Blizzard is legitimately one of the largest gaming companies out there, if not THE very largest in the industry. Its money cow, World of Warcraft, has consumed millions of hours from millions of players' lives, and its several other series - Warcraft, Starcraft, and the Diablo games, have reaped thousands upon thousands more. Why does Blizzard have such a great formula? What is it that keeps players going back? In this blog, I'll be analyzing what I see as the reasons for Blizzard's success.
Let's first inspect their main MMO, World of Warcraft. Known in shorthand as WoW, this game is truly epic in scope. You are one of millions of players total, in a server of perhaps thousands, playing in an absolutely enormous world torn by intricate conflicts and incredibly large story arcs. You can pick from any number of races and become any class available to those races, and begin your adventure as you wish, either down the early path they've set for you, or one you can define yourself (though this is much more challenging unless you truly know how to work it). As time progresses and you gain levels, you begin to see how huge the world truly is, hopping continents and even magical planes of existence. Your path becomes even more and more defined as your own, as you customize your character's gear set, skill specialization, and appearance. Eventually, you can join a clan - either serious or otherwise - that can guide you in many ways, assisting you along your journey, and providing you with allies around your level (or far greater than it) to help you as you wish. Quests and dungeon raids get more and more intense as you progress, and eventually, huge boss battles that require a group of 10 to 25 truly tests your skill.
The reason this game is so obscenely addicting is a combination of all of these factors that all culminate into one great sense of accomplishment. As you level up, your character becomes obviously more powerful: creatures that might've felled you quickly early on become toys at higher levels. The social aspect also ties in to this sense. When you raid with a
group, you come to know their play styles, and you work together to get
each individual person the very best gear available to them. Yours and their gear becomes more and more potent, as enchantments grow greatly in strength and number, and your non-combat skills that supplement your equipment or your wealth increase as well. Together, you dive deeper and deeper into more intricate dungeons that require intense levels of concentration and teamwork to sustain the group's lives, and monsters become both visibly and statistically more intimidating - only increasing the level of satisfaction when they fall.
In my opinion, World of Warcraft is a wonderful game for the people who have the time to dedicate hours to gameplay. I often found myself falling behind my friends in-game, though - I can't play as often as many others can due to my scholastic schedule. Still, casually, it's incredibly fun, though the 15$ monthly fee might be a little steep.
Warcraft and Starcraft are definitely not down my alley, at all - I'm horrid at RTS games. I've heard hordes of people say great things about them, though, which must mean that they're decent enough to play. They're challenging and require strategic prowess (OR A ZERG RUSH ASKFJSEL) that I certainly don't have.
The Diablo series...
*shudder of pleasure*
They're the epitome of an RPG. The singleplayer storyline is compelling, and while quests aren't abundant, they're fun enough to keep you hooked throughout the entire game. A huge array of items are at your disposal to destroy enemies with, and bosses are amazingly satisfying kills. Skills provide a wonderful sense of achievement as you progress, and the entirety of everything is just ADDICTING. *frothing*
Overall, I love the series, and I'm psyched for the release of Diablo III.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember - don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
Thursday, December 15, 2011
Sunday, December 11, 2011
Random Tangent! 02: Why I'm a PC Gamer
I know I'm going to receive tons of hate mail from all the console fanatics out there, but yes, I much prefer the PC to any other system of gaming. Sure, sometimes you've got to sink a little money into upgrades to keep up with the graphical trends in new games, and communities tend to be a little bit smaller, but the variety of games available only on PCs (HA, games on a Mac) and the graphical quality of the picture available most definitely trump the cons, at least for me.
Take Skyrim for example. On console, its visual interface is actually relatively flawed - it's probable that if you're playing on a television, you won't be able to see your compass or your inventory updates very well at all. To me, missing out on both of these parts of the game definitely removes some of the fun. But that isn't all - graphics are definitely sub-par when compared to PCs. Textures are reduced, polygon count is lowered, view distance is much smaller, and everything looks muddier in general. This detracts a lot from the game when I think of the experience I know I could be having (albeit the fact it would be on a smaller screen).
Another problem with console games is the lack of extreme variety. Practically nothing is free, and all the 'big games' that 'everyone plays' don't interest me. I prefer smaller, free games - League of Legends, for example! - and I love investigating individual developers' games, like the works from Studio Pixel. Team Fortress 2 and many other Steam games aren't supported nearly as well on consoles as they are on the computer, and individually developed mods aren't even a thought on the console, unless you're willing to crack it illegally - and even then, they're challenging to use. I never need to worry about stupid patches breaking any of my games - I can always revert to the previous state.
Gaming is a lot more rigid on consoles, as well, and I have fewer options available to me at once - I can only be doing one thing at a time .I can actually personalize my control layout on the PC - so maybe it is weird if I want to map movement to Y, I, O, and X, but who cares? At least I have the ability to. While I'm gaming, I'll often have youTube, iTunes, and sometimes even facebook (for really, really stacked games of LoL) open in good old Mozilla Firefox, easily accessible via Alt + Tab. Speaking of Mozilla - webgames! Everything available to you on the internet, right at your fingertips, rather than on two different systems. Websites like Kongregate and Addictinggames have brought me through hours upon hours of boredom.
At the same time, I absolutely love knowing my PC so well. I'm anchored to it - it isn't easily transported as consoles are, but I've got much more processing capability, and I can literally look straight inside it if I move my eyes 20 degrees to the right from my screen. I know where my GeForce GTX 550 Ti graphics card is, I can see my 4gigs of RAM chilling on the motherboard, and my ((relatively) weak little) i5 Processor spins happily along in my view. The hard drive is anchored securely within my case, and I can download any files or move them about with USB drives if I really want to transfer files - but why would I? I'm always at my computer desk, ready to play. :D
Have fun, good gaming, and remember: don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
Take Skyrim for example. On console, its visual interface is actually relatively flawed - it's probable that if you're playing on a television, you won't be able to see your compass or your inventory updates very well at all. To me, missing out on both of these parts of the game definitely removes some of the fun. But that isn't all - graphics are definitely sub-par when compared to PCs. Textures are reduced, polygon count is lowered, view distance is much smaller, and everything looks muddier in general. This detracts a lot from the game when I think of the experience I know I could be having (albeit the fact it would be on a smaller screen).
Another problem with console games is the lack of extreme variety. Practically nothing is free, and all the 'big games' that 'everyone plays' don't interest me. I prefer smaller, free games - League of Legends, for example! - and I love investigating individual developers' games, like the works from Studio Pixel. Team Fortress 2 and many other Steam games aren't supported nearly as well on consoles as they are on the computer, and individually developed mods aren't even a thought on the console, unless you're willing to crack it illegally - and even then, they're challenging to use. I never need to worry about stupid patches breaking any of my games - I can always revert to the previous state.
Gaming is a lot more rigid on consoles, as well, and I have fewer options available to me at once - I can only be doing one thing at a time .I can actually personalize my control layout on the PC - so maybe it is weird if I want to map movement to Y, I, O, and X, but who cares? At least I have the ability to. While I'm gaming, I'll often have youTube, iTunes, and sometimes even facebook (for really, really stacked games of LoL) open in good old Mozilla Firefox, easily accessible via Alt + Tab. Speaking of Mozilla - webgames! Everything available to you on the internet, right at your fingertips, rather than on two different systems. Websites like Kongregate and Addictinggames have brought me through hours upon hours of boredom.
At the same time, I absolutely love knowing my PC so well. I'm anchored to it - it isn't easily transported as consoles are, but I've got much more processing capability, and I can literally look straight inside it if I move my eyes 20 degrees to the right from my screen. I know where my GeForce GTX 550 Ti graphics card is, I can see my 4gigs of RAM chilling on the motherboard, and my ((relatively) weak little) i5 Processor spins happily along in my view. The hard drive is anchored securely within my case, and I can download any files or move them about with USB drives if I really want to transfer files - but why would I? I'm always at my computer desk, ready to play. :D
Have fun, good gaming, and remember: don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
Saturday, December 10, 2011
Random Tangent!: League of Legends
In lieu of my recent detachment from Skyrim, I've found myself returning to League of Legends quite often. Its forty-minute, action-packed, committed sessions of gameplay always pull me back for another round - I might be addicted. Personally, my favorite characters are the only ones I can play - 'Mage' classes. The mage classes focus more upon the ability power statistic - they use their abilities, which cost mana, to inflict damage upon their enemies or heal their allies. I find myself attached to these characters - they're incredibly fun for me to play, as they deal out massive damage relatively quickly, and have the most powerful stuns and slows in the game. The only downside is their tendency towards slower movement speeds and a 'squishier' nature.
