Token Female Gamer

Real life has been busy of late, which of course means I dont write as much. Well not online anyway.

Lots of writing on paper, that ancient style of keeping records, which is quite appropriate since I have vaulted myself in the nebulous world of Game Mistressing. I am quite privileged to have my first GM experience include introducing six young ladies to this fabulous past time. Its a huge responsibility, but I am taking the fact that non of them wanted to stop playing after two and half hours as a sign that I did something right.

When the husband and I first conceived of this idea, we debated which system to use. We finally settled on Pathfinder (aka Dungeons and Dragons 3.75 and not WoTC). Having now played it, also for the first time (lots of firsts today), I have to say that its a really great system that keeps the core of what made D&D 3.5 great, but enhances is just enough to heighten playability. Its really well done.

Since we were all so new to the system, we took advantage of their beginners set. But I wasn’t going to stop there, when in doubt, buy more books. Did I mention I’ve been reading a lot of late? The Patherfinder Players Book is quite impressively hefty.

The great thing about the beginners box is that it made creating my own little story quite easy. Everything I needed to know in one small book.

For anyone wanting to get into pen and paper RPGs, I highly recommend the Pathfinder system. Its satisfyingly meaty, while still maintaining ease of play.

Kickstarter seems to have become the Dr Frankenstein of ancient game franchises, as we keep seeing old favorites being brought back to life. Though I have been trying to keep away, the promise of a new Dreamfall game was too tempting to resist. Take my money!

From the Dreamfall Chapters: The longest Journey Kickstarter page about the Dreamfall series thus far:

The Longest Journey is a point-and-click adventure game that was released in 1999 (Europe) and 2000 (North America). The story of April Ryan, an unlikely heroine who goes on a very long journey to save the Balance between the twin worlds of Stark and Arcadia, the game received amazing reviews and won multiple awards.

TLJ was followed in 2006 by Dreamfall: The Longest Journey on PC and Xbox. Continuing the story of April Ryan, and beginning the story of Zoë Castillo, the follow-up also received glowing reviews and won several game of the year awards, including awards for best story, best adventure game, best music and best voice acting.

Buy The Longest Journey + Dreamfall on Steam!

These were two excellent story based adventure games. Clearly finding funding for a sequel has been challenging, as its been almost ten years since the release of Dreamfall.  Thankfully crowd funding can make it happen!

Maybe I will go play the first two games again, as a refresher. Wonder how well they hold up.

Oblivion was quite effective at smothering any desire I might have had to play other Elder Scrolls game. Being the victim of poor character choices and frequently lost in the vast empty abyss that was the world of Oblivion (aptly named) made quitting quite easy and overlooking Skyrim easier still.

But then I finished Mass Effect 3 and found myself pining for something similar, something new. Skyrim seemed like the obvious candidate; though thinking about it now, Dragon Age probably would have been a closer match.

Whatever the case, Skyrim was recommended to me and, thanks to my fabulous friends, loaned to me, since I still couldn’t bring myself to purchase a copy. Seemed like the perfect solution as I expected to dislike the game and return it a week later.

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New Years Eve at our house has evolved into an almost forgotten holiday and thus tends to be a quite affair. Having done the whole crazy, drunk, excessive, crowded party plenty of times, I find myself quite happy to leave it all behind for some snuggling and champagne. (Really! The idea of being sandwiched in amongst thousands of drunk, sweaty bodies is singularly unappealing.)

This year I took advantage of the guaranteed quiet evening at home and built myself a new computer.

For anyone who hasn’t kept up with my sporadic posting, my husband built himself a new computer as an anniversary present. And though I claimed that I would wait for a new computer until our next anniversary (I tried to wait, I really did!), I only made it as far as the New Year.

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This was one of the topics that I debated not putting on the list, mostly because, in my initial pass through, finding an answer proved more challenging then I anticipated.

As I pondered possible candidates, it became clear that my expectations of feeling heroic were vastly different then what most games provided. Which left me failing to find a convenient answer.

Instead of bailing, it became the quest to determine what I found truly heroic. Saving princesses wasn’t it, shooting tons of opponents wasn’t it, saving the world from zombies wasn’t it, ‘the game that never ends’ model certainly wasn’t it, solving puzzles wasn’t it, defending castles wasn’t it, building armies wasn’t it. These goals were all challenging, fun, and exciting, but never really heroic.

Clearly none of the typical (male?) versions of heroism were working for me. Once I let go of these preconceived notions, the answer was simple, Journey. No other game has made me feel as much or as heroic as Journey did; a game with no fighting, no spoken or written story, no killing, no items, no princesses, no gender, no weapons or armor, no spaceships, nothing but pure unadulterated heroic journey.

It is a truly incredible game that I think everyone should play.

Video game movie adaptations are pretty much universally terrible. Thankfully I really like bad movies, especially since many of these adaptations have crossed that line into ‘so terrible its funny’.

