The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited: A Co-op Experience

Yes, I have previously reviewed The Elder Scrolls Online before, but that was back in the days of yesteryear.  In the days before the Zenimax/Bethesda changed the pay structure from a monthly fee to a pay once to play with no subscription fee.  This was also my first real foray back into the game since I ended my subscription back in June 2014 due to the omnipresent "lack of funds" despite the game becoming subscription free back in March.

But now Conklederp's computer (from 2007) has been replaced and it is capable of running TESO:TU so we finally have been able to, more or less, play Skyrim together.  The first night we put in an hour and-a-half, followed by five and-a-half hours the following day and a few minutes ago (before going back to work), we adventured for about an hour.

Having already played 100 hours with my main character (Nord Dragonknight, Ebonheart Pact) and 13 hours with my secondary character (Bosmer Nightblade, Aldmeri Dominion), For my co-op playing, I created an Aldmeri Sorcerer as part of the Daggerfall Covenant to go with Conklederp's Breton Sorcerer.  Sure, a lot of people will tell you that it's probably not wise to group together with only two sorcerers, but we're not looking to become the Emperor as part of the siege in Cyrodiil, we're just running around exploring, doing quests and trying not to die/be killed/die.

These two are totally trustworthy. . .

Having come from a severely limited background in online gaming (Diablo II, Path of Exile), the experience of questing with someone else (along with umteen thousands of others in the background) has definitely been an experience (we're currently both level 7, as long as we're talking about experience).  The little arrow/crown above the other person's head is a nice touch, which is still visible when looking at the map screen, so finding the other person isn't too difficult.  Dealing with lag on the other had can be frustrating.

This is something that I did experience when I was playing solo, but presently, both Conklederp and I experience some-type of lag somewhat regularly, especially in towns and waiting for dialogue options to crop up.  Exiting out of conversations is always doable, which is sometimes the only way to progress with a quest when we find ourselves unable to continue with a conversation after incessant clicking.  The only other frustrating experience I have had is that I have been kicked off of the server (so out of the game) due to "Error 318."

What is funny/odd/weird about this error popping up, is that the only person I talk to is Conklederp, and since she is sitting right across the table from me, there is really no reason to talk to her in chat when I can just use my mouth hole and throat tube to verbalize what it is that I want to tell her.  Sure, I will often have my character play the lute, do pushups or just sit on the ground while I wait for her to find me or if I wait for her outside of the bank/smithing shop.  And this has now happened four separate times (three yesterday and this afternoon.  Thankfully Bethesda is aware that Error 318 is happening to people like me who have been kicked out.  So all I can really do is every time I have been dropped is to log back in, submit a bug report (/bug) using the chat window and let them know about what I was doing at the time.  I should also note that this has not happened to Conklederp.

Well, when I am not getting dropped from the server, I am approaching my sorcerer from the point of view that my character is fawning over Conklederp's character.  He wants to protect her even though she is a fully capable mage.  He hopes that one day she may fall in love with him, but in the meantime, it's questing time.  I have him wearing a combination of heavy and medium armors (what with trying to be a protector and all) and I have been switching back and forth using either the Destruction Staff and the Bow.  Not having played a magick-type before in any of The Elder Scrolls games, this a quite a departure for me, but for the time being I am quite enjoying the game so far.  I should also say that neither Conklederp or I are paying attention to any of the many guides for how to build the best possible class if you want to enjoy the game.  I guess then we will not be enjoying the game together, to the best of our ability.  N00bs are we!

So, taking TESO:TU, for what it is, I think that I would recommend the game, if Dr. Potts and I were ones to actively recommend games in the fashion that one tends to recommend games.  If the recommendation comes in the form of, "Yes, I will still be playing this game today and tomorrow with Conklederp," then that's exactly what it is.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

Move Your Legs To Dance A Soldier Dance

Breaking News: Angry People Online Angry At Other People! (NSFW)

People are angry.  And not just angry, violently angry.  I brought this up briefly at the beginning of the month regarding Konami's cancellation of Silent Hills and the outcry regarding the destruction and imminent failure of the studio due to disappointing their most fervent (violently aggressive) and devoted fans.  This morning, Bethesda Softworks tweeted/instagrammed/social media'd a 12 second teaser of a Revenant shooting/screaming at something it apparently is not rather fond of.  And let me tell you, the outpouring of support for a new game in this beloved franchise has been so incredibly heartfelt.

Just a warning, the rest of this article will contain language, both taken directly from the interwebs as well as general sentiment interpreted and reworked by me in order to make a point.  I feel odd to mention that I do not, in fact, agree with genocide of any magnitude upon anyone.

And it's not even that those who apparently only want to see Fallout 4 released by Bethesda to be announced/released at E3 this year as being the game, that for lack of a better and friendly term, unfriendly people here really want to see/hear about.  Even some of those in favor of the development by id Software and release by Bethesda Softworks of Doom by taking a defensive position are just as crass in their response to people complaining about no Fallout 4 announcement.

