Battle for the world!

With the fact that going out and doing things on weekends tends to cost a pretty penny between eating out and/or going to the movies it can run you in the area of...well a lot.  Our Saturday nights as of the past two weeks have consisted of board games, beer and movies.  The first time we tried this experiment in non money spending fun, the monolithic box with World Of Warcraft sprawled across it was drawn forth from the closet .  It's a pretty fun game if you love WoW, but don't feel like dealing with Barrens chat, kids, WoWHeroes Scores and other various BS that comes from playing it in the internet.

Anyway a few weekends ago I picked up Risk which I haven't played in YEARS.  It was the bookshelf edition so it was really old school with wooden pieces and everything.  Now if you have played Risk before you probably know the rules, if not heres a quick cliff noted version of it.  You pick your country, place some armies in zones indicated by cards and then the battle begins.  Each round depending on how many countries you own, you can place a certain amount of armies.  If you want to take over someone else's country, you have to go into combat against them.  Based on how many armies you have, you can roll 1, 2 or 3 dice against the defender. You then match the highest die of the attacker to the highest die of the defender, whoever is higher, wins and knocks out an army.  IE if I roll two die (3,1) and G rolls one die (2) I would win, but if he were to roll a three as well, the defender always wins a tie.  Each time you capture a country you get to pick up these cards that have either a cannon, solider or guy on horseback.  Match a combination of sorts with those cards (indicated in the rule book) and each time its your turn you get X amount of more armies to place on the board.  The more armies you have, the more die you roll, the better chance you have at crushing your opponents!  Now yes, I needed to explain the rules somewhat quickly because they become the backbone of our story.  Our players battling for control of the world on that night would be me(Black), my girlfriend(S - Purple), my roommate(G - Blue) and our friend(R - Green) (who I will refer to by the letter after just so I don't use names for now but)  We each picked our respective colors, cards were dealt and our armies were sent marching to their battle zones.  I was to the left of G which meant I started and went right for the throat. War had begun.

To war!

So with the rules now in play, the troops given their marching orders and the generals ready to die in a blaze of glory, we fought.  The first couple rounds were slow.  Small skirmishes taking place in Africa and South America led to early victories by myself and G.  The battle raged on and after the first hour G's blue warriors,   had conquered the America's as well as parts of Great Britian and forced out the combatants of S and R.  S was losing the battle quick having a few small groups to the North in Europe, most of her original troops dead in on the plains of Africa.  R had built a stronghold within the Asia countries and sat watching from the East as everyone else faltered under the Blue Regime.  With my grip tight around Africa and Europe I bolstered my forces and waiting for the on coming storm that G was ready to send across the Atlantic.

The Blue Wave of Death

The next few battles to take place raged for hours, days even (not really more like a few rolls but hey I'm trying to build atmosphere here...)  as I was pitted against The Blue Regime.  When G would roll against R or S, 75% of the time it was a no contest that he would win, until he faced me.  I held steadfast dealing impactful blows to G's army left and right.  I was the opposition, I was the immovable object.  G would march in with 6-7 armies against my small huddle of troops, and one by one, roll by roll, he would fall.  But as Optimus Prime once said "One shall stand, One shall fall."  and my time had come to fall.

  

The first to fall.

With each county G took over, he would be constantly picking up cards, and constantly putting down sets of three ever increasing the size of his army to insane amounts.  Now that I was out of the game, I figured I would lend a small hand and be advisor to the Blue Regime.  I helped G rearrange his armies fitting to take over the world.  We moved troops fast out of the Americas for there was no opposition seeing as G was moving west to east gouging chunks out of everything he could.  Armies were put into more strategic points in an effort to better conquer the last remaining vestiges of fighters.  The home stretch was here, it was time to decimate the weak.

CRUSH THEM ALL!

