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Crawl Impressions

Will_Ball gives this a solid "Rad" on the Ghost Scale

This is fun, with very few issues, and is well worth your time.

Will_Ball gives this a "Rad" on the Ghost Scale

This is fun, with very few issues, and is well worth your time.

The team at Powerhoof was kind enough to send Cheerful Ghost a download key for Crawl for the Nintendo Switch. After watching the trailer, I was ready to download it and give it a go.

Crawl puts you in control of a person trying to escape a dungeon, slay a beast and, in the end, freeing yourself. Sounds pretty simple, right? Well it is not. On you journey to free yourself, you are surrounded by three ghosts, who also want to make it out. Their goal is to kill you, regain human form and then try to free themselves. There can only be one human alive at one time, so not only are you battling the beasts of the dungeon, but you are battling the ghosts. Did I mention that... Read All The team at Powerhoof was kind enough to send Cheerful Ghost a download key for Crawl for the Nintendo Switch. After watching the trailer, I was ready to download it and give it a go.

Crawl puts you in control of a person trying to escape a dungeon, slay a beast and, in the end, freeing yourself. Sounds pretty simple, right? Well it is not. On you journey to free yourself, you are surrounded by three ghosts, who also want to make it out. Their goal is to kill you, regain human form and then try to free themselves. There can only be one human alive at one time, so not only are you battling the beasts of the dungeon, but you are battling the ghosts. Did I mention that each ghost/person can be controlled by another player (or AI)? Well it can. Welcome to Crawl!

Crawl is a hard game to explain, you must see it in action. It is a dungeon crawler/gauntlet-type game.

As a human, your goal is to defeat monsters, level up, get gold, upgrade your weapons, and make your way to the final boss.

As a ghost, your job is to beat up on the human, which you can do in multiple ways. One way to beat up on the human is to summon a monster from a summoning site. This is where you can do the most damage. Another way to kick some human ass is to possess some object, which causes a little damage. The final way make the human's day suck is to send slimes after them. You can accumulate slime like creatures by obtaining orbs throughout the game.

While your human levels up during the course of the game, your ghost can level up its monsters in between levels based on points you earn from humans leveling up. It is kind of confusing, but works once you play the game.

I love playing Crawl in spurts. It has a fun pixelated art style and a lot of character. On the Switch screen the gameplay can be quite chaotic, and sometimes you can lose track of where you character is. I have yet to play it on the TV, but it could help alleviate that problem. Even though it is chaotic on the Switch screen, it is quite enjoyable.

I could see this game being a great party game. If you have three other players going at it, there would be a lot of fun to be had. I originally thought the game had online support, so I could try multiplayer out, but it does not. This game is purely local multiplayer.

Overall, it is an enjoyable game, that can easily kill some downtime. I plan to keep playing this from time to time.

Crawl is available on pretty much every platform, so if you want to give it a go, you should have a computer/console ready to play it.

Valve Will Drop Windows XP & Vista Support in 2019

Valve has supported Windows XP and Vista for way longer than I thought they would so it makes sense that they are finally going to stop. I could see some gamers running older games that work great on XP get bitten a bit here but Windows XP is now 17 years old and most PC gamers have moved on and it seems Valve is too.

"Starting on January 1 2019, Steam will officially stop supporting the Windows XP and Windows Vista operating systems. This means that after that date the Steam Client will no longer run on those versions of Windows. In order to continue running Steam and any games or other products purchased through Steam, users will need to update to a more recent... Read All

Watch This Grim Fandango Table Read!

At this years E3 Coliseum Double Fine presented a really special script table read of Grim Fandango featuring the original voice actors and Jack Black! The original game music composer Peter McConnell was there providing the music creating the backdrop for a very special event. The whole thing was to pitch that Grim Fandango and Broken Age are coming to the Switch and if you haven't played these games and own a Switch you might be interested.

