Pak Watch: Undertale (PC)

Undertale

So, this one time, I was thinking about the subject of violence in video games.  Right, right, it's an old debate that typically goes nowhere.  I wasn't thinking about censorship, but I was thinking about content.  For example:  RPGs.  In most RPG games, much of the action consists of finding animals or monsters, killing them, and looting their corpses.  It's highly unrealistic, as snakes and rats don't typically keep gold on them, but this is where disbelief is suspended.  Still, I wondered to myself if it were possible to make an RPG where you didn't kill everything.

Lo and behold!  Toby Fox has gone and done just that.  Undertale is a low-fi indie RPG game, with the tagline 'A traditional role playing game where nobody has to get hurt.'  In this game, you have the option to spare the lives of the enemies.  I haven't played it yet, so I'm not sure how the mechanic plays, but I'm very curious.  

Undertale has been successfully funded via kickstarter, and is currently available as a demo.  Also, it appears that the game is downright adorable.  If you are prepared for some serious cuteness, I suggest watching the video below.  You won't be disappointed.  

You can find updates on Toby's progress with Undertale at undertale.tumblr.com.  Also, the soundtrack to the demo is available for purchase or to listen online.  And of course, you can download the demo here.

-D

Pak Watch: Legacy of the Kori Odan (PC)

Aurion: Legacy of Kori Odan

Prior to discovering this game, I knew of only one game produced in Africa: PHL's air flying game, which came out of Cameroon, and had decidedly low production and non-traditional effects. That is definitely not the case with Aurion: Legacy of the Kori Odan. This game looks fantastic. Also from Camaroon, Africa, Aurion is an RPG, with 2D hand drawn style animation.

In general, I haven't seen much media from Africa or about Africa (The Lion King doesn't count. That took place in Africa, but wasn't actually about Africa in any way). So this is refreshing. It looks like they didn't get much for their kickstarter. That's too bad.

Anyway, have a look at these images, It looks like a fighting game mixed with an RPG. And the art is top knotch. And here are a couple of articles about games in Africa, for the curious.

MIDI Week Singles: "Boss Fight Theme" - Final Fantasy II (IV) - (SNES)

"Battle 2" from Final Fantasy II (IV)  - Super Nintendo Entertainment System (1991)
Publisher: Square Co/NTT Publishing
Composer: Nobuo Uematsu

This song popped into my head while at work, and remained stuck in my head for the rest of the day, and pleasant memories abound.  My reactions to hearing this theme are heavily colored by my experience playing it (twenty plus years ago).  As I play the song in my head, I have the sensation of tensing up, holding on, knowing that the killing blow and that satisfying pop of the boss monster death rattle is just around the corner. Yes, I could die any moment, but just hang on!  Cure, Bersk, Ice 2, Attack!  What I love about this theme is that it really contributes to the sense that the enemy is a 'villain' not just an obstacle.  The grand, sweeping movements of the music also speak well to the length of time spent fighting bosses in this game.  

Usually this theme came after some sort of brief story portion, fit with its own music, following a longer exploration portion, with it's own unique song and full of battles containing a different fight theme.  So when this fight theme came on, the increased intensity was palpable.  Good memories.

-D

Path of Exile: FOR THE LOVE OF ODIN PLAY THIS!

You know, do not even ask me about the "Forsaken Masters" part as I do not really know.  But Path of Exile, I do not think I have ever sunk this much time into a free-to-play game.  Even the previously mentioned Clash of Clans or Plants vs. Zombies 2.  No, not even Mafia Wars, which was way back in the day, as far as I am concerned.

At the moment I have put 35 hours into this game, although that number seems to be growing week-by-week.  But let us talk about the game.

Bloody hell this game is beautiful, just take a look at this dank and infested dungeon!

and a spectral-esque-type forrest.

Now if I only played good looking games, there would be room for an argument here, but I am also playing a lot of The Elder Scrolls: The Arena which looks a lot like Doom with a sword and heal potions.  PoE plays remarkably well too.  Think Diablo, with bits of Torchlight II thrown in (stationary waypoints) as well as MMORPG action hot key type actions as well.   There are even some improvements such as removable gem socketing in weapons and armor without damaging either the equipment or the gems.  I think that is one of the things that helped to sell the game.  

There are even little individual animations that the enemies do.  For instance, an enemy archer will run towards you, stop, pull an arrow from their quiver, lick the fletching, knock the arrow then fire towards you.  That is, if you haven't already shot them yet.  If you zoom in as close as you can, you can see the corpses of fallen enemies twitching a couple of times before they lie permanently prone.  At first I thought it was either a glitch or my eyes playing tricks, but no, you can see hands and feet twitching a few times.  Sometimes monsters will also roar at you before or during attacks, you know, because their wild animals that just happen to want you very dead.

Oddly enough, one of the best things about this games is all the ways Grinding Gear Games does not charge you to play and there are a lot of aspects to this game that I feel that could have been used to create options to pay real world money.  You want to enchant that sword to a +1 to damage, pay 50 gold (translates to $0.50).  You want to recover that life sapping gem from your armor that you no longer want, that will be 200 gold.  You want to create more than one character, pay us 500 gold to create extra character slots beyond your first character.  Of everything that I have seen that the game charges money for, everything appears to be cosmetic.  Sure you have your swag stashed in a chest that has four pages of a 12x12 grid and you can pay for a fifth page, but I do not foresee needing that much space considering I am currently only playing one character.

