Capcom: Answer's One Prayer and Denies Another

You know, I'm not usually one to get into fighting games. I'm just not. I bought Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 2, and still haven't finished it. I really only bought it because it had Deadpool in it. But, fear not! Capcom has given me new hope! That's right, ladies and gentlemen! In Marvel vs. Capcom III, Marvel has announced: Pheonix Wright!


Capcom cut Megaman, in favor of Pheonix? Really, it seems kind of like a bad decision on their part, but I made a solemn vow that I would buy it. I guess that my wallet's getting pretty thin. With Skyrim coming out in a few days now (I'm still mulling over buying the extreme version like I did with Reach) Arkham City, and Bioshock Infinite all coming out very soon. UMvC3 id due out on the 15th of November, and Promises such greats as Deadpool, Iron Man, and now, Pheonix Wright. But, there is one hero missing as far as I currently know: Frank West. For anyone who has played the second best zombie game series of all times can tell you: Frank West is a pro Journalist who yells "Faaantastic!" every time he gets a great shot of either zombies eating people, or a great out-doorsy picture.

As seen here, this is the new gameplay footage for Pheonix. Yes. He does throw evidence at people for uber damage. And yes OBJECTION! Is an attack. I physically can't wait to buy this, but all I want to know is where is Frank? He was in that one wierd Capcom vs. Tatsunoko game, but he was pretty cool! he put zombies into shopping carts and rammed them into enemies! It was fantastic. If I find anything of a game preview with him, or another article to the contrary, I'll go ahead and change this post, but until then, there is no perfect fighting game.

TF2: The Scary Part Is That I Only Have 2 Weeks!

Well, once again ladies and gentleman, I have had my highest hopes revealed! Late last night Team Fortress 2's blog updates (Automatically notifying via Steam) and I get the message I have been waiting for: Scream Fortress III.For those of you who have been playing for more than 10 days, you may know a bit more about how Robin Walker and his team go about doing their hat-filled updates.

For the past 3 years, the Team Fortress team has taken it upon them to make a halloween filled update, and every year, they've made it bigger. Year one saw the addition of a new map, a mildly disturbing mask for every class, and of course, a free hat to all of those who clicked on a special page, or then dominated anyone who wore said hat. This was the birth of a hat for all, even though Ghastly Gibus isn't that much of a hat.  It gave the ability to all of those poor, hatless people to have one. I remember my first Gibus. Even though it is long gone, I still remember it with fondness. Mostly because I sold it for a Stout Shako.

Year two saw the addition of new masks for every class, the addition of more hats, haunted weapons, and even the first ever mini-boss. The Horseless Headless Horseman was the first baddy to not care if you were RED or BLU, he enjoyed killing everyone. Maybe he was color-blind. Im not quite sure. But what made him special was the ability to "scare" opponents, even shutting off sentries, super-jumping, and of course, gratuitous amounts of HP. This lead to the making of the "Vs. Saxton" Mod where you could fight off  Saxton Hale, or even control the great Australian-Moustached behemoth.

This year intorduces a special costume for every class, a new map, and the Demoman's missing eye, who you must defeat. This is all in the pursuit of a good time, and the addition that you only hve two weeks to collect these items on official servers makes me think of all the time that will now be dedicated to TF2 over the next few days. I had plans to play Reach with friends at a halloween party, but nooooo. TF2 just ruined all of my plans. I had even bought a Monkey Wrench and spray-painted it gold for part of my Engineer costume. I always love scaring the little ones by dressing up like an evil Texan. But, now I will be obsessed with trying to get a costume to make the Soldier look like a robot. Oh well. Time well spent! Time to get to work. Who knows? Maybe I'll stop for a candy break sometime in between.

Blargument: The rise of New Ideas, and Games

All right, ladies and gentlemen! I have a new idea, and it’s so stupid, it may actually work. My brother and I play a lot of videogames. But, we do not always agree. So, with a name given to me by a good friend, I will start a new series, occurring every now and then, simple called Blarguments. Inside of these simple little ideas, he and I will duke out ideas, and decide who is most right. Winner gets the satisfaction of knowing he won. I will be marked by Santa: and he will be by R.

