Recently in games Category
I didn't have a great draft in any of the three drafts. In my brother's league, I totally forgot about the way-too-early draft date, so I had an autodraft without ever adjusting my pre-draft rankings. In my college buddy's league, I had to miss the live draft due to a volleyball game, and again neglected to adjust my pre-draft rankings. Finally, in the league I'm running at work, I was so busy trying to keep everyone else on track during our first-ever live and in-person draft, that I neglected my own team and ended up picking guys at random, not following the one list I did take the time to arrange.
Anyway, my teams are below. Already, in the first week, I have some questions I can't answer. Should I play Kevin Smith against the pitiful Falcons or high draft choice Larry Johnson against the awesome Pats? Should I go with Philip Rivers and injured TE Antonio Gates or stick in Brett Favre in his Jets debut along with one of my old, old, old WR backups? It's 2am Sunday morning, and I have no clue what to do. But you know what? That's what I sort of love about Fantasy Football: dwelling for days on decisions that are really meaningless in the grand scheme of things. I'm good at useless timewasters like that.
MY 2008 FANTASY FOOTBALL SQUADS:
League: Frazier's Fantasy Football (Yahoo!)
Team: THE CHAMP!
1. (1) LaDainian Tomlinson
2. (20) Ryan Grant
3. (21) Maurice Jones-Drew
4. (40) Wes Welker
5. (41) Roddy White
6. (60) Calvin Johnson
7. (61) Derek Anderson
8. (80) Adam Vinatieri
9. (81) Indianapolis
10. (100) Kevin Smith
11. (101) Fred Taylor
12. (120) Patrick Crayton
13. (121) Reggie Brown
14. (140) Mason Crosby
15. (141) Jason Campbell (dropped for Derrick Mason)
League: League of Pain (Yahoo! Plus)
Team: Big Mac's Marauders
1. (14) Marshawn Lynch
2. (15) Larry Johnson
3. (42) Plaxico Burress
4. (43) Wes Welker
5. (70) Chris Cooley
6. (71) Chris Chambers
7. (98) Jay Cutler
8. (99) Pittsburgh
9. (126) Ryan Longwell
10. (127) Kevin Smith
11. (154) Drew Bennett
12. (155) Ted Ginn Jr.
13. (182) Philadelphia
14. (183) Randy McMichael
15. (210) Kurt Warner (dropped for Chad Pennington)
League: Digital Gridiron (EA Sports)
Team: Hoosier Daddy
1 8 Clinton Portis RB
2 5 Ryan Grant RB
3 8 Torry Holt WR
4 5 Antonio Gates TE
5 8 Hines Ward WR
6 5 Joey Galloway WR
7 8 Philip Rivers QB
8 5 Julius Jones RB
9 8 Reggie Brown WR
10 5 Indianapolis DST DST
11 8 Brett Favre QB
12 5 Jerry Porter WR
13 8 Antwaan Randle El WR
14 5 Isaac Bruce WR
15 8 Josh Scobee
Already, I've made both good and bad decisions. Dropping Jason Campbell for Derrick Mason was most likely a solid decision. Dropping Kurt Warner before he got named the starter was a bad one. I hope that doesn't come back to bite me on the ass.
Even before we got our Wii, my wife and I discussed how it was only a matter of time before Microsoft and Sony copied the technology and came up with their own Wiimotes and games that used it.
Well, it looks like it will happen even sooner than we thought.
It makes sense, though. The XBox 360 and PS3 have much better graphics, better online services, and some great platform-exclusive games. Add in the unique controls of a Wii, and either platform instantly becomes the ultimate gaming machine. In fact, I probably wouldn't have bought a Wii if I'd thought either platform was close to mimicking the controls. As much as I like my current console, if I could have the best parts of it with the graphics and games from the other two platforms, I would've went with the competition.
I know posting embedded videos every day is a lazy way to maintain a blog, and really isn't giving my meager audience much. But when I find something that actually resonates with me, I want to share it.
The video below is funny to me on two different fronts: 1) My dad's favorite song has always been Cat's in the Cradle, or at least that's the one song he always used to get choked up over when we were kids. I never realized, until just recently, that it may've had something to do with the fact that his own dad died when he was relatively young. Or that my dad had another son who didn't live with us and whose life he wasn't allowed to be a part of. I just thought it was my dad being over-emotional over an obviously manipulative ballad based on a nursery rhyme. 2) I have a picture from when Maddie was an infant of me playing something on the PS2 while she sits in my lap, sucking her hand. I never play video games in front of the girls anymore, because the games I'm into recently are too violent and because they always steal the controller, wanting to play whatever I'm playing. But there was definitely a time when I tried to better balance my video game obsession with childrearing. It wasn't easy.
