Fixing Player Toxicity

League of Legends (LoL) has become synonymous with toxic player behavior. From my brief experience, as well as all the chat log people link, there is something about the game that makes players positively inhuman to one another. You may remember that I recently talked about how a poor community is the only true deal-breaker for me, so I was very pleasantly surprised to see that Riot, the makers of LoL, have been paying as much attention as every else.

Jeffrey Lin, lead designer for social systems in LoL, undertook an interesting experiment to see if he and his team could better understand player toxicity, which he defines as "offensive language, obscenity, and displays of negative attitudes." While Lin states that "online gameplay has an inherently toxic element that must simply be accepted," any online gamer knows that there's a line between those annoying 12 year olds looking for trouble, and people who are genuinely awful in their online interactions. I accept that I'll have teammates killing me in hardcore mode of Call of Duty, but I won't accept someone blowing up my chat window with vitriol.

After Lin constructed some player profiles, he found that players who are truly toxic (i.e. acting out without provocation) are rare, but that these few players infect others who then carry that toxicity to their own games. So toxic players are like patient zero in any zombie movie, but how to fix it?

I'm not sure when this experiment was conducted, but when I played LoL years ago the opposing teams could talk openly in a shared chat channel, as well as a private team channel. While my experience had an equal share of rude players on either team, Lin decided to make cross-team chat optional for players. With this option, they noticed a general decrease in toxicity - and when you can't see the other team mocking your team or singling you out, which leads to your team scrutinizing you more, I can understand how this would be beneficial and why many games don't allow it from day 1.

Now this is where LoL goes from being known for its community to being known for how it handles its community. Riot's Tribunal system empowers players by keeping each other accountable. In most games, moderation is handled by a skeleton crew that can't possibly work to keep players in check and help them learn better online social skills (something that really should be taught in school at this point). The Tribunal system instead takes an offending player's actions and displays it for the whole community to see and, most impressively, allows them to decide the player's fate.

I'd heard mentions of this, but I was skeptical. If people are horrible because anonymity allows them to be, then wouldn't giving an entire group of them control over another player's fate be doubly bad? As it turns out, just the opposite happened. An unnamed number of cases have gone before the community, and after 105 million votes, 280,000 players have been punished and returned to the game without causing any further problems.

Now there's a lot to the linked article that's worth reading, but the Tribunal is what has caused some stir in the gaming community. Players are tired of toxic behavior in games, and reporting seems to do no good unless the offense is incredibly offensive and against a game's Terms of Service. I've talked to many players over the years who express discouragement at player behavior, yet shrug their shoulders because they feel like nothing gets done about it.

Yes there is a mute/ignore feature, but that's just a Hello Kitty bandaid placed on a bigger problem. People need to learn to act like human beings, pure and simple. Kids are thrown on to the internet, see people acting like jerks, are allowed to act like jerks without repercussion, and grow in to mostly-functioning adults who are incapable of understanding that the people they're yelling at are, in fact, people. The Tribunal system has its flaws to be sure, but when players know that their behavior can be punished, and especially when it is punished, will eventually make them think about how they're acting.

I would love to see more games implement this across the internet. Sure it would be rough while the problems were ironed out, but imagine an online gaming world where your online reputation was affected by your behavior as much as your real-world one. It would need to tread cautiously so that players weren't punished unfairly, but Riot's cases use bad behavior from several gaming sessions so that a player isn't banned for having one bad game. The system is brilliant because the moderators don't need to dig through mounds of behavioral reports, letting many slip through the cracks because it isn't worth their limited time. Instead they let players decide whether someone deserves to be banned for 24 hours for scatological insults while they spend time dealing with players who need to be banned permanently.

What do you guys think of the Tribunal system? Do you have an online game that would benefit from the players taking an active role in improving their community, or do you think it's just a bad idea? You can read more about it here, but I'm curious to hear everyone's thoughts.



See you tomorrow!

Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways!

My Top 10 - Video Game Genres

If you've played video games for a few years, you know that there are some types of games that simply need to be average to make you happy. We're all usually pretty open to multiple genres, but we also know that some are simply better than others. Here's my list, what's yours?

10 Simulation
Roller Coaster Tycoon, Sim City, Tropico
I had Roller Coaster Tycoon on my dad's computer, and I would spend hours on this thing. Sometimes I was legitimately making a popular theme park, others I'd play the tyrant by destroying active roller coasters and imprisoning/drowning customers who were complaining.

Sim games are always a good way to wind down by building an economy and watching as it runs its course. It's also probably the only genre where I'll play a "bad guy," because it's the only genre that gives a decent reward and penalty for being a jerk.

9 Real-Time Strategy
Age of Empires, Starcraft
Age of Empires was the only game I had on one of my earlier computers. I knew all the cheat codes for it, I could hold my own online, and I played through the campaigns and AI opponents countless times. I learned strategies without consulting online resources (something I'm practically incapable of today), and I made a few local friends who also happened to play the game.

The games are more fast-paced that I care for anymore, but I still enjoyed playing through some of Starcraft II, and a friend is currently working on talking me in to buying the updated Age of Empires. There's something so thrilling about starting a map with a few workers and growing it in to a juggernaut that crushes all opposition.

8 MMORPG
World of Warcraft, Rift, Warhammer: Age of Reckoning
I've played WoW off and on for 8 years. That's a lot of time to play a single game, but MMOs evolve so much that sometimes only the world stays the same. The games certainly aren't time friendly, often requiring you to spend hours just to reach the real part of the game (content for max-level characters). Still, when I can find a group of friends to play with, it's a great way to get my fix for cooperative gameplay.

7 Shooters
Call of Duty, Left 4 Dead, Borderlands, Earth Defense Force
"Shooters" is a pretty broad term, and often games have something extra tacked on (like how Borderlands is also an RPG). Still, there are some games that exist purely to let you shoot stuff. I enjoy Call of Duty purely for the competitive multiplayer, but games like Earth Defense Force and Borderlands are great for those times when you want to relax and pull a trigger for awhile. I personally prefer my single-player experience to be unrealistic (zombies, mutants, aliens), but when it comes to competitive shooters, give me an SMG and a belt full of grenades and I'm happy.


6 Side-Scrolling Action
Mega Man, Contra, Sonic
I rarely play these anymore, but whenever I do spend time on one I'm never disappointed. There's nothing fancy to these - you walk to the right, kill stuff, go right again, collect stuff, right some more, boss battle. It's pure, it's easy to understand, and it's always a challenge.

5 RPG
Elder Scrolls, Dragon Age, Fallout, Chrono Trigger
I like a good story, I like getting gear and special items, and I like stats. Hence, I will forever love RPGs. However, if you've paid attention to my Rest Time Reviews you know that I don't like games that don't give me a return on my time spent, hence RPGs only being #5. When I was in high school these were hands down my #1 genre - get rid of action bogging down my story. Let me fight enemies, get gear, and save the world! As you'll notice by the end of this list, most of my games need some semblance of character progression and story, I just can't spend another 50 hours running aimlessly through games like Skyrim where it could be 15 minutes before I happen upon something.


4 Action RPG 
Dark Souls, Diablo, Bioshock
The perfect blend of RPG and "always something to do," Action RPGs are quickly climbing this genre list. These games need to include good character progression to be worth anything, and I'm slowly coming around to the idea of a game's story being structured around going from Point A to Point B, rather than setting you loose in a huge world and letting you find the story yourself. The latter is much more rewarding, but the former often has much better gameplay mechanics and memorable boss battles.


3 Card Games  
Magic the Gathering, Ascension
Perhaps more of a niche genre than the rest of these, TCGs and deck-building games in a digital format are still a great way to play the game you want without spending the money you don't have. TCGs like Magic or Pokemon may not give you as much deck-building freedom as you'd find in the real world, it's still a nice way to spend 20 or 30 minutes. Console-based card games are a harder sell, but anything I can play on my iPad will catch my attention because it lets me spend 10 or 15 minutes playing a game I enjoy in almost any location.

