#but my previous method of recording gameplay

[heavensims]

@plumblobs this is my first Rook - Roser de Riva: an Antivan Crow with an overconfident ego who tends to put her foot in her mouth because she just kinda blurts things out without thinking.

I'm not super far into the game yet: I have the first 4 companions, an idea of who to romance, and the Crossroads has become my Hinterlands.

I also ran into the Bloodbound to Elgar'nan at level 12 and spent an ungodly amount of time fighting with no potions but managed to succeed. I was not prepared for that one, lol

[kyogre-blue]

Finally started on HSR 3.3 story. I've made it to just before heading off to face Aquila... or as it turns out, the... corpse of Aquila being reanimated by the will of Hyacine's ancestor...?

Anyway, that was quite a tough trek to make it here. It is back to back pov switch talking scenes for literally hours straight. I know I complained about too much "gameplay" in between story sections, but this isn't really better... I think the only real interactive portion in this entire stretch from the start to now (which seems to be about two thirds of the way through this act) was the part with Cipher in Styxia at the very beginning. And it's all in other character POV, so stopping feels really awkward, since the game makes you exit the POV if you want to do anything else.

On the positives, HSR does have a way of making certain scenes really tense. Like I mentioned, there was a couple of times like this in the Hoolay questline, and there were definitely some here. The background music also works quite well for setting the mood in a lot of cases. I know it's the big boss fight tracks and character trailer songs everyone remembers, HSR OST is pretty damn good.

Also, I appreciate that the characters interact with each other and have their own thoughts and intentions, which are revealed to us in pieces. The POV system is really awkwardly implemented, but I do think it benefits the story as a whole... mostly. The character relationships are something I particularly value, and they are what puts HSR story well above Genshin and Wuwa for me. (That said, the endless layers of backstory are not to my taste, though that doesn't necessarily make them bad writing, just not my thing.) The characters also have at least some variety in their perspectives and actions. Cipher has her own view of receiving a prophecy, and even Dan Heng has a distinctive approach to matters, very thoughtful and methodical, with an interest in records that fits with him sleeping in the data bank room (lol).

Overall, I don't dislike the story progression, and obviously I'm happy to see so much of Phainon's face (also lol).

THAT SAID, it's time to complain!

First of all, let me say, the TB is by far the weakest part of the story and kind of a dead weight on the story as a whole. Even Dan Heng is doing better since he's... doing things. TB's just here to be a Mem anchor. The lack of doing anything makes the occasional MC shilling and weirdly excessive closeness with other characters stand out even more. I've seen leaks about the letter Phainon sends at the end of 3.3 and let me just say...... that was so much dick sucking. "You are the true hero of my heart uwu" jesus christ... Don't even get me started on Castorice.

This can probably also be filed under the ways in which Amphoreus is negatively affected by being a chapter in an ongoing gacha. The gacha model is just not doing the story any favors here.

There's the need to slot in our existing protag who needs to be the most special and receive special powers but not have any history with anyone here. (Belobog finale suffered from this too.) In a reasonable standalone game, Phainon would just be the protag and be done with it, lbr.

There's also the weirdass pacing issues. A normal game would have you doing side quests in between all these story beats, and a VN would be way, way longer, so they'd have room to show you three hijinks daily life scenes for every plot scene. But since this is a gacha, the story has to compact all these plot scenes together one after another. (That said, at least let us have a natural stopping point between the povs instead of dropping us into the next one automatically??)

And of course, the need to align with character banners means their storylines are also compacted. It's not the worst thing, but it's REALLY obvious who the patch releases are because we focus on them so heavily. Hyacine was just a minor character with like two lines about her background in previous patches, but now we need to crash course through her entire character, and same for Cipher. We basically didn't even discuss Aquila until now, but now we speedrun its presence and importance. It's not great.

That said, the pacing is not actively catastrophic, just unideal. The worst fallout is probably the way this affects Aglaea, who spends three patches just kind of being there without doing much but now suddenly becomes The Best Most Important Character In Amphoreus. I don't even disagree with positioning her like this, but having it all come out so suddenly feels kinda forced.

Or at least, Aglaea is the Best and Most Important for now, until the story needs to sell the next most tragic yet heroic character. Every character needing to sell how sad, misunderstood and yet awesome they are is getting a bit old, ngl. I'm kind of glad that Hyacine seems to not actually have a tragic backstory. ...I sure hope she doesn't have a tragic backstory. I only have so much sympathy and tbh I ran out back in 3.1. All latecomers to the tragic backstory olympics are only getting an eyeroll from me.

[gdpm]

Optimize, Optimize, Optimize - I Am Your Beast

I Am Your Beast is an FPS game developed by indie studio Strange Scaffold and released on September 10th, 2024. The premise of I Am Your Beast centers around the player character - Alphonse Harding - fighting a guerilla war against your previous employers as they try and pull you back in for one last job. Here's a link to the game for anyone interested: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1876590/I_Am_Your_Beast/ The core gameplay involves completing a mission's given objective as fast & efficiently as possible, with additional bonus objectives that are only unlocked upon clearing the previous objective. Main objectives vary from interacting with objects around the map to killing all enemies, always ending with an escape hatch. The bonus objectives tend to be more specialized, placing restrictions on what methods you're allowed to use to kill enemies (such as requiring the player to only kill with headshots, for example). At first glance, the gameplay seems pretty standard. However, there is one mechanic that turns I Am Your Beast into an addictive test of mechanical understanding and planning: The timer. The timer is what determines the rank you receive after completing a mission, and it can be quite unforgiving at times. Here's the thing though; killing enemies gives you a time bonus, shaving seconds off your final time. The method you use matters as well. Killing an enemy without doing anything special only rewards 0.3 seconds, while explosive kills reward an entire second. This variance in reward encourages the player to experiment with their routing and forces them into a cycle of risk-reward decisions based on the potential time they could save by changing the methods they use to slaughter enemies. Of course, there are a variety of weapons available to capitalize on this. While there aren't any that stand out compared to typical offerings (apart from a tree branch), the way they play into eachother makes them feel incredible. All weapons have durability, either in the form of limited ammunition (you cannot reload guns), or a literal durability in the case of melee weapons. Though, nothing is stopping you from commendeering any weapons that happen to be lying around. Throwing a weapon at an enemy will knock them down - or outright kill them, in the case of the knife - and send the weapon they were holding flying to you. You can also knock enemies down by kicking them, should you find yourself in the rare situation of not having a weapon. With this, a new layer is added to the player's routing decisions: What gun is going to be the most efficient at netting time bonuses? How do I ensure that I get that gun when I need it? When can I afford to swap weapons? All of these things, combined with relatively non-linear levels and lively chatter from your opposition, result in a game that encourages in-depth routing which culminates in a spectacle straight out of a John Wick film. Here's some footage I recorded of one such run to demonstrate.

In my personal opinion, this game does everything right. It introduces mechanics at a steady rate, iterates on them regularly, and keeps the player on their toes the whole way through - even throughout the bonus levels. There are additional updates planned as well that will add things such as the ability to disable the timer outright for a more relaxed experience, as well as more levels. I cannot recommend this game enough, especially with it's relatively low price tag of $20. P.S. - I Am Your Beast has an excellent story as well. Wanted to add it at the end as - although it isn't related to the game's design - it is still very noteworthy.

