A Green Mushroom

Well I had a crazy week.  I barely played any games at all.  But I had some time to scan the headlines and keep up with gaming news. I realized that there aren't actually that many games announced that I'm excited for.  I was thinking ahead to everything I know of that is supposed to release this year and I only game up with a couple that I'm really interesting in getting. Final Fantasy Type-0 is the game I'm most excited for.  I obviously love the Final Fantasy series and this is the first time Type-0 is getting released in the U.S.  It's a gritty, mature take on war and it has the Final Fantasy name attached.  It's also an action RPG which is a departure for the series.  I've purposefully avoided most information about it because I know that I'll pick it up day one.  I'll always give a new Final Fantasy game a chance and I like discovering the world on my own. Because of my love for the series I'm also excited to get my hands on Fina...

I'm through the first dungeon in Majora's Mask and I'm really enjoying the game.  I haven't played it since it originally launched on N64, so it's fun to dig in and discover things I had completely forgotten about. It's amazing how all the characters interact and have daily lives.  I love the three day cycle of this game, it's such a perfect fit with how they've constructed the world.  You can learn where characters will be at certain times on certain days.  They are all interconnected with quests, objectives, and masks. To this day, there's still no other game like it. I think the multi-day cycle is a really cool thing that other games could take and run with.  I would like to see it redone by modern game designers, but it seems like a concept that was left alone after Majora's Mask. At this point I'm mostly focusing on exploring the world.  It's really fun just exploring and doing sidequests for masks even though I'm onl...

As I mentioned yesterday, I'm having a crazy week of work.  I had a bunch of projects land at the same time, which is always a blessing for money but a curse for my sanity and sleep schedule.  I've been working 16 hour days basically the entire week. It doesn't leave much room for gaming.  But I do need to take the occasional break to clear my head.  Usually a break is catching up on twitter for a few minutes or listening to part of a podcast while I'm eating a fast meal. But 10-15 minute gaming breaks can be super refreshing mentally.  So, I've been playing a lot of Quiz Up!  I might dig into some other iPhone games I have waiting on my phone already, but for the moment Quiz Up is keeping me sane.  It's really easy to do short sessions and it takes my full attention. It's amazing how much better I can work after a quick gaming break.  Clearing my mind with breaks every few hours let's me keep being super productive and last through thes...

It's shaping up to be a busy work week for me, so I'm not playing a lot of games.  I did get to watch an episode of Archer with my wife while I was taking a meal break yesterday and I realized I haven't written anything about it even though I've been watching through the entire series. Archer is a really funny show.  I know everyone's humor is different, but something about it strikes a chord with me.  I usually laugh out loud at least once every episode.  That's super rare for me.  Most popular comedy shows don't do much for me and rely heavily on dumb humor that I don't appreciate.  Something about this one just clicks with my sense of humor. When I first looked into Archer I was turned off by the fact that it's an animated show.  I didn't realize how adult it actually is.  Looking at stills don't do the show justice. I would recommend checking out the show if you already have a Netflix subscription, since there are 4 seasons sitt...

I must lack some basic pleasure mechanism that allows me to enjoy Borderlands 2.  It's a game that I feel like I should enjoy and I keep going back and trying it because of that feeling. I never actually have fun playing it. Shooting with friends is ok, but the rest of the game just bugs me.  I hate their quest system, the crazy amounts of loot, constantly smashing the pick-up item button, figuring out which gun is better, and traveling around the world.  Not to mention how repetitive the gameplay and enemies are.  And the shooting doesn't even feel that satisfying.  Borderlands 2 just doesn't ever click with me. I should probably call it quits with the series.  I never really liked the first game either, even though I finished it in it's entirety. The promise of adventures in an interesting world is one of the main factors that draws me back in.  I mean, I loved the first episode of Tales from the Borderlands.  The story and the world...

