Guess That Hero!

My friends and I have this weekly thing with DotA 2 in which we guess which hero Valve will add to the roster next. If you've never played DotA or Defense of the Ancients before, well it's not quite like any other game. After all, it was one of the first of it's kind. Although there are many of it, none can match the unqiue playstyle of the game. I'm sure most people have heard of League of Legends and Heroes of Newerth, and with those the coining of the phrase MOBA or Multiplayer Online Battle Arena. Originally and sometimes these games are still called "DotA-likes" in which I'd have to agree. Many games have entered the new genre, but still none can stand up to the elegance and diversity that DotA offers, and even more shockingly, this game was a mod of Warcraft III and based from something similar to another mod from Starcraft. It's garnished millions of players and a cult following and even to today, the original DotA mod is still being played fiercely.

As a matter of fact, DotA is so popular that it's hosted thousands of tournaments with the most recent and biggest one being The International tournament with a grand prize of one million dollars. Although DotA2 is technically still in closed beta, it's still hugely popular and widely played across the world. Although it's popular, that doesn't mean it's newb friendly. As a matter of fact, most players get turned off from the game because it can be difficult to learn (if you don't have a teacher or a brain) and the DotA community can be... hostile at times. What I mean by hostile is generally being rude, blaming their faults on others, and much more yet you learn to deal with it. I would say it's a fifty-fifty chance you'll come across a helpful player or a hurtful one, but as I said before, try not to let that turn you away from the game. The real difficulty with the game is trying to choose which hero will be your favorite and with one-hundred and ten to choose from (personally I'm the best with SandKing). Every hero plays differently, each have unique spells and abilities and each their own personality. If you've never played a Valve game, then you wouldn't know just how amazing they are with giving characters in games amazing personalities with top notch voiceacting. They've even given alliance and rivalry lines to heroes as well and lets not forget the long list of so horrible puns they're actually funny.

Although DotA2 is in a closed beta currently, they're working incredbly hard on getting it ready for release and even more impressive, they're making it completely free to play with an item shop on the side. Of course this item shop is specifically for visual changes, there aren't any items that would buff characters that would make a team have an unfair advantage. It's strictly to change the looks of your favorite heroes.

You can sign up for the closed beta and hope to fecieve a beta key or wait till Valve finalizes the release either the end of the year or earily next year. Although this post is over, the goodies aren't. I've added a few wallpapers below that are DotA2 releated. Enjoy!

Screenshots! Featuring Dark Souls

 Hey all, here's a few screenshots from my play through of Dark Souls. You can use them for background purposes, I may even edit them into wallpapers later. I also tried not showing any that are spoilers either, although the first one is a boss. Enjoy!

The Fall of Ingnofort

I've heard stories of how bad a game of Dwarf Fortress can turn out to be, but I've never expected it to begin so soon. The dwarven city of Ingnofort was recently abandoned and it's strength was broken, but not without a fight. It was autumn of the year 129, the quiet wilderness has left the fortress to build it's wealth to grand proportions. Single thieves and child snatchers would be spotted every so often, but each time they were routed out of the land. The metals, jewels and goods were increasing at an incredible rate as were the amount of citizens. It reached a high point of one hundred and twenty-four denizens. Sadly, they were all unprepared for that faithful day.

Spotted on the south-west was a small invasion force of goblins, the watchdogs had such keen eyes. The military was training while the alert went off, yet we soon realized there were too many. The dogs rushed in to attack, but were immediately slain. The hunters which were out killing game were fleeing back to the entrance while firing bolts at the goblins. Two of them were killed, but the rest of the fleet still gave chase. The hunters made it inside as the goblins ignored them to slaughter the food animals in the pasture. The militia gathered before the stone traps set at the entrance waiting for the impending rush of swords. The first goblins came in and were decimated by the stone traps, blood covered the walls. The next wave arrived and most were slain, but they were too strong for the militia. Deciding to risk their lives, they lead the goblins away from their home into the fields to buy time for the other dwarves to reinforce the entrance. All looked to be lost for the warriors.

