Archive for Videogames

27 results.

GenCon: My Pilgrimage to the Mecca of Geekery

by on September 11, 2013 at 10:15 pm
Posted In: Movies, VAGRANTS, Videogames

Hey there folks, my name is Chris and this will be my first vagrant contribution to 9to5. I was planning on making my debut talking about Anime but it just so happens that I got back from a rocking tour of one of the biggest games conventions in the world: GenCon. So I’m going to break that one down.

First off, I’ve been going to this 4 day con on and off since 2005 and it never fails to impress. Getting there is a bit of a bitch though as it involves a 16 hour drive from Montreal to Indianapolis. Perks along the way; Kraken Spiced Rum, decent pork rinds (#keto) and catching up on TV Shows on the iPad.

Some people might wonder: “why would you subject yourself to 32 hours of driving there and back just to check out a bunch of games? Can’t you just do that in your basement at home like a normal person?”

Well yeah, but GenCon hosts 40 to 50 thousand people every year and it’s a great place to meet like-minded folks plus revel in the 12000 possible events including; 360 different companies presenting their wares, artist and writer panels and the world’s largest game of Settlers of Catan  plus a 50 hour Guinness world record for longest game played. All that aside, the main reason I headed out was to help out some friends run their Dresden Files LARP.

922 players at once on really really really long boards.

922 players at once on really really really long boards. There were like 20 of those long tables which just as many people.

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Fuck Mondays: Delving Into The Tomb of Horrors – Part 4 The Final Chapter

by on July 29, 2013 at 8:03 am
Posted In: Keith, Videogames

Table ShotHere it is, the grand finale… the buildup and confrontation with the demi-lich Acererak. Here is the story so far:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

In the next area there is a rainbow staircase leading up to a magical door. I won’t tell you exactly how we got through this door, not because I don’t remember, but because I want you to figure it out for yourself when the time comes. However, part us figuring out this room involved teleporting one the characters to the entrance of the dungeon, naked. Why is he naked? His gear gets teleported somewhere else. Where? Read on, we’ll get to it. Sprocket is teleported away and presumably goes off to live the rest of her life as a sad, ugly little naked gnome.

After dealing with the magic door we make it into what is clearly the tomb of the demi lich. Written in platinum above the tomb are the words “Here Lies the Demi-Lich Acererak, Suck My Dick”. Or it may as well have at this point. In this room there is a set of iron armor in each of the four corners, a large sealed jar, two chests and the tomb itself. We pop open both chests, temporarily forgetting where we are. In one chest is 10,000 platinum pieces, in the other there are thousands of poisonous needles that kill Bernadette McGillicuddy.  We clearly forgot to disarm trap or something. We come back to our senses and set in motion the golden rule and search the shit out of everything. We discover two things. First, the big jar contains a goddamned Ifrit. Let’s not fuck with that. Second, one of the suits of armor conceals a hidden passage. What do we do then? We keep fucking going. We don’t fuck with the jar, we don’t fuck with the tomb, we don’t fuck with anything.  I cannot stress this enough. Don’t fuck around with anything that might be dangerous because it will fucking kill you. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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Fuck Mondays: Still Stuck in The Tomb of Horrors – Part 3

by on July 22, 2013 at 10:45 pm
Posted In: Keith, Uncategorized, Videogames
This thing isn't even in the article, but it runs you over after a gas knocks you out.

This thing isn’t even in the article, but it runs you over after a gas knocks you out.

In case you are wondering what you’ve missed, make sure you read the first two parts of our journey into the Tomb of Horrors:
Part 1
Part 2

And now, what was going to be the epic conclusion of 9to5 (dot cc)’s delve into the depths of Evil and a final confrontation with the demi lich Acererak (I think it’s worth noting that just about every player at the table had a different way of pronouncing his name). Why is it not the epic conclusion? When I wrote this all out it was nearly 3000 words long, which is too long for your fun time internet reading experiences. So I chopped it into two. However, you can read this and rest assured that the 4th part is already written. It’ll be up next week. Cross my heart. As always Jono (the DM) has added his insights in blue.

