s shoe from Mario 3! It only showed up in one stage, but it was awesome. :)

jdodson: Such a strange thing to only put something in on level. I wonder if it was someones pet project or what? Did some searching, found a good description of it but no history.
http://www.mariowiki.com/Goomba's_Shoe

jdodson: The Final Fantasy series is pretty long running with the original launching back in 87. Any game in the series stand out to you above the rest?

WhiteboySlim: FF3/6 and FF7 are my favorites in the series, with FF2/4 right behind them. FF9 is underrated in my opinion and another of my favorites. After 9 I think the series as a whole went downhill pretty quick. FF12 was pretty good despite some faults, but still doesn’t really hold a candle to the better games in the series. It’s not part of the “main” Final Fantasy series, but FF Tactics is one of my favorite games of all time.

jdodson: Recently I finished watching “The Last Starfighter.” I loved the film from when I was a wee lad and I think it stands up pretty well now. FINISH THIS!

WhiteboySlim: Oh man, I haven’t seen this movie since I was a little kid. I don’t even remember much about it. Is it on Netflix? I might have to look this up.

jdodson: Whom do you tackle first? Snake Man, Needle Man, Spark Man, Hard Man, Top Man, Gemini Man or Shadow Man?

WhiteboySlim: It’s funny you should ask this. After many years of not playing any Mega Man games I tried to pick up Mega Man 3 again. I forgot how brutally difficult these games were! To answer your original question, for whatever reason I always went after Magnet Man first.

jdodson: What game are you playing right now? Please respond with a Haiku.

WhiteboySlim: F.T.L. space battles! / Borderlands 2 gunzerking! / Minecraft, must build more!

jdodson: What about F.T.L. do you love? It has garnered quite a bit of attention lately, what keeps you coming back to it?

WhiteboySlim: The game is a really great blend of RPG, strategy, and simulation elements all wrapped up in a challenging game that is very easy to pick up and play for short periods of time. FTL and Minecraft are my go-to games when I only have a short period of time to play. Currently I’m trying to unlock the various different spaceships in FTL.

jdodson: I don’t know if there is anything as seemingly overpowered as the Green Gecko Gem. Except Bowser totally ignoring it. I don’t know, what did you think of this Mario comic and its ending? To this date this is the most memorable comic book story I have ever read.
http://www.mariowiki.com/Piranha-Round_Sue

WhiteboySlim: Well you see, early in the comic they say that “only the strongest enemies” can break through the green gecko gem’s protection. I’m assuming that’s why Bowser had no trouble grabbing Piranha-Round Sue but the lesser enemies couldn’t touch Mario when he had it. :) I love this comic too, so much in fact that I have read it to my kids as a bedtime story.

jdodson: You have been with the site since the very beginning. I wonder how you look at how the site has progressed over the last year? If you could do one thing with the site, what would that be?

WhiteboySlim: I think it’s awesome! The site is great, and I’ve enjoyed all the posts by all the users. I especially liked the haiku contest you had awhile back. As for new features, I’d like to see tools to help plan out game nights and CG events.

jdodson: As luck would have it, after I complete the thing I am working on now with the site, the next thing will be what you describe! Yay!

WhiteboySlim: Awesome! MOAR gaming nights!

jdodson: What do you think about the modern incarnations of the Final Fantasy series?

WhiteboySlim: Based on my previous responses, you probably won’t be surprised when I say I’ve been pretty disappointed with the modern FF games. If anything, the last couple installments in the FF series are prime examples that great graphics don’t make a game. They’re beautiful, but they’re just not that much fun. I think a big part of the reason I don’t like the newer FF games is that the characters are bland at best and straight out annoying at worst. (This comic comes to mind: http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2009/8/26 ) Even worse, the villains are also pretty boring. I will give Square Enix credit for not being afraid to experiment with their gameplay though. They are constantly trying new and different things, although usually with mixed results. Still, I keep hoping with each new Square game that they’ll manage to recapture some of the fun of the older games. :)

WhiteboySlim: On a related note, something I miss from older RPG’s is the ability to rename the characters. It’s a minor thing, but I always liked renaming the characters after people I know. To me, it made the adventure feel more personal.