My two favorite characters to play are Veigar and Morgana. They have two of the best stuns in the game, and can deal enough damage quickly enough to down many other champions, with the right item build. Veigar's area-of-effect stun sets up a fence around the area you cast it upon that stuns any enemies that touch it for two or three seconds - quite a long time in combat. Skilled Veigar players then drop his AoE bomb spell, which scales almost directly with ability power, leaving many opponents at two-thirds health or less. Follow this up with Veigar's ultimate and his main spell, and champions are dead or dying, easy enough to finish off with a few auto-attacks or an Ignite spell. Morgana has similar abilities - her skill-shot stun lasts for 4 seconds and deals out quite a bit of damage (300 + a percentage of ability power at level 5), her AoE deals damage every second, and lowers enemy magic resist. She has a spellshield that can deflect some damage, and her ultimate attaches chains to every enemy champion around her, dealing damage at first, and inflicting the same amount after a few seconds, subsequently stunning every champion still chained for 4 seconds. In combat, this ultimate can disable the entirety of the enemy team quickly - if she survives. Both Morgana and Veigar have very little health, even at level 18. As mages, they must stay behind their damage tanks to avoid a quick and painful death.
Another champion I've recently been attempting to learn is named Ezrael. Throughout the League of Legends gaming community, Ezrael's name is a joke - he's seen as a useless champion that almost ensures defeat for any team. For some strange reason, this is exactly what draws me to him. His skills focus around both ability power and attack damage, and his two primary skills are both medium-range skill shots. The other two - his third ability and his ultimate - are a ranged teleportation attack and a wall of sparkles that can fly across the map, dealing damage to all enemies in its path. This skill set makes him a true challenge to master - each ability use must be timed perfectly, as Ezrael is a squishy character, and lacks a large mana pool. Though this may be true, his ultimate is perfect at taking champions at low health down from almost across the map - the range is somewhere between one quarter and one half of the length of a lane. Every enemy it passes through removes 8% of the damage from its effect, but still, it deals a relatively large amount (500 + ability power and attack damage, if I remember correctly).
The fields of Runeterra have called to me so often recently that I've not been able to put this game down, and if you haven't already checked it out, I'd strongly suggest it.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember: don't feed the trolls (or the enemy team!)
-Toast
My two favorite characters to play are Veigar and Morgana. They have two of the best stuns in the game, and can deal enough damage quickly enough to down many other champions, with the right item build. Veigar's area-of-effect stun sets up a fence around the area you cast it upon that stuns any enemies that touch it for two or three seconds - quite a long time in combat. Skilled Veigar players then drop his AoE bomb spell, which scales almost directly with ability power, leaving many opponents at two-thirds health or less. Follow this up with Veigar's ultimate and his main spell, and champions are dead or dying, easy enough to finish off with a few auto-attacks or an Ignite spell. Morgana has similar abilities - her skill-shot stun lasts for 4 seconds and deals out quite a bit of damage (300 + a percentage of ability power at level 5), her AoE deals damage every second, and lowers enemy magic resist. She has a spellshield that can deflect some damage, and her ultimate attaches chains to every enemy champion around her, dealing damage at first, and inflicting the same amount after a few seconds, subsequently stunning every champion still chained for 4 seconds. In combat, this ultimate can disable the entirety of the enemy team quickly - if she survives. Both Morgana and Veigar have very little health, even at level 18. As mages, they must stay behind their damage tanks to avoid a quick and painful death.
Another champion I've recently been attempting to learn is named Ezrael. Throughout the League of Legends gaming community, Ezrael's name is a joke - he's seen as a useless champion that almost ensures defeat for any team. For some strange reason, this is exactly what draws me to him. His skills focus around both ability power and attack damage, and his two primary skills are both medium-range skill shots. The other two - his third ability and his ultimate - are a ranged teleportation attack and a wall of sparkles that can fly across the map, dealing damage to all enemies in its path. This skill set makes him a true challenge to master - each ability use must be timed perfectly, as Ezrael is a squishy character, and lacks a large mana pool. Though this may be true, his ultimate is perfect at taking champions at low health down from almost across the map - the range is somewhere between one quarter and one half of the length of a lane. Every enemy it passes through removes 8% of the damage from its effect, but still, it deals a relatively large amount (500 + ability power and attack damage, if I remember correctly).
The fields of Runeterra have called to me so often recently that I've not been able to put this game down, and if you haven't already checked it out, I'd strongly suggest it.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember: don't feed the trolls (or the enemy team!)
-Toast
Sunday, December 4, 2011
Saturday, December 3, 2011
Elder Scrolls Explorer: Skyrim: Beginnings
Continuing from my previous Elder Scrolls Explorer, I'm now going to delve into the world of Skyrim. :D
My first steps in this mountain wilderness were purposefully very slow: I had to stop and take a moment to breathe everything in. There was so much artistic detail in front of me that I was absolutely overwhelmed.
Aesthetically, Skyrim is gorgeous. The snowy mountains captivated me, and I was compelled to simply wander the countryside, indulging in my obnoxious habit of picking every alchemical ingredient I could find (sidenote: I'll go into detail about the alchemical system later). After exploring a few paths, I noticed a town off in the distance, and decided to head towards it.
About this time, I decided to pull up my inventory. I hit [Tab], and was presented with this:
I wondered how easy it would be to navigate between each menu, so I played around for a while, and found that navigation is actually relatively fluid.
The item menu has been completely revamped: now, different classes of items with different purposes have been given their own section (i.e. scrolls have a scrolls section), everything is arranged alphabetically, and selection is much easier. On PC, the menus were a bit buggy - clicking, scrolling, and using WASD all interchangeably makes things a little confusing, and sometimes I use the wrong potion, but it's relatively easy to compensate for, and I'm sure it will be patched soon enough.
The magic menu is actually divided conveniently now: individual schools have been given their own tabs. Spells are easy to select, and their effects are defined clearly in the description provided.
Following the main path into town, I was notified: 'You have discovered Riverwood'. The first things I noticed about the village was the huge sawmill operating on river power, and the forge located outside the blacksmith's shop. I was startled when I could actually use the forge myself, and from the blacksmith, I received a few smithing tasks and became more familiar with that particular skill. Being a mage, I quickly became uninterested, and wandered aimlessly about (distracted by a few local chickens) until I found the general store. There, a quest was presented to me immediately: the store had recently been burgled, and the brother and sister running the store were arguing over whether the sister should go out to fight the bandits they suspected had committed the crime. Conveniently enough, I barged in at the end of this argument, and offered to take care of the job for them.
I then turned to the shopkeep to ask if he sold spells, and the new nature of NPC interaction caught me off guard. Rather than zooming in awkwardly on his face, the conversation proceeded naturally, and I was even allowed to look around while I was talking to him. After I asked what he sold, the bartering interface popped up, and I was impressed.
As is clear, the previous method of dividing items has been preserved in trading, which makes item exchange much more convenient. With the new dynamic economy, merchants can actually run out of gold (just like Morrowind!), and will go on cycles of prosperity and near-poverty.
After purchasing my fill of spell tomes and selling the random junk I had collected throughout the tutorial, I decided to venture off into the wilderness and complete the task I'd been assigned by the brother and sister in the general store. Conveniently enough, my quest log had already selected that as my active quest, and I was guided by an arrow on the compass to the barrow in which the item was burgled was supposedly located. The sheer size of the dungeon took me off guard: it actually took about an hour to fully explore (I'm easily distracted), and I found it rather satisfying discovering all of its secrets. The ambient lighting in the dungeon took me off guard as well: just another gorgeous aspect of this game. I found myself using more magic than I ever conceived was possible in an Elder Scrolls game - it actually works now! - and so I'll be reviewing that system in my next blog.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember: don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
My first steps in this mountain wilderness were purposefully very slow: I had to stop and take a moment to breathe everything in. There was so much artistic detail in front of me that I was absolutely overwhelmed.
Aesthetically, Skyrim is gorgeous. The snowy mountains captivated me, and I was compelled to simply wander the countryside, indulging in my obnoxious habit of picking every alchemical ingredient I could find (sidenote: I'll go into detail about the alchemical system later). After exploring a few paths, I noticed a town off in the distance, and decided to head towards it.
About this time, I decided to pull up my inventory. I hit [Tab], and was presented with this:
I wondered how easy it would be to navigate between each menu, so I played around for a while, and found that navigation is actually relatively fluid.
