Cheerful Ghost: An Awesome Community For Gamers

The great sandbox in the sky

Kerbal Space Program (known colloquially as KSP) is one of those diamonds in the rough. I started playing back when it was a fledgling little alpha where you could barely get into orbit, let alone get off of the pad in one piece.

The premise of KSP is this: You have a bunch of bits to build a rocket. From there, you can perform orbital maneuvers, visit the mun (KSP's version of the moon) or send a probe into deep space. Normally, this kind of game wouldn't pique my interest this hard... but the feeling you get when you get into a successful orbit just can't be beat. Seeing your rocket stage and surge through the atmosphere conjures feelings that the first aerospace... Read All

Pandas in the Mist.

http://huntsmanslodge.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/wow_pet_battle_system.jpg

I wanted to hate it. I wanted to mock it from behind my usual standbys of EVE-Online, TF2, and DayZ. For a while, I probably did hate it... Then I saw it was on sale and wound up buying it and re-activated my account.

"What the shit is this? What'd they do to my Druid?!?"

Class changes aside, I've grown to...actually...like Mists of Pandaland. One feature I thought I'd abhor was pet battles... Boy was I wrong. Remember waiting half an hour for Heroic queues while you ground away on a couple of dailies? Yeah, not anymore. You'll assemble your pet-battle team and go lay waste to whatever furry creature you can find in the forest. Oh, that one has a blue border? YOU'RE... Read All

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/17/2012 at 11:12pm

The pet battle system was the thing in the Pandera expansion I was the most interested in so its good to hear it worked well. The interesting thing about new entrants into the MMO space is that they have a bunch of awesome WoW expansion to contend with.

The other day I started Planetside 2 and had no idea what I was doing. Nothing letting me know what was happening, nothing giving me a pro-top to what to do next. The game is a cool concept, but the original Quake does a better job of teaching you how to play the game. This isn't a jab at Quake but a slight against a new MMO like Planetside 2 that doesn't really show you what the deal is.

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/17/2012 at 11:13pm

Oh and how many pets have you collected so far?

Jason_Taylor Post Author wrote on 12/18/2012 at 03:45pm

Something like 65 I think? I meant to check last night but I was busy trying to build an epic space station in KSP.

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/18/2012 at 06:10pm

Nice. I was playing Dragon Age: Origins last eve. So fun, gonna write about it soon.

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Day Z: ERMAHGERD, ZERHMBIES.

I really wanted to like DayZ, and for a while I think I legitimately did. I still remember getting chills the first time I heard a zombie aggro me, running through some shitty town on the coast of Chernarus in the dark. DayZ is not without its fair share of problems however.

DayZ, for those of you who don't know, is a Zombie Survival mod for Arma 2: Operation Arrowhead. You start out with next to nothing and have to scavenge food, weapons and other various supplies to ensure your survival. The multiplayer component can be co-op, but is largely PVP based. "Who's shooting in Cherno?" being a common question of neophytes. Congratulations, you just gave up your position and... Read All

DoTA 2: A Friendly, Fun Experience

A few nights ago @WhiteboySlim and I decided to get together around 8PM PST and play some games together. We didn't have a game in mind but we wanted to play.

After meeting up I had the idea to play DoTA 2. Recently I went into the game and noticed you can create a lobby match and play with bots. In fact, you can play just yourself with all bots if you want to.

After pinging a few folks on the site, @panickedthumb, @WhiteboySlim & @Jacob_Richardson joined us for the match.

After getting everyone in the lobby and spending a few minutes figuring out how to start the game we started. I had no idea what any of the characters did, so I picked one at random. Our first match... Read All

New Rage DLC: The Scorchers

Totally excited for this new Rage expansion and the official press drop illustrates why:

"Battle an all-new maniacal bandit clan, wreak havoc with new brutally efficient weapons and explore undiscovered areas in RAGE’s new official add-on pack, RAGE: The Scorchers. Fight alongside new allies to thwart the Scorcher clan’s deadly plot to destroy the Wasteland.

The add-on pack also includes ‘Ultra-Nightmare’, a new high difficulty mode, as well as an ‘Extended Play’ option that allows you to play past the original ending of the game - giving you the opportunity to finish collecting items and achievements."

I appreciate the Extended Play option as it allows you to circle back... Read All

Self Imposed rules of gaming.