I can only imagine what Tumblr, Pintrest, 4chan, digg, fark, forbes and reddit all have to say about the people on the other side of their personal opinion.  And no, I am not going to be looking.  I can only take so much of people yelling at their screens about their displeasure expecting a sudden 180 in a company's decision.  Like someone at Bethesda and id will be scratching their heads in a years time wondering why no one said anything about their bad decision to develop and release an updated vision of a game that kickstarted the fps genre.  If only they had bothered to actually listen to what the rest of the world and not the people tasked with writing and designing their own product.

I genuinely wonder what occurred in these people's lives that have made them believe that demanding that what they want is what everyone else wants.  That by making demanding in a derogatory manner will give them what it is that they so desperately crave.  Has yelling "I want General Mills to release the Super Mario Bros. cereal again fucking-damnit!" ever worked out?  For anyone?  At the end of a relationship, do they yell "If you leave me I'm going to commit genocide on your mother fucking family!"  Has company ever been thankful for the "Hey, leave them alone for making a game you don't want to play you whining bitch faggots!" comments that are left in their defense?  When has ever threatening a company or complaining like someone whining while online ever given someone their way?

The comments that really get me are the ones that sound like "No one cares about Doom, everyone wants Fallout 4!  Why don't you listen to your fans!?"  Which are usually followed up by some conglomeration of "Shut the fuck up whining fallout fanboy piece of shit!  Doom is amazeballs!"  Meanwhile, Bethesda is over in the corner drinking themselves into an early grave wondering why they didn't listen to their real fans and publish a game that real gamers actually want to play and not this Doom shit.  Sarcasm.

I saw similar fallout (eh?) when The Chinese Room announced that their upcoming game Everybody's Gone to the Rapture was announced as a Playstation 4 exclusive, which included infuriated statements.  I read statements wanting The Chinese Room to fail with their game resulting in the closing of the company and that people would cancel their pre-order of Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs as a sign of protest against PS4 exclusivity.  As a fan of both Dear Esther and Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs, I was saddened to hear that EGttR was going to be an exclusive, but I wasn't up in arms wishing for the failure of the studio and death upon everyone associated with the company.  

Granted not everyone wanting Fallout 4 wants to bomb Bethesda back to the stone age until they create Fallout 4 (or Elder Scrolls VI: [Insert Name of Desired Geographical Tamriel Province that You Think Everyone Will Only Want to Play in and Everyone Can Suck a Bag of Dicks Because They're Wrong, Obviously]).  Some people just leave "Fallout 4" as a comment, and while it can be annoying to see a page full of a game's title on a teaser video for a different game, at least those people are not threatening to set a person's dog of fire (Bioware helpfully suggests not to pet them).

I'm just going to stop as I know that I could just go on and on (and on some more) often repeating myself and how I view the people who apparently feel that complaining in the above referenced (and shown) manner will get them what they want.  See, I was just about to do it again, but I stopped.  That's called self control.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

How Blind Can You Be, Don't You See?

Game Review: Dead Space Mobile (Android)

I was planning on doing a full on review for Dead Space Mobile, but the more I thought about it, I felt that I was too close to this story and franchise.  If you've been reading our miniscule particle of the internet, you'll know that I love the first Dead Space game, which I came to five years after the rest of the world.  After finishing the game, I wanted to consume everything in the Dead Space universe although I was a little worried about the touch screen control scheme when I heard there was a mobile game.

Let me get this out of the way before I start gushing.  The touch screen controls work.  There were a number few times when I couldn't get Vandal (the main protagonist) to run, possibly because of the grease/sweat that found its way to the screen causing my thumb to slide or much up the contact.  I also chalk it up to the point of my thumb, as to its face only being in contact with the invisible directional pad.  It took some getting used to, but that is really my only criticism.  The point is, Dead Space Mobile is a great game.

"In Your Hands." Eh, eh!  Now that's, comedy.

Now, why I think it's a great game, but first some context.  You play as an engineer with the code name Vandal (given by a voice over the radio whom you are forced to take orders from through a series of events), is a recent convert to the Church of Unitology and is employed as an engineer on Titan Station (aka The Sprawl) prior to the events of Dead Space 2.

Being on a mobile device, I knew that the graphics were not going to be PC/console quality, but for a mobile game, the graphics looked good with smooth animations, the sound quality was crisp when it needed to be and muffled when it was supposed to be.  The only other negative thing I really have to say (aside from my sweaty palms) was a graphics/engine glitch that happened in the end of the game that I will get to later.

What I really want to talk about is how the game messed with the player in a way that I haven't felt since Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, but in a less fun but not less entertaining way.  In Eternal Darkness, you had a visible sanity meter and you immediately knew (in most cases) that the game was messing with you.  Dead Space Mobile does not have a meter and all of the sanity events are programed to happen at a specific time and place.  Some of the events happen for a specific amount of time while others are triggered by your location and last until you leave that location.