An elven trade caravan arrived and dawned their eyes on the continuing fight. They immediately joined forces and helped slay the goblins. Many good dwarves died that day, including their legendary mason Ingod. The goblins were driven back, but knowingly would return. The dwarven militia were defeated, with three killed and five wounded, they were taken to the hospital wing for surgery and healing. Some dwarven children were also caught in the battle killing three. Two of the hunters helping the militia also suffered severe wound, insuring they could never use a crossbow again. Each dwarf was trying to help, each doing a job to ensure the fortress's survival, but they didn't succeed...

Many fell depressed and became miserable, the stocks of booze almost came to a halt, tensions between dwarves rose as fistfights broke out. No one could do their jobs since that battle. Many withdrew into their rooms and died from starvation or thirst. The warriors in the hospital wing died from their injuries and seemed to haunt the halls of the fortress. No one moved the bodies of the dead to the tombs, but then again there were no coffins to place them in. Production halted, they were seemingly waiting for their own demise.

During the summer of the following year, the dwarves have each calmed themselves and were getting back to doing the labor again. There were still few that were too depressed to work, but the others kept the fort running. Then... spotted from the south-west once again was a massive army of goblins and trolls seemingly coming back for vengeance. During this exact time, the dwarves broke into a cavern below the fortress filled with gems, ores, and all types of precious minerals. It was the largest underground cavern they've seen and was extremely expansive. The goblins rushed the entrance, the trolls attacked and maimed anything on the ground above. Any dwarf outside the fortress was murdered quickly. The goblins stormed inside, a river of death ran through the entrance. Blood spattered the walls like paint and ran down the central stairs to the dining room. Bodies lay in the halls and rooms, the workshops were empty. Each dwarf was in the dining room all huddling in a corner fearing for their lives as the goblins approached. Almost all were slaughtered and when the goblins finally left, the dwarves were so traumatized that they began killing each other or went into seclusion into their rooms. This was the end of Ingnofort, they were strong enough to drive off two goblin invasions, but couldn't survive the emotional toll of doing such.

That one just a single play through of Dwarf Fortress and as said, the fun is in the loosing. I can't wait to start another fortress with my next dwarven settlement and see what happens next time.

Dwarven Escapades

I've recently gotten into a little game called Dwarf Fortress and let me tell you, it is not easy. The fun of this game ironically is loosing. Sound strange? Unlike other games, your dwarven kingdom can last as long as you can keep it alive and sane.There's so much to explain about this game that it would take me the longest time to write it all out. I'm not even sure if I'm doing everything right, but it's fun as hell. There's so much variation and crazy events in this game that piratically anything can happen. For instance, something just happened recently that I didn't understand what was going on. My masonic dwarf was creating stone coffers in the masonry when he suddenly went into a "fey mood". He took control of the masons workshop and started working on an invention of sorts. I was worried, wondering if he became possessed or became upset. After a while in game he created a new invention. It was just a golden floodgate. After that he became a legendary mason which I greatly appreciate.

There's so much to this game, so much depth, so many little details you need to keep track of. If it wasn't for a genius quick start guide I'm sure I would have completely failed or wouldn't have even tried to play. The difficulty is in the micro tasking, thankfully you can assign tasks and such while the game is paused and you get used to checking on everything and making sure everything is fine and dandy. At some point your fortress will become a well oiled machine with a job for everyone and happiness to spread. I'm still new to this game, but with all of the dynamic things that can happen, such as immigrants, cave ins, wild animal attacks, planned attacks from enemies, dwarven emotions, trade caravans, and all kinds of other crap that can happen. So far nothing too strange has happened to me and this guide is doing me well, but I'm not in deep enough to have experienced this game completely. If you're interested in this game at all, don't think twice about it since it's free! The download link will be posted below along with the quick start guide that you'll undoubtedly need. I'll tell more about my tales in other times but for now I have a dwarven fortress to manage.

Game Download

Quickstart Guide

Fun With Modding!