Question: What will be the game of the year, 2011?

R: I think it will be Arkham City, and you’re lucky I think that too, otherwise your plan wouldn’t work out quite well.

Santa:  Well, I sure am glad that you think so, but it will be Skyrim.

R: It’s not going to be Skyrim, I can guarantee you. Anything that Skyrim will offer, AC will offer as well.

 Santa: What about the uber character customization?

R:  While it is true that AC will not have customization, you do have Batman and Catwoman who are very diverse characters. You will be able to speak in AC, and will be able to have big, glorious cutscenes which are impossible in Skyrim.

Santa: I was more referring to the ability to completely BUILD everything! You build their face, make their class, and build their skills; you don’t get better than that.

R:  While it is true that you can build a huge relationship with your own self-made character, Batman is special too. He is so strongly against killing, that he is completely different. You just can’t re-create a Batman. Catwoman is special too. I can’t wait to see the difference between them, and the new representations of weapons.  Batman will go anywhere, breaks laws, and private property but he won’t break his one rule, probably not even in self defense! He’s just that cool of a guy. He’s a dark vigilante who isn’t afraid of anything.  Not even one of my favorite characters, L, is willing to kill to use it to his advantages. Batman is truly uncorruptable.

Santa: You’re more referring to the building of the lore of Batman. But I find this a bit odd. You do have to realize that your guy just doesn’t get the chance in Skyrim, and to refer to Oblivion, will only get a slight back story. But, in return, you make your own. You decide. You are the judge, jury, and prosecution, similar to Bioshock or Fallout: New Vegas, but with more control. Yeah, you got interesting points in AC, but you can’t beat the wide aspects of freedom in Skyrim, you will have to end up doing the story in AC, there are millions of other adventures in Skyrim.

R: Not at all! It’s broken its shackles of Arkham Asylum. It’s a CITY! Think of the Riddler challenges. Took me hours, and I did it legitimately, even after being quite tempted by the internet.

Santa: There will be only one ending to AC; you will get multiple choices in Skyrim. Oh, by the way, how many hours did you put into Oblivion?

R:  With my one true character, which I did do everything on. I spent around 300 hours. But to be fair I spent over 500 hours in the original Bioshock. I’ll do the same with AC, bumping up the difficulty.

Santa: Do you really think you can beat out Skyrim for gameplay hours? If it’s anything like Oblivion, I will be spending around 1000 hours in the game.  I spent a huge amount of time in Oblivion, and while you will have your bigger world in AC, you’re missing the point that there are factions, guilds, dungeons, the main quest line, and, oh yeah, DRAGONS in Skyrim. Dragons man. How can you say no to Dragons? Imagine flying on one!

R: I am not saying no to dragons! But, Batman can fly! Gliding around the city, you’ll be like a dragon. Batman’s superpower, as we all know, is money. And with that, he will of course have to get out all of his millions of gadgets. You have new villains to get! Riddler challenges to do! We have two worthy games that deserve this GOTY award. You got big bad bosses in AC. The Joker. Mr. Freeze. The Penguin. Who do you have?

Santa: Dragons.

R:  Dragons are big-winged creatures that fly around and go pew-pew with fire breath. Oh no! They’re nothing compared to the villains of AC. They’re more classy, and dangerous.

Santa:  I disagree; some dragons will be able to shoot lighting and ice, too. And they will land and scratch you. They can also eat you, if they so desire too. But, the point is me trying to convince you that Skyrim will win over the AC is like telling a Mormon that you don’t want to hear the good news. Can we at least agree that it won’t be BF3 or MW3?

R: Without a doubt. This will be a battle to the death. I love both Rocksteady and Bethesda to death, and I guess only time will tell.

Santa: Thanks for talking to me today, let’s go eat some Enchiladas.

A special thanks to my brother for putting up with my slow typing.  More debates are to come, and there are games to be played, until next time.