Take the above screenshot for example.  Here the character Vandal is walking through a medical wing and I notice this other person on the other side of the glass.  I see them moving when I move and I think that it's a reflection, but it doesn't line up with where I am.  And, when I move, the character/reflection moves in the opposite direction.  That is it.  That is all that happens.  You can circle the window all you want and the reflection will always be there moving in the opposite direction, but nothing will happen.  It wasn't so much scary as it was confusing, intriguing and a little unnerving.

Another event happened when I passed through a door into a "plus" shaped room.  Upon looking around with only a single bloodied corpse, I noticed that where once there was only one corpse, three others had appeared.  Additionally, the door I came through had disappeared and was replaced by another corpse with "TAKE US" scrawled in blood above the body.  After taking out a couple of necromorphs in the room (one at a time), the room went dark and I found myself standing outside of the door I thought I had just entered.  It had been all in my head.  No sound cues to let me know that the bloodied room had been an illusion.  Just a shake and a holding of the head by Vandal.

There was another instance while walking down a hallway and directly under where I had my right thumb, the one that controls the aiming and firing of your weapon, a grotesque "evil" looking face faded on/into the screen.  When I noticed this visage, I pulled my right thumb away as if there was something physical on the screen for a few seconds before remembering that it was only an image and nothing physical that could actually do me harm.  And then I thought I was about to be ambushed by one or 73 necromorphs, but no.  Nothing came for me.

There was even a Lost Woods section while trying to get to Point B.  Unless you were to follow your RIG's locater mechanism (follow the glowing line projected onto the floor), you will walk around in circles, entering the same rooms even when going in a straight line.  When this is used in The Legend of Zelda, it somehow makes sense, that the forest is keeping you from finding your way to Point B.  In Dead Space Mobile however, I got the feeling that the ship was not trying to manipulate me (a la Event Horizon) but that this was all happening in my (Vandal) head.  To an observer, I'm sure that I would be seen walking through one door, turning around then come back or just walking around in circles in the same room.  It was very unsettling.

There was another instance where I walked through a door and all of a sudden I was somewhere else, off ship.  I walked forward as far as I could, thinking that the hallucination would eventually pass, but it didn't.  So I turned around the way I came and went back through the door, only to find that I was now on the other side of the hallway that I entered, as if I had walked in a straight line the whole time.

The only other negative thing that I alluded to happened during the boss fight (of all times and places).  About a minute into the fight, something emanated from the boss towards Vandal, but it was looked more like a smear of pixels and it didn't move so much as it shimmered.

By the end of the fight, almost half of the screen was being obscured by whatever glitch this was that kept up its fleshy colored shimmering undulations.  It was very distracting and if I hadn't just spent the last 30 minutes to get there, I would have turned the game off to restart the chapter (12:12).  Thankfully the glitch left enough room for me to be able to attack the boss' obvious glowing yellow puss filled weak points.

I should note that I played the game on whatever the equivalent of "Easy" is since I wasn't sure about the control scheme before starting to play, plus I just wanted to experience the story with just a the right amount of "Oh shit I'm going to die, I'm going to die."  There were still quite a few times that thought I was going to die.

So there!  I can't recommend Dead Space Mobile enough if you are in the market for a survival horror game in the truest sense of the term.  The game is reasonably priced (I happened to buy it when it went on sale) for having 12 chapters which take anywhere from 20 to 45 minutes to complete, depending on your desire to explore.  There is no saving aside from finishing a chapter, which might be a turn off to some people, but it was nice to know that with each chapter's length being fairly consistent, I knew how much time I could invest if I wanted/needed a half hour to kill.

Speaking of killing. . .

Now it is on to Dead Space 2, for which I am eagerly awaiting the same level of craftsmanship when it comes to "sanity effects," something I felt where the first game a bit lacking.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
And Life We Joyfully Drink

Monthly Update: April 2015

Whew!  Actually, I don't know why I said that.  I just finished writing another post for later in this fine month of April.  A few weeks of April are going to consist of long delayed articles about Dead Space that will span everything from before the Aegis VII incident and everything leading up to the events in Dead Space 2.  One of the articles has been sitting on the back burner since late 2013 even, but now I have found the right time to release everything.  Because nothing says April like Easter and Easter is when Jesus rose from the dead, like um, the necromorphs. . .because you know, Unitology is a religion. . . moving on.

Aside from this past week, I actually haven't been able to give a whole lot of time over to playing video games and with this current week coming to a close, 16 units of accounting schoolwork has started up again, so after the first couple of weeks, I will be going back to my sporadic posting schedule.

Conklederp and I did pick up another card game called Gloom, which was recommended to us from one of our friends.  We inadvertently bought the Unwelcome Guests expansion before first acquiring the stand alone game, so now we have more cards than we know what to do with for a game that neither of us have played, but it's a game that can be played with two to five people so I'm sure that Conklederp and I will give it a go before inviting others to join in.

