So for the past week or so me, anarchist and hiddendeth have been playing age of empires online. The game is like crack for us we couldn’t stop playing it. The is kinda of different from the other games. This one you build your capital city threw quest. We did pvp against one another to see who was better. What stopped us for a couple of days were the bots. Them bots don’t play games on age of empires. We finally took them down and it wasn’t barely neither we took them down hard. Now age of empires is so much fun to play. Games like that make you think really hard about what you’re going to do and its all more challenging on what you’re going to do. What makes it hard is that you don’t know what your opponent  is building and don’t know if they are building an army for you. Now after a while the resources start to deplete and people start to get desperate so they send troops in and try to take it over what we call pillaging and when hidden starts to get attack he does what we call run and go make town center. See we have good time playing which really counts i guess. All and all the game is really good  I have some problems with it like the game is kinda glitchy but that’s when we build a really big army, the severs have a bad connect sometimes but when the game gets started everything is good. Now i would give this game a 7.5 out of 10

(I wonder if the silly face I’m pulling is why Sara is laughing? But how would she have seen it?)

 (An Adventure Begins)

Braid is a game with themes surrounding perfection in one’s life and in one’s relationships. The main character faces isolation, regret, and yet also feels a sense of pride in his accomplishments to that point. Our own lives can often include the same deep sense of paradox. This game is as much a poem about love and it’s consequences, the sources of its archetypes, and our cultural understanding of it, as it is about the incredible gameplay.

(Sara found lots of interesting things at the beaches we went to)

Symbols saturate the game. And yet, what is most impressive is the cohesion of symbols and gameplay. In one puzzle, a wedding ring falls into a pit of fire if the player does not take the simple action necessary to pick it up while retrieving the key, or object of focus for that level. Themes of neglect permeate the game, and it was impossible for me not to feel a deep sense of poignancy at my mistake at this moment. I may have retrieved the key, may have succeeded in my objectives, but I had dropped what was most sacred to me, in fact the very motivation for the rest of the game. So often and so easily we forget to hold sacred to our values and motivations, to remember that instinct serves us.

(Bacon Bourbon Chocolate Milkshake.)

The game does not leave us with one message. Rather the gameplay and symbols repeat in a catalogue of time travel tropes in order to show us deep messages and dangers of our own viewpoints.

The final level of the main storyline is a powerful example. Each set of stages has a theme of time travel associated with it. Either your actions are taken again by your shadow of the past, you can manipulate time, or as in the case of the final level, you walk in a world where everyone else moves backward (Merlin may recall this level as his favorite, if he ever reverses his age far enough to play).

At the very last moment of the level we see the princess descending a vine, held by a night. This is a structural change for us, as we have been led to question the princess’ existence. We have also been taught to wonder whether finding the princess will be good for us, because of the analogy of a map of our personalities holding us captive under its scope. The princess may have an image of us that we must conform to so closely as to lose the rest of ourselves inside it, and even as we try to rescue her, we fear what might die in us trying to keep her happy.

(Sara and I went to Wrecker Beach so she could see the Pacific. It was amazing)

We follow the princess as she opens gates for us, saves us from fire, stops the flow of our enemies, and desperately tries to keep up with us, needing our help once again to open a wall between us. I found it hard not to fall in love with a partner who went to such lengths to reach us and help us reach them. The symbiosis evolves beautifully in the gameplay.

Found awesome trees to hug @Stanley Park 

At the end of the stage you reach the princess, finally able to save her, but you cannot move through a window to stand next to her. Old habits of gameplay inform the player to shift time backward, so that you might find an alternate way into the house to save the sleeping princess.

(Sara loved the waterfall by Mt. Rainier)

Only, when you go backward the game shows us another gap in our expectations.

We can no longer move in the old direction, the direction of difference, the direction of other.

As we move along the old path, and watch the princess, we might recall that she was moving backward in relation to us. She was trying to escape us, not bring us together. I found it impossible not to see in her desperate pixel eyes the same fear of loss of personality that the player might feel for her. With every wall that falls the princess no longer seems to press against it, but now seems relieved to have placed another barrier between her and the man who would seek to define her, to hold her forever in the prison of his expectations.

(Sara took us high into the woods by deep cove)

And in a most poignant moment of tropes, we learn that we were the villain all along. The knight was her rescuer, and Tim, gentle, awkward Tim who adventures in a ruffled suit, was the dragon she sought to escape. All those years of rescuing princesses from castles in games and Braid is pointing out a major flaw in the message.

(Sara is serene when she climbs)

May the map we make of others never be mistaken for the person themselves. May those we love always find us ready for surprise and able to give them priority over our expectations of them. May they do the same for us. This is one of the complex messages I took away from Braid and its gameplay interaction with its story. I would be curious to hear what others thought of this work of art.

(Park by my house and best sushi place I’ve found)

This 80′s style spoof of Far Cry 3 is actually pretty good, there are two ways it could have gone the idea was going to work or it was going to go horribly wrong. With its 16-bit pixilated cutscenes and 80′s neon future paint job it’s a game pulled out of the 80′s and into our time.

A copy of Far Cry 3 is not needed to play FC3 Blood Dragon as it is a XBOX Live Arcade/PlayStation Network title, aside from the name Blood Dragon appears to have no real connection as far as actual story is concerned.

