Team Fortress 2 - Contribute!

via teamfortress.com

Calling all creators- apparently TF2 is letting you craft your own items, hats, avatars, and other goodies to "immortaliz[e] you in the Team Fortress 2 pantheon forever while keeping our jobs safe."

Crowdsourced stuff from a major community like TF2 is bound to have some successes, and it shows Valve's still committed to revitalizing a game many have said has left its prime months ago. Hell, half the people I know who play this game are art majors, and they alone have created enough out-of-game related art to fill half a book.

I fear for Valve's servers once they open this floodgate.

Posted via web from Kuri's posterous

Continue Reading Team Fortress 2 - Contribute!

Grats GC!

I don't usually call this stuff out on my blog, but this deserves a shout-out.

Rotface has been a real thorn in our side since last week on both 10 and 25-man, and we finally nailed him in both modes. Now to work on Putricide (with a scant 10 attempts)!

Posted via web from Kuri's posterous

Continue Reading Grats GC!

Everquest Gets an Epic Documentary

I was meaning to post this a while back, but better late than never. Actually, the way it is now, it acts as a slick post-mortem to the EverQuest convention where this documentary was aired! Slick, huh?

So finally, here's a guy covering Everquest who isn't dressed up as an elf or dwarf in chainmail- not that there's anything wrong with those obsessed fans covering these types of things. Come to think of it, they'd probably make the best documentary since they live the MMO life in- and out-of-game... but I digress.

So a one-time developer and present-day TV and videogame producer by the name of Jason Hall put together a series of never-before-seen interviews with the original EverQuest team. You may also know him as the Founder/CEO of Monolith Productions (think F.E.A.R., The Matrix Online... okay, probably best to stop there). He's now tackling reality shows.

Regardless of your feelings about a producer covering a once-titanic MMO or the MMO genre in general, it's great to finally get a true insider look into the MMO companies behind the game. This documentary shows a mixture of things: MMO addict developers giving insight to the passion that formed the game, twists along the way that could've kept this genre from ever taking off, some unexpected "by-products" of EverQuest (WoW players will appreciate the nod), and more. If you have any feelings towards MMO games whatsoever, this should at least frame the industry that's made it as far as it has today.

Sadly, the convention this video aired at just finished yesterday so the full video isn't up yet. Feel free to torrent scan (I will) and catch the full product when it's up. Anything that has confetti, women popping out of cakes, and sparkles has an automatic "win" factor of 10.

Check after the break for the trailer.

Continue Reading Everquest Gets an Epic Documentary

Mountain Dew Game Fuel: WoW Edition

On the heels of last year's summer Halo 3-themed Game Fuel line (and their election-style compeititon between 3 new berry fusion flavors two years ago), Mountain Dew is testing your faction loyalty with 2 types of World of Warcraft drinks. Alliance will have a wild fruit flavor, and Horde will be citrus cherry (think Baja Blast and Livewire/Code Red).

These drinks have been very elusive, but after recently moving to Chicago I found each of these stocked at a local CVS. Nobody else I know has their hands on these yet, so they might be releasing their new flavors in phases in key locations. Makes sense if they're ramping up production over the summer.

They're also doing something akin to their (now-ancient) 'Every 10 Minutes' campaign on their Game Fuel website, and you can win random WoW-related swag, PC peripherals, an Alienware laptop... or even a trip to Blizzcon. Sign up, click things for points, and enter for a chance to win every 5 minutes (if you place points in each item- not recommended). Down the road, no matter how many tokens you do or don't acquire, you'll be awarded a cute robot mini-pet, so make sure you don't get shafted by picking Horde if you'd really like a blue pet.

I won't even try to pick sides to say which one tastes better, or if the Halo variety outdid what's out now. What I will say is you should at least try it, since supporting new flavors will ensure at some point down the road they will have a whole line-up of good flavors.

And now, a picture of my loot.

Continue Reading Mountain Dew Game Fuel: WoW Edition

5 Things in 5 (Well, 8) Minutes - Podcast 001

You might've wondered where I've been. Well, turns out making a podcast is a little more involved than I previously thought! And even after the podcast was made, there's still the matter of offering the media. Well, good news is... finally, those obstacles are gone.