So where were we? Oh yes, that’s right, completely stuck at this weird altar/temple place, with images of people doing everyday activities (presumably reaping and sowing and whatever non-Adventurer people in Dungeons & Dragons do) except, get this, all the people have no flesh! Creepy.  Finally we remember the all-important rule of Tomb of Horrors: fucking checking everything with every ability that lets you check anything. What does that mean? It means you cast Detect Magic, Detect Trap, Detect Secret Door all the time, every time. That last one was our mistake. We were scouring the walls, floors and ceilings looking for traps, but for some reason we forgot to look for Secret Doors. Eventually we realized our error and found a door to the next corridor.

Yeah, that room was one of the places where Gary decided to make wacky dungeon dressing.  There were portraits of good-aligned Gods and people doing normal things.  In the book, it’s revealed that the players are supposed to wonder if maybe Acererak isn’t so evil.  I think in the thousands of times this module was ran that happened all of never. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

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FF7 Cid

by on May 18, 2012 at 10:55 am
Posted In: Fine Arts, Sophie, Videogames

Hello again, friends. I bring you art.

I have had a bit of a creative block lately. I have a very hard time pushing out any type of creative work. Which is why when i sat down and forced myself to draw a submission for the current Comic Art Club theme, Final Fantasy, i wasn`t expecting much. The point was just to put something, ANYthing out, and hopefully it would turn out okay.

The first challenge was choosing a character within the theme. I have only ever played FF7, so even though some of the other games had familiar characters it made sense to chose one from that one. I was almost tacky and picked Sephiroth, for lack of inspiration, but thankfully a friend reminded me of Cid. Then i decided to draw the character design used for the Advent Children movie, instead of the game. It just seemed more realistic. I picked my model for facial features, Sean Bean. Ready to go, i sketch out my Cid.

 

I paused and looked at this. Holy shit i`m super happy with it! The age lines are just right, the beard stubble is light but visible, even the clothing falls naturally, something i sometimes have issues with.

I was not expecting this.

Suddenly i`m invested in this piece.

I decide to scan it after each completed step (sketch, ink, color) to make sure i can keep a version i am happy with should i screw up somewhere down the line.

My next difficult decision; do i ink this out and then color it with my trusty markers, or do i continue with my wooden pencil thing.

I decide i`m not yet comfortable or confident enough in my wooden pencil skills to finish this piece in the way i want to be proud of. Markers it is. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…

Ronimo Games/dtp Must Hate Making Money With Awesomenauts

by on May 7, 2012 at 12:34 pm
Posted In: Keith, Videogames

 

Awesome

Awesome

 

As a Playstation Plus subscriber I was super jazzed to find out that Awesomenauts was going to be offered to me for free as of launch. I had heard a little bit about the game and it seemed like it was going to be good fun.

If you haven’t heard about it I’ll give you a quick little rundown: the game is a 2D, side-scrolling League of Legends. Except, where LoL has a zillion guys, Awesomenauts (currently) has 6. The typical maps in Awesomenauts are some variation of only 2 lanes. You control your character the way you would in a normal 2D action game; you move with the analogue stick, you jump with one button, your primary ability is assigned to one button, your two upgradable secondary abilities are assigned to the other two.

In short, it’s a MOBA (Multiplayer Online Battle Arena) game for dummies. Sorry, I meant to say it’s MOBA game for console gamers. Seriously though, I’m terribly intimidated by LoL. We went to PAX East a few weeks ago and they had Dominion matches being broadcast on big screens and the whole thing just seemed terribly daunting to take on all at once. A stripped down version of the MOBA experience with a play-style geared a little more towards my area of gaming expertise (2D platforming) was exactly what the gaming doctor (Mario) ordered.

It’s also very, very good. After tackling the initial learning curve that came from never having played one of these games (and also not having immediate access to Voltar who turned out to be my primary character) I started to understand the strategy and playstyle of the various Awesomenauts (champions by any other name).

