Video Game Console Review: Retron 5

For my money there is only one console coming out this year and it will surprise you that its not and Xbox, PlayStation nor anything by Nintendo.  What I speak of brothers and sisters is the Retron 5!  An entire retro gaming experience in a box.  This isn't going to play a few systems or even five but rather you get nine systems of gaming play. 

http://hyperkin.com/blog/2013/03/retron-5-details-revealed-from-the-midwest-gaming-classic/

Yes now all your game boy games have a new system to thrive upon.  Rejoice.

Now all this would be cool but not fantastic, you see retro games look like crap on modern TV's, but no more.  They have addressed the problem with special clean up that will make your games look fantastic even on a new system and all through an HDMI cable.  This is great as it give use an easy to use modern connection for our old school games.

Now there could be more, obviously you don't see Atari anywhere in that chart or even Turbo Grafx but what are you going to do?

Video Game Review: Might and Magic II

Might and magic is the sort of RPG i like. With full control of a party and abstracted turn based combat.  There were a few fun puzzles to solve and loads of dungeons to delve.  While the series opener was very good it is Might and Magic 2 that really was fantastic.  It was in this second game were gifted with the joy of auto mapping. 

This version of the game seemed to have an almost correct way to play which I am going to admit was a bit rail roading.  The party could buy skills ended up giving you full mapping and travel over the land but only if the skills were assigned correctly.  Some had stat requirements and others had to be possessed by two member of the party to kick in.  It worked out so that your pregenerated starter party plus the barbarian drog you found and the ninja H.K. Phoey were sort of the correct group.

I am not going to say I remember all the quests and areas of this game.  I haven't even had my commodore 64 set up for years.  One area I do remember was a group of monsters called quizenarts that were hidden in a mount near one of the roads.  These guys were weird as they were super hard to kill, but if you won with at least one guy, that character leveled like twenty levels.  Then you could go back and it would be easier so that maybe another guy lived.  This process repeated allowed all your characters to become bad-asses.  But it had a downside.  The game used to generate additional enemies based off the parties level.  This added and extra thousand peon monsters to every fight and slowed down the game incredibly.

All in all a great addition to the might and magic game world.  Certainly better than the current online trading card game.  I hope this new might and magic X kicks some butt.

Video Game Review: Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Secret of the Silver Blades by SSI

Long time readers will know of my dislike for this game, but if you are new it sucks crap.  This was the first misstep in the gold box series for me.  I think it was something I had a ton of expectation for and not liking what I got curdled into hatred over the years. 

So we are dealing with gold box AD&D games here in first edition.  This had a couple of new classes the ranger and paladin, not sure if they were in azure bonds.  The big thing about it was they expanding the map beyond the 16x16 limits they had previously used.  From there it seemed the same game as all the rest, with a bit of a level cap increase.

The storyline is the party has been magically transported to the a city in danger, to help the towns folks.  They have no equipment at first but are quickly given some gear by the town elders.  That all is pretty standard for this time of game.  It's worth noting equipment never transfers over even if the party members have been leveled through Pools, hillsfair and secrets.  From there they are asked to stop the "Evil".  I really cant remember the evil though it was something about a frozen army and possibly a lich.

The party are sent out to explore and ostensibly power up.  this is where they enter the massive area of exploration that is the game.  You can just kill and kill and sometimes hit the locations you need to travel to.  Which would seem interesting but ends up being pointless as you never need to travel once you reach the portal zone.  I did find a +6 set of leather armor in a drawer once but after that nothing really of interest.  Once you reach the portal room you have a fight of decent difficulty for control of the portals.  After this you can travel back and forth.  There is a portal to the city you started in and eventually portals start opening that lead you were you need to go.  One is to a old dwarf fortress that is taken over.  Once you clear it you find an old dwarf that will heal and raise you for free, with no chance of con reduction.  That sort of breaks the game as well as you are always near a portal and then the fortress and can just use him whenever you are in trouble.

The last fight of the game is the only one where you really have a challenge.  I tried a couple of times only to die again and again.  The third attempt I actually buffed for the first time in the game, and it was cake.  One note give the ranger the giant slaying sword they have bonuses against them and he will kill a giant a round.