Basically, there was one time when I left the game for the sole purpose of finding out how I could give Grinding Gear Games money using real money.  Maybe buy a package thing via Steam using my Steam Wallet.  I could not.  There was nothing I could do but use their in-game market.  That was not was I was looking for, so I have yet to give them currency validation towards their great game.

Similar to Diablo and Torchlight, I do have a problem with hoarding.  When I found gems, I saved them until I could create the next higher quality gem, then I saved that gem until I could create the next. . .so on and so on.  I was always paranoid that I would find a better weapon or suit of armor and that gem that I had soldered into my equipment would then be lost forever.  Thankfully in PoE, this is not the case as I can take out and remove gems as frequently as I want (unless otherwise noted in the description of the gem).  Grinding Gear is making this game too easy to like and doing things that I had wanted earlier Diablo-esque games to do.

There are a handful of other features from the game that surprised me.  At first, I was annoyed that the maps were a lot smaller than what I was used to on Torchlight II, but I quickly realized that they were more like the Diablo maps and one of the sidequest goals is to kill every monster on the map.  That would be quite the feat in Torchlight II.  Another is that your health and mana potions autofill as you kill enemies and whenever you return to town, which makes healing spells almost obsolete.  It can become difficult however when you have to go up against a boss that does not want to summon creatures to help fight against you, which would then refill your potion bottles.

To date, I have only played cooperatively once with Chreekat a month or two back.  And while the game could be played with friends, you don't have to and I feel that playing locally would be a lot more fun than playing across the country.  That being said, I am usually up for playing cooperatively if people are interested.  That then brings me to the online-ness of the game.  Unless you are intentionally playing with anyones else, all the areas, with the exception of the towns/villages are instanced.  You do not have to worry about other people running around in the same area stealing your kills and loot.

The only negative statement I have to make about this game is that it takes a while to load.  The first couple of times I tried playing, I gave up because I thought the game was stuck on the loading screen.  It turned out that I just had to wait a minute or two, then everything was as I expected it to be.  There was no noticeable lag in the game and the only times the game had to load was moving between areas.

I am going to stop now so I can get this out there.  Path of Exile has been out there in the world for 13 months now and honestly, it is never too late to pick up this game and start playing.  So, you should go and start playing as it is just too much fun to not play.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
The Great Warriors of Doom and Wind

Emulator Hour: Dragon Warrior 2

Honestly, I think the Box Art says it all. This cover art represents everything I thought totally awesome when I was ten.  Look at the heroes' sweet horns!  You know those capes are imbued with properties of magical awesomeness causing them to always look cool and never get in the way.  Let's go fight some monsters in an exciting and triumphant fashion like it's what we were born to do!

As I previously said: As a sequel, Dragon Warrior 2 delivered .  Not only is it a true sequel, continuing the story of the previous game, but it has an expanded world and game mechanics.  This is the kind of growth I had always wished for in games and DW2 heavily informed my expectations.  The age at which I played Dragon Warrior 2 does a lot to color my memories.  The game was so BIG.  I remember dedicating hours and hours on weekend rentals getting my first party member, the prince of Middenhal.  That obnoxious prince of Middenhal who always seemed close to death. I remember upgrading my weapon to the iron sickle, feeling pretty badass.  I also remember having some coaching during this game as my other family members were still participating in video game time.  

It's not that I needed the coaching (my pride would not allow it) but it is always nice to have someone along with you for the adventure.  I think it qualifies as a Family Fun Time game, because I remember EMZ helping with and also commenting on the different creature designs.  Gotta love the smiles on the slimes and on the drakees.  There's something funny about that goofy smile on a creature whose only desire is to kill you.

I only ever rented Dragon Warrior 2.  I didn't beat it then, though I tried and tried.  I loved having a party to build, I loved raising levels and I loved that each character was different.  I could usually pick up the sorceress by the end of one rental (at Placer TV Video).   But then I'd have to return it, hoping and praying the save file would still be there next weekend when I aimed to rent it again.

In this way, Dragon Warrior 2 has always been a special title for me.  I owned and beat the first game more than once, but the second was elusive and expanded.  I never knew what the limits of that game were, and it leaves a nice feeling of possibility.

-D

P.S.

Here's the wikipedia article for some background.

Also, a gamasutra article about the history of dragon quest.  For further reading.

As previously mentioned, I will be calling this game and series 'Dragon Warrior' rather than 'dragon quest' to keep with my own experience.  It wasn't until many years later that I learned of the name difference, and that the US games began being called dragon quest.  For me it was always dragon warrior.