[blog-o-roosh]

Progress Blog: On-campus Testing 2

The other problem I fixed during this week of testing was the strangle screen tearing and RGB visual glitches which were negatively effecting the user experience in some levels.

This was a strange error compared to the others, as it would only appear within the headset specifically when it was linked to the computer via the Meta Quest link app. Because of this, I thought the problem might relate to the connection between the VR and the PC.

When researching this problem I found this guide, which involved adjusting settings in the Oculus Debug tool:

I wasn’t able to use this method on the University computers, as the Oculus Debug tool required administrator permissions to be edited.

I attempted to fix the problem on my personal computer at home where I had sufficient admin privileges, but the changes did not help, and in some cases, made the connection worse. In the end I decided to reset the settings to default and try a different method.

I searched for the answer in the “scalability” settings, which was how Unreal Engine refers to graphics quality. In the level blueprints I had a feature which allowed the player to adjust the scalability using the number keys in-game. I often used this setting in previous testing to decrease the graphics quality, which usually removed the issue.

However I wasn’t sure to set each level to its own independent scalability setting, because in the tests I often had to manually adjust the quality level once the game began running. The answer to this problem was contained within the level blueprints, where I found a specific node I could use to set the default scalability level. Luckily since every level had its own blueprint I could give each their own default graphics quality.

Since I already knew that reducing the scalability removed the screen tearing, I discovered very quickly that you could do the same by increasing the scalability instead. Once I had set each level to a graphics quality that matched them best, I was finished and could then record footage for my promo video and gameplay walkthrough.

Sources:

ONE37Works (2022) How to Fix Stutter/Chopping/Lag on Meta Quest 2/3/3S PCVR via Link Cable!, YouTube. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgMufQsUto8 (Accessed: 14 August 2025).

[aproblemforlater]

Week5

Testing is next week, so having a visual element in the game which gives the player feedback on their actions. Also, my hope for this system is that it will make way for other features such as a leaderboard, which will increase the enjoyment of the game, by adding a competitive element.

The development of this system was made entirely with iterative development, and since I would constantly need to check that new additions work, this workflow was the best approach for me.

Development

To start out, I made a class which just tracks time. Then I made a function which will start the time only when a collider is triggered. Once this was done, I extended this to contain additional colliders which act as checkpoints. All checkpoints need to be activated, and then cross the start/Finish line again to stop the time. The next challenge was to have each checkpoint only be valid if they were activated in a certain order, and the lap would only be finished if all checkpoints had validly been activated. This would stop laps being completed prematurely, if the player had not activated all checkpoints. The checkpoints can be separated into their own classes, as their values and methods are only specific to them, and don’t have a place in the LapTimer script.

At this point, I have now done what I wanted to create. However I wanted to develop the script further than just telling you your lap time. For this, I decided to look at other racing games, and what sort of common features they had which related to time tracking.

 I looked at Gran Turismo, Forza Motorsport, and Grid contained 4 main features:

Lap Counter: The lap counter simply tells you what lap you are on, and how many laps total are in the race.

Lap Time: This shows the current lap time. This will reset when a new lap is started.

Speed: Not related to time, but the speed of the vehicle is shown on all of these game UIs. This could be a feature to link to the vehicle controller.

Position: The position of the player. If we make the game split screen or PvE, a position indicator would be essential to giving the player visual feedback about their performance.

Expanding my search to more arcade games, I realized even games like Mario Kart, Jak X, and XG3 Racing contained these elements at a minimum.

I began adding these UI elements into the game, and adapting the LapTimer script to accommodate them. Adding the Lap Time and Lap Counter was a natural progression to display the system I had developed so far, but Position and speed were not the responsibility of this script, I left them out for now.

I wanted to expand the utility of this script a little more, and I thought a good idea would be to have a UI element which shows your previous lap times during the race. Again, this is a trivial addition, as everything was in place to implement this, and I feel that it fleshes out the gameplay a bit more.

I play Gran Turismo, and something this game does is show you your ‘delta’ (time difference from your fastest lap. I decided I want to add this to the game, and to do this I simply record the time at each checkpoint, and compare it to the best time recorded for that checkpoint so far.

I am very happy with the system I have created for the time. I have developed what I set out to do, and have pushed it further to add more quality of life features. I think this will be a great addition to the game for the testing session next week, and we have plenty of time to test and iterate the design.

Next week, I would like to create a leaderboard system which will store a player's best time, and display it at the end of a race along with past best times by other players.

Summary:

Developed a timing system for the game.

Timing system takes events from Checkpoints to determine progress and if a new lap is valid.

Researched different racing games to find common elements for the UI.

Integrated relevant UI elements with the Lap Timer to show the player things like lap time, current lap, and best lap of the session

I am very pleased with the progress this week, as I went further than I was expecting to.

[game-dev-progress]

Right Of Way Update and Sell Sheet Design

This week’s Right Of Way development update will be a bit shorter, as I've been working on my second IGB220 assessment this week. 

This week, I worked on creating the core gameplay loop for Right Of Way in gDevelop. I haven’t made any changes to the design since the last update, but I am aiming to get some playtesting feedback as soon as possible to avoid a repeat of Castle Defenders, most likely in class next week with other IGB220 students. Fullerton’s Game Design Workshop has an entire chapter on playtesting which I read last week, so I'm aiming to put some of the suggested methods into practice during playtests of Right Of Way. 

A key thing Fullerton explains in this chapter is the importance of a playtesting notebook, where you write down everything that goes through the playtester’s head and your own as you are watching the playtester, or testing your own game. This helps identify key problems by recording how many playtesters experienced the same issue, and also serves as a to-do list. This notebook should contain everything the player did and in what order, so that patterns can be found explaining why certain playtesters experienced issues with parts of the game, which can help with debugging or understanding why the playtester didn’t understand some mechanic.

Another thing Fullerton explains is the importance of the game designer remaining an impartial observer during testing, explaining that the game designer can never see the playtester’s natural reaction to game elements if the playtester has additional knowledge provided by the game developer. Failing to remain an observer also makes identifying trends in results between players more difficult, as this increases the number of variables during playtesting. Much like a science experiment, it is much easier to identify the common trend in the data with fewer variables, hence why scientists aim to reduce experiments down to one controlled variable and a resultant variable.

One part of remaining impartial is explaining the same things to each player at the beginning of the playtest, so that only the player’s background can affect their decision making and responses to game mechanics. To do this, Fullerton advises on making a script to read to the players, so that they all get the same information.

I’ll make use of these recommendations when playtesting Right Of Way’s core gameplay loop next week, and then add the extra obstacles described in the previous blog if the core loop is working as intended and is engaging for the player.

The other thing I worked on this week was my sell sheet for assignment 2. For this assessment, I am making a sell sheet, which is used like a poster for a game, demonstrating the style and core gameplay to create interest. My sell sheet will be for Cardslinger, a game I have been designing and working on as a personal project for a while now. This week, I made the main element of the sell sheet as shown below.

Images 1 - 5: Development of my Sell Sheet character from wireframe to coloured and shaded picture. Made using scratch’s vector art.