Video Game review: CBS Dream House

This was one of the weirder games I had.  I think my dad got it more for himself and realized it was not the drafting style home decoration software he wanted.  It was more like an editor for a graphical adventure game like Kings quest or something like that.  I remember making the house and filling it with things just to see if they animated.  That was the thing, some items would animate and others would not.

I vaguely remember two things about the actual game play.  the First was it would take forever to load, I mean almost a Datasoft "Bruce Lee" long load time for this sucker.  The second was the items were not universal.  So you could not take the folding bed and place it in houses other than the San Francisco style house.  That may have been for replay as it made me go through each of the houses to see what they did.  I can only really recall three houses one begin the San Francisco style another being a big fancy east coast style house.  The third I remember as a little cottage out of a kids story book.

I am guessing they were supposed to be saved onto a black 5.25 inch floppy but this never worked for me so my creations were only around as long as the game was running.  Which was fine as I never seriously intended to work on drapes and what not.

Video Game Review: Rad Warrior

On of the lamer games I purchased back in the day for the commodore.  It was very cool in promise and goofy as heck in execution.  It was a redistribution of a game by Epxy. 

You had two phases to the game both were incredibly short.  The first you were a jungle warrior throwing rocks.  the second  you had moved on to wearing powered armor and were defeating some evil enslaving device. 

This would have been cool if there were more to it but it was like a ten minute wash, rinse and repeat affair.  You would get screwed on occasion as you could run out of shields in a radio active area and have to get out of the suit only to die to the radiation.  That was actually the most interesting the game got as you almost always won. 

If i remember right you had to get the shields and guns for the suit then defeat the evil which was pretty easy to do.  It sort of reminds me of Metroid in a small way, but that also shows the Commodores flaws.  Compared to side scrolling on the consoles it was a total was of time.  I do like the Iron Maiden inspired character of the logo though.

Video Game Review: Ultimate Wizard for Commodore 64

I am not sure this is the exact version of the game I had, as I remember it as Ultimate Wizard Construction Kit for the commodore 64.  While I had some 50 levels of pre created game the fun was the creator.  We had a variety of levels mocking one of our friends, because apparently as a Kid I was a fucking dick.  I feel a bit more like shit considering Karazno was later killed somewhere in the redwood estates / Holy city area.  But one social reject giving another crap seemed like the thing to do back then.

Anyway this was sort of a lode runner clone with magic thrown in.  Your little guy had a few spells he could cast to do various stuff in the level. Often these were required to advance through the level other times they were just to fight monsters and make you feel good.  There was a pretty fun bug in one of them, the spell that teleported you down.  When you died you went through a little animation of your guy falling down the screen but should you have the teleport spell it would break the animation and place you alive on a lower level.

While this was great fun game it has pretty limited graphics, as was true with most commodore games.  This , like all lode runner clones, was at its heart a platformer.  The Nintendo did this so much better that it is very hard to get past that fact and play the game now.  I mean something like any of the Mario's feel light years more advanced than this little guy.  Mario construction set would be fun though.

Dear Sony

Hey Sony

How is it going?  Long time Xbox owner here.  As you expect I am pretty scared about this xbox next, it just doesn't seem like my sort of thing.  I like my console as an offline gaming experience and just buy my games to play them on my own.  I just recently tried some Downloadable content for the first time, it felt weird not sure I liked it. 

Oh just some stuff for my Rocksmith game, Blue Oyster Cult stuff like that you know.  I play with the bass!  It was sort of goofy how my xbox life account created its own user on my xbox.  I don't know if that was cool as my wife and I use different log ins on that game because we are at different levels on the guitar.  Also Her Dean has different headstock than my Gibson. I am still not sure the new songs are added to all accounts, which worries me.

I am rambling i know.  So I am thinking of moving on to your PS4 as the stuff described in the xbox next I just don't like.  But there is one thing, I am new to your titles and have heard there are a few games I should try out as PS fan boy, I am supposed to be a PS fan boy now right?  Anyway God of War sounds like something I would like to give a try.  But I hear you are not going  to do the backwards compatibility thing.  That sort of sucks, I want to try out all your old PS only games I have been missing out on.  What is it uncharted?  I think someone said that was good.  Can you please give me some option to play these Sony only games?  Xbox gave you the Ninja Gaiden games eventually, maybe not number 3 which sucked anyway.