As a side note, it's also a great way to enjoy the game if you don't play very often. Before I joined my gaming group the only time I ever played Magic was through Duels of the Planeswalkers. I've also become a bit interested in deck building games where you and your opponent share a card pool and build your decks mid-game. Rather than paying $40 for a game I'm not sure about, I paid $0 and found that I really don't mind them!

2 Action/Adventure
Tomb Raider, The Last of Us (I may buy a PS3 just to play this), Dead Island
I never thought I'd love action games so much, but the ones I've played lately have been astounding. As long as a game isn't so chaotic that I can't track what's happening, I appreciate the adrenaline-fueling excitement an action game can create. Maybe I'm running through a crumbling building in Tomb Raider, getting my vengeance in Darksiders, or saving Hyrule in The Legend of Zelda. Action/Adventures are always sure to please just because there's rarely a time when you're not scaling a wall, fighting a bad guy, or discovering a new item to help you climb a wall to fight a bad guy.


1 Turn-Based Tactics
Final Fantasy Tactics, Advanced Wars, Shining Force, X-COM, Hero Academy
This isn't even close to the previous entries. TBT games have been my favorite games ever since I found Return to Krondor back in 1999. These games always have you snapped to a grid, and you and your opponent take turns moving your characters and attacking one another. It's like an elaborate game of chess, with different weapons, spells, items, potions... all with a hidden dice mechanic to determine hits, misses, and critical hits. The games are always so strategically rewarding, and there's always something to upgrade right until the credits roll.

TBT also work great for short play sessions. A single battle usually takes 5-10 minutes, so all your other time is usually spent upgrading characters or going through cut scenes. There's no needless travel, and even if you have to "grind" levels to get your characters powerful enough to progress, the battles you fight are always enjoyable.

Honestly, it's hard for me to find a tactics game I don't like. And like shooters, TBT usually have something extra added on to them (usually an RPG), but it's that feeling of having a defined battlefield with terrain and varying units that bring the thrill. It can have a huge battlefield like X-COM or Fire Emblem, or be more confined like Final Fantasy Tactics and Hero Academy. When I can plan my strategy, move my pieces, outwit my opponent, and leave just a little bit to chance, I am one happy gamer.


See you tomorrow!

Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways! And now is the perfect time to enter and win a piece of terrain!

Farewell, Worthy Painting

I received a rather disheartening news email from MiniWarGaming today. Apparently Worthy Painting, a phenomenal group of commission painters, is having to close the door on their storefront and painting business. While this happens all the time with small businesses, Worthy Painting has been huge in my development as a painter, and seeing them have to close up felt like it was happening to a friend.

When I first started painting, as with all my pursuits I looked at what the pros were doing. One of my friends directed me toward Worthy Painting as a source of inspiration, and I found myself really enjoying how clean and precise their work looked. They use hard lines in addition to shadows to really make each piece of the model stand out.

While I thought it was simple, it turns out that drawing a fine line almost perfectly straight takes a bit of mastery. I got to practice it with a friend's Eldar and did pretty well for being a baby painter, but the precision they put in to bigger things like vehicles is amazing. Go check their gallery and see the precise, high-quality work they do.

Each artist tends to have their own style, and Worthy always strived to be clean but realistic. Their pieces didn't have that "fresh from the factory" look, but there was no muddying in their detail, and every part of a model was eye-catching. You could usually look at a model they did and know it was from their studio because they had an identity - a signature style that set them apart from many other professional painters.

So it's with some sadness that we say goodbye to much of Worthy Painting. They promise they'll still be around on YouTube, but I will miss their constant additions to their Facebook gallery. I hope they can find their way back to commission painting, but for now I wish them the best of luck.


See you tomorrow!

Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways! And now is the perfect time to enter and win a piece of terrain!

Comfort in Random Results

If you're anything like me, you enjoy games that use random results in tandem with skill. Whether it's a Warhammer 40k and your perfectly executed strategy falls apart because the dice gods frown on you, a computer RPG where that big number explodes over your enemy's head to signal a critical hit, or even Monopoly where you can strike it rich or go bankrupt based on a single six-sided die. As I've played a variety of games in my life, I've almost always lost interest in games that are based solely on calculation, and you win or lose based 100% on your actions.

Most of us enjoy this because it adds tension to the game. No matter how much of an upper hand your opponent has, you're rarely out of the game. A single attack could devastate a key piece of your opponent's plan, an ability that triggers on a critical hit could give you the edge you need, or you can find yourself in those wonderful do-or-die moments where the perfect dice roll will win you the game. These games aren't only left up to chance - you must play your pieces carefully, cast the right spells, and maintain control of anything not left up to chance. But no matter how much I calculate, nothing in the game is ever certain except that I or my opponent will emerge victorious.

While I love the thrill of the game, there's also something comforting about that randomness. I have never enjoyed fighting games because it requires perfection to do well. There's no room for error, and any slight mistake can end the game for you. To me, that's torturous. While randomness allows a B-rank player to put up a fight against an A-rank player, things like chess, Street Fighter, and even Starcraft set a very hard division between skills. 

Some love that because it demands that they reach their maximum potential and devote themselves to improving. They have to work tirelessly to learn all the nuances until they can play a nearly flawless game. Every victory is earned 100% by them, and any loss is 100% on them.

I don't like that. I like having room to fail, and letting a part of my success or failure not be in my hands. It lets me battle both my opponent and chance, but it also lets me breathe a little easier when I make a mistake because there's room to recover from it.

Let me clarify that I don't think randomness wins games. I could go down to my local shop and play against Keith, a guy who is representing America in a global Warmachine tournament coming up. If we played 10 games together, despite me being a decent Warmachine player, I would count myself lucky to end with a 1-9 record. I might be able to flail about and seem equally matched at the beginning, but even the best dice rolls will only do so much for me.

However, two equals can get together and enjoy the fierceness of skill vs skill as well as the excitement of the unknown. If we've both played our first turns perfectly, then victory goes to the one who can work around and with the dice, not win because of them. It's not about rolling dice randomly and losing because no matter what you did, you just couldn't win because of random results.

Of course sometimes I do lose because of bad results. It's rare that I can look back on a game and say there's nothing I could have done differently, but it happens. When it does, I do my best to accept the loss as my own and not whine about bad dice. After all, that comes with the territory of unpredictable results.

That's my take on randomness in games - what's yours? Do you like the excitement, the way it can smooth over a bad play, or something else entirely?

See you tomorrow!

Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways! And now is the perfect time to enter and win a piece of terrain!

Rest Time Reviews - Card Hunter (BETA)

Rest Time Reviews is a series for those with limited time to play video games. While I'll discuss the game as a whole, I also focus on whether or not a game is literally a waste of time. This RTR is all about Card Hunter (BETA).

A few months back I was thumbing through my Game Informer and I landed on the indie games section. I usually just give a quick glance of the pictures to see if I'm interested, and when I saw the image from Card Hunter, a free PC game, I had to find out more. The game is still in Beta, but if this sounds like the game for you (and how could it not be?) then make sure you sign up for the Beta!

Card hunter is a tactics-style game, meaning that you and your opponent take turns moving your pieces around a grid-based battlefield. If you've ever played Dungeons and Dragons with miniatures, you'll feel right at home with this game. It is a lighthearted game with several "in jokes" that most geeks will appreciate, like an ooze named Blpbpbpbqpl, cliche story hooks, class roles, paper stand-up models, and a hilarious Dungeon Master to help tell the story.

Everything in this game will feel immediately familiar to most. You start with a warrior, mage, and warrior priest at first, with more classes likely to come later. Combat is unique in that you draw a series of movement, armor, and action cards each turn. Unlike games like Magic, you don't necessarily choose your cards. Rather, your available attacks, armor, and different movement cards are granted by each piece of equipment on your character.