In my personal experiences with modding, I know it can be quite frustrating. I'm not even talking about the actual modding aspect of creating something from scratch or re-texturing things although that in itself is more difficult that adding mods to a game. Sometimes though it's easy to get frustrated with adding mods to a game. Take for instance Elder Scrolls: Skyrim. I've recently gotten into adding mods to the game, which is quite easy thanks to a handy little mod manager. Trying to get all of them working properly is a nightmare at times as well.

Don't be discouraged though, a monkey could add mods to a game, it's simple! For instance, yesterday I spent half of my day compiling the best textures into one huge texture mod. I got the biggest, best looking textures all together and it came to be 5 gigabytes of data. Holy crap. The thing is it looks BEAUTIFUL. Here are some screenshots of my modded Skyrim.

Although there are times where you get something unexpected when you mod a game... like this.

Don't worry everyone, he's alright. He's be excavated and is out chopping wood and working for Belethor again. Also, this is just one part of the game that most everyone is quite familiar with. This is all in and around the city of Whiterun. Such a beautiful city in my mind, still doesn't beat Solitude though. Since recently I've packed up my stuff and moved to Solitude. So all in all, modding isn't a scary thing to do and it can greatly increase the fun of any game. I'm looking forward to what wonderful things people will make with the Torchlight 2 modding tools that should come out pretty soon. Maybe later today or tomorrow I'll post a few more Skyrim screenshots that one of my friends took, if he lets me of course, but for now I'm going to get back to the land of Skyrim.

It's Been A While

So, today was my birthday and now I feel way too old. That's not the point though. I've slowed down with this blog but promise to resume posting more and more often. I ran into a tough spot and just plain haven't had time to update or post to the blog. Here's a quick update of some games I've been playing.

The most exciting thing that I've been doing is playing Hawken. Now before I say anything, there is a contract about not talking about anything in game, so sadly I can't tell anyone anything. Thankfully I can say I had a ton of fun playing the alpha and I can't wait for the beta to come around. I've always liked the whole Mech game genre like Armored Core and Front Mission. Anything to do with robots with machine guns and rockets gets my approval. Future Cop LAPD was awesomely fun when playing against a friend, or even co-op and this might be why I've been playing Supreme Commander a lot lately.

I recently bought Torchlight 2 and have been having a blast with it. As underwhelming of a release that Diablo 3 was, Torchlight 2 seems to do everything right and generally better. I have to say I truly missed putting my points into my stats like I should be able to do. Especially if I want a unique build. Though it has four classes, they're so varied with expansive skill trees that it doesn't matter. I've played as all the classes but the Berserker so far and they're all quite interesting. One thing that sets the game back a bit is the horrible time I've had trying to join games hosted by my friends. More often than not I'd get connection errors. They've apparently fixed this, but I've also had problems with crashing (which I eventually found out was due to anti aliasing being enabled) that I've sorted the problem to, but is a temporary fix. Hopefully there will be a patch in due time, till then it's a simple and reliable fix. I haven't beaten the game since I'm playing on elite difficulty and am waiting for friends to join in on the fun with me (since were soooo close in level now). Since I started my game with them I feel like I need to finish it with them.

I've been playing other games as well, but I'll mention them later and talk about much more later in the weekend. I'd also like to start on the topic of Dota 2 which I've gotten 300+ hours into already and still I feel like a new player. Anywho it's time I take my leave. It's getting late and I've got a bit of gaming to do before I rest.

Garage Sale Games

I'm quite exhausted after today. My town, which may be a whole five hundred elderly people, were hosting their annual garage and yard sales today. Out of the usual strange nicknacks and hordes of furniture, I did find a few video games laying around. A regular Sega with a couple of mainstay games like Double Dragon Battle Toads, Sonic, Sonic 2 and a few other titles that escape my mind at the moment. If I had the money and knew it worked, I'd purchase it, but alas, I left only to come back to an empty table and a shrunken heart. It actually shames me to say that most of my older consoles, such as my Sega, Nintendo and Nintendo 64 have gotten lost over the years. I wasn't able to save the games either, no matter how dearly I loved them. One of my goals in life is to reunite with my lost collection, re-apply all the time and love I put into those games and restore my unity with them. Of course this will take many, many years, but is a long time goal. I did however find an almost perfect condition copy of Driver for the Playstation. I've played that game a lot with my father since he's quite the car guy. His love for cars got me into racing games actually. I found a unique beauty from each crafted machine and being able to drive my dream car in a race. I only wish I would have found more games in my lost collection, but at least I'm one step closer now. I didn't have much time to actually check each sale, but I was surprised that some of the older people have these games to put out.

