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.

2731 Posts

These kinds of videos are always interesting. The film has James Rolfe the Angry Video Game Nerd as a news caster and features the original voice of Sonic in the Cartoon Jaleel White.

What did you think of it?


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On dueling:

"Here's a quick rundown of how dueling will work in Diablo III as well as some insight into our design philosophy for the system.

How it Works:

  • To duel another player, you’ll need to speak with Nek the Brawler at the inn in New Tristram.

  • Speaking with Nek will take you and your party to the Scorched Chapel, a new zone designed specifically for player combat

  • This zone has custom geometry and features four different areas: the church, the graveyard, the river, and the lake

  • Dueling currently supports up to four players in a Free-For-All format, which means you can battle your friends either one-on-one, three-player FFA, or a full four-player FFA

  • If you die in the dueling world, you will be resurrected in the dueling zone
  • Death is not permanent in the dueling zone, even for Hardcore characters

  • You don't take any durability damage while in the dueling zone

  • When you're done dueling you can take a portal out or use your Town Portal to return to town.

"

Beyond the dueling update in 1.0.7 the Wizard and Monk are getting buffs. There are also a plethora of other changes you can read about below. Interested in checking out duelling although from everyone I know, my character isnt as epic. Still, something new to checkout.

Are you interested dueling in Diablo III or have you moved on?
http://us.battle.net//d3/en/blog/8414560


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During the Steam holiday sale I picked up Rage: The Scorchers. I liked Rage quite a bit and I am pretty excited to check out the new stuff. I am not finished with it and will periodically post about how my experiences are going with it.

When I played Rage the first time I noticed some areas that seemed like they should have allowed you some access. Like an area at the far end of Haggar Territory where there was a settlement of people, if you go a bit further there is a huge installation you couldn't go in. I figured it would open up at some quest point, but it didn't. There was also a Casino in Wellspring that was closed that you couldn't get in. Always wondered about these locations. In The Scorchers both of these places are available to you in the quest line. Was this content that they took out because they had to make a deadline? Its a shame it didn't make the final game because Rage would have been more epic if it shipped with this content.

So far The Scorchers levels have been really inventive and beautiful. The extra Mutant Bash TV you have to beat to travel the new Scorcher quest line is a totally awesome addition. The only downside to the new Mutant Bash level is you can't replay it in game like the main one. They did add a new mode where you can replay any mission from the game, this is a nice addition but you can't play the new Mutant Bash level over again in your single player game.

Overall the content is fantastic and the extra chance to inhabit the world of Rage is great. Oh right and the new Nailgun is lots of fun. The animations when you switch between the ammo types is interesting as it swaps the entire look of the gun. My gun of choice in Rage is the combat shotgun, sniper rifle and wingstick. Even if harder enemies take a few shotgun hits thats not a problem as I love ducking in and out of cover.

If you dug Rage and wanted a bit more, you should get The Scorchers. I recommend getting it if you are starting out as the missions are available very early on in Haggar Territory and the addition of the Nailgun in your early arsenal would be epic.

http://i.imgur.com/9Rulw.jpg: The new Mutant Bash TV level, at the end you shoot Mutants flung at you with a big ass cannon deck! When you hit one a mess of blood flies everywhere.

http://i.imgur.com/vCNDL.jpg: A new Scorchers mission level.


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Valve posted that Linux client usage is already at 0.8% where Mac client usage rose to 3.7%. Wonder how these numbers will change as more games are ported to Mac and Linux?

http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey

To celebrate the awards Borderlands 2 won in 2012 2k is handing out 5 golden keys to everyone. Remember to use your keys as you seem to max out at 10!

http://www.gearboxsoftware.com/community/articles/983/awards-and-celebrations

According to a recent interview with Gabe Newell, some developers are earning as much as 500k per year adding content to the Steam Workshop. This just in, I am considering switching my career to "digital hatter."

http://www.develop-online.net/news/42933/Steam-Workshop-devs-making-up-to-500k-a-year


Back in 2004 I heard about a remix album for the SNES classic Donkey Kong Country called "Kong in Concert." I had never considered that people would remix video game tunes and decided to download it because it was free and I loved Donkey Kong Country. I wore out the digital files of that album, if such a thing is possible because it is so awesome. Over the last few years I have stocked my Video Game Music collection with Humble Bundle Game Soundtracks, Collectors Edition Soundtracks and free downloads from OC Remix.

To date I have collected 77 albums and most of them are really great. Recently I trolled the OC Remix site and noticed a few new albums dropped one being "Double The Trouble!" the remix album of Donkey Kong Country 3. Now the strange this is I never played DKC3 but since I loved Kong in Concert, I picked this one up. I wasn't disappointed as the remix album is largely fantastic. Not every track is great, but the majority are and it was a joy to discover them.