The game is fairly straight forward, but so far all the battle I've fought have had enough creature variety to make it unique each time. The battlefields are rather bland so far, with black borders around impassable terrain and the occasional difficult terrain that stops movement when you enter it. I haven't found terrain to be terribly important other than letting me create choke points - as a DM I find it disappointing that terrain elements aren't a bit more interactive, but it's a minor complaint that could easily be fixed later.

Card Hunter is free-to-play, which of course means that there's a cash shop that uses "pizzas" in the same way other games use gems.

Blue Manchu has made it a point to eliminate the "cash wall" that may prevent players from seeing content unless they pay. With the exception of adventures and frivolous things like different character tokens, everything in the game is attainable without lightening your wallet. How Manchu will handle this remains to be seen, as many games with a similar model practically strongarm you in to paying lest you spend countless hours acquiring enough gold to buy a single upgrade. For what you can get with Pizzas I do find them to be rather overpriced, but I hope the Beta will serve as a way for them to make it more of a desirable purchase.

There's no real story to speak of, and instead each point on the map is an adventure featuring a series of battles leading up to a "big bad evil guy," with each adventure being repeatable daily. As I said, each adventure feels unique enough, but I can see things becoming dull if Manchu doesn't have more elements to combat than a simple death match.

On the other hand, the game is fantastic in bite-sized chunks. When I would try grinding through several adventures in one sitting, I'd last maybe two adventures (8-10 battles) before I had to be done. But when I'd do 2 or 3 battles for about 15 minutes, the game had just enough strategy and excitement to make the time worthwhile. And since there is no wandering aimlessly through a dungeon, every minute you spend in Card Hunter will have you dealing with equipment or killing baddies so that you can get enough gold to deal with equipment.

Despite being in Beta, I think the game has shown me enough to make it worth recommending. The three characters bring unique abilities to the table, and each one can be customized to fill different roles. The game is fast-paced and enjoyable, with enough whimsy to make it easy to relax to. The lack of story and map creativity is disappointing, but for a game meant to be played a few minutes at a time it's easy to forgive. If Blue Machu handles the cash shop properly, then I think this will be a great game for anyone looking to goof around at work or when they have a few minutes to kill at home.

Remember, it's still in Beta so you can't play it just yet. There's a Beta sign-up on the site if you really want to give it a whirl, otherwise stick around because I'll definitely be letting you know when it goes live.


See you tomorrow!

Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways! And now is the perfect time to enter and win a piece of terrain!

Guest Post - Being Married to a Gamer

I'm very excited to feature my first guest post. I'm doubly excited because my wife has secretly been working on this since I first announced guest posting, and I think you will really enjoy it!

Being Married to a Gamer

Being married to a gamer is basically the same as being married to a non-gamer.

 They both build things:

Well, more like these things:

They need their T.V. time:

Although they tend to look more like this during it:

They paint:

But with smaller brushes:

They have recreation time:

Though it is more like this:

They also need the right equipment for it:

But it tends to look more like this:

Ok, so there maybe a few differences, but gamer or non-gamer, you still have to learn new things. Instead of hearing all about statistics and world cups, you learn about strategy and special abilities. Instead of hearing yelling about the “bad call” you hear discussions (maybe arguments) about rules and what allows them to make that move. There are tournaments instead of super bowls, and release dates instead home openers. But you still get to hear about the awesomeness of HD and how the bigger the screen the better! Although in this case it doesn't only apply to TVs.

The lingo also changes. You thought you learned all about letters in elementary, and then you figured about txt talk in middle school, now there is a whole new set of jargon to learn. Like tank (similar action to the military version, yet quite different), codex, noob, and "battlefoam" (now that sounds tough right?). There are acronyms like DMs and GMs, RPGs, PVP, MMOs, D6s 4s 8s 10s 12s & 20s, and AFK. Army will be used frequently, and even though my brother is a Marine, it is never actually used in reference to the United States Military (though that may have something to do with the fact that my brother would be highly offended to be lowered to that level “Oorah!")

There is much more participation when married to a gamer.  Instead of just being the means by which pop and chips make it to the coffee table in front of the game, you are the one that is asked to test drive the new game, or help with making things for tournaments, and talk through layouts. It can be fun at times, others you just have to smile and nod and pretend that you actually know what is going on, though I imagine that can be the same with a non-gamer and a fantasy football game.

Well here is my take from the other side of the game room! :-)

~Amanda Burns, Wife of a Gamer

________________________________________________________

See you tomorrow!

Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways! And now is the perfect time to enter and win a piece of terrain!

Countdown to Cyriss - Week 12

You thought I forgot about our regular Wednesday appointment, didn't you? I sort of did, but I finally made it! This week DC wrote sort of a capstone to his own Cyriss series, skipping the reveals and instead discussing three "pillars" of the Convergence of Cyriss army design.

I take this to mean that our Countdown to Cyriss is coming to a close. I don't know if they'll be releasing any more weekly content for it, but this may close a series I've honestly had a lot of fun with. As we look forward to Cyriss's release, I'd like to talk about all the things that have me excited about the army, and I hope you guys will chime in with some of your own!

• Unique focus management. While many are waiting for PP's eventual release of a new resource, Cyriss's ability to cycle a single focus between all of its jacks adds more depth to focus allocation and goes beyond what we're used to.
• True battlegroup support. Generally speaking, supporting the warjacks is left up to the Warcaster. While that's usually fine since there's not much to support, the fact that Cyriss is so friendly to its jacks is encouraging. Every release we've seen so typically fell in to 3 categories:
  
  1. Warcasters/warjacks
  2. Tools to boost the battlegroup or shore up its weaknesses
  3. Cannon fodder to deliver the warjacks.
  
  Yes, there were things like the Clockwork Angels that were more specialized, but overall the entire army is built around taking big tough things and making them tougher.
• An army of robots.  Many of us got in to Warmachine in the hopes of controlling a bunch of those big metal dudes we saw in all the artwork. While I wouldn't say that the game has failed to deliver a fun experience, I did feel a tinge of disappointment when I realized that I couldn't run a field of Juggernauts backed by Mechaniks. Cyriss has all the tools in place to truly support a sea of large bases, and it's going to be a whole new way to play from both sides of the table.
• Easy to paint. I'll be honest, my backlog of personal painting projects is overwhelming. I have a selection of Khador left, my Cygnar that I'll likely never get to, Skorne, and Circle. While I have my airbrush to do the grunt work, there's still a lot of brush work to be done, and that's the real time drain. With Cyriss, much of the army will be handled with the airbrush. Whatever's left will be small details or different colors of metal which are considerably easier to paint and highlight.
• Limited releases. What?! This is coming from the guy who nearly bailed on the army because of this? Let me just say that this crow is delicious. But seriously, having this be a small army means that it will be easy to finish and build lists for. I often find that there are fun pieces I'd like in an army, but there's so many other models that are functionally better that they have to wait. With Cyriss, there's not a bloat of models that you may or may not want. You have a limited selection of tools for your army, and you have to make do. Not that the army seems remotely limited, but there's no need for PP to release "fluffy" models that are neat but hard to make room for. We get jacks, units, solos, warcasters, and two huge bases from the get go, and we'll likely get light releases as time goes on.
• Worthwhile big purchases. This remains to be seen, but the battle engine and colossal seem really good. PP seems to have learned from their successes and failures regarding big bases, and these big bases seem to be PP's commitment to making a giant model that looks great and plays well.
• Servitors. Yes this is battelgroup support, but I really do love these things. Single point models that simply have a job on the battlefield is awesome. There's no way to misuse them because they can't really do anything else. Whether their job is to walk forward and explode, make a target easier to hit or damage, or just chump block a charge lane, they are very simple and you'll have a lot of them on the table.
• Warcasters with stated goals. While the army itself is incredibly complex to operate, you'll know going in whether you're playing a melee, ranged, or magic game. Their stats and granted abilities affect their entire battlegroup, and the warjacks needs to be used optimally according to what the warcaster is doing for them. It could potentially get monotonous, but each warcaster is unique enough that simply switching that single model will completely change how a list is played.
• Oooh, shiny. It's the new hotness, and that's always exciting.