The video's funnier at the beginning than at the end, but I like most of what Dana Snyder and Dave Willis do, and this is no exception.
Well, to my surprise, SaySwap has really been a good experience for me so far.
I've been able to fill someone else's game request every two or three weeks, and have gotten several of my own requested titles in at an even faster pace. There are definitely still some bugs in their system, so the site can give you fits at random, but the actual game trading goes smoothly when not impeded by the technical errors.
In the short time I've been a member, I've sent away the following games:
- Frequency
- SSX
- Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance
- PaRappa the Rapper 2
- Silent Hill 2
- X-Men Legends 2: Rise of Apocalypse
- SSX 3
- Tekken 5
- Resident Evil 4
I've had people bite on Herdy Gerdy and Def Jam: Fight for NY, two of my worst games, but the interested parties canceled before I could unload the games on them.
In fact, that's the biggest flaw with the system, so far: That people can cancel the trade before you ever respond to their original trade request email. I found myself often following an email to the site only to find that there wasn't really a trade waiting for me. The user had canceled, but I got no update telling me as much.
Also, although SaySwap pays for domestic shipping, since you can't see a user's address until AFTER you accept a trade with them, it's impossible to know whether or not there's a fee involved until you're legally bound to send the person a game.
Beyond that stuff, however, I'm finding SaySwap to be a good investment. I've put less than twenty dollars in so far, and have gotten four decent games in return. I still have a trading token remaining, and some points to spend, so I plan on getting at least one more game under this initial investment. I count that as a success.
If you're interested in trying out SaySwap, let me know. I'll invite you so that I can get credit if you become a member. :) Of course, your mileage may vary. I think I had such success with the site because I'm asking for old-gen games. With everyone getting a Wii, Xbox 360 or PS3, people are probably more willing to give old PS2 games away. But if you join with the intent to get next-gen games, you may find yourself waiting by the mailbox.
Because I am a major copycat when it comes to all things Internet, I recently jumped from reading Thomas' review of the game-trading site, SaySwap, to becoming a member of the same site.
I have a bunch of PS2 games sitting around that I never play, and I realized that I wouldn't mind parting with a bunch of them if it meant getting different games to try out. So I signed up and listed my games. I actually listed everything I own, but I made sure to lock the games I wanted to hang onto. I really locked more than I should've, but mostly because I didn't want to give away more than I was getting. I figured that if I gave away too many and got nothing back, it would mean that I'd have less games for my brother or nephews to play when they came over. You know, because they're ALWAYS coming over to play my games.
Anyway, so far, I've had bites on three games I listed. One of the requesters was Canadian, and since the site only pays free shipping in the US, I decided not to trade with this dude. Another requester was listed as being "on vacation" at the time of his request for my game. So while it would let me contractually commit to sending the game within 48 hours, it wouldn't let me see his address. I decided not to enter into that obligation.
In the end, there was only one game I could send off, which I did yesterday. It's totally fine that more people aren't asking for my games. I have enough points between the free-for-signing-up points and the ones I got for trading that single game so that I can pretty much afford to get any game on my want list if one should become available. Of course, my want list isn't very long. There's not a lot of games that I want, and I kept my list narrowed down to the ones I really am interested in, lest I use up my points and tokens on a game I don't really care about.
Now, I guess I'm in a waiting game. For Thomas, it seems like it took MONTHS before he got a game in the mail. We'll see if one of my games comes quicker than that. Luckily, I can afford to be patient, considering I never really play the ones I do have, anyway. A new game will be something fun to play around with, but it's not like I'll be waiting by the mailbox for it to arrive.
If you're a SaySwap member, feel free to check out my games and ask for any you want. I only have PS2 games--it's the one console I own (though I hope to get a Wii eventually), and they won't take any of the HUNDREDS of PC games I have.
If you're not yet a SaySwap member, I urge you to join only if you have in your possession one of the games from my wish list. If you don't even own a PS2, you're of no use to me.
Kidding, of course.
One of the best things about being in Indiana for any length of time is getting to play video games with my nephews. In Atlanta, I just never play video games with other people. I mean, I don't play video games that often, anyway, with the kids always wanting attention. But when I do play, it's usually a solitary activity. I'll sit on the couch for an hour and play some Ratchet and Clank, or play some Dungeon Siege II on my PC, always by myself.
Heck, even in the online multiplayer game that I subscribe to, I play like a soloist. I rarely group, and sometimes pay the price when I take on enemies for which I should really have a team's support.