So sometimes when I'm playing a game I've played and beaten multiple times, I start to come up with "rules" for myself to make the game more interesting. For example, sometimes when I play Final Fantasy tactics, I'll start to ban myself from using certain abilities because they're too powerful, or restrict the gear I'm allowed to use, such as no Knight swords. I've also tried going through Ocarina of Time for as long as possible without a shield just to see how far I could get.

I was wondering if anyone else does that, and if so, what are some of the rules or limitations you put on yourself?

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/15/2012 at 11:58pm

I am going to do a Let's Play about this sometime, but one thing I do in The Legend of Zelda for NES is max out my hearts, get the blue right and white sword and such before I hit level 1. That said, that makes level one easier... So. Harder...

Hm.

Well I had a dream with the Legend of Zelda that one could beat it without the sword entirely. I tried it a few times but couldn't seem to crack the nut, but some great souls have.

http://faqs.ign.com/articles/559/559800p1.html

Travis Admin wrote on 12/16/2012 at 02:21am

In the Elder Scrolls games, I always set out to make different characters with different stats and different focuses, but I always end up playing a sneaky thief archer/dagger wielder. So I'll frequently put these self-imposed rules on myself to force me to play in a different way. I just love that play style, it's hard not to go back to it, but it's worth it to see all the different ways you can play.

vdogmr25 wrote on 12/16/2012 at 06:01am

If a game has a difficulty setting, I usually choose the hardest available for my first play through. There's a few games where this doesn't work out; namely the Command and Conquer games, but it keeps things challenging. In games like Elder Scrolls, I try do at least one run though using fists only. There's a strange satisfaction in punching a giant to death.

Travis Admin wrote on 12/16/2012 at 06:18am

vdogmr25-- Elder Scrolls unarmed reminds me of this. If you haven't seen this, it's hilarious.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhBiNx749Zw

MAJOR language warning on this. Don't watch unless you're ok with numerous f-bombs.

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StarCrafts: NASL 4 Grand Finals

The latest Starcrafts Episode is a promo for the North American Starcraft League. As I was watching the video on the YouTube page I noticed this comment:

"Why did the Infestor fall down the stairs?

because its imbalanced"

ZING! :D Good one Fenix855!

Revisited, it's easy, but still pretty fun.

If you're unfamiliar, it's an arpg where you're collecting the Armor of God, and your main method of self-defence is throwing fruit (of the spirit, which is also literal fruit).

It could be nostalgia, but the character of the game is really unique. I used to play this game more or less daily when I was pretty young, but never beat it due to there being no save function. Say what you want about production values, but it's pretty unique.

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/15/2012 at 03:39am

My parents picked this up for me when I was a lad. Surprised me because I had never heard of it before and the cartridge is shaped funny. That said, I played it and loved every second of it. I memorized all the questions as well.

Since it had a save feature, I did finally beat it but it took some doing. You get the Sword of the Spirit and then you have enough firepower to go to the Hell stage. If memory serves the entrance to hell was in two places? It was always pretty fun to go to Hell and kill the Devil, I think thats why when Doom came out later I was so into it.

gmlawton Post Author wrote on 12/15/2012 at 11:21am

I think the questions section planted a seed that eventually became my obsession with bowties...

After weeks of playing it, I finally found the password system, but the 20 character-alpha-numeric-case-sensitive passwords were impenetrable to me at the time. I only ever got as far as the airport. Not that I died at the airport, but it was just that I had been playing for what seemed like hours at that point, and I simply could not go on.

Playing through this time, there was magic in getting past where I had ever been, and seeing things I had only ever imagined, like Samson's Jawbone and the boots and whatnot.

I love the idea of this being a spiritual predecessor to doom! Thinking back, it was somewhat interesting how you're in this utterly normal world (park, city, houses...) and there are demons, and devil dogs that slowly work their way in...

Timogorgon Member wrote on 12/15/2012 at 05:35pm

I'm kind of surprised how many people know about this game. I thought my cousins and I were the only ones!

The game is actually pretty good for being kind of a Zelda clone. The banana was my weapon of choice if I remember correctly. :)

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/16/2012 at 12:02am

@gmlawton: The password system was ridiculous for sure but somehow I was able to navigate it, but sometimes I wrote it down wrong clearing my progress. Samson's Jawbone is a great item, my other fav was the vial of God's truth. But the most OP item of all was the Sword of the Spirit, after you get that its basically "Game Over" for the Devil.

@whiteboyslim: The Banana was the first weapon(if memory serves) that was fast AND went all the way across the screen. If was a front runner to the Sword of the Spirit but when the Sword hit, it blew up with a radius of two "truth bombs."