Oh right and the album is no slouch as it clocks in at 5 hours and 23 minutes of total music. Its also interesting as this remix album does something few do in that it remixes tracks from the SNES and Game Boy Advance versions seperately.

A few stand out tracks:

- Knautilus (video embedded above)
- Intoxica (Pokey Pipes): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGsg5yjwzOw
‎- Road to Double Trouble (Fanfare): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sfq6TVeb5xk

There are others but I don't want to spoil your first listen of the entire album. You can pick up the entire album FLAC+MP3 or just MP3 on the OC Remix site.

http://dkc3.ocremix.org/
http://dkcproject.ocremix.org/


In one of those totally odd and awesome moments I present to you a video I found from The Gourmet Gamer. In this Episode the Gourmet Gamer makes the peanut cheese bars from the game. He also shares the recipe for all of you that will be making some this weekend.

Your welcome.



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It started about a few years ago. I bought my first Humble Bundle and linked it to my Steam Account that contained Half Life 2 & Counterstrike. I then bought Portal 2 on PS3 and got a free Steam copy. After that I bought my first Steam game, The Binding of Isaac and then after a few more Bundles and Steam Sales I now have 81 Steam Games. I have more PC games, but those are the ones that Steam manages. Its awesome to be able to pick up any game I want. Its also awesome to have a zillion choices for what to play.

Well. Sort of. On one hand I can pick up a great game on a sale for cheap. On the other hand I have 81 games and the list keeps growing year over year. Placing that next to the fact that we have a limited time, it is becoming apparent to me I have games I may never actually play.

Again, its awesome having so much choice but on the other hand it poses a problem, for me anyway. Like what games I should play? Should you play 50 games at once, I mean I can so that should be awesome. Also having so many games often leaves me at a loss for what to play as there as so many awesome choices and I need to pick the awesomeness choice. I also don't want to just play 4 seconds of each game, I find the best experiences I have are with games I have sunk some serious time into.

One of my friends linked to a TED Talk by Barry Schwartz called "The paradox of Choice." I don't entirely agree with his points in the first few minutes, but found by the end I agree with the crux of his argument. In a world with so many choices, its hard to pick the right one. I don't want to speak for him and his talk is awesome, so ill link to it now:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VO6XEQIsCoM

Over the last month I have come up with a strategy to combat this problem as I love Video Games and want to make what time I have be as much fun as it can be. I limit my choices of games I can play. For instance, right now I am only playing 3 games. Rage: The Scorchers, The Binding of Isaac and Dragon Age: Origins. 3 games might be too many but its a start and so far it has helped out.

So what do you think, do you have a sea of games and if so what do you do?

@Will_Owens had a similar problem and started his blog http://www.backlogkiller.com/ to go through each of his games one by one and blog the process.


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@Gary_Butterfield posted on the Watch out for Fireballs podcast page a question that I wanted to re sound here because I was interested in what everyone was thinking.

What video games are you looking forward to in 2013? No table limit, send up as many as you are excited about.

Full disclosure, I don't know a ton about all the games that will be released in 2013 beyond a few. But those few I am very excited about like:

Starcraft 2: Heart of the Swarm, MewGenics and The Binding of Isaac 16 bit de-make.


"Tetris. We’ve all played it, rotating the pieces (“tetrominoes”) and dropping them in the perfect place, or despairing as we discover a piece won’t fit. You may have even joked about “mastering” the game during a stint of unemployment, or as a child, before you could afford any other Game Boy cartridges. But what about the people who’ve truly mastered Tetris? Where are the Kasparovs and Fischers, the great champions who’ve dedicated their minds to solving its deepest puzzles?"

I would place Tetris as one of the best games of all time. After playing it on the Gameboy I was hooked. This love for the game brought me to watch "Ecstasy of Order" a recent documentary that covers the history of Tetris and its best tournament players. While the start of the film wasn't to my liking the documentary really gains its steam over time and by the end I was fully immersed in the story.

The documentary shares some space with "The King of Kong" in that it features the current high score keeping organization/arcade Twin Galaxies. "Ecstasy of Order" showcases one of the early Tetris masters, Thor and covers the famed Nintendo World Championships.

I was really impressed with how much effort it takes to be the best at something. The people they show as attending the Twin Galaxies tournaments really are masters at Tetris and even the last place entrants are Wizards of the craft.

If you love Video Game movies and documentaries, I really recommend you watch "Ecstasy of Order." It provides just the right mix of Tetris history and makes some as it brings the best Tetris players from around the world together for an awesome competition.

http://ecstasyoforder.com/
http://www.twingalaxies.com/