Cheerful Ghost: An Awesome Community For Gamers

Duke Nukem 3D Atomic Edition: Free on GoG

"Duke Nukem 3D: Atomic Edition, the legendary FPS in which the Earth's greatest hero provides a steady flow of bullets and badass one-liners, is available on GOG.com, for the low price of one smile, for the next 48 hours. That's not all. For the first time in history, this supreme space-alien slaughter simulation is also available on Mac!"

Duke Nukem 3D Free and now on Mac? Awesome. Best head over to GoG and nab this game before the clock runs out. Never played any Duke games personally so here is my chance to redeem myself!

http://www.gog.com/gamecard/duke_nukem_3d_atomic_edition

Dat Firehose: Diablo 3, Scaling League of Legends

Looks like Blizzard is experimenting with Diablo 3 on consoles. No official plans yet they are getting it working.

http://www.polygon.com/2012/12/10/3752536/diablo-3-running-on-consoles-still-not-an-official-blizzard-project

Riot Games, the makers of League of Legends is now dealing with "big data" and how to scale that to millions of users. As a programmer I find this sort of thing interesting.

http://games.slashdot.org/story/12/12/08/207248/for-league-of-legends-creator-riot-games-big-data-is-serious-business

Valve wants to get DoTA 2 running on tablets but it looks like the current offerings are not hefty enough to power DoTA 2.

... Read All

Will_Owens wrote on 12/12/2012 at 03:31am

I'm really considering getting Eador. I loved playing HoMM (15 years ago? Jeez) and love games that have opaque systems I have to dig in to learn making this look outstanding. The graphics also look pretty cool in that Age of Wonders watercolor painted kind of way. If anyone has any experience playing it I would love to hear more about it. Also, if it has multiplayer capability, we could get a game night going.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 12/12/2012 at 03:41am

Ill append the post but have you played... let me get the link...

Battle for Wesnoth? Its an Open Source game that is very mature and runs on all the relevant platforms, I even think it has an iOS and Android port:

http://www.wesnoth.org/

Its free too :D

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 12/12/2012 at 05:42pm

Reason I bring it up, is because if we want to have a game night with a turn based strategy game that might work as its free for anyone to download and runs on all platforms.

Will_Owens wrote on 12/13/2012 at 12:59am

Very true, although, in my case it would be a game morning. I'd be up for that if we can organize something, but turn based strategy isn't the most popular genre anymore...

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 12/13/2012 at 06:52am

Yeah it really isn't. Maybe we can plan something closer to the holidays, ill have some time off to make scheduling anything much simpler :D

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Thoughts After Finishing Braid

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-EfhR_jDjesY/Te8B-_eYniI/AAAAAAAAA-E/vVQPvdNabko/s1600/Screenshot-1.png

Having just completed Braid for my blog (www.backlogkiller.com), I thought I would transfer some of my comments over here to Cheerful Ghost. If you haven’t finished the game and don’t want to have anything ruined, I guess you should skip this post. Although, there’s really not that much to ruin since the entire game is mechanics and puzzle driven.

Braid, the brainchild of the (in)famous indie game designer Jonathan Blow, is a puzzle platformer that uses time manipulation as its primary mechanic in addition to the standard running and jumping. By pressing a single button, the player can reverse time to avert death, manipulate entities in the world, and experiment with... Read All Having just completed Braid for my blog (www.backlogkiller.com), I thought I would transfer some of my comments over here to Cheerful Ghost. If you haven’t finished the game and don’t want to have anything ruined, I guess you should skip this post. Although, there’s really not that much to ruin since the entire game is mechanics and puzzle driven.

Braid, the brainchild of the (in)famous indie game designer Jonathan Blow, is a puzzle platformer that uses time manipulation as its primary mechanic in addition to the standard running and jumping. By pressing a single button, the player can reverse time to avert death, manipulate entities in the world, and experiment with different solutions. Although this sounds simple, the introduction of new elements such as monsters or objects immune to time control complicates things greatly. Using time reversal and properties unique to each world, the player must control the main character (Tim) to collect puzzle pieces and rescue the enigmatic princess that was lost in the past.

Throughout the game, the player is fed small bits of story through strange blocks of text that hint at the identity of the Princess Tim is looking for. This enhances the somber mood of the levels and adds enormous gravity to the metaphor the mechanics of time manipulation work to build. The concept of going back to correct your mistakes and take another path through life is universal and lies in everyone. As a way to represent the desire to recapture a lost love, career, or youth, Braid is very effective and quite touching in my opinion. Unfortunately, the game squanders this chance by making a baffling narrative choice I cannot even begin to understand.