Flashback Special: Funniest Town Around (MMO Special)

Sitting next to my other blogging friend, he may not exactly care for this game. I don't care; he doesn't understand our forbidden love. I am, of course, talking about my all-time favorite MMO, and my current addiction, Toontown. That’s right, ladies and gentleman! I am playing a game made by Disney. Yes, it does make me feel a bit dirty, but I have forgiven them for this instance. This is the absolute greatest MMO ever as far as I’m concerned, I put my entire 4^th grade life into this game, and I am currently putting this one into it as well, so, let’s get into the mechanics of this alluring game.

Toontown gives you the role of a Toon (calm down, I know!) And you live in the wondrous world of Toontown, split up into different districts, with distinct neighborhoods’ for famous Disney characters. But, the evil aspects of business in the form of murderous robots, simply known as cogs, have invaded this quaint little republic of laughs. But, fear not! Cogs have no sense of humor, and you can use this to your advantage! Using gags, such as throwing a cream pie, or dropping a grand piano, you can defeat the foreign monsters.  Inside of this, you can choose 6 out of 7 special tracks to help the Toon resistance. Such powers include

Toon-Up: Allows you to heal your comrades in battle, good examples include telling jokes and juggling. Toon-Ups ALWAYS hit.

Lure: Low accuracy but gives you an amazing ability: To be able to put cogs into a state where attacks do more damage or you can use a powerful trap. When lured, cogs will lose their ability to attack for a few turns.  But, be warned! Sound will not do extra damage, and after being hit, they returned to their normal state. Drop gags always miss when a cog is lured. Examples of Lure include magnets and Hypno-Goggles. Lure gags can hit one, or all cogs, depending on the type.

Trap: The only attack gag to always hit. These deal high damage, but must be done with lure, as luring will bring them into the range of the trap. Traps deal high damage. Examples are TNT, banana peels

Sound: Sound hits all cogs, and does the least amount of damage. But, if you get a team of people to use foghorns (the highest level of sound) it will instantly destroy all cogs, at any level. Sound has a high tendency to hit, and good examples include an elephant trumpeting to a bugle.

Throw:  Throw is one of the few gags you start with, it hits heavy, and can miss every so often. Great examples are birthday cakes to cupcakes.

Squirt: The other starting gag, Less powerful, but more accurate than throw. Examples include Seltzer bottles and squirting flowers.

Drop: Low accuracy gives the benefit of high power, coming in the form of either a Grand Piano, or an anvil

Gags come in up to 6 different levels. You earn higher level of gags over time as you use other gags. You get more xp from higher level gags. A cupcake (level 1) gives 1 xp. A Cream pie (level 5) gives 5 xp. You need more and more xp over time to earn the next gag. When you max out the gag, you receive a special level 7 gags, which hits all cogs, (or heals all Toons) and does more damage.  Strategy is key for use in Toontown, and is best used with coordination with your Toon friends.

  Cogs, the antagonists of the game, represent all of the evils of business and growing up. The four types are self-explanatory and are Bots, Lawbots, Sellbots, and Cashbots. Cogs use business powered attacks to make Toons sad, and will return you to the nearest playground upon doing so. Cogs come in various levels, 1 through 12, and come in 8 different types per cog class, and their head honcho, resulting in 36 types of villains to destroy. 

Now, you may now be asking: "Santa, why would I ever get a subscription? It costs so much!" And you are right. Membership for Toontown come either Annually, Semi-Annually, or monthly. Costing $90 for a year, and that's the best deal.  But, Toontown is the epitome of my childhood. Back in the day, I had one of the strongest Toons around. I had 107 laff points, I had all of my gag tracks maxed out, and I was soloing Cog Buildings in Donald's Dreamland just because I could, but I eventually gave it up in favor of a membership on Runescape subscription. And so, when I came back my data was gone, which severely shocked and saddened me. I had spent a year of my life playing that game non-stop, giving them a good deal of money, and they just deleted it? It was sad. But, I came to forgive the game I once loved so dearly, and I am once again playing, for how long is the question, but I do enjoy it. There is a limited FTP system for everyone else, and at the very least, I suggest checking out this wonderful game.