That's not all there is to Cyriss, but that's the stuff that really has me pumped to throw money at Privateer Press. The army may not win tournaments in the long run, but they seem very rewarding to play in local games. Look forward to more Convergence of Cyriss content in the future, whether it's discussing more news from Privateer Press, painting tutorials, or just battle reports.

See you tomorrow!

Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways! And now is the perfect time to enter and win a piece of terrain!

Spring Gamers

Is this brilliant? Yes, this is brilliant.

First Impressions of Lego Games

My sister stopped by today to hang out with me and the kids (and the new kitties). When she got home from college she bought Lego Batman 2: DC Super Heroes, and she's been asking me to play it with her. So today I hooked up my Wii to the TV and off we went with her as Batman and me as the Boy Wonder.

I'd never played a Lego game before, but they always get such great reviews that I was really excited to finally try this one out. Things started out well enough, but soon we found ourselves growling in frustration or consulting online guides to get past a fairly simple part that seems impossible because of loose platforming controls, terrible camera control, and graphics that made it hard to tell a simple switch from a random piece of the environment. It's not that we wanted the game to hold our hand the entire time (it did plenty of that), it's just that it felt like I was playing a game on the Nintendo 64, rather than a current-gen system. From a design standpoint that's fine because Lego games are meant to be whimsical, but when the functional gameplay suffers, I take issue.

Now maybe I just experienced a bad game, but from other YouTube videos I've seen I think I got a good taste of the Lego experience. From people I've talked to, the Lego feeling of the games appeals to people who were in to Legos as a kid, which I really never was. Combined with an IP they like, I can understand how people could really enjoy the series. But it's rare when I can play a game and ignore how it plays, and that's all I noticed with Lego Batman 2. Robin was climbing across straight walls and falling for no reason; traversing the open world was unwieldy; jumping across gaps had you falling to your death because you somehow missed that two foot jump for the fifth time.

In all my frustrations with the game, none of it has to do with what Lego games are meant to be. The story is cheesy, the characters are comically over-the-top, the puzzles are simplistic, and there is a LOT of stuff to break and collect (usually in that order). It's not for me and that's fine. Games like Battlefield 3, The Sims, Grand Theft Auto and FIFA aren't for me, but I can acknowledge that they have meritorious gameplay mechanics. But after playing a few demos over the years, and now getting several hours of hands-on time with a Lego game... I just don't get it. The game isn't canon, the graphics are average, the music... exists, and the challenge is relaxed by usually enjoyable.

Now to be fair, the games also have a lot of unique things going for them. As I played I saw things done in ways I'd never seen before. The ability to get different power suits for the characters is great, the ways you solve puzzles is creative, the story is very tongue-in-cheek and pokes fun at the DC universe (at one point a reporter mentions that it may not be a good idea to house all of Gotham's worst criminals in the same location), and way they use Legos throughout the game is creative and even makes me reminisce about the few Lego sets I've owned throughout the years.

I can see how all that stuff would appeal to people because it is fun and lighthearted in an era where all of our games feel so serious. And maybe that's what the Lego games come down to - getting to relive childhood for a few hours. A childhood filled with goofy games like Banjo Kazooie or Sonic where the controls weren't always tight but you had fun with the corny characters and goofy gameplay elements. Personally, when I look back at the days of Nintendo 64 I can't believe how oblivious I was to the controls, something that is a huge factor in my game enjoyment now.

So for you Lego fans out there, what's the deal? Do you agree with these faults in the game? And if you do, how do you overlook them? Does it just come with the territory or did I completely miss the point of playing a Lego game? Or worse yet, did I take a single example of a franchise and incorrectly assume it's a universal experience?

See you tomorrow!


Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways!

Points of Light vs. Established Settings

As the GM of my IKRPG group (think steampunk D&D based in the Warmachine universe), the burden falls on me to know the story. When I've run D&D games in the past I've always used a "point of light" setting, where the setting was either entirely made up or loosely based on an existing setting like the Forgotten Realms or even Middle Earth. However, the IKRPG has challenged me by having my players be familiar with the world of the Iron Kingdoms, thus making the story come more alive for them if I based it in the world they know. It's the first time I've done this, and I never imagined how difficult it would be.

You'd think it'd be easier. I mean the setting is there, I just have to make up a story that fits the setting. The problem I'm having is that I like my players to take an active role in the world's conflicts, and witness all the big stuff that shapes the campaign. In a game like D&D where players can kill gods that's not so hard. But IKRPG only lets them off the leash a little bit, and so the thought of these heroic characters killing a monstrous dragon like Everblight is laughable because despite the fantasy influences, the Iron Kingdoms doesn't have room for nearly omnipotent heroes.

And that presents another problem. When working in an established setting you are restricted by timelines. My players can't kill Goreshade because he's still alive in the fiction. I can't have the Cryx start invading Llael or Five Fingers because they invaded the Thornwood first. If I'm going to stick to the fiction, I'm also allowing myself to be handcuffed by it. Sure they can take part in things that may have happened behind the scenes, or they can go on adventures that don't clash with facts, but my creativity is more invested on making it fit the story, rather than letting my players take it anywhere they want.

That's what I love about a Point of Light campaign setting. The second campaign I ran went off the rails from an adventure book, and my players had no idea what to expect. They were invested in the world because they knew nothing about it. It had influences of the Forgotten Realms, but I could reflavor a god, kill a hero, overthrow a kingdom, and it woudn't matter because it was our world and not the world of R.A. Salvatore. We weren't just visiting, we were carving out the story with our own hands. I gave them something to do for week 1, and what they did gave me something to do for week 2. It was immersive because everyone was invested in the world.

When I get them together in a few years and make them play one more game with me, you can believe that they will be fighting a deific Kobold Slinger because that's the sort of story they were crafting. In my IKRPG setting, I could have them storm the shores of Cryx and kill Toruk... except that midway through our campaign, a piece of fiction may be released that has Sorscha and Feora taking him down. Then what? We either have to make a choice to go off the rails and ignore the established world we stuck to, or change some story bits and try to keep going.

The good-ish thing about the IKRPG setting is that it takes place in the recent past, so you know what you can and can't do. While that works, it again asks that the campaign story run quietly alongside the official lore, only interfering when it makes sense. It's a hard line to toe - on one hand it lets you take things in lore that are barely mentioned and make them relevant and exciting. At the same time you know that your story simply can't impact the world.

And yes, I realize that GMs have creative liberty. I'm bogging myself down by sticking to "the rules" of the setting. I know other GMs can handle it perfectly well, but I have a hard time making a flexible story without having a flexible world in which it takes place.

That's what I've been struggling with as I've been coming up with story elements. I'm already running off the rails which you can read about if I ever get our last campaign story written up, but I'm trying to tread cautiously because I have some lore buffs in our group that may not appreciate too much deviation from the story. Not that I would fault anyone for feeling that way - if I'm working in an established setting, it's important not to bend the world out of shape and make it unrecognizable. It's just a simple matter of learning how to make an interesting story in a world full of interesting stories.


See you tomorrow!

Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways!

What Does It Take?

In all aspects of life, we have our breaking points. For things like jobs and friends we need to have stamina because it's hard to let those things go, but with gaming we can be much more petty. Whenever something new is announced for a video/tabletop/card game, you'll inevitably have people standing out on the street corner with their big cardboard sign declaring that the end is nigh. Everyone is quitting the game and the company will go bankrupt, there's mouth-frothing, and if you were new to the internet you'd think it was time to start looking for a new game.

Of course everything turns out fine and people begrudgingly accept that the new addition is great until another announcement is made. Now some of these people just let their passions get the best of them, but some people genuinely fear that their beloved game is done for. Those are the ones who are seriously having to ask themselves whether this change, if it goes badly, will be the death of the game for them.