The item menu has been completely revamped: now, different classes of items with different purposes have been given their own section (i.e. scrolls have a scrolls section), everything is arranged alphabetically, and selection is much easier. On PC, the menus were a bit buggy - clicking, scrolling, and using WASD all interchangeably makes things a little confusing, and sometimes I use the wrong potion, but it's relatively easy to compensate for, and I'm sure it will be patched soon enough.
The magic menu is actually divided conveniently now: individual schools have been given their own tabs. Spells are easy to select, and their effects are defined clearly in the description provided.
Following the main path into town, I was notified: 'You have discovered Riverwood'. The first things I noticed about the village was the huge sawmill operating on river power, and the forge located outside the blacksmith's shop. I was startled when I could actually use the forge myself, and from the blacksmith, I received a few smithing tasks and became more familiar with that particular skill. Being a mage, I quickly became uninterested, and wandered aimlessly about (distracted by a few local chickens) until I found the general store. There, a quest was presented to me immediately: the store had recently been burgled, and the brother and sister running the store were arguing over whether the sister should go out to fight the bandits they suspected had committed the crime. Conveniently enough, I barged in at the end of this argument, and offered to take care of the job for them.
I then turned to the shopkeep to ask if he sold spells, and the new nature of NPC interaction caught me off guard. Rather than zooming in awkwardly on his face, the conversation proceeded naturally, and I was even allowed to look around while I was talking to him. After I asked what he sold, the bartering interface popped up, and I was impressed.
 |
| Yes, this character's name is Flub. He's an Orc. ^-^ |
As is clear, the previous method of dividing items has been preserved in trading, which makes item exchange much more convenient. With the new dynamic economy, merchants can actually run out of gold (just like Morrowind!), and will go on cycles of prosperity and near-poverty.
After purchasing my fill of spell tomes and selling the random junk I had collected throughout the tutorial, I decided to venture off into the wilderness and complete the task I'd been assigned by the brother and sister in the general store. Conveniently enough, my quest log had already selected that as my active quest, and I was guided by an arrow on the compass to the barrow in which the item was burgled was supposedly located. The sheer size of the dungeon took me off guard: it actually took about an hour to fully explore (I'm easily distracted), and I found it rather satisfying discovering all of its secrets. The ambient lighting in the dungeon took me off guard as well: just another gorgeous aspect of this game. I found myself using more magic than I ever conceived was possible in an Elder Scrolls game - it actually works now! - and so I'll be reviewing that system in my next blog.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember: don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
Thursday, December 1, 2011
Elder Scrolls Explorer: Skyrim: Intro
I went to my local Gamestop and waited from nine until midnight to finally get Skyrim...I was one of the first 20 out of over 200 to get it at that single outlet.
I dropped my friends off and rushed home, chugged the 32-oz Monster I left in my fridge, and tumbled down the stairs to my gaming rig. The blue light was already glowing in the darkness, and my internet was ready. I inserted the disk, my entirety quivering in anticipation. The installation screen came up...
And said I had to wait nine hours for it to download.
I was beyond furious.
After staring at the progress bar until about 1:45 in the morning, my eyes stopped glowing blood crimson and instead faded to a calmer red. I googled "why the hell isn't skyrim letting me install it pc" and quickly found hundreds of others with problems similar to my own: the Steam servers were glitching, and forced those who purchased the physical copy of Skyrim to download it even though all the data was sitting, raw and ready on the disk. I quickly found the local god in the thread, who posted an easy solution to this problem. Within minutes, I had fixed the issue, installed the game, and began playing.
I have to say: it was well worth all the wait, and all the trouble.
The instant I began my new game, I was blown away by both audial and graphical quality (see screenshots!), when compared to the previous Elder Scrolls installments. On my decent PC rig, people actually looked like people, outlines were smooth, and textures were gorgeous. Varied voice acting was actually present in Skyrim (unlike Morrowind or Oblivion) - over a hundred different actors contributed - and it, coupled with the wonderful visuals I was getting, allowed me to completely immerse myself until 4 in the morning, when I passed out in my chair at my desk.
Within those two hours, however, I discovered many things about this new Elder Scrolls game. I won't spoil the introductory sequence (it's AWESOME), but something I do want to cover in depth is the character creator.
Races in Skyrim Compared to Those in Oblivion
As is plainly visible, characters have changed drastically in many ways. Differences between each race have become more distinct: size and frame tendencies vary more obviously, and all characters are rougher in appearance (fitting, for the land of Skyrim is not a forgiving place). Argonians, Khajit, and Orcs have undergone a complete overhaul, and don't look nearly as silly as they did in Oblivion (Orcs can actually be considered intimidating now!). Also, during race selection, a general overview of each race is provided, along with their origins. There are just as many customization sliders to play around with as in Oblivion (which means there are quite a few), so individual players' characters will never look exactly the same.
After playing around with my Breton's appearance for about twenty minutes, I continued on with the tutorial. I finished it rather quickly, and left well-equipped, which satisfied me immensely (especially when I compared this beginning to Oblivion's, which left you empty-handed and alone in the world q_q ). I took my first steps into the world of Skyrim, and boy, did I love it.
To be continued in the next Elder Scrolls Explorer.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember: don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
Friday, October 28, 2011
Free Download of the Month: League of Legends
It seems as though all free download games are introduced to me by my friends...
Months ago - sometime before summer - my friend Clint dragged me to a game's website. The game was simply known as League of Legends, and he made a million promises about it: that it was an RPG, an MMO, and a TD game, all rolled up into one, and was free to play, too. I brushed his claims off as outrageous, but decided to check it out anyway. I browsed the site for quite a while, finding a couple of rather interesting videos that presented me an epic game where teams of different characters met on a dark battlefield and duked it out using magic, armaments, and brute force. This finally persuaded me to click the download link and play. After I had it up and running, I was presented with an impressively easy-to-understand tutorial, pleasing graphics and dove right in to the streamlined PvP realm, which makes up the main portion of gameplay.
I was rather impressed from the get-go: on a half-decent gaming rig, League of Legends looked...well...great! Even the sign-in page was captivating: a desolate battlefield with a powerful-looking wizard conjuring wisps of blue energy from his hands, and an assassin, poised to strike with blades glowing a menacing green. This took me off guard, as many free-to-play/download games' graphics leave players rather wanting. Even as I began to play the game, the interface and arena of play looked wonderful. Character detail was varied, the color palette was interesting, and the whole of the 3D area didn't have a polygonal feel. It always leaves a warm, fuzzy feeling in my heart when I know that the developers of such a game actually put time and effort into graphical appeal. :D
I figured that before I actually got into the game, I should learn a little bit of its lore and basic strategies, as when Clint was discussing it, he threw so much jargon into every sentence that I was absolutely lost.
The lore behind this game is based around a utopian society where different city-states have come to dominate the political sphere of a fictional world. Rather than wasting time and resources drawing out wars, the city-states instead agreed to form a central combat arena, where they would send their champions to do battle and decide the fate of the realm. You, the Summoner, are an agent of the city-states and control/direct these champions in their battles, connected to them by the Nexus, which sits in the heart of your base. Your objective is to level up your champion, break through the enemy's tower- and champion-based defenses, and destroy their Nexus, thereby winning the match for your team. Of course, this is no small feat, as you have five enemy champions against your team as well, along with the hordes of minions sent as cannon fodder out onto the battlefield from both sides.
After this most basic of research, I found myself thrown into an incredibly intricate arena of play. It would take me an entire blog post to explain its nuances (foreshadowing!), so I'll just go over the basics: in general PvP, two five-person teams, composed of different characters, each with unique skills, are thrown into the arena and attempt to destroy one another's defenses, and eventually their respawn center, the Nexus.
League of Legends insanely fun and disturbingly addicting once you get into it. The graphics are pleasing to the eye, and gameplay is satisfyingly complicated. It's definitely worthy to hold its place as October 2011's Free Download of the Month.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember - don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
Months ago - sometime before summer - my friend Clint dragged me to a game's website. The game was simply known as League of Legends, and he made a million promises about it: that it was an RPG, an MMO, and a TD game, all rolled up into one, and was free to play, too. I brushed his claims off as outrageous, but decided to check it out anyway. I browsed the site for quite a while, finding a couple of rather interesting videos that presented me an epic game where teams of different characters met on a dark battlefield and duked it out using magic, armaments, and brute force. This finally persuaded me to click the download link and play. After I had it up and running, I was presented with an impressively easy-to-understand tutorial, pleasing graphics and dove right in to the streamlined PvP realm, which makes up the main portion of gameplay.