Video Game Maps: Dragon Warrior (NES)

Dragon Warrior was released in the US in 1989 for the Nintendo Entertainment System [NES].  It was my first real taste of RPG gaming, and I enjoyed it thoroughly, whiling away many hours in the world of Alefgard.  While I completed the game more than once, many times I would play through only a portion of the game, walking the same areas, collecting the same item, defeating the dragon and rescuing the princess.  Repeat.  In my inaugural edition of the Video Game Maps segment, I'm actually going to focus on two games:  Dragon Warrior and Dragon Warrior 2*

Here is a map of Alefgard, the world of Dragon Warrior:

Cool enough world,  several continental shapes,  complete with geographic obstacles, and town tiles dotting the landscape. This seminal RPG took plenty of time to fight through.  Cleverly, the designers placed a key item at the furthest point counter clockwise from the start, only to send you back the other direction to get to the final battle. The difficulty of the enemies increases as you travel further from your starting point. Because you had limited supplies, it was necessary to return to towns periodically to resupply your healing items and magic points.  This leads to retreading a lot of ground, and an intimate familiarity with the landscape.  I can still, at a glance, pick out the little patch of woods where you harvest gold from the appropriately named Gold Man.   

Dragon Warrior featured a few landscape details. Water, can't walk on that.  Grass, standard walking speed.  Hills, slow walking speed. Swamp, damage every step.  Mountains were impassable.  Desert and forest were just like grass, as I recall.  However, in addition to appearance and walk-speed changes, different enemy encounters were often triggered by changes in landscape tiles.  There is a really cool map with enemy overlay that you should definitely check out if it sounds interesting to you.  That map and many other Dragon Warrior details can be found at The Almighty Guru. 

While assembling this post, I have enjoyed reveling in all these delightful details and memories.  Dragon Warrior is truly a game near and dear to my heart, and I must restrain my enthusiasm in order to stay on topic.  In my next edition of Video Game Maps, I will feature one of the best sequels of all time:  Dragon Warrior 2.   

-D


*please note:  I will be using the name 'Dragon Warrior' as opposed to 'Dragon Quest' because the games that I played, way back in the 80s, were called 'Dragon Warrior.'

Emulator Hour: Xenogears (PS1)

Seems like a sufficiently villainous goal

You know, in my endless pursuit of nostalgia, I've come to the conclusion that the Playstation 1 actually had a lot of really great games.  Back in the great CD Burn-off of '01, I acquired quite a few excellent RPGs from Square.  In fact, I think the rate of US release for Square really increased around that time.  'Only in Japan' was no longer a phrase to frustrate the RPGphile.

Xenogears - it's been twelve years since I played through the first disc, but I still remember it like yesterday.  Would I do it again?  Maybe.  I think I'll just read a plot summary instead.   This is a very good plot summary, full of love and criticism.   You know, I played this game yesterday for barely an hour, and I've had its image in the back of my mind all day today.  I think this may be due to the sheer number of hours I put into it twelve years ago.  This  game is long-  50 hours on one disc!  (of two)

Playing Xenogears is like watching 300 episodes of some Shonen Anime.  You know - the kind whose story just keeps getting bigger and bigger, new twists, bigger bad guys, greater powers.  Xenogears is epic, sweeping, daring and strange.  The music is good, the environments have character, the battle system is fun.  All in all, a great jRPG from 1998.  

 But, there's no getting around it:   Xenogears starts to drag after while.  Then it proceeds to drag on for a very long time.  After a point, it's hard to say what is dragging the most, the story or the gameplay.  You start to notice the encounter rate is maybe a bit too high.  Or that the story simply takes too long to reveal things that it has been hinting at for a long time.  On the one hand, I like that the game takes its time with the story.  On the other hand, when two things are dragging at once, it really takes its toll.  This game is in dire need of an editor.

And yet... I would still consider playing it through again.  Or at least trying.  Boy it would be nice if I shorten some of the gameplay though.  It feels weird to say so, like some kind of betrayal of my young self, who loved long games.  But it's true, and I don't think it's just me being old. I think that Zeboyd games were onto something when they made monster encounters manual.  Or Chrono Trigger with the encounters being featured on the screen, sometimes avoidable, sometimes predictable, but not hyper-persistent and random.   There are so many times when I'd like to explore a little-- hell, even hear some more of the music play out, but I know I'm going to hit a random encounter every five seconds.  In an already long game, this is just too much. 

So, ultimately I'd say Xenogears:  play at your own risk.  If you like jRPGs, particularly 90s era RPGs, Xenogears is a great game.  Compelling, unique and mysterious.  But it takes like 50 hours to get through the first disc, and it can really drag.

It's really tough to encapsulate Xenogears in just a pic or two.  But here's a cast shot.

 
P.S.  I decided to read through the Let's Play Xenogears article rather than play through the second disc.  It was enjoyable and entertaining, with music links for each scene, and a pretty funny sense of humor.  I can only recommend it as a cop-out for those of us unwilling to dump another 20 hours into this game.  

P.P.S.  Xenogears gets a lot of criticism - the same criticism I also levied against it.  So here's an article from Joystiq coming to its defense.  It really is a great game!   Mostly.

Return to Morrowind: The Fall of the Nerevarine

I finished Morrowind quite a while ago although I never wrote a followup to my First Impressions article, mainly because I couldn't think of something insightful to say that hadn't already been said my the people who already love that game over all other games in The Elder Scrolls series.  I will simply say that I love Morrowind too for what it was back in 2002 and for what it is here in 2014.  