Did you both find all the hearts in the game?

Travis Admin wrote on 12/16/2012 at 02:23am

I only know of this game because of the AVGN review of all the different bible games. That said, I did buy Bible Adventures a few years back, and it's just as bad as AVGN says.

gmlawton Post Author wrote on 12/16/2012 at 02:50am

The banana was great to find if I recall, you're in the hotels and you talk to this old guy that says something about patience, and if you stand still like 30 secs, a wall moves and that's where you find it!

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/16/2012 at 05:04am

@gmlawton: I think you might be right about that. How many pears did you find? Or... Well there was a fruit weapon you could get that you could get 4 of, grapes or pears... I don't remember.

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A Humble Opinion

I'll preface this with the fact that Oblivion is one of the best examples of a game where modding capability really shines; there are countless user-made additions and at least one full-modification pack, Nehrim, that I know of off the top of my head. If you play Oblivion may people will tell you to just go straight into mods and ignore the base game and that's where I have to disagree.

The first game I played was vanilla. And, man, that first time you exit the sewers, you can do anything. The immense freedom, the open-world nature, it was incredible. Oblivion is by no means perfect and going back now the combat doesn't age very well, but the main focus of the game, the... Read All

Travis Admin wrote on 12/14/2012 at 08:25pm

It's fantastic. One of my favorites of all time. I play with mods now, but very few. The vanilla game is great as it is.

Gary_Butterfield wrote on 12/14/2012 at 10:15pm

I love Oblvion and Skyrim but I think the FPS Fallouts are a lot better. Fallout has one of the most unique settings in gaming. The Elder Scrolls games, though I love them for their freedom, always seemed really generic setting wise.

gmlawton wrote on 12/15/2012 at 02:07am

For me, it was like my experience with Morrowind. I didn'tget into either right away. It took until I was able to work up the patience to get myself immersed. Also both games, their best foot isn't put forward in the main quests, it's the guild missions imo. It took mea while to figure that out, and that rushing through things wasn't the way to enjoy the games, but relazing and soaking in the universe.

Overall, I think it's The Elder Scrolls games helped me really mature as a gamer. They're great games... they just don't really pull you in, they grow on you if you give them the timeto.

Travis Admin wrote on 12/15/2012 at 03:25am

Gary, allow me to nitpick a bit. I don't think the Fallout games can realistically be called FPS games. I'm open to being convinced otherwise, but...

The VATS system means that you never really have to aim. Sure, it's obvious that Bethesda put a ton of FPS elements in their games. As an FPS though, Fallout 3 would fail miserably. It uses some pretty clunky FPS mechanics, when treated as an FPS. New Vegas improved on it quite a bit. It's substantially better. I used VATS far less in New Vegas because of the improvements, but still, VATS is front and center.

But otherwise I agree. The Fallout games really have some of the best atmosphere in any games I've ever played. I don't think the Elder Scrolls is generic, but the modern Fallouts are definitely more interesting and unique. I can't wait to see what Fallout 4 can do with the Skyrim engine!

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/15/2012 at 03:44am

@panicked @gary The new Fallout games have elements of a Shooter for sure. The game is in first person. I don't know the game doesn't feel like a traditional shooter but it has those elements.

I played more Oblivion that I have Skyrim, I ended up stopping my play of Oblivion on the PS3 due to me becoming a Vampire and not wanting to undo that. I didn't realize a Vampire had bitten me and then I turned. Walked out side and, yeah it hurt. :D

Timogorgon Member wrote on 12/15/2012 at 05:45pm

Oblivion is fun, but I kind of hate the leveling mechanics. You have to put in a lot of work to make sure you get the most out of each level up. After sinking somewhere around 15-20 hours into the game i ended up having to start over because my character kept leveling up but getting horrible stat gains. That soured my experience (pun intended) pretty bad, and after putting a couple hours into my new character I got bored and moved on to other games.

I actually have not tried any of the mods for the game. Maybe a mod or two would help bring me back to the game.

Timogorgon Member wrote on 12/15/2012 at 05:55pm

As far as Fallout goes, I'd say it's a FPS / turn based hybrid. The FPS features are a little clunky I agree, and I really only use them when sniping or up close with a shotgun. The setting is great too. I love the sort of retro-futurism of everything.

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/16/2012 at 12:04am

The Fallout story blew my mind. I don't sink 8-10 hours a day into a game, but with Fallout 3 I did.