I'm a huge fan of the Star Wars Expanded Universe.  For those of you that don't know, the Expanded Universe is anything Star Wars outside of the movies.  I've been reading novels in the Expanded Universe for as long as I can remember.  Some of my young adult novels were Star Wars Expanded Universe when I was still learning how to read. The Expanded Universe that I know and love is now wiped out.  They've officially made it non- cannon  to make way for the new Star Wars movies and all of Disney's future creative endeavors now that they own the intellectual property. A basic timeline of the Old Expanded Universe novels It was a major blow to me when I found out.  I've been invested in this Expanded Universe for as long as I can remember.  I didn't read a Star Wars book for almost a year after they made the announcement.   A New Dawn was my first novel after my hiatus, and it's the first novel that is part of the "New Expanded Universe"....

This week I finally got around to trying the Steam in-home streaming functionality.  It works really well! My two main computers are a Mac laptop that I use for creative purposes and my Windows desktop that I use for fun.  My Windows desktop is my main gaming PC and my household media server as well. One day this week I was curious to actually try in-home streaming .  I was on my Mac and needed a break.  I knew my desktop was on downstairs.  I booted up Steam and picked a Windows only game to play.  It gave me a basic prompt telling me that it would stream this from my other computer where the game was installed. And then I was playing!  It was super simple and a great experience overall.  It was easy to do and very playable. It's a feature that I had almost forgotten about entirely, but now that I've used it I'm very impressed.

I wrote about my experiences with comics a few weeks ago.  After having some positive experiences and being excited for the release of Marvel Star Wars #1 I thought I might actually end up being a comic guy. Now I'm fairly sure I am not. I've read Star Wars #1, Star Wars #2, and Vader #1.  I really wanted to like them, but I only think they're ok.  The story isn't bad, but it's not great. I think my problem is that I read super fast.  I've been an avid reader for as long as I can remember.  I fly through books to get the story.  I also tend to fly through comics just reading the text.  I never stop and linger over the images, I just glance at them and move on.  They don't really do it for me. I finish a comic book in about five minutes.  The few that I picked up over the last weeks have been around four to five dollars each.  Five bucks for five minutes of entertainment is not a good value proposition for me personally. ...

I just finished reading Star Wars: A New Dawn .  As far as Star Wars books go... it was ok.  It wasn't amazing or anything, but I had fun reading it. I know that's not a rousing endorsement but there's a reason for that.  This is a tie-in novel with the current Star Wars CG TV show Star Wars Rebels. A New Dawn fleshes out two of the characters' backstory.  It's an interesting look at where they're coming from.  Unfortunately, because you know they're in the show you know that they're never in real danger.  They're obviously alive further on in the timeline.  It takes a lot of the tension away from the novel. While I love the Star Wars universe and read a lot of the books in it this is one I would tell most people to stay away from. There is an exception! If you're a fan of the Star Wars Rebels TV show and really want to find out more about Kannan and Hera's past together, by all means grab yourself a copy of A New Dawn.  For th...

It looks like we've come full circle.  Apple is now advertising games that are "Pay Once and Play." It's so weird that we have to come up with a term to talk about games you buy once and then play forever.  Every game used to be that way, but in this world of crazy amounts of DLC and in-app purchases it is no longer the norm. I'm actually happy to see this.  It's finally a backlash against the predatory in-app purchase model that so many games seem to take.  Not all in-app purchase models are bad, I don't hate them categorically.  But some of the games out there might as well be slot machines.  They're the ones giving gaming a bad name right now. When DLC or in-app purchases are done correctly, they can be great.  But when they're done poorly they can just be there to take peoples' money. I hope Apple keeps promoting games like this.  Maybe it will help draw some attention away from the "games" that are only there to take...

I've been sick since last Wednesday.  I'm over the worst of it but now I just have this cold that keeps lingering.  I've been working from home and getting a lot of sleep but besides that I'm just floating between games and activities at the moment. It's hard to lock down on one thing and focus while I'm sick.  Instead, I'm kinda just sampling stuff and making a little progress here and there. I'm through the first dungeon in Majora's Mask 3D on my 3DS. I went back and spent a couple nights playing around with endgame content in Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn . I'm playing Quiz Up whenever I have a few free minutes on my phone. I'm trying to finish reading Star War: A New Dawn on my kindle. I finished watching the Star Wars films in Machete Order . I played a little more Wolfenstein . I don't have anything big to report.  I'm still just trying to feel better.  But expect some of those fleeting thoughts above to...