Just as a warning, there will be SPOILERS in the following section that cannot be avoided as they pertain to events that happen to the main character in the game relating to the main storyline.  You have been warned.

What I'm here to talk about is the evolution of my character, Valgrin of Markarth, whom I briefly covered in my first post about Morrowind.  In that post, I said that Valgrin was born somewhere in the province of Skyrim, probably sometime around 3E-400 (27 years before the beginning of Morrowind).  Stuff happens around the city of Markarth that lands him in prison, possibly Cidhna Mines and as there is little known history as to how long Cidhna Mines have been in operation as a prison, we'll still go with that story.  Eventually he is shipped off to Morrowind by decree of Emperor Uriel Septim VII as is told at the beginning of the game.

The story events happen in Morrowind including Valgrin contracting Corpus Disease although the symptoms are nullified through events in the game.  Additionally, Valgrin receives the Wraithguard gauntlet from Vivec in the later stages of the game.  I decided that Wraithguard, upon equipping it, has fused to Valgrin's arm.  I haven't decided if this has to do with the Corpus Disease or if it is simply something that just made sense in my head.  I also based the following events on what is known to have happened to the Nerevarine from various sources of information.

So Valgrin of Markarth, now known as the Nerevarine has a disease that affects the mind and body as well as a gauntlet that has fused to his arm.  

The main reason for all of this is that I wanted to increase the stats of the skills that I did not focus on during the main campaign and do side quests in both the main game and expansions that I did not have a chance to do the first time around.  My Light and Medium Armor skills were very low, so I began equipping bits of armor I found, replacing the Nordic Mail I had been wearing since starting the Bloodmoon expansion.  So I have decided that Valgrin was becoming slowly crazy, as an explanation for wearing non-matching pieces of armor.  It made sense in my head.

If you recall from my initial post, when I started the main storyline in Morrowind, Valgrin looked like this:

By the end of the game, roughly 120 hours later, he had developed into an ass kicking Nordic tank sporting primarily Ebony and Daedric armor; I apparently did not care about wearing the heaviest armor in the game.

Although his outward appearance has started to become erratic, I have not changed his overall behavior towards the other NPCs and I am continuing to complete quests as they come in.  He still acts the same as he did before the effects of the Corpus Disease and Wraithguard, but he is not outwardly carrying himself as he did before.  During one of the quests in the Bloodmoon expansion, I came across a creature that used a severed Nord leg as a club that I have held onto.  I figure that along with Valgrin's conglomeration of armor from various sources, that he will end up only equipped with this semi grotesque clubbed weapon (not depicted here however).

Yes, a bug helmet.

I think my endgame is that eventually he will act erratically enough that he might start killing people just because (although that might be pretty extreme), although I am sure that most of us have gone on killing sprees right after saving knowing that we would not be saving after.  After I have decided that I am done playing Valrin, he will be lost from Vvardenfell, possibly becoming a hermit, with history only remembering that an Outlander was found to be the Nerevarine and was never heard from again after a certain amount of time.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
And Everything Needs A Reason To Be

Game Review: Wizorb (PC)

Wizorb is a game that came bundled with Humble Indie Bundle 6 over a year ago and based on it's premise of a conglomeration of Breakout and a Dragon Warrior/Final Fantasy NES era RPG, this game should be right up my alley.

First off, I am not particularly great at Breakout and its many clones.  No, this does not mean that I suck at video games.  As it happens, I apparently do not have the stamina to play multiple levels of Breakout with a limited number of lives.

In Wizorb, you take on the role of Cyrus, a wizard tasked with saving the kingdom, or the world, I am not too sure on that point.  Once the story portion is completed, you are sent out to reclaim what was rightfully, someone elses, I think.  The plot, as far as I can tell, is a pretty generic JRPG plot but instead of playing a strapping young lad kicked out of his respective village, you play as an old man wizard/sorcerer/mage.  Maybe you have to rescue your daughter?  Suffice it to say, I do not expect any significant plot twists to occur.  Maybe the main villain is your son?  We will have to just wait and see.

After the not too long/deep story/exposition part of the game, you are then taken to the level where the Breakout-ness happens.  As you break blocks to clear the stage, you are often awarded with either nothing, gold, gems for store purchases, extra lives, vials that refill your magic meter, and eventually magical bits that can temporarily slow you down or reduce the size of your wand/paddle.  Magic is used to cast spells, the first two being a wind spell that moves your magical projectile (the ball) in the opposite direction and the other spell being a fireball that causes damage just like your blue ball of magical goodness.

So far, the game should not be too difficult, but often completing a stage requires additional support.  Throughout the stages, you can find shops to purchase temporary upgrades to your staff/bar-thing, extra lives or vials to refill your magic meter.  One time I bought a staff upgrade thinking that it would be permanent, but it turned out to only last the length of the stage and my staff was back to its normal size (after four hours) at the beginning of the next stage.  All the other times I have purchased extra lives in the store as I have found them to be much more valuable.  Apparently there is also a magnet of some-sort, but as I have never purchased it, I could not tell you what its application is.  Maybe it does not bounce the ball but just grabs and holds on to it instead?

