Tribes: Ascend: My Guilty Pleasure

No, this is not the title of some random Japanese game that is poorly translated into English. The title of the game is Tribes: Ascend. Tribes games have been around forever, I’ve always known what they were but never experienced them. I say this game is my guilty pleasure because when I should be spending my time on the game I waited a decade for (Diablo 3) I find myself more and more playing Tribes. It is a first person shooter unlike any other I’ve ever played before. Tribes: Ascend is 100% free to play, there are bonuses to becoming a premium member but there is literally nothing you can do as a VIP that you can’t do as a regular member. 

Tribes: Ascend is a futuristic shooter with a unique method of transportation around the map. The skill is called skiing (similar to real world except without snow and a lot more fun/less cold/less painful, so nothing like real world skiing in all actuality). While skiing you can get ‘mad air’, ‘mad speed’, ‘mad something’. Let’s just say it is fun, fast paced, and action packed. Just like that movie you went to see this summer that was a total disappointment, except nothing like that.  If you aren’t skiing in Tribes you are dead. Speed and energy for your jetpacks is what keeps you alive in Tribes. Did he just say jetpacks? Hell yes he did. Jetpacks, this game has them, they are fun as hell, you can fly.

Tribes has a ton of classes; defensive, support, offensive, scout-like, it has them all. All of them have very distinct play styles and for the most part they all seem fairly balanced. I’ve heard that some of them on the more professional level are less useful but for amateur matches all of them can excel when used by a proficient player. My personal favorite is the technician (one of the ones I’ve heard is less spectacular at higher level play), its focus is defensive, laying sentries to defend the flag or generator or as a trap for some unexpecting opponent. However, the technician isn’t useless without his sentries. With strong grenades and one of the more powerful LMGs the technician can provide strong base defense with the potential to chase down players if positioned correctly. 

I’ve played all of the classes, just to experience them; and I have others that I like to play on certain maps. This isn’t a statement that I would normally say for other FPS’s. I will play any class just to try it out, but rarely do I find a class that I like for a specific map. Tribe’s wide variety of maps allows me to enjoy a specific play style depending on the map, if I want to be offensive I play a pathfinder, if I want to cause chaos in the enemies base I will play an infiltrator, if I want to focus on defense (without playing technician) I will be a brute. Tribes excels at allowing you the opportunity to play whatever the hell you like.

IT’S KIND OF LIKE A RPG! I’m serious. Because it is a 100% free to play game there has to be a system in place to unlock premium items. There is a leveling up system based on experience that is, in my opinion, completely fair. No there is no story, this is a multiplayer game (so I guess technically it’s not a rpg) but it has that system of progression. Currently my technician (my most played class, and the one I focus on unlocking stuff for first) has 58% of all the items for the class unlocked. I’ve spent about 30 hours in the game thus far and focused mostly on unlocking stuff for this class. If your priority is unlocking/progression, this game is going to offer a lot it while being fun as hell. 

Tribes: Ascend is powered by UE3, Epic Games’ engine that it allows developers to use for their games. The graphics are pretty (I like the shadows a lot). That’s about all I have to say on the topic. Tribes isn’t going to push your computer to its limits (if you have a relatively new one), but it definitely won’t look bad at all. Really the only game I can think of to compare it to in terms of style is the Halo series (as far as armor is concerned) except MUCH faster. 

CLOSIN’ IT OUT

Tribes: Ascend; a game that is completely free to play, with a strong community (that is developing professional leagues/tournaments), an active development team, and SKIING… FAST.  That kind of sums it up, if you are looking for a new first-person shooter that doesn’t fall in line with the stale Call of Duty mold, try this out. I’m certain you won’t regret it. 

P.S. For those wondering, I am not assigning numeric values for a game, if I don't like a game I will say it, if I like a game (like this one) I will have said it (like I did). 

P.P.S I'll add links to download the game and some pics in the morning, but for now it's late and I need some sleep. 

Enjoy.

Diablo 3 thoughts, I give back to YOU

Diablo 2 was one of the most important games of my childhood, it was an iconic game that defined that genre of gaming for a very long time. I grew up playing it, learning it, studying it, mastering it. It solidified the foundation of my addiction to gaming. The addictive nature of the game lied in the fact there was no perfecting it, there were endless combinations and there was always that one piece of gear that was better than what you had and infinitely out of reach but it seemed to somehow be attainable if enough effort were given. Its successor, Diablo 3, has a lot to live up too and after playing it for about 60 hours I think I can understand why Blizzard took so long to develop and release it. I think it has also helped me to understand why Half-life 3 and other (3^rd in the line traditionally legendary games) may never be developed/released. The legend that surrounds games like Diablo 2 makes it nearly impossible to make a future installment that will please everyone and live up to the name. 