Sources:

Fullerton, T. (2019). Game design workshop : a playcentric approach to creating innovative games. Crc Press.

[gameyolk]

I decided that just for the race game protoype, learning from my previous experiences with games, I would keep my scope relatively small. There would be no enemy variants, and replacing the car models with instead being ( later idrgaf right now ) erasers and other writing related objects.

i dont have storage on my pc dont ask me for recorded gameplay.

I also did not have a good method of generating letters so I just made all 26 characters of the alphabet.

SPELLING RACE GAME

In my previous games, I had a weird problem with my chosen application for doing pixel art, so I finally figured out a way to fix it, I'm still developing a sense of style for game art but I had made 3 different intended characters for the player to use with different stats.

As previously mentioned, the three different cars would have different game functions. I found it difficult to make the word function work properly whilst prototyping without it interfering with other aspects such as movement, so what I did instead was design there to be letters for the player to collect that would fill in the words for them which randomly appeared at random intervals. The reason why I wanted to have three different playable characters is becauase I was inspired by the lecture in week 9, when we talked about RPG mechanics and design. In giving the game more RPG elements, the three different player icons were going to act as different classes the player could choose.

The pen class would let the player move faster around the road, the pencil had a larger catch radius for letters and the mechanical pencil would have more letters appear on screen for the player to catch. I thought this would be a better way to balance the game.

[seven-skies-above]

writing this out because my brain has been wrapping around the thought

so like. the whole big issue with the cycle being like literal death and revive video-game style save state is that well. Nothing Can Die. like. ever. does this mean that the population continues to grow infinitely until the world is full? then how does evolution work if natural selection is not there to influence certain survival traits?

we know that creatures evolve; rain worlds creature are explicitly stated to be evolutions of purposed organisms, developed into a more survivable form.

but without permanent death, how is this possible?

WELL. GUESS WHAT MECHANIC I FORGOT ABOUT.

-slams table-

LINEAGING.

when a creature is killed, there is a 33% (or 50% for certain scugs) chance that it respawns. so within the karma-cycle system, it re-cycles i guess idk. we’re still working out the kinks of that whole thing

anyways, when a creature respawns, there is also the chance that it respawns as a higher “tier” of creature. ex. pole plant respawns as a monster kelp.

so this likely means that lineaging is rain world’s method of “natural selection.” if a creature dies enough times, it re-cycles as an evolved form of itself. creatures that survive will maintain that form, while creatures that do not will again re-cycle into a different form until it reaches one that is suitable for the current environment.

the game sort of implies that there is a set order to lineaging (see the order of lizard lineaging from green to red), and that creatures cannot de-lineage into previous forms, but I’d like to think that creatures tend to lineage towards the form most adapted to the current environment. this is why we see no red lizards in Survivor and Monk, since having such a powerful and resource-intensive form would be unsustainable with less spawns and food around. however, if survival becomes impossible without being a red lizard (ex. scug murders you over and over again), then red lizard becomes a suitable lineage option again. meanwhile in Saint’s campaign, strawberry lizards have become a preferable mutation since they’re small and can conserve energy.

for the record, we never see slugcats lineage, even though they’re implied to be descended from the pipe cleaning purposed organisms. this is most likely just due to game design reasons (too many scug variations and changes in gameplay from dying too much) and suddenly learning to handle different scugs on top of already trying to just learn how to play the game is a little much.

but yeah. rain world still gets evolution even when things can’t die permanently because instead of birth causing mutations, it’s rebirth causing mutations. wild.

does this explain why rain world doesn’t have a severe overpopulation issue? absolutely not and i cannot even begin to fathom a reason for this. but i have answered one of my questions and i call that a success!!

[cawareyoudoin]

Yesterday I figured out how to record gameplay (and even edit)! @rollingdanielle and @bluegekk0 , per our previous PV conversation: this is my method! It works when well-executed (here it's... Not really). I traded Heart for Dashmaster, and the damage boost is really nice.

[etes-secrecy-post]

Hi, before I explain my post, I want to say something important.

• What you see my blog has become a major overhaul. And despite the changes, I decided that my 2nd account will be now my artwork blog with a secret twist.

⚠️NEW RULE!⚠️

⚠️ SO PLEASE DO NOT SHARE MY 2nd ACCOUNT TO EVERYONE! THIS SECRECY BLOG OF MINE IS FOR CLOSES FRIENDS ONLY!⚠️

• AND FOR MY CLOSES FRIENDS, DON’T REBLOG IT. INSTEAD, JUST COPY MY LINK AND PASTE IT ON YOUR TUMBLR POST! JUST BE SURE THE IMAGE WILL BE REMOVED AND THE ONLY LEFT WAS THE TEXT.

⚠️ SHARING LINKS, LIKE POSTS, REBLOG POSTS, STEALING MY SNAPSHOT PHOTOS/RECORDED VIDEOS/ARTWORKS (a.k.a. ART THIEVES) OR PLAGIARIZING FROM UNKNOWN TUMBLR STRANGERS WILL IMMEDIATELY BE BLOCKED, RIGHT AWAY!⚠️

Okay? Capiche? Make sense? Good, now back to the post…↓

My 8bitdo Pro 2 Review w/ 8bitdo USB Wireless Adapter ‘PS Classic Edition’ - Part 7 (Recorded Video) [Mar 22, 2022]

Hello! Here’s Part 7 of my new 8bitdo gamepad, the Pro 2 Bluetooth Gamepad/Controller! 🎮😁

And today, I'm going to do connection support using my 8bitdo USB Wireless Adapter ‘PS Classic Edition’ through my recent 8bitdo gamepad, the Pro 2.🎮📶 My Pro 2 gamepad was connected via Bluetooth from Ugreen, so hope my wireless adapter will have the same function performance as my USB Bluetooth.

If you haven't seen my Part 6 of the same topic, then please [CLICK ME!].

So, without further ado, let's get started:

BTW:

#1 - Watch my record video first.🎦📲

(And) #2 - I combined all four record videos into one file using my new video editing software, the Wondershare Filmora 9. To be honest, this is far better than my previous one, so I'll be learning how to use it via tutorials if I have time.

My record video:

• Okay so, before I connect to another wireless device, you noticed I unplugged my Ugreen USB Bluetooth adapter from my PC & then I plug my 8bitdo wireless adapter into the second USB Type-A port. I haven't updated the firmware for my retro adapter since 2020, so why not give it a shot anyway.⬆️ I open the 8bitdo's firmware update window & the new firmware was released for my wireless adapter. The v 1.33 listed their improvements for our gameplay needs, so now I clicked "update" & wait for a few seconds. Also, I noticed that the new version for firmware updater now supports Pro 2 wired gamepad. 🎮 It's essentially the same model as the original Pro 2 w/ the cord attached, and way cheaper than the wireless variant. I update the new version of my firmware updater as well. Another method for updating firmware when open is to click the "update", then certain instructions on how to download the firmware from the updater by unplugging the wireless adapter & press 'n hold the sync button, then replug the adapter. The green light appears & click "update" once more. Just in case your new firmware for 8bitdo device(s) had severe problems, then this method is the only option to do so.