Quiz Up is an awesome game of niche trivia.  I don't know how I haven't heard of it until last week.  Apparently it's been highly rated in the app store for a long time and I've just overlooked it. Let me emphasize, this is niche trivia.  That's what makes it so amazing!  It's not general knowledge like most trivia.  I've never enjoyed those types of trivia games.  This has very specific subsections of knowledge. For example, I've been competing heavily in the Star Wars Expanded Universe trivia area.  I'm actually ranked number one in Minnesota at the moment which gives me some kind of perverse pleasure.  It's such a small facet of geekdom, but for the moment it's mine! I showed the app to my wife and now she's hooked too.  Recently she's been dominating the Harry Potter trivia section.  We were dueling for awhile over The Newsroom TV show too. Quiz Up allows for very quick play sessions.  One round of trivia consis...

I was browsing the 3DS e-shop and saw Gunman Clive 2.  I loved the first game, and Gunman Clive 2 was only $2.99 so I instantly purchased it. It was so good! It's a short game, only 25 levels, but they're all superbly made and fun to play.  There's no filler or bloat in this game at all.  I applaud it for that.  I wish more games would be willing to embrace the shorter structure when it makes sense. If you like platformers and own a 3DS you should definitely buy it.  It's great, and seriously... it's only $2.99 .

I wrote up some reactions to the Codename S.T.E.A.M. demo while I was in the middle of playing it last week.  Last night I finally sat down and finished playing the demo. I've decided to not buy the game. It's sad for me since I was really looking forward to Codename S.T.E.A.M.  On paper it seemed to be a really cool turn based strategy game that would be a good fit for me. In practice it falls apart for two main reasons: The enemy turn takes way too long. The best strategy is to rush to the goal. By the end of the demo I hated both of these things. Waiting for the enemy to take their turn and move around becomes excruciating after a few levels.  It's even worse once the levels get more complicated and contains more enemies. As far as the "strategy" in this game... all my careful strategy and best laid plans are worse than just rushing one character to the end of the level and getting them in the "Goal" area.  Once I discovered th...

STAR WARS!  I love Star Wars!  It's easily the fictional universe that I'm most invested in.  I've read almost all of the novels in the Extended Universe (even though that storyline has been wiped out to make room for Episode VII).  I've played every Star Wars video game I can get my hands on.  I consume Star Wars lore, stories, and experiences whenever I can. So this holiday season when I finally got around to buying my first Blu Ray set I picked up Star Wars: The Complete Saga .  It was really affordable around Black Friday and while I'm in the Star Wars universe a lot via different media, I don't actually watch the movies all that often.  It was finally time to pick up a modern version of the flims.  Part of my motivation is that I wanted to rewatch them and finally try out the Machete Order. You may be asking yourself, "What is the Machete Order?"  Well, it's the order that you can watch the Star Wars movies in to keep all of the ...

I jumped back into Wolfenstein The New Order last night.  I had played the first hour or so when I did the giant playtest of my entire Steam backlog in December/January. Getting back into it I'm reminded just how much it feels like a 90s era shooter.  Health doesn't recharge to full every time you hide in cover like a modern shooter.  Health packs and armor are pickups found throughout the levels.  That alone gives the game a very different feel from modern shooters. But not only that, the way weapons are handled is decidedly old school.  You can carry as many weapons as you want with no real restrictions.  None of this one primary weapon one secondary weapon crap that "realistic" shooters have been imposing on us lately.  You can even duel wield totally impractical guns. My favorite is duel wielding assault rifles.  It's something that's completely impractical and totally unrealistic but it's so much fun.  The developers of this g...

Last night I sat down and for the first time in a long time I didn't know what I was going to play. After finishing up the last main entry in my Final Fantasy Project I don't specifically have any games lined up to play.  I want to get around to the Final Fantasy spin-offs, but I'm taking a break before diving in. I was surprised and excited to see that the second episode of the Telltale Game of Thrones game was out!  I downloaded it and marathoned the whole episode last night. It was really good.  I'm a big Game of Thrones fan and I've slowly been becoming a Telltale Games fan too.  The combination of the two is a perfect match for me. This particular episode jumped back and forth between characters often and really had the pacing of a Game of Thrones episode.  Characters developed and grew.  Tension was built.  There were a couple "Oh shit" moments in the typical Game of Thrones vein too.  I just loved it. I don't know how...

