All posts by Brian A. Thomas

I am the father of Ari and Sidd. I am the owner and administrator of this site.

Is Goat Simulator a Baaaaaad Game?

Is Goat Simulator a bad game? That’s not a simple yes or no question.

There is no question the game provides a few moments of humor, both from the premise and the physics. However the humor wears thin, and the title I use for this article is the sort one can expect. Blow up a gas station, earn the Michael Bay achievement/score thingy. The text to voice software provides a few moments of fun when you make it when I made it say “Ari and Sidd are doofy poopy butts”, which sent my ten year old laughing so hard he had to leave the room. It’s the physics itself of course that provide most of the humor. Being able to climb a construction crane’s ladder with your neck, the odd physics glitches. Those are the things that provide most of the humor. After a while though, as noted, it wears thin. You can see the same joke only a few times before it gets repetitive and boring. The humor is certainly not great humor like South Park: Stick of Truth, which is one of the most genuinely funny games, if South Park crude humor, ever. It’s more like, “Ha, watch how he gets stuck in the air if I activate this power and see him rag doll around.” The second time you push that R to deactivate the power and fall back as the moment is gone. One will watch a funny movie several times, and find it funny each time, but this isn’t the same with Goat Simulator where you just start rolling your eyes at it after a short while, and without the humor moments the game loses most of its appeal.

There is a bit of a game inside the physics sandbox portion. There are some statues hidden around the lone map that the game ships with (though there is another map coming sometime in May) that you want to collect as many of as possible. Collecting them and finding certain hidden areas and doing the challenge there, give you upgrades. For example, in the goat fighting circle, defeat four goats and you get a muscle power goat. Don’t hurt anything for 5 minutes get the Angel Goat, drag five people to the pentagram and earn a devil goat and lots of others. These powers, once unlocked, can be used in a custom game mode, and combined for some semi-funny combos, some of which are needed, apparently, to unlock other modes. There are a few odd challenges to try and attempt like getting on the hang glider, jumping on each trampoline in the game only once without touching the ground in between them, and a few other odds and ends. These are what makes one actually come back to the game off and on. Continue reading Is Goat Simulator a Baaaaaad Game?

Ready for Titanfall

I’ve been looking forward to Titanfall ever since the announcement. Made by Respawn Entertainment, a company formed by the people who created the Call of Duty franchise after their rather public firing by Activation, it held promise to deliver a new FPS franchise to rival the others. The question would be could they deliver?

The TLDR answer? Pretty much. The game delivers a very entertaining multiplayer experience. The wall running, parkour elements add a great deal of fun. The Titans themselves make for a nice replacement for the usual driveable vehicles. The Source engine, while a bit outdated, holds up reasonably well and with the promised fixes coming to at least the PC version, I think it will deliver a solid experience visually. Is it perfect? No, but it is a very good multiplayer FPS, so long as that is all you are looking for. Want more details, then read on after the break. Continue reading Ready for Titanfall

Resistance With Regular Playing Cards

The Resistance is one of the best games to play in a group. However sometimes you don’t have your deck with you but might have access to a deck of regular cards and the game is possible with a regular deck of cards. I’ll present some basic rule sets for playing the game with regular cards below…

The Resistance is a hidden role game for 5-10 players (it works best with 7-10). You can go over 10, but the rules presented here are for up to 10, and it becomes a bit more unwildy above 10, above 10 you are probably better moving to Werewolf, Mafia (a webcam version is popularized by Daily Mafia), Two Rooms and a Boom as they are better balanced for larger groups. Anyhow, as I was saying, it is a hidden role game. You are a member of the Resistance, fighting against an corrupt government. Each turn somebody becomes leader and decides who’s going on a mission to destroy the government. However, your group has been infiltrated by spies, who may sabotage the mission if they are on it. The number of spies depends on the number of players. If the Resistance makes 3 successful missions, they win, if the spies sabotage 3 missions they win. Continue reading Resistance With Regular Playing Cards

Finally in Hearthstone Beta, and Loving Faëria

Well, I’m finally in the Hearthstone beta, finally got the opt-in key (and no, I don’t have extras). I’ll give impressions later. Right now my card game of choice though is Faëria, which may be one of the best card games out there, and a huge shame it isn’t getting far more attention. That one for sure I’ll be giving more coverage to.