• Now that my wireless adapter's firmware is updated, I'll bring out my Pro 2 gamepad & see will it connects. But first, I'll show you what's inside of Pro 2's battery compartment. And as you can see, my Pro 2 has equipped two Eneloop AA batteries instead of the included battery pack. Yeah, my two battery packs had rung out of juice & the good thing I've had a backup in the form of cell batteries.🔋🔋 Anyways, I turn on my gamepad (by pressing the start button), press 'n hold the sync button & it starts syncing, the same goes for my wireless adapter. Unfortunately, to no avail. 😕 My wireless adapter didn't search for my recent gamepad nor the aforementioned Pro 2. Hmmm, that's strange. You know what, let's try to update my Pro 2 gamepad's firmware to solve the connection problem.

• I'm bringing out the included USB Type-C cable & plug my Pro 2 gamepad through PC for the first time. BTW (#3): the wired mode test for my Pro 2 will have another part, coming soon. Also, I've already removed two AA batteries before I switch to wired mode w/ the Type-C Cable. Once connected, I open the firmware updater & the current firmware was released. The v 1.07 for the Pro 2 improves & fixed certain problems for connecting the Switch console. Also, you could see the Pro 2's current firmware was v 1.03. The v 1.03 seems good all in all, so hoping the v 1.07 will enhance my gameplay. Time to update my Pro 2's firmware anyway & see will my retro adapter connects.

BTW (#4): My apologies for rumbling my phone while I was recording, because I can't twist the neck part of the smartphone holder that I'm using.

• Alright, take two for the wireless connection test w/ my two 8bitdo devices. But before that, I unplug my Ugreen USB Bluetooth adapter from my PC (sorry you see that I think). Unsurprisingly, it won't connect between two devices after updating both 8bitdo devices.😟 Man, I just don't understand why is my retro adapter won't support my Pro 2 gamepad. Given that the Pro 2 was the predecessor to the original SN30 Pro+ & it connects perfectly w/ my old latter, connecting my Pro 2 with my gray retro adapter was falsely advertised. Also, I'd just found out that the brown retro adapter had newer firmware updates than the gray counterpart. Ummm... wait, should the gray one will do the same? 😕 Strangely still, the brown retro adapter is the only one that can connect the Pro 2 wireless gamepad. *Sigh* The company should give the gray retro adapter's chance to release new firmware.😞

Overall:

• It's quite disappointing for the gray retro adapter. I thought it'll support the Pro 2 connection as well as newer firmware as the brown counterpart, but it never happen. It's such a shame, that I want to connect my Pro 2 straight through my retro adapter, so I won't be paired via Bluetooth on selected platforms (e.g. Switch, Raspberry Pi, etc.). Maybe I should buy the brown one? Or maybe this one → [CLICK ME!]. That's right, the company already released the successor to the gray/brown retro adapter, and ditch out the old 2.4gw/ something far better than that. So, go check it out. But right now, I'll be sticking with a Bluetooth connection & wait for the new firmware for my gray retro adapter.

I have another record video right away, so please [CLICK ME!] for Part 8.

Well, that’s all for now. If you haven’t seen my previous parts, then I’ll provide some links down below.↓😉

My 8bitdo Pro 2 controller review:

• Part 1 [Dec 2, 2021]

• Part 2 (Recorded Video) [Dec 4, 2021]

• Part 3 [Feb 21, 2022]

• Part 4 [Feb 26, 2022]

• Part 5 [Mar 4, 2022]

• Part 6 [Mar 6, 2022]

Tagged: @leapant

[thewakingcloak]

Spacefarer Newsletter: August 2020

I spent the first week of August cleaning up cliff and z-object stuff. Not very glamorous! I was definitely ready to move on, but it had to be done. Everything I mentioned at the end of the July newsletter? I tackled it.

Falling off ledges now works properly. This was surprisingly difficult.

Tile animations on z objects is now handled... 

Building cliffs is much less painstaking now. The objects automatically resize themselves for proper collision, and the sprites are all color- and number-coded.

And more: lots and lots of weird cases and stuff fixed. Cliffs at a “negative z” (below sea-level, essentially) were a whole ‘nother animal. They’re still a little janky, and I’ll have to do more manual intervention for these.

Also, area transitions were only based on x and y, so throwing z into the mix messed those up hardcore.

Once I got past all that, I decided to tackle swimming!

Talk about a switch. Cliffs took me a few months. Swimming took me, like, a couple days. Even the stuff I thought would be hard (falling off waterfalls, slippery momentum, etc.) ended up being more or less built in to the systems I have, lol, so I basically just wrote a line or two of new code for those. Diving took an extra few days on top of that, mostly just because I went back and forth on how to modify the z.

Next came rolling. (You might say we’re on a roll.) This was the first bit I’d copied over from The Waking Cloak project in ages. The Waking Cloak will eventually be built afresh on the ProtoDungeon foundation, but I guess the old code does still have some useful stuff in there!

I did spend an evening converting my mess of move speed/direction/vectors to create a Vector2 struct in 2.3. Structs are a nice breath of Object-Oriented Programming in GameMaker. :) Then I leveraged this so I could easily modify the direction of rolling, jumping, etc. I could have done all this without, but it makes it easier.

“Rolling” in the water will be a dash. Unfortunately, in doing all this, I broke the “slippery” friction on water, which for some reason took me a few days to fix.

Roll cleanup from there involved allowing jumping into a roll and rolling into a jump. For gameplay purposes, these don’t let you jump further or anything, but it adds some usability. Without this, if you press the “roll key” right before landing, nothing happens, and it feels clunky. With this, if you press the roll key while jumping, the character will roll immediately when they hit the ground. It feels really good!

I updated the controls to match the new rolling. Space and shift now both trigger rolls for keyboard, and the left face button does so on the gamepad. This also meant I had to update the control remapping settings (which needs a UX overhaul, I’m breaking a couple guidelines here, but no time for that now lol).

Next came the dash. This only took a few days, since it’s basically the same as a roll, just faster (not shown in the video, I sped it up after recording) and with a cool afterimage effect! I had to take a video instead of a gif to capture the full effect (gif framerate is too low, so it’s much more “blinky”). Anyway yeah, click this giant link to watch, lol.

And then I rounded out the month by updating various tiles and sprites. It was pretty tough to get back into the swing of things, art-wise. Thanks to the Studio Spacefarer Discord server, though, I’m pretty happy with the direction things went.

Check out the “before” in last month’s newsletter.

Oh, also, on the penultimate day of the month, I felt like taking a quick break from all of everything to install rt-shell, a plugin that lets you do debug commands. My previous debug method was a list of hotkeys. It was pretty limited! The new one is extensible (I can write my own scripts), so it’s gonna be really helpful.

[cregames645]

What is best gaming rig pc or mac

Thinking of Moving To Pc Gaming?

Enthusiast Gaming is a media and technology business developing the largest neighborhood of authentic gamers. Travel into a virtual world with a VR headset , where all of your senses will be treated to a barrage of stimulus from different sources. With the Oculus Rift + Touch Virtual Reality Program , you'd have to prepare your self for extra intense gameplays, much more immersive action, and a completely new and exhilarating gaming present experience as the package currently comes with six VR games that will maintain your heart pumping via your chest. The Oculus Touch controllers are ingeniously developed for optimum and unparalleled interaction with the many components in the virtual planet. You will want to meet particular technique specifications on your laptop, though. This also makes a perfect gift for nerds in your life.