5 Things in 5 Minutes is the new podcast theme for this blog. Once every few days (podcast update frequency to be announced at a later date), I'll be uploading this as a quick non-text recap of important news of the week. There's much more than 5 things going on at any given time, but these are the 5 most interesting to me. Oh, the power.

Included with the podcast will be "show notes" to provide additional context to the show. If something feels glazed-over in the podcast, check the notes- you'll find plenty of resources to deepen your understanding.

Show Notes for Episode 001:

Left 4 Dead 2 (Soon?)

Parodying the community reaction for L4D2's unexpectedly-early release, we have these two videos. Epic music and ominous tones? Check and check.

Battle.net 2.0 is (Maybe?) Free!

Why go in detail when you can see my update here?

The Big 3 Makes Motion Controllers Now, Not Cars

Wii's Vitality Sensor, XBOX360's Natal, and Sony's 'Yet-Unnamed Eyetoy Motion Controller'

PSP Go is Go!

More specs than you can shake a stick at. Click here for community (well, IGN editors') impressions.

EA Thinks Protesting is Marketing

Viral marketing hits E3. News at 11.

Hope you enjoyed the first episode, and be sure to tune in next time. I might even get a better microphone.

Continue Reading 5 Things in 5 (Well, 8) Minutes - Podcast 001

CONFIRMED: Battle.net 2.0 to Be Free

You wonder why Blizzard didn't release this from the first announcements of Starcraft II and Diablo 3, but late's better than never.

According to Activision-Blizzard's annual conference call, and now a post on the official Battle.net forums, Battle.net 2.0 will be free to those purchasing Starcraft 2. This comes as good news to people frettting they'll have to fork over $50 for the base game and complement it with an XBOX Live subscription.

However, if you look closely at the wording, you'll notice Blue poster Karune only specifically mentions SC2. Yes, it's the SC2 forum on Battle.net. Yes, he's primarily speaking to the SC2-interested audiences. No, I didn't get the opportuniy to sit in on the Activision-Blizzard conference call to hear Mike Morhaime specifically define what the service covers. But there's some important factors to consider... after the break.

World of Warcraft, which will be included in the new Battle.net 2.0 integration, already has a $15/mo subscription fee attached, so including Bnet2.0 should be a no-brainer. SC2 was recently announced as a trilogy, so assuming a $50+ price tag on each game, they're netting $150+ total from each dedicated customer over the lifespan of SC2. Diablo, the only intellectual property still in the air, is only planned (at this stage) to be a single-game iteration, so this game might be up for a Battle.net 2.0 access fee, or worse, a subscription model. However, the Diablo community has come to expect free online play from the previous 2 games... but meeting profit estimates tend to trump histortical trends. This is just the cynic in me talking, though.

If you dig enough, you'll even find tidbits that older games will not be supported (although this isn't cited anywhere specifically). This means they'll be stuck on the old Battle.net iteration until they're taken offline. It makes sense since the new Battle.net is being built around a whole new infrastructure (clan management, event planning, game achievements, etc.), but it's sad to see if you're playing a retro game there's a chance your friends won't see you on.

Overall, it's good to see Blizzard's moving towards a "free" model for Battle.net 2.0. But this all might be dependent on how much revenue they can generate from each IP individually over the long-term to support the service. Keep your ears tuned, especially in August during Blizzcon, to see how this situation evolves. Better yet, come to my blog, since I'll actually be attending (liveblog attempt incoming?!).

Continue Reading CONFIRMED: Battle.net 2.0 to Be Free

E3 Winds Down

So, the truncated E3 is down from 5 days to 4 since it shrunk in 2007, which means it's officially over and we have all the news updates to skim over and analyze from the previous week.  I saw a suprising amount of journalists lamenting over the short period since there were so many games to test, but too long of lines to get to them all.

Rather than try to be one of those blogging androids that covers all of E3 from all sides (Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo, independent hardware developers... and all the games being showcased), I will take the more humanistic approach and cover the highlights of the event.  Best thing is, since I'm not liveblogging the content, I can provide insight with the power of hindsight.

Not saying it wouldn't have been fun liveblogging the event, but that's what Twitter's for nowadays.  I'd also prefer to be at the presentations.  So we'll save those crazy antics for the day I get a press pass.

Now that you know my stance on the subject, keep your eyes peeled in the following weeks for updates on all the E3 announcements and their impact on how you'll be playing your consoles going forward.