The time had come to deliver the final blows.  TBR would strike first to the green armies of R, dealing heaving damage quick and silently moving closer to the East.  It was at this point that G would come into his final set of three matching cards, now giving him a total of 25 EXTRA armies per turn, on top of the armies he got for each county he had control over.  He ran out of armies and soon representing 20 armies would be a candy corn, and candy corn pumpkin for 30 armies.  It was insane how many troops he had in battle at this point.  Battle was fought sparingly for the next few rounds, but not wanting to take any POW's G and The Blue Regime finished off every last bit of the other armies for a clean sweep.  At one moments in the last wee hours of battle G attacked the green army and with much EPIC FAIL, rolled three 1's against R's one 1.

Critical failure FTW

All in all the game was a blast.  We had a lot of fun playing.  Overall game lasted about 2-2 1/2 hours I would say which is pretty short for a Risk game.  G and I will be starting our own 2-player game in the coming weeks, and with a new army at my side, I have a good feeling that The Blue Regime will not last long...

To war!
-Nerdsbeware out!

XBox DLC Watch: Now with more Zombies!

This weekend I had a small bit of downtime while my girlfriend was doing her fishing dallies in WoW so I sat down with my 360 and thought I would check out what was new in the world of DLC. I went straight to the XBLA arcade game section and grabbed the Zombie Apocalypse trial game.

Think Geometry Wars but instead of wrecking face on shapes, it's zombies.  The controls are almost 90% the same where your right analog stick automatically shoots in any direction you point, your left and right trigger buttons throw "zombie bait" which makes your character toss a pink teddy bear filled with C4 and all the zombies run towards it and boom goes the dynamite.  You basically start out with a machine gun and unlimited ammo, as well as a chainsaw.  As you run in circles avoiding the hordes of zombies, new weapons will drop (such as a grenade launcher, minigun and flame thrower)  Every now and then a survivor will come out and you need to keep them clear until the helicopter gets them.  All the while each different level (noted as "Day 1, Day 2, Day 3...") has what are called "hazard traps."  If you have ever played MadWorld for the Wii, these will seem familiar.  Basically they pre-existing hazards of the level that give you bonus points.  Such as on the Airport day, there is a crashed plane but one of its engines is still spinning and you can shoot and knock zombies into the blades.  The objective of each level is just to survive, as you have a limited number of lives to do so with.  It has local and online multiplayer which is really cool.

This probably sounds A LOT like another awesome game named Left 4 Dead, and yea it is.  You get to choose between 4 characters (a black business looking guy, a girl, a film geek type guy and a grizzled redneck war guy.)  You get different weapons each level, you get a bomb that attracts all the zombies to it when thrown etc etc you get the point.  Now I love playing L4D, but only on my PC, so playing this game was a nice fun little version of the game.  I love playing Geometry wars on XBLA and taking that into a zombie setting just adds a whole new level of fun. 

If anyone else has the game or ends up getting it, come find me (Gamertag: Nerdsbeware) and well slay some zombies!

See you at the apocalypse,
             - Nerdsbeware out

Liferuiner

WOW

Three small letters.  Know the world over as one of the most addictive substances know to man. A agent of chaos bringing forth death and destruction in its path to whatever it touches.  Relationships ended, families broken all because of three small letters.  To most of you who read this blog, you know what those horrid letters stand for...for those who don't, shield your eyes.

World. Of. Warcraft. Oh Yea.

**DISCLAIMER: If you don't play WoW or games in general, this post might as well look like kanji symbols, but please read on!**