Nearly all elements of gameplay have been simplified and re-skinned including the side challenges manhunt, predator and capturing bases. This doesn’t mean the game is less fun though, when you pilfer enemies you can take their cyber hearts which can be thrown to lure Blood Dragons into a group of enemies when nearby and if you lower the shield on a base your trying to capture a Blood Dragon will storm in and help you out (as long as you stay out of its way and don’t attack it).

The animals you hunt in the game have even had a paint job be it a Cyber Shark, Mutated Buffalo or Devil Goat, really Devil Goat? Is there a need to make a goat sound so evil?

I recently did a animal hunt side mission I don’t know how I didn’t get the reference from the description of the mission but I actually laughed when I realised what was going on considering the location, what was around me and the animals I was hunting.

The game even has cheesy 80′s style action movie quotes like when I killed one of the enemies with a my shotgun out character Sgt. Rex “Power” Colt said ‘he called shotgun’ or ‘I called shotgun’ an I found it awesome.

FC3: Blood Dragon is enjoyable, I would say its for people who have a love for 80′s action movies or Far Cry 3 fans that want to experience the game in a different way. If your not sure on it download the free trial, it’s what I did but then again all I did was watch the opening cutscene and see how the game started and I knew it was for me so it was purchased.

Thank you for reading and happy gaming.

You know for a reality how strong social networks can be in today’s time. Its power even transformed the planet of internet marketing and advertising in a significant way. Whether you are offering something on the internet or you just want to encourage the web site you are web hosting, you can definitely make use of social networks. One particular of these social networks is Twitter. Till recently, it is only employed for expressing personal sentiments or team messaging. Nevertheless, Twitter has currently absent outside of a follow me and I will adhere to you set up considering that it has now turn into an essential instrument for internet marketers. Now, if you are producing use of Twitter for your world wide web marketing and advertising, you definitely know that if nobody follows you, your objective of advertising your web organization will never ever be achieved. But, with so a lot of men and women and companies environment up their personal Twitter accounts, it is indeed challenging to contend and stand out. Properly, if that is the scenario, you really have to put your have confidence in into a professional Twitter track record maker.

This is the method utilized by many Twitter customers nowadays to make eFlip software their website page appear a lot more specialist and to increase their world wide web advertising advertising. It allows folks to actually know who you truly are and what you are actually pushing for. As they often say, a image paints a thousand terms. Therefore, if there are pertinent photos depicted in your Twitter webpage, for confident everyone will be enticed to know much more about what you are making an attempt to advertise. With the support of a Twitter track record maker, it is easier for you to design and style the total web page and contain appropriate images and texts to generate a fantastic impact to your followers.

Aside from permitting individuals to take a glance at your web page, it is also a way of branding uniqueness to your webpage. You can now pour out all your imaginative juices so that your page will entice far more men and women to study and sooner or later comply with you. Effectively, in the world of world wide web advertising and marketing, as they usually say, it really is a dog eats pet to survive.

First up is Ultimate Dodgeball, which is a more or less straight telling of the actual sport.  And that’s the biggest problem with it.  Dodgeball doesn’t really lend itself well to video games on its own.  Without having over-the-top wackiness sprinkled on, such as the case in the still-popular-to-this-day (though I don’t understand why myself) Super Dodgeball.  Ultimate does have some power shots and special moves, but as a digital sport, it’s light on the excitement and gets old quickly.

Yep, that’s Dodgeball. Look at it, all Dodgebally.

Don’t get me wrong.  Ultimate Dodgeball is fundamentally a well made game, with intuitive controls.  Except when it came to catching the balls, which neither myself nor my playing partner (hey Cameron!) could get the hang of even after hours of practice.  There’s online play as well, which is the reason why this review is delayed by several months, as the original build was not stable.  All problems with it seem to be fixed, and we were able to enjoy a few rounds.  While it can be fun, it just doesn’t have staying power.  I guess I’m leaning towards a tepid recommendation.  But really, this game doesn’t need to exist.  I think there are much better options for games on Xbox 360 where the object is to launch projectiles at enemies to, ahem, eliminate them.

Ultimate Dodgeball was developed by K-Dog Games (80 Microsoft Points miss the Dodgeball league they had on Gameshow Network).

Ultimate Dodgeball is Chick Approved and ranked on the Indie Gamer Chick Leaderboard.

A review copy was provided to Indie Gamer Chick for the purposes of testing out online multiplayer.  The copy played by the Chick was paid for with her money.  The review copy was given to a friend who had no feedback in this review.  Consult the FAQ for how review copies work at Indie Gamer Chick. 

Next up is Avatars on the Edge, which is sort of a skateboarding-race game that feels like a bad Mario Kart clone.  This is one of those titles where you play it and feel like the potential for something a cut above average has been laid, but it’s not ready for primetime yet.  The biggest problem is that the track layouts are confusing.  Avatars on the Edge does an admirable job of giving you a sense of speed, but you often have no idea which way you’re supposed to go.  The only help the game offers is a red beacon, but otherwise you have to trial-and-error your way through each course, which is not the type of gameplay I’m looking for in a racer.  Even worse is the insane requirements to unlock each new stage.  You have to hit a target time in order to progress, but those times are too short, probably from the developers being too good at their own game and not realizing that the rest of us haven’t spent our lives practicing at it.

Props to the team behind this for the graphics and frame-rate, which only had a few brief hiccups. However, some of the courses look awful, with too much blacks and not enough texture. Gives the game an unfinished look.