Sadly, Dungeons & Dragons has yet to happen again due to scheduling mishaps, but this is something that tends to happen when you are trying to schedule between six people.  Maybe I should start killing off PCs?  An offering has been sent out so hopefully they will take the bait and by bait I mean invitation.

Lastly, Conklederp and I finally finished in setting up (mostly) our office / retro video game room.  I am still having issues with the SNES as it will display tinted color bars that scroll down the screen indefinitely.  Originally I thought it was due to a 1990 console to a 2011 HD TV, but I still get the color bars on an older tube TV.  The N64 and Game Cube run fine though.  The only N64 game giving me trouble is F-Zero X, which will automatically reset anywhere from three seconds to about two minutes in.  I'll have to look into that.  The point though, is hopefully I'll be putting out some more posts in the coming months looking back at the last 20 years of Nintendo video gaming.

We'll see you later in the month.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
Like Anything Was Possible

Game Review: Theatrhythm Final Fantasy: Curtain Call (3DS)

This article started out as a "First Impressions," but 52 hours later, I feel like I have gone a bit beyond simply "first" and now I am into full on "Game Review" mode, but not a "Full Review."

Theatrhythm Final Fantasy: Curtain Call is the sequel to the 3DS music/rhythm game Theatrhythm Final Fantasy that was released by Square Enix back in 2012.  I reviewed that game and was apparently pretty harsh (or at least I think I was), but since then, I grew to love that first game and almost everything that is done here in the sequel has been an improvement over the first game.

First off, if you have not purchased either game and you are on the fence, I would recommend buying only Theatrhythm Final Fantasy: Curtain Call (hereafter referred to as TFFCC), not because the TFF is a inferior game, but because TFFCC does everything that TFF does but it also gives you access to over 100 songs right off the bat.  By the time you reach roughly eight to ten hours, you will have unlocked all 221 songs, whereas in TFF you have access to about 80 songs.

TFFCC also pulls music from a lot more sources than the first game.  New to the sequel are songs from Final Fantasy I - XIV, Final Fantasy Tactics, Mystic Quest, Crystal Chronicles, X-2, Advent Children, Crisis Core, Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo's Dungeon, Dissidia and Dissidia 012 [duodecim], Type-0, XIII-2, Lightning Returns.  There are downloadable songs which you can purchase at $0.99 a piece, but are from various Square Enix games like Xenogears, The World Ends With You, Chrono Trigger, Romancing SaGa 1 - 3, SaGa Frontier, Final Fantasy Adventure, Seiken Densetsu 3, Secret of Mana and Bravely Default.

The mode of play is pretty much identical to TFF although I have noticed that battle music stages (usually battle music) seem easier while the field music stages (typically overworld and dungeon music) and the event music stages (themes played over in-game cinematics) are more difficult.  I've noticed that I have received a "Bad" rating while holding my stylus over the green slider (the one where you hold and follow the path during the field music stages), possibly because I wasn't holding the target up/down enough in the direction that the path was going (??).  

Another addition that I did not think that I would initially like is the online battle system where you can engage in a 1:1 battle with another player either locally, domestically, internationally, or against a computer AI if you are unable to connect with other players (or if you just do not want to).  Battles are run like a standard battle music stage with your party of four characters going up against random monsters as well as a boss-type monster (Kefka, Cagnazzo, The Undying, et cetera).  After a certain number of successful hits, you perform one of nine attacks on the other player that have varying effects such as having the notes/triggers move faster, having them move at varying speeds; needing to hit the note/trigger precisely (critical hit) otherwise it is counted as "Bad;" having the notes/triggers show a question mark until right before you have to tap them so you don't know if it's a regular tap or an arrow swipe; having the arrow triggers spin which makes anticipating which direction they will be pointing when you have to swipe them pretty difficult.  Basically you are messing with the other person while they mess with you and whomever has the most points at the end of the battle wins points (bragging points) and in-game collectable cards.

In TFFCC, I have noticed that some songs are used in the BMS's such as "Aerith's Theme" or "Final Fantasy Theme (FF XII Version)" which are not battle themes, but I am guessing were included in this category so you could use them in battles.

In TFFCC, cinematics were removed from a lot of the games in the series (FF I - XIII), but some of those that were included (Final Fantasy Tactics) were very short, lasting less than two minutes and having just over 50 notes to tap, which seemed kind of sad and useless.  Another criticism I have is that while there are a lot more characters to choose from, there are some characters that have doubles due to them appearing different in different games (Tifa from FF VII and the film Advent Children; Lightning from FF XIII and FF XIII-2).  Personally I would have like to have had additional characters from Final Fantasy (White Mage), Final Fantasy IV (Cid or Yang), Final Fantasy VI (Shadow, Setzer or Realm), or Final Fantasy VII (Red XIII).