So keeping all of this in mind, my initial impression was that I did not like the game.  I loved the visual aesthetic and the newish take on Breakout, but I found the level to be comprised of too many stages to be able to progress through to and defeat the level boss.  Being able to make it through I-do-not-know-how-many stages in each level and defeat a boss was too much for me the three or four times I tried out the game.  A few months later I came back and decided to give the game another go.  This time I used a controller and I noticed that if I did not make it to the boss, I did not have to start back at Stage 1 of Level 1, but I started whatever stage I was currently on, but with all of the blocks back in their original starting position.  I believe the game must have updated at some point, for which I am very thankful.  

It is also highly probable that the game has always operated this way and I just did not notice, but which is sad because since finding this game-saving-fact out, I have put in two hours into the game.  I find that I play a lot better with a controller and not playing through out TV set.  Something about the distance away from the screen seems to give me less time to react to where the goody magical blue ball is going to land.

So after as semi-disastrous first impression of Wizorb, I definitely plan on giving the game the time it deserves.  At least until I become so frustrated/aggravated/annoyed with my general lack of skill in the game that I give up entirely.

Happy Monday!



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconain
Igniting the Paralyzed Soil

First Impressions: The Elder Scrolls Online (PC)

I really wish that there was a game stats screen  in The Elder Scrolls Online, similar to what you would find in Skyrim and Oblivion, that way I would know how much time I have put into ESO in the three weeks and change that I have spent playing the game since its early access release on March 30th.  I would not say that I have been dumping truck loads of time into ESO at this point, but I have been neglecting some of the other games that I had been working on before (Assassin's Creed, Bioshock 2, Castlevania: Lords of Shadow, Papo y Yo, Final Fantasy VII, et cetera) and I think that part of that is that since I have paid for the game and am on a monthly subscription, I want to feel that I am getting the most out of the game for the money I have and currently am putting into it.

However, that argument will not be valid until, I believe, May 6th, which is when the 30 day free period for my account ends and the paid subscription starts.

But enough of that, what about the game?  How does it compare to the beta test?  How buggy is it, even after just under a year of beta testing? How have the early access perks given you an advantage over the regular players?  What are the quests like?  Does it feel like an Elder Scrolls game?  You know, the usual.

To answer, what I feel is the most important question: yes, The Elder Scrolls Online does feel like it belongs with the rest of the games in The Elder Scroll series.  Like every game in the series, you start out as a prisoner (this time finding out how and why you are in prison), you escape by going through a tutorial level and are then plunged into the larger world with a brief hint that something larger that does not involve (or maybe it does and I just don't know about it yet) the war in Cyrodiil between the three factions.

One aspect that has been retained, to a certain extent, from the Elder Scroll series has been the inclusion of books and reading about the lore of Tamriel throughout the various eras.  While in previous Elder Scrolls games you could read individual books on a bookshelf/table/floor/cauldron, in ESO, you can only read from a bookshelf.  This initially made me sad that I could only read one randomly (?) selected book from a bookshelf full of books.  Once I realized that this was how the game was going to operate, then I grew to accept it as is.  As in the other Elder Scrolls games, you still learn skills and can gain quests by reading books.

I do greatly appreciate though that Bethesda still maintains the level of quality of the books in ESO that the community has come to expect.

While you can simply run up to a bookshelf, click to open a book, see that you've gained a level in your Heavy Armor skill then run away without reading a word, I love that I can crack open a tome and read two and-a-half pages of text.  I know this isn't for everyone, but for me, it's a key component for immersion and I love its inclusion in an MMO game.

Another Elder Scrolls staple is the quality of the voice acting, which so far has been very well executed.  Bethesda has reused a lot of the voice actors from their previous games and the have even brought on a fair amount of "Hollywood talent" to voice both main and minor characters.  Most notably has been Michael Gambon (Sleepy Hollow, Harry Potter) as the character of "The Prophet," whose reading of "Let the will of Molag Bal be denied!" is chilling.  Kudos as well to the script writers.

I have noticed a few changes between the released game and the beta tests, the most notable is that I have only experienced one real bug that impeded my progress:

One other bug was similar to the "MISSING" box bug that I encountered during the January beta test, just something else that went missing in a different location.  Other minor bugs have been missing dialogue to text, but those come across as purely cosmetic.  I have, however, seen other people bring ask about potentially broken quests, but I personally have yet to encounter a broken quest so I do not know if I should count myself fortunate or maybe I am simply progressing slowly enough that the bugs are being fixed by the time I reach the formally broken quest.

I have noticed that the combat feels more "real," which was one of the biggest complaints that I kept seeing creep up during the beta test.  It is a hard thing to explain, that when you attack someone that it should feel like your hits are connecting.  Without a rumble feature, this has to come across visually and whatever was done between the middle of March and release has been a great improvement.  I no longer feel like my weapons are simply passing through the enemies, but are coming into contact with them, it is very satisfying.

Personally, when I think of MMOs, I tend to have a mental image of some crowded plaza in World of Warcraft and to date, the greatest number of people I have seen congregate anywhere was at the bank, where you can store items to use between characters, group members and guild members.