Avatars on the Edge also has problems with fairness.  I played an online race set on a monorail track.  Because your character moves so fast and the controls are so loose, making narrow turns and taking sharp corners is frustrating.  Still, I was doing pretty well on this particular race.  Then the train came around again.  The strip you have on the side of the track is far too thin and leaves no margin for error, and thus I got smacked by the train.  But then, when I respawned, the train was still there and I got splattered again the very moment I came back.  Hmmph.  Finally, I respawn for the second time in a row, only it put my character on the edge of a cliff, and there was no way I could correct it, leading to me dying for the third time in just a few seconds.  That whole sequence pretty much sums up everything wrong with Avatars on the Edge.  Crappy stage layouts, overly difficult requirements placed on players, and unfair mechanics.  With a lot of patchwork, something good might come of it someday, but for now, this game sucks.

Avatars on the Edge was developed by Mancebo Games (80 Microsoft Points liked this much more than their previous effort, the very dull Zombies Ruined My Day)

Finally, Terranon Worlds.  It’s the first game I’ve played on XBLIG that uses Asteroid style controls, which I’ve never been a fan of.  I think gaming has come a long ways since 1979.  Since that time, there’s been an amazing innovation called a “joystick” that allows for more precision movements.  Here, the stick is used just to aim you, while you have to manually fire thrusters.  I didn’t make it too far into Terranon Worlds though.  The enemies are too small, your are bullets too slow, and aiming is too imprecise.  Worst yet, the amount of enemies ramps up so quickly and they’re so picture perfect in their movements and aiming that the game quickly becomes unreasonable.

Plus, the upgradable stat thing is bungled horribly.  The worst part is how you have a limit on how many bullets you can fire at once.  This was an utterly awful idea given the sheer volume of enemies, and how tough it is to line up an accurate shot.  You have to spend the majority of the game running away from enemies while you wait for your bullets to refill.  You can upgrade these things, but the game becomes too overwhelming before you have enough points to put an acceptable amount of muscle in them.  Having said that, there’s a “free mode” where you get a ton of money right out of the starting gate to upgrade stats, and I still never found the gun was well done, even fully pumped up.  At best, I didn’t have to worry about my bullets running out.  Shooting was still too difficult because the enemies are too small and too fast.  I don’t know if multiplayer takes the ease off either, because nobody was willing to dive into this with me.  Can’t say I blame them.  If I got swimming through raw sewage, come out smelling like shit and complaining about how nasty it was, it’s hard to convince people to join you the next time.

Well, at least the enemies look like they get bigger. Wait, why did the game start out with the smaller, harder to shoot enemies? Shouldn’t the bigger ones that make easier targets have been the tutorial-level baddies?

While I dig Terranon Worlds’ neo-retro vibe, it just isn’t fun.  Some older concepts can be done today with modern sensibilities and become spectacular.  Look at We Are Cubes.  Look at Orbitron.  Look at Minigame Marathon.  These are games that take tired ideas and make them work again.  You can’t just dig up antiquated game mechanics, throw upgradable stats in, and expect it to still be relevant in today’s climate.  The developer of Terranon Worlds did that, and his game suffers for it.  He should have asked himself what could be improved with the original formula.  The tiny enemies, for example.  I always hated picking off the last tiny fragments in Asteroids.  Some kind of aiming bar, or cross-hairs, or homing shots might have improved that.  Instead, you have to watch while your bullets miss and the enemies leave you no room for second chances.  That’s what frustrates me about Terranon Worlds.  The formula wasn’t worked with enough to make it palatable.  Also known as Pepsi Next Syndrome.

Terranon Worlds was developed by Snargosoft (80 Microsoft Points think whatever chances that Asteroids movie had of being made were probably sunk by Battleship in the making of this review).

This took a lot longer than I thought, I have to admit this one hurts me…a lot…I’m a longtime fan of the series and this one was like a knife to the back from Konami then again I suppose it could just be me as well. At any rate off we go.

Graphics – Of all the things, the graphics are probably one of the few high points here. It’s a 3DS game so naturally there are some 3D elements there, mostly just adding depth and nothing more which is a good thing.

Story – The story here has to be one of the worst I’ve seen if in Castlevania’s history which is really saying something since they’ve had their fair share of crummy stories but this one goes even beyond bad. You start off as playing Gabriel through a form of tutorial as he fights an ancient evil…not Dracula just some other evil. While Gabriel is away his wife gives birth to Trevor whom you may or may not remember from games in the past. Once Trevor is born three monks, or holy men, something along those lines convince Gabriel’s wife that evil is coming and the baby needs to be hidden away so naturally she lets three strange men take her newborn son. At the same time Gabriel is busy being turned into Dracula…yeah…that’s what I said, and years go by and Trevor has a son of his own, Simon, another familiar name. Through the years (and if you think about the fragmented chronology of the series) Trevor at some point fought and defeated is suddenly vampire lord father then of course had a son but somewhere in there Dracula had one too by the name of Alucard. This particular game focuses on both Simon and Alucard as they go after Dracula though you spend a lot of time mostly playing as Simon.

Gameplay – Gameplay is pretty straightforward, it may have 3D elements to it but aside from that it’s very much like nearly every other Castlevania game, side scrolling and all which is what I personally prefer when it comes to Castlevania.

Sound – Regardless of how I feel about the rest of the game, for the most part the music and general sound of the game is excellent and holds up to the franchise history so thankfully they didn’t screw it up.

Replay Value – Unlike a lot of the series, this one has already been relegated to the trade in pile, I know I can’t see myself playing it again and there really isn’t a lot there to make someone go back once they’ve finished the game.