Continue Reading E3 Winds Down

Star Wars Galaxies: A Nostalgic Retrospective

Hey, blog!  Long time no see.  Been doing well while I've been gone?  Aw, you even kept this place how I left it.

Now if you don't mind, I'll be taking over again.

To jump back into this whole blogging thing, I felt an MMO-related story would be appropriate.  So what better to kick off with than my old stompin' grounds of 5 years passed, Star Wars Galaxies?

I stumbled across a great compendium to learn about Star Wars Galaxies, where it goes over the game's pre-launch, initial reception, progressive (and regressive) updates, eventual downfall, and present condition.  It's really summarized quite well, and is available after the break.

I, personally, left the game right before player housing and vehicles were implemented and the Jedi unlocking system was 4/5ths-released to the public.  In short, I was really not playing all that long, although it did consume at least 4 months of my teenage life.  I can still remember my old guild (the name of said guild, not so much) and things like entire staked-out fields of windmills to generate resources to build our first guild city, invasions of Republic guild cities, duels with players much more powerful than myself, tromps across vast planets, and constantly not understading what I was doing.

Some things in the videos are spot-on:

• There was (and apparently still is) very little direction given in the game.
  
• The New Game Experience patch utterly destroyed the community by releasing Jedi as a readily-available class, when it was a smash-keyboard-and-win kind of class.  That and the whole talent/combat revamp.  From all accounts it was an unwelcome shellshock.
  
• The 34 classes provided depth but, as the game expanded, was ultimately a barrier for new entrants.
  
• The game's scale is indeed the most ambitious of all games released to date to capture the feel and immersion of the Star Wars world.
  

But one small quibble- the "new Star Wars MMO that is nothing but rumors" is in fact no longer a rumor- it's confirmed Bioware is working on The Old Republic, as evidenced by their theatrical trailer and accompanying footage.

The mighty may have fallen, but in their place arise great things.  This kind of evolution is what keeps me excited about the MMO genre.

Continue Reading Star Wars Galaxies: A Nostalgic Retrospective

World of Warcraft: 3.0.3's Largest Nerf

You might be wondering- what's the big deal about a broom?

Well, for those of us who have been playing World of Warcraft for the last half a month, there was an event called Hallow's End that integrated candy, tricks, and loot into 15 days of festive fun, traveling, and boss-slaying. One of the unsung champions of this event was none other than the Magic Broom.

What this little guy did was nix the usual 3-second cast time to mount. There were major implications due to this in multiple areas- you saw every PVPer sporting this guy since you could pop on a 100% speed mount immediately upon leaving combat. Advantages are even better for Rogues and the Night Elf class, who sport Vanish and Shadowmeld to immediately leave combat. I presume it's a similar situation for Hunters with Feign Death.

In PVE, suddenly grinding low-level quests and monsters weren't as big of a hassle. Usually monsters are spaced 20-30 yards apart, and the run time wasted during a typical quest could be upwards of 5 minutes. Assuming it takes 15 minutes to do a quest with some traveling, that's 33% of your time spent running monster to monster! This cut that downtime to 1 minute or less, and it was suddenly fun to chain-quest again.

I think Blizzard realizes the benefits this item brought, but its effect in PVP probably made it overpowered. I don't see anything wrong with having no cast time on mounts- it makes for a twitchier game- and I'd gladly take it back. It's a drag that the game feels it needs to waste time just to waste time by re-implementing the cast time to mount. I say be done with it and make every mount casting time-free.

Your customers who like spending their time playing, not casting and standing still, will thank you.

(In other news, I hope Blizzard finally fixed the achievement "A Simple Re-Quest". I'd like to enter a Battleground again without having to worry about it wiping the number!)

Continue Reading World of Warcraft: 3.0.3's Largest Nerf

Mirror, Mirror on the HDTV

Mirror's Edge, for those unfamiliar with the game, blasted onto the gaming blogosphere with a bang thanks to its realistically-moving camera. The rest of the game's fairly standard platforming fare- plop on a roof, jump onto a pole, swing, land, beat up bad guys that run to meet you, and repeat. But it's the first first-person shooter/platformer that actually attempts to attach a camera to the character's head, rather than place it on a static X-Y-Z axis. Now, if you kick the back of a guy's head, you'll look down your arm, center on the enemy's head, and the camera will bob as you make his face meet steel grating. It's a nice touch to a genre that's been unexcitingly consistent in presentation.