I was rather impressed from the get-go: on a half-decent gaming rig, League of Legends looked...well...great! Even the sign-in page was captivating: a desolate battlefield with a powerful-looking wizard conjuring wisps of blue energy from his hands, and an assassin, poised to strike with blades glowing a menacing green. This took me off guard, as many free-to-play/download games' graphics leave players rather wanting. Even as I began to play the game, the interface and arena of play looked wonderful. Character detail was varied, the color palette was interesting, and the whole of the 3D area didn't have a polygonal feel. It always leaves a warm, fuzzy feeling in my heart when I know that the developers of such a game actually put time and effort into graphical appeal. :D
I figured that before I actually got into the game, I should learn a little bit of its lore and basic strategies, as when Clint was discussing it, he threw so much jargon into every sentence that I was absolutely lost.
The lore behind this game is based around a utopian society where different city-states have come to dominate the political sphere of a fictional world. Rather than wasting time and resources drawing out wars, the city-states instead agreed to form a central combat arena, where they would send their champions to do battle and decide the fate of the realm. You, the Summoner, are an agent of the city-states and control/direct these champions in their battles, connected to them by the Nexus, which sits in the heart of your base. Your objective is to level up your champion, break through the enemy's tower- and champion-based defenses, and destroy their Nexus, thereby winning the match for your team. Of course, this is no small feat, as you have five enemy champions against your team as well, along with the hordes of minions sent as cannon fodder out onto the battlefield from both sides.
After this most basic of research, I found myself thrown into an incredibly intricate arena of play. It would take me an entire blog post to explain its nuances (foreshadowing!), so I'll just go over the basics: in general PvP, two five-person teams, composed of different characters, each with unique skills, are thrown into the arena and attempt to destroy one another's defenses, and eventually their respawn center, the Nexus.
League of Legends insanely fun and disturbingly addicting once you get into it. The graphics are pleasing to the eye, and gameplay is satisfyingly complicated. It's definitely worthy to hold its place as October 2011's Free Download of the Month.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember - don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
Friday, October 21, 2011
I Cast Magic Missile (A DnD Blog): Gameplay 02
Time to finally continue that DnD Gameplay blog that I started oh so long ago!
Before diving into statistic determination, one must have a rudimentary understanding of the dice system used by DnD players. Each die is used in different situations, and DMs as well as adventurers often have their own sets that they use. Sets consist of die that range in number of faces, and each die is referred to by how many faces it has - for example, a 6-sided die would be called a D6. Required for adventurers are the D20, D12, D10, D8, D6, and D4. (DMs generally add one more die to their collection: the D%, which is similar to the D10, except that it counts in tens rather than ones, and is used for determining percentages.) In my guides, I'll be referring to dice with their abbreviated names. Oftentimes, to indicate the number of rolls with a certain die, a number precedes the D. Take, for example, an instruction to roll the D6 four times. To indicate this, I'll write 4D6, just as many DMs (and even other players) will say in gaming sessions.
Once you have your character designed - class, race, and gender decided upon - you MUST record this information where it will be readily available at all times. These three facts play a huge part in how sessions play out. When determining statistics for your character, race and class are the two most important of these data, for they determine a multitude of different things. The first and most vital thing to determine is your Ability Scores. Each race has their own Ability Modifiers, and individual DMs have different ways to determine base Ability Scores. (To provide a generalized explanation, in this blog I'll be using my house rules, which follow DnD rulebooks from series 3.5 relatively closely.) In my sessions, players roll 4D6 and remove the lowest number each time to get their scores (see example below for greater detail). They then can place the scores in any of the 6 Abilities they choose: Strength, Constitution, Intellect, Wisdom, Dexterity, and Charisma. It would be wise to assign high Ability Scores to the Abilities essential to your class, as doing so confers high bonuses to the skills available to you. From here, you must find your Ability Modifiers. Based off of your Ability Score, these numbers are critical, as they will be applied to skills, saving throws (which will be reviewed later), and many other numbers that might just make the difference between life and death. Be sure to record these in their respective areas on your character sheet.
Scores below 10 confer negative bonuses, but as these are relatively rare among adventurers, I'll begin at 10.
10-11: +0
12-13: +1
14-15: +2
16-17: +3
18-19: +4
Example:
For one Ability Score, Godmund the Fighter rolls 4D6, and the die fall in his favor - he gets 2 sixes, a 5, and a 3, which give him one score of 17 after he removes the low 3. He continues his rolls and gets a 12, two 14s, a 15, and an 18. All of these scores are unusually high - the average is 10 - but this is normal for an adventurer. Because Godmund is a Fighter, he must focus largely upon Strength and Constitution - he'll be taking the brunt of the blows from enemies he and his party faces. He places 17 into Strength, and 18 into Constitution. To hit often, he assigns 14 to Dexterity. The adventurer playing Godmund decides to put a twist on his character - he assigns his third highest score of 15 to Charisma, making Godmund more appealing to others so that he can lead his party effectively. To Intellect and Wisdom, he assigns the 10 and the 12, as these abilities are the least relevant to his class.
From here, he determines his Ability Modifiers. Strength gets +3, Constitution +4, Dexterity +2, Intellect +0, Wisdom +1, and Charisma +2.
In the next installment of I Cast Magic Missile, I'll continue my overview of DnD character statistics, covering health, Armor Class, Initiative, Grapple, and other easy-to-determine statistics.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember - don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
Before diving into statistic determination, one must have a rudimentary understanding of the dice system used by DnD players. Each die is used in different situations, and DMs as well as adventurers often have their own sets that they use. Sets consist of die that range in number of faces, and each die is referred to by how many faces it has - for example, a 6-sided die would be called a D6. Required for adventurers are the D20, D12, D10, D8, D6, and D4. (DMs generally add one more die to their collection: the D%, which is similar to the D10, except that it counts in tens rather than ones, and is used for determining percentages.) In my guides, I'll be referring to dice with their abbreviated names. Oftentimes, to indicate the number of rolls with a certain die, a number precedes the D. Take, for example, an instruction to roll the D6 four times. To indicate this, I'll write 4D6, just as many DMs (and even other players) will say in gaming sessions.
Once you have your character designed - class, race, and gender decided upon - you MUST record this information where it will be readily available at all times. These three facts play a huge part in how sessions play out. When determining statistics for your character, race and class are the two most important of these data, for they determine a multitude of different things. The first and most vital thing to determine is your Ability Scores. Each race has their own Ability Modifiers, and individual DMs have different ways to determine base Ability Scores. (To provide a generalized explanation, in this blog I'll be using my house rules, which follow DnD rulebooks from series 3.5 relatively closely.) In my sessions, players roll 4D6 and remove the lowest number each time to get their scores (see example below for greater detail). They then can place the scores in any of the 6 Abilities they choose: Strength, Constitution, Intellect, Wisdom, Dexterity, and Charisma. It would be wise to assign high Ability Scores to the Abilities essential to your class, as doing so confers high bonuses to the skills available to you. From here, you must find your Ability Modifiers. Based off of your Ability Score, these numbers are critical, as they will be applied to skills, saving throws (which will be reviewed later), and many other numbers that might just make the difference between life and death. Be sure to record these in their respective areas on your character sheet.
Scores below 10 confer negative bonuses, but as these are relatively rare among adventurers, I'll begin at 10.
10-11: +0
12-13: +1
14-15: +2
16-17: +3
18-19: +4
Example:
For one Ability Score, Godmund the Fighter rolls 4D6, and the die fall in his favor - he gets 2 sixes, a 5, and a 3, which give him one score of 17 after he removes the low 3. He continues his rolls and gets a 12, two 14s, a 15, and an 18. All of these scores are unusually high - the average is 10 - but this is normal for an adventurer. Because Godmund is a Fighter, he must focus largely upon Strength and Constitution - he'll be taking the brunt of the blows from enemies he and his party faces. He places 17 into Strength, and 18 into Constitution. To hit often, he assigns 14 to Dexterity. The adventurer playing Godmund decides to put a twist on his character - he assigns his third highest score of 15 to Charisma, making Godmund more appealing to others so that he can lead his party effectively. To Intellect and Wisdom, he assigns the 10 and the 12, as these abilities are the least relevant to his class.
From here, he determines his Ability Modifiers. Strength gets +3, Constitution +4, Dexterity +2, Intellect +0, Wisdom +1, and Charisma +2.