Diablo 3 is in no way a bad game. I missed the first two days after the game was released so I had little experience with the major errors and server issues but to assume that there would be none would be foolish. Even with all of Blizzard’s experience  there is no way to predict just how hard the servers are going to be hit initially so to say the game was ruined because of its launch wouldn’t be fair to the game.

I am 60 hours into the game, I have a max level (60) character (monk), that is progressing through the highest difficulty (inferno) but I’ve barely had the game for 10 days. Technically speaking I beat the game in two days and my first reaction was to send a text to a buddy of mine “Just beat Diablo 3. I waited a decade to beat a game in 11 hours. Good thing Diablo is all about replay value.” Exactly what this says about this game wasn’t entirely clear to me as I was sending the text. Is it too short? Did I experience it wrong? Did I have the wrong expectations going in? I didn’t really know, but I have been thinking about these questions for a few days now and I think I may have some answers.

Spoiler Alert: Deckard Cain is back.

Is the game too short? Yes and no. Diablo 2’s campaign took a long time (unless you were power leveled) mostly because of the enormous maps but that doesn’t make it better. I don’t think the game itself is to short, I think the story is to short and that is what made everything about it feel so short. I never really felt connected to the story until the beginning of act 4 (the whole Leah thing, to avoid spoilers I won’t share). Up until that point I was just kind of grinding my way through. The story wasn’t very developed and to be completely honest many of the quests felt like those from WoW. 

So did I experience it wrong? NO way in hell, well maybe a little bit. Diablo is a min/maxers, a stat whores, a damage buffs dream and I can proudly say that those descriptions would accurately describe me. I felt disappointed by it because none of those things happened in my first play through. There was no gear check, nothing was difficult, and I don’t believe I died even once due to mechanics or my own faults in the first difficulty. The second and third difficulty offered little change. They weren’t any more difficult, they were necessary evils to level your character all the way to 60. It wasn’t until inferno that I felt a real challenge, the challenge I wanted, the challenge that made the game an experience not just a grind. Inferno is where the game shines (for most).

Expectations. We all had them and I truly believe that Blizzard tried to kill some of the hype early on because they feared that dreadful 3 that so many others do as well (VALVE).  When we think back about Diablo 2, we remember the best of times, we remember a damn near perfect game that brought people together and defined gaming. This is a total lie and the reason why so many people will be unhappy with Diablo 3. We remember Diablo 2 differently than it actually was; it’s been built up in our minds for so long that it no longer has flaws. I went into Diablo 3 expecting the exact same experience from Diablo 2 and then some because without the ‘and then some’ there would be no progression. But if I think Diablo 2 is a perfect game, it is impossible for Diablo 3 to live up to expectations. That is why I am no longer comparing Diablo 3 to Diablo 2, they are separate entities and without the comparison I can remember Diablo 2 the way I like, and enjoy Diablo 3 the way it was meant to be.

NOW TO THE GAME ITSELF (SIGH). 

Many people on the Diablo 3 forums are complaining about the graphics, I like them. There isn’t a whole lot more to say about it than that. They look nice, I have the settings maxed, I like destroying parts of the environment, and I think the cut scenes are quite beautiful (I’m going to try and post a high resolution picture of my favorite cut scene shot in the game). The physics are fine, things work the way they are meant too, I’ve had literally no graphics bugs, errors, or collision issues in the game yet. If you are looking for BF3 or Crisis level graphics, you will be disappointed, this is a top down game with a camera angle that takes some getting used too.

This is the highest res ss it would let me take

The game play is solid. Most of the classes (with exception to my main, explanation later) can progress normally and fairly. There are some exploits that are floating around but Blizzard is handling them as the show up. With how many people there are playing the game there was just no way for Blizzard to predict every possible build combination. The fighting is fun, fast paced, a little bit hectic at times and if this is your first dungeon crawler at this camera angle, well there’s almost too much happening at any given instance, it just comes with the territory and takes some getting used to. If you were a fan of Diablo 2, you won’t be disappointed by how it feels, though I do personally miss the potion spamming. I feel as if I’m not doing enough with my left hand without it. 

