Blog Hiatus

Hello all,

Unfortunately this is going to be an extra short post and the last one for a little while. I just can’t seem to keep up with weekly content at this stage in my life. Particularly for something that I do for fun and for free. But lately writing for the blog isn’t fun. It’s just tedious. If any of my contributors want to write any articles they will 100% be posted on here but as for weekly content that;s just not something I can promise anymore.

But do not worry! The podcast is still going strong and I still thoroughly love making it. There are some big things on the horizon for the show and I cannot wait to share them all with you! On a side note. Last weekend I did record my first ever live episode of the podcast! I haven’t had much of a chance to listen to the audio yet but the event went well and I’m looking forward to doing more!

Sincerely thank you to anyone who took the time to read my ramblings on this page. Spelling errors and grammatical…. whatevers and all.

I would like to bring this blog back in the future. But for now I just don’t have to time to keep up with it.

I hope you all continue to listen to the podcast and I will see you all next time…

Super Mario Maker 2 Hype!

Holy crap it is almost here. Super Mario Maker 2! This weeks post is going to pretty much a Super Mario Maker love fest. I didn’t get to play a ton of the original but there was a solid week of my life that I devoted to just making levels. I was obsessed. It was an immense amount of fun figuring out new ways to create unique and interesting puzzles. I honestly don’t have much to say this week. I’m tired and busy but I am beyond excited for this sequel. So I’m gonna keep this short and sweet.

Here’s the trailer:

In this new game, a sequel to the original Wii U™ game, players can create the Super Mario courses of their dreams, with access to even more tools, items and features, including the new ability to create slopes for the first time. Super Mario Maker 2 launches exclusively for Nintendo Switch this June.

Now go play some freakin’ Mario!

NHL 19

NHL 19 has become my latest gaming obsession. I seriously am not into sports games. I honestly think they are a waste of time buying the new version of the same game year after year. NHL 19 may have changed my mind with that for the NHL series at least.

Seriously this game is way more fun than it should be. Lets start with the controls. They take some getting used to. Especially for people like me who are used old school NHL controls. I would also argue controls are the biggest barrier for entry due to this reason. But once you get used to it. You sit down and take your time. Allow yourself to be bad. Once you get used them it honestly makes the whole game feel more immersive. It makes each shot you take feel more effective. It makes each hit you land feel that much harder. While you have the puck you hit R2 to pass. Im playing on PS4 btw. You use the right analog stick to control the hockey stick of the player with the puck. So to shoot you bring the joystick to the side and whip it forward for a wrist shot. For a slap shot you bring it back to the bottom. Almost like you are winding up. And then snap back forward to complete a slap shot. I won’t bore you with more of the control details. but they seriously make you feel more like a hockey player than the older ones did.

Now I understand this type of control isn’t new to the NHL series. I only really played NHL 13 prior to this one and NHL 2002 prior to that. So there are so large gaps here. NHL 13 had a similar control scheme but it just never really felt right. This does.

The game also offers a plethora of game modes. Besides the random pick up game and franchise mode, you also get HUT Ultimate Team, NHL 3’s, Create your own player/career etc. So many different options. There is a lot of content in this so you will have plenty to play. My only real complaint is HUT ultimate team. And not that it’s bad but the stupid micro-transactions involved with it. To build your ultimate team you can buy card packs with actual money. The card packs behave like real life card packs where you don’t really know what you are getting. Well the odds are so stacked against you that it honestly doesn’t make it worth it. I’ve spent $60 on these fucking things and I can tell you it is not worth it. In fact the last $10 of that was an accident. I accidentally charged myself $10 more by mistake on PSN. So I spent it and it really was not worth it.

My 2 personal favorite modes are the create you own player mode and the Ultimate team. I like the feeling of you building towards something. Whether that is your individual players stats, or the make up of your ultimate team, it just feels fun.

So overall I just wanted to rave about this game for this week’s blog. I also have been crazy busy and it’s been getting harder and harder to make time for this. But I do plan to continue on! I’m looking for more contributors to help relieve the pressure on my end so that will help with this as well. There is big stuff coming with the podcast as well! So be on the look out!

Red Dead Redemption

Crazy as it sounds but I have never played a full Rockstar game. GTA, Red Dead, Manhunt, Bully, you name it I haven’t beaten it. The one I have played the most is GTA IV but I got stuck on a mission and rage quit. But with the release of Red Dead 2 out I felt it was about damn time for me to actually try my hand at the original. So this week’s blog is going to be dedicated to my playthrough of the game so far. Next weeks? Well hopefully I will have beaten it by then. But if not you will get another update!

Red Dead Redemption was Rockstar answering a question no one knew they wanted to ask. What if you made GTA into an old western? I vaguely remember the hype for this game before it came out and that a lot of the games press was skeptical of the idea. But once it was released it was smash hit and became both a critical and financial success for them. It was released on May 18th 2010. Anddd at the time of writing this it is just hitting me that the game is almost 9 years old… Well that was my daily dose of feeling old. Anyway let’s dive into my first week of gameplay.