It really is difficult to evaluate 15mm rulesets due to the fact they're typically so various, so rather than try I will merely say this Patrol Angis stands on its own laurels as an exemplar of contemporary wargaming. It is rapid to play, it has sophisticated systems, and it is not overburdened by rules. It has a working points technique. It benefits drastically from the great fluff of the Ion Age and the miniatures that go with it but could easily be applied for any 15mm games you want to play. Regardless of its billing as a one-platoon skirmish game I can not see any reason why it wouldn't hold up nicely with 10+ units on the board.

You have played thousands of distinct board games, yes that is ideal not hundreds, but thousands. You are a member of various gaming groups, and you have come to realise that distinctive groups have distinctive personalities and exclusive dynamics. You realize what style of games you love and precise mechanics that you do and do not like in a game. You do not actively preach or inform individuals about board games, but when asked you are an ambassador for the genre and with your vast knowledge you can usually add thoughtful discussion and predictions with regards to games you are yet to play. Your collection is the perfect variety of games that you like. It is not simple for a new game to make it into your collection, and you have a defined a rigorous trial of fire that any game should meet to make it effectively into your collection.

Do you appreciate to fight even though constructing your own town or village in a game? If yes, Clash of Clans is the greatest option for your gaming requires. It is a single of the most popular games by Supercell. It is a multiplayer game that comes cost-free of cost with in-app purchases. The major aim of the player is to construct a village and fill it with every little thing that the villagers will need to have. A town hall, gold mine, army camp and much far more get unlocked through the course of time.

With Giving Assistant, you can now get money back just about every time you get a new game. Stop by the web page to obtain coupon codes valid on Green Man Gaming. You can then adhere to the hyperlink offered to check out that web-site and get started buying. As long as you use Giving Assistant and remain logged in to your account, you are going to get a double money back with each and every buy that you make. Providing Assistant pays out earnings every single week on Monday, which aids you get your money back more quickly than you believed achievable. You also get peace of mind mainly because Providing Assistant will respond to any challenges rapidly and assist you get the cash that you earned automatically deposited in your account. Video game lovers can now earn cash and save funds at the exact same time.

Functioning as the assessment editor for Destructoid and operating as a gaming writer for Destructoid, Jim Sterling also runs a weekly video game series on Youtube. Sterling discusses several of the unethical enterprise practices in gaming like gender inequality and early access games. The most important gameplay series that you will come across from Sterling is titled, Jimpressions,” and he covers subjects like new-release video games and covers the gameplay with his pre-recorded sessions.

The fantastic thing about the gaming niche is that video games are a hobby. This means that individuals will continuously invest additional money to fund this hobby, irrespective of whether it be by means of new games, new gear, or both. You can capitalize on this by building an e-mail list, which will preserve these buyers getting from you once more, increasing your income regularly. When 1 game gets old, simply send them out an e-mail and begin advertising the subsequent 1 to them. When the next excellent headset comes out, send out an email. New CPA platform? Market it! With an e-mail list, you can get these purchasers coming back to spend their money over and over once more.

A gaming site solely committed to Computer Gaming for over 20 years. The platform brings expert testimonials on most up-to-date gaming gears, introduce you to strange new mods & ground-breaking news about-the-clock. They also organize yearly events such as Computer Gaming Show & Computer Gamer Weekender which is really well known all more than the planet. Apart from posting every day updates on video game news & previews, user can also discover amazing hardware getting guides and very best gaming bargains here.

Like gaming? With the support of a screen capture device (or a video camera) you can pass on your experience on a particular game (or level) and Extra resources entertain individuals at the same time. Video games as a spectator sport is a relatively new phenomenon, but immensely common. Take Twitch, exactly where millions of gamers gather every single month. Some gamers have even turn into celebrities as a result.

Gaming consists of distinct genres and systems, and it is vital to know what sort of gaming web site you would want to be. Gaming web pages consist of on line magazines that focus on gaming-related articles, gaming portals, on the internet retail and distribution, and gaming blogs. Gamers are distinct with what content material they want to access, which indicates that defining what your web site is would ensure you get the suitable audience.

Get Rid of GAMING For Good

The tactile satisfaction of the mechanical keyboards is frequently missing in membrane keyboards. It mimics the feel of writing on an old college typewriter, like in the previous. Now, this doesn't imply that the modern day mechanical keyboards are missing functions. They are packed with the things that the consumer desires for every day use and even in most instances for gaming as effectively.

With years of business-major QA experience behind us along with a team of gaming and domain professionals, we are properly-placed to serve the end-to-finish and cross-platform gaming QA needs, which we meet by way of a extensive service portfolio that incorporates functional testing, localization testing, compatibility testing, and certification testing.

So you want to commence a gaming blog? Good for you! Gaming is a wonderful subject to write a blog about, with plenty of men and women out there interested in this niche. No matter if you want to get started a weblog as a hobby or you happen to be seeking to make a bit of dollars from blogging, the following suggestions can aid you get began.

Never you wish you had your very own arcade machine proper in the comfort of your household? What if we told you that we have identified a gaming method that is not only reminiscent of retro gaming arcades but is also made to fit suitable in your hands? That's what the My Arcade Retro Arcade Machine Handheld Gaming Program is all about. This handheld gaming console is created pretty a great deal like an old-school gaming arcade total with authentic D-buttons and joystick. However, its compact style makes it a pretty handy arcade comprehensive with 200 of your favourite laptop games of the 80s and 90s.

If you are in the market place for less costly or more cost-effective games, make confident that you verify the Hot Offers section of the internet site. Green Man Gaming involves a link to that page on all its pages. You can appear at the Deal of the Day or at present specials that let you save up to 75% off the MSRP on common games. The Hot Bargains section also incorporates some VIP specials chosen by major games from around the planet.

[rugeon]

Project Blog 10: Getting the game ready for testing: The gameplay build

The next stage of developing the game involved getting it ready for wider testing:

This involved creating a pause screen that could edit the parameters of the game which would then be saved, and could be re-edited. As well as creating the test paper and the sliders and buttons people would test with.

First I needed to decide what variables I wanted to test and was unsure about, and wanted feedback on. I needed to create new functionality to alter certain variables and create new ones for the game to interact with. I also created some new gameplay mechanics/ styles for the purposes of testing and comparison.

First order of business was adding a pause screen. I was initially panicked at this prospect because I hadnt planned for this and was worried my audio intensive game that hadn’t been designed with this in mind would struggle to have everything sync up. It turned out to be surprisingly easy!

Following the info here: https://gamedevbeginner.com/the-right-way-to-pause-the-game-in-unity/

Simply changing the time scale to 0 stopped all game activity. No variables mechanics were running outside of time.deltatime. Those that didnt use it were being updated in update in a way which still worked.

I created a pause canvas ui which displayed over the whole of the screen when the game was paused on key press, and wrote instructions for the game’s controls on the pause menu.

The resource for the player was still regenerating while paused so I rewrote the meter to run on time.deltatime this also had the benefit of making the variables used to control it more legible to me, so that I could see the meter for player inactivity would last 6 seconds. -A relatively long time as I wanted the play experience to be somewhat relaxed and approachable. I also thought players might be able to change its duration but I ended up not testing for this as I felt there was already too much being tested and it did not fit into the other variables I was testing.

