The Offspring of Too Much Exp.

Monster Pinky, you've met your Match!

More proof that the Japanese want every single penny out of your wallet, they'll do anything to get it. That includes making these little challengers to the Pinky St. collection of Monster Hunter figurines. Now your battles are both challenging AND cute. Who knew?

Calling Infinity Ward, Your Servers SUCK!

Call of Duty 4 is an excellent shooter. Awesome storyline, great graphics, smooth gameplay...at least on the PC. We get to the consoles and massive issues arise when it comes to getting online to play the damn game. Though I'm not sure about it on the XBox 360 side of things, the PS3 version has just 1 horribly crippling problem. The gameplay itself is basically lagless but that's if you can get on the damn servers at all to play the game!

It's been 3 or 4 days now since the servers went wonky at Infinity Ward. Tons of gamers that purchased this game just to play online have been waiting out bogus Download Game Settings... messages and dropped connections. When you can actually play the game it usually takes a good 10 - 15 minutes before you can even get on. Surprisingly the SIXAXIS is not bad for aiming in the game. I thought it'd suck but so far I haven't had much of a problem with it. But it just goes to show that I would rather stick with the PC version at this point as I normally do with shooters. IF needs to shape up about the online servers soon or they're gonna lose a LOT of customers.

Bonds on the Battlefield? How about Explodey Things?

Kidou Senshi Gundam : Senjou no Kizuna (Mobile Suit Gundam : Bonds of the Battlefield) is an arcade game that's a major hit with the Japanese. Based on the One Year War era of slow plodding nuclear fueled giants of destruction, Senjou (for short) has you pilotting your choice of Zeon or Feddie mobile suits from within a pod designed to emulate the cockpit of an MS. Pretty impressive as it's an experience that can't be emulated on a home system without a $200 controller like Steel Battalion.



What's even crazier about this game is that it's networked, the more pods your arcade has the more players can join. An 8 player vs. battle between teams of 4 isn't a rarity to be seen as the Gundam license itself is pretty big in Japan. My constant ramblings on this blog about Gundam should probably give you a clue as to how much (and how improbable) I want to play this thing. The controls seem to be based on the good old fashion dual stick tri-window setup. It even has that old classic White Base attack theme song all the old school viewers seem to love.

Is this only the first step? A glimpse into the future? After all, how many more years will it be before they adapt this into an army vehicle of some sort? Preprogrammed human-like motions coupled with the proper mechanical technology with a sufficient power source? It seems the Japanese already have the control scheme down...

Even crazier is what you do when you're not playing. They have a bench area where players sit and wait in a line and off to the side is a view screen for players to watch the other would-be pilots show their skill. Below the screen is a stats window I believe probably detailing the overall combat situation ladder style.



This guy Joshua Zimmerman explains it all very well. Youtube can at least give us a glimpse at what you'd like and the Japanese NEVER give you.

Making War Fun for all Ages!

Seriously speaking, Call of Duty 4's demo hit PCs a few weeks earlier and it is an impressive wartime simulation if not an entirely realistic one. But here's the thing, I had thought that this was going to be slightly futuristic and thus a crock of bullocks when it came to weaponry. Lo-and-behold my military knowledge may be quite lacking but I looked it up and that is an M4. So the machine guns are real enough but what about the rest of the game?

Laser wars in night vision. This is just crazy, kinda makes one wonder what the Paris Hilton video might have been like if she were poor...in the middle east...during a terrorist sting operation. Still it's a cool visual to see all the laser pointers moving around. I freaked once or twice thinking the enemies had the same pointers so I thought I was being targeted. It is a nice way of allies being able to pick out exactly what direction you and your buds are aiming in.

There's one part of the demo that has you pick up what's called the "Javelin" which was a lock-on laser guided missile for mobile weaponry like tanks and helicopters. I didn't think that was real either after seeing it's ridiculous firing arc (the thing shoots straight into the sky and then turns dramatically crashing into the target from above). Then I saw this on youtube.com promptly demonstrating how much of an army n00b I be. Good times!