Overall, I love this game and listening to the music from a number of the games in the Final Fantasy series that I have not played (VIII, X, X-2, XIII, Chocobo Dungeons, Type-0, Crystal Chronicles) definitely makes me want to go back and play these games.  Well played Square Enix marketing department.  Additionally, I began thinking of all the Nintendo game series that have great music that I would love to see implemented in this style: Dragon Quest/Warrior, Super Mario Bros., The Legend of Zelda, Metroid, Donkey Kong (Donkey Konga does not count).  Granted there would have to be some tweaking since not all are turn-based RPGs, but something similar could be thought of for any one of these games and I, along with a good portion of the video game music loving community who own 3DS', would buy these games up in very near to a heartbeat.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

The Realm of the King of Fantasy

Monthly Update: February 2015

If you're a frequent reader of our site, you may have noticed the fall off in posts towards the end of January.  The last couple of weeks have been taxing on me as coursework has begun to pile up and finding time to both play games and write about them has dwindled to a level that makes posting twice a week very difficult.  Thus, I have decided to cut myself back to posting once a week (Monday or Friday), but not including the MIDI Week Singles that has become a fun staple that both Dr. Potts and I contribute to on a whomever-has-an-article-written-and-ready-to-go-come-Wednesday basis.  Actually, I might post twice a week if I'm feeling up to it and am overly talkative.

That being said, I have managed to put in a fair amount of time with Theatrhythm Final Fantasy: Curtain Call on the 3DS that will garner at least two posts this month.  I also started up playing Dungeons & Dragons again last week, which will hopefully turn into a weekly or biweekly event.  That DMing experience will also earn itself its own article, probably mid month.  This revised interest in D&D had also got me thinking again about painting miniatures, something that I haven't done since July 2011.

Around mid-January, Extra Credits put out a couple of videos about making your own video game and their recommended steps to going about that arduous process.  These series of videos got me motivated about using RPG Maker VX Ace to make a game in the same way that listening to Robert Rodriguez talk about making movies convinces me that I could shoot, cut and score my own movie.  It's simple things like starting out small and not trying to make Final Fantasy VI on my first attempt are more important than churning out a masterpiece and getting bogged down on my first attempt.  All good points and based on their most recent video (part 3 in this game making series), I've realized that I should still scale back my plan just so I can get the mechanics of using the program down.

And then there was that Super Bowl MLLXVXLIX that happened last Sunday as well.  Now, I know it's stereotypical for someone who plays video games, D&D, paints miniatures and cross stitches pixel art to either not know or care about the NFL (or to go to a Star Trek convention instead. . .1999 I think it was), but after the 49ers were eliminated during the playoffs, I sort of turned my brain off and until the middle of last week, I had forgotten all about the Super Bowl.  Plus, without expressed consent from the NFL, I'm not supposed to talk about or give any kind of recap about the game.  Besides, who was I supposed to root for?  The Seahawks eliminated the 49ers so I can't cheer for them, and the Patriots have that whole deflatinggatenonesense going on, but more importantly is that I've never been a New England (team, not the region) fan so I don't plan on aligning myself with them at the present date.  I also don't feel that I should hoorah for the Seahawks only because they're a West Coast team and are closer to Portland than San Francisco, or because 90% of the football fans in the Portland metropolitan area are Seahawks fans.  I ended up picking Seattle.

So that's what happened last month and what is looking to happen in the upcoming/presently circumcised month of February.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

The Works of My Gods Receding Now

Second Impressions: VVVVVV (3DS)

I say "Second" because Dr. Potts had already created a First Impressions about a year and-a-half ago, but I found it on sale through Nintendo's eShop a few weeks back for a price I couldn't refuse.  I have also been wanting to play it on my 3DS for a good long while after only being able to play it on my PC for a measly 25 minutes.  I enjoyed the game enough during the first stage in the ship, but once I left the ship I felt overwhelmed by the minimalist aspect of the game combined with the apparent size of the map as well as playing an Atari/NES era styled game on the PC.  I also felt demoralized upon finding out that the game kept track of how often I died.  

My death count was upwards of 80+ after not even 30 minutes.

I don't remember when I last played VVVVVV on the PC since Steam for some reason doesn't have that information available (maybe there's it loses track after a year of inactivity?), but when I saw it on sale in the eShop last month, I quickly picked it up.  There's just something about the 3DS handheld platform that made the game seem like it would be more approachable and somehow less intimidating.  Additionally, the 3D effect in the stills through the eShop looked good and I feel that VVVVVV lends itself very well to being converted to 3D.

While there are some differences between the 3DS port and the PC version,  such as altering the graininess of the screen, the biggest difference is that you cannot create custom levels; you can, however play other player (from where?) created levels.  It is not clear if these levels are pre installed or if you can acquire them throughout the game or if the game is updated with new user levels to play.  So far, I haven't found these differences to be detrimental to my feelings about the game or how it plays.