There is also a lot of grouping around crafting stations, where you can craft your own armor (heavy, medium and light), enchanting, woodworking (shields, bows, staffs) et cetera, but the nice thing is that you do not have to wait for the station to be free for it to be used.

So far, I have been playing solo and without grouping or questing with others.  There have been certain events such as when Dark Anchors (portals that lead into Oblivion) start depositing beasts of all sorts into the world.  These events, which happen pretty frequently usually draw about 10 other players and a decent sized battle en mass commences against the forces of darkness.

While it is possible to approach the above Dark Anchor or certain quests solo, these are events/instances that are specifically designed to be taken on by a group of people.  I have tried, accidentally to take on a Flesh Atronach (flesh golem) who was supported by two skeletons alone and quickly found myself dead.

This battle was not on purpose either.  I was approaching the two skeletons and right as I "killed" the one, the Flesh Atronach came through a portal as the skeleton archer backed up.  Let it be known that I died with honor.

There are plenty of aspects to The Elder Scrolls Online that I know I have not covered, most importantly the PvP area in Cyrodiil that deals with siege engines and storming castles.  I also did not mention anything about the lack of lag, even in areas that appear to be heavily populated by both PCs and NPCs.  There is just too much information to convey.  I also have not even mentioned the music, but that I will cover in Friday's post (so come back for that if music is your thing).

I will say in closing for today that I am having a lot of fun with the game and, presently at least, I feel that the cost of the game plus the $15/month subscription fee has been and will be worth the experience contained within.


~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
The Skies of Hell Unfell to Earth

Feb to March Update

Thanks to my camera-phone for this washed-out picture of the Grand 'Ol Canyon.  It's much more colorful than this.

Hello One and All,  It's time for a random slice of life posting from my favorite blogger: Yours Truly.  I actually did a couple things this last month.  I went to Arizona, that was cool.  Saw the Grand Canyon, which was awesome.  Grand Canyon is big, and it begs to be explored.  But if you're not careful, it will kill you.  

They say that every year people die at the Grand Canyon.  They go too far, they don't bring enough water, they get lost, and they die of thirst.  I understand why this is.  There is a sense of beckoning which I could not shake.  Even having been warned, I was tempted at every turn to travel deeper, knowing that the road out would be uphill and in the sun, twice as challenging as the road in.

The Gravity of the Grand Canyon is twofold strong:  there is the attraction of the canyon's great beauty, deep and complex.  There is the enormity of the canyon, a mile deep, stretching far and wide as if to swallow the sky.  The Grand Canyon is like an inverted mountain.  You can see everything, but there is so much to see, and such immense detail, that you've just got to take a closer look.  And because it is inverted, every step is heading downward, with gravity;  it's so easy to take another step, and another.  

I was alone, and ill-prepared, my trip to the canyon part of a last-minute trip to Arizona.  For these reasons, I did not go more than a thousand feet down.  That's 1/5 the depth of the canyon, for those keeping score.  But I very much want to return, and when I do, I will go down to the Colorado River, which flows at the center of the Canyon.  But I know it as a scraping from a skyblue colored pencil against the Canyon's many-layered backdrop.

The most adorable book on desert living you're likely to find

Tucson:
Hell yeah. Grand Canyon.  After a six-hour bus ride, I ended up in Tucson, visiting a writer friend of mine.  Tucson is a cool town.  I liked it's vibe.  She described it as 'artful and populist.'  Tucson has a pub theater similar to Austin's Alamo Drafthouse.  The Tucson theater is called 'The Loft Cinema' and is totally cool.  Lots of special events, current movies, classic movies, campy movies.

Random Game Rant:  
Flora and Fauna of Arizona are very different because it is a desert.  I wonder about video games and different climate regions.  Are there any games that go into detail?  Because RPGs frequently have an entire globes worth of regions, I imagine theres an RPG or two that goes to a deeper level with it.  MMORPGS most likely.

The ways in which I know RPGs do things that respect regional flora and fauna:  Different monsters, material harvesting, sometimes the landscape will change your ability to move - poison swamps, hills in Dragon Warrior slowing movement.   In general, my experience has been that the settings and climates of RPGs are mostly window dressing.  I just know it can go deeper.

The Train:
Oh, did I mention I too the train back?  30 hours on the train, from Tucson to Sacramento.  It was pretty cool.  I took the Texas Eagle from Tucson at 8:30pm, and was able to sleep pretty well, given that I had two seats to myself, and was able to spread myself out effectively.  Then, the next day I took the Coast Starlight from LA to Sacramento.  The Coast Starlight is very famous for its views of the ocean and coastal hills.  It runs from LA to Seattle, and I've taken it most of that distance, though always heading north.  I'd like to ride the length of it south, and who knows, maybe I'll get my chance, because...

Amtrak has an awesome plan to give free rides to writers!  Granted, I'm not sure I qualify, but I do have a blog and an English Degree!  Whatever the case may be, I think this is totally awesome, and a dream come true for writers/train lovers.  


Okay, that's all the news that's fit to print.  Talk at you later!