I apologize for the short post, but fear not, tomorrow I'll be talking about a surprise game that has been very popular through the years, although I haven't gotten into it until about five months ago. Till then, I am one tired gamer who still finds time to game everyday.

Monster Hunter

It's huge in Japan

This largely popular franchise has been hugely popular in Japan for quite some time now. With the release of the original Monster Hunter since March in 2004, this game has been thriving and getting sequels and expansions more than most other games including it's own port to the handheld consoles. The US releases haven't been as prominent in sales as they are in Japan which could mean the end of localization to fans in the west. If this actually happens, we'll lose one of the greatest franchises that we've ever seen and I don't feel like moving to Japan any time soon.

There are a LOT of monsters and these aren't even all of them.

The greatest thing about this game is the huge and varied amounts of monsters available to hunt. From ancient dragons to giant wyverns and everything in between, your selection in variety is like a buffet in Las Vegas. Generally speaking, each monster has it's own properties, attacks, elements, ailments, and weaknesses. They're all quite unique as you can see above. Although there are sub-species of some of the large monsters which are recolors who have some different properties. Then again, in the world of Monster Hunter, new and unique monsters come often. Did I mention how large these monsters can be? In the image above the human player on the very left is there just for your size comparison. These monsters can be huge and fighting them can give you the most fun you've ever had in a game.

A bit robotic looking eh?

The basis of Monster Hunter is to take and finish quests that the town gives you. Honestly, there isn't much story in any of the games, Tri being the one with the most engrossing story of trying to find out why there have been so many earthquakes in the area. What really counts in this game is the gameplay. The beginning of the game gets you going, you begin collecting monster parts from the smaller and not as dangerous monsters you kill to start to get a better weapon and armor. Now this can be slow, but when you get to the serious quests of killing the larger monsters, this is where it gets dangerous and fun. The more monsters you kill the more armors and weapons you can make. The weapons are unique, each is technically a different class and have special properties and ways to use. Different monsters have different elemental properties and ailments such as fire, lightning, water, poison, sleep, and more. Making a weapon using parts from a monster with elemental or ailment attributes can cause the weapon to gain those and become stronger.

A real Golden Rathian in Japan

 

As I said, Monster Hunter has been a huge success in Japan, sadly it hasn't had such great luck in the west. Apparently if you were to go to Japan, you would see many, many people playing Monster Hunter in their down time on their handhelds. It's so common that you'd be an outcast if you didn't play. Even Universal Studios Japan has a "real life Monster Hunter" type exhibit of sorts, the picture above is part of it and yes, it moves. Personally, I picked up this game back with it's release in the US many years ago. Unfortunately, I was never able to purchase a Playstation Portable in order to play the other versions of the games that actually do sell outside of Japan. There's even a Monster Hunter MMO for PC as well, sadly it's only open to Japan and Korea. I understand some people have put thousands of hours in this game, I myself have played over five hundred hours of Monster Hunter Tri and will definitely play more until the servers are inevitably shut down. I implore you to give this game a chance. The scenery is beautiful, the monsters are huge and the gameplay is top notch. It's difficult, it's fun, and it's great to play with friends. Such a unique game should be shared with every area of the world and not just contained in Japan. If we could show Capcom how open we are to unique games, maybe other developers would follow their steps in trying something new and giving us more experiences to enjoy. I highly recommend Monster Hunter, give it a chance and it might just grow on you.

Dragon's Dogma

Do dragons really have a dogma?