Nintendo's Big Reveals at E3

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
Smash is back in a big way with Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. It will have every fighter from every Smash Bros. game including Ridley from Metroid (see the video above).

You can use a Game Cube controller and all Amiibos can be used.

There are also some changes and tweaks to the mechanics that you can learn about, along with everything else about the game, in this 25 minute video: https://youtu.be/L93H7YC-83o

Super Mario Party
This one is interesting. A bunch of new, fun looking mini-games as you'd expect, but this one brings in extra functionality if you use multiple Switches. The downside being that to use it, you need multiple Switches but... Read All

Cheerful Ghost Radio episode 26: Apple Closes the Valve

In this episode we cover a variety of video game news. Will Steam Link ever get a release on iOS and Apple TV after Apple denied the app? How awesome does Rage 2 look? How long will Nintendo support the 3DS? Will we see an N64 Classic this year? Will No Man's Sky's Next update be everything we hope? What is the meaning of life? We dive into these questions and more in this episode of Cheerful Ghost Radio!

For All The Grub Eaters: Sony @ E3 2018

I don't own a PS4 and don't plan to buy one but I hold a special place in my heart for Sony as I was a happy PS3 owner until mine died a couple years ago. They seem to be doing a great job of collecting the hardcore console audience and the console exclusives seem interesting to fans. I watched the conference tonight and if you are interested in seeing what Sony is up to you should too. I'll drop some interesting bits of that conference below and if you have something I didn't note let me know in the comments.

In the beginning there was Banjo: The whole stream started off with an old dude playing a banjo and it sounded awesome. I also liked how the Sony conference... Read All I don't own a PS4 and don't plan to buy one but I hold a special place in my heart for Sony as I was a happy PS3 owner until mine died a couple years ago. They seem to be doing a great job of collecting the hardcore console audience and the console exclusives seem interesting to fans. I watched the conference tonight and if you are interested in seeing what Sony is up to you should too. I'll drop some interesting bits of that conference below and if you have something I didn't note let me know in the comments.

In the beginning there was Banjo: The whole stream started off with an old dude playing a banjo and it sounded awesome. I also liked how the Sony conference featured a few musical interludes. Not sure how many other gamers liked that part but I did.

Last of Us Part II: Holy shit Part II looks crazy insane violent. I didn't play the original but if I did this would be interesting. Honestly the game might be too violent for me, which is an odd thing to say but I am getting older and way less cool so there's that. I started watching the live stream while watching my son and I thought I would be able to watch all of it but when the video switches to Ellie stabbing a dude in the neck I had to finish it after he went to be.

Death Stranding: I have no idea what this is but it looks like a cool concept movie. The video featured a woman eating a grub which was neat but I prefer snacks like peanuts. Hideo Kojima fans are excited about this and I like the trailer I saw but the game doesn't look like something i'd play. Still, a woman ate a grub in the trailer so I bet that will push some units. Press X to eat grubs.

Spiderman: The game looks like a ton of fun. To say it looks like the most Spiderman version of Batman Arkham Knight possible isn't an insult because the game is doing it's own thing and seems to speed up gameplay quite a bit. I wonder how replay-ability is with a game that seems so corridor and story beat focused? It might just be the way the gameplay was cut, it might play out very differently in the end. Either way this game looks fun.

Travis Admin wrote on 06/12/2018 at 01:56pm

The Spider-Man continues to blow me away. I can’t wait. Based on what we’ve seen before I don’t think it’s going to be heavily corridor based like this gameplay trailer may suggest. There are some segments of the Arkham games that show off the awesome grappling hook and gliding action as well.

But at the same time it could be that they needed to restrict the world a bit to make the web swinging seem believable. I remember previous spider man games that didn’t require you to be anywhere near buildings but modern gamers might balk at that.

The Last of Us Part 2 looks so beautiful. And those situational combat tricks were surprising. I enjoyed the first one, I need to actually finish it.