I also changed the music tracks from the more synth and strings oriented temporary ones to a more pleasing and cohesive generic rock output. These too were made in soundation. While I intended for the game to be closely tied to desert rock, I was limited on time and my own emotional resources in composing new music. I felt that composing something quicker that was close to my original intent and theming was the best use of my time, without going on a massive tanget, recording my playing. Finding stoner rock samples is not easy. The set I used in soundation from the ‘arena rock’ collection was more accessible and a better match than the previous audio track.

Next I changed the dash so that dashing while in the inactive state deleted enemies without triggering them. This let people clear the field and once again collect themselves while maintaining a ‘rest’ period in the music track. There was some trouble in checking for the player when dashing as the way I stopped triggering sound obejct was to turn the players trigger to ‘off’. Making it so that the player had acces to the spawner allowed me to get the location of the sound agent to call the spawn particles function, spawning the particle prefab on the sound agents position, By calling the function onCollisionStay, instead of onCollisionEnter

```

   void OnCollisionStay(Collision collision)    {        if (dashing && !active)        {            //if (collision.gameObject.name != "Player")            //{            spawnController.SpawnParticles(collision.gameObject.transform.position);            Destroy(collision.gameObject);            Debug.Log("Destroyed : " + collision.gameObject.name);            //}        }   

 }

 ```

I could check for the player dashing while also satisfying the inactive state. the check only occured on collision stay instead of all the time so it did require too many additional processes, thought I see it could have been optimised further.

Using the default Unity Slider ui I added sliders for the spawn rate: the time added on to each spawn interval. this was changed to ‘spawn delay’ as raising this value increased the time between spawns unlike the implications of ’spawn rate’ where you might think being high would make it so spawning happened more often.

I also added ‘spawn variance’ to control the random range that the spawn interval was affected by, this was added on to the spawn delay.

In this way you could make the game consistently spawn stuff with 0 variance/ randomness. Or make it less consistent. A spawn variance of 10 would have longer pauses, but also sometimes shorter ones, but this was always added on as time to the interval, which was a major limitation of this spawn system.

‘Spawn change’ originally called ‘spawn coefficient ‘, changed the coefficient of the calc adjustment value described in a previous post. Explaining this algortihm was seen as unnecessary to testers and coefficient too confusing so it was left as the vague: spawn change.

The next variable people were able to choose initially by ticking one of two boxes that switched on and off and later to a drop down menu that implied a discrete chocie between one of two options was inverting the player inactive state behaviour. This would invert the default state to be the inative one and the right click limited resource meter state to be the active one. I wanted to see whether people prefered this more active play style which I felt was more like the activity of playing music in some ways because rest is easier than playing an instrument; it is an active choice. I know this game is abstracted and I prefered the first original behaviour myself but I was curious what peoples reactions would be. I wonder if it would be biased by the defaults.

Also fixed a bug where dashing while inactive didnt change the sound agent count which would mess with the calc adjustment function. Essentially increasing time between spawns as the player deleted enemies while dashing while inactive even though there were lesss enemies on screen.

Recognising that the way the current enemy movement worked was based on transform, somewhat inelegant, and sound agents could be launched offscreen I added boundaries to delete sound agents pushed offscreen and removing them from the total count. Also let people edit the sound agent speed. And let people choose between the transform and velocity based sound agent movement. This is a very subtle change, and velocity may be more consistent but without further editing so that it could be psuhed by the player, the transform method of movement allowed the player to bunt enemies away while inactive. Which I thought was fun, but so was having enemies cling to you like a mish pit in some ways. I left the choice up to testing.

[0poole]

Northernlion

There’s a serious oversaturation of people trying to live off of playing games on Youtube/Twitch. Really, it’d take a lot to get me to watch anyone new, just because the people I already follow already check off all necessary boxes I’d want in a channel, pretty much. Not to mention that no one (and I do mean “no one”) could top Northernlion. He’s easily my favorite of all #gamer Youtubers/Twitch streamers, and it definitely wouldn’t be wrong to say he’s my all-time favorite of those (although it’s hard to be sure because the previous favorites either stopped uploading stuff or started uploading a lot less/different content).

And, since Youtube is trash for fiscal purposes, I finally went and bought a subscription to him on Twitch. Really, the only thing holding me back was the scary commitment of a monthly payment, as I’m sure many feel. It’s made worse by how I don’t have a steady income yet.

Anyways, there’s something subtly unique about Northernlion (AKA NL) and his friends. It’s kind of hard for me to say exactly what makes him likable. Other content creators try to be unique by being really good at a game, having a more unique set of humor, or even doing skits outside of the gameplay (of course not to say any of that’s bad), but I think what makes NL different is that his “gameplay” content is practically a podcast as well. 

Literally any moment of his videos, he can divulge into either an anecdote or some random thought he had about whatever and why it’s odd. That’s the selling point of his 1000+ episode Binding of Isaac series, which he’s played enough of for some of the more complicated actions and choices to become second nature, letting his mind wander. Then, on his live shows, he has a handful of his friends to bounce off of. 

His live shows are easily his best content, thanks to every one of his cohosts bringing their own flair to whichever show they’re on, ranging from the insane Josh to the innocent Hafu. People always act like some shows are ruined by one or two specific cohosts being on, but honestly I can’t see any of them actually ruining the show. Obviously no one is perfect, but saying something like that just makes you a supreme asshole. See: Nick.

It’s funny, because they have a habit of revealing a lot about their day-to-day life, meaning people should see them as actual people and not just a mindless funny-machine. 

One of the big things about NL specifically, though, that is a serious breath of fresh air in the modern Youtube landscape, is that he doesn’t edit his videos at all. Literally no editing is done in his videos, and when there is a single jump cut or something, people make a spectacle about it. That means if he ever has to take his cat off of his keyboard, let it out of his office, talk to his wife, whatever... it’s all recorded, and seamlessly put into each video. Sometimes his wife will even sort of join in on the commentary for some videos. It’s so casual, not just in the commentary but in the whole entire presentation. His titles are even casual, where they’re basically just the usual “The Binding of Isaac: AFTERBIRTH+ - Northernlion Plays - Episode 1,000,000″ with a completely random keyword for each episode. Absolutely no clickbait, or even remotely interesting content presented, apart from the idea that NL is playing the game. 

Obviously it wouldn’t be as fun if the community around him and his show wasn’t both big and involved. It’s crazy, I go to the streams of other people outside of the NLSS crew and the chat is just in disarray. No one’s really talking about what’s going on, or even especially reacting to it. Even the smaller streamers basically just have people asking occasional questions, with a bit of reaction. Not to mention that other streamers feel the need to shout out each and every one of their supporters the instant they support them, making their streams feel so choppy. I get why they do that, it’s just seriously annoying. Some of the NLSS crew do that too, but during the shows they go as far as to mute themselves to do it. That kind of respect for the show makes me (and probably a lot of other people) respect it a lot more.