This game has quite a few interesting aspects that keep it unique from other games in it's genera, even if it isn't the story. The combat and classes as well as the unique amount and varied monsters keep this game generally fresh. The world overall can seem droll at times, but as often as not, there is quite a bit of beauty to some areas. The pawn party is unique onto itself since I don't recall any other game doing such a thing and although the game's surroundings can be beautiful at times, the graphics aren't always a pretty. These are my thoughts about Dragon's Dogma.

I have to fight that!?

 

The story begins with the awakening of a dragon, hence the title. It decides to attack the village your character lives in, in which you, since you're such a brave soul, begin to attack it using only a sword and wearing some cloth. Not really a smart idea since the dragon could literally eat you. Instead it decides to take your heart, for unknown reasons, and gobble it down. Apparently when this happens you become Arisen. Your journey is set in stone, you're to kill the dragon and end this blight of it's attacks and vanquish other monsters as well. No easy task alone, but with your fellow pawns, you can take on the dragon to defeat it. What's a pawn? A pawn is a being that looks human, yet doesn't give expression, feelings, or anything otherwise. They are exactly what they are called, pawns. They are there for the Arisen, to fight monsters and otherwise protect the Arisen from death. They also come from a dimension called The Rift, in which you can summon other pawns, but I'm getting ahead of myself. There are quests, people to help and people to become friends with which all ultimately aid you in your quest to kill the dragon.

"It get's excited when it sees a women!"

 

The combat in this game varies enough to keep you otherwise occupied. The controls can be sketchy at times and targeting the creature you would like to kill can be difficult since there's no lock-on capabilities with most classes.  Each enemy has their own set of weaknesses and strengths that you need to learn. Your pawns generally tell you what each is weak to and knows how to deal with each foe. If you have a pawn that doesn't know how to deal with said foe, they learn about it. The more you fight an enemy, the more they learn. It's an interesting feature and it also works the same way with quests. There is a unique gameplay ability that allows you to grab or scale a monster, like in the sense of Shadow of the Colossus. You can grab hold of any creature, be it human, wolf, or cyclops. This adds another interesting element to combat. For instance, be wary when climbing up the back of this ogre in the picture above or he may just jump up and slam on his back to get you off. Your pawns are able to do the same and by having them grab hold, they can attack while holding and slow the monster with their own weight.

Every class is a viable option

Any class you choose can be effective. Even the basic classes from the three choices in the beginning can be kept till the end of the game. As you level these classes, you increase your vocation level which allows you to learn more abilities. The higher the level of your vocation, the better off you are. What's that? You don't enjoy the class you chose? That's fine too since you have the ability, once you reach the main city, to choose which ever vocation you'd like. Not only that, but you also have access to six more classes. You begin with your basic fighter, mage and strider. If you're not enjoying those or you just feel like trying something new, you've got your advanced classes, which is a beefier version of your basic classes, or you've got your hybrid classes, which blend two classes together and allows you to use abilities and weapons of both basic classes. I myself went from a strider to a ranger simply because I'm a fan of longbows. It turns out I made a good choice. Be wary though, not every class can use every weapon or armor. Most equipment is class based and as such I almost made the mistake of not having a bow when I changed classes. You can also upgrade your gear through vendors with specific materials collected from the land or monsters. Not only can you change your class, but you can change the class of your main pawn as well. Quite useful as I found that having only two mages in my party was holding me back greatly. You also can upgrade their equipment as well. Each class has their unique capabilities and work quite well in tandem with all other classes that your pawns can have.

At least they're not lonely

 

Speaking of pawns, Capcom decided to introduce a unique way of adding pawns to your party by way of a Rift Stone. These stones allow you to go into the dimension that the pawns reside in and choose which pawns you'd like to include in your party. Of course, your main pawn is always there to stay, I based my pawn off of a friend of mine actually. Not only can you invite pawns to join your party in the main world, since so many roam around there, but you can come into the rift and find specific pawns for your team. Even more specifically, you can choose to add any of your friend's main pawns to your party as well. It's like you're playing with your friends, but you're not. You are however helping them out greatly by helping them collect rift crystals. Rift crystals are used to pay a pawn to join your party in some cases, or are used to purchase rare items from some special vendors. Questing with pawns earns them crystals when their Arisen gets online the next time. Not only can you get additional currency, but if you so choose, when you leave a pact with a pawn in your group, that pawn will return to it's owner with the items left on it. Think of it as gift giving since the player will receive that item. This also implements a neat way of helping a friend who doesn't have good enough gear to continue with the game, or to help him upgrade his gear.