Flashback Special: MMO's and You- What you Need To Know About 2 Big Titles

So, I’m not much of an MMO guy, at least, I wasn’t when I had written my Animal Crossing blog last week. But, I was needed more material, so I though and thought. And thought. So, I went out, and looked for some new games, and almost bought a N64, but because of a lack of money, and one car crash, it didn’t end up happening.  So, on Saturday, I was talking to my friend and lo and behold, he was playing Runescape. That old game.  So I thought, well, maybe this could be fun. Bad idea, it brought me back in, not soon after, I came back to the other game that was the epitome of my childhood, but that’s for Friday. For now, I’m going to talk about Runescape, its history for me, and what it can do for you.

RS is the best free MMORPG ever. Seriously. Just about out of anything ever made.  It allows you to make a cute little character and train them in a medieval  setting. For there, it’s up to you for making money, training your combat, or completing quests. But, when you find life to be a bit too boring, you can throw $5.95* (per month) and do everything you could literally imagine. I have been playing Runescape for about 7 years now, on and off, and I have had my account hacked 3 times, been a member 4 times, and have committed genocide on trees by selling them for profit. I still enjoy every moment of it.

Let’s get into the finer things of RS: Money. Currently resting in my bank is 500k, full rune, and various other tools that I have acquired over time, like a snow globe that spawns infinite snowballs and a chicken suit.  Runescape, although not always serious, has many features that I have always loved. One is pest control, where you kill interestly themed monsters to fitting music, the point of which is to protect your shaman, who is keeping you in the fight. You win by destroying all of the portals that are letting the pests in.

So, believe me, Runescape is a fun game, and is one of the major parts of my own childhood. I put many, many hours into this game, but coming up, I’m going to talk about the most influential game to me of all time, and I’ll give you a few hints, it’s an MMO, and it’s not WoW.

TF2: Why Did I Sell My Buds?

Yeah, they're still alive. I was getting worried, no post from the TF2 team in almost a month? Preposterous. Even though Robin Walker (creator of the original Team Fortress) can sometimes go onto hat filled tangents for months at a time, even he comes out and gives us something new. Usually hats. No, they were saving up. They released a whopping universal update in honor of my all time favorite update, the Mannconomy update. A few days ago, trading turned 1 year old, and to celebrate: they added a few goodies that I’ve been wanting for awhile now.

First off, they added new hats! (I know, calm down!) But, they also improved the features of uploading hats as well. just follow THIS to see. (This covers the whole update, be warned there is a Baby Saxton Hale exploding out of a bear's chest.) But, that’s not the point; the point is a new miscellaneous slot. That’s right. If you thought wearing earbuds and glasses at the same time was impossible, YOU WERE WRONG! You can also add custom decals to your weapons, and try out weapons from the store, oh and give people high-fives (If you pay for the “taunt”). Re-plays now come with Slow-Mo, and of course, a few new maps. One is for testing your new hats, and one is for playing.

With this update comes what I feel is more attention to what the players have been wanting, even though I now have the chagrin of knowing that Earbuds have skyrocketed. But, I’m okay with that, even though my horrid computer still can’t play games with anymore graphics properties than Toontown (coming up in a future blog!) without crashing. Team Fortress 2 shows that not only the community can play, but can actually play, too! Over this year span, over $2 million have been payed in royalties to hat/ weapon creators, that’s pretty cool. But TF2 continues to do what I love most: be itself, which isn’t what it was in the beginning of it’s life so many years ago. TF2 is the only game where a human of unknown gender can go around with a monocle and hair taped to its face, listen to earbuds through its mask, and of course, wearing a quite nice fire brigade’s helmet while setting people on fire. Yeah, it’s a bit brutal, but it’s so, creative. I do know that they do sell out to Major game developers, but it does fit within the actual game, or it at least feels that way. So, until the day that Hat Fortress 2 doesn’t launch on my computer anymore, I will continue to play, perhaps not every week, but I do love the game, and of course, all of the features it brings with it.

Flashback: Why Am I Doing This?