Loot, this game is all about it. Without it there would be no point in playing and Diablo 3 for the most part does not disappoint. I feel as if there are fewer sets than in Diablo 2 (or I may just be comparing it in my head to Torchlight and I don’t realize it), and legendaries are not as powerful as they should be. However Blizzard has already spoken on the topic and plans to change them in the future. Diablo 3, like Diablo 2, is all about the farming at the high levels. It’s that one piece of gear that puts you over that damage or mitigation mark that you will never get. Unfortunately this brings me to the auction house (don’t bother even asking me about the real money AH). I don’t think the auction house was thought through entirely, it makes it to easy to get what you need and it means people can make their money by playing the AH rather than playing the game. I think that breaks part of the lasting appeal of the game. All those economics majors are going to get the best gear before me without putting in the time played. 

My personal experience.

I play a monk, a melee class, a class the needs balance in a number of areas and arguably the weakest in the game right now. I can no longer progress in the last difficulty without spending 10’s of hours farming to get money to buy items on the auction house. Blizzard recently ‘hotfixed’ some bugs/exploits that monks were experiencing, in the process they practically made the class worthless. This has been my experience in Inferno the last couple of days. I’ve hit a progression wall that requires gear that isn’t attainable without going through the AH, and if you have gotten this far you know how I feel about the AH. 

I’m not going to rate this game on a scale, these are opinions and experiences. I will however say that as many negative things I had to say about the game I’m still playing it (I do however worry about lasting appeal). In my honest opinion I don’t think Diablo 3 will hold up to its name, not because it is a bad game, but because these are different times. There are so many big titles coming out every year that as great and huge as this game is, it won’t last in the minds of everyone like Diablo 2 did.

Spoiler alert: not nearly as attractive in this one

Update: apparently I keep my cursor in the same spot on the screen no matter what is going on (just look at the pictures I put up), it took quite a few tries to get clear ones and my cursor barely moves.

Ready Player One

Two days ago I was watching the Feedback podcast hosted by G4’s Blair Herter with his fiancée Jessica Chobot and two of G4’s editors as the hosts. At one point during the podcast Blair started talking about Ready Player One; a geeky, nerdy, quest-driven, 80s memorabilia riddled, romance, adventure story. That sounds pretty vague and I’ll admit it is, it was the first book the author ever had published and it was a unique style to read. Typically I stick to my action adventure espionage thriller genre type books (Vince Flynn/Lee Child) but I decided to give this book a try. 

Yesterday around noon I went to a nearby brick and mortar store to pick up the book, about 3 in the morning I had finished it. With exception to going to dinner with my parents and the occasional bathroom break I read it from beginning to end. Now don’t get the wrong idea, I’m not saying that it was so good I couldn’t put it down, it was a great book but that’s not the case. That is just how I usually read books. 

Without ruining too much of the book here is the gist of it. The main character is a teenager that plays in a virtual reality world like World of Warcraft but much much more immense and immersive. Most of the world played this game because the real world had essentially become post-apocalyptic (minus the apocalypse part). A world wide quest was given out to obtain a huge award for real world money; it was a puzzle quest of sorts. The trials and growth of the main character are what keeps things interesting, the main character develops relationships in this world but knows nothing of their true identities much like our own world of gaming. The book creates an interesting perspective between the friendships that exist in the real world and internet world. 

If you enjoy reading; and since you have suffered through this much of my own writing, then you will probably enjoy Ready Player One. It has an excellent way of reminding us of the 80s (which I missed by a couple of months) and the evolution of gaming, pop-culture, music, and the movie industry. 

If you are interested in the book you can find it here on amazon (SUPER NEAT LINKY)

Dungeon Defenders is the most addicting 3rd person action rpg tower defense you will ever play

So it has been awhile since I’ve posted now for a number of reasons I don’t really need to go into on here but I am going to try and start posting more regularly now. Instead of focusing of daily posting about the news I find for that day I think I will only post about what I am actively engaged or excited about. That said, since I’ve stopped posting I have played quite a few games that you guys might be interested in hearing about. I am going to abandon the numerical measurement system for video games because it is difficult to quantify everything and instead let you hear what I think about the game; its successes, failures, and how I think it impacts the gaming industry.

As a coming back to writing post, I think I will write about the game I’ve played most since I stopped writing which is Dungeon Defenders. Originally this game was made for mobile devices using Epic’s UT3 engine but the young company, Trendy Entertainment, decided to take its hit mobile game to the next level and make it a full PC game (and maybe Mac, I don’t really know). 200 hours into the game as of last night I can confidently say that I have experienced just about everything you can in the game.

