Cheerful Ghost: An Awesome Community For Gamers

Mercenary Kings: 2D Pixel Shooter -w Crafting

Mercenary Kings is a neat looking Metal Slug styled shooter that was funded on Kickstart last year I totally missed. The game is being made by Tribute, the awesome team that brought us Wizorb and is currently in the closed Steam beta for Kickstarter backers.

The video above shows off the shooting, missions and crafting that makes Mercenary Kings unique. The game also boasts 4 player local co-op something I plan on trying out with my friends.

If you played Metal Slug in the arcade, like me, you might love this franchise. The last new Metal Slug was in 2009 and it seems that now its just re-released on systems in various forms. I picked it up the Metal Slug anthology on... Read All

Cheerful Ghost Events Reveal

I am very happy to be able to bring you the totally new and completely awesome new Cheerful Ghost Events! Cheerful Ghost Events is a system designed to make it easy to schedule games with your friends by:

Magically translating all events to your local time. Even if your friends live in Hong Kong and you live in Portland the event will show up translated for your local time.

Some online games allow 30 people to join, some are 1 on 1. We let you specify how many people can join your events and also show you how many spots are open for events you want to join.

After you create or join an event you can easily add it to your Smartphone or Google Calendar for a reminder.... Read All

Starcrafts: Mine For The Taking

Funny, but a very defective mine. Well defective looney tune style.

Jonathan Blow talks about The Witness

After Microsoft's XBox One reveal, it seems Sony is pushing the Playstation 4 efforts in a very different direction. Sony released a interview with indie developer Jonathan Blow(of the Braid fame) about his new game that will debut on the Playstation 4 called The Witness. Instead of focusing on TV, movies and sports, Sony seems to be focusing on games and indie developers.

Still unsure if I will pickup a Playstation 4, but so far Sony is pushing this a bit closer to my style.

In the video Jonathan talks about being an indie developer and that he can pick what games he wants to create. He talks a bit about The Witness and there is some video showing it off. Whenever I... Read All

Place your bets: Terraria 1.2 release date pool

http://media-curse.cursecdn.com/attachments/56/871/terrariaheader.jpg

Come one, come all, to the first Cheerful Ghost Release Day Betting Pool of Awesomeness (title subject to further scrutiny)!

From what we can tell, Terraria's 1.2 update, the biggest update yet, will be releasing some time soon. Scour the internet for all the tidbits of information you can find, and then make your guess. The winner will receive an awesome trophy on their profile for being the best guesser, and win the admiration and envy of many.

The rules are simple:

Simply comment on this post with your guess of when 1.2 will drop.

If someone has already chosen the same date, please pick another. Only the first occurrence of a date will count.

If an actual release... Read All

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 05/24/2013 at 02:05am

My guess is July 1.

scrypt Supporter wrote on 05/24/2013 at 02:42am

I'll go with July 17th

jdodson Admin wrote on 05/24/2013 at 03:37pm

July 6th.

vdogmr25 wrote on 05/24/2013 at 07:09pm

July 22nd.

Blue_Element wrote on 05/24/2013 at 08:42pm

July 24th.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 05/24/2013 at 09:25pm

ONE DOLLAR

AdamPFarnsworth wrote on 05/25/2013 at 12:02am

July 7th.
(I'd say sorry Jon, but I'd be lying lol)

jdodson Admin wrote on 06/02/2013 at 05:08am

https://twitter.com/Demilogic/status/341011246050578433

Blue Element looking really good right about now :D

vdogmr25 wrote on 06/03/2013 at 03:43am

Dang it! I was so close! *shakes fist*

jdodson Admin wrote on 06/03/2013 at 05:49am

Well vdogmr you could still win depending on how late July it turns out to be :D

Blue_Element wrote on 09/11/2013 at 11:15pm

The update is officially out on October 1st. Umm... Did I win? :P

jdodson Admin wrote on 09/11/2013 at 11:32pm

As I see it, yeah you did. This was fairly beyond what they originally promised but yeah, you were the furthest out!

Blue_Element wrote on 09/11/2013 at 11:54pm

Yay! I feel like the contest kinda ended since they haven't announced the release date until now. So, I'm not even sure I can count this as a win.

jdodson Admin wrote on 09/12/2013 at 12:13am

It's a win, because I made a trophy AND SOMEONE IS GONNA GET IT DAMMIT! I mean, it does look really neat. After I film the CG roundtable, i'll hit you up with it.

But yeah, they are way over the original release zone. Still, be fun to play the new content in October.

Blue_Element wrote on 09/12/2013 at 12:51am

I get a trophy? SWEET! :D And I hope someone makes another Terraria wrapper for 1.2 when it comes out. Being a Mac gamer is hard.

jdodson Admin wrote on 09/12/2013 at 03:15am

And there we are:

http://cheerfulghost.com/trophies/2019/awarded

I was really bummed if something happened and someone couldn't win that trophy, it's really cool. I might do some limited edition trophies for the next Terraria server if there is interest.

Blue_Element wrote on 09/12/2013 at 04:09am

:D So cool!

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 09/12/2013 at 02:11pm

We kept debating relaunching the contest. He kept saying "I'm pushing forward the release" and then "Wait no I'm not."

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Fabien Sanglard Reviews the Doom 3: BFG Code

iD Software is really forward thinking tech company in that it releases the source code for its older game engines and level tools. Don't take my word for it, check out the code they have released on github.

https://github.com/id-Software

This kind of thing should be applauded because when game companies release the source to their games it means that the odds you will be able to play the games you love in the future is pretty good. Plus its awesome to play a game you love on any platform you want. Its also a great way to learn how a top notch game engine operates.

