Cheerful Ghost: An Awesome Community For Gamers

Game Pricing in The Download Age

One of the coolest parts of being in gaming is how many awesome games we have access to. Steam, GoG, Origin, iOS and Android stores all let you buy a ton of awesome games for much less than the traditional $60 console price point. That said, many triple A games that come out sell digitally and physically for the same price. YouTube gaming sensation Boggie2988 made a video recently that caught my attention I linked above. He asks Microsoft and Sony to change the pricing model for digital content because the digital versions of games don't allow trading and loaning yet are cheaper to distribute.

This is something that's bugged me for quite a long time that doesn't stop... Read All

Lokani Addicting Space Runner -- Launching April 1, 2014!

Lokani Addicting Space Runner is a 80's-future-style endless runner now launching on iOS. Our first ever game and we definitely have more to come! http://www.lokani.com

AdamPFarnsworth wrote on 03/31/2014 at 10:37pm

So what is this game?

lokani Post Author wrote on 03/31/2014 at 11:02pm

Updated! Thanks for the necessary clarification :)

scrypt Supporter wrote on 03/31/2014 at 11:55pm

Is it always the same platforms and background? Played for a while and nothing changed, except for the color of the player orb as the pace quickened. Also, your ads are broken. Tried to access the "No Ads" area, to see how much you are charging, then coming back to the game the ad space just says "Request timed out".

lokani Post Author wrote on 04/09/2014 at 07:24pm

Hi guys, the game has kind of progressive levels in it. So far platform timing increases in speed, music moves up in a crescendo and the colors of the avatar change. Also: the In app Purchases are fixed! You may now remove the ads without struggle (and we thank you for that! :) ) More to come, have a good week!

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FTL: Advanced Edition Will Release April 3rd

"As a reminder, FTL: Advanced Edition is a free content expansion for FTL. All current (and future) customers will receive this update regardless of where they purchased it. Prior to release, we will post detailed instructions on how to get the update from whatever digital vendor you originally purchased FTL.

The iPad version of FTL will require an iPad version 2 or higher (iPad 1 is not supported) and will cost the same as the PC version, $10. It will be the complete game, including the new Advanced Edition content, and will not have any in-app purchases. We are proud to say that the iPad version is a true equivalent to the PC in the experience it provides, which is... Read All

scrypt Supporter wrote on 03/30/2014 at 05:04pm

I have it on good authority that the iPad version is a near perfect representation of the PC version, and understand it to be a "new joy" to experience it through touch interaction. :)

Timogorgon Member wrote on 03/30/2014 at 06:19pm

I am beyond excited about this! I don't own an iPad, so I won't be picking up that version. But I will be rockin' the PC version after the kids go to bed on 4/3. :D

AdamPFarnsworth wrote on 03/31/2014 at 02:48am

I love how the "introducing the ipad" shows you dying lol

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 03/31/2014 at 07:00pm

GET READY TO DIE ON YOUR IDEVICE. OR SHOULD I SAY iDIEvice?

Orionnoir wrote on 04/03/2014 at 03:37pm

Nice. FTL will port to a touch paradigm very nicely. It almost already works on my windows 8 tablet *almost*. I wish more games (even my own) did the 'full game' thing more more on mobile touch based tablets (i.e., the market would bear the cost of full development) The turning point in my opinion about experiencing 'real/serious gaming' on a mobile device for me was 2k's latest xcom in iPad. It impressed me having been playing the PC version (my only gripe is they washed out some of the lower level micromanagement bits in some of the gear.) My situation has been such give up gaming if its not on a mobile device for a while now. Firing up the PC was too much of a commit. actually it is a dangerous trap as of late... I would never come to bed once I started playing... so this is about self preservation really... maybe... but I digress. But am I alone that I find myself on the PC gaming less and less??? I do miss it, I miss the time to sink into it. Maybe this is a mid-life two jobs married father of two syndrome... o.O One last thought are we past 'gaming on a mobile device' is not gaming arguments?

scrypt Supporter wrote on 04/03/2014 at 07:03pm

@Orionnoir, I have to believe that anyone seriously opposed to the idea of gaming on a mobile device, or considering it a serious gaming platform, has either never really experienced what can be done (uninformed), or just doesn't much care for mobile gaming (i.e. Gameboy, et al.) (biased). It's a way to enjoy games, and a good one at that.

Also, I just want to say, you're doing a noble thing in sacrificing your hobby for your family. I have a good number of friends that struggle with the same thing. Games are fun, but family is so much more important. I take it, by your "even my own" comment, that you are a game developer to some extent? Very cool! I'd love to try your game, if it's available.

