Autopsy Report

I've been playing a lot of FF: Tactics War of the Lions on PSP. It's a port (with a few changes) of the original PSX Final Fantasy Tactics.

The most recent Tactics game is A2 on the DS, and a lot has changed since then. So I thought I'd go through some of the bigger changes that I really like and some I'm not keen on.

( Click here then or now for more. )

Yarrr maties, we be discussing piracy today arrr.

Pirates be filthy dogs with eyepatches and peg legs arrrrr. They be wielding Cutlass! They drink! They gamble! They've the scouuurrrrrge of the seven seas.

What ye filthy landlubber? This are be the WRONG kind of pirate?

... arr... nobody cares for us pirates anymore do ye...



( Click 'ere landlubber for the low down on ye pirates arrrr. )

Been doing searches online for cheap (read: free) music that I could use in Talon.

Came across this site: ccMixter it's a music site under the Creative Commons License. Which in english means non-commercial uses can use the music for free. I'm planning on making a demo game for use in a portfolio, I'm pretty sure that's non-commercial.

Found this little cool track called Maellus Malleficarum on there. I'm thinking it sound good for the Sepelition, my deep underground level.

This link here is an idea of how I want Talon to play in both playstyle, graphically and musically.

Let's face it, I'm nowhere near this level of graphics design, neither is Laura so I'm not getting this kind of sprite quality. But at least I can try and have a goal to aim for.

Enjoy the link. It's an amazing overlooked game, I wish there was more like it.

Join me now, in a journey. A journey back to a forgotten time. A time when games where huge massive refridgerator sized contraptions that ate quarters like kids eat candy. Now imagine if you will one of these behemoths of gaming.

Pacman and Space Invaders are the big games.



The business model? Quarters. Or 50p to the UK lot.

Remember those? Yeah they cost like £1 now don't they? Mostly games you can get on a console or PC now too, but back then the Arcades were the main way to play.

( So why am I telling you all this? )

Been working on something new as of late.

In the next while I plan on picking up the Torque 2D Engine and start making me some games! However it would be stupid of me to just start making things while having no clue what I'm going to make. So until I get the engine I'll be working on a design document for a game I want to do by the name of Talon. Since my reason for this is portfolio piece it's in my interest to put the entire document online both as a portfolio piece and also as it's in the public I won't run into a legal problems for sending it to a company alongside CV and Applications etc. (Yeah some companies are understandably iffy about receiving that kind of thing).

So here it is. I'll try and update this post when I've got new stuff added or modified but no promises.

Big important note:

I don't have the engine yet. I don't have any graphics yet. I don't have any programming done. There is no sound or music or 'alpha build' to play. This is just the design doc as is written in my Open Office file.

( Clicky to ready )

Yesterday the newest World of Warcraft expansion was announced, Cataclysm. It looks really epic to be honest, the whole world getting ripped up and flooded, lava everywhere, exploding volcanoes.

But I digress. Point of this blog is to take a look at some of their proposed stat changes and the possible effect on the game.

Disclaimer: I don't play many of the affected classes at a high level so I don't guarantee what I say will be 100% accurate, but it'll be close enough. This is spoken of in a general sense, there will always be exceptions, WoW is too big a game for there not to be. You'll get the point though.

( Click to gain +10 Strength. )

See you 'n' me? We're gonna sit down 'ere and talk a little, kapeesh?



( Join the mob, click here. )

Gonna do something different and take a look at a piece of useful gaming related software I use.

It's called XPadder. In short it takes an Xbox 360 for Windows controller's input and converts it to keyboard buttons.

"Scott", I hear you ask, "Why would I want to do that? What's wrong with just the normal input?"

( Well click here and I'll explain it! )

This entire post will be dedicated to Warhammer 's PVP system. Yeah it's that big...

The first order of business is to make clear that Warhammer doesn't call PVP.. PVP. It calls it RVR.

RVR stands for Realm Vs Realm as the game is split up into the Realms of Order and Destruction. Now personally I think calling it RvR is just a petty way of being different, but WO (Warhammer Online) likes even its mechanics having a roleplay flavour to them so RvR we're stuck with. I'll still be calling it PVP here.

( So click here to see just what this PVP entails. )

I just finished having my ass handed to me on a golden plate by a normal AI in Age of Mythology.

It wasn't fun. No really, I like a challenge and all but this was just ridiculous for standard difficulty.

( Bloody lousy cheating games... *grumble* )

Tank, DPS and Healz. Lolwut?
( What on earth do tanks and acronyms have to do with games? )

OMGOMG!! This new game! Warhammer Online! It's gonna KILL World of Warcraft. This is it! WOW's dead! Long live WAR! Blizz are shutting down WoW's servers, they know they can't compete!!! DEATH TO WOW! LONG LIVE WAR!!!

( .... or something like that )

I don't see enough Dots! More Dots now!

( Ok... stop dots )

( Don't nerf me bro! )

Defenses? What do you call all this armour? Isn't THIS defenses?

( PWNED!!! By Zergling Rush! )

A new patch for World of Warcraft was announced and some of the details given to see. What this blog will be is looking at one of the elements of the new patch in particular from a design perspective and comparing that to how the player base sees it.

( Click to read about it. )

Farming, like the real world farming, is an intensive long period of repetitive activity to accomplish a goal.

In many MMO's you can get very good items from player crafting. Unfortunately these items tend to have excessive item requirements and require many hours of 'farming' either quests or resources in order to afford the,.

In Players vs Player combat (PVP), when one player farms another it means that the attacker is killing an individual or group repeatedly for personal amusement, to up his kill total or to increase his PVP currency for future spending.

Farming doesn't always involve killing, it can also be farming materials through mining, fishing or herbalism.

If you're farming for experience, this is often called 'grinding'. It is given a different word because it's generally more mindless and boring in nature.

Farming: Participating in a very repetitive, often dull, activity for personal benefit.

A frag is a kill.

...

What you want more? Oh alright.

The word Frag is originally a military term and refers to the act of killing a superior officer with a fragmentation grenade. A grenade was used as it leaves no fingerprints or ballistic shell to analyse.

In the gaming world however it refers to the killing of another player, usually in a First Person Shooter.

A Frag can refer to:

• Shorthand for Fragmentation grenade.
• An alternative to a well known four letter swear word starting with F.
• The act of Fragging, to kill another player.
• A score tracker of kills: I have 5 frags.
• A board game by Steve Jackson games inspired by the FPS Quake

In the Quake Arena games when the game limit is set to number of kills as opposed to time as a player approaches that limit a computer voice will announce " THREE FRAGS LEFT" to all players letting them know the end of the game is near.

Like other forms of entertainment like music or movies, Games are broken up into genres to easily show how the game is played. Unfortunately there are subject to so many acronyms and mixing that it ends up confusing the issue. Some games are also impossible to categorize under existing genres and as such get labeled with things like "Action-Adventure" which is shorthand for "No clue"

So I'm going to take some of these Genres and explain what they mean. This by no means a comprehensive list. I'm not going through each and every nuance and minor genre, just sticking to the main ones.

( Click to read all about them. )