Intro Fabien Sandlard a guy with an awesome hobby, he looks at released game source and blogs about it.... Read All

The Firehouse: ANNE Funded, D3 Comics + New Humble

A.N.N.E. the awesome new 2D metroidvania Kickstarter was recently funded and the games creator shared his excitement in the video above. Awesome to see the game to drop early next year and for more information check out my interview with the games creator, below.

http://cheerfulghost.com/jdodson/posts/1272

Blizzard will be releasing a new Diablo III graphic novel "Sword of Justice" next month. Written by Aaron Williams and art by Joseph Lacroix this will be a pretty nice addition to your Diablo collection of awesomery.

http://us.battle.net//d3/en/blog/9762740

New Humble Weekly Bundle dropped today featuring Alan Wake. More reasons to pay what you want for games you might... Read All

Terraria 1.2 Update Teaser

demilogic posted a new video update on Terraria 1.2 showing off smooth walking, new house roofs, armor, rock launchers, waterfalls, in game music, painting and more. The video also shows up the new in game mini-map.

"Preview for the slopehalfblockwaterfallpaintrocketlaucheromgwhatisthatthingeater'sbone 1.2 update. Also there is a minimap. The update is far from done, we are aiming for a July release. Thank you for your patience and continued support."

I will be running a Cheerful Ghost Terraria server when the 1.2 update drops in July so stay tuned!

Travis Admin wrote on 05/23/2013 at 04:25pm

From what I read, it's only been said that it will be before the end of July, but after the first week of June. So it could be sooner than we think!

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 05/23/2013 at 04:29pm

Second week of June huh? Sounds good to me :D

Travis Admin wrote on 05/23/2013 at 04:50pm

Then hopefully the Starbound beta releases in late August.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 05/23/2013 at 04:53pm

Ha yeah, I don't think so.

I think Starbound and Stardew Valley will ship in the last three months of the year. Id love them to ship sooner, but yeah later part of the year is where my bet is.

Travis Admin wrote on 05/23/2013 at 05:55pm

For the final, yeah I'd agree, but they're still targeting release in 2013, so a beta in August is wishful thinking but within the realm of possibility. At least that's what I'm going to keep telling myself. Because I want it.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 05/23/2013 at 05:57pm

I would love an early release for sure.

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Site Development: Comment Sharing & Gaming Events

comment sharing

After Travis posted about the new XBox One I commented in that post and realized I wanted to share the comment on Twitter. I didn't want to make up a post and then share that, I just wanted to share the comment in Travis post. So this evening I added a share button to the comments that allow anyone to get a URL that links back to any post comment. This lets you share any comment on the site you find useful. I have read some really epic comments on Slashdot and Reddit I have linked to and this allows you to do the same. But don't take my word for it, head into an active comment stream and check it out.

new event system - coming soon

For quite some time... Read All comment sharing

After Travis posted about the new XBox One I commented in that post and realized I wanted to share the comment on Twitter. I didn't want to make up a post and then share that, I just wanted to share the comment in Travis post. So this evening I added a share button to the comments that allow anyone to get a URL that links back to any post comment. This lets you share any comment on the site you find useful. I have read some really epic comments on Slashdot and Reddit I have linked to and this allows you to do the same. But don't take my word for it, head into an active comment stream and check it out.

new event system - coming soon

For quite some time people have told me they want it to be easier to play games with the Cheerful Ghost community. In the past, someone had to create a post and then people commented if they wanted to play. When the time came to play, sometimes people forgot or didn't join in because of timezone strangeness. Needless to say, it works for some but its not awesome.

For the last month I have been working on an awesome new system for Cheerful Ghost to schedule gaming events with the community. The new Event section will allow anyone on the site to join and create events easily on the site.

If you want to schedule a session of Left 4 Dead on Steam Saturday @ 1pm you will easily be able to do that. Since we all live all over the world the new event system will automagically translate the event times for you. So if I create an event in Portland with a start time of 1PM, when Travis looks at the event in New York he will see 4PM. It doesn't matter where you live, Cheerful Ghost will automagically translate the event time for you to your timezone.

Left 4 Dead 2 only supports 4 players so the new event system has a mechanism to hard limit the amount of people that can join if you say it should.

Events in many ways act like posts and as such after you create your event you can comment in it and share it easily on Twitter, Facebook & Google+.

I am pretty busy and as such use my calendar to schedule my life. Once you join an event you can easily add it to your Smartphone, Desktop or Google Calendar. This is a really hot feature and I just added it this evening. Its so magic seeing the event get added to your iPhone calendar :D

I am still in deep development on this but its already working well. I plan on doing a soft beta launch very soon and plan on releasing a teaser video in the next few days so keep a look out for the new goodness.

Progress Update: Ship Travel, Speech & 3D Printing

Been following all the posted development activity for Starbound over the last few weeks and wanted to bubble some up to your attention. One feature I thought was interesting is that they are adding in game 3D printing. Its an interesting feature and ill have them describe it for you.

"We’re also working on the 3D printing interface, which is very similar to the crafting interface but you’re also able to “scan in” items to reverse engineer them. Almost any object you find in the world can be scanned/reverse engineered to allow you to print it using ‘pixels’. However, anything you make with a 3D printer will be marked as “printed” and will have a much lower value. If... Read All