-D'vid

Saguaro Cactus.  These cartoon cacti only grow in the Sonoran desert.

My Time With The Elder Scrolls Online Beta Testing (PC)

Now that Bethesda and Zenimax have officially lifted the Non-Disclosure Agreement, I am now able to babble to my hearts content.  Keep in mind though that this will end up being a longer post than usual as I will be blabbing about experiences from three different beta tests going back to November of 2013.

With that in mind, I present to you:

The first of many loading screens, since updated.

First off, I am not exactly sure how many beta tests Bethesda/Zenimax have run, but I was able to take part in the last three (November 2013, January & February 2014).  The current word is that there will be one last beta test before the game is released on April 4th of this year.  My experience that I will relate to you in frustratingly bad detail will be from only those three beta tests.

Secondly, before November 2013, I had never played an MMO of any kind.  I never played World of Warcraft at any point even though I loved Warcraft I and II (still sad that I never played III).  I never played Final Fantasy XI despite my general love of the Final Fantasy franchise, although that love began to wain with Final Fantasy's VII, VIII and X, so it's no surprise that I didn't do anything with XI.  With all of this in mind, it will be pretty obvious that I am not hep with all of the lingo and understanding of acronyms and verbiage.  During the post play survey, I had to look up what LFG meant and I am still not 100% on what "aggro" means in the context of a battle and how it works.  Maybe I do know but I don't know it.  Even though I find it hilarious, this rant that I first saw as a flash back in 2006 doesn't mean a whole lot to me.

Thirdly, with the exception of the last beta test, each session was over a weekend that I had to work. At least two of the days of the test.  In November, I didn't work the first day, but the test did not start until 12pm PST, but as to be expected during a stress test, the server was overloaded at many stages.  The above picture I took after I had logged on.  The progress bar got about as far as the circular band before if froze and I had to restart.  Three hours in I was finally able to make it to the character generation portion, but I was booted out a handful of times before I could create my character:

Bosmer Nightblade, part of the Aldmeri Dominion (November)

In the forums (where the majority of people were very cool with not everyone coming from an MMO background), a lot of people were coming up with names that would be based on the race of character they were playing while I chose a name that people might recognize me by as opposed to a name that would blend in with the world.  So, I chose to be a male Bosmer (Wood Elf) and I was immediately excited that the heights of the races was restored to something more similar to their respective heights in Morrowind; that Orsimer (Orcs) are larger than Humans who are larger than Dunmer (Dark Elves) who are larger than Bosmer, et cetera.  While I am usually not a fan of tattooing my characters, I early on decided that I would give all of my characters the same tattoo pattern, just because.

Because I am lame, I didn't take any pictures during the character creation process, but I will say that it is somewhat similar to the process in Skyrim, but different in other ways.  For instance, you are able to change the general shape/look of the body to be muscular, large or thin and the face to be soft, heroic or angular.  The video put out by Zenimax Online does a good quick job of describing the process.

Moving onto the beta test.  While playing each time, I always had the fact in the back of my mind that what I was playing was not a finished product.  There were going to be errors, which was the whole point of the beta existing.  We were there to find bugs, problems, glitches and whatnot with the game so that it would be as bug-free as possible come launch day.  

My first time though, I initially felt that the controls (keyboard & mouse) felt very loose, almost as if I wasn't totally in control of my character.  Granted I was coming from playing Morrowind which has somewhat sluggish controls and your player does run pretty slowly, even when sprinting, but after a while, I became used to how the character moved/ran/interacted with the environment.

Battles/Fighting in the game is something that I have not noticed any changes to since November.  The fighting has seemed, for lack of a better adjective, weak.  Yes, when you swing your weapon and it comes into contact with an enemy damage is done, except that the contact part does not feel real.  I know that is an odd sentence but I cannot find an easier way to explain what it is that I am trying to say.  Here's another go: when your sword (or your weapon of choice) comes into contact with an enemy, the weapon passes through them as if they were not there, but damage is still done, but the feeling that you have inflicted damage is not there.

My first playthrough, I encountered a number of animation glitches while trying to draw my bow back.  I don't have any pictures or a capture card, but my character would draw the arrow and then begin to rotate very rapidly in a 90 degree arc.  When I released the arrow I would hit my mark, but the character was still wigging out.  In the last beta test, the main animation glitch was that my character would use a long range attack and the animation would stick at the end with the last bit of sound effect that accompanied so the effect sounded like buzzing tin foil.

The most frequent bug that I came across was that while exiting out of a conversation with an NPC, the dialogue options would be gone (as they were supposed to be), but I would be stuck in the same frame, unable to move, re-establish dialogue.  My only option at that point was to submit a bug report (by typing /bug in the chat window) and then killing myself (/stuck) so that I could respawn at a "wayshrine."  A random bug/glitch/error that I encountered and that I actually took a picture of was during the January beta test.  I was playing as a Breton Templar (Cleric) and running around part of the island and came across a missing graphic:

Just in case one "Missing" didn't get the point across.

Mainly because this didn't turn out to be the Dwarven Part that I was searching for, I thought this was pretty funny.