Final Score – 3/5

In the end this was just an okay game, nothing spectacular, nothing that really stood out other than the story and not in a good way unfortunately. I would say it’s worth a rental but nothing more than that and definitely don’t get your hopes up too high either or they quite possibly will be crushed.

~FA~

PS: Happy May the 4th fellow Star Wars fans, yes I know I could have done something Star Wars related but I’m a little behind and trying to catch up

The Settlers of Catan

Summary

The Settlers of Catan is a multiplayer board game. Players collect resources to build settlements, roads, and cities. At the end of the game, the player who first accrues ten points from combining settlements, cities, and victory points wins. Players are not eliminated through the game. The game board consists of 19 numbered hexagonal terrain elements, each producing one type of a resource. Players build settlements and cities at the intersection of the terrains, and collect resources, in the shape of cards (brick, ore, grain, lumber, and wool), by rolling dice. When a player has a settlement on certain numbered cards, rolling the number causes the terrain to produce resources. Then, they use the resources collected to build more settlements, roads, and cities. They can also trade their resources with others in order to have the appropriate number of specific resources to build.

Critical Evaluation

Although the recommended age for the game is 10 to 14 years old, this is a game that teens and young adults will enjoy playing. The game is simple to learn, but it also involves a considerable amount of strategy in order to win. The building and trading aspects are challenging because each player has to consider the odds of rolling a certain number, and being able to collect the right amount of resources to build. The tiles can also be rearranged for each game, creating new combinations of resources. This combination of simplicity and ability to expand and improve on winning strategies is what makes the game a favorite of beginner and advanced board game fans. It is also what make the game a great choice for teens. Library game nights are usually focused on games for children – whether it be board games or video games. The Settlers of Catan is a great option for a game night for teens. Unlike most of the children’s board games common in libraries, it does require some organization. The game needs  to be set up, and supervised for beginner players, and may take an between one and two hours to play and at least three people. It can be used as part of a game program at the library, or available for in-library use by interested patrons.

Reader’s Annotation

The Settlers of Catan is a multiplayer board game centered around collecting resources and building settlements to earn points.

Website: http://www.catan.com

Genre

Fantasy. Board Game.

Curriculum Ties N/A

Interest/Reading Level

Grade 6+

Challenge Issues: none

Challenge Defense Ideas:

The book presents no apparent challenge issues, but prepare to defend selection by having library’s selection policy at hand.

Reasons for Inclusion

Board game appropriate for a teen audience.

Starting with the graphics.  Not only are they ugly, but they get in the way of gameplay.  Because of the colors selected for backgrounds, it causes severe problems in judging distance between platforms.  As a result, Avatar Trials comes across like an evil eye exam developed by an unscrupulous optometrist who wants to pad his wallet by making every patient he sees think they’re going blind.  Combine this with one of the most spastic, uncooperative cameras I’ve encountered in years.  At the most inappropriate times, it will swing around and zoom in on a wall.   Not even a pretty wall, either.  I mean, if it was a close-up of the Great Wall of China or the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem, I could understand why the camera would focus on it.  It would be pretty fucking cool to see.  These walls?  They look like someone threw a box of crayons and a blank piece of paper into a cement mixer and scanned the results into the game.

None of the screen shots from Avatar Trials selected for the market seem to show actual gameplay. Just shots of the map.

These problems might be worth looking past if the controls were well done.  However, movement is extremely loose and jumping is too floaty.  In a game where judging distance is already an issue, having anything less than pin-point precision in movement would be a fatal blow.  That’s the case here.  Platforms will be overshot even when you feel you’re being conservative in jumping.  Or sometimes you’ll get right up to a ledge and leap for it, only to completely short what looked like a small distance.  Plus, the that damn camera never stops being a bastard, so sometimes you’ll make a straight across jump only for the camera to swing wildly to the side, throwing off your angles and causing you to fall to the ground, or sometimes to your death.  And, if you manage to somehow get past all these issues without swearing off games in disgust, Avatar Trials will throw some nifty glitches at you.  The most common one seems to getting stuck hanging on walls that aren’t there.  It happened to me several times, and apparently it happened to Timothy H. Hurley Esq. as well.  But, I have Hurlmeister topped, because sometimes when I was hanging on the invisible wall, I would let go and get stuck, or outright fall through the world geometry.  I’ve played some truly inept 3D games on XBLIG, but I can’t think of one that is this bad on this many levels.

Look, it’s a student project.  I get it.  And believe me, I get no pleasure pulling this thing apart like a vulture does with carrion.  But, Avatar Trials: Ninja Uprising was dead on arrival and my job is to explain why.  Also, regardless of whether this is a student project or not, it’s also a commercial game that costs real money for people to own.  Maybe I expected too much from this, on the grounds that it comes from students who apparently took the same courses as the team behind the increasingly better looking Magnetic By Nature.  I’m not sure why the quality is so low that it can only be reached by submarine.  I would think maybe the team behind this partied too hard and studied too little, but we’re talking about the University of Utah here.  I think their idea of a party is sneaking a caffeinated beverage into the dorms.  Perhaps I’m completely wrong about the intentions though.  Maybe the assignment was to create the most broken, unplayable game possible, and then after it was released, fix it.  If so, A+ on the effort for part one.  Having said that, I would sooner believe the Titanic could be seaworthy again before anything could be salvaged from Avatar Trials.

Avatar Trials was developed by Stunt Bear Games

80 Microsoft Points noted that all the students and educators involved in the University of Utah’s Entertainment Arts and Engineering program have been class acts and are deserving of encouragement and support in the making of this review.  Just don’t buy this fucking game.