All of the maps are a subtle variation of a two lane setup and I have the sneaking suspicion that the only reaseon there are variants at all is to help transition the console gamer who is used to having a huge variety of playing fields in their video game. Matches are 3 on 3 and gameplay consists of attacking one another to try and kill your oponent and benefit from the ever increasing respawn time (towards the end of a match a respawn can take nearly 30 seconds) and help your little creeps approach enemy turrets, knock out the turrets, then finally destroy the home base of the oponent. Obviously all this is done while trying to prevent the enemy force from doing the same.

Now, we all understand how League of Legends makes money, right? They offer their game for free and then they sell stuff that are generally unlockable for small amounts of money. Then they become millionaires.

If you haven’t heard, Awesomenauts developer Ronimo and publisher dtp are both in the midst of some financial difficulties. I can only imagine that by offering Awesomenauts for free.

Retro Gaming: Metroid is the Best Metroid

by on April 30, 2012 at 8:00 am
Posted In: Fuck Mondays, Jon, Jon's Junk, Videogames

Note:  Astute readers from Reddit have brought to my attention the process of Sequence Breaking, but after reviewing the list and finding that 90%+ of the sequence breaks in other Metroid titles depend on bugs and glitches I feel that my point stands.

 

The best

The Best

Metroid (1986) is the best Metroid.  It also has no sequels.  Some of you may believe that the other 10 games with the name Metroid are part of a franchise called Metroid.  But really, those other 10 games should be called something else.  Maybe, “Legend of Robot Suit Lady”?  I don’t really care ’cause they’re all kind of crap.

There is a whole subgenre of games that follow a similar pattern.  Explore an area, gain powerups to grow stronger and allow access to new areas, search for more hidden items.  The so called Metroidvania genre includes dozens of titles in the Castlevania and Metroid franchises, but realistically also Legend of Zelda and more.

So what makes Metroid (the original) different?

 

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Retro Gaming: Phantasmagoria

by on April 16, 2012 at 8:00 am
Posted In: Fuck Mondays, Jon, Jon's Junk, Videogames

 

Phantasmagoria was a big deal.  In 1995 having your videogame come on a CD was pretty cool, and Phantasmagoria came on 7.  It was made by Sierra, then at the height of the adventure game world, and designed by Roberta Williams.  It may come as a surprise to modern gamers, but at the time there was a Queen of Game Design.  Not only was she responsible for the legendary Kings Quest franchise, but when Phantasmagoria came out it was her twentieth(!) video game.

It’s wasn’t just big in the video game world either, this thing made waves.  It was a horror game.  It had a rape scene.  It had real actors in it, and you could control the real actors in the video game.  This is a year before the Nintendo 64 came out, that’s how ahead of its time it was.

I can still remember the sleek black box, and playing it on my brand new Pentium 1 computer, and loving every minute of it.  Naturally when I saw that gog.com had Phantasmagoria on sale it would be time for a walk down nostalgia lane, and maybe would prompt me to play some of the other adventure game classics like Full Throttle, Monkey Island, Space Quest, and who knows what else (Day of the Tentacle is what else, that’s what).

Well, gentle reader, I was wrong.  Dead wrong.

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9to5 Entertainment System Episode 6: Bzzzorrt!

by on December 14, 2011 at 5:53 pm
Posted In: 9ES, Movies, Podcast, Podcasting, Videogames

Jon finally talks about Skyrim! Glory day! We make fun of Scott’s technical impairedness once again (the fact that he doesn’t play video games seemingly ever, really, you haven’t played Fallout 2? Also he mutes his microphone for a little bit at the beginning of the show like a big idiot, I left it in this time though, so he feels shame. Otherwise he’ll never learn). See what happens when Scott doesn’t send me an episode image? I halfass it pretty hard.

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We don’t actually talk that much about Skyrim honestly. We reminisce a lot about Final Fantasy 6,7,8 and Spirits Within. Seriously, it’s about 75% of the podcast.

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