Gary_Butterfield wrote on 12/16/2012 at 02:05am

I just meant First Person. Reflex!

Travis Admin wrote on 12/16/2012 at 02:19am

Gary, yeah, I get that. I had actually just been discussing the very same thing earlier in the day on another site, so I was primed ;)

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/18/2012 at 02:06am

Primed for EVIL!

Travis Admin wrote on 12/18/2012 at 03:11am

THE PRIME EEEVILLL. THE LORD OF TERR-OR.

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/18/2012 at 03:36am

Dude that totally a different game!

Travis Admin wrote on 12/18/2012 at 03:59am

Right, but you said "prime" and "evil." What choice did I have?

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/18/2012 at 04:06am

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A Piece of History is Now Free.

One of the grand daddies of MMO's, Everquest went free to play. It was the first video game I heard tethered to the idea of video game addiction. It was also the first game that, according to rumor caused the end to many relationships as one partner spent so much time playing Everquest the relationship flew apart at the seams. Whereas I had no known proof of this, the stories seemed real enough. It was also coupled with a new concept to me that people could spend "too much" time playing video games. I sort of dismiss that sort of notion now as digital life is all encompassing and one can spend the same if not more time simply reading news articles, looking at Facebook... Read All One of the grand daddies of MMO's, Everquest went free to play. It was the first video game I heard tethered to the idea of video game addiction. It was also the first game that, according to rumor caused the end to many relationships as one partner spent so much time playing Everquest the relationship flew apart at the seams. Whereas I had no known proof of this, the stories seemed real enough. It was also coupled with a new concept to me that people could spend "too much" time playing video games. I sort of dismiss that sort of notion now as digital life is all encompassing and one can spend the same if not more time simply reading news articles, looking at Facebook or a Smartphone.

That said, my first throws with this game was largely from a negative "this game will suck your life from your bones" perspective. Needless to say, I totally wanted to lose my life to it, I just never got the opportunity. One reason for that was at the time my wife and I were quite poor and we had no money for the subscription. I was able to flirt with disaster a few times though and I loved every second of it.

I was able to play it a bit over at a friends house that played religiously. He let me create a character and I picked an Elf Necromancer. I remember summoning my pet from bones I collected from killing Skeletons and then hoarding more bones to sell to other players in a stack. Doing those simple things in the game were so awesome and I badly wanted to join the ranks of Everquest players, but it wasn't meant to be. I took out my Everquest angst on Telnet MUD's and spent many an hour huddled around my screen slaying creatures and leveling up in a text based world.

The last few years I have hoped Sony would release Everquest as a Free to Play game and recently noticed my wish came true. The details of how that works are on the Everquest site.

http://www.everquest.com/free

I created a Gnome Wizard and eagerly started the game. Right away I noticed a few things I hadn't before. Early on, there was a bit of BBS / Internet drama about Everquest stealing from MUDs. Some people accused Sony of stealing code from MUDs to make Everquest. I never really understood the argument, Everquest is a 3D game and MUDs are all text. As I played the game now I notice Everquest does draw heavily from MUD's and as such requires much more typing than any new MMO. A staple of modern RPG's / MMO's is to click a NPC to initiate dialog. In Everquest you must type "Hail" and click. Then you have to read the dialog and parse out words you can use to continue the conversation. As I realized these mechanics were central to the game, I remembered the old calls of Everquest "borrowing" from MUD's and the argument made more sense to me.... 13 years later... Not saying Sony actually stole anything, but I understand the argument better now.

That all said, if you have never played Everquest or wanted to come back to it after being years apart now is a great time to do that. It is available from download from the Everquest site and is a new entry in Steam under Free to Play.

Gary_Butterfield wrote on 12/15/2012 at 12:47am

You know what's free? Frog Fractions. You know what's fucking rad? Frog Fractions. http://twinbeardstudios.com/frog-fractions

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 12/15/2012 at 12:54am

Wow, Frog Fractions kicks Number Munchers right in the feels.

Gary_Butterfield wrote on 12/16/2012 at 02:04am

Frog Fractions: GOTY.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 12/16/2012 at 04:49am

Hopefully they wrap up all the DLC and package it up for a re-release.

Gary_Butterfield wrote on 12/16/2012 at 12:54pm

By the way, that board game store I was talking about is called "Unplugged Games" not "Brick and Mortar Games." Not sure what I was thinking.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 12/16/2012 at 02:39pm

Thanks for the clarification. This time I will let it slide... But next time? Horrible consequences.

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