Have you grown tired of cutting a rug with Ubisoft yet? Based on how well the Just Dance series continues to sell, probably not. Just Dance 4 is the recent main-line entry to the series that’s mostly another one of those. However, for fans of the series, that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Also, the Wii U version that I’m playing has a few console-exclusive perks that may be enough get you back on the dance floor once again.

At its core, this is the same Just Dance you’ve been playing since its inception. With your Wii Remote in hand, you follow the on-screen dance moves as best you can. All of the pros and cons of this control scheme carry over to the Wii U, so there should be no surprises. Personally, I’ll always hold the game’s inability to tell you exactly how to score a perfect on every single move against it. However, the counterpoint to that is the fact that Dance Central‘s insistence on accuracy makes it harder to break out at a party and have everyone enjoy it.

Just Dance 4‘s setlist covers a wide range of different musical artists from Elvis to Carly Rae Jepsen. The nature of the setlist is such that you probably won’t like everything, though it should appease most in a party environment. The vast majority of these songs are original recordings, though there are still a few covers strewn about. I personally can’t stand the use of covers in most music games, and here is no exception. You can shore up your playlist with downloadable DLC, though your previous songs won’t carry over, and as of writing there’s only 15 downloadable songs available without any more on the horizon as far as I know. Step your licensing game up, Ubisoft.

Having played 1 and 2 in the past, the choreography is fairly solid, though many of the dances are starting to feel the same. Not sure if it’s because they’re recycling dance moves from the previous games, or if it’s because they’re sticking a bit too closely to the choreography formula that they seemingly employ on every song, but the phenomenon is noticeable to series veterans.

The franchise isn’t really known for its presentation value, though I do enjoy watching the dance routines when the visual accoutrements match the song. At its best, it’s like you’re watching a fancier classic iPod commercial dedicated to that song. My favourite is Rock Lobster, as that one actually has a dancing lobster in it. At its worst, the visuals don’t match the song at all. Rick Astley’s Never Gonna Give You Up is the worst offender by far. Sure, the source material doesn’t give you much to work with, but the super hero motif and dance moves Ubisoft went with feel horribly out of place. Thankfully, there are only a handful of fringe cases like this.

Not sure if this is new to the franchise or not, but it has a number of additional incentives to keep playing. As you complete songs, you gain points that go towards a Mojo meter. Each time that meter reaches a new level, you’ll get the ability to randomly unlock something, such as a new game mode, playlist, or dance routine variation for an existing track. There’s no shortage of things to unlock, though the trade-off is that some of the cool game mode stuff that arguably should be available from the outset are buried behind this.

On the Wii U, you’re getting three extra songs: Want U Back by Cher Lloyd, Domino by Jessie J and a cover of Christina Aguilera’s Ain’t No Other Man. You’re also getting access to a number of Wii U specific functions. Off-TV Play is curiously present, though I have a hard time imagining a use case where dancing in front of your Wii U Gamepad is something anyone would want to do. While one of your dance partners is in the thick of it, you can also use the Wii U Gamepad to draw on the main screen, pull up lyrics to the song, or pick the next track. The most involved use of it is in Puppet Master mode, where its used to select the dance moves just before your dance partners have to execute them. Aside from the ability to cue up songs, most of this is superfluous in nature.

For its intended audience, Just Dance 4 is probably another serviceable entry in the series that will liven up parties until the next one comes out. Steff and I have played our fair share of Just Dance in the past, and we yet again had fun with the new one. With that said, there’s clearly room for improvement and the Wii U version doesn’t do much to play to the platform’s strengths. With the Wii U lineup being as dry as it is, this may not be a bad idea if you’re still looking to shake your booty. At the very least, you can make things better by buying Gagnam Style from the eShop.

Buy Just Dance 4 Now on Amazon.com

GTA V- Trailer 1

GTA V will be located in and around a fictional place called Los Santos in the state of San Andreas.  These places are based of of Los Angeles and Southern California. This game is an open world action-adventure game which means the map is pretty much limitless and the player has complete freedom to move around anywhere they want and interact with the environment. This allows players to follow the story line and complete the missions or they can choose to completely ignore the story line and just roam freely doing whatever they please. This map is so big that is it said to be larger than the maps of red dead redemption, Grand Theft Auto San Andreas, and Grand Theft Auto IV combined, now thats one big map. There is also a multiplayer included in Grand Theft Auto V. This has a social team playing mode called “crews”.  As of right now they havent told us exactly how it is going to be working but we have seen the “crews” gameplay before in Max Payne 3, so it may be something like that. This game has not just one or two but three main characters that the player can switch between them during the game and at some points in the game the trio will be working together.  The three main characters name are  Michael, Trevor, and Franklin. Players can switch characters at nearly any time throughout the game play and each character having a distinct personality, skill set, and a group of friends. When the player is controlling one of the characters  the other two will leave and do something else on their own to help out.  

 

For any more information you can go to http://www.rockstargames.com/V/ and check out all cool traits that Grand Theft Auto V has to offer and also check out GTA V’s second trailer here as well.

Associated with TechCircuit http://www.techcircuit.net

Twitter: Josh@the_gamemana – Shawn@game_mana

Vx.