As I said before Dungeon Defenders was designed for mobile devices turned PC, it was a 15 dollar game and I’ve dumped more hours into it than most games I get my hands on. In fact I have put more hours into this game in the month and a half it has been out than I have put into games like MW2, TF2 and Civilization V so it pretty much goes without saying that I’m addicted. Being a mobile game originally, it was plagued with little content compared to what PC gamers have come to expect but the developers (all 17 of them) have been adding content and patching their game at a rate I have literally never seen before. In Rift when a major patch came out and there were bugs they would come out with a hotfix for the patch in a couple days, TE would have a hotfix submitted to Steam within hours. Sometimes this doesn’t come without its own issues but as a young company trying to keep their fan base it was generally well received. 

Company, cost, patches aside and we are left with the actual game and if you are still reading this I commend you. The game itself is a third person (with the option of first person) action rpg tower defense, which may seem like a lot to take in. Think your typical tower defense game but where you control a character in the mix of the madness having an effect on each level. With 70 levels, 5 different types of armors for each of the 4 slots with endless prefixes changing the stats and tons of different weapons and even more stats, there is a huge amount of rpg to the game. Part of the reason why the game is so addicting is the rpg side of it but at the same time it’s the competition of getting your name on the leader boards because your strategy and tower placement is better than the rest.

With at least 250,000 players (this is an old number, I’d suspect closer to 500,000 now) there is a lot of competition on the leader boards. Last I checked I held the number 1 spot for 2 different maps/modes, but that is out of a possibility of at least 100 different rankings. Beyond the rush of rankings the developers are updating their game with new content and fixing current content all the time keeping the game very active and fresh.

There are 8 classes, 4 come with the original game and 4 are gender swapped dlc (with slightly different skills). They are always adding new maps and if you play on the open server even more because TE released their version of the Unreal Developer Kit with the games code so that you can mod to your hearts content. The UDK is actually pretty easy to use; with no experience at all I was able to make a simple level without much trouble. With it made I could technically upload it and let others play it but I dare not embarrass myself because the modding community is active and some cool maps are being made all the time.

This is the season for Steam sales, this is a 15 dollar game that I have spent more time in than most 60 dollar games and in this season chances are you will find the game and all of its dlc (a lot of it’s free but all of it together probably isn’t more than 8 dollars right now) on Steam for a great price. I highly recommend picking this game up this holiday season, you get a good game that is a unique style and very fun, you get to support a start up indie developer committed to its community, and you get to kill tons and tons of goblins which is always a plus.

That is it for now but there are a bunch of other games that I will try to post about soon (Skyrim, BF3, Orcs Must Die, Gears of War 3, Dark Souls and more)

Steve Jobs passed away on October 5, 2011

I apologize for the lack of posting the last two days; I have been a little bit under the weather (despite how nice it has been outside all week). I had hoped to come back today with a happy exciting post about some game I found on my phone that I really enjoyed but last night I was informed of the passing of Steve Jobs the co-founder and former CEO of Apple, so I will dedicate this post to him.

A week or so ago I read an article written by someone at IGN that basically talked about the culture of gaming and who represented it (or in this case the lack of representation). They wrote about the direction of gaming and how there weren’t any faces that were recognizable beyond doubt that could move the industry forward with their influence and power and that got me thinking. Who for the past decade has been the face of technology? Steve Jobs, his influence in the world of technology is arguably more widely known than any other name. Not everyone uses or even likes Apple products, I myself am not a huge fan of them but I can’t ignore their importance to everything else I use. Apple hasn’t ever been the innovator but they have for a long time now taken an idea, done it the right way, and taken over entire markets. They have dominated these markets so well that others companies take Apple’s ideas and use them their own way because they see how good they are. They have done what they do so well that for years and years and even now companies are still trying to compete (and for the most part failing) with the iPhone and more recently the iPad.

Credit for the dominance in entire markets should be given to Steve Jobs, sure he had a team backing him but it was Steve that put his life out there to move the industry forward. Because of his work we can game on our phones while accessing our favorite videos, manage our calendars, and check our emails. Hell, our parents can’t even figure out how to do half of that but for our generation it comes second nature and that is because Steve Jobs has helped to make technology such a big part of our lives. You think PC you think Microsoft, you think Apple you think Steve Jobs, that is why I say he was the face of technology. It is upsetting to see a legend pass, but this won’t be the end of Apple, I’m sure that for all he gave to the company he set it in the direction for continued success.

P.S. If this was unbearably difficult to read or make sense of I apologize, it is a much different article than I normally write and I found it a challenge to convey meaning and purpose of another persons life.