Major changes in my gaming history that have pushed me out of the game include GW price increases, YuGiOh's catering to little kids (more so than what they did originally, anyway), Legend of Zelda's departure from a normal controller, and Microsoft is pushing the envelope with the Xbox One. However, the one thing these all have in common is that there is usually something I could overlook. If I enjoyed GW's stuff enough I'd pay their premium price; if I could have prevented Link from running around like a terrified moose I'd have beaten the Wii game; and if Microsoft can do enough to outweigh the bad decisions they showed us, I might be debating between XB-O and PS4.

[Beware, unintentionally long psuedo-tirade incoming]

However, there's one thing that will always turn me away from a game no matter what, and that's the community. If I can't tolerate the people I'm forced to be around, I will drop the game no matter how much I enjoy it. I had to quit Halo because I spent weeks without finding a single mature person that owned a mic. I will no longer play competitive games at a gaming shop because anything from Magic to Warmachine (and even D&D!) seems to bring out the competitive d-bags who can't seem to balance civility with competitiveness. Competitive games thrive on the community, and because of that it's the players that can truly be the death of a game.

Fortunately online games have taken measures to cut out the really bad apples with things like online reputation and report functions. But a company can only ban so many players before their bottom line is affected - as sad as it may be, the most unpleasant players in a game are often the more diehard fans.

So then what to do? Sure I could unplug my mic, ignore chat, avoid annoying players face-to-face, but then I'm forced to take away the best part of competitive/team games, and that's getting to play with other people who share an interest with me. Unplugging my mic turns Call of Duty is as entertaining as playing against AI opponents, and only playing Magic with a handful of mature people becomes monotonous. It's not that I'll quit a game because of the presence of bad people, but when pleasant people are put on the endangered player list, it's time to move on.

But that's just me. Almost everyone I talk to about this thinks I'm crazy because they can't see how sucky people could be an automatic deal-breaker. I admire their patience, but I don't play multiplayer games just to compete with a faceless opponent. Generally speaking, a multiplayer game tends to have less pizzazz than a single-player experience simply because game makers understand that the competitive nature of multi-player makes us overlook an otherwise tedious experience.

If you've ever taken part in a "training room" where you can play the multi-player game against computer opponents, you know that the experience is much different simply because you're playing alone, and all you have is a shallow gaming experience. To me, multiplayer games are all about the human interaction. Even if I'm not talking to anyone, successfully working together with - or fiercely competing against - other people is key to my enjoyment. If I have teammates whining, yelling at other people, being over-the-top offensive, etc., I will have 0 fun because the people who are a part of my gaming experience are unbearable. I can take and give jabs and light-hearted trash talk, but if I have an opponent mocking, insulting, or complaining about me or the game, then I no longer care about the game.

I play competitive games to play a fair match against a mature opponent. I don't want to waste my free time on an unpleasant experience. That's my time. I can deal with crappy people in the real world where things matter, but when it comes to my hobbies I simply can't bring myself to find pleasure in a bad experience.

[Ok, you can start reading again]

Whew. This was supposed to be 3 or 4 paragraphs long. I have work to do tonight and you guys got me thinking about all these games that "could have been" if people could have just grown up and played the game! The point of today's post was to ask you your breaking point. You've seen the what and why of mine, so I'm curious to hear yours.

What is one thing in a game that will almost automatically push you out? Cost? Graphic style? Skill requirement? Your favorite army/class/whatever no longer being powerful or relevant? I'm curious to hear how others can walk away from something that they might otherwise be willing to play for years, so be sure to use that comment section down below!

See you tomorrow!


Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways!

"Tropes Vs Women" Releases Episode 2

Oh hey, look at that:

I'm on my way to work right now, so I'll be watching in-full and commenting further later. For now, have at it:

UPDATE 1: Work was canceled, video watched, comments below the jump:

UPDATE 2: Some vengeful asshats have (apparently) gotten the clip taken down by exploiting YouTube's draconian TOS. A written transcript is still available HERE. Obviously, as soon as I see where it goes back up, I'll repost. People with mirrored links are welcome to post them in the comments until then.





So, then...

In many ways, I feel like this episode was a really solid reaction to the "where's the new substance?" critiques of the first one - much more in depth, much more focused on the "why is this problematic?" aspects, etc. Everything from 22:35 on, in particular, should serve as an answer to the "misandry is just as bad!!!" fools; laying out how patriarchy is also disempowering to men.

Honestly, though? I actually feel like she wasn't hard enough on some of this; particularly the "The bad guy corrupted me and you must kill me to set me free!" thing. What gets glossed-over so often with the Damsel in Distress thing is that the original context of "Save The Princess!" fairytales was rescuing women from having their virginity stolen (via rape or otherwise) by parties who did not have the proper claim on such in an era where virginity was inextricably tied to marriageability and thus the entirey of female worth. "Kill me, I'm a monster!" in other words being a modernization of "Kill me, I am a 'ruined' woman!" It's a fantasy-ization of honor-killing, basically, and that's pretty fucking pernicious.

P.S. Comments will remain enabled on this post until such time as people prove themselves incapable of behaving like grownups. Abusive/trolling comments will be deleted at the discretion of me. People with an issue about the YouTube video itself not having comments are advised to click here and then go get some sunlight.

Starting Them Young - Emma's First Painting Lesson

Some of you may remember when I took my daughter to our FLGS to buy some supplies for her first miniature. Here's the highlights of our first time together!




If you have kids who have expressed interest in your painting hobby I can't recommend this bonding moment enough. She had a blast getting to be like Daddy, and I got to see her do something I honestly didn't think she was ready for. The full video only clocked in at about 26 minutes, and she was ready for more by the end of it! Keep an eye on my Facebook photos - when I get my painting/photo area rearranged I'll be posting her fully painted and based miniature.

See you tomorrow!

Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways!

My Top 10 - N64 Games of All Time

Oh nostalgia, you've been a constant companion lately. I trust this will satiate your need for attention.



10. San Fransisco rush 2049
While enjoyed the overall destructive and zany nature of the Rush series, 2049 will forever be my favorite racing game. I'm not a racing fan, but cars with jet engines that could explode after too much damage? I was on board. I still remember recovering from the flu for a few days and spending hours in the game's stunt course, ramping and spinning (and gleefully exploding) to my heart's content.

9. Harvest Moon 64
 Did any one else ever play this series? It was the first incarnation of Farmville, complete with giving gifts and faithfully harvesting your crops or else. I would grind this game for hours on end, farming crops, making friends, discovering odds and ends (including researching a crop teleporter that I never finished), and getting fairly upset when the girl I was pursuing fell for Kai. I tried later iterations of the game, but nothing matched the first time I put an addition on my house or won a competition.

8. Super Mario 64
It was everyone's first game so you know I had to add it. I played the heck out of this game, and I even had to replace the cartridge because my first copy up and died on me. I never successfully got all the stars, but I would go to things like the ice sliding level and play them over and over for no reason whatsoever. But hey, I had plenty of those blue, translucent stars!

Also, did anyone ever find Yoshi on top of the castle?

7. Turok (series)
I don't know what it was about this series, but it gave me a savage sort of enjoyment. Exploding arrows and guns and (in the third game) the Cerebral Bore that would make an enemy's head explode. This was the first game where I used fun cheat codes, and by golly I loved my Pen & Ink mode! The later games got a bit ridiculous, and nothing ever matched the simplicity of a man killing dinosaurs that we got in Turok: Dinosaur Hunter.

6. Goldeneye
Again, cheat codes made this game so much fun to explore. Do you remember the level where you had to chase the bad guy through a bunker and fight your way out before the gas canisters exploded? Turning on god mode and fighting a limitless supply of spawning enemies in a room covered in a green haze was awesome. And multiplayer, for as often as I was able to play it, was a great introduction in to my later Call of Duty addiction. If CoD had Oddjob and paintball mode I'd probably still be playing it!

5. Mario Kart 64
If you've played it, there's no need to expound on what made it awesome. It featured characters everyone loved, fun power ups, and was the cause of a lot of yelling and shoving between friends and family. On the other hand... Rainbow Road.