Some of this action has been shown in a brand spankin' new gameplay video released at Leipzig Games Convention 2008 (after the jump):

One concern from earlier trailers was that it'd be too scripted or oversaturated with gimmicky camera movements. Since nobody's tested the final product it's impossible to verify the truth of that allegation, but assuming there's a gradual progression of skill sets and fights a'la Portal's evolving stages, the gimmick factor should be minimized.

I'm satisfied with the eye-candy shown so far, but I'd love to see more gameplay. Since release is a while off, with many game shows going on before then, expect more to be released in a calculated way. Marketing teams just love doing that.

There's even some back story to the craziness contained in the above videos. Peep extra trailers and related videos below:

Continue Reading Mirror, Mirror on the HDTV

Don't Look Now, But...

IT'S SAMUS ARAN! It's not like I typically inject this blog with cosplay/artistic love, but I think this exhibit warrants a mention. Plus it's about a game, so there, that's my excuse.

The cosplayer in question today is cosplayer Jenni Källberg, who's been making front-page rounds on news circles showcasing her new Samus outfit. It's certainly impressive, and since she's not Asian herself, I presume this is why it's made such a splash in Western circles- no dig at Asian anime folk, it's just they're the ones typically associated with over-the-top cosplay getups.

Check the link, or if you're lazy, click the jump. It'll be worth your time.

Continue Reading Don't Look Now, But...

Atari Getting Some Help

Following up last week's Atari article, it seems Infogrames Entertainment (Atari's parent company) is using its BlueBay division to buy Atari's debt and inject it with $10M to carry it through the holiday season.

Yet this $10M isn't going to cut it, Atari says, and they're looking for further financing.

Kotaku's Mike Fahey makes the jab, "I'm patiently waiting for a PayPal donation button to appear on their homepage."

Atari's future is looking pretty foggy, and I'll be checking to see what becomes of the long-standing, yet mis-managed company.

Continue Reading Atari Getting Some Help

XBOX360 Propels to 1st Place: Halo 3 to Thank?

Never underestimate the chain reaction of success a blockbuster title can bring. Right on the heels of Halo 3's release (okay, calculate in a month of lag for all those fence-sitters), industry sales jumped 74% this month, largely thanks to Microsoft's hit title.

Nintendo saw Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass (DS) rack in a hefty amount of sales (400K), coupled with the continued success of Wii and its casual-fun games. Between Zelda, Samus, and Wii mini-games, Nintendo saw well over 1 million copies sold for September and early October.

However, that number pales- and I mean pales- in comparison to what Microsoft saw since Halo 3's release. Clocking in at 3.3 million copies sold on release day, that number's since grown to over 5.2 million copies sold worldwide. If history taught us anything about hit exclusives, it's that each release is coupled with massive sales increases with its console.

As NPD Group analyst Anita Frazier says, "Halo 3 had a very big and significant impact on 360 hardware sales. Consumers always tell us that the availability of the games they want to play is the #1 reason why they purchase any given hardware system, and when you have a game of this magnitude, the effect of compelling content on driving hardware acquisition is evident."

Well, people weren't just acquiring consoles... they were snatching them up like all XBOX inventory was going to be incinerated by Christmas. Analysts can't help but chock that up to Halo 3 (and partially to others).

An NPD Group analyst, Anita Frazier, "We should continue to see strong sales for Halo 3 into the holidays and that will definitely help keep the momentum going for the 360. Not only that, but those new owners are going to be looking for some more content to play so it's a cycle that feeds itself."

With Sony's Playstation 3 and Nintendo's Wii offering nothing of world-shaking significance (yet), it's going to be a white-and-green holiday as XBOX360 games piggyback off Halo's penetration.

To sum things up:

• Software Sales: +64% (Rose to $550.5 million)
• Hardware Sales: +188% (Rose to $418.6 million)
• Industry Sales: +74% (Total video game sales rose to $1.36 billion)

Continue Reading XBOX360 Propels to 1st Place: Halo 3 to Thank?