So far I have been having as much fun as I wanted to have in the PC version.  The controls are about as basic as it gets and the response is perfect without any lag.  The 3D effect also looks great with the backgrounds being pulled back from the Captain and the platforms in the foreground.  The music too is identical to that of the PC game and absolutely not loss in sound quality so Souleye's work can be enjoyed unhindered with the rest of the game.  I have nothing negative about this game in this format.

Enjoying VVVVVV as much as I have on the 3DS has made me wonder if I would like Super Meat Boy more than I have if I were to also have access to it on the 3DS platform.  Somehow I do not see the goriness of that game getting by Nintendo's eShop custodians, but I guess stranger things have happened, so we will just have to wait and see.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
Instrumental

First Impressions: Dead Island Riptide (PC)

This has been a combination of my experiences playing the game so far.

Images like these:

Coupled with frequent noises like this:

The noise that I recorded is only at 80 dB whereas it can jump at random (as if this isn't random enough) to 120 dB.  This is what I have read from various sources online as I do not actually own a decibel meter. No I do not have one on my phone.

My last session lasted an hour so that I could get an idea how often the screeching static noise would last and how frequently it would grace me with its presence, so in an unscientific manner, here is what I recorded:

7:07 minutes of no noise

0:43 seconds of noise

3:12 no noise

2:29 minutes of noise

0:26 no noise

3:38 minutes of noise

1:44 no noise

6:29 minutes of noise

1:13 no noise

5:21 minutes of noise

0:35 no noise

2:27 minutes of noise

0:02 no noise

0:03 seconds of noise

12:59 (unknown as the volume was turned off).

Týr knows why, but I've presently put five hours into this game even with the sound effects volume in-game turned down to practically nil and even then, the sound (120 dB) will still poke it's ugly head out of my speakers.

Last week (as 0f when I wrote this back in December) I contacted tech support at Deep Silver relating my problem to them to see if they knew what was going on.  I was then prompted to run a diagnostic tool and email them the results so they could have a better idea as to the specs of my computer and what I was dealing with.  I felt perfectly fine doing this as I did something very similar when I applied for the Elder Scrolls Online Beta request.  Within 24 hours I received a straightforward reply which suggested that I update my drivers, which I hadn't realized that I hadn't updated in a while.  So I followed the supplied links and was able to download three of the five drivers.  The two sound card drivers I was not able to download/install  as they are integrated drivers and even knowing the manufacturer and name, I could not locate the correct driver to download.

So I went back to the game with bright polished up video drivers hoping against hope that my problems were fixed.  The game played fine for about eight minutes before the screeching wail of dying souls and banished ear drums returned to mock my computer and mine own ears.  I played for maybe another 15 minutes before ultimately giving up.

I do not know if I will be going back to Dead Island: Riptide anytime soon as it is the only game that seems to have a problem with my apparently lackluster sound card.  Even games that have come out more recently than April 2013 have operated fine without any sound issues.  Maybe after I acquire my next computer (do not know what that will be) I will come back and see if my experience improves.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
Instrumental

Emulator Hour: Mega Man 3 (NES/3DS)

Thanks to the wonders of modern technology, I am finishing up today's post from the Aéroport de Bürbànk and sitting less than a foot away from a bin de trash.  But onto more important matters.

I recall first playing Mega Man 3 (III) way back in or around 1991 or '92 (seeing as how I was rarely one to play the newest video games, let alone games in the Mega Man series of which I was never able to beat until June of last year).

But I did it, I beat Mega Man 3 and I think I've come to, at least for now, a bit of realization that I like this game as a whole more than the frequently touted Mega Man 2 as the best in the series {{Citation Needed}}.  Thinking about the first three games in the series up to the year of our lord, Nineteen Hundred and Ninety, I found that I enjoyed the level design of Mega Man 3 the most whereas I like the music from Mega Man 2 just a smidgen more than MM3.  Plus there's the additions of the newly created slide ability and the robot pet dog Rush with his various, if somewhat limited use abilities (Marine Rush!?).

First off, everything that I loved about MM2 was refined for this installment.  The level design gave me enough of an idea to the robot boss type and I didn't notice too much of the level art being reused for subsequent levels.  But it's the level design is what makes me enjoy this game just a little bit more than MM2.  After defeating the first eight bosses, you have to go through four of the levels again, but they are in a ravaged state.  chunks of the world are now missing, as if the absence of the boss or the havoc brought on by Mega Man has left portions of the world/level in a state of disrepair.  In Gemini Man's stage part two, there are Jamacys that fall through cracks and holes in the blocks that create the borders to the stage.  In every stage that you run into Proto Man, his escape routes are still there.  Then when you get to the boss area, you now have to fight one of the bosses from Mega Man 2, which is a nice throwback until you realize that your weapons are all different than the ones used in that game so your weapon choices have to be decided upon rather quickly (or you can use the aforementioned chart like I did).