Spoilers Below:

The ‘Princess’ in Braid is actually the secret of nuclear weapons. Tim is a scientist who worked on the Manhattan Project that brought about the age of nuclear bombs and the cold war. Even though the metaphor of time makes sense in terms of the desire to put that genie back in the bottle, it is absolutely ridiculous (in my opinion) when slapped on the game. What could have been a poignant and relatable concept is blown out of the water by the torpedo of grandiosity. I don’t understand why this was done other than to say ‘video games can be important’. Importance can take all shapes and sizes. I cannot relate to developing of a weapon of mass destruction, but I sure as heck can relate to wanting to recapture something I’ve lost in my own life.

It is easy to see why Jonathan Blow is such a controversial designer. The brilliant game design makes me very hopeful for his new project, The Witness, but it also worries me about what direction it will take. Many great stories have dealt with personal conflicts that give them an even greater impact which may have helped Braid. Despite this, I enjoyed the game and was only mildly let down by the ending since it was such a pleasure to play.

Read my full thoughts here: http://www.backlogkiller.com/2012/11/36-braid-game-myth-legend.html

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

One thing you can do with games is make statements. I am glad you spoiled the game here so I could find out what the reveal in Braid is, thanks for that. Does the reveal for Tim's character make sense with the style of Braid? Perhaps not.

I found the gravity of a nuclear assault on life and the landscape to be fairly poignant in Fallout. Just existing in an environment can clue you in to what a designer is trying to say.

That said, starting with a known concept like a Princess and then flipping that over to have the Princess be undoing something they believe is evil is interesting.

Did he start the player out with some regret and baggage or did the reveal just kind of come out of nowhere?

Will_Owens Post Author wrote on 12/12/2012 at 03:53am

The block text kind of hints at regret, but personifies the Princess in a way that makes it almost explicit that it's an actual person. I may have been assuming too much, but it really just came out of nowhere. I think Fallout works as a commentary on nuclear war because it takes concepts we are all familiar with such as anger, violence, and other base emotions and pasts them on a recognizable backdrop. Braid uses a fantasy inspired theme (although there are hints in the artwork) that doesn't really support that kind of left turn at all. I don't usually like to say stuff like this, but it felt like it totally M. Night Shyamalan'ed at the end.

Travis Admin wrote on 12/12/2012 at 04:30am

Seems you either love or hate that story reveal. I was torn. It was interesting, compelling, and poignant, yet considering the game it was a part of, it didn't quite work. I think had it been done a little differently or on a different kind of game or with a different setting, it would have been awesome.

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/12/2012 at 05:35am

That makes sense.

@Will do you mean a later M. Night film, because I felt the reveals in his first couple up including Lady in the Water were pretty awesome. (my taste)

Will_Owens Post Author wrote on 12/12/2012 at 06:07am

I haven't seen any of his movies since Signs to be honest.

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/12/2012 at 06:27am

No problem, but I get what you mean, total switcheroo but wasn't stylistically earned.

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More Time with the Wii U

This weekend I made my way to the Mall for a bit of Holiday gift retrieval. As I made my way through the morass of Holiday Shopping Victims I noticed a Wii U Kiosk. I navigated my way through the Horde and spent some time watching kids play and asked the attendants some questions about some of the games.

One thing I took away from checking out the Wii U is that the games are very pretty. The New Super Mario Brothers Wii U & Scribblenauts HD look stunning.

One game stood out to me as a pretty fun example of the new Wii U tablet style controller was Nintendo Land. Nintendo Land is essentially a set of Wii style party games similar in tone to Wii Play & Wii Sports.... Read All

Travis Admin wrote on 12/11/2012 at 02:01pm

It really does look unique, interesting, and fun. But so did the Wii, and with the exception of first-party titles, I barely ever touched it. There were a few good ones, like MadWorld and No More Heroes, but it's been collecting dust since Super Mario Galaxy 2. Nintendo made something amazing, but the lagging graphics and tons of shovelware kinda pushed out third-party developers.

Hopefully the Wii U is different, but I worry that once the new round of consoles that MS and Sony release will push it to the same spot as the Wii.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 12/11/2012 at 05:20pm

The last game I played seriously on the Wii was Super Mario Galaxy. My wife and I still pull out the Wii for the Just Dance games at parties. We just picked up Just Dance 4. I have a soft spot for the Wii, but like you it mostly goes unplayed. In the end, my Playstation 3 did more so hopefully the Wii U can fill that void.

I am wondering what Microsoft and Sony are doing next, so far I have no idea what that is but I will hold off until I know more for sure.

Timogorgon Member wrote on 12/11/2012 at 06:22pm

I'll admit that up until a couple weeks ago, everything I heard about the Wii U had been kind of underwhelming. But now that the system is out and people are getting some hands on experience with it, I'm seeing a lot of really positive reviews. Hopefully this enthusiasm will stick better with the Wii U than it did with the Wii.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 12/11/2012 at 09:37pm

I think the Wii U made some choices to give it lets over the next generation better than the Wii. A few reasons:

The Wii U is compatible with all your old Wii Stuff.