EA's BioWare & Pandemic Acquisition Details Emerge

Recently, EA made headline news for its USD 825M acquisition of Pandemic (Star Wars: Battlefront) and BioWare (Mass Effect / Baldur's Gate) studios, which put questions in the minds of gamers everywhere. Why the sudden purchase? What was the strategic motive?

Well, today, EA released some general, yet logical information regarding their decision. Simply put, "This acquisition fills up a gap in our genre line-up. We are currently underrepresented in key genres: RPG, action, and adventure." He substantiates this with the fact that 36/29 percent of the North American/European markets respectively are made up by these genres that these studios specialize in, and >25% is no small piece of market pie.

Pandemic and BioWare cumulatively have 6 wholly-owned projects in the works, and as if a cherry on the top of a $825M sundae, BioWare is also working on a yet-unannounced MMORPG.

Filling out your portfolio doesn't come without a cost, however. Investors and executives alike are relying on their revenue estimates to make this deal profitable, and while the breakeven point is set for 2009, dud games will cause quite a bit of strain on EA's value.

When asked by Gamasutra if they were worried about being utterly taken over, overshadowed, and tossed around in a corporate dryer of sorts, BioWare replied that EA was actually very in-line with their goals, and being attached to such a powerful entity might provide the necessary resources to see even bigger projects come to fruition.

There's no doubt this story's only going to get deeper, and soon we might see the finer details of EA's desire of Pandemic/BioWare ownership.

Continue Reading EA's BioWare & Pandemic Acquisition Details Emerge

No Wii Price Cut - Confirmed

This should come as no surprise whatsoever, but the Nintendo Wii will not be seeing price cuts this holiday season. With ample demand pushing sales and Nintendo receiving gains from every unit sold, Nintendo has no reason to follow in Sony and Microsoft's price-drop decisions.

Says NOA's George Harrison, "We'll stay at USD 249 for the foreseeable future. We are still selling everything we can make."

GamesIndustry.biz also speculates repeat Wii console shortages again this year as the masses run out for gift-buyin', so don't let your guard down- get your Wii early if you plan on buying one.

Will price drops increase competition between the three vying consoles? November and December, we await your bombardment of gaming-related TV ads.

Continue Reading No Wii Price Cut - Confirmed

Change is in the Air... at Atari

Mismanagement of a brand is never a pretty thing. Neither is seeing a stock chart mimic a ski slope. However, Atari has both problems on their hands and is finally trying to turn things around for the staggered company.

Head board members were removed (an oddly strong word, likely chosen to portray the seriousness of the change) today, with new management to be put in place soon.

Will this change really bring Atari back? The last great Atari game, many have argued, was Pong. Harsh words that, unfortunately, ring pretty true. Neverwinter Nights fans, no offense intended.

Once this change begins to yield financial fixes and make good on Atari's promises, we might see some rebounding. In the meantime, IT'S SKIING TIME!

Continue Reading Change is in the Air... at Atari

WoW: Great News for Reroll Virgins

For as long as I can remember, the most painful experience in World of Warcraft was re-leveling a character. For all but the hardiest of gamers (or those sick of their current character), starting fresh and spending countless hours running through the same content you played through not too long ago is #1 on peoples' "Avoid" lists.

Well, patch 2.3 details came swooping in today to lift that bad "re-roll" taste from peoples' mouths, and it's improvements all around for those who ever wanted to play another class but never had the time (or patience).

Here's a summary of the upcoming changes (from WoW Insider):

• Amount of experience needed to level reduced by 15% per level between 20 and 60.
• Experience gained from completing quests increased between levels 30 and 60.
• Outdoor elite quests will now now be soloable, with the same (or better) rewards.
• About 60 new quests and a new goblin town based in Dustwallow Marsh (levels 30 to 40)
• Level ranges for old dungeons to be narrowed down a bit (so that if you are high enough to start them, you are high enough to finish them too)
• Increased questing experience for dungeon quests.
• Buffed up item drops from dungeon bosses.

For twinks and altoholics, these changes might be a bit disheartening, tossing days of work to the wind. But, such is life in constantly-evolving games like MMORPGs.

Stay tuned for further updates regarding this change, because as we're told by Blizzard itself, this is only the tippiest-top of the iceberg to come. Huzzah, my alts might yet again see some play time!

Continue Reading WoW: Great News for Reroll Virgins

40GB, and NO PS2 GAMES FOR YOU.