Similar to how I played Mega Man 2, I used a chart to figure out which bosses I should play and it what order.  And how I defended my decision as I previously did, I don't find this to be cheating.  I find it no different than talking to Dr. Potts or Delaños about the order they used and which weapon they found to be more effective against which boss.  Again, I still had to go through the level and defeat the bosses on my own in the end, I just did it with an additional bit of information.

But here is the order that I took the bosses in:

1) Snake Man

2) Gemini Man

3) Magnet Man

4) Top Man

5) Shadow Man

6) Hard Man

7) Needle Man

8) Spark Man

I decided to start with Snake Man, because that's what I remember from playing 23 years ago.  Also, Snake Man's theme is pretty damn catchy and there isn't much more to get me interested and stay playing a game that hearing awesome music while being destroyed by a giant undulating robotic snake hellbent on destroying a modified service and homemaking robot.  

Now, I know that based on the aforementioned chart, that this list doesn't take into account "the best" way to go through the game and choosing the bosses based on their weaknesses.  Sometimes, as in the case with taking on Magnet Man before Shadow Man, that I needed to take a break from constantly dying in Shadow Man's stage and I found I was able to get through Magnet Man's stage and take him out.

Going back to the music, I find it interesting that Capcom brought on newcomers to the Mega Man franchise, introducing Yasuaki Fujita (credited as "Bun Bun" during the credits) who wrote all but two of the songs (Gemini Man and Needle Man) and Harumi Fujita. What I find interesting though, is that the music from this game blends fairly seamlessly with that from Mega Man 2, while still sounding different enough to not be repetitive as to be disinteresting to long time players of the series.

In the end, Mega Man 3 took me 6h21m to complete with an average play time of 25 minutes.  In MM3, I found that the regular stages were a lot more difficult than MM2, but that the Dr. Wily stages were a lot easier to traverse.

I guess I should in closing say that if you haven't played any of the games in the Mega Man series, that Mega Man 3 wouldn't be a bad place to start as it is a great continuation of a great series that, so far anyway, is a bit easier than the previous two games but is still a challenging experience that should not be missed out on if you are at all into older NES games from a great era of gaming.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
If It Ain't Broke. . .

A Review: Assassin's Creed (PC)

Similar to what I wrote for my review of sorts for Dead Space, I do not see the point in writing a full review for a seven year old game (as of 2014) that has over 134,000 hits when looking for a review of Assassin's Creed.  Granted the first game search will include the reviews for every game in the Assassin's Creed library due to it's lack of a subtitle or number, but I plod on . . .  Unlike some reviews (on Steam), I never had any issues booting up or playing Assassin's Creed.  The game never crashed spontaneously, the sound never cut out randomly and there was no visible skipping either by the game or by Altaïr.

So Assassin's Creed, the first game in the series of the same name, was released by Ubisoft back in 2007.  Before playing this game, I had played Assassin's Creed: Altaïr's Chronicles back in February and that was it.  All I knew about the series was that you played as an assassin at various points throughout history. . . assassinating people.  I had no idea about any of the "present" day activities as Desmond or anything about the Animus accessing ancestors memories coded within the DNA of said Desmond.  That was a bit of a shock, although it did not bother me by way of a story telling mechanism.

I was a little surprised at the beginning of the game by the typical use of the Metroid-effect of starting out as Samus does in a fully powered suit only to have something happen that brings you back down to n00b status.  So that happened.  By the time I neared the end of the game, despite having gained all of my equipment back (better sword, throwing daggers, short sword, grasping abilities while falling), I never felt that I was the master assassin that I was supposed to be by that point in the game/story.  I felt that I was a guy who was great at freerunning/parkour and who was decent in a fight against anywhere from three to 15 enemies.

There's only eight here, but you can't see the other umpteen that showed up shortly after plus the couple that I had killed before the picture was taken.  And it's blurry because I done just killed a guard.

Being ganged up on was actually one of the most frustrating aspects of the game for me.  There would be times when I would be shoved by a homeless citizen (who has some sort of mental illness as they are always walking around, gibbering and will seek you out if they spotted you) into a guard and then you are wanted by every visible guard.  There were plenty of times when I would be fighting two or three guards, then a small contingent of four to six would reinforce the main unit and I would just give up as by the time they were all done swinging at me, my life would be down by a good eight to ten hit points.  Especially in the later levels, guards seemed to have gained in their sword fighting ability, multiplied in numbers and their proverbial trigger fingers were whatever is the next step after itching.  