In the next installment of I Cast Magic Missile, I'll continue my overview of DnD character statistics, covering health, Armor Class, Initiative, Grapple, and other easy-to-determine statistics.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember - don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Elder Scrolls Explorer: Introduction (Premise)
Another mini-series I'm starting! The Elder Scrolls Explorer is bound to continue on for quite a while
There are thousands of RPGs (Role-Playing Games) out there, of all different sorts. Open world RPGs leave the player to do whatever they want, while guided RPGs bring them along for a ride, giving them goals to reach and bosses to defeat. These two styles are different ends of one spectrum, and there are loads of games in between, each of them unique in what they bring to the table. One specific series has touched me, and helped define what I find to be a good game. The games are known to many by their individual titles: Arena and Daggerfall for the oldschool gamers, and Morrowind and Oblivion for the newbies in the gaming arena. All together, these games make up what is known as the Elder Scrolls Series. They're renowned for their open-ended gameplay and their humungous worlds, and have won many awards, such as Game of the Year, and Best of E3...
I've loved these games ever since I was introduced to them, and I figured that for all of you that haven't yet been introduced, I'd better fill you in. For those of you that have experienced the glory that is an Elder Scrolls game, hang on for the ride, and maybe I'll show you a couple tricks you never knew about beforehand. :D
The premise of the entire series is stated outright in the instruction manuals (that people rarely read, which I have a problem with - but that's for another time): play the way you want to play, and have fun with it! The series always starts the player in a relatively simple tutorial area, whether it be a dungeon or a customs office, where the controls are explained, and the player can design their character any way they like. Character design sets up the general experience for the rest of the game, so quite a bit rests upon it, but if the character doesn't seem to work, it's always possible to work around or fix it (or just design a new character).
After design, the player is sent off with their character into the vast world and left to their own devices. Oftentimes, players choose a mix of exploration and questing, which generally provides the most rewarding gameplay experience. As the world is full of quests for both the most holy and darkest of dark characters, so there's always something new to discover in cities or the wilderness, and dungeons and temples are scattered about as well, offering their loot up to anyone that can face their dangers without being decimated. Combat along journeys can be dealt with in many different ways, and it serves as the main gauge of your character's skill.
The self-guided nature of these games makes playing them feel like leading another life in which decisions at one point can affect hundreds of things in your future...I find it absolutely wonderful, and so do thousands of other gamers. They're definitely worth checking out.
I'll be continuing this series with an actual breakdown of the games, the series history, and the plotline that ties the series together.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember: don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
There are thousands of RPGs (Role-Playing Games) out there, of all different sorts. Open world RPGs leave the player to do whatever they want, while guided RPGs bring them along for a ride, giving them goals to reach and bosses to defeat. These two styles are different ends of one spectrum, and there are loads of games in between, each of them unique in what they bring to the table. One specific series has touched me, and helped define what I find to be a good game. The games are known to many by their individual titles: Arena and Daggerfall for the oldschool gamers, and Morrowind and Oblivion for the newbies in the gaming arena. All together, these games make up what is known as the Elder Scrolls Series. They're renowned for their open-ended gameplay and their humungous worlds, and have won many awards, such as Game of the Year, and Best of E3...
I've loved these games ever since I was introduced to them, and I figured that for all of you that haven't yet been introduced, I'd better fill you in. For those of you that have experienced the glory that is an Elder Scrolls game, hang on for the ride, and maybe I'll show you a couple tricks you never knew about beforehand. :D
The premise of the entire series is stated outright in the instruction manuals (that people rarely read, which I have a problem with - but that's for another time): play the way you want to play, and have fun with it! The series always starts the player in a relatively simple tutorial area, whether it be a dungeon or a customs office, where the controls are explained, and the player can design their character any way they like. Character design sets up the general experience for the rest of the game, so quite a bit rests upon it, but if the character doesn't seem to work, it's always possible to work around or fix it (or just design a new character).
After design, the player is sent off with their character into the vast world and left to their own devices. Oftentimes, players choose a mix of exploration and questing, which generally provides the most rewarding gameplay experience. As the world is full of quests for both the most holy and darkest of dark characters, so there's always something new to discover in cities or the wilderness, and dungeons and temples are scattered about as well, offering their loot up to anyone that can face their dangers without being decimated. Combat along journeys can be dealt with in many different ways, and it serves as the main gauge of your character's skill.
The self-guided nature of these games makes playing them feel like leading another life in which decisions at one point can affect hundreds of things in your future...I find it absolutely wonderful, and so do thousands of other gamers. They're definitely worth checking out.
I'll be continuing this series with an actual breakdown of the games, the series history, and the plotline that ties the series together.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember: don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
Friday, October 14, 2011
Retro Gaming 03: It's-a Me, Mario!
For anyone who grew up around a Nintendo 64 that actually had any decent games, the phrase "It's-a me, Mario!" will hit their nostalgic nerve like a freight train. For those of you that don't know, the Mario series is the iconic series for Nintendo, and the number one hit for its series on the N64 was Super Mario 64 (genius title, I know). Aside from the title, the rest of this game is actually relatively brilliant. It was of decent length, varied gameplay up compared to old Mario games, and kept the player thinking the whole time.
The premise of the game is that Mario has been invited to Peach's castle for cake, but when he arrives, the castle has been taken over by the evil King Koopa, Bowser. He scattered the power source for the castle (and all of the land, the Mushroom Kingdom), known simply as Stars, across different worlds that manifest themselves in paintings throughout the castle. The player then assumes control of Mario and must explore these worlds, gathering stars on each different level and eventually advancing to defeat Bowser - not once, but three times.
Gathering Stars is easy at first - the worlds start off with simple challenges like races, jumping, and defeating easy bosses. Amassing the first 20 Stars and defeating the first iteration of Bowser is obscenely easy. After that, however, things become more challenging: jumps are harder, puzzles more complicated, and situations more dangerous - death is common to the inexperienced player after the first 20 stars. Bowser seems further and further away, as one must collect 70 stars to reach Bowser for the final time (though to truly beat the game, one must collect all 120).
Mario's arsenal of moves had been greatly expanded upon in Super Mario 64. He can perform a number of acrobatic jumps and can even launch off of walls. Mario can also access powerup hats that provide him with different characteristics not otherwise available. There are three different hats: the Wing Cap, Metal Cap, and Invisibility Cap. The Wing Cap allows Mario to take off and fly after successfully performing a Triple Jump - this allows players to fly anywhere they want around the map for the duration the cap stays on Mario's head. The Metal Cap turns Mario into pure sentient steel, making him invulnerable to most kinds of damage and able to sink to the bottom of bodies of water instantly (which proves to be essential many a time). Finally, the Invisibility Cap immaterializes Mario, giving him the ability to pass through certain walls.
Super Mario 64 proved to be an incredibly fun, rather challenging game. Though it had points where it did drag a little, those were made up for by the sense of triumph after completing the puzzle at the end, or getting that final Star in a level. All in all, it's definitely worth a 40 to 50 hour gameplay session.
The premise of the game is that Mario has been invited to Peach's castle for cake, but when he arrives, the castle has been taken over by the evil King Koopa, Bowser. He scattered the power source for the castle (and all of the land, the Mushroom Kingdom), known simply as Stars, across different worlds that manifest themselves in paintings throughout the castle. The player then assumes control of Mario and must explore these worlds, gathering stars on each different level and eventually advancing to defeat Bowser - not once, but three times.
Gathering Stars is easy at first - the worlds start off with simple challenges like races, jumping, and defeating easy bosses. Amassing the first 20 Stars and defeating the first iteration of Bowser is obscenely easy. After that, however, things become more challenging: jumps are harder, puzzles more complicated, and situations more dangerous - death is common to the inexperienced player after the first 20 stars. Bowser seems further and further away, as one must collect 70 stars to reach Bowser for the final time (though to truly beat the game, one must collect all 120).
Mario's arsenal of moves had been greatly expanded upon in Super Mario 64. He can perform a number of acrobatic jumps and can even launch off of walls. Mario can also access powerup hats that provide him with different characteristics not otherwise available. There are three different hats: the Wing Cap, Metal Cap, and Invisibility Cap. The Wing Cap allows Mario to take off and fly after successfully performing a Triple Jump - this allows players to fly anywhere they want around the map for the duration the cap stays on Mario's head. The Metal Cap turns Mario into pure sentient steel, making him invulnerable to most kinds of damage and able to sink to the bottom of bodies of water instantly (which proves to be essential many a time). Finally, the Invisibility Cap immaterializes Mario, giving him the ability to pass through certain walls.