The Wii U is essentially a PS3 or XBox 360 horsepower wise. I believe this is important because the PS3 and XBox 360 will be supported well into the next generation. Whereas the PS4 and XBox 720 might look better, I believe publishers will still make PS3 and 360 ports well into the next generation.

Its $300. This is a good price to start at as it starts reasonably and will drop over time.

That said, for me the most exciting platforms are the PC, Steam in your Living Room and Apple TV with apps.

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Happy Holidays with Minecraft!

Like many of you, when my Holiday time off comes around I plan on playing some games. Minecraft will no doubt be played and it seems that Mojang will be updating it so you can ring in the New Year Minecraft Style.... Minecraft Style.... OP, OP, OP!

From the Mojangs mouth:

"What’s this? This doesn’t sound like a redstone update at all!”, you say. “Indeed,” we say. Thing is, we* suddenly decided we wanted to make sure that you have fireworks for New Year’s Eve, so we’re working in several parallel branches of the code now. One is for the 1.5 “Redstone Update,” and one is now for a 1.4.6 patch update. This update will be out before Christmas, and 1.5 will wait until January... Read All

Mew-Genics Title Music

Just adding another post to the continuing trail of cat parts littering the road to the launch of Mew-Genics.

"So we really splurged with the soundtrack for Mew-genics, the game will feature a full album of over 20 studio recorded songs, with more than half of them with lyrics! we really wanted to make the games music feature extended themes of the game or small stories within each song, kind of how Katamari did it in a way, except all our songs are about cats!"

I really dig the title track and am really looking forward for this release.

http://supermeatboy.com/129/Mew_Genics_Teaser_week_7/#b

gogonlinux: Games from GOG in Linux made easier

A community of GOG fans has released the first beta of gogonlinux, a tool to make playing your GOG games easier in Linux.

http://www.gogonlinux.com/about/

Installing it requires a few steps (you can read up on them on the "Getting Started" page) but using the software seems straight-forward. Just log into your GOG account, and it handles downloading and installing the games for you.

There are currently only a few games present. It isn't currently using Linux ports, but things like Wine, Dosbox, and Scummvm to run games with the most compatible configuration.

Hopefully with Steam's Linux client looking toward release, and Desura's presence for some time now, GOG will do... Read All

Street Fighter X Mega Man to release Dec 17

You read that correctly. A new 8-bit Mega Man game that pits our blue hero against the characters from Street Fighter.

It drops Dec 17 on PC, FOR FREE, in celebration of both franchises' 25th anniversary.

I feel like I should say more but at this point you should probably just drool over the video. Enjoy!

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/09/2012 at 06:26am

I had to check on this, not because I didn't believe you but because ... I don't I just had to read more about this.

http://www.capcom-unity.com/brelston/blog/2012/12/08/street-fighter-x-mega-man-coming-december-17

A unique paring for sure!

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 12/09/2012 at 06:32am

I've been doing some digging as well. It appears this is a fan-made game that got Capcom's blessing and they're also doing promotion and distribution. So official, yet not. This is awesome of Capcom.

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/09/2012 at 06:38am

Yeah, it is. Good on Capcom!

AdamPFarnsworth wrote on 12/10/2012 at 05:50pm

Dude! So rad!

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/10/2012 at 09:56pm

Hadoken!

Timogorgon Member wrote on 12/11/2012 at 06:15pm

This is pretty awesome. A lot of companies would have just slapped the fan made game with a take down notice, but Capcom has done something awesome instead. And after the whole on-disc DLC thing, they can really use the good publicity. Good job Capcom!

As for the game, I will definitely be checking this out. I gotta get a controller for my PC now!

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Valve does have plans for a SteamBox! ...Kinda.

Gabe Newell gave an interview with Kotaku last night where he discussed the possibilities available for PCs in the living room. In summary, Gabe says that Valve's current goal is to make PCs better for the living room. The next steps for them are to get Steam out of beta on the Linux platform, and get Big Picture Mode working well for Linux, which will give them more flexibility for their own hardware.

He doesn't think Valve will be the only players in the game though. Newell expects other hardware providers to join in as well, selling PC's that connect to your TV and play Steam games right out of the box, and these PCs will be competing directly with consoles.

This is... Read All

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/09/2012 at 05:36am

I really hope this pans out to be awesome. I saw how this would work with Portal 2 on PS3. Buy one game, play everywhere you can. I got a PS3 game and a copy for Steam on PC. I played the single player on my console, then when they released the map editor I made those on PC. It was magical and I want more of that. Steam console should allow this.