Digital Card games in order, off initial impressions of my likelyhood of playing a lot:
Faëria (great, deep game, very strategic and tactical)
Hearthstone (fairly casual)
Card Hunter (ahead of IW mostly due to the humor and casual fun)
Infinity Wars (deep, and complex, perhaps too complex for casual play, and I got Faëria for the deep end right now)
I’m considering Scrolls…
SolForge, Magic and the rest… Hex probably would go here as well, but all below those for the moment.

TLDR: Get Faëria… now…

Present State of My Digital Card Game Playing

I’ve spoken before of the Digital LCGs, TCGs and the like that I’m wanting to play. A small update on some of those.

I am still not in the Hearthstone beta. Can’t comment too much on it outside of what I’ve seen. For the moment I’m digging Infinity Wars and Card Hunter until I can get in.

I actually got in the Infinity Wars beta after all. Very good game. However I’m stuck on one of the early missions (Warpath Campaign 2 for anyone interested in helping… if I’m still stuck when help comes). Here I am playing the game (the screen cap may say Offline Now, because I likely am offline from Twitch at the moment, but it was recorded there and rather than export it to YouTube I’ll leave it there for now, anyhow the video should work.):
Continue reading Present State of My Digital Card Game Playing

Virtual Tabletops

This post is more of a note to myself to remind me later… but I figured I’d share the discoveries with my limited audience as well…

What do you do if your gaming friends are spread too far apart to get together and join in on a game? Or you just don’t have a local group? Virtual Tabletops on the Internet is becoming more and more popular. Some people just use Skype or Google Plus Hangouts, but the virtual tabletops add a few extra elements.

There are many to pick from, but for this article I am going to focus on two newer ones.

Roll20. Available as a free version which will work for most players, though GMs will probably want to get the paid version. This has a built in video/chat function, or you can integrate it with Google Plus Hangouts (which is apparently more stable at the moment). Can handle card games as well, though really, I’d probably stick with OCTGN for virtual card games that don’t have dedicated apps. It can also apparently handle board games as well.

Tabletop Connect 3D. Available now via Kickstarter. Near as I can tell this will cost a little bit even from basic players. However, this tabletop seems to be much closer to what I had in mind if I was a good enough programmer to make one myself. It adds a 3D element, and some other features that make it likely to become the king, though Roll20 is more full featured right now. I don’t know if they are going to expand to include support for modern designer board games or if they are going to be strictly a RPG type virtual tabletop. Well worth checking out though.

Both are well worth checking out if you need a way to play D&D, Pathfinder, Star Wars: Edge of the Empire or the like over a virtual table. There are many others out there, but these seem to be the two big rising stars of the moment.

Digtial LCGs, TCGs and the Like of the Next Generation That I Want to Play

I’ve never been a Magic the Gathering player. I’ve had decks, but never really played.

Recently I’ve really gotten into Android Netrunner. In my opinion it is one of the best games for two people out there… but it isn’t digital… well not officially, you can play on a client called OCTGN, but for the most part you really need to be able to get to your local FLGS (favorite local game store) and play. My local FLGS in Akron, Underhill’s Games, has a weekly Netrunner event, but my car situation keeps me from making it like I would like…

Meanwhile I also have Lord of the Rings: LCG, which can be played solo… but again, not available digitally officially yet…

So digital card games are what I’ve been looking into.

The big one at the moment is Hearthstone, but that is in closed beta and I’m not in it yet, once I’m in I’ll report more and post up some videos. There are plenty of videos of it on YouTube and Twitch. Check it out. Blizzard, who made World of Warcraft, Diablo and the StarCraft (I need to get those for Ari) made this one. It seems very well done as one would expect from a first level developer like Blizzard… (Side note, I can’t wait to see Blizzard All Stars and Titan.) This is perhaps the big boy on the block, at least in the general public eye.