Super Mario 64 proved to be an incredibly fun, rather challenging game. Though it had points where it did drag a little, those were made up for by the sense of triumph after completing the puzzle at the end, or getting that final Star in a level. All in all, it's definitely worth a 40 to 50 hour gameplay session.
Retro Gaming 02, Part 2: A Link to the Past
Continuing my last post, I'll now be diving deeper into the game that is The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past.
Uncanny for its time was the sheer vastness of the realm: it takes a few minutes to traverse from one end to the other (unaided), and often about half an hour to hit all the large landmarks in the land. Yet this is only the singular realm of Hyrule - after you battle Agahnim, you are sent to Hyrule's parallel, simply known as the Dark World. The contours and landmarks are essentially the same, but the feel is entirely different: while in Hyrule, you wander a friendly, green landscape, constantly oppressed by the soldiers' omnipresence, in the Dark World you find yourself surrounded by depressing shades of brown, or menacing red and black areas (as well as the occasional white or blue that sticks out like a sore thumb), and are constantly threatened by those that were foolish enough to pursue the Golden Power and are now stuck in their hideous, evil forms.
Gameplay capitalizes on traveling between these two worlds: if the player exploits such transport to the fullest, s/he will find that their heart container (the ingame life meter) is always full, that their equipment is always in top condition, and that treasures await around every corner. The most rewarding part of exploration for many players is the discovery of heart pieces, which are treasures that, when collected in groups of four, increase your heart count (health). These eventually prove essential, as enemies become more deadly and bosses more challenging.
The actual game leads you through the three dungeons in the light realm of Hyrule, and then through the seven temples scattered throughout the Dark Realm. In each dungeon/temple, the formula is relatively simple: find the Big Key (which is usually possible through a little bit of thought-out puzzle solving), get the dungeon's item, and use it to defeat the boss, thereby earning whatever reward (be it pendant or crystallized descendant) afterwords. Though the formula itself is relatively simple, it is made much more entertaining by the fact that there are so many intricate puzzles in each dungeon that one might spend an hour or three in each simply figuring out what's going on, and the satisfaction of finally acquiring that big dungeon item. I remember, just the other day, I was spelunking through a dungeon and dying over and over because of a few obnoxious jellyfish enemies - pathetic, I know, but they're always in the way - until I got the Hookshot. After that, I could fly around wherever I wanted with no fear - the jellies were killed instantly when I shot them. It leads to a small (yet still satisfying) sense of triumph, as the land becomes less and less dangerous as you brave its perils.
All in all, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past is a game definitely worth playing through at least once, if not multiple times, to discover its multitude of secrets and experience the sense of triumph after getting all the items.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember - don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
Uncanny for its time was the sheer vastness of the realm: it takes a few minutes to traverse from one end to the other (unaided), and often about half an hour to hit all the large landmarks in the land. Yet this is only the singular realm of Hyrule - after you battle Agahnim, you are sent to Hyrule's parallel, simply known as the Dark World. The contours and landmarks are essentially the same, but the feel is entirely different: while in Hyrule, you wander a friendly, green landscape, constantly oppressed by the soldiers' omnipresence, in the Dark World you find yourself surrounded by depressing shades of brown, or menacing red and black areas (as well as the occasional white or blue that sticks out like a sore thumb), and are constantly threatened by those that were foolish enough to pursue the Golden Power and are now stuck in their hideous, evil forms.
Gameplay capitalizes on traveling between these two worlds: if the player exploits such transport to the fullest, s/he will find that their heart container (the ingame life meter) is always full, that their equipment is always in top condition, and that treasures await around every corner. The most rewarding part of exploration for many players is the discovery of heart pieces, which are treasures that, when collected in groups of four, increase your heart count (health). These eventually prove essential, as enemies become more deadly and bosses more challenging.
The actual game leads you through the three dungeons in the light realm of Hyrule, and then through the seven temples scattered throughout the Dark Realm. In each dungeon/temple, the formula is relatively simple: find the Big Key (which is usually possible through a little bit of thought-out puzzle solving), get the dungeon's item, and use it to defeat the boss, thereby earning whatever reward (be it pendant or crystallized descendant) afterwords. Though the formula itself is relatively simple, it is made much more entertaining by the fact that there are so many intricate puzzles in each dungeon that one might spend an hour or three in each simply figuring out what's going on, and the satisfaction of finally acquiring that big dungeon item. I remember, just the other day, I was spelunking through a dungeon and dying over and over because of a few obnoxious jellyfish enemies - pathetic, I know, but they're always in the way - until I got the Hookshot. After that, I could fly around wherever I wanted with no fear - the jellies were killed instantly when I shot them. It leads to a small (yet still satisfying) sense of triumph, as the land becomes less and less dangerous as you brave its perils.
All in all, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past is a game definitely worth playing through at least once, if not multiple times, to discover its multitude of secrets and experience the sense of triumph after getting all the items.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember - don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Retro Gaming 02: A Link to the Past
If you take a look at my childhood, about a quarter of it was spent playing one game for the GameBoy Advanced (though I actually played it on an SP). Which game, you might be asking yourself? Well take one look and you'll recognize it from the Legend of Zelda series. It premiered on the Super Nintendo in November 1991, and its name was The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. I was able to spend so much time on this game simply because of its size: it had two full worlds that were completely explorable and absolutely enormous. Gameplay was fun and addicting, and the quest was straightforward, but always a challenge because of the puzzles you faced along the way.
The game begins with an introductory cutscene describing the situation that the realm of Hyrule faces: an evil wizard named Agahnim has killed the king, seized the throne, and is attempting to gain a mysterious "Golden Power" that would make him omnitient. This Power was sealed in a different realm long ago by seven sages, but the wizard is breaking the seal by capturing the sages' descendants and locking them in crystals. You, link, are called out to by the final descendant conscious: Princess Zelda. She summons you to the palace, where Agahnim is about to complete his dark ritual.
At this moment, your uncle (whom you live with) hears the call as well. He was part of the royal guard before the king was murdered, and thusly heads to the castle to save the princess. You leave after he does, braving the storm and avoiding guards, to find him dead in the castle sewers...he gives you his sword and his shield and commands you press on to save the Princess and therefore the world. You're then sent to explore the castle grounds in search of the princess, who's locked away in the dungeon. After a few minutes of wandering and joyfully killing palace guards, you encounter her in her dungeon cell and free her by defeating her flail-wielding guard. You then take her to a sanctuary connected to the palace by a system of poorly lit sewers, leaving her in the hands of the priest there, who then informs you fully about your quest and your duties: you are perhaps the only chance the land has at peace, and the only one in any position to search for the three pendants that unbind the Master Sword from its place in the forest. From there, you're thrown into the massive world that is Hyrule.
Next blog post, I'll be continuing this section of Retro Gaming, diving deeper into the realm of Hyrule.
(Blogging Week 3, Post 1)
Have fun, good gaming, and remember - don't feed the trolls.
The game begins with an introductory cutscene describing the situation that the realm of Hyrule faces: an evil wizard named Agahnim has killed the king, seized the throne, and is attempting to gain a mysterious "Golden Power" that would make him omnitient. This Power was sealed in a different realm long ago by seven sages, but the wizard is breaking the seal by capturing the sages' descendants and locking them in crystals. You, link, are called out to by the final descendant conscious: Princess Zelda. She summons you to the palace, where Agahnim is about to complete his dark ritual.
At this moment, your uncle (whom you live with) hears the call as well. He was part of the royal guard before the king was murdered, and thusly heads to the castle to save the princess. You leave after he does, braving the storm and avoiding guards, to find him dead in the castle sewers...he gives you his sword and his shield and commands you press on to save the Princess and therefore the world. You're then sent to explore the castle grounds in search of the princess, who's locked away in the dungeon. After a few minutes of wandering and joyfully killing palace guards, you encounter her in her dungeon cell and free her by defeating her flail-wielding guard. You then take her to a sanctuary connected to the palace by a system of poorly lit sewers, leaving her in the hands of the priest there, who then informs you fully about your quest and your duties: you are perhaps the only chance the land has at peace, and the only one in any position to search for the three pendants that unbind the Master Sword from its place in the forest. From there, you're thrown into the massive world that is Hyrule.
Next blog post, I'll be continuing this section of Retro Gaming, diving deeper into the realm of Hyrule.
(Blogging Week 3, Post 1)
Have fun, good gaming, and remember - don't feed the trolls.