A two land hand with a Coral Helm Commander was how I started, and it took a while before I had mana to do anything else. I turned Balthor’s Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth into an island, but sent attacks towards Bolas (getting a Sol Ring). Thada died and was re-cast twice. Bolas got knocked out of the game, and while my Seasinger was doing its darnedest to prevent Balthor from getting crazy, I was unable to keep up. A last ditch attempt to get enough merfolk on the table to make use of Balthor’s Coat of Arms came up short, though it almost looked as if I could pull it off. It was a fun game.

About the Deck (tappedout.net coming soon)

This deck was my first mono-blue deck. It started out as an Empress Galina deck with a “Counter and Steal” theme that was partial Merfolk Tribal. Now it can play with either Empress or Thada as the boss. Thada is quicker, and less likely to get killed right away, so I only play Empress if the other Thada player is around.   It still has a counter and steal theme, but I’ve added a few more merfolk in to it. It’s not one I reach for often, but I’ve had some really fun games with it in the past.

What game am I talking about? This:

I have a bunny that does stuff like this on a regular basis.

Yes, I’m talking about Mirror’s Edge. Oh my gosh I love this game. Its colors, its music, the unique feel of it… I’m getting ahead of myself. Let me back up.

It was the year 2008 and I was bored out of my skull. I had grown tired of shooters (the only kinds of games I ever played at the time) and was out of interesting books to read. It was a dark time, a time of misery, and the end of post high school graduation euphoria (the college scene was ok but we’re talking games here, not real life). All in all, everything was just ok but could have been better.

Then this game came out. It looked so different! The colors were gorgeous and strong. Brilliant whites, vibrant reds, shocking yellows and greens, it was like nothing I had ever seen before and a welcome change from the drab browns and greys that dominated all the shooters I was playing. The gameplay focused more on running and parcouring around the rooftops of a city while trying to escape the cops rather than just mowing down hundreds of boring Locust, Nazis, Communists, Opposing Forces, etc. The music was beautiful, a transcending, uplifting electronic soundtrack that perfectly complimented the game. The experience of the game was so fresh and new, I immediately fell in love with it.

The game’s plot for me was inconsequential and ultimately forgettable. Though I normally uphold good stories as the most important thing in  such media, for this game I was willing to look the other way. The experience more than makes up for what it lacks story-wise. Though I suppose I should say a little about the plot…

In a city where all information is closely monitored and regulated, there are a group of people called runners. They deliver messages and information across the rooftops, providing a valuable service to those not wanting certain bits of information known. The trouble starts when the main character’s sister is framed for the murder of a man running for mayor. From there you set out to prove her innocence and eventually stumble upon a conspiracy that could threaten not just your sister, but all the runners and your very way of life: Project Icarus.

As an added bonus, the game also offers several courses to run time trials on. These are a lot of fun and offer a different experience, one without cops and helicopters trying to kill you. There’s even DLC (Downloadable Content)  that offers much more abstract courses instead of the usual cityscape. It’s kinda trippy but awesome and totally worth it.

Of course, the games not without problems. The camera is a little shaky at times due to all the parkouring around, so those prone to motion sickness should avoid this game at all costs. As for gameplay, the controls are fine but it can be a real pain to disarm someone sometimes. You have to hit it at just the right moment and I admit that I haven’t quite mastered this yet. Usually I just slide kick enemies in the crotch. There are some slower parts and some rooms where you have to figure out how to get to an exit set just out of reach. These parts can piss me off but in a good way. I often find myself muttering darkly about how “I’m gonna solve the hell out of this stupid puzzle…” or, “Damn it!!! This is so fricken hard!!! WHY!!??!! I refuse to quit!! Imma beat this thing!!! GHAAHH!”

So help me woman you better run!!!!

Overall, this is definitely one of my top ten favorite games. Mirror’s Edge was such a novel and unique adventure that I know I’ll cherish and reminisce on for (most likely) decades to come. What’s more, I hear a sequel is in the works so you know I’ll be spazzing when that comes out.

Now back in my first post I mentioned that I’d written a book. I’m getting closer and closer to finishing with the editing and I hope to self publish very soon. That being said, I think it may be time to start revealing a few of the details surrounding my first novel. Stick around for my next post and I’ll share lots of little details and background information on this upcoming piece of literature. Heck, I may even answer some questions, but only if I have an answer. Until then, here’s a gameplay video from Mirror’s Edge:

Fun stuff.

Uprising Is Call of Duty Black Ops 2 newest map pack, it has 4 new maps, and a new Zombie game map. The 4 multiplayer maps are Vertigo, Studio, Encore, Magma. The New Zombies map is called Mob of the Dead, which I about in another blog post called Call of Duty Black Ops 2 Uprising-Mob of the Dead (Zombies). There are no new guns for multiplayer that came along with this DLC.

Vertigo

Vertigo- located in India   ”High above the clouds atop a mega skyscraper in India, players must battle across a VTOL landing pad and through the transportation terminal, bringing new dimensions of verticality to every battle.“— Official Description

Studio

Studio-located in hollywood California  ”Set on a Hollywood studio backlot, players will take cover in a wide-array of classic movie sets in this reimagined adaptation on the fan-favorite multiplayer map Firing Range. — Official Description.     similar to a fan favorite map in black Ops firing range.

Encore

Encore- located in London     ”Set on the grounds following a bustling London music festival, the central stage provides players with a key vantage point overlooking the close-quarters battle of the surrounding amphitheater and main tents.“— Official Description

Magma

Magma- located in Japan      ”Lava carving through a modern Japanese village leaves rivers of fiery damage in its wake, providing players with dangerous terrain, compromised cover, and frenetic firefights for survival.“— Official Description

With invigorating new elements infused into a proven mix, Dead Island Riptide reanimates the zombie terror for a second battle for life against the dead. A monsoon has hit the once beautiful archipelago and heavy rainstorms have laid waste to large areas of the islands. The city of Henderson and jungle areas on the island of Palanai were flooded leaving boats as the only remaining way of transportation.