It's the third post of the week, so you know what that means, ladies and gentlemen! It's time for another random game out of my "of old and forgotten pile of nostalgia." Today's feature is from the Gamecube. I probably played this game as much as I did MKDD or Smash Bros. Melee. I had the cheat codes for this game memorized before I knew my entire alphabet. If you guessed Animal Crossing, then you would be correct! Animal Crossing is like the version of Sims that everyone has played, but you are ashamed to admit. Playing Animal Crossing was like joining AA; you had to admit at one point that you had a problem. Animal Crossing was the epitome of me doing stupid things as a child, until I got onto the computer and started play Runescape and some other games of course, but that is a completely different story. Today, I dive into the past of my childhood, and decide on whether or not I could have actually done anything worthwhile with my time.

Animal Crossing starts out on a cute little train, as you are moving to a new town; this is where various things happen, like meeting an annoying little cat who asks you your name, the town you’re moving to, and most importantly, where you’re going to live. Since you have no house, he hooks you up with Tom Nook, the insane shopkeeper who gives you the smallest, dirtiest house in the entire world. Oh yeah, you got to pay him for it too. And how do you receive money? You do random tasks for the villagers living with you; dig random holes to find money, catch flies, fish, find fossils, or cheat. When you pay him off, you can re-model your house. Like make it bigger, get a basement, or even an upstairs, all of which you must pay for. After 500 hours, and you may have paid him off, he erects a giant gold statue of your character in front of your house, and since he is now a multi-millionaire, he doesn’t charge you this time. From this point on, you can do what you’ve been doing, socializing with your virtual friends, buy things for your house, fish, etc… when you place objects in your house, your house rating goes up, if it is fashionable. From this point on the game is just a slurry of nothing but pointless gameplay hours. But, you could just start a new house. Each town has room for 4 people. And if you want to get adventurous, grab another memory card, start a new world, and bring your old guy over via the train you came to town on. Yeah, you can visit a friend’s town, or just build one yourself, whichever way you like to spend your hours.

            Animal Crossing is legitimately one of those games I would look at when I was trying to decide to play either Luigi’s Mansion, or Mario Sunshine, or Melee, and just to Animal Crossing. It was effortless, like the Sims before I got Sims III. But, why did I do it? I had more fun on every other game I played. Even Shark Tale for the GBA, which was a game I randomly found on the bus in 4^th grade. But, I think it was simply because I had nothing else to do. I mean, really, if they had put all the man-hours of Animal Crossing into something like curing AIDs, we would have found the cure years ago. Animal Crossing was the greatest waste of time since watching paint dry on a wall, and then realizing that you were staring at the wrong wall the entire time. But, you can try for yourself. When you find yourself waking up at age 32, playing AC on your Wii with your Wavebird’s batteries dead again, you have been warned. This game could teach WoW a thing or two on addictivity. Although I did have fun (and I still can’t remember how) I will admit, there are some games not worth playing, now if you’ll excuse me, I have to finish the pool for my Sims on Sims 3.




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Why Nobody Cares What I Think About

So, I was on YouTube watching videos of hilarious cats in boxes when I came to a sudden realization. The internet is big. Very, very big. So big, I can't even describe it to you. But, I can give you a good representation. But, here's my point: the internet really is just about the last place where everything can, and probably has, happened. There are good parts of the internet, and bad. There are amusing things, disgusting things, and a mixture of both. There are piles of memes, spawning from all corners of the internet, from DeviantArt to YouTube. There are many things out there that I thought I would never like, and some more I thought I would. I myself have seen a good deal of what the internet has to offer, but most will throughout time, whether they use the internet for fun, or the lulz. Today I will focus more on the idea of Social Networking, and how the stupidest thing can lead to a multitude of smaller, stupider things.

Twitter, Facebook, these sites represent the idea of Social Networking in the Free World, China uses a site called QQ, which I personally know little about. But, I do know more about Facebook and Twitter, both of which have their uses. Unfortunately, some people don't seem to understand how these simple sites ought to be used. Between useless tweets like "OMG JUST GOT UP" and statuses like "GOT HOME, WHAT A LONG DAY!!1!" Now, I may just be cynical, but this is just a waste of everyone's time. If you have something to say, at least let it be a smidge interesting. I've given up on Twitter, I haven't used Twitter in over a year, it just seems pointless to me. What it would be useful for would be for it to be used for actual news, or important updates, like it should be. As for Facebook, I can't turn off everyone's posts, or maybe I could, it would certainly stop a huge amount of the Farmville spams I get.