Ah, Playstation 3 marketing- the crux of every marketer's "not to do" list. Recently, there were inklings of Sony making a "Big Bang" announcement regarding its PS3- which were promptly shot down by Sony Computer Entertainment of Europe (SCEE). Lest I remind you, they (SCEA/SCEE) consistently attempt to cover up announcements like this, so don't buy into their response too easily.

Next, people reported new SKU#'s popping up in retail store catalogs described as- you guessed it!- a $399 40GB PS3 models!

And now, presumably feeling that their surprise was out of the bag, Sony is saying the 40GB model will lack backwards compatibility. Wait, WHAT?!

If lacking backwards compatibility sounds trivial to you, consider these figures: There's 1,700+ Playstation 2 games out now with plenty still in development. Sony quotes a 90% backwards compatibility count. Playstation 3, however, offers a meager 65 games, a handful of which people actually consider "good."

Sony's saying: In buying our new 40GB console, you're being locked out of our previous hit games, but trust us... our great games are just around the corner!

But wait- here's the irony. Recalling back to 2006 in a GamePro interview, Sony's Phil Harrison said "Backwards compatibility, as you know from PlayStation One and PlayStation 2, is a core value of what we believe we should offer. And access to the library of content people have created, bought for themselves, and accumulated over the years is necessary to create a format. PlayStation is a format meaning that it transcends many devices -- PSOne, PS2, and now PS3."

Joystiq puts it best: "A little over a year and 'core values' go right out the window."

There has been confirmation that hardware in the Playstation 3 has been removed from the 40GB version to make production cheaper, so a firmware add-in is impossible. Bafflingly, there will still be continued backwards compatibility support for the 60/80GB PS3 models (I thought this was a huge cost?).

So, Big Bang announcement or no, there's an interesting month ahead of Playstation 3. Christmas is coming up, and this is the worst time of year to get bad publicity. Keep your ears open October 12th for that bang- hopefully for Sony, it won't be the sound of Playstation's sales (and/or reputation) crashing.

Continue Reading 40GB, and NO PS2 GAMES FOR YOU.

WoW's Brew-Ha-Ha!

(Source: WorldofWarcraft.com)

World of Warcraft's newly-released annual festival- Brewfest- was just released this week on October 2nd, and denizens of Azeroth have been quite jolly with the free booze and abundance of intersting outfits and gimmicky items.

Despite some event-shattering hiccups (Dark Iron invasions crashing servers, inability to obtain certain quests, and hundreds of people amassing in front of Ironforge straining peoples' graphics cards), the event's been a smashing success with much praise towards Blizzard with this new casual content.

For just 15-40 minutes a day, you too can work towards a Dwarven beer-carrying ram, Bavarian-esque outfit, or Beer Goggles (my personal favorite- check the linked video) just to name a few. It's a nice break in the quest/PvP/instance grind, and you get a blurry screen and slurred speech to boot.

This was an unexpected treat from Blizzard, and there's rumors that this year's Dwarven-centric event might even get Horde-ification next year due to player demand. Can't wait to ride a beer kodo! Tips and screenshots after the jump!

Screenshots (Click to Enlarge)!

Brewfest Quest Select Tips:
Pink Elekks on Parade - Repeatable: DAILY - This quest requires you go to all major Alliance cities (there's also a Horde version, not described here), head to the entrance, get drunk, and zap some Pink Elekks! I assume you're hearthed to Shattrath and not a mage. Start in Ironforge, fly to Stormwind (zap 3 Elekks outside Stormwind gates), hearth to Shattrath, take portal to Exodar (zap 3 Elekks), take hippogryph/boat to Darnassus (zap 3 Elekks), and you're done!

Bark for the Thunderbrews (or Barleybrews) - Repeatable: EVERY 12 HOURS - Get the name of a brewery out there! You can only pick 1 brewery every 12 hours to bark for, but the premise is simple- you mount your ram, ride to Ironforge, and run between flags at each of the 4 main districts. There's a picture here detailing the most efficient route. After you bark at your last location, you're free to use your real mount to return to the questgiver.

Now This is Ram Racing... Almost - Repeatable: NO - Do this quest first, because it opens up the bulk of Brewfest's quests! There's a semi-fine art to whipping your ram in this quest. Tap the reins you receive in your pack slowly to trot, a little faster (once a second) to canter, and spam-click to gallop. There's finer points to note, which I'll outline next. Just think of your ram as a 4-gear car that needs constant attention.