I started playing Red Dead 1 almost exactly 1 week from the date this blog is being released, this past Saturday. First impression. This game still freakin holds up. The controls are probably the most dated aspect of the game and from what I’ve heard they haven’t really changed too much in Red Dead 2 either. I really do not like how you have hold or mash the “X” button (“A” button on XB360? Im playing it on my PS3) to run. I also don’t like how the characters move. You don’t feel 100% in control of your movement. There is an awkward turn radius for everything you control, whether it’s the main character, a horse etc. Probably the worst thing to control and maneuver with is any cart or wagon. It’s so easy to over commit to a turn and cause you to drive off the road and fuck up whatever mission you’re on. But other than the controls the game still plays well!

Probably the most striking aspect of the game that still holds up are the graphics! The character models and the building textures aren’t too great. However, the lighting and environment just looks stunning still. Obviously not as good as the new game but I was still pleasantly surprised!

WARNING! SPOILERS AHEAD!? So I don’t know if this really needs a spoiler warning for a game that is almost 10 years old now but none the less I wanted to throw that out there since this last bit of the today’s post I wanted to talk about the story I’ve played so far! As of me writing this (literally the night before being posted) I have just made it into Mexico and it appears that I have completed the Landon Ricketts quest line. I’m really enjoying the story so far. Marsden is a great main character. The way Rockstar has written him makes him a little ambiguous in terms of is her a good or bad guy? This allows the player to decide what type of character he is going to be. I almost always plays the goody two shoes type of guy so I like how he can be an outlaw with a heart of gold. I’m not entirely sure who is keeping his wife and daughter captive? Maybe I’m missing something but he seems to be intentionally vague on that. It could be the government? Or possibly remnants of his old gang?

In any case. So far I am enjoying this game and I look forward to keeping you all posted with my progress!

NAMCO Museum

A big thing I want to do with this blog is talk about games that I have little interest in. Okay, that may not be the best lead in for this but hear me out. I want to talk about specific games or specific gaming topics that I find interesting or have respect for but don't really enjoy playing or engaging in. Today's topic is a perfect example of this. NAMCO is one of those storied developers. They have pretty much been around since the birth of the video game industry. And while I respect what they have done for this industry I just don't enjoy playing their games all that much and that just.. feels.. wrong. Those who follow the podcast know I love video game history so it surprises me even more that I don't enjoy their games. But with all that said, the NAMCO Museum games are surprisingly fun and totally worth a visit. Especially for you video game history fans out there.

I want the next couple posts that I write to cover the various volumes of the NAMCO Museum series. However, I am honestly not 100% sure there is enough to talk about in each volume that can fill a blog post for each volume but dammit I am going to try. So for today we are going to begin with NAMCO Museum Volume 1.

The first volume of the Museum series consists of 7 different classic NAMCO games. Pac-Man, Bosconian, Galaga, Pole Position, Rally-X, New Rally-X and Toy Pop. Like I said I'm not the biggest fan of NAMCO's classic titles and if this series was just a compilation of those titles I wouldn't be all too impressed with it. Besides since some of these games are so iconic I will probably do episodes of the podcast on them and dive further into their history. But what makes the NAMCO Museum series stick out is the literal museum aspect of it. In this compilation series you can either chose to play the games or you can chose to “visit” the NAMCO Museum. If you select the museum option from the menu the game will let you explore the museum in first person. You wander around looking at all the exhibits it has to offer. Not surprisingly there is an exhibit for each game on the collection and as boring as this sounds the museum was the most interesting part about the entire game for me.

Before I dive into the museum in full you can see a full video of the museum tour for NAMCO Museum Volume 1 HERE.

In each exhibit you will find scans of promotional material, instruction cards, sprite libraries and more for each of the games in the collection. At the end of each exhibit they have a 3D rendering of what the arcade cabinet for each game. You can then walk up the cabinet and play the game there! It's a crude representation of an arcade but it is still pretty cool they would add something like that. In the video linked the player starts out in the exhibit for the game Toy Pop.

Prior to researching this I had honestly never heard of this arcade game before. It was released in 1986, which was 3 years before I was born so it was out of arcades by the time I really got to experience it. On a side note I also did not really go to arcades at all as a kid which probably contributed to me never seeing this game, so that's two strikes against me. The first thing you are able to view in this exhibit is a sales promotion pamphlet from 1986. You can then select a larger version of the scan and zoom into various points and take a good look at it. Sadly since this is a PS1 title the scans are NOT really the highest quality. The player then progresses and views Toy Pop stationary, a POP card (which was a card placed on the side of the arcade cabinet), an instruction card, finally a tip book that offers tips on how to get better at the game and finally a picture scan of the actual arcade board that was inside the cabinets.

Each game's exhibit has different things like these on display. And while I find this interesting I don't want to bore all of you. I mean where is the fun in mean just describing what's in a video when I already provided a link to watch it. After writing all of this I'm really starting to realize that there isn't much insight I could provide for the other games in this series. But if this type of thing would interest you reach out to me! I would be happy to write more posts about this series. You can see all my social media links at the bottom of this web page or contact me via the contact page on this site.

It is honestly amazing to me how much detail they put into these museum segments. The first volume was released in 1995 and as someone who likes video game history a great deal I can't help but love that NAMCO took to the time to document and archive all of this. Unfortunately not every game developer takes the time to do this and a lot of video game history is lost. But thankfully NAMCO preserved it and I am looking forward to diving more into their museum series personally. Whether it be for the blog or just for fun!