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
I Cast Magic Missile (A DnD Blog): Gameplay
(Toast's Note: This blog is part of my blog series, I Cast Magic Missile, and I'd suggest reading the first two parts before you proceed. ^-^ )
So you've decided to step into a gaming session of DnD for the first time, and have absolutely no idea what's going on - all you've ever heard about is dice rolling and a lot of paper. Well, my good friend, jumping in to the DnD adventuring experience is relatively easy (and even more so if your DM is committed), so relax and have fun!
The first thing adventurers need to know is who they are: this is what the entirety of the rest of their gameplay style should be centered around. Are you the cunning rogue that beguiles enemies and taunts your friends? Are you the silent wizard, whose fiery rage explodes when his allies are touched? Or are you the guts-and-glory warrior, who charges into everything head-on? These are all entirely up to you when you create your character. Pick a class that seems like it would be fun to play, but also fits the group you're adventuring with (ask your DM what is and isn't good at the time), and record basic details such as eye, hair, and skin color, race, and gender so that your Dungeon Master knows how to describe you when other characters encounter you.
After you've determined all this, you can move on to the statistics of your character - how s/he actually gets about when the dice hit the table. If you take a look here, you'll find the sheets many Dungeon Masters prefer to use when crunching data. It might seem like there are an overwhelmingly large number of stats to record, but if you know how your DM forms the numbers, then it should be completable without much trouble. Next blog, I'll follow up this basic character overview with descriptions of the information found on the character sheets such as skills, abilities (which are entirely different than skills - yes, I know it's odd), feats, and the most basic overview of spells.
(Blogging Week 2: Complete)
Have fun, good gaming, and remember - don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
So you've decided to step into a gaming session of DnD for the first time, and have absolutely no idea what's going on - all you've ever heard about is dice rolling and a lot of paper. Well, my good friend, jumping in to the DnD adventuring experience is relatively easy (and even more so if your DM is committed), so relax and have fun!
The first thing adventurers need to know is who they are: this is what the entirety of the rest of their gameplay style should be centered around. Are you the cunning rogue that beguiles enemies and taunts your friends? Are you the silent wizard, whose fiery rage explodes when his allies are touched? Or are you the guts-and-glory warrior, who charges into everything head-on? These are all entirely up to you when you create your character. Pick a class that seems like it would be fun to play, but also fits the group you're adventuring with (ask your DM what is and isn't good at the time), and record basic details such as eye, hair, and skin color, race, and gender so that your Dungeon Master knows how to describe you when other characters encounter you.
After you've determined all this, you can move on to the statistics of your character - how s/he actually gets about when the dice hit the table. If you take a look here, you'll find the sheets many Dungeon Masters prefer to use when crunching data. It might seem like there are an overwhelmingly large number of stats to record, but if you know how your DM forms the numbers, then it should be completable without much trouble. Next blog, I'll follow up this basic character overview with descriptions of the information found on the character sheets such as skills, abilities (which are entirely different than skills - yes, I know it's odd), feats, and the most basic overview of spells.
(Blogging Week 2: Complete)
Have fun, good gaming, and remember - don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
I Cast Magic Missile: Intro (Part 2)
Though some are content to
categorize players into different playing styles, I firmly believe that there
are as many different styles of playing as there are people on the planet, no
matter the role. But there are trends that emerge in players, and though they
might seem it, many aren’t mutually exclusive.
Dungeon Masters, for example, can take an infinite number of
routes, depending on a multitude of factors, such as group size, personality,
tendencies, and preferences. Trends in DMs, however, are easily recognizable
once they are set:
The Quickie DM:
This Dungeon Master is often in his position to fill a hole, or simply to
experiment as being a DM. They aren’t quite familiar enough with the particular
style of gameplay they want to forge, so they often resort to dice-rolling and
consulting a guidebook. Storylines developed by these DMs are simple, but not
uninteresting, and show a lack of thought before the gaming session.
Descriptions are conjured hastily and often leave adventurers wanting, and
lines like, “You kill the goblin,” and, “You enter the town,” pop up
frequently. Though the want to create good gameplay is there, the will to
create it isn’t yet present.
There’s a long gradation from this white into gray space that
leads us to…
The Committed DM: These
guys are really into what they do, and they absolutely love it. They contrast
starkly to quickie DMs, and oftentimes even those in between, because of how
intricate plotlines are, how varied geography and demography can be in their
worlds, and how intense gameplay situations are. These DMs are in their element
all the time, no matter what the adventurers do, and have a way of manipulating
the other players to do just what they want to spring brilliant plot points
upon them. Often, they employ every method they know to make the world more
real: they might whisper to adventurers when they discover a secret that only
their character is being told, or yell and flail intensely when the flame golem’s fiery hand comes down to
crush the wizard, but at the VERY last second a spiraling spout of water erupts
from his staff and puts the entire golem out, and then he turns to you, his
blonde hair streaking out behind him, magical essence snapping in the air, and…
You get the idea.
Adventurers, on the other hand, face much more restriction:
they only have one character to manage, and can only act as they would. But
despite (or maybe because of) these
restrictions, there are hundreds of different playing styles an adventurer can
take, such as:
The Looter: These
people absolutely love the idea of amassing a huge store of gold and magical
items and thusly do all they can within the game to acquire riches and fame for
themselves.
The Quester: Players
like this take joy in exploring the world that the Dungeon Master has laid out
for them, and
The most important quality in a player is their willingness to
play! If they dismiss acting out the adventure as silly or boring, act as a ‘troll’
within the group and go against everyone else’s wishes, or are just outright
obnoxious, they become a nuisance quite quickly and can ruin individual
sessions and even entire games. However, when the DM and the adventurers are committed, Dungeons and Dragons sessions can become the most anticipated hours of one's week, if not month. Because of this, I strongly recommend at least trying out a few sessions of DnD with a group that seems legitimately concentrated. Who knows? Maybe you'll be the player that turns the tables in that final battle with the dragon ;)
In my next blog, I'll be continuing the I Cast Magic Missile series, kissing the surface of actual basic DnD gameplay.
(Blogging Week 2)
Have fun, good gaming, and remember - don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
In my next blog, I'll be continuing the I Cast Magic Missile series, kissing the surface of actual basic DnD gameplay.
(Blogging Week 2)
Have fun, good gaming, and remember - don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
Thursday, September 29, 2011
I Cast Magic Missile: An Introduction (Part 1)
When
critics and even gamers look at games today, they base much of their judgment
on how free their gameplay style is – how many options there are available for
them to customize their character, where they can go, what they can do, and so
on. Most games are limited by the development team’s size, time allotment, and
the style of game they’re producing. But there is one game out there that has
only one limit: the imagination of its players. A group of five people can sit
down for a couple hours and come up with a game that has never been conceived
before, all the while having loads of fun, and not even noticing the time
passing.
[Note: I've decided to divide this blog up into many separate parts, as it will be incredibly lengthy. So watch for the next part as it is released!]
(Blogging week 2)
What is
this miracle game, some may ask?
Well,
it is known by many names. Some call it stupid, nerdy, and a waste of time;
others refer to it as the greatest game ever devised; most, however, know it
only as Dungeons and Dragons (or DnD for short).
Once
one can make it around the negative social stigmas associated with DnD, it is
truly the most enormous game playable. To begin, one simply needs an
imaginative mind and a group of friends. While guidebooks are available for
purchase, they are known as guidebooks for a reason: they serve only to give
players ideas as to what they could do in the game. But before a prospective
player can dive into even the simplest game, they must first know the basics.
Present
in every session of Dungeons and Dragons are the players – they are, after all,
the center of the storyline. They generally number from two to six (though this
limitation can be expanded if they are experienced), and fall within one of two
categories: the adventurers and the Dungeon Master (DM). Adventurers are the
most numerous of the group, making up the majority of those at the table, as
they play the characters that the story generally revolves around. They can
come from any walk of life, and have any amount of experience (or a lack
thereof). However, the Dungeon Master fills a very important role: s/he is the
one that controls the world surrounding the adventurers, from plot to geography
and everything in between. Dungeon Masters are generally very experienced
players that have been gaming DnD and know its subtleties well, though there
are exceptions (such as myself) that jump into the role with no prior knowledge
to fill a hole in a gaming group.
[Note: I've decided to divide this blog up into many separate parts, as it will be incredibly lengthy. So watch for the next part as it is released!]