The last bug that I encountered with my Breton Templar, which was a game killing bug, was that I accidentally did a quest in a closed off area out of order and as a result, I was unable to leave the area or proceed with the quest line.

How many Orsimer does it take to kill an invisible prisoner?

What is going on here, is that you are in a memory.  The Orc with the arrow above his head should be standing next to a prisoner.  Upon talking to the Orc he states the prisoners crimes and you decide if they should live or die.  Being an Orc (in the memory I was an Orc), I felt that the prisoners should die, so I found four prisoners and had them all killed.  Only after the fact did I talk to the person who gave me the quest for the area.  The arrows above the specific Orcs appeared but the prisoners remained dead.  I was unable to reload the quest and even after I killed myself (/stuck) I was permanently stuck.  I submitted my /bug report but I was unable to use this character for the remainder of the beta test.

Over the course of the three beta tests, I did see some changes.  First there was a sound effect of coins dropping after purchasing or selling an item that was not present in the November test.  The second was the inclusion of two enemies that greatly expanded the first tutorial area, but I won't say anymore to prevent spoilers, of which I am trying to be somewhat vigilant.

The music!  I just realized I haven't said anything about the music.  From what I can tell, based on the music in the menus and in game music, Jeremy Soule is still the composer for the Elder Scrolls Online, although that is not confirmed.  The credits in the game consists of "Credits Text 1" through "Credits Text 3."  After listening to the music, I do believe that Jeremy Soule is still the composer.  At some point between the January and February beta tests, a lot of the menu music changed and while it does sound less dark than the previous versions, there is a lot more use of a choir, which in my book is very rarely a bad thing.  

And while we are on the topic of sound, Bethesda and Zenimax have gathered quite a cast to handle some of the voice acting.  The "only" voices that I came across, due to my inability to reach Level 10, was that of Michael Gambon and John Cleese.  Again, I will not say in what capacity they offered their vocal talents, but I will say that they were used very well.  I am told that this cast also includes Bill Nighy, Kate Beckinsale, Alfred Molina, Malcolm McDowell and Lynda Carter.  Not that just because the vocal cast is notable will make the writing any good, but the vocal notables do do a great job with the material that they have been given.

That being said, there was not as much reading material as one might have found in any of the previous Elder Scrolls games.  Books were few and far between and when you were able to read a book, it most likely came from a bookshelf full of books rather than a single volume.  This is something that saddened me greatly during all of the beta tests.    Because The Elder Scrolls Online takes place in an era that has, as of yet, been unplayable (ie the Second Era), I never really felt that I was playing roughly 700 years before the events in The Elder Scrolls: The Arena begin or nearly 900 years before the events in Skyrim.  Reading books is what helped me solidify my immersion in the Elder Scrolls games so I was a little sad to find out that, at least, as of the February test, literature would be somewhat scarce.  Or, maybe I am just not looking hard enough, which is always a possibility.

There is a lot that I have not touched on that is present in The Elder Scrolls Online.  There is a crafting system where you can create items related to your specific ethnicity and learn those of other groups as well.  I did not do anything in the way of crafting as I tried to spend the majority of my time doing story and side quests to raise levels.  There are group dungeons that you can only explore with three other people.  I am sure that voice chat is a thing, but I never looked into it as I primarily played by myself and didn't bother with anyone else.  And finally, there is the whole of the mass battles in the PvP area of Cyrodiil.  As briefly stated somewhere up there in all those words, I said that I never made it to level 10 (to note, level 17 was the goal and max for the last three beta tests) which is the minimum level required to enter Cyrodiil and the massive PvP areas.  I did not.  I also do not know about controller support for the PC as I only played with keyboard & mouse.  It would seem like controller support of PC should be a thing as there are plenty of people who simply prefer this way of playing a video game.  I guess these will all just be wait and see.

In closing (because it's late for me and I still need to sleep, as of the writing of this), I will say that I have (so far) enjoyed my time with the Elder Scrolls Online beta tests.  There have been a number of bugs/glitches that have hampered progress and some occurred frequently enough to make me turn the game off because of having to kill myself to become "unstuck."  The beginning areas, which act as tutorials were very linear, almost annoyingly so when compared to other games in the series, but I figure that they are simply that, tutorial areas, for you to become used to your character and to build their levels and abilities up a bit before putting you out in the big bad scary world of people yelling over the internet.

To date, I have had a very fun time playing, despite all the bugs/glitches that I would expect to be present in a beta test and I know that both Conklederp and myself are looking forward to the end of March when the game will launch for pre-orders and April for the rest of the PC market.


~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
People Running 'round, It's Five O'Clock


P.S.
I wanted to share some of the other pictures I took during the three beta sessions.  Sadly though, I did not take many pictures of bugs that occurred during game play as most were either based around animations that would not translate to pictures or because the glitch would not have looked interesting in picture form.  So here are some others which you may or may not be interested in.

Breton Templar, part of the Daggerfall Covenant (January)

Dunmer Kightblade (Theif) as part of the Ebonheart Pact (February)

Mudcrabs feasting on a washed up corpse of an NPC.

It's never a good thing to see and/or be near a portal that leads to Oblivion.