Breathtakingly average

 

The world and scenery in this game can be great at times and very dull at times. I've found that traversing the land gets boring rather quickly, until I explore a new area. I find the main problem is that you'll be running through the same areas over and over far too often. Capcom has always had this problem with backtracking as I call it. You open a new way to find a key to a door which you've explored to before which gives you a key to a door that was in your new way. They've gotten better at fixing that issue with sending you straight ahead in some cases, but when you have an open world to explore like this, I find it better for the atmosphere to add interesting locations to run across rather than a canyon floor. There were times I stopped and admired the view, but mostly I trekked through areas rather quickly to get to the next location. The turning from night to day gives a bit different scenery and more danger as areas you've been through can have stronger enemies or just a larger amount than during the day. Most locations are just your generalize caves, mountains, plains and forests. Others can include ruins, catacombs, and other ancient structures. Apparently the main city is ancient, but it looks pretty well kept to me. The world can feel small at times, but if there's an area you haven't explored you, you should head there if you want to find something new. Be careful though since you're more likely to run across something that could easily kill you as I've done that time and time again.

There are some issues that I have with this game overall. The one that annoys me the most is the pawn chatter. They say the same things far too often, way too often actually. It's nice to hear some lore about the place, but they don't need to say something about it each time we go through. I'd rather like to duct tape their mouths than anything. Another thing is the lack of a targeting system. When using melee attacks against small enemies, I like to move from one to another quickly and with accuracy, but am sometimes unable to. Not a game breaking point, but frustrating at times. The foliage in this game is completely lacking graphically. It's your basic 2-D image pasted to stick in one spot while it rotates around to keep the same view for you. It's ugly unless used correctly which it's not in this game. There's close to no 3-D foliage except for trees and bushes. Maybe I'm nitpicking, but I dislike that and feel it's more lazy than anything else. There are other small things that can be annoying at times like the weight system, but that's there for a reason and is justified. Also the missing feature of fast travel, but again, was not included due to the game's design and is also justified.

The issues listed before are miniscule in comparison to the pros in this game. Being able to climb on the back of huge bosses and monsters gives an exhilarating feeling of power and struggle which I so desperately love. The ability to upgrade weapons and armor that you find or purchase is nice since I've grown accustomed to doing so in other games. The pawn system is a great way to raise difficulty since you can make it so you've only got a party of two rather than four, although the difficulty in general tough as is. This game implements things that others should follow even if it lacks in other areas. I for one am enjoying this game and will further enjoy it in the time to come. There is a demo of the game out right now, so if you're leery on purchasing it, you can download the demo and give it a try. Dragon's Dogma is currently available on Playstation 3 and Xbox 360.

Tomorrow I'll be talking about Monster Hunter, another Capcom developed game, and more specifically about Monster Hunter Tri for the Wii. Until then keep on slaying those monsters and game everyday.

Welcome to Dark Souls

 I hope your brought your lubricant

Now imagine this, you've been drudging through hollows whom have been getting the best of you making you get down to your last healing item. Suddenly a Black Knight comes from the shadows and begins ripping you a new one, yet with good reactions and foresight you manage to beat him, although you used your last flask. You know the bonfire is close since you read that message on the ground, but wait, the way there is covered with a wall of white mist. You've just been invaded by another player who happens to just have snuck up from behind to stab you in the back for your death. This is Dark Souls.

This fellow is not nice

In Dark Souls you start out in a prison cell, you're a hollow which is pretty much a zombie. This prison is where hollows are placed so they don't cause more destruction then they should, but of course they still do. You yourself are an undead, yet not a senseless hollow. You still have that last bit of humanity left that makes you almost human. A hollowed knight gives you the key to fight your way out welcoming you to the tutorial. The knight, lying on his death bed tells you of a pilgrimage to ring the two bells and awaken something that has been waiting for the chosen hollow. I myself haven't gotten far enough into the story to know what is truly happening since I've only rang one bell.