Infinity Wars is another big one out there in beta. I downloaded the client a few days ago, but didn’t make an account until today (Sept 1st), and sadly they just shut down beta invites… like had I signed up when I downloaded I probably could have got in, but now I’m on a 2-3 week wait. Again plenty of videos on YouTube and Twitch… to which I’ll be adding to for sure. As of the writing, they shut down new beta invites for 2-3 weeks. Had I tried to get in when I downloaded the client I probably would have been in already and making content for it…

Hex: Shards of Fate is perhaps one of the ones I’m most interested in seeing. It seems to be combining an MMO with a TCG. Yet again, closed alpha (not even beta yet). This one you can buy your way in, but I don’t know if I’m sold on the idea of buying in… I’m not clear yet on the MMO elements… what little I’ve seen seems to be just a next generation digital TCG, but I haven’t seen any of the PvE stuff yet. I’m very interested in the concept here at the very least.

SolForge I have on my iPad… I haven’t really used it yet though. I know lots of people are playing this while waiting to get in on the above.

There are a few others on the iPad that I’m not going to link to directly, but there’s Summoner Wars, Nightfall, and Ascension…

Of course Magic has its own digital version…

What I Would Have Done for the New Superman/Batman Movie

The way I imagined The Superman/Batman movie. Lex Luther (Bryan Cranston) reaches across the bay to Gothem’s richest citizen Bruce Wayne (now cast as Ben Affleck, though I didn’t have a casting choice in yet and I’m fine now with Affleck) in a voice of concern about this new caped crusader that nearly destroyed Metropolis in his battle with Zod (I didn’t mind the end of Man of Steel, Superman 2 had the same result, and in that one they laughed it off rather than Superman being upset about it). Batman comes over, they have a fight but they realize they are on the same time. Meanwhile Joker (no casting choices yet, I though about seeing if Mark Hamill would unretire his Joker, but this isn’t voice acting and Mark’s acting itself is what the question would be) along with my beloved Harley Quinn (also my beloved Katee Sackhoff ever since she started campaigning for it, though I might hold her off for a part in Justice League) starts causing havoc across both cities. Batman and Superman, not friends exactly, but working on the same side fight their common enemy, in the end finding that Luthor is the one pulling the strings and encouraged Joker, Luthor has something bigger planned… roll credits, tease Justice League (which is where Katee might be better cast as Wonder Woman, a tough roll to cast, Eliza Dushku would be possible, but doesn’t really fit the role as well physically, but perhaps that would be more the point).

This Is Water – Your Must Watch Video of the Moment

If you watch only one video anytime soon, then this is perhaps the one.

From the video description: In 2005, author David Foster Wallace was asked to give the commencement address to the 2005 graduating class of Kenyon College. However, the resulting speech didn’t become widely known until 3 years later, after his tragic death. It is, without a doubt, some of the best life advice we’ve ever come across, and perhaps the most simple and elegant explanation of the real value of education.
We made this video, built around an abridged version of the original audio recording, with the hopes that the core message of the speech could reach a wider audience who might not have otherwise been interested. However, we encourage everyone to seek out the full speech (because, in this case, the book is definitely better than the movie).
-The Glossary

Board Gaming in the Canton/Akron Area

I’ve been able to explore some of the stores in the greater Canton/Akron, Ohio area (CAK as our airport is called), and I’ve formed a few thoughts. My primary interest is board games, Netrunner and LCGs if I ever could play them, followed by roll playing (never get to play those either, but hey…), and then on from there. I list Canton first as I’m closer to Canton than Akron. I live between Alliance and Hartville, and work in Akron (and sadly this new job takes me out of the gaming arena for the moment due to the schedule).

