Mobile Gaming: A Healthy Dose of RPG

If there’s one game genre that I really, truly love, it’s RPGs. You could take away every other game I’ve got, and I’d be happy for quite a while with the likes of Nethack and Fallout 3.

That being said, I’ve been bummed for a while that there haven’t been any truly good RPGs for the iPod Touch / iPhone platform. Most of the offerings there have been your standard puzzle games that most people like to play, ports of card games, etc. There’s certainly a market for that, but those of us who game for reasons other than burning a few minutes here and there want something more.

That’s where The Chronicles of Inotia: Legends of Feanor comes in.

Bethesda Interview: Ashley Cheng

I first mentioned my series of interviews a couple weeks ago, and suffice to say I’ve been a bit busy since then. Scrounging, hunting people down, coming up with hundreds of (hopefully) interesting questions, hitting a lot of dead ends… it takes some time to get a project like this going. Regardless, I’m happy to announce that the first interview has been published, courtesy of VE3D. It’s got a bunch of pretty pictures and cool stuff like that attached, so frankly I would click through to their site to read the piece. If you really want to do it here, though, I’ve got the text-only transcript after the jump.

Green Dawn 2: Leafy Redemption

One of my friends over at Zestful Contemplation put together a fun machinima video using Fallout 3. It’s called Green Dawn 2: Leafy Redemption, and it made me laugh – the humor is especially relevant if you’ve played through the game. Here’s what he had to say about it (in the original post):

It tells the tale of a hero’s journey, based on the steps of the hero’s journey by one Mr. Joseph Campbell.  It is a fictional story set in the world of Fallout 3.  Our protagonist, however, might not be what you’d consider a typical hero….

Let’s just say we turned the steps of the journey on their head just a bit and had fun with them in a way much more fitting to the world of Fallout 3 than the myths of old told to us by Campbell.  The protagonist is a man who is a hero… in his own mind.  He follows the voices in his head that tell him how best to serve the world and spread purity to its people.

Well, purity or mini-nukes.  What’s the difference, really?

Anyway, here it is. Watch it, comment, tell your friends.  🙂

Fallout 3: The Jump

This is what happens when you spend too much time in the Wasteland.

After an Inexcusable Hiatus…

Please forgive the recent dearth of posts. I’ve got a ton of reasons as to why nothing has been posted, but unfortunately none of them are truly good reasons. There weren’t any deaths in the family, both my computers are functioning quite nicely, and while I’ve been busy with writing for class recently, it hasn’t been to the extent that would merit ignoring my blog.

All that being said, I’ve got some interesting thoughts on the subject Fallout 3, which has consumed my gaming life for the past two weeks or so. I put in 18 hours last weekend; it was one of those things where you don’t even realize how long you’ve been playing until you look at a clock and let out an involuntary squawk when you realize how many meals you just skipped.

Left 4 Dead Demo Available

The Left 4 Dead demo is now available on Steam! Check it out here.

Left 4 Dead

Of course, if you’ve already pre-ordered the game, you’ve probably been playing the demo for a week. I’ve been consumed by Fallout 3 as of late, so I didn’t get it. I will however, be downloading and checking out the demo later this week (read: after finishing papers for school).

Fallout 3: An Examination of Morals

In the interest of full disclosure, I’ve got to admit something up front: I haven’t been able to put a lot of time into playing Fallout 3 yet. There’s still tons of content I haven’t seen yet, I’ve only explored perhaps a dozen or so markers on the game’s map, and I haven’t even started pursuing the main quest yet.

Despite all this, I’ve managed to get a juicy taste of the moral dilemmas the game presents.

Clearly, Fallout 3 isn’t the first to examine such issues

New Computer Interface?

Check it out. This company called Mgestyk (say it out loud, you’ll get it) has posted videos of their product being demoed on Youtube.

Essentially, they’ve taken a high-end 3d webcam and paired some software with it that allows gestures to be recognized as input, similar to a mouse or keyboard.

Fallout 3: Initial Impressions

So… up until three days ago, I had convinced myself that I wouldn’t buy any more computer games until the semester was over. It was almost like my version of a New Year’s resolution, and it lasted about as long.

I saw that Fallout 3 was available for pre-purchase on Steam, and couldn’t help myself. I bought the sucker, and promptly began counting down the hours until I could play it. For some reason, once the release date rolled around – yesterday, October 28th – Steam wouldn’t allow my download of the game to start until 1:00pm my time (central). Not too sure why that was the case – I’ve purchased plenty of games on there before, and a few of them even gave the option of pre-loading game files so my experience wouldn’t be hindered in any way once  it was Go Time. Honestly though, it was a minor inconvenience, as I was somewhat busy yesterday and didn’t even have time to install the game until this morning.

I’ve only put in perhaps two or three hours so far, but I like what I’ve seen. As I play through the opening, explore the immediate area, and take a few quests, I’ve decided that Fallout 3 is a blend of a few recent games, both visually and in terms of gameplay and interface. Bioshock, Oblivion, and Half-Life 2 all came to mind, and none of those are bad things. Incidentally, some of the voice acting done was by the same professionals used by Oblivion.

All in all, I’ve got nothing but good things to say about it. Parents might want to stear clear of this one, because Fallout 3 has definitely earned the Mature rating. There has been an amount of language and truly impressive levels of gore (headshots that blow away the cranium, realistic body fluid effects, etc).

Hopefully I’ll be able to post some screenshots and a few gameplay videos tomorrow. I really want to capture a few good examples of the V.A.T.S. system, as the visuals that accompany it are really cool.

Right now, however, I’ve got a paper to write. It’s due in a little over two hours.

Left 4 Dead Demo

Valve’s upcoming shooter Left 4 Dead is looking to be pretty good (although honestly, what game from Valve isn’t?). More to the point, we’ve got the opportunity to see for ourselves this upcoming week when the demo is released.

 

***Update***: I’ve got a review of the demo here. Additionally, if you want to purchase the game, do so through Valve’s Steam distribution software at Steampowered.com.

 

Left 4 Dead

 

 

The game garnered several awards at this year’s E3 (Electronic Entertainment Expo), and has seen a ton of media attention. The self-described survival co-op has my interest piqued, and I’ll probably be checking it out in between Fallout 3 sessions (incidentally, I installed Fallout 3 last night; review/impressions of the game to follow in the next few days).