I'm relatively new to PC gaming, having been on consoles most of my life, so I'm kinda eating it up. Honestly, it's all Microsoft's fault. I'm disappointed with what they've done with the XBox platform. I'll get an XBox One eventually, because I love games, and exclusives are a stupid reality, but I'm not looking forward to it. I don't know. Of all the systems I have available, I'm the most content when I'm on Steam. That could change, and probably will once Destiny comes out on PS4 :).

Orionnoir wrote on 08/07/2014 at 05:30pm

I concur! I have traded much of my time to be with the family and its been great. They have also stod by while I chased a dream with what little time I had too. So its not all take!

Its been a crazy 5 months, but I quit my day job just over a month ago (July 4th 2014) to make games full time working with a good friend in a partnership at Appsomniacs. We've had more people in the past, I've been slinging code at our problems part time since July 2011. Everyone else involved has pretty much walked away or stopped showing up, mostly because of the work entailed. Specifically how much work. that work can be viewed at http://www.appsomniacs.com (shameless plug!) ;)

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WowCraft Episode 1: The Creation

WoWCraft is a fun new cartoon from the creator of the amazing Starcrafts series. The opening episode of WowCraft is pretty spot on with how hard it can be to start a new character in an MMO.

Prison Architecht Alpha 19 Cash Horde

"After a long playthrough of the game, we concluded that the Finance system was most in need of some development love this month. It has become common practice to cheat your way to $1,000,000 in the bank because there is simply no other way to raise that kind of capital, and the game becomes boring when you have to wait for it to roll in. There are many mods that filled the gap by adding more grants to the game. Furthermore, if you use all the official grants up (all four of them) and still have a negative cashflow, you have literally no way to recover other than cheating, because your bank balance will be decreasing every day and you won’t be able to afford to build... Read All

Burial At Sea - Episode 2, Available NOW

The final piece of the puzzle is here. The swan song of Irrational Games, and what Ken Levine has said should be a very satisfying end to the Bioshock saga as IG has told it. My Steam download queue shows the file coming in at 9.1GB, so if bandwidth is an issue, start downloading it ASAP.

jdodson Admin wrote on 03/26/2014 at 07:36pm

SPOILER ALERT

Yep, saw this hit last night while I was playing Reaper. VERY excited to give this a shot and I hope it delivers a really great ending to BioShock Infinite. Totally love the idea of playing as Elizabeth and escaping rapture or whatever needs done.

I'd love it if it were a game where you went to other areas and looked for other Bookers to take down.

Travis Admin wrote on 03/26/2014 at 08:18pm

I read a very little bit about it, and I'm stoked. D3 is taking up all my gaming time right now but I'm really looking forward to playing this very soon.

scrypt Supporter Post Author wrote on 03/26/2014 at 08:30pm

My intention was to take a bunch of old games down to GameStahp and trade for Reaper, but I just haven't made it in yet. This week, for sure :).

jdodson Admin wrote on 03/27/2014 at 05:45am

Not a bad idea.

jdodson Admin wrote on 03/29/2014 at 04:20pm

Curious if anyone has played this yet and if so what they think of it? I am still pretty deep in Reaper. That said, i'll be playing this one next.

scrypt Supporter Post Author wrote on 03/29/2014 at 04:52pm

Haven't had time to finish it, but spent an hour or two in it, and it's quite interesting, so far. The stealth aspects are a nice change, and, tied with being back in the environment of Rapture, gives a more nostalgic feeling of fear and anticipation from the first Bioshock, more so than the first episode could conjure. Stealth is an option, which I appreciate. Hopefully tonight I can wrap it up and give a better opinion.

jdodson Admin wrote on 03/29/2014 at 06:05pm

Cool. I just checked it out and I like how it has a "Previously in Bioshock" which sums up the entire first game.

scrypt Supporter Post Author wrote on 03/29/2014 at 09:34pm

Kind of a bummer that they did this, even though it is a very vague and general summation of the first game. I guess it works, mostly, to give an idea of who certain characters are, and events that transpired, though I don't like that they use specific scenes from the game to do it. Now that Infinite is leading into the deeper depths of Rapture (if you will), I think it's more important to play the original Bioshock.

scrypt Supporter Post Author wrote on 03/30/2014 at 03:27am

Just finished. That was intense. Now it's imperative that you play the first game :). After the fact is fine, though it spoils some of the surprises. Still, very cool. Bravo, Irrational Games!

jdodson Admin wrote on 03/30/2014 at 07:24pm

Awesome. Can't wait to try it out. About how long is it?

scrypt Supporter Post Author wrote on 03/30/2014 at 09:07pm

I took my sweet, sweet time, and I think I was in there for 6 hours.

jdodson Admin wrote on 03/31/2014 at 04:08pm

Not too bad. Looking forward to it!

