Cheerful Ghost: An Awesome Community For Gamers

Watch Out For Fireballs Kickstarter

Are you in Portland? We're going to do a live show at the PRGE! We need help to do it! I won't be obnoxious about this but consider helping out!

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/53695366/watch-out-for-fireballs-live-at-prge

Interview With Jay Watts Creator of Solar 2

Solar 2 is a beautiful game where you start as an asteroid, gain mass to become and planet and finally a black hole. The game play and score are mesmerizing and after I got it as part of the last bundle I was hooked. The made a pretty large impression on me and as such decided to hit up creator Jay Watts and ask him a few questions.

I want to thank Jay for taking the time to talk with me and wish him well on his next project which at this point, is a secret to everybody. Well, except Jay. :D

jdodson: I just wanted to start by saying “thank you” for making Solar 2. The game is very fluid and as I play it I find myself going to some kind of zen place with the music and... Read All

Collect Many Apples, Stupidly Die in a Lava Pit

I recorded 3 Let's Plays this weekend and I leave you with the finale, my recent play through of The Legend of Dungeon. Its actually a pretty good run until I... overshoot a jump into a Lava Pit. That said I collected a ton of Apples and found a neat hat, so I have that going for me at least.

Steam trading cards are a thing now

http://media.steampowered.com/steamcommunity/public//updates/tradingcards/02.png?v=2

It's been joked about for years that Steam is a game in and of itself-- much like Pokemon, you gotta catch em all. They had little contests around the major sales that helped support this claim, but now that's being kicked up a notch.

Currently in beta, Steam Trading Cards are virtual cards you earn while playing Steam games. Once you collect a set, you can turn them into a profile badge (like the "Pillar of the Community" badge from one of last year's sales) that will get you virtual items and XP toward your Steam level. Leveling up earns you other virtual items. Also, you can win coupons for other games, which is what's driving my interest.

It looks interesting. Steam... Read All

jdodson Admin wrote on 05/16/2013 at 01:02am

I think this is pretty neat. At some point hopefully you can play a game with these?

vdogmr25 wrote on 05/16/2013 at 01:39am

I'm not too big on the idea of a gamerscore. I generally don't care either way, but the ability to turn that into coupons or in-game items now and then actually makes me willing to work for these a bit.

scrypt Supporter wrote on 05/16/2013 at 03:28pm

This is something along the lines of what I thought Microsoft was initially going to do with their Gamerscore system. My local friends are very much completionists, though they aren't on Steam much, or at all. In either case, I don't think this would be something that would attract them, or compel them to play more. It seems a definite progression toward their living room experience, and if someone was to play toward 'leveling up' their profile, why not play on the system that gives you something for that, rather than just a number?

I think it's a cool idea, but will have to spend some time with it.
(just updated my Steam with a beta token/invite thingy. Nice that they assign a level based on what you've already accomplished, so you don't have to start from scratch. About to jump into Team Fortress 2 to see if any magic happens...)

scrypt Supporter wrote on 05/21/2013 at 04:46am

Okay, I've collected a few cards in the games that are available for collecting. Traded, and purchased from the Steam Market, some cards that I needed to complete a set... The whole system seems pretty damn cool. Play the games, and cards "drop" into your inventory while you are playing, up to a certain limit. Trade extras that you have, or sell on the Steam Market. When you have collected enough to have a set, you push a button to craft a badge for that card set. This crafting unlocks other items, such as graphic backdrops for your Steam profile, chat emoticons, even coupons for discounts on Steam games. I don't know if this will show up properly, but I'm linking a copy of my profile here, as a preview (check the "Favorite Group" unlock!):

http://steamcommunity.com/id/neverhouse/

Very interested to see what else they do with this. If (when) other developers jump on board with cards for their games, it's going to explode. So far, I'm impressed.

jdodson Admin wrote on 05/21/2013 at 06:37am

Awesome scrypt, what games does it drop cards for to start? Half-Life and Portal 2 only?

scrypt Supporter wrote on 05/21/2013 at 07:25am

Half Life 2, Portal 2, Counter Strike:GO, Team Fortress 2 and Don't Starve. For now, at least.

jdodson Admin wrote on 05/21/2013 at 03:02pm

Don't Starve huh? That may accelerate my acquisition of that one...

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 05/21/2013 at 05:32pm

Don't Starve is interesting. It's a roguelike-like survival world-building game.

jdodson Admin wrote on 05/21/2013 at 06:48pm

Yeah, I played it on a friends computer, it really is fun.

