July 2005 Archives

New Comic. Kinda based on Eternal Darkness, mostly based on my apartment. Not much else going on. Other than my A/C frizzing, my fridge freezing soda and milk, my windows producing concrete bits, my carpet bleeding, and the 9 AM jackhammers on the floor below. And that's just this week. Odds are this has something to do with me moving out of Savannah tomorrow. So next my post will be from Ohio, hopefully from a much better apartment in Kent.

The first two panels (and the Title page) of the mini-series are now up. The first slide introduces the character and the world. Be sure to come back next week to find out what happens after that intense battle!

Oh, and I gave the comics archive page a bit of an overhaul.

I have been working very hard at work and I have something to show for it.

Bigger Pic

New Comic. I feel sick, tired, and dizzy so I'm going to sleep now. Hopefully the storms will quiet down and the jack hammers won't return.

When I quit R. O. S. E. and Gunbound, I gave up on online games. I was sick of the people and the time wasted leveling instead of having fun. When a friend told me about GunZ The Duel, figured I'd check it out despite my prejudice against the online community. As an open beta, it was pretty well done despite a few gripes I have.

As with most games online party games there's a story behind the games image, but of course nobody playing cares about it. Short story is you have guns and blades and so does the enemy, who will fall first. Granted there is a variety of weapons and armor for your character so you can customize to your particular fighting style, but nothing too wierd.

gameplay seems on par with most 3rd person action games. You dash, tumble, wallrun, and climb through a mess of modern and archaic landscapes and maps. And because this is a realtime action game, there is little time to type nonsense and troll other players with out getting killed by another player.

The sound effects and music seem to fit the game well. I can't even get the violins out of my head when I'm not playing.

Now for the bad news. This game is far from perfect in many ways too.

Unfortuately the game focuses a lot on leveling characters. Which interferes with the goal of having fun. plus it gives some players too much of an advantage. Having to upgrade ones equipment is also a bit of a headache as well.

Then comes my favorite annoyance of the game. It promotes too much stupid gun and sword play. Most shoot-outs are with amateurs in close range with poor lighting and horrid accuracy. Further more, most people are critically injured by just one bullet wound, there have been documented cases of people dying after accidentally shooting themselves in the foot, and most forms of body armor are cumbersome and lowers ones agility. Granted they got the accuracy and lighting right for the game, but most of the chacters can take more bullets to the chest than 50cent. In fact I was able to unload an entire submachine gun clip into a person yet they were able to turn around and kill me as I reloaded the weapon. Also the rocket lauchers seem to be pretty weak as well. I've seen players shoot these off at people point blank with them both caught in the blast, yet they still were standing alive and well. Also, for some odd reason tumbling out in the air, even out in the open, makes it harder for the other players to hit you. Most amateurs learn quickly that John Woo moves are just a quick way to die, and the best bet usually lies in cover and suppressive fire.

But despite all of my whining, GunZ is not unforgivably horrid. Unlike R. O. S. E., Ragnarok Online, and many other MMORPGs, this game had the one thing they were lacking - GAMEPLAY. And as a free open beta, it was pretty fun. If they ever get rid of the leveling, balance the weapons and armor correctly and realistically, and just allow full avatar customization it would be fantastic. Though I will probably delete this game off of my computer in the next week or so, I won't regret playing the game.

Another review is up now. This time I cover the online beta of GunZ The Duel. Its not an MMORPG, so you know it at least has a chance of being fun and involving game play.

You may have noticed a few changes to the website. First off, we have added a donation bar off to the left. We would appreciate donations of any size (a few pennies or two dollars) BUT, be sure to include your email address because all donators will receive a special gift at the end of the month they donated in. I am in talks with Dive to figure what the first gift will be (comic/wallpaper/something cool). So if you donate, please include it in your paypal donation.

We have also added ads by Goooooogle. Each click to our sponsor brings us some change. I like change, so I would appreciate it if you would click on one of the gooogle links on the site (please? just a simple click).

We don't like to beg. But pleeeeeeease help us raise some money for our server costs. As always we want to give our visitors a clean enjoyful website and don't want to have any of those damn annoying flash ads and pop-ups.

Quote:

ScummVM lets you run these adventures: Adventure Soft's Simon the Sorcerer 1 and 2; Revolution's Beneath A Steel Sky, Broken Sword 1 and Broken Sword 2; Flight of the Amazon Queen; and games based on LucasArts' SCUMM (Script Creation Utility for Maniac Mansion) system. SCUMM is used for many games, including Monkey Island, Day of the Tentacle, Sam and Max and more. Compatibility with supported games is continually improving, so check back often.

Installation:
- Add games to your memory stick, add them anywhere it doesn't matter
- Install under \PSP\GAME\SCUMMVM\
- Create a SAVE folder under the folder
- Run ScummVM and use the launcher to add games and run them

I can't wait to get this installed. I haven't play Sam & Max for a long time and now is a good time to play it on my PSP.

Download it here

New Comic. Sorry I'm a little late. My apartment is being renovated, so I couldn't sleep well. At least my new apartment in Ohio should be better. Hopefully I will be able to get into Kent State and continue to at least try to update on time.

A little slip-up on one of Microsoft's partner sites has revealed the release date for the Xbox360, November 4, 2005. I assume this is for us in the US but no confirmation yet. Since Ryo and I recently moved into an apartment we will be broke for a while, so feel free to donate all your pocket change towards our Xbox360 funds.

Update: Ryo has set up a Paypal donation address. Check out the sidebar to the left.

I just got back few hours ago. Ryo must not have gotten my e-mail with Friday's comic. So here's the new comic. Sorry if the comic is too much like a bad rant, but the problem with multiplayer games is that they place you with the same people you try to avoid by playing video games.

In a previous post, I mentioned a site that had a whole bunch of TV ads for many games and consoles and that I was trying to find the Kirby Canvas Curse TV ad. Well, I found it.

Right on time!!!!
I'm pretty sure this isn't where Dive got the idea from but...

The Nintendo DS moto is "Touching is good." Well, as we all should know (Mr. Jackson knows at least), you shouldn't always touch and this is how I imagine how it would go in the video game world.

On Wednesday, I went to see War of the Worlds. It was a pretty good movie. It has violence, blood and scary parts, but also had the parts that contradicted it. It is a well done movie and I will probably buy it, but that's not to say it didn't step on itself a few times. I won't go into any details to give away the movie for those of you who haven't seen it, but the part at the beginning where the “electro magnetic storm” fries all of the electronic components (cell phones, watches, cars, etc.), how did that persons camcorder still work?

Anyways, reports that piracy on the PSP is possible. psp-hacks You can load a Lumines ISO off the memory card and play it. I haven't seen a console or portable hacked this quickly. An update will sure come out to fix this.