To summarize my point, Twitter is a lost cause as far as I'm concerned. Its pretty much boring, and 90% of posts are either out of place, or are completely useless to me, but I still have hope for Facebook. I know this is a commonly known issue, but if I can change one mind while I am still on my soapbox, then I'll say it: think before you post. There is a good chance most people don't care about when you got up, and if they do, at least try to make it humorous. And for one last thought, if you have over 300 friends, do you actually know them? I only talk to about 30 or so people on Facebook, and that's what I narrowed my friend's list down to. If you don't talk to them, why add them? It's not a race, its just another way to say "HA LOOK AT ME!!! I HAVE 2,387,202,989.232 FRIENDS!" While everyone else is just confused.

Fight With Your Friends, or With NPCs?

So, a while back my brother and I were debating on one of our favorite subjects: Video Games. One of your favorite topics just so happens to be whether or not plot is more important, or multiplayer. I myself usually play multiplayer based games, while he prefers singleplayer based ones with intense storylines. Now, don't get me wrong, I've logged thousands of hours on Oblivion, Fallout 3, Bioshock, etc...  But my favorite games are still Team Fortress 2, League of Legends, Halo: Reach, etc.. And this confuses him. I personally think it's because he can't play multiplayer very well whilst I think I can do fairly well. But, let’s compare the two, as I think that the two can take a cue from each other.

Starting off for the Questline side, we have the ever great Oblivion, I would use Skyrim, but, I still have 1 month to wait. Its October 11th. I can just feel Bethesda taunting me with 31 days. Oblivion, also known as The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, is the wondrous work of Bethesda software. You start out making your own character (which can take you a few hours, depending on how you want your character to look. The options for customization are amazing.) You may then choose how you want to go the vast open world. do you want to be a rogue, an archer, a magician? Its like D & D when your friends are being dicks and won’t play with you, so you go and play Oblivion instead. I have legitimately put around 800 hours into Oblivion, and saved over 850 times.

Next, as pictured below, is Reach. The original part to the original trilogy, it shows the events before Halo: Combat Evolved. Naturally, when I first saw this at E3 a few years ago, I just about lost it. As any fan-boy

Can tell you, seeing Reach re-visited was just about a dream come true. Now, Reach does have a plot line, and it is pretty good for the most part, I won't spoil the ending for all of you who may not own the game, but I had tears in my eyes, maybe it was from the 8 hours I has spent playing the campaign straight through on Heroic. Maybe it was the Flaming hot Cheetos that I had mistaken for normal Cheetos that I had started eating right before the last mission. But, Halo is renowned for its classical Matchmaking game. It’s everything I could, except there are no hats, a cue that all game developers could take from Valve, but it did the next best thing. Complete customization over your Spartan, the one to the left is my very own. I will admit that I have fallen out of playing Reach over the past few months, but I still log onto my Xbox every now and then, and make sure I put a couple of games in. You never know when it may come in handy to remember how to use Bumper Jumper. So, what IS more important? In all honesty, I think it was to be one or the other, and I have a good example on how to prove it: Bioshock 2.

Now, Bioshock 2 was a good game, but that's the point: it was just a good game. And I think it had to do with them putting time into multiplayer instead of just focusing on the singleplayer experience. But, if you bought Minerva's Den, you found a quest-line rivaled to the original Bioshock. The game has amazing and fluid gameplay, but it just turned out kind of "meh." And that's why I do truly believe that you need to focus on one or the other, if you got a reputation for having a large plot, focus on the plot. Dead Space II was on 2 discs, just saying. And if you are making a game almost solely for Multiplayer, there should be bigger focus on how that handles. Unless your game is play-tested for 4 years, it won't be perfect. It took Valve 7 years to finish TF2, and they still update it to this day. They didn't even think of adding new weapons, or gametypes, or god forbid if they didn’t hats. This isn't to say you can have both, it is simply to say that I don't expect a game that has a massive world to have a massive multiplayer feature, unless its a MMO. And I don't expect there to be people yelling at me. "DOOD STOP HAXXING, UR A NOOB" when I'm playing in a deep questline based game. Until the day that they finish a complete virtual reality, if I really want both, I can always play Dungeons and Dragons, but, then again, Skyrim is just around the corner...