But when I'm in Indiana, I get to play games with the nephews and niece, and I love it. There's always a bit of a learning curve, since they own an XBOX and I'm a PS2 guy. But considering that none of them are yet teenagers, they're usually pretty predictable and unimaginative when playing competitively, which keeps me competitive even when I can't get the controls down quickly.
Tonight, I played video games with the boys off and on for several hours. Except we didn't play on the XBOX. One of my nephew's friends had come over for a sleepover and brought his Nintendo Gamecube. We played Super Smash Bros. Melee, Mario Kart Double Dash, NFL Street and NBA Live '06.
I wasn't the worst at Super Smash Bros., which is surprising as I'm usually bad at fighting games. I never won a battle, but I was the last one eliminated a couple of times. And since I made a point of trying every character, rather than sticking at the ones I was better at, I'm counting that as a moral victory.
I was a bit better at Mario Kart, coming in third twice, but then finally getting a first and a second. The same went for NBA Live, where I won my first game, but then got beat when playing 2 v. 2 with a partner that wanted to play as Spud Webb and insisted on launching threes constantly.
Finally, we had an NFL Street tournament. I was knocked into the consolation bracket with a first round lost to my oldest nephew. In my defense, we matched the better players up early so the younger players wouldn't just get eliminated by a powerhouse in the first round. If I had played my younger two nephews, I may have had a better change. In the consolation round, I found myself matched up against my niece. In this game, the first one to 36 wins. When I went up 24-0, I realized I should take it easy on the poor girl. Of course, that thinking backfired. I lost 36-34. I didn't mind losing, especially when I was running trick plays every series and trying not to score on a few drives. But it was sort of funny how serious everyone else was taking it. When I lost, more than one nephew came in to make fun of me for getting beat by a girl.
Despite having a far from perfect win-loss record, it was still fun getting to play some games. One of the things I miss most during fatherhood is the lack of guys' nights. As sad as it is, hanging with eight and eleven-year-olds playing Gamecube may be the best I can hope for.
I finally won this damn game! It must've taken me about sixty tries. My luck with dice is so bad that other people will watch me play and laugh at how the other guy beats me on almost every roll.
Last month, City of Heroes celebrated its second anniversary. Those who logged on during the month were entered to win cool prizes (I didn't win anything) and received badges to commemorate the occasion. Also, if you logged in over the last weekend of the month, you could attend an online, Silver Age-themed dance party, and could take unique missions that would require you to team up with other heroes or villains for special rewards.
In case you didn't already know, City of Heroes (and its companion game, City of Villains) is a massively multiplayer online roleplaying game based in a comic book world of superheroes and archvillains. It's sort of like Everquest, but with the Superfriends instead of elves and dwarves and such. It doesn't have a single-player experience--you have to create a hero and then log on to the shared, online world to take missions and fight crime. But you can run around by yourself in that world, if you wish. Within the game, you can join a superteam (like the Justice League or X-Men), or you can make a name for yourself without any help. The game gives you a lot of freedom to construct your own experience, while providing storylines, missions and other aspects to help you along.
See my City of Heroes slideshow!Considering the fact that I was an original beta tester for the game, two long years ago, I decided I would write a state of the union address, summarizing my thoughts on the game so far. I've been along for the entire ride, though I can hardly be called a power player (I only have two characters over level 9, and neither of those has gotten above level 25). I've also taken some time off, here and there, when I didn't feel like paying the monthly fee. Luckily, COH doesn't erase your characters or mess with your account while it's inactive, so I've always been able to jump back in and play whenever I felt like it. I've played often enough over the last two years, however, to feel like I can give an informed review of the game.
Obviously, two years of gameplay gives me a lot to talk about. In an effort to keep things organized, I've divided things up into "works" and "needs work."
Works:
- Character Designer - The game's designers have done an amazing job of giving the players a variety of options for creating just about any character they can imagine. From animal heads and tails to cyborg parts to manga/anime hair, if you can dream it up, you can design it. Sure, they're missing some physical features we see in comics, but they've done a great job building a library of costume choices. They've even done a great job ensuring that players don't create walking copyright violations (like a Hulk or Spider-Man in the game). In fact, they do a good enough job with this that they recently won a copyright lawsuit from Marvel Comics.
- Power Effects - By this, I mean the special effects that happen when using your powers. Some of these are less impressive than others. But overall, they rock. You'll often see vines growing from the ground to trap a villain or lightning shocking them into seizures. And in the next update, they've previewed a "landshark" attack. Awesome! It's one of the things that makes playing on a team fun.
