Steam: Building Your Own Future

Team Fortress 2 is the undeniable leader for hat and hat accessories in the video game world. But, Valve can only make so many hats, even to Robin Walker's own chagrin. But, for the last few years, there has been a was to add hats to the game without Valve having to do anything!

This is a subject I've mentioned in about 3 or so posts now, but I do believe that it is deserving of its own post. The Steam Workshop is a way for people to submit user made  content, after which can be viewed and voted on by viewers. 

But as well know the Team Fortress community is filled with mappers and modders and hackers. I may not understand how to program, but I sure do appreciate the work that these non-paid vigilantes put in to making these wonderful items that I may some day be using to taunt my fellow game player. But, one may ask, why should I bother to learn how to do this? it seems just about pointless to me. But, this is where you are wrong. Valve gives to whomever makes an item, and then is implemented into the game the item they made, but it has green text (similar to the text of a genuine item) and is called a self-made item. It also sparkles, like community weapons. What I would give for a sparkling Hotrod...

But Valve has expanded the Steam workshop. With the release of the creation kit for Skyrim there are now more mods coming out to shake a stick at, and it just so happens that Steam has Skyrim on sale for $40 bucks at the moment (certainly not a strategy to increase sales, of course not!) and a possible mod to be able to kill stop children from hindering your path, it may be time that I invest in a computer copy, at the very least I could just look at it on my computer. Just staring at me aimlessly. Just like New Vegas.

So, if you think you got what it takes to make a hat, or a map, or something else really cool you can try out SDK, I was never any good at it, but I have a few friends who have made maps. The community can always use more map makers and hat creators. And to any of you with the talent to do it, best of luck.

--Santa

the Internet: I'm Stuck

All right, this was a post that was originally wasn't going to happen. Originally I was planning on reading the first few pages on a bet, say it was stupid, and stopping.

I was completely wrong.

Yes, I was going to make this post yesterday, but I ended up reading for about 4 hours and then not caring that it was 10 pm. I guess its time to say it.

I enjoy webcomics.

To be more specific, I've been reading MS Paint Comics. Which is just another way of saying this bro writes out comics in Microsoft Paint, and then puts them on the internet.

The guy is a genius. His job is to draw on MS paint all day. And he makes bank. I literally have to spell it out as bank.

so this guy has 4 stories that he has written, 2 of which he has abandoned, one he finished, and one which is ongoing, and very, very long.

• Bard Quest- Bard kills dragons, set up like a Choose-your-own-adventure (Unfinished)
• Jail Break- Self Explanitory (Unfinished)
• Problem Sleuth- Starts with a detective stuck in his office, ends as an epic adventure. (Finished, around 1700 pages)
• Homestuck- Four kids start playing a very powerful game (Very big understatement, In-Prgoress)

Although I have read about 50 or so pages into Problem Sleuth, I am at least 1000 pages into Homestuck. Actually, Im RIGHT HERE. (don't click, spoileres, unless you've read Homestuck, of course. )

A quick summary of the ideas of Homestuck: Impossible to give. Really, after about the 3rd act, everything gets all loopy and hard to explain. So, I won't. Instead, I'm going to put a page break in, and talk to everyone who wants spoilers, or has actually read ino the Second half of act V.

TF2: Whats in Store for 2012?

So Robin Walker and crew did something a bit different this year to bring us into the last year of our existence. They outlined some things we can expect from TF2 in 2012.

• Meet the Pyro will be released. My second favorite class will probably have the coolest meet the video, too.
• The Second annual Saxxy Awards. I came nowhere close to winning last time, I didn't even enter, but I sure would not mind getting a cool piece of Australium to fill the void in my heart that only a wrench made of gold could solve.
• Steam Workshop Blog. For all of you following the Steam Workshop, take a look at this.
• Something top secret. Valve hints at a hat-map hybrid. I can only hope that they're lying. I just want more hats.

So much to see, so little time. Oh well, I'm going to go play more Co-op v. AI until TF2 is a little more loose-lipped about their up-coming plans. I waited a year for Skyrim, I can wait a month or two for Meet the Pyro.

--Santa

League of Legends: The Post That Santa Forgot

Here in my workshop I have a schedule for my posting, generally on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday for easier reading purposes. It also makes it so I keep a more rigid schedule, as it is my goal to blog 3 times a week. Yesterday I completely neglected to do Wednesday’s post. It was on my time the entirety of the day, but I never got to it. Why? Because I was much too busy playing the thing I was going to review.

A few of my more frequent readers may remember me mentioning a week or so ago that in the upcoming patch they were completely overhauling Coop v. AI. They were adding around 30 or so new bots, updating the modes to include Dominion, and making the bots just one step closer to Skynet.      Other than my fears of the new robot overlords, I did spend basically all of my time yesterday investigating this new mode so I could give all my readers a good feel for what they could expect if they were going to start playing Coop. My suggestion: Do it.

The old bots, to be nice, had absolutely no skill. None. Absolutely Nothing.  When I first started playing League of Legends I had next to no skill. I had never played Defense of the ancients (A Warcraft III mod that is the birth idea of the League) so I tried a range of characters. My first game of LoL I rolled Pantheon and got him 2 Warmogs. I figured more health meant more survivability. I was very wrong.  So, I started play Coop, and started on easy mode. I chose the lovely pirate known as Gangplank. He had the longest chest hair I had ever beheld. Gangplank would end up being the first champion I ever bought, following Heimerdinger (who became FTP after Gangplank, and before I had enough IP to get him, he also reminded me of an Erwin Schrodinger-Engineer hybrids, another love at first sight.) These were the two champions I really bonded to, and give me a mix depending on our team: AP or Attack Damage.

I used to engage in countless bot games, playing until I didn’t have to look down at the keyboard, didn’t die, and got at least 10 kills. When I hit this point, I went on to Intermediate games, doing the same process to get a strong hold of my champions.  When I finally felt that I knew my champions I went out and played real games. With my experience being much higher than other players at my skill level I generally did a lot better in games. I got other champions (most notably Anivia, Cho’Gath, and Graves) and did the same processes for them, as of recently I bought Leona for a tank, and I’m starting to do the same for her.

However, I find myself with the need to completely re-do the roster for all of my champions. This new updates gives a more wide-range feel for these champions, and makes the game feel much more realistic. So my line-up of champions: Anivia, Cho’Gath, Gangplank, Graves, Heimerdinger and Leona gives me a full feeling of the League, (two AD carries, one AP Nuke, one tanky-mage and one AD Tank) but this also means that I need to re-train so I can get back up to my old playing status. It’s hard to juggle 6 characters, especially when you end up playing a few over the rest. But, I’m getting back into all my characters, slowly and surely, and rest assured, I bet the same thing could easily happen to you.

--Santa