Pondering Tuesdays – Reality Check Edition

By on March 26, 2013 with 7 Comments

Tomb Raider - Lara on Radio

I’m just going to keep putting random “thinking about stuff” synonyms in the title field until I run out. Let’s get started…

Wanted: Strong Female Role Model. Ashelia (no full name given) played Tomb Raider and had a powerful reaction. Go read it and then come back.

I wish I could have my daughter read this. You hear about the need for female empowerment and role models all the time. It’s almost always well-intentioned, but there’s a point at which those become buzz words and not something genuinely meaningful. As a father, it makes it hard to know exactly where to steer her because you want so badly for your little princess, as she becomes a person who’s not so little anymore, to choose role models that represent the best in human nature and not Twilight’s pitiable Bella or some camera-starved reality TV whorelet.

Also, Justin Bieber. Le sigh.

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Jumping the Shark Podcast #167

By on March 26, 2013 with 0 Comments

No High Scores Podcast Logo

Image: Filomena Scalise / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

The Brakke and Cackowski-Schnell Hour of Pour returns this week with Bill playing the role of dutiful husband. It’s a shame that The Abner misses our special Abnercon re-cap episode, but if you want to hear all about World Cup, Spartacus, Mare Nostrum, and Tomorrow, I’m here for you. If you don’t, well I don’t even care. Nyah!

Filling up our video game quota, Brandon speaks ill of God of War: Ascension, casting it aside to play more Fire Emblem and do some more fishing of the ridiculous kind. We also marvel for awhile at the reported $200M budget billed to the production and marketing of Bioshock: Infinite. I mean, seriously? That’s Avengers money there. And I don’t see Infinite, however good it may be, pulling it a billion dollars worldwide. Just say’n.

All this and more coming your way in episode #167!

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Calendar Man – Week of 3/25

By on March 25, 2013 with 10 Comments

BioShock Infinite

BioShock Infinite comes out this week, as does a bunch of other things including my new house. I’m swamped and stressed and have too much other stuff on my mind, so this is all you get this week. Next week you’re also on your own for new releases and the finding of deals as I will be waist deep in unpacking. Enjoy your time in Columbia.

Mage Knight: The Lost Legion Review

By on March 22, 2013 with 3 Comments

Mage Knight Lost Legion figures and box

Mage Knight Goldyx felt old and tired. He’d been to Atlantea several times, with comrades and without, but the effort of preparation, the length of the journey and the interminable waiting around for other Mage Knights once there had dulled his taste for adventure. Now he preferred to spend his days playing his magical game-tablet while toasting his feet before a fire.

One day, there was a knock on the door. Unused to company, and with legs stiff from long hours of inactivity, Goldyx irritably called for the visitor to enter. He was unsurprised to see Wolfhawk, newest of his order and about to set forth on her first Atlantean expedition.

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Cracked LCD- GOTY 2012 Expansions in Review

By on March 21, 2013 with 1 Comment

 

 3-21-2013 9-52-59 AM 

Among last year’s best games were Arcane Wonder’s first release Mage Wars, a complex CCG-on-a-board dueling game and Fantasy Flight’s X-Wing, the best miniatures game I’ve ever played. Naturally, great games that sell well (and some terrible games that sell well) tend to be the start of product lines, particularly when the titles in question have modular or customizable elements and “open” architecture. And so it has come to pass that both of these outstanding titles have received their first expansions, effectively giving us a first taste of how these games might open up and create new play spaces and options for those willing and able to stick beyond the core set. Continue Reading…

Chrom Blocked

By on March 20, 2013 with 9 Comments

chrom blocked fire emblem awakening 3

One of the best parts of Fire Emblem: Awakening is the support system. Many tactical RPGs have a system in which various team members can team up to either do more damage or take less damage or somehow help each other out in battle. It’s a pretty simple system here: when attacking, or performing any other battlefield action like healing or dancing (yes, there’s dancing), you place the active unit directly next to another unit. That’s it! Pretty simple, right? Then, based on the depth of the relationship between the two units, or however many units the active unit is adjacent to, bonuses are conferred. Maybe you get a bonus to hit, maybe to dodge, maybe to damage. The same bonuses can be conferred when on the defensive too, with the occasional instance of your battlefield partner pushing the attacked unit out of the way of the enemy’s attack. Thanks Frederick!

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Tuesday Chatterbox – Abnercon Edition

By on March 19, 2013 with 4 Comments

Railroad Tycoon at Abnercon

Railroad Tycoon at Abnercon. I’m Yellow. No, I didn’t win. 

Abnercon Wrap-up

Abnercon was, as always, a fantastic time. Over the weekend we played 7 Wonders w/expansions (x2), World Cup, Spartacus, Mare Nostrum w/expansion (x2), Railroad Tycoon (US East map), Cosmic Encounter, and Tomorrow (in development). I pulled out victories in World Cup (with Ireland, no less!), Spartacus, and Cosmic Encounter (total fluke). I finished strictly middle of the pack in Railroad Tycoon and was fortunate to do that after I completely biffed my opening turn. I am ashamed. As to the other high and lowlights, let’s dig in…

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Jumping the Shark Podcast #166

By on March 19, 2013 with 2 Comments

No High Scores Podcast Logo

Image: Filomena Scalise / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Hey, look! It’s a new JTS for two consecutive weeks! With this kind of consistency, it’s almost like those old glorious times of, uh, early February! On tap for this week, Bill delivers a Conquistador Games and Abnercon update. (More on Abnercon from me in the next post.) I nitpick Tomb Raider some, wholly out of love I assure you, while Brandon plays the worthy defender. (And he’s right. It’s a great game.) Brandon breaks out his inner-psuedo sportsman and goes Ridiculous Fishing before hitting the links for a little Super Stickman Golf… 2! Finally, there’s more quality TV Time with Bill finally watching the Star Trek movie. All this and more in Jumping the Shark #166!

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You Can Go HOMM Again

By on March 18, 2013 with 13 Comments

Homm3

Over the past couple of months, I’ve been dabbling in the very, very low end of PC gaming again, preparing for the coming Console Apocalypse when every AAA game requires constant connection to your credit card, demands that you make friends, and somehow “services” you in exchange for forbidding you to buy a used game. I’m stockpiling classic games and notable indies for the End Times, which are scheduled to hit sometime around Holiday 2013. Maybe it’s a kind of doomsday prepping, but in my estimation it’s more a prepping to tell the corporate carpetbaggers and their blessed shareholders that have shanghaied the video games business where they can shove their DRM, DLC, and every FU with which they’ve assaulted their customers over the past several years. Continue Reading…

Calendar Man – Week of 3/18

By on March 18, 2013 with 8 Comments

calendar man week of 3-18 gears of war judgement

Lots coming out this week. Gears gets a prequel, the Wii U gets a new, non-licensed LEGO game, a new Walking Dead game hits as does a new Monster Hunter game and a whole bunch of other stuff drops. This is way too much activity for March. Don’t these people know that I have a move to plan?

As for me, I’m continuing my run in God of War: Ascension despite hitting a game progress glitch that forced me to restart. Oh Kratos, all sound and fury and no brains in that big, ashen head. Fire Emblem: Awakening continues to impress despite me getting my heart broken (more on that later in the week) and I continue to fill all manner of aquatic creatures with hot, hot lead in Ridiculous Fishing.

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