Plus Steam is way more awesome that the current console generations. Even the next gen won't be as awesome as a Steam summer sale. I see the NextBox and PS4 doing more with digital but with the same prices and same kinds of DRM we have now.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 12/09/2012 at 06:07am

I tend to agree with you there. Signing into Steam when launching Portal 2 on PS3 was a moment of clarity for me. It was a realization of what *could* be. I'm not sure this will work to make that more common, but if this new hardware is treated like a console by those selling it and buying it, the effect will be similar.

And yeah, there will be a bigger focus on digital distribution next gen, but I can't imagine the big console providers going for the massive sales like Steam.

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/10/2012 at 06:42am

I don't either, they can do sales now to compete but they don't. Its as if consoles are immune to market forces. Well, they are because you can buy a game second hand and it can be marked down after launch. That said, the digital component doesn't seem to slide much. I remember when they had a sale on the Pixel Junk games and you could get em' all for cheap. I was going to spring for them all but was stopped by how hard it was to give my PS3 money to buy it. Seriously, after 35 minutes of trying I stopped.

Much simpler to pay Steam.

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/10/2012 at 07:03am

This has been making the rounds today: http://games.slashdot.org/story/12/12/07/182217/valve-begins-listing-linux-requirements-for-certain-games-on-steam

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 12/10/2012 at 02:32pm

That's odd, I've never had trouble with purchases on the PS3. Do you remember what the problem you were having was?

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/10/2012 at 02:57pm

Not knowing how to give them my money in the checkout process.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 12/10/2012 at 03:48pm

Hmm, I've always hit "add funds" or whatever it's called, popped in my cc info, and told it how much to add. I've actually always been impressed with that process. But without seeing what you saw, who knows what the problem could have been...

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/10/2012 at 04:31pm

I don't think you can do that during the checkout process. Which later I realized you need to add funds before you checkout, or at least appeared to be the case.

Oh well, I saved a few bucks anyway.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 12/10/2012 at 04:49pm

Nope, that's where I always add mine. Go to check out, it tells you that you don't have enough funds, so you hit add funds and it takes care of it for you.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 12/10/2012 at 05:25pm

You may need to add a credit card to your account first, though. I'm not 100% sure.

jdodson Admin wrote on 12/10/2012 at 09:56pm

Yeah, it was something... Next time I might just buy a PS3 card at the store and redeem that. After the breach I am not really in love with giving them my CC info.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 12/10/2012 at 10:16pm

That's a very good point. It can happen to anyone though, MS, Steam, Amazon...

In Sony's case, it seems there was some significant fault to place on them for having less than stellar security, but I think after that they straightened up. At least I hope they would. They should be having yearly (if not more often) internal and external penetration tests and audits to make sure that kind of info can't get out again.

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Dat Firehose: Elder Scrolls Online & Portal on TI

Bethesda's Elder Scrolls Online Team recently released a story from the ESO Universe. This one focuses on Jorunn the Skald-King:

http://elderscrollsonline.com/en/misc/leader-profile/ebonheart

Some awesome people released Portal for the TI Calculator. Video linked above. Nab the code for your TI:

http://www.omnimaga.org/index.php?action=downloads;sa=view;down=841

THQ stock jumped 40% after its latest Humble Bundle went live:

http://m.pcgamer.com/2012/12/03/thqs-stock-rises-nearly-40-thanks-to-humble-bundle

Some have noted the Wii U is better for Indie Games. Great even:

http://games.slashdot.org/story/12/12/03/1549213/cheap-indie-games-make-wii-u-a-better-value

Crysis 3 specs... Read All

Travis Admin wrote on 12/08/2012 at 04:06am

Hey, I think I might be able to pull off Crysis 3 at almost recommended!

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 12/08/2012 at 06:18am

Awesome! You must have some awesome hardware!

Travis Admin wrote on 12/08/2012 at 12:35pm

Not really. I think it's mostly that I got a video card recently. It wasn't even the best or anything, just a $125 NVIDIA that was significantly better than the ATI I was running.

Travis Admin wrote on 12/08/2012 at 04:20pm

Also, Portal on the TI looks surprisingly functional.

jdodson Admin Post Author wrote on 12/08/2012 at 04:50pm

Yeah, it really does. That TI font... Reminds me of college.

BR Supporter wrote on 12/08/2012 at 06:16pm

Well...I know what I will be spending my math class doing now.

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Duke Nukem 3D Atomic Edition: Free on GoG

Dat Firehose: Diablo 3, Scaling League of Legends

Thoughts After Finishing Braid

More Time with the Wii U

Happy Holidays with Minecraft!

Mew-Genics Title Music

gogonlinux: Games from GOG in Linux made easier

Street Fighter X Mega Man to release Dec 17

Valve *does* have plans for a SteamBox! ...Kinda.

Dat Firehose: Elder Scrolls Online & Portal on TI

Valve does have plans for a SteamBox! ...Kinda.