Anothe standout for me might be Ghost of Tsushima. That game is gorgeous and if they can pull it off it will be something I can imagine tossing s lot of hours into. An open world samurai game? That’s just such a fresh idea.

Death Stranding, man... I get the idea that you can play that game all the way through and still not have any freakin clue what you just played. In terms of plot that is. It looks compelling but at the same time offputting depending on my mood.

Control looks pretty solid. Like a freaky sci-fi third-person action game. The powers they showed look pretty unique.

The Resident Evil 2 Remaster looks great so far. If you can even call it that. I guess Remake is a better term. The graphics are done so well, and it looks like some jump scares are in our future.

Will_Ball Game Mod Super Member wrote on 06/12/2018 at 03:29pm

To me it felt like the Sony E3 presentation catered more to solo play experiences compared to the Microsoft E3 presentation. For that reason, I am probably more excited about what Sony is bringing to the table compared to Microsoft.

Travis Admin wrote on 06/12/2018 at 05:33pm

That seems to be pretty typical. Almost all of Sony’s exclusives seem to be single player and I love them for that.

Travis Admin wrote on 06/12/2018 at 08:37pm

https://kotaku.com/swinging-through-new-york-city-as-spidey-feels-effortle-1826773221

This description of the demo involves pretty free reign to swing anywhere in NYC suggesting that the corridor worry isn’t going to be a problem.

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Steam As An Open Marketplace Is Creating Controversy

When you ask someone if they want some corporation deciding what movies, music, books or games they should consume they usually say they don't. One negative part of the Apple Ecosystem people cite is that the app store curation doesn't allow anyone the ability publish any app they want. Most apps get through but some don't and recently the Steam Link App was barred access for reasons that aren't entirely clear. One really amazing benefit of open systems such as the PC, Linux and the Mac is that you can install anything you want and I appreciate it when companies and communities build these open systems. So it wasn't a controversial topic, to me, when Valve recently... Read All

Fuck Nazis: Bethesda at E3 2018

Bethesda is busy. To think, ten years ago all they really had was the Elder Scrolls series. This year's conference showed off a ton of new games and updates.

Rage 2
This one looks like a hoot. I loved Rage but the open-world part didn't exactly land. The gunplay was near perfect but it left some to be desired. This time, id is partnering with Avalanche (of Just Cause fame) to bring something special and the trailer and gameplay look like exactly what I was hoping for.

Elder Scrolls Legends and Elder Scrolls Online updates
These games seem to be doing really well for Bethesda. They spent some time talking about some new updates. I'm just gonna be straight up honest here, I... Read All

jdodson Admin wrote on 06/11/2018 at 03:43am

I liked the part where I was right and we're not getting any new Elder Scrolls content or announcements this year!

Will_Ball Game Mod Super Member wrote on 06/11/2018 at 03:45am

When you went to your fridge did you play Skyrim?

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 06/11/2018 at 03:49am

I don’t have a Samsung Smart Fridge unfortunately.

jdodson Admin wrote on 06/11/2018 at 04:05am

Nah, my fridge is still powered by the ice delivery man.

jdodson Admin wrote on 06/11/2018 at 04:06am

Anyways, Elder Scrolls Blades looks really fun. I signed up for the beta and they didn't have the iPhone 6S as an option. It was all iPhone 7's and higher plus Androids. They let me select other but I wonder if it requires a much newer phone than I have?

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 06/11/2018 at 04:19am

I'm disappointed with the Fallout 76 part about being online-only. and that we don't know if you can play w/out other players. If there isn't a single player aspect to it, I'll probably pass on it. I have been playing some games that their original game play intention was online and with others PVE and PVP. However, I play those games in single player mode. I usually prefer to play alone, but I do enjoy playing with friends (not against) sometimes, too. Maybe the beta test will be interesting and maybe in due time I'll have a better understanding of the game.