I’ll cover stores first. Clubs and Meetups next, then a couple misc links that aren’t really local related but community board game related…
Continue reading Board Gaming in the Canton/Akron Area

The Hobbit At 48 FPS

I finally got to see The Hobbit today at the local theater in the High Frame Rate, 48fps 3D the way Peter Jackson filmed it and intended it to be seen. A bit about the movie… it’s a great movie and a must see, I’ll speak more about the movie in a bit.

The big news about the movie is that Peter Jackson filmed the movie at 48 frames per second…
Continue reading The Hobbit At 48 FPS

Me Playing Mechwarrior Online

Mechwarrior Online is a Free To Play game where you drive large Mechs around and engage in Mech combat…

Here I am playing a little… This is near my average game play in terms of piloting and shooting, though I normally bite it somewhere along the way. About the 5 minute mark I take too long to pull the throttle back to make my sharp turn, but otherwise I think my piloting was semi-okay in this. I need to master lasers better. This is using one of the trial Mechs. The game is free, and you get a choice of 4 Mechs, one from each class without buying any, and as you play, you earn in game money that allows you to buy stuff later on, or you can spend real world money to buy the stuff without the grind, which is how they make their money, though people like me tend to just use the grind…

Insane Amount of Video Game Posts

Looking over all my old posts, there have been an insane amount of video game posts… of course there hasn’t been much else going on in my life really, and most of my friends/family are on my Facebook anyhow for the more random odd things… I keep saying I should update this more often and never get to it… 🙂

Stress Missed

I missed the last Guild Wars 2 Stress Test on June 27th due to a massive headache. I got in some, but didn’t feel well enough to record more videos or take more screenshots. Lucky for me there is one more Beta Weekend Event coming near the end of July before the Guild Wars 2 releases… My original plan was to get a few more screenshots and videos that I could do commentaries on later, such as the release date announcement.

I also wanted to spend a lot of time in sPvP, and while I got there, I couldn’t figure out how to actually get into a sPvP match… lack of homework on my part. Perhaps due also in part because I skipped the tutorials… 🙂 Anyhow, I got to the loby area, but never figure out how to get into the matches from there. Apparently there is a crier or something that can get you into the matches. I’ll have to look next BWE.

I really don’t know if there will be much Guild Wars 2 news between now and release… save perhaps details of the upcoming Beta Weekend Event. No word yet if one or two of the remaining races will be playable or if they’ll just keep them until release. There hasn’t been details yet about when we’ll be able to link our Guild Wars 1 account with our Guild Wars 2 account if we created the GW1 account after we made the 2nd, or some people skipped it or couldn’t do it at the time due to technical hiccups. ArenaNet has promised they would open that stuff up before release, so we’ll trust them on that. The only reason to link them, at least for those of us at low levels, is name reservation since names are unique to the whole game, not just per server. The head start is August 25th, for those of us who pre-purchase the game, so there is still some time to go before they have to make sure the system is in place. I would guess since they announced a date, they could do it at any moment, but my guess is that they probably will hold off until August.

Be sure to join me in this great game…

Guild Wars 2 Is Coming August 28th

Not much else to say, but news over at the Official ArenaNet Blogis Announcing the Guild Wars 2 Launch Date. I got to get ready for work, so more later…

Here is the launch date trailer for it:

There is one more Beta Weekend Event that they also announced on July 20th to the 22nd. No word if they’ll do another stress test or slip in a public beta before release, but this frankly is all I would expect.

All the more reason to get it now if you haven’t already.

Guild Wars 2 Beta Weekend Events Overstaying Their Welcome?

There is an interesting post over at the Guild Wars 2 Reddit expanding on an idea brought up on the recent Guildcast (June 20th edition, which I had started to watch but didn’t finish before posting this originally). The question is if all the Beta Weekend Events sort of diminish the game in some ways and if that goes into ArenaNet‘s release date plans for Guild Wars 2.

It is an interesting thought, and I have to agree a bit with the whole concept that they were bringing up. Continue reading Guild Wars 2 Beta Weekend Events Overstaying Their Welcome?