Flashback Special: A look into the Greatest Generation of Handhelds

So, after my LoL binge, I decided to pull out my old DS. For the record, I've gone through two before getting to this current one. My first DS was an old DS, which I simply called “FatS” because they're so much bigger than the DS Lite, it was Electric Blue, giving it the name Big Blue, and I swear I could hear thunder in the background every time I turned it on. I spent probably as much time on that DS as I spent on my entire time on the Gamecube. But, tragedy struck one day about 4 years ago. When I was giving it to my brother, he didn't have a strong enough grasp on it, and he dropped it, cracking the screen. There was a large disturbance in the force, as I could feel a small portion of my soul dying out, and so I ran to the nearest Super Target, receipt in hand, and claimed that my warranty covered it. Luckily, the man behind the counter was either stupid, or just had pity for me, as I had tear stains on my cheek. As any true gamer can tell you, you can get very attached to your handhelds.



What was besieged to me wasn’t quite what I expected, as I had originally owned an electric blue DS, that’s what I wanted back. But, this was when the DS Lite had made its first appearance, and the FatS were starting to disappear of store shelves. DS Lite’s at the time cost more than my FatS, and since I had no money on me at the time (And I was just about to beat the Elite 4 in Ruby version, again) I settled on the plain-Jane version, just silver. Now, don’t get me wrong, silver is fine, but it just didn’t have the power to make angels sing every time I flipped my DS open like Big Blue could, but I had him longer than I had most other things. I eventually gave him the name “Old Silver” since I was playing him no later than last June, but, of course, nothing good lasts forever.



I went through many games on Old Silver, from Phantom Hourglass to Diamond Version of Pokémon. I had him in my pocket for so long that his original bar code had fallen off from ware-and-tear. I even got him a cute little carrying case that had Mario and Luigi on the front from their greatest RPG “Superstar Saga.” It didn’t matter to me that it was made for the DS Lite; it still fit (even if it did put a good deal of strain on the zipper.) But, when I was out traveling, I gave it to my brother. And he dropped it. If you’ve ever had a pet die, and your parents have to break the bad news to you, this was the equivalence. I came into the room we were staying in, and he said, “Santa, we need to talk.” What proceeded was him sighing, and holding up Old Silver, now in two pieces, top screen in his left hand, and touch screen in his right. I was despondent for about a month.



I hadn’t used a handheld in about 5 months, and I had been on the Xbox ever since, this was about the time I started transitioning to PC gaming. But, I could feel the excitement of this box, and while I unwrapped it, I could feel a small rumble. It was a DS, Electric Blue. But, there was one difference, it was a DS Lite. I could feel the beginning of a new era. I went downstairs, pushed myself up next to my desk in my La-Z-Boy, and started charging. While I waited for it to charge, I opened up TF2, and traded for a few hours, (that was my obsession at the time) and when I turned it on, I gave it a new name, my new name, Santa, as a way of thanking this Christmas miracle. I started back up Ruby Version, and started a new game. Although I don’t play handhelds very much, I still love the DS; I can still play my GBA games, and get a tough of the future. Maybe I’ll get a 3DS in the future, but I’m not counting on it. I like holding onto the old days, and who knows? Maybe I’ll find my Gameboy Advanced in my storage room sometime soon.

Dominating Has Never Been So Rewarding

League of Legends is one of those games that can really make an impression on everyone who plays it, from the lores to the vast amount of character abilities that you can have, and control. But, the main point is always in the game, which as I found out, Dominion completely changes up. For all of you gamers out there, its like Modern Warfare 2's Domination tied up with the fast action of a good game of Dustbowl on TF2. League of Legends is quickly pulling me back in as a very powerful and addicting game, and Dominion is the main cause of it.