What?! I just told Jon we probably won't see Elder Scrolls VI for many years, but they showed the world?! Wow! I have to go check that out. I wonder if it'll be ready in less than 5 years. Thanks for the info!!!!

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 06/11/2018 at 04:21am

Oh well this article says there is solo mode (I guess we just have to presume w/out other players?). Maybe it's kind of like Diablo III. https://www.gamespot.com/articles/fallout-76-is-an-always-online-multiplayer-focused/1100-6459647/?utm_source=gamefaqs&utm_medium=partner&utm_content=news_module&utm_campaign=homepage

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 06/11/2018 at 03:03pm

Todd said you could play solo but I play MMOs mostly solo. That doesn’t necessarily mean you can play single-player. We still need some more details about the specifics there.

Will_Ball Game Mod Super Member wrote on 06/11/2018 at 03:45pm

Alexa Skyrim: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07D6STSX8/

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 06/11/2018 at 05:58pm

Oh wow. I assumed that was pure joke.

Will_Ball Game Mod Super Member wrote on 06/11/2018 at 06:01pm

Travis, I did too.

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 06/11/2018 at 06:38pm

Yeah, sorry, I watched a video about it after I wrote that.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 06/12/2018 at 02:42am

https://youtu.be/PdYtulRRfDU

Interview with Todd Howard linked above. He clarified a lot about Fallout 76.

There is no offline mode. Playing solo does NOT mean you will be playing alone. They're working on ways to opt out of PvP and balancing the rewards for people who aren't interested in that kind of gameplay.

VATS is going to be present but it won't slow time like it has.

There are no NPCs aside from robots. Presumably other than the Overseer but that may just be a voice on the intercom in the vault and nothing else. There's still a world to discover via terminals and things like that, but there are no NPCs. That seems weird but they could make that work.

Mods will come, but not at launch. Private worlds will come, so you can mod up your server the way you want, but not at launch.

jdodson Admin wrote on 06/12/2018 at 02:58am

Thanks Travis, that's great news. Gonna watch it with the stack of other videos

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 06/12/2018 at 03:06am

I dunno about great news but hopeful for sure. If they can keep griefing from being a problem then most of my worries are gone.

jdodson Admin wrote on 06/12/2018 at 03:12am

It's showing they are at least listening and thinking about it. They might be making a game that's not meant to be played by yourself or at least right away because private servers aren't coming at launch.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 06/12/2018 at 03:41am

"Listening" I'm not sure about since they just announced it and haven't exactly had time to react to anything people have said. But it definitely shows they knew what people would be concerned about and are working on those things.

I don't know what you mean about it not being a game for me. I went into their conference knowing that it would almost definitely be online only and was still interested. I've already said that even with my questions about it I'm very interested. I don't need private servers. I play MMOs some. For me it's just about being able to have fun playing a game without a troop of assholes wrecking my fun, and that's where the questions still lie, as for what kinds of things are planned to prevent that. He did specifically say that griefing is something they're spending a lot of time working out, thus it's hopeful news.

jdodson Admin wrote on 06/12/2018 at 03:44am

> I don't know what you mean about it not being a game for me.

Sorry for the confusion there. When I said "not mean to be played by yourself" I mean't it wasn't to be played single player by yourself. This game does seem to be a multiplayer game and that's cool with me. I'm not sure if i'll get it yet, but it's interesting. I think I want to know more but playing a Fallout game with friends does sound neat.

jdodson Admin wrote on 06/12/2018 at 03:45am

> For me it's just about being able to have fun playing a game without a troop of assholes wrecking my fun, and that's where the questions still lie, as for what kinds of things are planned to prevent that. He did specifically say that griefing is something they're spending a lot of time working out, thus it's hopeful news.