4. Resident Evil 2
Ohhhh buddy, my first horror game and first true introduction to zombies. I still remember the seemingly innocent bus full of dead people, the cop who died and came back to munch on you, and that narrow hallway when you first encountered that fiendish wall crawler with the long tongue. The game sort of fell apart at the end for me (more zombies, less mutations!), but I played through the first half of the game over and over.






3. Ogre Battle 64
 This one flew under the radar for a lot of people, and it's a shame. It was a huge RPG with a lot of unique classes, a stress-free combat system, and a branching story that started with you as a rookie in the army, to joining a resistance, to fighting a kingdom corrupted by daemons. The combat had you controlling an army of units in the open world, and then you'd go liberate cities all the way to the map's enemy.

When you'd engage in combat you and your opponent would have your units on a 5x5 grid and characters would attack whoever was in front of them according to their initiative. You could flank, use terrain to your advantage, and barrel through the opposition or surgically remove everyone. If you haven't played this, download it on the Wii or get a ROM. The game hasn't aged well graphically, but it's just so good.


2. Super Smash Bros
This may be my favorite game series that has spanned multiple consoles. Getting to see familiar and unfamiliar Nintendo characters duke it out was a dream come true. Whether it was speedy Fox, balanced Mario, beefcake Bowser, goofy Jigglypuff, or my favorite electric mouse Pikachu, everyone had a character that suited their playstyle.

I haven't been a fan of how the single player experience has changed. The Wii version featured a painfully long experience filled with a lot of boring platforming. But the original got it right - it had you doing everything you loved in the game, with a few goofy special levels thrown in. I love how the roster has evolved, the stages have improved, and the item selection has stayed fairly balanced. If I were to get a Wii U, it would be to play this series.

1. Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask
Hey, listen! If you heard that in Navi's voice, you can appreciate the influences this game had in your life. Legend of Zelda featured an epic story of a hero rising up to save a world that was corrupted by an enemy he was too weak to stop. Link has always been a favorite hero of many because he lets nothing stand in his way to save Zelda and/or the world. No matter his incarnation, Link is the epitome of courage and sacrifice.

But OoT is where it started for many of us. Despite his 2d iteration, the N64 brought him to life in an entirely new way and is considered by many gamers to be the greatest game ever made. It had unique locations, head-scratching puzzles, intuitive combat, an amazing story with memorable characters, a power-hungry boss you had to hate, and a slew of items that were fitting of the heroic journey you were on.

Majora's Mask took the same style of game and put a dark twist on it. The world was going to end in three days and you had to stop it. In a Groundhog Day-esque twist, you could travel back to Day 1 and better prepare yourself to stop this from happening. Unlike OoT where the cast featured characters full of hope and good, some characters in MM were almost Wonderlandian in their creepiness. And if you ever looked in the sky, the freaky moon creeping ever-closer to earth served as a dark reminder that everything in this game hinged on you finding a way to stop the deranged Skull Kid who was being possessed by the dark artifact, Majora's Mask.


What about you guys? I had a hard time trimming down my list to just 10 items, and I was sad to cut games like Star Fox, Tony Hawk, and the original Star Wars game. What are your memories of the N64? Sound off in the comment section below!

See you tommorrow!



Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways!

May Blogging Giveaway

Entry is easy, just click here to be taken to the entry page. Winners will be chosen June 8th and the hills will be sent out once they're complete! Make sure you tell your friends because if I hit 25 entries I'll choose a second winner, at 35 I'll choose a third winner, and so on. If we can get to 100 I'll do some sort of grand prize, so get the word out!

See you tomorrow!

What's Your Name?

Whenever a game lets me name a character, I get a bit excited. In my years of gaming, I've always gone through phases in name selection, rather than choosing the same name every time. I have some friends who will use the same name, or a variation of it, for years and never grow tired of it. But you know me, I like my variety!

As a kid I'd name my profiles and characters Ray, or sometimes a random name I thought was cool. Super boring, right? But I wanted to be in the game, so there was that.

As I hit my early teen years I started doing goofy stuff. I don't remember specific ones, but bodily functions (and I'm sure bits of anatomy) were heavily featured. Fortunately I matured pretty quickly, so I only marred a few games with that nonsense.

In my teen years I discovered a limitless supply of fantasy novels, and my mother's unwavering willingness to buy me any book I'd read. Teen fiction being what it is, many names I discovered were over the top or painfully cheesy. Names like John Strongman or Drake Bloodfang made me reel back in my seat and shout "oh man, that's awesome!" Or groovy or whatever kids said in the late 90s. Sadly, despite spending years in college taking many literature and writing courses, these sorts of names still creep in to my games. "Crow," my name for assassin-like characters, has still stuck with me after all these years. What can I say, the movie was weird and the name was cool. To this day I'm still a sucker for any art featuring a black bird.

When the original Lord of the Rings released I dug out my old LOTR trilogy and started working through them. I found myself really loving the naming conventions of Dwarves. And as time went on and I discovered the Warcraft universe, I continued my love of Dwarves. At some point I'd designed a dwarf for D&D or a story I was writing and named him Thoradin Doomshield, and like Crow that name has stuck with me for years and has become my first choice in naming any heavy armor, shield-wielding character I create.

In my later teens I jumped on the bandwagon of using foreign, and especially Eastern, words for everything. I went to Japan when I was 10 so I always felt a slight affinity for the Japanese culture and language, so I started using English to Japanese dictionaries and using those as names. I still have my WoW characters Kankyo (secluded life) and Mikiri (forsaken) on my account from years ago. I've since abandoned that naming convention since it confused the heck out of people, but it did spawn some of my favorite character names.

At one point I inexplicably went through a phase of naming every online character Face_____. It was due in part to my inability to play just one character, and thus people could just call me "Face," but I stuck with this for quite awhile. It affected my Xbox Live name, several forum names, a host of WoW characters, and I even painted it on a coffee mug! My usual one was Face_Stabbity, and while the name itself is a bit immature I still love it. I never use it for character names anymore, but a lot of my current online friends still call me Stabbity instead of my real name, so I guess it's the one that finally stuck.

Lately, for as few games as I'm able to play, I've been trying to stick to a "doom" motif. As I said my paladin is Doomshield, my troll mage is named Voodoom, I made an IKRPG character with the nickname Doomshot... pretty cheesy and I've grown tired of them, but I'm not sure where to go next. The problem with many of my names is that they're often taken, so I'm still waiting to find that one name that I can use universally, and that won't sound utterly ridiculous.

What about you guys? How do you name characters for video games, RPGs, web forums, etc? Do you stick to one name or theme, or do you just name them whatever the heck you want?

See you tomorrow!



Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways!

The Xbox One Reveal - Brilliant or Catastrophic?

The next generation of Xbox has been revealed, titled the Xbox One. After the hype of the PS4 reveal, people wondered what Microsoft (MS) could do to keep people interested in their system. And as gamers around the world watched or read about the reveal, the entire world slightly shook as thousands upon thousands of shoulder slumped at the same time. The big reveal we'd been waiting for came and went, and it was very hard for people to get excited. The Xbox One fell flat in the eyes of many people, and many think the system will fail. But... was that Microsoft's plan all along?

When I first saw the reveal, I was ticked. I've always had an Xbox, and it wasn't going to be too hard to convince me to jump on board with the next incarnation. But here's basically what we were given at the console's first look:

• Kinect is required for the console to work (grrrrrr)
• They are doing something wonky with the used game market
• It's not always on, but an internet connection is required at least once every 24 hours
• No backwards compatibility
• Full voice control (grrrrrrrrr)
• Many other entertainment features like Skype and live TV
• Various quality of life features

Basically nothing that indicates that this is a gaming console for gamers. Microsoft hasn't been shy about their goal of making this main part of a family's entertainment, but no one expected that this reveal would focus on it. So we were mad that they squandered their big chance on frivolous features. But as I started thinking about it, I started catching on to their plan.