There was one battle in particular that occurred near the end of the game that caused me to stop playing altogether.  Granted each time I would watch a "how-to" video my confidence would again perk up a bit, but then after two-to-three more tries and failing, I would give up.  <Pity>It would seem that each time I would reach a rooftop, I would be pursued by a never ending supply of guards and Templars and rarely would each enemy soldier patiently wait their turn to attack me.</Pity>

The information gathering missions were a lot of fun at first, but that was before the guards became increasingly aware and al lot easier to trigger into their blood frenzy.  The problem being that once the guards become aggressive towards you, any side mission you happened to be on (assassination, pickpocketing, physical interrogation, eavesdropping, racing another assassin or picking up flags on a short route throughout the area), your mission would end then you would have to evade the guards until your "Social Stealth Meter" which lets you know how noticeable you are to the guards goes to yellow which means that you can then hide which will then reset your "SSM" and then you can return to the person who gave you the task in the first place to start it all over again.  Whew.  By the end of the game (the last two stages I played through), I gave up trying to complete every single task and only completed the ones that I had to in order to proceed with the main assassination target for that portion of the storyline.

The one side mission that I always completed was also the one that I had the most fun doing.  Climbing to the top of designated buildings would de-fog a portion of your map in the given district the stage was taking place in.

These portions of the stages were fun because you often had to parkour up to a building then jump to an adjacent building  leading to the tower/building that you had to climb.  There were a couple of specific leap/upper-body-pulls that always made me nervous even though being able to "make it" was guaranteed.  Guaranteed, unless you were already spotted by guards who would then shoot arrows at you (rate of fire was reasonable) or throw rocks if you were not too high already.

Another thing that bothered me about the game was the amount of time it took to exit out.  I understand that the process to quit the game was probably designed to create a sense of immersion for the game, being that because you are playing as Desmond who is viewing an ancestors memories through a machine, and in order to exit the game, you would have to exit the machine first.  That is all well and good in theory, but in practice it creates a series of unnecessary steps that only caused me annoyance.  To give you some idea, in order to exit out of the game, every time, you would have to go through the following steps:

• Pause the game to bring up the menu.
• Select "Exit Animus."
• This exits you out of your memory and back into the present, now controlling Desmond inside the Animus laboratory.
• Pause the game to bring up the menu.
• Select "Exit Game."
• This brings you back to the profile select
• Select existing profile, which for whatever reason only works with the mouse and not the controller.
• Select "Quit Game."
• You are asked if you are sure that you want to exit the game.
• Yes I am sure I want to exit the game.
• Exit game.

In my personal opinion, quitting a game should not take that long.  Maybe going from the pause screen to the quit button and if I'm asked if I want to "Save & Quit" or simply just "Quit," I am perfectly okay with those options.  Then I should be out of the game.  If there was something to do when you are outside of the Animus at times that are not designated by the game, then maybe I could see exiting the machine you are hooked up to, but from what I have seen, there is nothing.  You can walk around the lab and one of two people there continuously ask you to return to the machine so that they can continue with whatever it is that they are having you do.  Maybe this was something that was passed over in beta testing?

While this experience has nearly tainted the Assassin's Creed series for me, I do have the second game on Steam and I feel that after a few months, I will probably give that game a try.  I feel that some redemption might be in order.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
Flowing Through the Loins of My Pain

Desert Bus for Hope 8

If you're not familiar with Desert Bus for Hope, I should probably explain what Desert Bus even is before going any farther.  Looking back, I've talked a bit about Desert Bus for Hope since we started back in 2012, but not a whole lot about the game.  

Desert Bus was a mini-game created as a satire of video game violence accused of being perceived as too realistic for audiences, especially younger audience who apparently cannot tell the difference between 1995 CD games and real life.  Thus comedian magicians Penn and Teller created the concept for Desert Bus which would travel the six hours between Tuscon, Arizona and Las Vegas, Nevada in real time.  However, the overall game, Penn & Teller's Smoke and Mirrors was never released because the publisher went out of business before the game could be published.

There is a Desert Bus port available on the Google Play Store and the Apple Store with all proceeds form the sale of the game going to Desert Bus for Hope and in turn, the Child's Play charity.  Which brings us back to Desert Bus for Hope 8, which starts today, November 14th at 10am Pacific and will run for (at least) 86+ hours.  It all depends on how much money is brought in during the "drive."

Confession Time:  I've personally never donated to Desert Bus for Hope.  The years that I have been able to donate money, I have done it directly through the Child's Play website where I can either specify a specific hospital that I want to donate to, browse an Amazon gift registry to donate a specific item for a hospital, or just give the charity money.  Don't worry though, I'm not going to try and guilt trip anyone into donating money to any cause, I'm just letting people know about an option if they already were looking to donate.

I'll be tuning in a few times a day during the (at least) three and-a-half days the bus will be driving back and forth from Tuscon to Las Vegas, if anything just to watch the exhaustion in the eyes of the people from LoadingReadyRun.  Oh those Canadians.  They're beautiful people.

How does this game NOT look fun!?

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

They Make Me Feel So Good

P.S.  And Folks, this starts in 8 minutes!