This is Totally Unreal

Unreal Tournament, one of the uber-shooter franchises for the PC once again rears it's not so ugly head. As one website described it, Unreal seems to be full of Gears of War rejects and graphically depending on your system the game itself can surpass even Gears' graphical splendor. Though that's according to Epic themselves and being that this is an FPS I would imagine that the graphics will indeed be impressive. As you can see from my very ugly screenshot (I can only take 1 at a time and believe me when I say it is HARD to get a good shot in this game while it's playing live. My best screen shot is one I took as I lost...that's rather telling) that even my system can push out a pretty impressive piece.

I do notice however that this may once again be one of those games where having HDR lighting means sacrificing anti-aliasing. It's not a big deal for those people with awesome setups who can bump up the resolution but for those of us who can only run games at a meager 1280 x 720 (ok...that is pretty high, but still...) I wonder if HDR is even worth it then? Though a few jaggies on a hi-res widescreen monitor is better than nothing. It's apparent though I need more RAM as 1 gig isn't sufficient to hold the frame rate at a stable pace. I can imagine that the PS3 version is being capped at 16 players online for that very reason. I did see a server claiming to be able to hold 256 players...though that's obviously NOT a good idea.

Unreal Tournament 3 returns us to the same exact game as previous renditions. What that means is it's the ultimate test of twitch shooting madness. Characters in UT run so fast at times it's hard to aim and snipers really are tested on their skills at that point. Imagine trying to play the game while finding time to hit the screen caps only to realize that you've got about .5 seconds to touch that button or you're minced meat. Hopping around and firing rockets or whatever you may have is once again the best option as the speed of the game is break-neck and forces players to almost spaz out in firing their weapons, sometimes with much luck you can get a kill or two off before you're eventually blown away by that one guy who has a Core 2 Quad + 8800GTSSUPERAWESOMEEDITION. The weapons return all unchanged except for the aesthetics but one thing I have to congratulate Epic on is the vehicles. That screenshot up there? That's something you can drive and as you can see from my perspective that was not a great place to be at all.

Over-all it's more of the same in the same way Halo 3 is more of the same but at the very least they decided that Gears of War looks so good that they should make UT3 look similarly impressive. For me, it's vomit inducing and I couldn't play it for more than 5 minutes. I'm sticking to Team Fortress 2.

20,000 Leagues under the Monster Hunter

Discovery in the New World!

These pictures speak for themselves, I don't have to say anymore. Found the images on e2046.com's forum site.
I wants these NOW!!

Bioshocked!

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/editorials/zeropunctuation/1394-Zero-Punctuation-BioShock

If you're ever gonna play Bioshock, please don't watch this fun review. If you're never gonna play Bioshock and you're a cynical PC Gaming bastard like I am, then this is one awesome review of the game that's most likely going to get game of the year in 7 categories for some bootleg cable channel reward show. I'm now returning to my cave in the ground as I'm most likely being hunted by Bioshock fanboys who can't stand to here anything even slightly bad about the "second coming"...

There Isn't Enough Monster Hunter

As mentioned below Monster Hunter Freedom 2 is killing all of our time in the whee hours of the morning. So here comes MORE MONSTER HUNTER. This is a newish (well old but newer) trailer for Monster Hunter Frontier, the Hunt continues for Japanese PC gamers not smart enough to purchase a PSP ^_^;. It uses Monster Hunter Dos as a base and basically brings that game as it is online with some nice additions. Those who have PSPs are getting roughly the same things however there are differences in exclusives. This PC version seems to have the rooster-rex (I call it that) wyvern as seen in the OST-book while the PSP release gets Tigrex as their exclusive creature. The town is also very different as the PC version is a large town created to hold literally up to 100 players at a time while the Freedom 2 gets the quaint and wonderful Pokke village. There's obviously more differences than that but it's good to know that if this hits North America, then there's going to be enough Monster Hunter for everyone! Perhaps a simple 360 port will be in the works?

Something to Keep an "Eye On"

The Wrath of 'Los

http://www.hlj.com/product/HAP80430

Too bad I found out about this a little late, but this is getting exciting. More and more Monster Hunter goods are appearing on the market and this one is a pretty darn awesome rendition of the Rathalos. Too bad the picture is cropped so close because I can't see if it has folded wingspans or if he's in full flight form there. Either way, this gets a big thumbs up from the Bard.