E3, a large gaming convention, is coming up and Microsoft will do a part 2 of their reveal at the event. While many are frustrated that they're waiting until then to give us any more info, I think MS has accepted that they'll catch a lot of hate initially, but it will be for the good of their product. What it will do for them in the long run will keep their momentum going long in to the holiday season.

I'll try to explain what I think they're doing. MS knew that many of their customers wouldn't be interested in many of the features they revealed recently. Some are unpopular (mandatory Kinect) and some are features not everyone would care about (specs). So rather than trickle them between two reveals where no one would remember them, or people would be disappointed that they wasted time on unimportant features, they instead frontloaded all of it.

The result? We get mad and yell about how doomed the system is and that we're taking our money elsewhere. But then we cool down and watch their E3 presentation, and we will be bombarded with everything we care about. System price, clarification of used games, Xbox One exclusives, and big features like Xbox Live changes or new additions no one has talked about yet.

Now Xbox One has nothing but positive PR carrying them toward their system release.  They're giving us the bad news now in the hopes that they have so much good news that we'll forget all about their horrible first showing. People will still gripe, but overall their customers will end this two-part reveal with a positive idea of how much better this system will be over the current generation.

It's also been awhile since Sony has made much noise about their system, so much of that excitement has died down for now. With MS waiting until closer to the system's release it will seem like the only thing anyone can talk about is Xbox One as MS systematically releases more and more info throughout the coming months. I'm sure Sony will do the same, but this extended pause between information may be MS's chance to grab a bit more of the spotlight.

I'm still a bit miffed at MS for their poor showing, as well as the features I simply can't stand (seriously, I hate the Kinect). But now that I've cooled down and cleaned up the ashes of my Microsoft effigy I set fire to... I think we'll all be pleasantly surprised after E3. PS4 may still be the better system,  but I'm confident the giant that is Microsoft isn't capable of failing nearly as much as we're being led to believe.

I have a comment section below, make sure you use it! How are you feeling after the Xbox One reveal? Do you think Microsoft really is a sinking ship, or is this just a clever move to get more buzz at E3?

See you tomorrow!

Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways!

Countdown to Cyriss - Week 11

It's the moment we've all been waiting for... Cyriss's colossal, aka the Prime Axiom! For as much as colossals are capable of, DC didn't spoil too much this week. However, he made up for it with a terrific sketch!



Before we move on, do so you see that rock? I hope that's included so that I don't have to pin his spider legs to the base. That being said, let's take a look at what we learned today:

• Not something new, but I had forgotten that this is considered a warjack and is therefore affected by battlegroup spells!
• It has drag, allowing it to grab a model from range and pull it in B2B contact. And as you can see from the sketch, it gets to do this twice. Like the Galleon, Axiom gets a free drill vice attack (likely its generic melee attack) on targets it Drags, followed by the ability to purchase more melee attacks. Nothing super special here, but it does let you keep Axiom back, rather than forcing you to charge closer to your opponent's models.
• In addition to drill vice, it has an attack called "accelespiker." Cheesiness aside, we get no word on what this actually is, nor can I really tell where the attack might come from. It has a circle of spikes on its forehead, so that's the best guess unless his drill hands are multi-functional like other Cyriss weapons. I want to hazard a guess that these will be armor piercing, but that might be overkill.
• For stats we have DEF 7 ARM 20. It's one of the better ARM stats for these big fellas, and it's not like anyone really cares about a colossal's DEF anyway. With the sheer amount of support you can pack in a 50 point list, this thing is going to take an opponent's full army to take it down, or it will need to have a bunch of units fed to it to keep tied up and away from the action. It's just too bad about that tow cable!
• Now let's get to the juicy bits... Launch Servitor. If you have been around long enough, you'll remember that in Week 4 I covered a number of servitors. You can guess where this is going... Prime Axiom can place any servitor model within 2" of its base. Once per turn you get to whip out your Swiss Army Knife and respond to any situation your opponent throws at you. You can repair, handle high DEF, high ARM, swarms of models... basically, your opponent will never truly be safe when near your model.
  
  The best part? The servitor activates that turn! That means that you can blow a hole in your opponent's infantry, finish off a Dragged target, or just move forward 6" and block a charge lane. While servitors aren't overly powerful for their 1 point price tag, it does give you greater flexibility in the middle of a game, and also frees up several points for other models. Even if this is Axiom's only ability, it's darn good and will make this model a terror on the table.

So that's it. Nothing too groundbreaking, but the artwork and Launch Servitor are all I needed. It's going to be hard to spend so many points on a single warjack when Cyriss has so much support for the others, but I think this thing will carry its weight with the proper support.

It's hard to believe that we are 11 weeks in and still have much more to see. This is certainly not the shallow release I anticipated, and I think Privateer Press is making a very solid, one shot army. I certainly can't wait to get mine!

See you tomorrow!


Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways!

OVERBYTES on XBOX ONE

XBox? None.

ALSO: newest episode of the main series is HERE if you missed it.

Tilting Towards a Loss

If there's one thing I've always struggled with, it's playing a good game while being on tilt. In poker, a player is on tilt when something throws them off their game and they respond by playing overly aggressive. They abandon their normal strategy and turn in to the Hulk with a powerful desire to mindlessly smash.

That's me when a plan goes awry. Using a strategy requiring finesse usually requires you to set up a lot of moving parts that, when working properly, are nearly unbeatable. See combo decks in Magic where losing a single card can render your deck impotent; or combos in Mortal Kombat where hitting the wrong button can leave you painfully exposed; or any video game with a class/character that is seen as requiring the "most skill," where messing up a rotation or using an ability at the wrong time sends you from being a powerhouse to a dragon's snack.


That, of course, is the excitement to those sorts of strategies. When things go well, they go really well, and you can be nearly unbeatable because your opponent just can't get the upper hand. But when you're juggling a bunch of plates in the air it becomes very easy for the slightest disruption to send everything crashing down. I can usually deal with minor inconveniences, and in games like Magic you should always have a Plan B should your opponent try to remove a key component to your strategy. But when my opponent really just hoses me over, I don't know what to do and I lose the game.

The problem, of course, is that my opponent hasn't beaten me yet. My plan is ruined, so I give up trying to make it work and instead just go on the aggressive. Despite the fact that most strategies requiring skill don't have a single powerful component that can win a game, that seems like the only option I have left, even though I know that doing so is impossible.

Let me give you an example. When playing Circle Orboros with a friend, the only powerful piece I'd packed was a Warpwolf Stalker, which is basically a giant werewolf with a big sword. The idea was to use my army's movement shenanigans to send him right at my opponent's warcaster when he wasn't able to shrug off most of the damage. My plan required two units of shifting stones (which were used for teleporting), and a unit of Druids who could move enemies around the field and give me a place to teleport my Warpwolf. The biggest problem is that a unit of Stones can only use teleport if all 3 models are alive, so the turn before I was ready to go for the kill, a stone died to some accidental (though very fortunate) blast damage.

What could I do? I could have repositioned my models to make it work next turn, or perhaps adjust the strategy and take out a key piece of his army. Instead my eyes darted frantically across the board, my brain lost all ability to reason, and I threw all my models against his wall of more powerful models, hoping to stall until I could figure out another plan. While my Stalker did a number on his target, the rest of my average models found themselves flailing about helplessly as I tried to make them kill in a way they weren't designed for.

Away from the table, the reaction seems silly. But when you're working through a strategy while trying to counter your opponent, and everything seems to come undone, all I see is red. Finesse goes out the window and I just my things in to their things because it seems like the only thing left to do. Sure, sometimes it may honestly be the only thing left to do, but most competitive games won't be so imbalanced that a single loss will be the end of the game. Clear, rational thinking can turn the game back in your favor, and it almost always leads to a good story later. But I can't do it... I mess up, Hulk out, and there goes the game.

How do you guys do it? How do you respond to an opponent pulling a wire in your intricate machine, making it useless in its current form? How do you keep a cool head when everything looks hopeless? At the age of 27, I still don't know how to recover from a dizzying punch like that, but I think it's time I learned.