 Reminds me of a scene from Lord of the Rings

The world of Dark Souls is simply amazing. Unlike it's sort-of predecessor Demon's Souls, the world is one large place where you don't select a level to play, but more so a path to go. The intricate world design left me in awe when I realized just how many shortcuts there are in this game. Not to mention how the world itself is simply beautiful. Your beginning area may be a prison, but it's still quite a sight to see. From crumbling ruins, to lush, dark forests and the grandest castle you've ever seen, Dark Soul's environments are each as unique as the next. With this said, this creates an amazing atmosphere of awe through the most simplistic means. Areas are often so detailed that you can't help but to stop, and look at your surroundings and simply say "wow".

Now, the combat in this game is much different from all others and here is where I'll get personal about this. I dare you to call this game a hack and slash. I double dog dare you. If you so much as make one mistake that leaves you open, your enemies WILL punish you. The difference between this game and a hack and slash is not button mashing, not timing, but literally time itself. In your usual hack and slash game, like say Prototype, usually you kill enemies as fast as possible just to be done with them. Dark Souls is more or so about time. You take your time going through areas, you must be as careful as possible. Then when you meet a new enemy, you take your time to learn what it does, how to counter it, and finally how to kill it. This game is about studying your enemy, finding a weakness and exploiting it. If you don't exploit it, you'll most likely die. In my opinion, we need more games like this. More games that will punish you, more games that force you to learn, more games that make you freak out when you meet new enemies. The bosses are just the same except you have a smaller amount of time to learn their moves before they utterly crush you. This heightens the difficulty as well. 

If you've played this game and have never died, I bow to you good madam or sir, for you have done what I could not. I'm sure I've got around fifty or more (most likely more) deaths already. The good thing about this game is it does give you a second chance in a strange way. Your death leaves a bloodstain in which you can collect all that you have lost which includes souls collected from killing enemies and humanity. If you die, you need only to return to your demise and hope you don't make the same mistake again. Rushing there would be a fools errand since when you respawn, you also respawn all of your enemies. Loosing your souls is like loosing a lot of progress in game as well. Souls are used as currency and experience. Improving your level is strictly through souls and improving your weapons and armor, you need souls and items. Purchasing items and weapons through shops also takes souls, so dying is an important thing not to do.

The most incandescent fellow you will meet in your journey

Of course you've got all kinds of others who have made the same mistakes, and try to help direct you in how to deal with such obstacles. This is an online only feature. Other players are able to place soap signs down to give messages to another plane, such as your own. These messages give hints to players if they choose to read them, my favorite being "Imminent tears ahead" where there is a boss battle. Some others aren't so helpful when it comes to this. A small amount of people leave messages which say "try jumping" on a cliff side, I really just find it funny. There are more online features of this game as well. As my brother in arms Solaire explains, we're all connected, yet on different planes. A sort of dimension type deal of kinds. We can see signs and ghosts of other players (as well as bloodstains), but can never physically meet them unless you summon them there, and even then, it's just a phantom of themselves. This is a great concept of single to multiplayer. It gives the player a choice of beating the game solo, or if you're having difficulty with an area or boss, you can summon someone who has left their sign. You also get rewarded for such things if you do help people as well. If you help the summoner defeat the boss without him dying, you get a large lump of souls and some new-found humanity. That humanity is used to reverse your hollowing, which allows you to summon people to you as well. The more humanity you have, the better off your are. Although, the crowd pleaser of online is the PvP. Using an item, you can invade another player as a phantom and attempt to slay them. This will net you some souls and the ability to laugh at the other players death as well. There are other aspects to this player versus player, but it's best to leave it left unsaid so I don't spoil everything for new players.