Fun in the Sun 2007

I swear, first we have Korean Revolutionary Colonies, then Castlevania in Korea, NOW we've got fun in the sun. So...how exactly is this related to Spanish colonial conquest?

I bet Maggi didn't design those : http://maggi.new21.net/

Hope This Isn't Just a Fairy Tale

http://kotaku.com/gaming/psp/folklore-psp-in-development-291556.php

After changing into a fresh pair of pants, I can safely type now. Kotaku is reporting from yet another source that they've confirmed a PSP version of FolkLore (FolkSoul in Japan). I loved the demo, it might not be the best game in the world but as the Shining Wizard mentioned...the Bard loves fairy tale creatures. If this game pans out the way it should, then Gaming Republic may just redeem itself for the real historical giant crabs. Only time will tell.

The (Simple) Art of War

Some of the friends of the Blacksmiths have asked questions about Granado Espada as it's a game that isn't widely known to them as they aren't avid players of MMO games. So to answer these questions I've made 2 more small clips that demonstrate exactly how a multi-character system can function in the simplest setup. I started this game playing with the Elementalist (Warlock), Scout and Warrior. This combo is a simple tank and AoE (Area of Effect) setup which most MMO players are quite familiar with. The unique thing about GE is the ability to switch between 3 characters and control all or none of them at all. By simply pressing quick keys (Alt+E or spacebar) one can set the characters up to Patrol Mode which basically tells the AI to react to enemies nearby in attack mode, similar to placing Gambits on partners in FF12 but a little more advanced as you'll see.



In this clip I set up my Warrior and Scout in Patrol Mode. After they position themselves I hit F1 to select my Elementalist (Galatea) and then hit F9 to switch to Individual mode. Individual mode makes it so that any commands I input only effect the person I am currently in control of so obviously Select All mode gives the commands to all of them. In this mode however, I am free to move Galatea all over the map and do anything I want, in this case it's to draw (or pull) enemies towards my Warrior and Scout. As they approach you'll notice that once they reach the field of vision the Warrior automatically runs forward and starts swinging away. The Scout also times heals based on damage percentage and automatically knows to heal since he is in the right Stance (stances dictate what abilities that character has to utilize). In this clip however he's idle because no one has taken enough damage.



In this second clip, you see what happens when things get more hectic. I ended up pulling much more than I needed to and at the same time some more enemies spawned behind my group. Things look a bit worrisome but anyone who's played MMOs a lot knows that a good plan always comes through. Here I use the aforementioned strategy of Tanking/AoE. The Warrior in this game is the same as WoW's in that they can provoke nearby enemies to focus attacks on them. By using this I can gather away all the nasties from my squishier characters (like Galatea). My Scout finally begins auto healing here and when they all get near, it's time to drop the bomb and call it a day. After clearing out most of the enemies with a well timed AoE spell, I clean up the stragglers and try unsuccessfully to show off Freezing Spear. Btw you can also hear in the distance someone else who was in the area. Apparently they tried to same thing with less success as you can hear their Elementalist bite the dust.

The Latest from Colonial French Korea!

Have you ever seen the map of Granado Espada? Well it's in the same shape as Korea itself. So does that mean Granado Espada is some sort of Spanish/French Korean alternate universe? Weird. Anyway, I thought I'd post up about the only thing that keeps players playing this game. Unlike most other MMO games, customizing characters is not entirely what Granado Espada is about. In fact you can argue that collecting more family members is ultimately more fun in this game than getting a silly hat or shoes. So here's the latest 2 that I added to mine :
That's Emilia Guilianno and Lisa Lynway. There's a more super version of Emilia named Emilia the Sage but I don't really feel like paying real money to get an Emilia that can fly. Lisa is just fine the way she is though. I also got a guy named Soho but I don't really feel like wasting Barracks space to create him.
So what about the rest of the family? They're fine, except for poor Raki there. He runs the expenses and he just realized how expensive his sisters are. At least he can take solace in the fact that now they level fast AND stylish!