Well Thanks
;

Kickstarter Review: Chasm

I loved Simon's Quest, that is one of my favorite games on the NES.  Metroid was great too but the RPG aspects took  Castlevania over the top for me. 

I wanted to point you folks to another Kickstarter that needs some love.  Its a metroidvania type game called Chasm.

You can go to the URL and check it out here http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/discordgames/chasm?ref=live

Gamepad support and low system requirements make this pretty enticing and the $15 DRM free version of the game makes it a total easy purchase.  I don't they they are going for stretch goals so we just need them to hit the $150,000 funding goal.  We can do it folks!

Svegrund the barbarian burned to the ground

Well I decided to move on with my TRing of Svegrund last night.  I was thinking of sticking it out to max out my Legendary Dreadnought epic destiny but it seemed like a good time to move on.  I was back up to 200 epic to, err tokens of the twelve and had finished a lit2 bow.

My new version of the Sveg was back to bard to start and then two levels of ranger were tacked on.  I have some weird plan of Spellsinger 1 with Arcane Archer 1.  I am really not sure how to go about doing that.  My plan is 7 Bard and 13 ranger so I can get displacement too.  I can tell you my stats were as follows.

Strength 12
Con       16
Dex       18
int          8
wis         8
Chr        14

My feat choices were force of personality and toughness.  Not sure if those were a mistake, because i am a bit behind on my Bow-ness.  I grabbed weapon focus at third level.  I think my next will be Point Black Shot at 6th, and Maximize at 9th or 12th.  I guess from there I need some sort of Shot on the Run feat.  I am really not sure about that one as it takes dodge and mobility and most archers seem to just stand in epic quest.  Let me know if I need it, ok!

I am trying to keep my perform and search skills up in my ranger levels, while keeping UMD and Diplomacy up in my bard levels.  I may be missing some jump which sucks and sneak will suffer. 

DDO Tokens of the Twelve rewards are insulting

I have been running around for a week or so in my post 20 barbarian life and am oft getting screwed on Tokens of the twelve.  This is a bit of a worrying development as I am not sure if they are driving me to run the House Cannith Challenges or there is some sort of bug.

Two nights ago I ran with Poppy Cleric, not sure of name, and some other folks the Black Loch quest on Epic Elite.  We died and were at least somewhat challenged and in my mind I was think, ok this will be worth a full token.  Nope it was worth none, well 8 fragments that were rewarded during the quest.  I didn't know what to think of that but moved on disappointed but not angry.

Then last night occurs I am running with Toafet and a few folks of his friends and head into the sands.  We do The chamber of Raiyum on Epic Hard and actually I am rewarded a full token and 38 fragments.  It ended up being 51 with the fragments awarded during the quest.  All is good I am happy.  We move on and run Offering of Blood on Epic Hard.  I am excited as I actually needed this for flagging but then we see the Epic chest.  We each go A token of the twelve, I have never even seen that load of fuck before, A token.  That was just telling us to fuck off.

Dude Turbine I have been on your side playing telling folks about the game I love in the face of them playing other games.  Fighting the fight of True metal and DDO on two fronts.  You could have my back.  You could not care.  But don't tell me to fuck off!  I am playing monthly doing the right stuff for you!

Ok how do you make amends here?  Well fix tokens for one.  I am not asking for more, I will get my 20 on my own and TR.  Really that's it, just don't be insulting dicks to your players, with A Bull Shit Token.

Feeling more remorse put old Svegrund in the game.  I propose Svegrunds Axe: +1 great axe, songblade.

Game Review: The Red Star

To follow up on the review I just did for Guardian Legend, I am giving you The Red Star.  This game kicks all sort of ass and In retro fashion.  The game has a number of levels that jump between styles of old shoot games that is just a freaking love fest for old games. 

Much of the game is a beater style with a feel of something like Captain Commando or Knights of the Round.  Then something happens and it changes in an instant.  A giant aircraft busts thought the roof and you are doing one of those dogging a thousand bullet Raiden things.  You fight the end boss as something out of street fighter.   The was a level that was like carrier airwing that went left.  It went fucking left!  somethings felt like the commando/MERCs games.  It just constantly hit me with something that felt like a blast from the past. 