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 01/25/2014 at 05:16am

It is interesting. I'm probably a bit of a newb when it comes to Steam as I only have two games, Portal and Terraria. Guess how much I paid for both games.....that's right $0. I got Portal when I found out it was free. I spent 3 hours on it, I think, that's it. Terraria on the other hand, well I spent 159 hours on. It was interesting once I started playing Terraria that I noticed I had earn some of these cards based on Terraria. I may have but a few and it doesn't seem like I've earned any since. I'm really not sure what they're for, but it is interesting.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 01/25/2014 at 02:31pm

How did you manage to only spend 3 hours on Portal?

jdodson Admin wrote on 01/25/2014 at 04:04pm

I think the game can be completed in three hours. That said, my first play through was much more than that.

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 01/25/2014 at 10:06pm

Hahaha, Travis, probably because I got so frustrated with it. Sometimes puzzle games make me feel so stupid.

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Here it comes again.

I get the feeling that this won't get a whole lot of hype on CG, but Gran Turismo 6 has just been announced. I enjoy good racing games, and this series is near and dear to me, so I'm looking forward to this next installment.

So Much Evil For Your Desktop

Blizzard's art team released 4 new desktop backgrounds for Diablo III today. If you are looking to amp up your desktop's hell factor, I seriously recommend checking them out.

The offer some seriously epic resolutions so you can see all the blood in oh so crisp and savory HD.

http://us.battle.net//d3/en/blog/9691897

Game Modding & More Game Development Progress

If you are curious how difficult it will be to add items to Starbound after launch a recent update from Starbound developer Mollygos should interest you. Outlining the step to easily create in game items I am thinking of a few I would like to add to the game when it ships. Like a placable Cheerful Ghost framed portrait for starters :D

Tiy also posted a few short blog posts about the new stuff that was added to the game last week as well and I have them linked below for your enjoyment.

http://community.playstarbound.com/index.php?threads/basic-object-implementation-a-tutorial.21463/
http://playstarbound.com/a-brief-look-at-what-weve-been-working-on-this-week/
... Read All

Dark World Dungeon 2

The game I am currently playing is The Legend of Zelda Link to the Past and I decided to make a video of me playing the Dark World Dungeon 2. As I explain in the video, I tackle Dark World Dungeons in the order of 1, 4 then 2. After that I usually hit up the ice level as I find that quite a bit of fun. I may capture the remaining levels and post them depending on time and interest by all you lovely people.

It has been __YEARS__ since I last played Link to the Past so my run has a few back tracking moments. That said, this game is still very fun and am really enjoying my time with it.

Happy Retro Tuesday!

Blue_Element wrote on 05/16/2013 at 12:46am

Are you playing that from an actual SNES or are you using an emulator?

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 05/16/2013 at 01:00am

I own the original, but I am playing it from an emulator.

Blue_Element wrote on 05/17/2013 at 01:12am

What emulator are you using?

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 05/17/2013 at 01:19am

This was on my Mac and I used... snes9x

Blue_Element wrote on 05/18/2013 at 12:55am

Cool! That's the same emulator I use!

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 05/18/2013 at 05:04am

Awesome, yeah its a good one.

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More Details about Krieg Emerge

Krieg is an upcoming playable class Gearbox is adding to Borderlands 2. This new class looks pretty awesome and does a few things differently. With the other classes when you run out of life, if you can come back to life immediately if you make a kill. With Krieg when you run out of life he switches to suicide mode where he can toss around dynamite sticks and blow himself up to try and take out bad guys. The video above illustrates the class really well so I recommend you check it out.

If you want to spend some time playing with Krieg's skill tree hit the link below.

http://www.borderlands2.com/us/skilltree/psycho.html

Krieg will be available for purchase today... Read All

Let's Play: Mr. Rescue. A Retro Firefighter Sim.

Last night I recorded a batch of 3 Let's Play videos and decided to post Mr. Rescue first. Mr. Rescue is a interesting new indie game where you take the role of a Firefighter rescuing people from a burning building. Mr. Rescue is totally free and works on Mac, Windows and Linux. Supporting USB controllers, Mr. Rescue's play control and style are pretty tight. You have to issue some care jumping out the edge of the building but I didn't have any control issues outside of that.

It took me a few play throughs to understand you needed to toss people out the doors to rescue them. Its totally satisfying throwing people through a door and seeing the door break to get someone... Read All