Yeah that's big for me too. I don't want to build a base and have people smash it up. That's why we have Cheerful Ghost private Terraria servers.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 06/12/2018 at 03:48am

Ohhhh "By yourself"

I get it. lol

jdodson Admin wrote on 06/12/2018 at 03:50am

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 06/12/2018 at 04:08am

Thanks for the link, Travis! They did remind us about that interview that I was referencing when I said the Elder Scrolls VI is years away, because the technology isn't there....yet. Unfortunately, I still have questions about Fallout 76. It'd be cool if it was an online game such as Diablo III, or like GTAV which has GTA Online separately. This one seems to be more of GTA Online. I would rather play on my own with NPCs than real people (with some already noted exceptions). I may let this one slide for a bit and I'll wait for you or someone else here or somewhere else get it and let me read more about it, so I can decide whether or not to get it. It does look cool and being 4 times bigger than Fallout 4 is impressive. I'm also glad that you can build anywhere and that building is now part of the game. We'll see.....

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 06/12/2018 at 04:44am

Doom Eternal sounds cool, too. I just watched a quick video about it. They said it will debut at QuakeCon in August, I interpret that as a release date/time. It does sound awesome like Doom and looks kinda cool. I'm interested, but I just hope the season pass (assuming they have one again) isn't full of multiplayer only stuff. https://youtu.be/umShGxEAw2E

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 06/12/2018 at 01:15pm

That doesn’t mean a release in August, that’s just when they’ll be giving it a proper showing.

While it wouldn’t be unheard of for Bethesda to drop one of their “and its available... right now!”, they would want to show it off and then leave time for pre-orders for such a huge game.

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 06/12/2018 at 04:07pm

Right.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 06/13/2018 at 06:06pm

There was a behind the scenes mini-doc and interview that gave us some new info about Fallout 76.

This is a reddit post that breaks down the new info and links to the video if you want to watch the full video

https://reddit.com/r/Fallout/comments/8qsx8s/complete_notes_from_the_noclip_documentary/

This mostly hit all the notes I wanted it to. You can’t just get repeatedly killed by the same person. That kind of targeted griefing isn’t possible. But you can still get randomly killed because they want that kind of danger. You don’t lose anything, you just respawn, and people who do this get bounties so if you grief you have a target on your back.

Also nukes can be used on players but considering how hard they are to get, it would be wasteful to do so. The player you nuked respawns and you lose the potential loot you would have gotten from nuking a better spot.

It does really seem like they’ve balanced things pretty well.

jdodson Admin wrote on 06/14/2018 at 02:32am

LOTS of people are saying great things about Rage 2, which this and Elder Scrolls Blades are the two games i'm most excited to play soon. Fallout 76 looks interesting but i'm not sure i'll actually play it when it drops as I haven't finished Fallout 4. I was addicted to Fallout 3 but I just didn't have a similar experience with 4 even though I enjoyed what I played.

https://www.gamesradar.com/i-played-the-rage-2-demo-four-times-in-a-row-and-it-got-better-and-smarter-every-time-heres-what-i-learned/

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 06/14/2018 at 02:43am

Saying that I'm more interested in a Rage sequel than a Fallout game feels weird, but Rage 2 is high up on my most anticipated list. Right below Spiderman.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 06/14/2018 at 03:42pm

It’s worth noting that there’s no Steam page for Fallout 76 or Rage 2. And based on this FAQ it looks like the Bethesda launcher may be the only way to get them.

https://fallout.bethesda.net/faq

Will_Ball Game Mod Super Member wrote on 06/14/2018 at 06:05pm

Sounds like they are going the Blizzard route.

Azurephile Super Member wrote on 06/14/2018 at 07:29pm

I don't think it's a good move to only have the game via their launcher. I think it'd sell a hell of a lot better on Steam, they could use both platforms.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 06/14/2018 at 08:40pm

They would sell a lot more copies for sure but those micro-transactions for cosmetics would get the Steam tax. They might figure they can get more money on their own turf. What may happen is an initial launch on their own launcher and then a month or so later launch it on Steam. This is just spitballing on my part.