For those of you who like a visual representation of the map, click this! It shows the entire map, and'll give you a good representation of how the game works. Once again, you get to be on one of two teams, blue or purple, and spawn on their respective sides. But, you start out at level 3, more gold, and gaining xp and gold over time, and at a rather fast pace. This pushes gameplay a lot faster, and lets you get a larger grasp on your abilities. Now, you get one minute or so to talk shop with your team, and decide which of the 5 towers you want to capture, or "cap." There are 5 points of interest all around the map: The windmill, the quarry, the refinery, the drill and the boneyard. Capturing 3 of these points will swing power in your favor, and hurt the enemies' nexus. Since you can't hit the enemies' nexus, it now has an odd form of hit points, which are damaged when you have 3 or more towers, one of the champions die, or you complete an objective, given every 10 minutes or so. The Nexus has 500 hp, and although it may seem like a lot, it only takes about 15-30 minutes to finish one game of Dominion, packing all of the intensity of the original gametype into a faster paced game. 

But, LoL isn't all about the fighting; it's also about finer things, like how you can kill people faster at the beginning. In LoL, you are a Summoner, a magician who controls your champion through magical powers. And you have 2 spells that you can cast to help your team, or yourself, and runes, which affect only yourself. Both of which you unlock as your summoner level goes up. Spells are free, but runes must be purchased, and at levels 10, 20, and 30, you unlock Quintessences, which are like super runes. Runes do everything that items can do, but can also grant the abilities to gain more experience, or build better over levels. You also get Masteries, similar to runes, but free, and not quite as powerful. Masteries come in 3 different slots: Offensive, defensive, and utility. All of these can give powers to your champions before you even enter battle, but be warned, as not all of these powers will help every champion and playing style, try to experiment!

Seeing to the fact that I believe that seeing can really impact, I thought I would showcase two of my favorite characters in League of Legends. First up is Gangplank, that swashbuckling pirate. Yes, he says just about every single stereotype you can think of, he is a drunkard, a brute, and inappropriate, but he's also quite fun to play, and my first champion. Gangplank is a carry, making him quite strong later on in the game, and is a melee character. Gangplank has two unique things about him, one is his main ability "Parrrley" yeah, it is a bad joke. But it is special. Gangplank fires his Ye Olde pistol, and deals around 20- 70 damage (depending on its level) and however much attack damage you have, too. To put this in perspective: Gangplank gets around 200 attack damage by the time I hit level 15, so, 270 damage, that's also with pretty good range. This ability can also critically damage (for 200 or 250% if you get Infinity Edge, a very nice weapon), and apply effects like slowing and whatnot. Gang's ultimate attack is cannon barrage, which allows him to take his ship's cannons, and fire anywhere on the map. Literally anywhere. I can fire right on their spawn if I want to be that big of a dick. My usual build for Gangplank goes for attack speed, critical strike, and attack damage. I can get gang attack twice a second critting every time, and deal 800 damage per hit. He can be a very scary guy. 

Now, you your immediate left, you will see a giant insectoid. He is wearing a suit, top hat, and monocle. He also has a bottle of champagne and a pipe rubber banded to his claws, yes, this is the greatest skinned champion of all time, Gentleman Cho'Gath! Now, Cho'Gath does not usually come in his greater, cockney accented form, I had to buy him like this. He is the epitome of human eating Praying Mantises, as his ultimate allows him to eat enemy champions. If he successfully eats them (essentially killing them) then he will gain a feast stack, making him grow larger, and giving him more health. Cho'Gath also features a scream that can stop enemy champions from casting abilities, spikes that he can shoot from his back, and the ability to stomp on the ground, and fracture it. While Cho'Gath may require more grace than Gangplank, he is also much more, how do I say it, civilized, and hi famous catchphrase: "Let us Fight Like Gentlemen" is even printed on one of Riot's T-Shirts, showing him sitting in a nice chair. I bought that shirt, and I am currently wearing it. What can I say? I can be quite the fan boy.

For the rest of you hanging on the fence about joining this League, do it. It is a large download (not quite the size of TF2, but it comes close) and snazzy things such as skins can't be bought without throwing money into the game, but, you do earn champions with IP, given out at the end of each game, and Riot also goes through the free champion rotation, giving you the chance to sample before you buy. So, if you need to kill a few hours, or maybe just one, try out the league, Riot is always trying to out do themselves, and as Dominion has shown, they're always coming up with something new.