- Teamplay - Speaking of teamplay, the game's creators have done a good job giving you a compelling reason to team up with your fellow heroes to fight crime. And they've built the powers and archetypes in such a way as to reward a team that has the right combination of abilities. Sure, there are some Leroy Jenkins-type players in the game, who do their best to get everyone killed. But when you're on a team with the right mix of players, all with the right attitude, it can make for some beautiful, large scale buttkicking.
- Level and City Design - When the game is named "City" of Heroes, you would expect the city to be a character in the story. And fortunately, it is. You actually play in a variety of cityscapes within this game, and the designers have done a good job giving them all some personality of their own. Skyway City does, indeed, have highways filling the air above you. Boomtown looks like a city that's been hit by a nuclear blast. Steel City looks like a comic book version of Pittsburgh, filled with factories, warehouses, and other industrial centers. Even the smaller mission maps look good, whether its un underground cave, a high-tech research facility, or an abandoned club. Sure, there could be more variety on those, and some of the underground missions are designed with such subtle shading that they're hard to navigate for a colorblind person like me. But the overall design of the game is beautiful.
- NPC Villains and Heroes - The villain types you take on during the game are each unique as a group, with further differences between individual members. Although you can feel, sometimes, like you're fighting the same guy over and over, visually, they've done a good job of making them all at least look different. And the powers have been divided up enough that you'll quickly discover that you prefer fighting one type of villain over another. For example, my guys are especially immune to blunt force trauma, so I'd much rather fight the kung fu stylings of the Tsoo than the flamethrower-wielding Longbow soldiers. The villains in the game cross every genre, from zombies to ninjas to robots to mafia men, and they each look cool in their own way.
- Community Events - These can be attributed more to the players than the designers, but the fact that they exist is a compliment to the open-ended nature of the game. The events you'll see while playing may vary from costume contests to death races, to dance parties or protests. The players of COH are pretty loyal and regular, and they do a good job of creating events that make you feel like you're part of a unified group, whether or not you actually know anyone within the game. There are even some online radio stations devoted solely to the COH experience. I highly recommend playing the game while listening to one of those--it's reminiscent of playing Grand Theft Auto while listening to the in-car radio.
- Updates - Although "Issue 7" is taking forever to come out, I have to admit that the creators of COH have been great about adding to and updating the features of the game as time goes by. From new missions, villains, and cities to new costume choices or character classes, they've managed to provide enough new content to keep the game feeling fresh, even after two years. In my opinion, this is an absolute must for a game that charges a monthly fee. When you pay something each month, you expect to get something new now and then. And this game delivers.
- Support - In the few instances where I've needed help, the in-game support team has been quick, efficient and courteous, getting me back up and running without any fuss at all. Even better, they've been non-judgemental, which is important, since most of my requests for support fall under the "I'm lost" or "I can't find the final bad guy" variety.
Needs Work:
- Supergroups - After two years, I still can't see the value of being in a supergroup. Sure, it gives you people to play with, but I find that I'm never online at the same time as SG members who are of the same level as me. And I play often and am in a huge SG! So I never end up teaming with my own Supergroup. The other "benefit" of being in an SG is supposed to be the base, but the only thing that's good for is the portals, since I'm apparently now allowed to play with the other items in it. There was supposed to be a way to do supergroup vs. villain group raids, where you could steal things from the others' base, but that never materialized. So all SGs are good for so far is they're a good place to donate influence.
- Bases and Salvage - Unless you run a Supergroup, salvage (items you collect off of the people you defeat) is worthless. The only use for this stuff is to create items in a base. And the only people that can do that are group leaders. Speaking of bases, like I said above, they're mostly worthless. Sure, they provide portals to allow you to jump from city to city. But in my experience, I can never find the portal I need, and the bases themselves aren't exactly user-friendly. Nothing is labeled within them, so you just have to click on everything at random. Sometimes, you'll get the "you don't have permission to do that" message, and sometimes you'll get instantly transported to some random location. Hardly useful to most players. And hardly the personalized HQs we were promised, since only the leader can construct or create anything within them.
- Travel - Why do you have to wait so long to get a travel power? You can't fly, teleport or superjump until you're well into the double digits, level-wise. This is ridiculous. So if you create a Superman-like character, he has to hoof it for half of the game. Any Nightcrawler clones can only wish for teleportation at first. I can't see a valid reason not to let people get around quicker in the game. You'll find that you spend half of your gameplay time, in the early levels, running through the cities. Not exactly action-packed stuff, there. The only reason I can think of to deny people easier travel is to force them to play the game at a slower rate, thus stretching the content out without adding anything new. Sounds like lazy design to me. I think you could give players travel powers up front, and just maybe keep them low level at first. Or, make them sacrifice some other area to get these powers. So a flying archetype can fly from day one, with maybe a cost somewhere else. At least, that's how I'd do it.