The only place to play Fortnite is via Epic’s launcher and they seem to be doing pretty well.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 06/14/2018 at 08:41pm

It’s also worth noting that this may just be for the beta and the final release may go on Steam. It’s hard to tell. But the only way to get into the beta is to preorder, and the only way to preorder seems to be their launcher.

jdodson Admin wrote on 06/15/2018 at 01:37am

I bet this is just for the beta:

"A: The B.E.T.A. will be available on Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and on PC (via Bethesda.net). Stay tuned for exact timing for each platform here and @Fallout on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Please note that the B.E.T.A. for Xbox One will begin first, followed by other platforms."

I'm fairly sure they will push to Steam as they have for Quake Champions. It's a pretty big store and they'd miss a few sales if they didn't. Might be an interesting long term goal for them but in the case of Blizzard they went from box copies to selling it on Battle.net so the transition was pretty seamless.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 06/15/2018 at 02:45am

I would agree except that there's just no Steam page for pre-ordering, and right after E3 is when people are excited about that and their previous games that were announced with a release date later in the year have all gone up there immediately. I'm like 50/50 on it.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 08/07/2018 at 02:35am

Two-months-later necro bump

https://www.overclock3d.net/news/software/fallout_76_won_t_be_released_on_steam_-_pc_version_will_be_exclusive_to_bethesda_net/1

No Steam version of Fallout 76.

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 08/07/2018 at 02:57am

Honestly the POTENTIALLY worse news here is that they're shooting to have beta progress transfer over to the full game.

Which means people who preorder have a clear advantage in this.

I say "potentially" though, because it depends a lot on how they deal with balance.

jdodson Admin wrote on 08/07/2018 at 01:35pm

It was only a matter of time before they kept their next game to the Beth client. Now I’m wondering if 76 will be free to play akin to Fortnight?

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 08/07/2018 at 02:01pm

It may be eventually but the beta requires a preorder so it won’t be for launch or a lot of people who are out $60 would be very upset.

jdodson Admin wrote on 08/08/2018 at 02:49am

Ah right, that's good to know. I guess we might see Fallout 5 and everything else on the Beth client then to launch. I wonder if they will do a timed year exclusive or even longer?

jdodson Admin wrote on 08/08/2018 at 02:50am

Also wondering if this is how iD games will end up? Not Quake Live obviously as that's on Steam already but at some point will they be Beth client exclusives?

Travis Admin Post Author wrote on 08/08/2018 at 03:30am

It seems like at a certain point publishers can save money running their own servers and skipping the 30% Steam tax. I imagine if it goes well for them, this may be the way forward for Bethesda.

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The Neo Geo Mini Has a List of Games

Ah, Neo Geo. I never had a home console, but I remember a lot of Neo Geo arcade games fondly. This minified version looks to reclaim that nostalgia, minus the smell of grease and cigarette smoke that usually accompanied playing these games in restaurants and bars.

This one stands out from the others by having a small LCD screen built in, but you can still hook it up to your TV and play with a replica of the Neo Geo home console's controller (sold separately)

The list of games for the Neo Geo Mini just dropped. 40 in total:

The King of Fighters ‘95

The King of Fighters ‘97

The King of Fighters ‘98

The King of Fighters 2000

The King of Fighters 2002

Samurai Shodown II

... Read All

E3 Day 1 - Electronics Arts Roundup

EA was the first big game entity to present at this years E3 and as such I have a few news bits I thought were interesting about it. If you have more you want to share that I didn't cover, please drop it in the comments.

BioWare's New Anthem

Anthem looks to be the big game EA is betting quite a bit on the success of and it launches next February. If you look at the gameplay you can see why as it looks like Halo/Destiny decided it needed more mech suits. The game also looks incredibly pretty yet I have an odd feeling like we've seen the same game play now for the last two years of E3. It keeps looking better, I just wonder how many more environments or scenarios the game... Read All