In the end it seems like Final Fantasy XIV might not be for me.  Although I like the story and the Final Fantasy nostalgia I can't seem to appreciate the game as a whole because of it's MMO trappings. Every thing I dislike about this game is because of the MMO format.  With that being said, it still is one of the best MMOs I've played.  It's right up there with World of Warcraft in terms of quality.  The mechanics, gameplay, and graphics are all solid for a MMO. The best part of Final Fantasy XIV is it's community.  I've had the most positive experience in this community out of any MMO I've ever played.  Almost every time I was new to a dungeon the other players were happy to help.  It doesn't hurt that the game incentivizes playing through old content and helping new players. It truly is social engineering at it's finest.  Rewards are given for using the Duty Finder Roulette too.  The roulette will place you in any dungeon where you...

The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask is releasing on Friday and I'm seriously thinking about picking it up.  I'm still sitting on the fence because I had a lot of trouble getting into Ocarina of Time on 3DS when I attempted to play it a few months ago. My struggle getting into Ocarina of Time was that I remembered the game too well.  I had played those 3 intro dungeons so many times as a kid that I still remembered everything about them.  I got bored before I even got to the first adult Link section.  So I promptly gave up on the game. This shouldn't be a problem with Majora's Mask.  I played the game once and only have some scattered memories of it.  Everything I remember about the game is positive.  I still think the 3 day cycle mechanic is really interesting.  Nothing like it has been done elsewhere in gaming.  Majora's Mask is the most unique Zelda game out of the whole series. If I do pick it up, I'm hoping it can rekindle my lov...

Graze boxes have been a huge help for me eating well.  I mentioned it offhand in my post about judging hunger and intermittent fasting but I wanted to give it some more focus. I've always been bad at snacking healthy.  I have a tendency to eat whatever is out on the counter or easily visible while looking around my kitchen.  This has always led to me eating a lot of candy and processed food.  I've also never tried to portion control snacks, I would just eat a bunch. Then my friend BJ Keeton told me about the wonders of Graze boxes .  Graze is essentially a subscription snacking service.  They have over 100 snacks and each one is self-contained and pre-portioned in a little container they call a punnent.   I've completely switched over to Graze punnets for snacking and it's made it much easier for me to eat healthy. One of the really cool parts of Graze is that the snacks are relatively healthy but they aren't super healthy crazy super food...

Rogue Legacy is free to pick up as a PSN subscriber this month so I downloaded it for PS4 even though I've already tried it out on PC. I launched the game while I was on my stationary bike and just kind of zoned out for a bit while playing, exercising, and listening to some podcasts. My initial reaction was the same as when I played it on PC.  I didn't like it much.  But, it was helping me kill time while exercising and most of my brain power was being used listening to podcasts anyway.  So I kept playing. The first hour or so of the game sucks.  Like, it really sucks.  Characters die almost instantly against enemies and can barely get anywhere in the game.  It's super frustrating and the first few unlockables don't feel like they help at all.  If you look back at my initial impression on the PC you can see that I gave up before even playing an hour of it because I was so frustrated with the game. Something interesting happens after about a...

I had a few super busy days in the last week where I didn't get any chance to game.  Non-gaming days are the exception for me since I always try to make a little time in my day to disconnect and play something. One of the few things that keeps me sane on crazy days are all the gaming podcasts I listen to.  I have a bunch I subscribe to and love.  With them always on my phone I know that I'll at least get to rest my mind for a bit while I'm commuting to and from work or meetings. These brief periods of disconnecting from work make a huge difference in my day and my general happiness level.  At this point, I never listen to music in the car anymore since podcasts do such a better job of engaging my brain.  While I love music, if I listen to it while commuting I find that my mind is constantly on work.  If I throw on a podcast, my mind is actively engaged with the discussion on the show. Finding gaming podcasts and listening to them has truly h...