I apologize the dramatic intro, but really for those of you who have played the game, that statement above slighty, sorta, maybe makes sense to you or you have heard/seen a story about someone else who it has happened to.  Thankfully, it hasn't happened to me...yet.  Actually my girlfriend played quite as much as I did.  A couple that raids together, stays together...unless shes the same class as you, and takes your loot (yes were both rogues, no she never ninja'd shit from me).  Needless to say, Warcaft is a sink (pick your poison: time, money, life etc etc.)  If you read my review of PAX '09 I think I talked a bit about my WoW life.  If not, I "beta tested" by that I mean I was jobless and using a friends account while he was at work (Thanks again BK).  After beta I jumped in on release day starting a rogue, but soon learned that in our group of friends we only had DPS and no heals.  I had played a priest in beta and enjoyed it so I said I would change.  Thus Dolomite the troll priest was born.  I climbed my way to 60 with a shadow spec, switching over to a holy/disc at 60 because I wanted to raid, and at that point in the game, raiding as a SPriest was blashpemy.  I raided Molten Core, Ony and BWL snatching up my early tier gear and undertaking the most unholy quest in the game I have ever had to do for the end result of carrying Beneditcion/Anathema.  This was the holy grail for priests, hunters had a similar item, and warriors had a cool quest for Quel'Serrar.  Soon after I dropped off a bit, returning months later with a new account and a new char.  Here is where I began the 2nd phase of my WoW career.  I made an undead rogue named Chinzilla, and tore my way to 70.  Joined a guild or two, raided Karazhan a bit before WoTLK release garnering some awesome gear and making a bunch of cool friends.  Not to long into Wrath and hitting 80, sites were set on taking down the floating necropolis known to all as Naxxramas. 

It was at this point where I really learned my class.  I spent a lot of time actually reading boards and posts on good rotations, the BiS gear and weapons to have, and learning how each one of my individual stats worked with the other.  When I raided with Dolomite, I was a healer, and healers are ALWAYS in need, so yes I was taken 90% of the time, but I was good at what I did.  I kept people alive, knew the fights and didn't screw up.  This time around, it was totally different.  I was DPS, and one of the major sources of DPS no less.  I knew the game had been stepped up.  No one would want to take me along on raids if I could barely break 2K dps on a boss.  Within months of hitting 80 I was decked out in the top pre-Naxx gear, hitting the top of the DPS meters in most 5/10 man instances.  Hell even on 25 man runs I placed in the top 10 which is great.  I had finally hit the point I wanted to.  I considered myself to be in that somewhat upper echelon of player.  I didn't let it go to my head like most people do, I knew my place.  I knew I wasn't the best player out there, but I knew I could hold my own.  My guild backed me as one of their top DPS players, always including me in their raids over others, and soon honored me with being the guild Rogue leader.  As for raiding, I knew the fights, I watched videos, read breakdowns and lead a few OS10 runs myself that went pretty well.  I was loving the game.  To much to a fault.

I had become so engrossed in the game.  I was writing up my own excel spreadsheets to compare gear to see which was better, full dps charts to see how I could maximize my damage and even grids for my low level characters showing me a all-in-one where to find the best gear at my level sheet.  I would work on these for hours, fine tuning the details so that I really could be the best I could at this game.  And yea eventually I got to where I wanted to be.  And proceeded to quit.  Once my guild moved raiding to Friday/Sunday nights for Ulduar with Tues/Thurs for The Eye (this is all in theory if people showed up) and that I still needed a few pieces of gear from Naxx25 which I would have had to PUG, raiding lost its flair.  I have a girlfriend and a social life so raiding on weekends just did not work for me.  Once I stopped raiding, the only thing left to do were dallies, which as well, lost their fun fast.  They were more of a chore than "I'm getting my rep up with them for a reason."  All these factors combined plus a ever increasing pile of Wii/DS/360 games going untouched, I had to step away from the one game I had truly become great at.  For a while it was nice.  I got a ton of good hours in of Team Fortress 2 as well as Left 4 Dead, Fallout 3 and Mass Effect. 