Hell’s retriever

They also have some new items in Mob of the Dead which includes the hell’s retriever which can turn into hell’s redeemer.  Hell’s retriever is just the name of a new weapon that is the flaming tomahawk, and when you make the tomahawk blue it than becomes the hell’s redeemer. They also added in two new types of traps that are pretty handy to use, there is the acid trap and the fan trap. even though they are new traps they work the same as any other trap in zombies, you buy the trap to activate it and than it will kill zombies. Another interesting  future that has been introduced in Mob of the Dead is the afterlife mode. This mode is either activated by doing down by a zombie or by going to one of the stations and pressing x on the Xbox 360 controller, and square on the PS3 controller. In the afterlife mode you can shock different objects, walk through specially  marked walls, as well as using the shock to attack zombies. Afterlife mode can be usual to help clear out a room of zombies and than either reviving yourself our someone else.

hell’s redeemer

Electric Cherry Perk

Electric Cherry Perk-a-cola

Now for one of my new favorite perks in Zombies I introduce to you Electric Cherry. What this perk allows you to do is it sends a shock wave around your player when you are reloading. And the shock wave can kill zombies which can come in clutch when your shooting a zombie and you almost kill him but run out of ammo, now you can reload your gun for the kill. Once of the good things about this awesome perk is that it isn’t that expensive either, it only coast 2000 points.

The Electric shock sent while reloading

Golden Spork

Golden Spork

The golden spork is ironically the strongest melee weapon is all of zombies so far. Although this melee weapon is not one that you can just buy off the wall. There are an entire process  that is fairly difficult to do to obtain this secret weapon. I will list the steps to getting this golden spork, list is from http://callofduty.wikia.com/wiki/Golden_Spork.

1. Visit the Golden Gate bridge at least once.
2. Obtain the Hell’s Retriever.
3. Obtain the AcidGat by converting the Blundergat via the Acid Gat Kit.
4. Find the jail cell with a blue and green movie poster hanging on the wall near the Warden’s Office. Throw the Hell’s Retriever at the poster and it will be removed revealing a hole in the wall.
5. Enter  Afterlife Mode. There is a portal entrance at the end of the row of cells near the Warden’s Office. Enter the portal and zap a spoon lying on the floor to the right of a large crack with a skull in it. If done correctly, the player will hear the Demonic Announcer laugh.
6. Enter the cafeteria and proceed to the barrier at the back of the room. There is a table against the left wall inside the barrier, and the spoon will now be laying on top if it. In order to pick up the spoon, the player will need to throw the Hell’s Retriever at it. If done correctly, the player will hear Brutus. (Note: This step must be completed for each player who wishes to obtain the Golden Spork.)
7. Enter the infirmary and locate the lone bathtub filled with blood opposite a Mystery Box spawn. Hold the action button when next to the bathtub. A silver spoon will appear and stir the blood. (Note: This step must be completed for each player who wishes to obtain the Golden Spork.)
8. Enter the underground showers and kill zombies using the Acid Gat or Vitrolic Withering. When the correct amount of zombies have been killed, the Demonic Announcer’s laugh will be heard once again.
9. Re-enter the infirmary and return to the lone bathtub filled with blood. Hold the Use button and a zombified hand will raise out of the blood grasping the Golden Spork. Press the Use button to take the Spork, and it will be removed from the hand. (Note: This step must be completed for each player who wishes to obtain the Golden Spork.)

Once you complete all these steps you can enjoy using your knew melee weapon which is a single kill for a very long time. I have confirmation that it is a one hit kill till at least round 28, and I have read that it is a one hit kill all the way up till the end of round 33. Mob of the dead also has many hidden easter eggs that you can do and you can check out some of these ester eggs by clicking here to view NGTZombies youtube channel, he has posted many videos about Call of Duty that you can check out.  

I’m playing through Dragon Age 2 again. Yes, I know: “But it sucks,” you say. “The combat mechanics! The repeating maps! The teleporting enemies! So bad!”

Screenshot of my Warrior!Hawke with her BFF Aveline.

True as that may be, I can’t resist going back to play this game again and again and it’s 100% because of the party/companions, and the way they can change the narrative, depending on how you play it.

The first time through, I’ll admit I was obsessed with getting everyone to like me (it’s difficult, and requires a lot of party juggling), but now I tend to play with a set party and I’m stuck with whatever approval I end up with. It’s a great way to make me think about the decisions I make, instead of just sitting there picking sassy!Hawke dialogue every time.

But no matter how much I try to play as jerk!Hawke, I can’t help myself: I’ve got to get Aveline to like me. I’m just not Hawke unless I have Aveline as my BFF. There’s something about her that makes the feminist in me giggle with glee. By “something”, of course, I mean the fact that she’s strong, caring, loyal, smart, passionate, and…not romanceable.

I love that you can flirt with her, and she responds with (something like) ”You’re such a good friend”. While I would absolutely get with Aveline if that were an option (how could I not??), I’m grateful that the writers of DA2 made that impossible. It means so much more to me to have a truly loving friendship with Aveline — something I don’t really get to have with the other ladies (Bethany excepted) who are romanceable. While I am, of course, so happy to have female romance options for a female Hawke, I am equally happy to see a friendship between two kickass ladies (something that’s also generally missing from popular media).