I can't tell you how pissed i was that this didn't come out on xbox, I pretty much bought the ps2 for this thing.  A used on sure but that is how much i was into this game, well and I wanted to check out God of War.  This one was a bit more fun than the god of war thing.  I see its available for the Ios so I may have to pick it up again, having given my ps2 away.

Game Review: Guardian Legend

This was another of the cheap game purchases I made back in the day.  I sort of wished i would have saved up and got something more worth my time but this was ok.  I remember thinking it was some sort of Robotech like transformer thing.  I guess it was intended to be robot girl that turns into a jet.  I was a little disappointed by the game play here as I am not much into the Raiden style vertical shooter.  I prefer horizontal if I am going to do that sort of thing, like Carrier Air Wing or Aerobusters.  I imagined transforming mid game and switching in between guardian and battloid mode or whatever.

This worked out ok i guess, though i liked the parts with the giant robot more.  Sorry i guess robot girl I should say.  they were sort of like a legend of Zelda dungeon with the flying bits being what is pictured above.  You had a lot of upgrades to get in the dungeon parts which I needed as I sucked at flying. 

All in all not a favorite of mine, I wish i would have bought the willow game instead.  That was one i rented but couldn't finish in a weekend so was left with gaming blue balls.  Maybe i should try it with an emulator!  On this one like Side Arms or the Macross video game, the good Robotech adaption remains elusive.

Kickstarter review: Shovel Knight

In keeping with my classic gaming theme of the last couple of days I wanted to show you folks a kickstarter for a game that looks pretty cool.  Its called Shovel Knight by the folks at Yacht Club games. Its seems to be an rpg style platformer sort of like Faxanadu or Simon's Quest.

It looks pretty fun i like the shovel down bound move the little blue guy does in the video, it sort of reminds me of Rygar a bit.

You can pick up a digital copy of the game at the 10 or 15 dollar price point, which seems pretty fair for a fun little game.  They are not funded to the point were they will port to Mac yet but lets hope they get there.  I think it would work out great with my USD SNES controller.  I am really thinking about jumping on this one but not sure yet.  We will see after H&R Block tells me how much the government is looking to take. 

Honestly some days I wonder why I pillage at all

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/yachtclubgames/shovel-knight?ref=category

Updated for transparency: I just backed this project so you are now helping to deliver a video game to me and yourself should you back the project. 

Game Review: 8 Eyes

This was one of the games I picked up for cheap, I sort of always was going for the cheap games as I didn't have big cash in those days.  Well that is still the same today really but whatever.  I think I grabbed it at the game place in Eastridge mall.  It was downstairs by the JC Penny's.  Sort of a counter with games that they let you play for a few minutes, but only if the game was popular or they wanted to open it already.

I picked this one up after borrowing my cousins copy of Simon's quest and thinking this seems pretty much the same but cheaper.  I was very very right!  You are supposed to be a fencer with a sword that strangely looks like Simon's extended whip.    You are going from castle to castle battling through the mission with your bird friend and then doing a boss battle.  Each boss or zone has a particular weapon that everything is weak against.  I guess that gives it a bit of a megaman influence but it seemed to be pretty light.  The first boss you use your bird to take out in the most boring fashion possible.

After each villain you get a new weapon and a jewel for the end of the game.  This was were the game got weird, it threw a logic puzzle at you.  Honestly that was just strange, the only other game I have ever encountered a logic puzzle in was Centauri Alliance.  Its just an odd thing to get in a video game, Stop now work this out!  Ok i am actually very good at them and it was not problem but just odd!

Game Review: Faxanadu

Over the weekend I picked up a copy of Faxanadu for my Nes Clone.  This was one of the first games I got with my original NES.  I really loved it for some reason.  It was sort of a side scrolling RPG, I guess.  You had weapons that increased and new spells to learn. 

I remember the story being the elves were worried about the dwarves who had been corrupted by some evil force.  It was a bit weird but it facilitated the game that was basically climb up a giant tree and then go underground.  I liked it except in the little bit that is shown where you only have a knife and you have to duck down to attack small enemies. 

I hope its something that plays like I remember and not something that makes me doubt my childhood self.

Thoughts from a novice Dungeons and Dragons Power Leveler

Hey Sorry i am not writing I feel a sort of post Christmas writers block that needs some fire set under it.  I just haven found anything that is stirs me up enough.  I need some sort of motivation shot, I almost felt it the other day but it rushed itself away. 