There and Back Again - Repeatable: EVERY 12 HOURS - This takes the skills you learned in Now This is Ram Racing and adds a few variables to the mix: exhaustion and apple barrels. For this quest (doable 12AM-12PM then 12PM-12AM server time), you ride between Kharanos and the Brewfest grounds delivering giant kegs on a special ram. You'll notice as you go, however, your ram gets more and more exhausted until it caps at 100- then you move at the speed of your grandmother covered in frozen molasses. You can either avoid it by stopping clicking (to let the ram rest), or better yet, utilize the apple barrels along the road to clear your exhaustion altogether. These barrels are located inside the tend behind the questgivert, next to a directional post halfway between the towns, and behind the keg-thrower in Kharanos. I recommend just tapping the apple barrel with your mount as you run past, which should clear your exhaustion points. I average about 24 tickets per 12 hours, so this quest is definitely worth your time. Find these apple barrels before you head out, lest you waste time looking for them!

Continue Reading WoW's Brew-Ha-Ha!

Since We Last Talked...

It's been a long, long time indeed! And since KuriNeko's last article, I've been there and back again in terms of gaming, visited Japan for a month and drooled over their game selection, and delivered Jimmy John's (but that's another story for another blog). I'll be more than happy to give you my story thus far- followed by some actual gaming industry goings-on.

Let's get started... after the jump, of course.

You might recall me covering the Wii. Quite a lot. I even sat outside a Toys 'R Us overnight after scouring tipster websites to get my hands on one.

Well, now my Wii has found itself a new home via eBay. Looking back on that little bugger, I realize how entertaining theory doesn't translate into extreme fun. After logging countless hours with Wii Sports, Super Monkey Ball, Wario Ware: Touched, and dabbling a bit into Zelda: Twilight Princess (never really did find the time to play this allegedly-awesome game, but there's always the Gamecube version), and flushing away some Wii Points on Ristar and Super Mario 64, I realized something.

I realized I wasn't playing the Wii. Heck, I realized I was avoiding the Wii.

I grew up on the controller and the couch-sitting that came with it. I also grew up on deep, complex games that entertained for more than 6 hours of fun, and had more depth than 3 repetitive hand motions.

Having to set up a sensor with line-of-sight to my couch? I can't just turn this thing on- I need to learn the art of "laser adjustment"?

Where were the beefy, console-defining Wii games? Mini-game inspired releases? That's what the online store is for. Spare me the ping pong simulators.

Eventual promises of Mario, Samus, and Leon? What about now? What's keeping me with you, Wii, while XBOX 360 and Playstation 3 get these revolutionary titles that not only look beautiful, but contain the whole package?

What about online connectivity? Friend codes- 16-digit codes that need to be traded person-to-person (unless you use some online communities which act as code mediums) are hardly my idea of "playing online with everyone, everywhere, on a revolutionary system"? I was expecting XBOX Live, and I got the equivalent of trading my driver's license information to even interact with others.

I was monumentally let down by my purchase, yet consistently impressed by the next-gen news bits that XBOX 360 and Playstation 3 were generating.

Long story short, I wanted a hardcore and cutting-edge gaming experience, and Wii positioned itself in the casual/low-tech market. It just wasn't meant to be.

A few weeks after Microsoft announced the XBOX 360's price drop, I jumped ship and shelled out $400 for a used XBOX 360 Elite. It's sexy, it's a powerhouse, and it's gaming I'm used to. I cannot recall how long it's been since I got "sweaty palm" while unloading machine gun rounds into clone armies- but man did I miss it.

Now, I have a (relatively tiny) game library that was the same size as my Wii's back last Christmas, and I log at least an hour a day on my sleek, black Box. I won't even guess how much that'll increase once Halo 3 arrives. It's going to be good times.

And, as expected, I've been playing my fair share of World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade. I've been cutting back lately due to burn-out and real-life reasons, but the game's still a staple in my gaming diet, and I have no intentions of stopping. I probably should, but it's just too dang fun.

And so ends the catch-up. Now let's move on to better, and juicier, goodies. I say we start with... Sony. Big Bang, anyone?

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