First Impressions: Game of Thrones RPG

Game of Thrones is an action RPG for the Xbox 360 and the PS3 published by Atlus and co-written by George R.R. Martin, the brains behind the books that have spawned all this craziness. My first criticism of this game is: Not as many boobs as advertised. Moving on from my tits fetish (Don’t judge me, you have one too), this game is phenomenal story wise, okay game play wise, but crashes and burns with animation.

See this?

Apparently people hate staring at that guy. The biggest criticism of this game is the animations during the multitude of cut scenes. This head (and the others belonging to people you talk to) doesn’t move much, has one expression (or has an intense expression that doesn’t match the dialogue), and his lips don’t match his words. In other words, it’s Elder Scrolls: Oblivion all over again. But people loved that game! So why do they hate this game?

My opinion is the criticism from this game come from people expecting more action from their action RPG. I can’t blame them for that, nor can I say that the animation isn’t shitty, because the animation is shitty. What I can do is call them immensely silly for expecting anything that has even the loosest ties to the Game of Thrones franchise to not have expansive dialogue, story, and cut scenes. Atlus would have been better off comparing this game to L.A. Noire or Heavy Rain as it’s closer to that style of game play than the Elder Scrolls or Dragon Age.

So far, this game is mostly what I expected: lots of people talking, less so me killing things. I actually cleaned my living room, set up my file cabinet and organized my files all while listening to the fully voice acted dialogue during cut scenes for the first three chapters. All this chatter is broken up by your own conversation selections and combat, but there’s still so much that it’s like listening to T.V. (I don’t watch T.V., I listen to it – stop judging me).

In Before It’s Out – Persona 4: Golden

Inaba — a quiet town in rural Japan. A normal teenager arrives at the station to begin his year-long stay in the countryside, only to be welcomed by the news of a dead TV announcer. Shortly after, another body appears, mysteriously hung from the top of a telephone pole. The cause of death is unknown, with no leads on the suspect… As the peaceful community is thrown into turmoil, the urban youth and his classmates wander into a strange, surreal place covered by a thick fog…

AHH IT’S PERSONA 4 ON THE VITA!!!!!!!111!one!

Alright, now that that’s out of my system, let me tell you about the original game. Overall Metacritic score of 90, several “Editor’s Choice” and “Best Of” awards, Persona 4 was my favorite of the Persona series to date. I spent over 100 hours immersed in the story and combat, destroying demons in the various levels, and collecting/customizing my demons. As with all Atlus games I’ve played, the story is brilliant, engaging and twists about at the end. Updated from Persona 3, creating bonds with the memorable characters had bonuses outside of unlocking the highest tier of demon fusion.

Whimsyshire, or the Not So Cow Level

Diablo fans all know the Cow Level. In I and II, this was a gory, super hard level that was difficult to access, but dropped amazing loot. Diablo III’s secret level, Whimsyshire, is no easier to get into and it’s just as hard to survive, especially with four players. Unfortunately, it isn’t as profitable as the D1 and D2 secret Cow Levels, but it’s far more entertaining to run through. After discussing this place on the 5wowthings podcast, I was very lucky to be pulled into this level by my friend @lazervis and saw the whole craziness for myself.

The Not So Cow Level is full of cute monsters, gold and item drops giant pink cupcake heal orbs, random and elite bosses, and rainbows, sunshine and lollipops. Okay, not exactly, but there are rainbows and unicorns, carebears and presents, even little flowers. Everything is bright and cheerful, with green grass, flowers and lovely trees dotting the landscape.

Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, though, everything still wants to kill you and it’s not so easy to kill them first. I went in on normal difficulty and (with four people) couldn’t kill anything on my own at level 36. Two of my companions were near level 60 and they had a lovely time massacring all the cute fluffies that were around. With just two players, it wasn’t so bad, but the non-champions will give players under level 40 a run for their money. My advice is to be careful and bring friends.

Accessed during Act One, getting into the Not So Cow Level requires five special ingredients and a plan to teach the Blacksmith how to craft them into the Staff of Herding. As was the case with the D2 Cow Level, you must have defeated the difficulty level you’re in before you can enter. So if you want to go in on Normal mode, you must have killed Diablo on Normal, etc.