Fun with Fraps

Here's a short clip I recorded from earlier while running around Al Queza Moreza (whatever I'm sure I didn't even spell that right much less got it close)? It's a test of fraps on this PC while running a game. For the test however I had to significantly lower the resolution (1024x768) from my usual resolution (1440x900) in order to get a size ratio and a smoother running recording. On my default size it slows down, though not too much. I also wanted it to fit the youtube.com size ratio rather than force feeding it a 16:10 video.



Oh and this one is thrown in for fun. A glitch that happens when you die every now and then is that your animation gets stuck. This one features the knockdown animation, which looks pretty funny.

More Fun with Oblivion

Using a new mod I found called Actor's-in-Charge (I think it's what it's called) I've been fooling around in Oblivion with a lot of different things. The mod basically gives your character the ability to use many different poses and also gives you a spell to cause others to do those poses as well. I've also input a free roaming camera to allow for better angles then the default ones. Finally using the magic of fraps I'm able to take screenshots of the game with anti-aliasing enabled, which finally shows what the game is capable of on this cheap eVGA 7600GS (it's not the best in terms of frame rate but that'll do donkey...that'll do).
I also decided to change my character's face. One of my friends doesn't look too kindly at the Alba, so I decided instead of decimating a real person's mug I'd try my hand at creating a custom one using Ren's Cosmetic Beauty pack which gave me this elf look. After downloading more mods including Remy's Fantasy Figures, I've been able to create a very attractive elf character. It's after all the goal of every fantasy dork out there to have a hot elf, Oblivion PC makes that ever more possible with modding. Also I noticed from some of the Japanese Oblivion sites that they tend to make mod pages where they take screencaps and write a mini-storyline for their characters. I'm not that obsessed but I thought that it'd be hilarious to try taking screens in a sequence without telling any story. See what you come up with?
My question though is why would an elf chick be thrown in jail? We all know the first 2 minutes of the game is a jailbreak which leads to this point in the game, but why would anyone throw someone like this in jail? With how absolutely FUGLY the ingame NPCs all are, this game needs more beautiful people which is for the first time a really good justification for having made such an attractive character. Maybe with all the fugliness around, it's like that episode of the Twilight Zone where the beautiful woman was horribly disfigured and the "regular" people were pig faces?
I screwed this one up a little, her arm is going right through the floor there. Oh and an explanation about the "armor" she wears, it came with one of the mods that added clothes for Remy's UFF. I decided to add to the sheer dork factor here I'd make her wear something that would recall that lol sound clip of the D&D with the Mountain Dew.
And we're done. So what kind of story did you create here? What do you think is happening? Oh and you can see it slightly but I have the improved Natural Environments mod added so the trees are bigger, though the skies in this shot are entirely clear of the weather effects. I also didn't catch any of the added insects or birds in the screen but futures posts with more fun are abound.
*Update : I just noticed it, but I did catch 1 fly buzzing around near her ear there.

Fun with Oblivion

Ah the best part about Oblivion for the PC is definitely the mods. So what mod did I use now that I've got the game running against it's will? Well, Jessica Alba of course! This has got to be one of the strangest things to do with a game, I gave my character here Jessica Alba's face thanks to those Face Gen guys and on top of that I gave her "BAB's" hot body mod to replace the mannish one they all come with. I just got started with the modding fun so far, but fear not as I get deeper into the game there will be more mischief. For now...it seems Alba needs to hunt some deer...

The other guys like Sean Connery are harder to make look decent as they require facial hair mods and that sort of thing. This works best with the clean faced individuals it seems.

*For some unknown reason Bethseda deemed it necessary to allow you only to take screencaps by modding the ini file...and on top of that it only works without full scene anti-aliasing on so Alba looks a bit rough on the edges.

Playstation 3 Unkillable According to Kotaku

http://kotaku.com/gaming/console-of-steel/the-ps3-is-unkillable-288962.php

Unkillable? I hope the folks at Kotaku realize what they stumbled upon. I hate to say this but if this state of matters proves true, then the Zombie Apocalypse Rating Index may just go straight to high. Unkillable? Zombies are unkillable. Are you saying that the Sony Playstation 3 is in actually one of the living dead!? Troubling times indeed...