But then it comes with out warning.  Like a siren it the night it wakes me up so abruptly.  I'm getting the itch again.  It started with  the announcment of Cataclysm at Blizzcon.  I had been working on a WoW Machinima for a bit now (it's still in the works!) and made a trial account to go and take some pictures, video, scout locations to film.  I happened to start up  the launcher and I saw a giant dragon engulfed in flames and the big words, EXPANSION III ANNOUCNED CATACLYSM.  I wet my pants.  I wasn't even playing the game, yet I was still so goddamn excited.  I took a picture with my phone and sent it out to people expression my ultimate joy.  That sensation of something new coming to a game I loved.  The thought of how I spent my last two expansions rushed in my head.  They were great.  For Burning Crusade, my (now girlfriend, at the time not) and I went to the midnight release at the local EB (bleh shame), picked up our copies and stayed huddled in my bedroom for almost two days playing.  For Wrath, same thing, midnight release (we were 2nd in line) back to my apartment followed by a full day of playing.  PAX rolled around and I got my first taste of the new classes, trying out a Goblin.  It was downhill after that.  I was like an addict who feel off the wagon.  It started small.  Checking WoW's site for updates on Cataclysm.  Wandering slowly over to old haunts such as Shadowpanther and Elitistjerks, catching up on the rog community. 

Finally I couldn't take it anymore.  My disease was spreading, my roommate, my girlfriend.  The bug was hitting everyone else, we were all talking about it.  We all wanted to play.  So it is with a heavy heart that I gave in, and have signed back up for World Of Warcraft.  I logged on for the first time in almost 6 months on Sunday night, and it was honestly one of the stranger experiences I have had in a long time.  I stepped foot into a game, that just half a year ago, I knew this game like my phone number, inside and out.  I walked into a game that I knew nothing about.  Since I quit, two patches came out, two new instances, new weapons, new tier sets, new fights and new things to worry about.  My gear was outdated, noone would want a rog in Naxx10 putting out 2-3K dmg when most melee are putting out near double that I think I saw the today.   So just as I had did with Dolomite, I shelved, or will be shevling Chinzilla for the most part.  The character I had loved and gotten great at, now due to being gone for so long, is a character that I don't even know anymore. 

So now I move forth with my alts , a lvl 38 Warlock Carrots, a lvl 35 mage Elfphaba and the man who started it all, Dolomite (sitting in Howling Fjord at 68).  I will eventually go back to Chin, get her geared out and ready for Icecrown one day, but for now, if I am going to start this game back up until the next MMO **cough**starwars**cough** comes along,  For now I start a new adventure.  A new class to learn, master and hopefully take into the next expansion, to the next level.

For all those who want to join me, find me on the Gorefiend server (horde) under Chinzilla/Dolomite/Carrots/Elfphaba and also I'll be starting a Warcraft specific blog about my day to day adventures and stories, but on Wordpress, just to see how I like it.  For those interested:
http://destinationazeroth.wordpress.com/

See you at the respawn,
              -Nerdsbeware out

Scribblenauts: Part 2 In Review

Well, if you read my last post, and the comment following it, than sadly, no, poop does NOT work.  Yea it was the first thing I tried.  Now, again I didn't it for and with a purpose.  In a game where you can spawn anything and everything, I thought I would try the oldest trick in the book.  Spawn a piece of crap, spawn a bag, poop goes in bag, light bag on fire and see if someone would stomp it out.  For my own sheer pleasure I wanted to do this.  In no way would it be able to solve the puzzles, but it would have made me laugh, and laughter is generally equated to fun, and isn't fun supposed to be the root of video games anyway?  Circle of life folks.

Finally, onto the game! First thing is the game is not based on graphics, its more about the game play.  The start screen acts as a sandbox of sorts.  No puzzles to solve, no starites to get, just open. Here is where I began to test the limits of what this game could really do.  Again as I mentioned above, I tired the aforementioned with no luck and moved on.  I tested the basics first.  Made a car, drove around in it, spawned a bomb, blew up the car.  I was having fun.  I knew no brand or proper names would work but I still tried some.  As also mentioned in my first post I tired the age old pirate vs ninja (three times mind you just to really test my theory!)  Then just because the other duel to the death I had always wondered was who would win when Chuck Norris fought God...even though to some, they are one in the same.  Sadly when I typed in "Chuck Norris" all that came up was some nerdy looking guy with a beard that in no way at all the King of Kick Ass.  I did hear that Rick Ashley was in the game, so I plugged in "RICKROLL" and a small guy came up who looked slightly like him popped on screen, did a dance and just stood there for it bit.  I proceded to try various other forms of explosives suchs as bombs, dynamite, rocket launchers and nukes.  The nuke was sweet.  I set it up, went over and interacted with it, and BOOM the whole screen goes white, next thing when the screen clears is Maxwell lying dead.  All in all and almost two hours later, I hit that big star "Start" button on the bottom of the screen.  