(Blogging week 2)
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Free Download of the Month: Cave Story
A while back, a friend of mine, Danny Davies, brought up the Japanese game
Cave Story in casual conversation. I was intrigued, and thought that because it
was a free download, it could do no harm, and I tried it out. I expected a
meager, hand-crafted game with a few bugs and slightly choppy or unbalanced
gameplay; I received quite the opposite. The original developer, Studio Pixel,
had crafted a masterpiece in 8-bit, and didn't even set a price - though many
players (myself included) would've been glad to pay, if only to support the
creator.
How was this homemade game a masterpiece, you might ask?
Well, it all boils down to a couple of things: what makes 8-bit shooter games endearing - simple beginning controls with a learning curve easy enough to follow but also challenging enough to be interesting, fast-paced gameplay, and intense music (which I was delightfully surprised by - but this I'll return to later). Yet it also brings back an element many modern games lack that was generally present on the true 8- and 16-bit systems: a full-fledged plotline with twists and turns. All of these elements combined to make a wonderful game that I was drawn to complete in my first sit-down of 7 hours.
After a cutscene showing a man in distress attempting to contact his sister,
you awaken abruptly in a cave with no idea what to do or where to go. There’s
no tutorial because the controls are so simple: the arrow keys move you, and Z
makes you jump. As you explore the cavern you’re trapped in, you steal your
first weapon from a smith you find asleep in his room, and you quickly learn
that X fires the meager pistol of yours. Your first shots are taken at the bats
that chip 1 of your 3 health away, and you eventually end up in a small city of
humanoid animals. As the story progresses, you discover that your character is
a soldier with amnesia, sent from the surface with a group of humans to explore
the island floating in the sky that you’re on. I don’t want to spoil the plot,
but the conflict is interesting, and there are many choices that affect gameplay
and the storyline immensely. The music is interesting from the start, and completely
8-bit, which I adore – it sounds as though Studio Pixel even routed an original
NES soundcard for the audio bits. Using a hand-crafted editing program, Studio
Pixel produced tunes that fit each and every scene in the game, ranging from
ambient cave percussion to intense boss battle themes.
Cave Story found its way into my heart within the first forty minutes after
I started it up, and I’m sure that if you give it a shot, you’ll love it as
well.
English Cave Story Site
Final note: remember that this game was produced originally in Japanese, and that you must install a patch to play it through with its English translation. Both the original download and said patch can be found at the site above.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember - don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
(Blogging Week 1)
How was this homemade game a masterpiece, you might ask?
Well, it all boils down to a couple of things: what makes 8-bit shooter games endearing - simple beginning controls with a learning curve easy enough to follow but also challenging enough to be interesting, fast-paced gameplay, and intense music (which I was delightfully surprised by - but this I'll return to later). Yet it also brings back an element many modern games lack that was generally present on the true 8- and 16-bit systems: a full-fledged plotline with twists and turns. All of these elements combined to make a wonderful game that I was drawn to complete in my first sit-down of 7 hours.
English Cave Story Site
Final note: remember that this game was produced originally in Japanese, and that you must install a patch to play it through with its English translation. Both the original download and said patch can be found at the site above.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember - don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
(Blogging Week 1)
Monday, September 19, 2011
Retro Gaming 01: Megaman, Mortal Kombat, and Scott Pilgrim
This blog begins what may become a
series of retro (8-bit, 16-bit, etc) games...if it's received well
enough and I like writing it. :D
Games such as Scott Pilgrim vs. the
World, Mortal Kombat, and the Megaman series may seem to have nothing
in common when one merely glances at them. They emerged at different
times, on different systems, and entirely different eras. However,
they're tied together by a few key points in their core: they all
float about (and generally improve upon) the generic
'beat-the-baddie' formula, their graphics and their music at least
started in the realm of 8- or 16- bit, and how well they were
received. I absolutely love all three of these games, and I'll be
reviewing them today.
The Megaman game series had the first
release of these three games, with the first of its many (now above
50) installments simply dubbed Megaman (or ロックマン
- Rockman). Debuting in December 1987, this game's
story revolves around the character Megaman, an adaptable robot set
in a crumbling futuristic society that has mastered the art of
building those similar to him. He was created by Dr. Light originally
as a simple robot, but was refurbished with the famed Mega Buster to
combat the evil Dr. Wily, whose 8 robot menaces conquered the world.
Though the storyline may seem cookie-cutter, the intense run-and-gun
on-rails shooter had many different possible playthroughs. The first
installment had 6 Robot Masters that one could fight in any order.
After defeating one singular boss, Megaman would gain their weapon,
which he could then use in any other stage (though it had limited
ammo, unlike the Mega Buster). After besting all 6 Robot Masters, the
Dr Wily Stage opened, where one would proceed through 4 linked stages
and a battle with all 6 Robot Masters, and then finally Dr. Wily.
My favorite installment in the series
is Megaman 2 (available on iTouch as an app) because of its longer
gameplay (8 bosses, 3 difficulties), catchy music, and generally fun
nature.
The Mortal Kombat series came second,
releasing first in arcades, and then on consoles as its popularity
rose. It was a 2D fighting game known for the complexity of its
movesets as well as the goriness of its 'Fatalities', which allowed
players to absolutely decimate their enemies, reducing them to fleshy
mush and blood. Because of these factors, it became a cult hit, and
eventually spread over into the realm of consoles. Even today, it
lives on, and though it is not as strong as it once was, it preserves
its roots of goriness and complicated moves.
I personally love how Guile's theme
goes with EVERYTHING. (Really. Look it up on youTube whilst doing
anything and it will sync up perfectly. Especially exercise.)
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is the
third of these three great games, and is the only one that is not
(and most likely won't be) a full-fledged series. The plot is based
upon the movie: Scott Pilgrim really wants to date Ramona, and thusly
must fight the League of Evil Exes to be able to do so. Its gameplay
is relatively simple compared to the other two games: you sidescroll
through 8 worlds, fighting any number of goons, and eventually arrive
at the stage's boss, who is any one of Ramona's evil exes. Though it
may be considered dumbed-down to some, I find its simplicity
endearing, and a wonderful introduction to the combo-based system
that many fighters use today. Its music is upbeat and fun, and its
stat and leveling systems are the epitome of what a casual game's
systems should be.
Have fun, good gaming, and remember:
don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
(Blogging Week 1)
(Blogging Week 1)
Awesome Game Music: The Elder Scrolls
Today, I was fantasizing (as I often do) about the upcoming game, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, when the theme music popped into my head. I've got it practically memorized at this point, after watching the trailer so many times, yet it's still as awesome as the first time I heard it. The huge choir knocks me flat each time, though they're singing in a 'language' (lacking syntax or grammar) present only in the realm of the game. After I had played through its final decrescendo and wiped the tears of awe from my eyes, I realized just why this music was so amazing: it connected with what I had listened to in my earlier years - to be more specific, a game earlier in the series.
My friend Brandon got me started on the Elder Scrolls game series when I was but 11 years old, and then, the latest Elder Scrolls game was Morrowind, the third installation. Its opening theme used a rumbling bass, coupled with a piccolo, that struck up an epic melody with a symphony as the title of the game appeared on the screen, and it was the most awesome theme I'd ever heard (which was saying something - I'd played through Super Mario Bros Deluxe and Pokemon Silver plenty of times by then, which are both classics, in the realm of music and games). The next installment of the game, Oblivion, brought the melody from Morrowind back in its introduction theme, though much more subtly, focusing instead on themes that sounded more imperialistic and filled with doom.
Skyrim's introduction throws back to Morrowind's, but in a much more obvious way than the Oblivion intro had. It preserves the melody almost perfectly, using a full symphony with choral accompaniment. There are many differences, however, that are used to portray the nature of the game: the staccato notes in the brass and the choir are much more intense than the legato phrases played by the piccolo and the symphony in the Morrowind theme, the choir emphasizes the importance of language and vocabulary, and the general feel of the two songs are very much different. While the Morrowind intro piece is calm and beautiful, Skyrim's theme is (artistically) chaotic, loud, and more explosive.
I absolutely love the way that these
pieces connect the series together. The games are in the same series,
and are connected by this and the lore they share, but also are
strung to one another by this music, giving the series a sort of
fluidity that not many other games have.
Skyrim Theme
Note: it's highly likely that, in the near future, I'll be doing another blog about these games focused mostly around gameplay mechanics.
The Elder Scrolls Series and all that stuff are copyright Bethesda and such and such. I take no credit in creating any of the media I present, nor do I make any profit from presenting it.
(2nd Note: This blog is similar to another post made by another music blog I had started, The Eerie Noise, because I changed my blog's theme.)
Have fun, good gaming, and remember - don't feed the trolls.
-Toast
(Blogging Week 1)
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