The coolest armor in the game, hands down

My overall opinion of this game is simply that it's amazing in all its glory. We need more games like this. Those who complain about the difficulty need to take a different approach to it. Be cautious, be vigilant, and never let your guard down. You cannot go full speed ahead through this game or you will fail miserably. I enjoy that fully, even with myself being completely cautious throughout the whole game so far, there are parts where I still died simply because I didn't observe my surroundings. This game is not cheap. This game is not unfair. If you can't take a different approach to this game other than hack and slash, you should give up. It's hurtful to hear, yes, but necessary to say. Other great things about this game that I like is that enemies and bosses are unique to their own. You might meet them a couple times over, but anything new that comes along, you'll need to understand before you can kill. Also, apparently any weapon and armor set can be upgraded enough to be viable through the whole game. If you so desperately want, you could finish the game with your original weapons and armor, or so I've been told. This gives in to the people who enjoy the aesthetics of the game as well, allowing you to use your favorite looking armor or weapons without too much regret.

Now I've been playing this for PC and I do have complaints. Dark Souls may be amazing, yes, but the port from console to PC leaves more to be desired. Now, if you don't care about the graphical quality being lesser than what it could be, that's fine with me. Yet if you're putting a game from a console to a PC, a much stronger machine, shouldn't you improve the graphics along the way? The developers of From Software either didn't know how or didn't honestly care. The in game graphical scale is still set at the low resolution for consoles. While others have fixed this, we can only hope that From will eventually shoot out an update that will make higher resolutions be supported inside and out. Also, a little bit more optimization would be great since I've felt slow downs in some areas of the game where it shouldn't happen. Another thing that irks me at times is the multiplayer. The concept and idea is a great one, if it works. I've had difficulty summoning anyone into my world, and trying to get friends in your world is even further difficult. I understand the summoning is supposed to be anonymous, you have a random player whom you may have never met summoned to your world to kill the boss, but I feel it would be more fun with an actual friend that I know. If there were some possibility to show where a friend put down a summon sign and have him be priority, so their sign is more visible, I would really like that feature. Alas, multiplayer sometimes fails to work at all at times. I've gone through areas as human and have seen no one to summon when I felt like doing some jolly good co-operation, yet I could be invaded. That's troubling at times. Lastly and possibly the worst issue with this game, although easily avoided, the controls. If you are using a mouse and keyboard setup for the PC version, quit now and save yourself the frustration. You can remap your keys, yes, but the game shows that it was undoubtedly set up strictly for a controller. This is fine by me because of the style of the game and I've got an Xbox controller. Others may not be so lucky and could have to spend an extra twenty dollars just to play it properly. To those I say, good luck and godspeed.

All in all I would greatly recommend purchasing Dark Souls for PC. Even if it's not the best console to PC port, it's still a great game on its own and worth taking a look at if you're not easily enraged and would like a challenge. Tomorrow I'll be writing about Dragon's Dogma, a game made by Capcom which revolves around a fantasy setting in which you are the chosen one whom needs to slay a dragon. Maybe not the best plot, but hey, it is Capcom we're talking about.

Before I go and begin getting comments about a graphical fix for Dark Souls, the link is here.

Feel free to leave comments and questions and I will answer them as quick as possible.

Introductionary Post

Welcome to everyday gamer. I'm creating this blog with intent to continue with supple posting, at least once a week. This is about my experiences with games, a sort of what I've played through my life, what I'm currently playing and views and interests in gaming in general.

Obviously with this gaming blog and posting each day, I'll try to post about a different game each day. Currently, I'm giving Dark Souls for PC a try which I will talk about that game much more tomorrow. For now, I'll give some background of my gaming history.

I began with my fathers Atari 2600, given I'm only twenty two years old, that was quite a long time ago. Pong was obviously the best game, or at least my first so there always that special place in my heart for it. Afterwards I received a Nintendo, which I played countless hours of Mario, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Ikari Warriors on, as well as other games. I think I enjoyed Super Mario 3 the most though. After that I was well on my way to playing Super Nintendo, then came the Nintendo 64, Playstation, and more till I'm here to current consoles.

Tomorrow I'll start with talking about Dark Souls and just how awesome it is. For now, I'm out. Of course to play more Dark Souls.