What I have been toiling myself with is Dungeon and Dragons online power leveling of Svegrund.  I am taking him through barbarian past lives for the extra hit points on future lives.  I have got to say you are not going wrong with barbarian lives.  The beginning quests were way easier with just one barb past life.  Its just a help to everything unlike my bard lives. 

So far I have learned, get in a group that have a goal planned.  I don't care if  the depths are less experience than derping from quest to quest, they can be run in a half hour bang, bang , bang.  Knowing what you are doing getting your ship buffs once and running is so much better than waiting for one dude who is dicking around to smoke and take a bio.  Just trying to decide what to do that kills!   Figure out if your group is free to play and what packs they have.  From there go with the lowest common denominator and run quests near your level.  Just run!

I am no expert but here are a few quests I have power run so far.  Stealthy repossession, The Kobold's New Ringleader, Tome of the Immortal Heart, Tear, Gwylans, Running with the devils.  Any of those are good with a group of determined folks.  You just need to know if you are zerging or not because that is an all or nothing activity.   I am new to the zerg and get yelled at all the time, but I am trying to be open and listen to folks. 

Also you don't need to fully sandbag in fact i think that is a poor idea. You should probably think of getting 4 into the next level and then taking it.  You don't want to limit a group that is going like rolling thunder and have them wait for you to level.  Sure there are times when you have no choice but letting everyone know is good.  Synchronize your Bio's and drink with leveling.  You don't get a drink you are leveling you go without, just pee and ship buff and don't waste the groups time more.

Video Game Review: Legacy of the Ancients C64

http://www.c64gg.com

This was a fantastic old game for the commodore 64 and a few other systems.  I think it was released by EA back when they made good games and didn't suck.  Its a computer RPG that was standard for the time but it included some nice elements.  You had traveling over the world map, some sections that were first person as the picture displays and even some over the dungeon sections when you were storming castles.

It was made by a couple of brothers using questron as a model and then went on to make a spiritual sequel called legend of black silver. 

The basic premise is you are a farmer that finds a corpse with a dagger, mysterious coin and bracelet.  This quickly leads you to a cosmic museum.  The exhibits in the museum are odd in that some display items that you can insert the coins in and take and places that you can travel too.  At first many of the exhibits are not functional but as you progress and level up they allow you to interact with them.    This works to limit your access to items and areas.  It also works to give you something like quests.

I had  loads of fun with this back when i was a kid.  I really found it deep and had enough game play to be memorable. I liked the difference between dungeons and storming the castle parts.   This game demands and update as do many of the older EA titles.  Its funny how they have gold in the vault and keep doing the sports crap.  Seven Cities of Gold was amazing and would be a fantastic game.  Really it was the first sandbox game, they could remake it with the same ideas and loads of achievements, it would be great.  This game too!
 

Video Game Review: Masteronic Action Biker

 I guess the coming Christmas has me thinking of toys and games I got in Christmas past.  This is one of my favorite cheap games from my favorite cheap game company back in the Commodore 64 days.  Here in the US it was known as Action Biker out in the UK it's KP Skips Action Biker with Clumsy Colins.  I guess that is a potato chip manufacturer in Britain that sponsored the game.  I have never heard of a video game chip tie in but I guess there was Kool Aid Man for the 2600.

This game was probably Masteronic's best.  I had three or four of them including, Knight Moves and Ninja.  This one certainly had the most depth.  You were driving around and collecting 50 items for you motorcycle.  The thing is you only had a single item present on the screen at any given time.  This required a large amount of driving around.  You were basically all over the map all the time.  Some items required you to ride up the roller coaster or go up girders in the construction site.  It was really fun and required a bunch of control.  

The items you collected generally had no power up for your motor cycle but a couple did help.  There was an extra fuel tank that allowed you to drive more before going back to the gas station.  There was a gear box that allowed you to go into fast gear.   Finally you got skis that allowed you to go on water to get the last items when was located on an island.  This was a cheap game at the time 9.99 compared to 35 or more so really a good buy.  If you are not paying it may seem like a cheap crappy game but its worth your time, its fun a challenging in its own little way.