First Impressions – Devil Survivor Overclock

Shin Megami Tensi: Devil Survivor Overclock is a tactical RPG for the Nintendo 3DS. Published by Atlus, it is an enhanced port of the DS game, Shin Megami Tensi: Devil Survivor. For those who aren’t familiar with Atlus, the company commonly re-release their games, but always gives players who enjoyed the original content a reason to spend their money again. To do this, they enhance the original game with slightly improved graphics,  new story lines, and new music. New features for Overclock are: an added 8th day, as opposed to 7 in the original release; improved, higher-resolution visuals; full voice acting; the ability to choose different difficulty settings; and an increased 20 demons to fight with.

Set in Tokyo, players take control of the Hero (left) as he meets his friends Yuzu and Atsuro. You’re supposed to meet up with your cousin Naoya, but he never shows. Instead, he’s given Yuzu “COMPs” (which look exactly like your DS system) for the three of you to have. Atsuro (being the lovable, too-smart for his own good sidekick) decides to hack the devices which triggers an email telling the future being sent to the three of you.

Yes, email that predicts the future. This is an Atlus game and it is set in the Shin Megami Tensi universe, so immerse yourself and don’t ask too many question or your head will explode.

No more special ponies – New Black Market in WoW

Ashes of Al’ar mount

Those pissed that they can no longer be special ponies with the addition of account wide mounts and achievements in World of Warcraft have something new to fear – The Black Market Auction House. The new Black Market AH allows players to bid on special items that are not sold by NPCs, like the above Ashes of Al’ar mount. Other items that have been seen are the Reins of the Blazing Drake, Swift White Hawkstrider, and Riding Turtle.

It’s not just mounts that will be sold, though. The picture (below) posted by MMO-champion suggests there will be pets, crafting recipes and the long lost Tier 3 armor sets. If you were looking to transmog your gear into these gorgeous sets, you no longer have to wait for them to be added to the Dark Moon Faire, though hopefully they still will be. There’s also speculation that even more items that are no longer obtainable will be reintroduced into the game this way like the Zul Garub tiger and raptor mounts, the Ulduar black and plagued proto-drakes, or the batling pet from the Wrath release event.

But who’s responsible for this madness? Madam Goya, who makes her home at the Tavern of the Mists in the Veiled Stair, which is north of the Valley of the Four Winds. Wrathion is chilling with her, but I’m not sure if that means anything.

Only time will tell if Blizzard/Activision has made a smart play with this new Auction House, but one thing’s for sure, all of those who farmed up a ton of gold and want something to spend it on will finally have a place to dump their  cash. Maybe inflation will go down on the regular Auction House now?

Caramelldansen Panda

I will now have Caramelldansen stuck in my head all damn day and that’s a good thing! I love this song, the bits of the Pandaren female dance that copy it crack me up, and I can’t wait to see people mimicking it at the next Blizzcon. One problem: Now this race is even more ditzy and spazzy. Oh well – *bursts into dance*

Here’s the original speedy cakes remix of Caramelldansen (the only good version!) for those of you who missed the meme several years ago:

The Pandaren male dance isn’t as interesting as the female’s, but that’s because I can’t recognize where it’s from. If you do, please toss it in the comments below for me. Also, is it just me, or is he grimacing the whole time? That face is terrible, but I love the freeze.

Update: Thanks to Bryter from the Stopcast podcast commenting below, the Pandaren male dance is from LMFAO’s Party Rock Anthem. Handy-dandy embed:

Glitch – The ultimate casual game

Glitch is a web-based MMO created by Tiny Speck. Similar to Maple Story, it’s much more entertaining and has very few griefers and all around jerks hopping around. I have been playing it for five months now, even though it’s technically still in Beta, and have enjoyed my time in Ur immensely.

But really, what is Glitch? According to Tiny Speck:

My character in Glitch

Glitch is a web-based massively-multiplayer game which takes place inside the minds of eleven peculiarly imaginative Giants. You choose how to grow and shape the world: building and developing, learning new skills, collaborating or competing with everyone else in one enormous, ever-changing, persistent world.

For the most part, Glitch reminds me of the casual games from Facebook on a huge scale and without all the annoying crap. With more depth than any Facebook game, it is easy to get lost for an hour mining, farming, scraping, cooking, or selling goods on the auction house. The developers have programed their Flash based game so it’s easy to navigate, contains bright and cheerful graphics, and has complicated gameplay that is still easy to understand.