Back to the community, though... It’s insanely active. Every meme that comes about on each show is marked by the sheer amount of posts and comments people make about it. Even in a live chat, everyone can seem so unified in how they’re responding to the humor. It kinda helps my monkey brain enjoy the probably really low brow parts of their show, just because it knows so many other people find it funny too. Sometimes, while I have their show in the background, I’ll occasionally tab back in just to see chat react to a funny thing they’ve said or done. 

If I had to pick a specific running joke that’s the best, it has to be calling NL an “egg” just because he’s bald. I feel like he deals with that joke in the best possible way: obviously not getting super annoyed about it, but not going so far as to make it his entire brand as well. He’ll definitely acknowledge it when it comes up, and he might get playfully annoyed about it, because a hint of anger does make things funnier. Of course, he doesn’t go around calling himself an “egg” a lot either, so the humor in the joke sort of stagnates with the fandom and isn’t driven into the ground by his overuse. Really, that’s how a lot of their memes go. They mine it for a bit, then resent it, then mine it resentfully. They’ll even sometimes keep the meme alive by calling back to it every once in a while. It’s like the perfect method for humor, at least in their scenario.

As for a favorite? It’s actually seriously hard to say, considering almost every single one has driven me to actually laugh out loud (which, for someone as quiet as I am, shows a lot). Dan, for sure, has to be the source of most of that laughter, since he’s such a strange person. He’s the perfect hypeman, and doesn’t shy away from an odd bit, making him a total gem to have on anything. Every time he Cracks Open a Cold One for their tuesday shows, he just gets me super excited, even if I’m not into the game they’re playing for that. It’s crazy. I especially love it when people compare his laugh to a hyena’s. It’s a perfect analogy.

Anyways, thanks for coming to my TED Talk, etc. etc. and go watch his/their stuff.

[mu-legends-hack]

Mu Legend Hack Review

Mu Legend Hack Review - Program

WEBZEN, a worldwide developer and publisher of free-to-enjoy video games, has introduced a free of charge starter-pack giveaway for the ARPG MMO MU Legend. MU Legend has a clan program, mission technique, ability tree and distinct match modes, and dungeons alongside the maps. one. Enter Valofe's MU Legend Homepage and commence to the Support Transfer webpage. Then, comply with the transfer website page methods and requirements, which will lead you to the Webzen character verification webpage. After the game's first OBT debut previous November, the beautiful hack ‘n' slash Motion-Mmog MU Legend will officially be launched on August 7th, together with its 1st official growth: Noria.

After the official launch, MU Origin two gained a whole lot of acceptance with in excess of 500,000 downloads in South Korea. In addition, it has become the number two app in terms of revenue equally on the Google Perform Shop and Apple's App Mu Legend Cheat Retailer, and that in the hugely competitive Korean game titles industry. Masses of PvE and PvP MU LEGEND by natural means enables its players to unparalleled liberty of customization in its large range of PvE and PvP material.

1st, let's make clear what MU Legend is all about. It's an Mmo, like its predecessor, that is geared in direction of fluid hack-and-slash combat and ought to engage in easily on reduced-end techniques as nicely Mu Legend Hack as larger-stop kinds. Subsequent the footsteps of internationally productive MU titles (MU Online, MU Origin), MU Legend offers an reliable alternative to the dungeon crawler gaming knowledge.

The very first factor you want to do is to verify the laptop characteristic before signing up for the sport on MU Legend OL 2 Shopper obtain webpage. It is also attainable to check your pc on-line. Just click on the red button on the download webpage. With the OBT launch, players will have obtain to the entirety of MU Legend's entire world maps. Produce your character, check out historical civilizations like Greece, Egypt, Babylon, and China, and struggle in opposition to hordes of famous creatures! Mixing historical mythology with non-stop action, Titan Quest is a vintage hack-and-slash providing energizing gameplay with a quick, extreme rhythm.

It truly is been a lengthy wait for the MU Legend open beta test, but it appears like that wait is acquiring at least a couple of months more time. Webzen has confirmed that the subsequent period of the game's development is getting delayed for added balancing and changes. A next generation ARPG with MMO components, Mu Legend focuses on Overcome, Character Expansion and Partying.

MU Origin two is WEBZEN's endeavor to recapture the magic that turned MU On the web into one particular of the most popular MMORPGs of the past decade. This match offers radically-enhanced graphics over its predecessor, as effectively as many upgrades to the gameplay and standard good quality-of-life. We have partnered with Webzen to bring you 3K beta codes for MU Legend's second closed beta check, due to start on February twenty first.

Mu Legend Hack Review - The Best Cheat

Mu Legend looks incredible, with its a few dimensional and multi-layered amount design and style. The skill consequences and battle mechanics search easy with just sufficient of flashiness. WEBZEN, a international developer and publisher of free-to-engage in games, has announced its impending action Mmog MU Legend will enter its open beta stage this September. Very good Information! MmoGah has added the solutions of promoting MU Legend Zen and MU Electrical power Leveling which are welcomed by gamers with far more and much more orders each day. MmoGah has a great track record among gamers.

Webzen declared yesterday that it will include its 1st new class, "Emphasizer", to the Laptop online match 'MU LEGEND'. If you happen to be also a fan of the MOBA genre then very good news: the Revelation On the web Mythical Overcome update provides a different game manner inspired by MOBA titans like League of Legends and Dota two Mu Legend Hack. Accessibility to dismantling and crafting without having obtaining to go to NPC and thirty% exp bonus , would seem to be number of of items that could be considered P2W components, but i come to feel like the way the sport is built ( remember token and teleports ) , it doesnt actually give that a lot of a direct to a male with platinum time on his acc.

Zen is the forex you use in MU Legend to obtain new products at merchants and auctions, restore your equipment, and several more. This is why you have to seize each prospect to get it. Dragon Marked For Death is a side-scrolling Second action RPG that can played solo or with up to 4 gamers in local or on the web multiplayer. Its unhappy tho, as I genuinely appreciated my time with MU Legend. The battle is intense and truly enjoyable. It made me search with other eyes to Global Cooldown online games, like WoW and FFXIV. Motion MMORPGs can be genuinely excellent if completed properly.

You require Mu Legend Redzen for your endgame, due to the fact things for high ranges cost a lot and there is no point in throwing away your Mu Legend Redzen on low amount things only to outgrow them. You will do just good picking up items from mobs, getting them from quests or Rifts. When fighting monsters, try to hold them in a team. This way, the area attacks (which represent the greater part of capabilities offered in the sport) will damage a number of enemies at after, generating the fights significantly shorter.

[biscuitreviews]

Biscuit’s Favorite Games

When it comes to a great game, there are a few factors at play. ���Is the gameplay good? Is the story great? What cool memories do you have associated with the game? Did the game leave an everlasting impression?” All of these I feel are what help create a favorite game for a person.

Now normally people would countdown to their number one game and although I do have a number one game. There are many other games I enjoy as well and have left impressions on me that I carry with me to this day. 

With that I’m not going to do a “traditional” countdown, but rather give my favorites before going to my all-time favorite (which for some of you shouldn’t be a surprise because I’ve gone on record with it a few times already). With that, let’s go over some of my personal favorite games.

Halo: Reach

I love the Halo series. I love the setting, I love the idea of you being a badass super soldier, and  I love the soundtrack. I have more memories with the Halo series playing online with my friends and Halo: Reach for me has the best memories.