I've been super excited for Codename S.T.E.A.M. ever since it was announced at E3 this year! It's a turn-based strategy game from the same people who make Fire Emblem.  This game is set in a steampunk world with lots of interesting visuals.  Each turn players have a certain amount of "steam" which is used for movement and attack.  Since both move and attack share the same resource it becomes a game about balancing when to use each one. The demo just released earlier this week so I've been playing it off and on.  My reaction has been mixed. I can tell the core of the game is really good, and I'm still most likely going to buy it.  I love the turn based strategy and the steam mechanic of resource management.  But there are some issues that I wouldn't have noticed if I skipped the demo. My two biggest issues are the alien movement and the controls. Alien movement is the enemies' turn and it takes a really long time to sit through.  While wai...

I'm really good at Mario games.  I'm talking about the platformers, not the spin-offs. I noticed it recently since my daughter has been asking me to play various Mario platformers with her on Wii U and 3DS.  I can jump into any level and typically beat it on the first try, often without being hit at all.  Even if it's right at the end of a game. This makes me wonder, have I gotten too  good at Mario games?  I still enjoy them, but they don't give me the same challenge they used to. If a new Mario platformer comes out I always pick it up.  Lately, I'll beat the game within the first week.  Sometimes it's even within the first couple days. I probably sound like an ass since I'm saying I'm too   good  at something.  But, when skill level and challenge level don't match up it can be frustrating.  It can go the opposite way too where the challenge is just so far above a player's skill level that it's frustrating. I would re...

I've noticed something weird as I've been tracking my calories.  I'm getting good at estimating how hungry I am... in calories. I'm doing a diet where I only take in calories during 9 hours of the day.  One of the typical diets people do is only 8 hours (one third of a day) but 9 seems to work better in my case.  For me, this is between 2pm and 11pm.  It's a form of intermittent fasting which is interesting but doesn't have a huge body of research to back it up.  The important thing is that it's working for me. I still take in a normal overall calorie intake for the day, just during a compressed window of time.  There are some extreme versions of this like the Warrior Diet but they didn't appeal to me as much.  They're a bit too extreme. Intermittent Fasting plus tracking calories has had an interesting side effect for me.  I'm learning how to judge my hunger in calories.  I know generally how many calories I need to fulfill different...

Yesterday Nintendo updated their Club Nintendo rewards and finally, for the first time, put up a good selection of games and accessories.  As of writing this, the site is still down because it can't handle the traffic.  That's what happens when you offer more than 100 different game choices and new physical rewards to a group of people that have been given 4-6 really bad game options each month for years on end.  Here's a full list from Reddit of all the reward offerings. This has only come about because the Club Nintendo program has been canceled and that's the sad part.  I hate to see it go, but this is a nice parting gift. I just wish they had all of these games available the entire time the rewards program was open.  They would have had many more people using Club Nintendo and responding to their surveys. While I'm sad to see it go, for now I'll just be happy that I finally have some good games to spend my rewards points on.  Thanks Nintend...

I took my wife on a date this weekend to a baking class.  We have a local shop that offers all kinds of hands-on cooking and baking classes, it's tons of fun. This was a sweetshop bakery class, so we basically got to make breakfast pastries.  Those doughnuts you see above were made by us in class.  On top of those, we also made cinnamon rolls, danishes, and scones! It was really nice to get out together.  This past year has been crazy busy and we've gotten out of the habit of date night.  Now we're getting back to it and it's wonderful. Not to mention that it's always fun to learn and try new things.  If you're never taken a hands-on baking or cooking class I would highly recommend it.  There's probably one in your area if you just google around a bit.

This isn't a post about reading less. This is about the fact that I can't ever abandon a book part way through. It's been a curse and a blessing in a way for my whole life.  If I manage to get past the first real chapter of a book I will finish it.  Always. It's gotten me to read things I wouldn't typically.  It's pushed me out of my comfort zone.  It's exposed me to a lot of different books. Lately, it's driving me crazy. I just finished reading a string of books that were slow and uninteresting.  I hated that I had to slog through them before I felt like I could move on to the next book.  For some of them I had to pick up the audiobook version just so I could finish.  I was that sick of reading the words on the page.  It's not like me to feel mad or upset about finishing a book.  It's a new feeling. That's why I'm giving myself permission to put a book down, in the middle of reading it, and walk away from it forever.  It...