But there are a few that were enjoyable for simply being fun and entertaining. My favorite is probably ‘Tomb Raider’. Angelina Jolie does a great job of being an action star, and I’m always a sucker for an intelligent, kick ass, female heroine. My runners up are ‘Mortal Kombat’ and ‘Resident Evil’.

Let me clarify, these are not great movies, but they still managed to represent their games fairly well and be quite entertaining. Frankly, with the selection of game movies that are out there (~cough~ Dungeon Siege movie ~cough~) these three movies are masterpieces.

The TVtropes site has an interesting write up about why video game movies suck and how animated versions tend to be better received. Well worth a read for deeper insight.

While games don’t seem to adapt as well into other mediums, the opposite direction is often much more successful. Two of my favorites are Lego Star Wars and Marvel: Ultimate Alliance. Both are super fun games that represent their various genres extremely well.

I’m a big fan of pets, from D2’s Necromancer with his hoard of minions to Pokemon’s wide selection of tamed battle pets. Maybe it’s just that I like minions, but I often find games where I have the option of having pets/minions as helpers, preferable. This is opposed to the games like Nintendogs, where the entire game revolves around the pets. Not that I don’t like these games, they are after all very cute and lovable, but I definitely prefer to go on adventures with my pets.

Though I really enjoy the hoard of mindless minions like the Necromancer’s skeletons, or the imps in Overlord, or Pikman, they aren’t very permanent. In Overlord the entire point is to sacrifice your minions, which makes it rather difficult to get overly attached to them.

Pokemon made this leap from random mass of pets, by encouraging each one be named. Not that I ever did this, because I was devoted to Pikachu. SOOOOOOOOooooo adorable. It was a hard day for me when I finally realized that Pikachu was not a very strong combatant. Never the less, Pikachu was certainly my first favorite pet. (Don’t even get me started on how much Pikachu paraphernalia I had.)

My geekiest pet award goes to my hunter dino pet that I named Grimlock. Though I originally thought that hunters in World of Warcraft would be pet collectors, akin to Pokemon Trainers, they ended up having a very limited selection of pets. This means that I chose my pets very carefully, thus Grimlock came about. Turns out that the Beast Master spec at the time was a total waste of space, so I had to give him up.

But they did put Battle Pets in WoW (probably to make it up to all those disappointed hunters) and my favorite for that is the very awesome Star Craft 2 Collectors Edition bonus pet, Mini Thor. What can I say; I have a soft spot for robots.

As for mounts, the game I play with the largest mount selection (!!!) is, by far, World of Warcraft (shocker!) And though I started my Warlock mostly because the class mount was a Nightmare and I really wanted to ride a flaming black horse, my current favorite is the very awesome Ice Skeleton Dragon mount (its actually called a Bloodbathed Frostbrood Vanquisher, but my name is really more descriptive.) =P

Violet Hold Bosses

I’m sticking with MMORPGs again on this topic because its what I remember the most. There must be something about the endless repetition of playing the same dungeons over and over that makes them a bit more memorable. Shocking, I know. =P

Favorite World of Warcraft dungeon is by far Violet Hold. I love how the entire dungeon is contained in a single room, gladiator style. While there are still quite a few trash mobs, the entire experience seems a bit more fresh as they spawn in random locations around the room. The boss selection is also random.

Lower Guk Dead Side

Favorite EverQuest dungeon is hands down Lower Guk. It was a make or break for Enchanters in that place, with tight quarters and lots of mobs and endless trains. There was no better dungeon to learn how to truly crowd control, except maybe the original Cazic Thule. That’s some of the most fun I have had in an MMORPG, probably ever.

(Side note: still posted on the 8th!! Been so busy and I haven’t managed to pre post any yet. Ah well. I’m not late!!!)

Mists of Pandaria is live today! Go panda party. Okay for me its going to be a level to 90 party. Same thing. =P

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My ‘currently playing’ list is still pretty accurate: Super Mario 3D Land, Skyrim, Dungeon Defenders, Zelda, Trine 2, Tales of Symphonia, SWToR, WoW, ME3 Multiplayer. Lots, but Skyrim has my focus currently. Raptr keeps track of everything I have played since May.

My to play pile is rather embarrassing since there are a lot of things on there that have been sitting around for quite a while. =/

Here is the list:
Quantum Conundrum
The Secret World
Civ 5
Okami
The Legened of Zelda: Skyward Sword
Xenoblade Chronicles
Borderlands
Brutal Legend
Red Dead Redemption
LA Noire
Ghostbusters
Arkham Asylum
Arkham City
Alan Wake
Mortal Kombat
Fable 3

Not sure if I will ever get to most of these but that’s the pile.

Here are a few games that I plan to play in the future:
World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria
StarCraft 2: Heart of the Swarm
Guild Wars 2