- Badges and Rewards - The biggest flaw in this game is its lack of a collectible system. As opposed to most MMORPGs, where you can get unique weapons and armor that change how your character plays and what they look like, there's no such thing in this game. You can collect "enhancements" and "inspirations" as you play, but neither of those consists of unique items, or changes how you look or what your powers do. They're all just heals and boosts to your existing powers. I think the lack of collectibles and a barter/trade system is what makes this game less addictive and obsessive as Everquest or WOW. And the badges they give aren't much help, considering they also fail to change anything about your look, your skills, or your experience. I'm not sure this part of the game will ever change, so I'll have to just deal with it. But adding some sort of collect/barter system that actually lets you change things up would really improve the game for me.
- Storylines - I hate to bash the storylines within the game, because I think a lot of work went into them, and they all contain good writing and creativity. The only problem is that, for the most part, they don't mean anything to the game. You can play a mission and totally ignore the text screens that pop up explaining the story. Once the mission is completed, that storyline won't carry over or effect anything else you do, anyway. They're there to give purpose to what you do, but they don't have any real effect or lasting value. Even the longer storylines that involve multiple missions are worthless, as finishing them only gets you a badge or enhancement (see above), neither of which has much lasting value. The worst thing about the storylines, however, is the fact that if you play with more than one character, each one could potentially get the exact same storyline. There's a very linear approach with no randomization, so if you make similar decisions with consecutive heroes, you'll perform the same missions, making for a boring repeat experience.
- Animations - While the design and animations look good, overall, my complaint here is based on how the animations change per bodytype. Rather, I'm bothered by the fact that they DON'T change for different bodytypes. If you have a kick power for your lithe acrobat character, it will look exactly the same as it does for your stiff, bulky brute. I hate seeing my hulk-like brute do Karate Kid kicks and graceful backflips. But my only other option is just to not take new powers for him. I wish the powers had a better variety of animations, so if a small character took it, it would look like a flip kick, but on a bigger character, it would look more like a straight-on kick.
- City of Villains - City of Villains is fun. It's just like City of Heroes, for the most part. But that's the problem I have with it--it's just not unique enough to make me feel justified in owning both. Sure, the character designs are darker, and the cities/villains are more violent and wartorn. But other than that, there's not much difference. In fact, if you visit "Pocket D", the club that both heroes and villains can visit, you'll find it hard to tell the two apart. There's just not that much difference in the two types of characters or in the experience between the two games. I'm not sure what I want here. Maybe more destructive ability, or the ability to randomly take out NPCs. Just something to make the villain experience feel different than the hero experience. And right now, it's just not there.
- Comic Book - It started out as a real comic that was shipped to all subscribers. Sadly, it sucked. So how do they fix it? They hire some big name creators to work on the book....then stop sending it out to people. Sure, you can download it for free, but who does that? And who buys the comic in stores, knowing it's just promotion for the game? It was a good/obvious idea to make a comic book based on a comic book game, but it's never quite lived up to its potential.
So there you have it, two years' worth of thoughts on City of Heroes. I still enjoy the game, and play it regularly. In fact, last night, I finally got the villainous Gulag to move up a level (he's now level 23). But I'm playing on a gamecard I got for Christmas right now. When that expires, who knows if I'll decide to start paying to play again. Lord knows I have enough other free things pulling at my time.
I think I'll probably wait for "Issue 7" to come out, and see if that helps me make up my mind. Some of the features it's supposedly bringing to the game sound pretty cool. And it may help make the villain and hero experiences feel a little more different than they currently do. (Can you say "more different?" I've done it three or four times already.)
Soon, I'll post some info and pics of the characters I've created in the game. More for my entertainment than for yours, but maybe you'll get a kick out of what I've constructed. If you have any questions about the game, feel free to ask in the comments below. And if you're a player, let me know which server and what your character name is, and I'll look you up. I'm still disappointed that I've never played with any Atlanta residents and have played with only one person I know in the real world. I know there have to be some more locals in the game, right?
When I saw Seth's post about this, I was amazed. I thought for sure he'd be a master, considering he's the only one of us that has an NES in his cube. I also thought I might do better than his lowly NOOB score. I was wrong. The jump in difficulty (and obscurity of the titles) from the easy to hard levels on this quiz will take out any wannabe NES fan.
I have been humbled.
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