We would often get large groups going into big team matches and when we couldn’t get a large group we would go into the small team games and have tons of fun with either matchmaking or custom matches. There are many times we would stay up until 5 or 6 a.m playing Reach. Reach also spawned off quite a few inside memes with my friends, memes that we still quote to this day. With Microsoft’s recent announcement of Halo: Reach being re-released on PC, we’re looking forward to remembering the good times as we exchange teabags with a new generation of Spartans.

But aside from multiplayer, Reach also had in my opinion the best campaign. It was emotional, it had some amazing epic set pieces, it was challenging, and most importantly Noble 6 was your Spartan model from multiplayer which gave a more personal attachment to the story.

Pokemon Silver/Gold/Crystal

I was on the ground floor of the Pokemon Hype in the 90s. When the follow-up to the amazing Blue/Red/Yellow came out, many of use were ready to embark on a new Pokemon adventure in a new region eager to catch the new Pokemon.

It made great improvements from the original game, adding additional Pokemon types, a story with Team Rocket trying to make a comeback, and the biggest surprise of them all, going back to Kanto and fighting the Kanto Pokemon Gym Leaders. This made the world of Pokemon feel much larger and connected. Ever since then, it’s been a highly requested feature to have a previous region in another version revisited or ot have a nice dense post game. Although, revisiting regions has yet to happen since Silver/Gold/Crystal, each Pokemon game has been released with a good sizeable post game adventure to embark on.

The remakes HeartGold and Soul Silver are just as fantastic.

Devil May Cry 3: Dante’s Awakening

There are games that we complete at 100%, then there are games we complete until there’s nothing left. Devil May Cry 3 was the first game that I ripped apart inside and out in terms of content. I completed every single difficulty as both Dante and Vergil, acquired every skill, every alternative costume, and every challenge.

I did it because I had a lot of fun with the game’s combat and it was also my first Devil May Cry game. How I got the game was interesting as well. A friend of mine had Devil May Cry 3 and a relative of theirs gifted them another copy of the game for their birthday unbeknownst to them that my friend had the game already. They asked if I wanted their extra copy and that’s how I got into the Devil May Cry series. One day Devil May Cry 5, one day.

Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater

The Metal Gear Solid series is one of my favorite game series of all-time. The first entry of the series for the PS1 taught me so many things. In fact, the original Metal Gear Solid also greatly influenced my playstyle, which is emphasis on stealth.

Metal Gear Solid 3 was a great game that challenges your stealth skills. Not only did you have no radar, but you had to be more aware of your surroundings. Not only could you encounter guards, but you could potentially encounter wildlife in the jungle that could and will also harm you. You would also have to eat to keep your stamina up, wear the proper camouflage for the environment for optimal stealth, and you would have to heal injuries through various methods. All of these considerations added a new challenge to the stealth game to where the systems served as an extra layer rather than an annoying chore to keep up with.

Mega Man X4

This game was actually my first exposure to the Mega Man X series. I was already familiar with the classic series and I was eager to play this particular game and learning what the deal with having the X in the title was. It was then I learned that you could play as two different characters, the ever familiar blue bomber, which my 8 year old thought, “Ok, that must be a new model of Mega Man.” However, Zero was what immediately caught my eye, a robot using a lightsaber (which I would later learn it was called Z Saber) as an attack, sign me up!

The gameplay was super fun and there are slight differences in the story depending on who you play as. Granted it’s clear that this entry was catered for Zero rather than X, it’s still a really fun game no matter which character you picked. Similar to its predecessors, the game has also aged really well graphically.

Skies of Arcadia

To me, this is the perfect summer adventure in gaming. You’re a Robin Hood-esque air pirate who comes across a woman from a thought to be lost civilization. This was a turn based RPG where you had use the correct element on your weapon to effectively fight in battles. Not only that but there was also ship battles where you can engage in fighting other Airships.

It’s also a game that I feel constantly gets forgotten by Sega whenever they do Dreamcast collection releases. Skies of Arcadia is great and is one of the few games that I will 100% buy whenever it finally gets the HD remaster that it deserves.

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time

As far as the Legend of Zelda series goes I love every entry. There are a couple that I don’t like as much, but they still have qualities about them that I find enjoyable. Although Link to the Past was the first Zelda game I played, Ocarina of Time was the first one I would ever own and complete to 100%. At the time of its release it was a open area for you to explore with tackling temples and finding secrets. It also had a neat time travel mechanic with the story having some areas that would have effects on the future.

Telltale’s The Walking Dead Season One

This is a title that revived the the point and click adventure as well as popularize the episodic format. I got into this game during my Walking Dead craze and this game touched me in an unexpectedly emotional way. So much so I got teary eyed on the season finale and if a game manages to invoke such an emotional response within you, you know it did something right. I got attached to Lee and Clementine and the writing for the season was superb. Choices were respected and although there were many events that still happened no matter the choice, it was more reflected in the dialogue and for what Telltale was trying to accomplish, I thought it worked well.

Borderlands 2

Everyone that loves Borderlands 2, loves Handsome Jack and he’s an amazing video game villain. However, I do have a personal connection that cemented this as a favorite. This is a game that my wife and I would completely co-op with no handicap of any kind. What do I mean by a handicap. When it comes to playing co-op games on PC I am hopeless with a mouse and keyboard, where as my wife is completely running the show. Similar to consoles, my wife is hopeless with a controller and I’m taking point.

I used to not be much of a PC gamer. When I got a Windows 10 laptop my wife and I decided to get Borderlands 2 as Windows 10 allowed you to plug in a Xbox One controller without having to download any additional programs or anything. My wife was mouse and keyboard on her PC, and I was plugged in with a controller on my laptop and it changed everything. We no longer had to babysit one another, we could go into a camp of enemies and come out with barely a scratch on either of us. We even got to better understand one another’s playstyle and it complimented each other very well for an amazing co-op experience. Now I have evolved more into a PC gamer and have started playing so more co-op games with my wife.

The Witcher III: Wild Hunt

This is a game that I’ve been replaying and going back through since I played it in 2016. The detail of how character dialogue reacts to your decisions is just amazing. Also the way you go about fighting monsters is amazing as well. You have to study them, research them in your bestiary, drink the appropriate potions, apply the proper blade oil, use the propers signs and bombs in the fight. It gives you the sense that you are preparing for a fight.

CD Projekt Red used a branching story writing program called Articy Draft. It’s a program I myself actually use in my day job. I’m constantly going back to this game and studying it to try to imagine how the writers wrote certain decision points and how it branched out within Articy. Making different decisions and doing quests in a different order are just some of the things I do to further study this game in how they approach it in dialogue with Articy.

All Time Favorite - Final Fantasy X

As I mentioned in a few of my posts Final Fantasy X is my favorite game. I love everything about this game: the story, the setting, the characters, the combat system, the sphere grid progression system and the soundtrack. The way that Square had the player go through the world and learn more about it was genius and allowed for a deeper connection between Tidus and the player. There have been other games that have done this method of relaying plot information to the player, but to me Final Fantasy X was the one that got it right.

One day I will review this game, but I have no plans to review it for a good long time.

Those are my favorite games! I’d love to hear some of your favorites as well!