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Diablo III: Reaper of Souls Now Available

"I do hope you have been making the best of your time, nephalem, because the sands in your hourglass have run out. The time has come for my master to sweep clean the streets of Westmarch, and your feeble efforts will mean little against our inevitable tide."

After spending the last few hours playing Diablo III: Reaper of Souls I can say that it is a very worthy upgrade to Diablo III. I started the new Crusader class and so far am loving it.

What are your spoiler free thoughts of Reaper of Souls? How did you start and where did you end off after your first day playing?

http://us.battle.net//d3/en/blog/13370216

Goodbye Oculus VR.

I had such high hopes. I can't believe this... just ruined my day.

https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10101319050523971?stream_ref=1

Travis Admin wrote on 03/25/2014 at 10:14pm

I was on my way over here to post this.

Sigh.

AdamPFarnsworth wrote on 03/25/2014 at 10:14pm

Hmmmm, I guess I'm glad it's still moving forward? I'm not crazy about FB owning it, but glad it's not completely dying.

Travis Admin wrote on 03/25/2014 at 10:18pm

Yeah I mean I know I'm being a pessimist about this, we don't know what will happen yet. But it just makes me uneasy.

Timogorgon Member wrote on 03/25/2014 at 10:36pm

http://nooooooooooooooo.com/

Ok, ok, calm down... don't be so pessimistic. I mean this could be a good thing right? Now Oculus has a huge stack of cash behind them to advance the technology right? And all the parody Facebook VR videos and meme's we're about to get are going to make for some solid comedy.

How long until the Oculus starts tracking your eye movements to see which ads you look at and for how long, so to better target you with future advertisements? >.<

Timogorgon Member wrote on 03/25/2014 at 11:07pm

Already some interesting news on this:

Apparently there was a version of Minecraft being developed for Oculus. Not anymore according to Notch: https://twitter.com/notch/status/448586381565390848

Engadget has an article about the deal with this disheartening quote. This is from the "update" while on a conference call with Mark Zuckerberg: "Specifically, he talked about the potential of a virtual communication network, buying virtual goods, and down the line, advertising."
Article: http://www.engadget.com/2014/03/25/facebook-oculus-vr-2-billion/

jdodson Admin wrote on 03/25/2014 at 11:11pm

What the.... I mean I guess Oculus would have been purchased and... I just never thought it would be Facebook.

Wow, need a bit to process this. I mean Zuck is right, it is the future but...

AdamPFarnsworth wrote on 03/25/2014 at 11:12pm

Watching the Dev Days videos, it seems like a lot of people don't like FB (it seemed to be a running theme that you shouldn't be on FB. Never really for any specific reason, just "If you're still on FB, you've made some poor life choices"), so I am interested in seeing how Valve and Steam react to this.

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 03/25/2014 at 11:19pm

Interesting.

scrypt Supporter wrote on 03/26/2014 at 09:09am

Life is such a damn cartoon sometimes. I want Microsoft and Facebook to release a platform that has nothing but advertisements on it. Static ads, and 30-60 second spots of pure consumer targeted drama. They could call it something classy like "Ads, MF" or "PinkEye 360."

In truth, I haven't been keenly interested in VR. I'll holster any real opinions until I've actually tried it. However, I'm not a fan of Facebook. I think Facebook actually did give me pinkeye once.

jdodson Admin wrote on 03/26/2014 at 03:29pm

Most startups (Oculus, etc) are created to get acquired. They take investment and either want to grow huge to IPO or sell. In this case Oculus raised a huge amount of cash from the community, which give it a shot in the arm popularity wise but didn't seem to change the companies strategy.

So basically, when you fund a Kickstarter yo are basically pre-ordering something. So if you think your dollars mean "oh hey, stay independent guys" well, apparently that's not what it means at all. Cause Facebook be all like, 2 BILLION and Oculus be all THANKS FOR THE MONEY!

That said, yay for them and all that but like you guys, this just doesn't seem awesome. That said, I bet in the end the Oculus will still be great and they are still focused on games.

jdodson Admin wrote on 03/26/2014 at 03:30pm

On the other hand, I am very happy that Valve and other companies are still in the VR business.