So the way the game works is that for each level, there are two modes.  First mode is the puzzle part of the game.  Here the objective is to get the starite.  The star is pretty much in plain site, but you have to solve the puzzle at hand to get it using your vast imagination.  The second mode is the action mode.  Once again the objective is to solve the puzzle, but it's a bit different.  This time the star is not in plain view but you are basically put to the task of solving the puzzle to spawn the star.  The game has its own currency called "ollars" which you earn by completing the level.  You earn more ollars based on three things.  First is time, the faster the better.  Second is style which is a cool one.  The stranger, less obvious way, or sometimes the MOST obvious way will earn you some more.  The last is par, which I will get into in a minute.  Each level has a par, that par is how many items you can use to solve the puzzle to get the most amount of ollars.  After you beat a level once, you can go back and play it three more times in a row to get more ollars and new merits.  Merits act as somewhat achievements in the game.  So you earn these ollars so that you can buy new levels, avatars and music.  So that's the basics of the game.  Simple concept but the game really offers so much just on the fact alone that their word data bank is so huge, the possibility of solving a puzzle the same way is limitless.  Yea, you can just use jet pack or lasso to get the star every time but really what fun is that?

Just an example that I like to use when I tell people about the game. The first puzzle style game is the star is in the tree and you are tasked with getting it down.  Well naturally the first thing you would think is chainsaw and/or axe.  So yea I did that, chopped down the tree, got the star.  Easy enough.  I wasn't looking for easy though, I wanted to challenge myself to see what I could think of and how I could solve something as simple as a star being in a tree.  So I started up the level again, and tried "beaver."  The little guy came out with an weird thought bubble emotion thing that is similar to the way you Sims would talk to you when they want something.  His was of a chicken leg, which meant he was hungry.  Bites the tree, tree falls down, I get star, we are all happy.  Also par was 2 for this level so I was trying to keep it low.  So I kept trying other various items, some worked, some didn't.  I tired blowing up the tree, burning it down but both ways only failed and I had to start over.  One funny way was that I spawned a tow truck, attached the hitch to the tree and drove off ripping the tree from the ground.  It tore out pretty fast and gave me a good laugh.

There are some faults to the game, albeit a few that I found so far.  The overall game play can be wonky at times with Maxwell's controls being a bit off.  There were a few times when I was trying to move a cow by putting leash on it and walking it, where Maxwell flipped out and wouldn't stop running until a butcher caught site of the cow and killed the shit out of it.  Yea that was funny.  Another thing that is really minor but some what bother some when playing is that with a data bank of words THAT big, the same models get used over and over again, so I might type in say "ray gun" then a few games later try "laser gun" (yes they are the same thing but its just an example) and you will get the same model, same effects.  Again the devs didn't want to kill them selves with this shit so I totally understand, but when I am trying to put in something specific and it brings up something generic its like wtf mate?  Other than that the game is awesome IMO.  The highest point I found was actually the music surprising enough.  It's goofy but at the same time really addictive to listen to.  Most times when I'm playing DS it's while watching TV, waiting to respawn or be rezzed so the volume is down.  Not this time, I played it with just the natural music, it's great.

The game really does offer so much fun stuff and I don't want to give away more than I have to because for anyone who has a DS, you should play this for yourself.  To me the game totally lived up to its hype and is still providing hours of fun when I get bored of various other games that I play.  When you need some mindless fun, just pick up the game, and see who would win between a zombie robot and a ninja shark.

As always guys, thanks for reading
                - Nerdsbeware signing off