See you tomorrow!

Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways!

Time to Stop Hoarding

My "faction ADD" has become a joke with my gaming group. If you read my Quality vs. Quantity post you know that part of that is because I like seeing all the facets of a game and I don't want to be relegated to a single army. But as I was working on a Cygnar commission today I realized something - I wasn't as keen to play my small Cygnar force as I once was.

For those who are unfamiliar with Warmachine, Cygnar is an army that excels at shooting the opponent before it reaches them. They possess melee, but the main point of the army is to soften up the opponent before finishing them up close. That gameplay aspect really appeals to me because I enjoy all the positioning involved with ranged units, as well as the simple annoyance they are to my opponent. Just ask anyone what they think of my Widowmakers!

So why the sudden change? I think it's because my primary reason for buying Cygnar wasn't to play them, but to paint that awesome looking blue! I still wouldn't mind playing the army, but I feel much more satisfied after painting some blue coats and hats, and my own army has sunk to the bottom of my priority list.

As I started thinking about this, I found it interesting that my reason for buying Cygnar was different than my reason for buying Circle Orboros. In games, I'm a big fan of anything that increases my mobility. It's why I used speed perks in Call of Cuty, why I enjoyed the Empire in Star Wars X-Wing a few days ago, and why my usual RPG class is a spellcaster that possesses a movement spell. Increasing my mobility lets me set the tempo of the game, and I rarely have to worry about being outflanked. I decide where the battle will take place; I draw the line in the sand and leave it up to my opponent to figure out how to get the game back in his favor.

However, I always hated the looks of Circle Orboros. One brand of heavy beasts consists of big magical scarecrows with stone plates attached to them. Their werewolves have bony spikes popping out all over them (huh?), and their satyrs are... well, pretty cool even though I don't own any. Their studio color scheme consists of black, brown, and a really dark green. Also, they're kind of psychotic tree huggers. Nothing about the army appealed to me visually, but how they played on the tabletop was exactly what I wanted to play.

The coolest part of the army is their ability to teleport. There's a unit called Shifting Stones that lets you place any model in their triangle up to 8" away. I can bypass a frontline, block a charge lane, keep key pieces behind cannon fodder... the abundance of possibilities is astounding, and that's just one unit! Even the slower "stone scarecrows" (aka Wolds) can create surprising situations with their ability to cast one of their warlock's spells. And if there's anything that could contend with my love of movement shenanigans, it's my love of being able to conjure things on the battlefield - and Circle does love their forests.

I haven't been miserable while painting Circle models, either. I enjoyed trying to use all washes, and testing different techniques on them. It wasn't like painting my Behemoth, and it probably ranked lower than most commissions I've done. But I'm loving the army because after I painted them, all I had left to do was play them, and although I have to paint my models, it's being able to play them that really excites me about an army.

So I've decided that I'm done hoarding armies just to paint them. My Skorne might see some love on the tabletop, but I'm not so sure about those Cygnar guys. I like the army visually, but their looks are more exciting to me than their gameplay. From now on, I'm putting mechanics first. It worked when I bought Khador despite their goofy hats, it worked for Circle despite... everything; so I think that's just the way to go - buying the army to play it after I paint it, rather than to paint it and having no choice but to play it.

Which is why... I'm buying Convergence of Cyriss!

See you tomorrow!



Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways!

Star Wars X-Wing - Info and Quick Review

I'm a bad geek - I've never been a fan of Star Wars. I've never found anything wrong with it, it just never resonated with me like it has for... well, almost everyone else I know. So when my friend bought the new Star War X-Wing game that the entire internet has been raving about, I had a lot of reservations. I assumed that people were going crazy because there was a Star Wars game that didn't suck, and not because there was a good game that happened to be Star Wars. As it turns out, the Star Wars license is just extra frill on a very solid and strategically deep game.

At its core, I'd liken X-Wing to a re-imagining of chess. Unlike the miniatures games I'm used to, terrain plays a very small role in the actual game, and the rules of the game are pretty straightforward. You have two sides - the Rebels and the Empire, and a handful of ships controlled by each. The intro games I played pitted my two TIE Fighters against my friend's lone X-Wing. Similar to Warhammer 40k, individual models can be outfitted with equipment that increases the point cost of the model, but makes it much more powerful on the table.

Ships all share a basic set of rules. You have numbers representing how many attack or defense dice you roll, Hull Points (damage the ship can take), and Shields (these are removed before Hull Point damage can be assigned, and can be recharged by special equipment). Each ship also has a unique movement dial from which each player simultaneously chooses who each ship will move on the table. These dials differ based on the ship, with ships like TIE fighters being quicker and more maneuverable.

Once each player has chosen their maneuver for the turn, each ship is moved starting with the lowest  Pilot Skill. Rather than moving in inches, you have maneuver distances between 1 (slow) and 5 (very fast). All maneuvers have a template associated with them, and depending on the ship you can move straight, bank left or right about 45 degrees, or move forward and end 90 degrees from your original facing.

Movement is where the true strategy in the game lies.You can move through ships, but if you top your movement overlapping a base you must stop at the point of contact and lose your action for that turn (more on that later). Furthermore, you have no idea what your opponent is going to do! Are they going to bank left and try to avoid one of your ship, or zoom forward and face the other direction to try and catch you from behind? You have to examine the game in its current state, think about your opponent's best options, and try to move in the most advantageous way possible. It's surprisingly exhilarating to try to out-do your opponent without putting your ship in unnecessary danger.

Each ship needs to have an action assigned to it as soon as it's made its movement. Not all ships can use every maneuver, but the options are Focus, Evade, and Barrel Roll. Focus is the most useful, allowing you to improve your chances on a single attack or defense roll. Evade allows you to automatically ignore one of your opponent's successful hits, which is often the action you'll choose if you have no one in your sights or you don't think you'll survive an attack. Finally, Barrel Roll lets you place your ship to the left or right using the Maneuver 1 template, letting you get slightly better position or try to get out of your opponent's line of fire. Personally, I loved the Barrel Roll as it let me lightly adjust any mistakes I made in my movement phase, allowing me prepare to better position myself for next turn.

The rest of the turn is pretty straightforward. Starting with the highest Pilot Skill ships make their attack, using a rather clunky range checker to determine if the attacker is close (+1 attack die), normal (normal attack/defense rolls), or far away (+1 defense die). You make your attacks and hope for a hit or critical hit on your attack dice. You opponent then rolls their defense dice, hoping for enough evade icons to avoid any damage.

As I said, the game itself is very straightforward. But the movement phase is truly what makes or breaks a turn. If you can get a high Pilot Skill ship withing close range, there's a good chance that you can scrap an opponent's ship in 1 turn. If you can get yourself in the right position, your opponent will need to spend 1 or 2 turns just trying to avoid you, letting you put a lot of pressure on them. I played 2 small games of X-Wing, and both games felt like a true dogfight. We were zooming around the table, both fighting to get a strong position against the other. I had TIE Fighters both games, so I used to speedy, weaker ships to try to take down is slower, more powerful X-Wing.

Despite the seemingly simple rules, the game seems to have a good deal of depth to it. While both of my games broke down in to a dog fight, Game 2 found me using different strategies, and things I tried in Game 1 just weren't working. And that's just a basic game using 3 total ships. When you add equipment, more ships, and use pilots with abilities, the game doesn't seem to be in any danger of becoming stale.

If you are a fan of Star Wars, you probably have this game already. If you want a quick, fair, no-nonsense game of strategy, you should probably get this game right now. Stores are having difficulty keeping it in stock, and there's a very good explanation for that. This game is fun, exciting, and competitive without being too stressful.  So give it a try - you won't be disappointed!

See you tomorrow!

Remember to follow me on Facebook. I'm doing a blog post every single day for 2013, and Facebook is a great way to stay up-to-date as well as take part in my monthly giveaways!