Dungeon and Dragons The Menace of the Underdark a review

Thanks to http://fatpenguinblog.com for the image

Well The Menace of the Underdark expansion is now upon us and Dungeons and Dragons online changed.  The game has been simplified and made easier.  Perhaps more alarmingly is a hint of fourth edition D&D mechanics creeping into the underlying game.  All and all I don't know if I like it as I am seeing less solid game play.  This would include coming from myself.

To dig into the expansion a bit they have changed the EPIC system so that there are now three versions of the epic dungeon.  Those are Normal, Hard and Elite.  Normal and Hard are pretty damn easy which sort of sucks.  The Elite is an increase over the old Epic which makes for a challenging run. This has the good effect of removing the equipment barrier from epics as now you can suck dick and do just fine in quests.  It also removes from of the separation between the TR and the non TR character.  As you don't have to fight through Epic quests that are out classing you to get tokens.

The new Epic leaves that you will be going through for level 20 to 25 are a combination of epic destiny and classes.  The class levels can be though of as non specific unclassed level that give a generic set of HP , save and skills to everyone.  So casters will be getting the same HP as the fighter. There are some epic feats which are pretty nice, the Bard song feat is an absolute must have.

The epic destinies are sort of the like the epic version of enhancements.  You start off with the freedom to select one of these, which should probably be the one associated with your class.  From there your points go into an advancement tree that is pretty World of Warcrafty.  These are cool as they allow you to fix problems with your character and are pretty easy to start attaining.  What I mean is you can get Hit point pretty easily through these destinies if you are low by taking the Barbarian tree.  The bard tree auto grants spell level increase which helps with my low DC's.  So I could start working up my crappy paladin and take hit points so he could go from pathetic to just plain bad.

The equipment awards in these quests is also very generous.  New equipment is on par with much of the green steel pieces.  Don't get me wrong you still want your Min2 Khopesh but you can easily do with some off hand that you find in epic quests.  The armor also get you near to the point of epic quests.  Finally some of the Forgotten Realms area quests yield collectibles that can be turned in for almost epic quality items.

All in all this allows for a pretty easy path to leveling up to twenty five and gaining high end equipment.  Changes in epic token yield makes challenges a must for TRing and I have got to say the first run of an epic quest can yield incredible experience points for not a lot of work.  For me this is a bit like the quarter change in coin op games.  You can have a great character with not a lot of skill.  Yes they have defanged many of the time sinks which is good but taking out the difficulty puts a lot more noobs in my pug groups.  And if I am in the group you already have at least one suck player.

Video Game Review: Ninja Gaiden 3 for Xbox 360

I think I am going to be be rehashing a lot of reviews of Ninja Gaiden 3 here but I wanted to comment.  I am really let down by the game.  That is as deep as most comments go but I would like to dig into it a bit.  I love Ninja Gaiden for the Xbox, it is in my top five video games of all time.  That said most of what I loved about Ninja Gaiden is gone in this third installment.

The design has decided to go for a very story focused power run through the plot.  You are constantly being driven forward and In a way this gets very tedious.  There is no exploration and places where once I would have tried to climb or run around in, I am just running through. 

The hunt for items is also gone, this really was something that appealed to me in the original.  I was always looking around and was happy to find a new toy or power-up.  Here its just story and forward drive.  This gets tiresome as there seems pretty limited reason to look around.  Just forward.  Also I am not really powering up or getting new combos.  I run into the same enemies from the start of the game and they are just as hard as they were.  I feel like I should be shearing through these twerps but I don't.  This makes combats more of a drag than actual fun.  I never feel powerful.

I think the biggest let down comes when you do try to explore a level and find there are invisible walls.  This was never something Ninja Gaiden used.  You could at least explore an area after you cleared it.  In the jungle section of the game I floated into a communication tower then dealt with the ground forces.  Afterwards I find and invisible prison preventing me form checking certain spots.  This feel lame as hell.

Digging into the combat a bit again I am disappointed.  It uses a mechanic of after the scene refill of health.  This is sort of like ducking behind a wall to regain health in a FPS.  I have always disliked this.  Here its seems even goofier as you can barely scrap through a second of a boss battle and quickly die in the next second and you come back full health in that second section after you die or you heal up in little cinematic running bits.  This feels very cheap compared to the awesome battles in Ninja Gaiden.  Even in that game when you did kick ass without much challenge you felt like you were in the zone not the game allowing you to kick ass.