Travis Admin wrote on 03/26/2014 at 04:40pm

This comment sums up my feelings on it. "I don't want to live in a future where a handful of giant companies are dividing up every piece of creative enterprise that stands a chance of reaching mass market"

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/mar/26/facebook-and-oculus-rift-game-developers-react

It's insane to see the developer support falling off. Notch pulled the plans for a version of Minecraft for the Oculus, tons of others are dropping.

scrypt Supporter wrote on 03/26/2014 at 07:07pm

Kickstarter funding may not be implicit with staying independent, but I'll bet it makes people think twice about funding tech projects in the future, if they see that their $2M contribution could just be funding a $2B buyout. If I had Kickstarted OR, I would be pissed right now, because instead of supporting the vision of Oculus VR, now I've successfully funded the vision of Facebook. A scarier thought might be that their visions were aligned in the first place, in which case I doubt as many would have cared about OR in the first place. If this were LOST, Oculus VR would be J.J. Abrams, Facebook would be Damon Lindelof, and it might sound all well and good for a while, but in the end it's just a steaming pile of horseshit.

The magic is gone.

(I don't really think Damon Lindelof is as frustrating as Facebook, but, as a writer, he does frustrate the shit out of me sometimes. :D)

Travis Admin wrote on 03/26/2014 at 08:16pm

I love Lindelof but yeah, frustrating is a fine word to describe him.

scrypt Supporter wrote on 03/26/2014 at 09:15pm

Here's another recent example of Goliath controlling David, what consumers are agreeing to, and how it can go very wrong:

http://www.joystiq.com/2014/03/26/xbox-one-griefers-may-have-twitch-privileges-dessert-taken-away/

Timogorgon Member wrote on 03/30/2014 at 06:04pm

John Carmack has weighed in about the Facebook buyout over on Peter Berkman's (a member of chip-tunes band Anamanaguchi) Tumbler page. Kind of a weird place to make his first comments, but whatever.

Joystiq has a summary of Carmack's comments: http://www.joystiq.com/2014/03/30/john-carmack-on-facebook-buy-of-oculus-they-get-the-big-pictur/
Carmack's original comments: http://peterberkman.tumblr.com/post/80827337212/wrong-and-right-reasons-to-be-upset-about-oculus#comment-1310233365

Apparently the Facebook buyout was a surprise to him, although he seems fairly OK with the decision.

jdodson Admin wrote on 03/31/2014 at 06:59pm

Whereas I agree with him, the buyout still feels odd. Then again, he says outright there could have been a better pairing other places.

That said, who would have offered the 2 billion buyout?

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Link's Style Over The Ages

How Nintendo has drawn Link has changed from game to game. This image references the different stages of his design and sort of shows off how his style varies from consoles to handhelds releases. It seems that the console versions feature a much more adult Link as the consoles have him at a younger age.

I imagine when we get a Zelda game supported by the Oculus Rift Link will be well into his late 30's.

AdamPFarnsworth wrote on 03/25/2014 at 02:23am

Is this art from game manuals?

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 03/25/2014 at 02:34am

Not entirely sure, it may be culled from a few sources like manuals and Nintendo Power art.

AdamPFarnsworth wrote on 03/25/2014 at 03:15am

Ah, that makes sense. I had forgotten about Ninetendo Power.

..I had forgotten about Nintendo Power?!? How *old* am I now?

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 03/25/2014 at 03:33am

Too old?

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 03/25/2014 at 10:34am

Awesome!

AdamPFarnsworth wrote on 03/25/2014 at 04:26pm

You know, for as much of a Zelda fan as I was/am, I just realized that I've not played hardly any of the games! I've only played The Legend of Zelda, The Adventure of Link, A Link to the Past and Link's Awakening... that's less than a quarter of all Zelda games.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 03/26/2014 at 04:38am

Yeah, I haven't played many of the modern Zelda's since Twilight Princess and I didn't beat it. It was great, I plan on coming back to it.. Someday.

Timogorgon Member wrote on 03/30/2014 at 06:23pm

I'm glad Link got past that awkward no pants stage...

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 03/31/2014 at 06:59pm

Hahahahaha, yeah me too.

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Mozilla and Unity3D To Bring Native Games To the Web

"Mozilla and Unity are announcing new deployment tools bringing Unity-authored games to the Web without the need for plugins, made possible thanks to Mozilla-pioneered technologies including WebGL, a Web graphics library and asm.js, a supercharged subset of JavaScript. Unity’s WebGL add-on will be made available with the release of Unity 5.0 later this year."

Using open web technology such as WebGL and asm.js it should be pretty easy for developers to port their games to the web using the upcoming version of Unity. Currently Unity web games require a browser plugin and after the new version is out developers can start building native browser games.

Now that Internet... Read All