There’s a little something for everyone in this MMO: Skills allow leveling and progress; anyone who enjoys decorating or transmogging can make their mark with building an outfit for their avatar or (with the new patch out) decorating their home; hundreds of badges are out there to be collected; crafting skills range from cooking to building furniture, caring for animals or plants to alchemy; and quests break up the monotony by sending you on missions to far away lands to do whatever it is your pet rock told you to do. If you can think of it and it isn’t in the game, putting a suggestion on the forums has a good chance of your idea being implemented later on. Personally, I’m hoping for an “Activate All” button as the only tedious part of the game is activating each individual piece of broccoli to get the iMG bonus. Since if you’re reading this, you won’t know that iMG is the Glitch equivalent to XP so yes, you can grow XP by buying or making broccoli seeds, then growing the vegetable.

Confused yet? Understandable. There’s just so much to do in Glitch that it’s hard to understand in a few paragraphs. Let’s see if I can break it down for you.

Karkarov on Amnesia: the Dark Descent

One of my fellows from the Twisting Nether Gazette wrote the following review about Amnesia: the Dark Descent. I’ve wanted to feature this game in a review, but horror/survival games scare the piss out of me so I never play them. I have watched OMFG Cata play this game, but that doesn’t seem like enough to write a review on, so here is Karkarov on Amnesia: the Dark Descent. I’ve added some links, but otherwise, it’s all him.

Lately I have been playing this game called Amnesia: the Dark Descent made by the same people who created the Penumbra series, Frictional Games.

This is what we call a survival horror game. The real thing mind you; this is not Resident Evil 5 where you have a partner the whole time and a semi auto shotgun to solve your problems. You play as an amnesiac named Daniel who wakes up inside an old Gothic castle around the year of 1839-1840. All you know is your first name and that there is a “shadow” hunting you, bent on killing you. The story is supposedly based on the Lovecraft tale “The Outsider,” but I haven’t read it so I can’t say. The game feels like a Cthulhu story for certain, though.

I have played a decent clip into the game and I am really digging it. If you like horror games, you want to give it a shot. It isn’t the longest thing in the world but the graphics, presentation, and atmosphere are top notch. It is only 20 bucks, which is less than even a DS game and barely more than games like Shank, which are nothing but re-skinned beat-em-ups with a whole 6 hours of play through. Amnesia also will have a pretty neat tool set, which they are working on now,  so people can make their own adventures.

Put on your Robe and Wizard’s Hat – Jan’s RP How To

When I tell people I RP (role play for the uninformed), I usually get several reactions: trolling, confusion (wtf is that?), amusement, and intrigue. Of those who think my hobby is interesting, a few always comment, “I would get into that but I don’t know how/don’t have the time.” To you, here’s how and let me remind you, there is always time.

Know Your Lore

First when you get into RP, and this goes for any game setting, you need to know the lore. It won’t matter how good a roleplayer you are, if you don’t know the very basics of the game you’re playing, you’re going to make an ass of yourself. Now, this isn’t to say you need to know that Arthas had a sister, or the specific lineage of Mograine, but you had better know that Arthas was the Lich King and he was once the crown prince of Lordaeron. You should also know that in the wide world of Azeroth (that’s the name of WoW’s main planet), it is not commonly known that Bolvar is the new Lich King, but that is on the more obscure edge of necessary lore knowledge.

Here’s some links to either refresh or inform your memory:

• World of Warcraft: Short Stories
• World of Warcraft: The History of Warcraft
• World of Warcraft: Leader Short Stories

One thing to remember: There is always someone who knows more lore than you do. Always. So if you get corrected, just absorb the information and move on. Maybe toss out a thank you, but don’t get butt hurt over it. RP’ers are a bitchy bunch, but when it comes to lore, we just want to help each other learn. If you are interested in learning more than the bare bones of the world (something I recommend) check out WoW Insider’s Know Your Lore posts. These guys have a ton of interesting articles and tid-bits about World of Warcraft’s history and characters in easy to read formats.

Maybe this isn’t enough, though. Maybe you need to know something that isn’t easy to find because you want to do something different with your character. Don’t fret, this is common and the forums are the place to go for this. My RP server has it’s own RP forum (Linked in the Twisting Nether Gazette picture at the top of this blog) and we have two sections dedicated to RP and Lore questions. Just last week we had a player wanting to roll a new character who had to wear a gas mask all the time. Why?