The feelings I have for Aveline are quite different from those I feel for Merrill or Isabela. This is partly because their characters are so clearly different, but also because I can’t have that same level of emotional connection with them without having to negotiate romantic possibilities. I understand that that’s also totally realistic: when you have a deep emotional friendship, there’s always the possibility that one (or both) of you will want it to turn into something more, and I’m definitely not complaining that the other ladies in my party (who aren’t my sister…) are romance options for a female Hawke. But it’s just not the same.

When Hawke is male, the friendship between him and Aveline is just as awesome: I am always complaining that there aren’t enough not-even-a-hint-of-romantic-tension friendships between men and women in movies/tv/etc (yes, I’m watching Elementary), but I identify so much more with a female Hawke that the attachment I feel to my party is stronger in a f!Hawke playthrough.

This is just a long way of saying that Aveline is the best, and nothing can get between her and my warrior!Hawke, and an even longer way of making the hours that I’ve played DA2 this week worth something…

The Rowan Profs easily handle the first game of the NJAC playoffs beating Richard Stockton College 13-0. They will face William Patterson University in the second round of playoffs on Thursday, May 2nd.

“Anchoring the second map pack is Mob of the Dead, Treyarch’s most terrifying Zombies experience to date. Top Hollywood talent rounds out a cast of four Prohibition-era gangsters – each with a unique set of skills – that are forced to fend off hordes of the undead while imprisoned on San Francisco’s notorious Alcatraz Island. While guard towers and new weapons offer tactical advantages, survival offers an unprecedented new challenge for these four lost souls.“— Map description

Mob Of The Dead in my opinion is one of the coolest ideas that Treyarch has come out with for their Zombies game mode. There was an extreme amount of research done by Treyarch about Alcatraz to make sure they really captured the creepy and scary feeling that alcatraz brings. They  didn’t just use the internet to find information about The prison they took it to the next step and actually sent the workers of Treyarch to visit Alcatraz, and experience it first hand. The way you start off the zombies game is not different as well. You actually start off the game dead and you pick to revive one of the four characters.

Blundergat Gun

The Blundergat is a a Civil war based weapon, it is a combination of the blunderbuss and the gatling gun. This wonder weapon can be pack-a-punched, and this gun can turn into three different guns. The order of which you pack-a-punch the gun and get the Acid gat kit will depend on what. The Blundergat turns into either the Sweeper or the Acid Gat, and both of those guns upgraded will turn into the Vitriolic Withering.

To continue reading more about the new features that the Mob of the Dead has to offer read my next blog Call of Duty Black Ops 2 Uprising-Mob of the Dead (Zombies) Part 2. Or you can check out CallOfDuty.wikia.com, to check out more details about Mob of the Dead.

Vs.

I had a two land hand and drew into the 3rd. I played 8-and-a-half Tails, Oriss, Samite Master, a Daru Spiritualist and had both Emeria and Mistveil Plains in play.  Balthor had one of its slow-start games with no black mana sources for quite awhile.  Bolas just alternated between Christmasing Jace Beleren and drawing cards.  Then he just combo-ed out with Kiki-Jiki and Pestermite. I tried to make him go through each iteration rather than just saying “8 million Pestermites, I win, Bro.” but he misunderstood my “Do it 8-million times” for affirmation rather than demand.  I played things on the board, but the game had 0 interaction.

About the Deck (tappedout.net coming soon)

This is a Super-Mono White Cleric/Angel tribal deck.  All cards in it, other than lands, are White. It also contains no artifacts, and very few enchantments.  It has a slight “Holier-than-thou” theme with cards like Righteousness, Holy Day, Purify, etc..  It doesn’t really have a strong win condition, other than surviving, or playing Divine Intervention/Celestial Convergence, though I suppose an 8/8 Indestructible flyer is pretty decent.  This one has interchangeable generals (Atalya; Mikaeus; Avacyn; etc.  pretty much any of the legends can be the boss).   It’s not one I play often, because it can be kind of slow and reactive.

Vs.

A silly Kamigawa Block deck provided me with my first victory. I had a 4-land hand, and all colors represented (which is hard to do in Kamigawa block). Savra had a bad mana start.  Doran built up a strong position with a lot of high-tougness creatures and Doran himself. I made good use of Night Dealings and some pro-black attacks from Hand of Honor.  Michiko Konda hung out for a bit, and Tenzo, Godo’s Maul was on the table when I cast Tariel.  With Doran in play a Tenzo-ed Tariel was a 2-turn clock, and the severe lack of fliers meant that she flew in pretty easily for General Damage victories.  The game only recieves a Neutral rating, because it wasn’t very interactive (and I didn’t get to do too much tapping of Tariel).

About the Deck: (http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/tariel-samurai/ )

I needed another RWB deck. I already had Oros (graveyard destruction/grief), and I’m opposed to Kaalia on a fun-damental level, so it fell to Tariel.  I couldn’t decide what I wanted to do with her mechanically, and I had a number of Samurai sitting around. Tariel looks vaguely samurai-esque (though I eventually custom-foiled her to be even more so).

The deck, aside from the general, is all cards from the Kamigawa block. There are exactly seven Legendary Samurai in the deck (from the Kurosawa block), and a few other supporting samurai. It’s also got the requisite splice/arcane package to be extra silly. My Jitte is currently homeless, so it may go in to this deck.