An interesting development is tabletop gaming has quietly been taking shape in the shadows of the gaming world, and it is totally not of the Chinese variety. I speak of several genre-bending games on the horizon - or already here.
Clash of the Dragons - This game (formerly on my "if it advertises on my sidebar - I'll never play it!!!) lured me in when one of my good friends was hired to program for them. It is a free-to-play MMO (notice the RPG missing from the end?). It makes this list because Magic: The Gathering still ranks among my favorite time-destroying methods. It is essentially a collectible card game with a very active community, and fun Holiday multiplayer boss brawls. Unlike some other games who will remain nameless, the paywall here is soft, and doesn't leave marks on your face.
The Banner Saga - Is an absolutely gorgeous looking example of where I think mainstream RPG's are heading. Lush graphics, deep story rooted in norse mythology - I signed up for my beta account, what about you?
Minion Master - Looks to be exactly the geeky PVP I've been looking for. My wife will still probably own me though. Life just isnt fair sometimes.
Arkham Horror - The seminal (Ha!) classic reskinned as a complete online experience. No update on this for awhile - but I have high hopes this labor of love sees the light of day..
Anybody else know of any cool projects that need a shout-out? Let me know in the comments.
Jan 7, 2013
Jan 5, 2013
No promises...or porpoises, but possible a cetacean of a different color.
Hi.
Been awhile, hasn't it. There was no question mark because it wasn't a question (see what I did there?) It was a statement of being absent far too long.
I still game - as often as I can (which isn't very often), and have revived my old Dragonstar campaign. Love that game - Spelljammer with plasma cannons :)
As for me, I found a job with ONLY a 1 hr 15 min commute, and basically lost myself in the gridlocked rat race of existence for awhile, or exactly one year, as I was laid off again 3 days after my 1 year anniversary. Company needed a little more payroll overhead for the new executive team they hired. Sigh.
So here I am hopeless, but hopeful for better things. In fact, I applied for a job as a community manager for 5th planet games where a good friend of mine is working as a software developer. If any of you know these peeps, let them know that Donny_the_DM is legit :)
Otherwise, just watching the kids grow up, and teaching them geekery of the best kind. Family game night is either spent on Munchkin (sometimes quest), Talisman, or Clue Jr. (three guesses which night I have to put my imagination away). My kids are totally geeks in training, and doing well.
I apologize for a meager catch-up, but I retrieved my lost PW on a lark, and didn't have anything else better to talk about- though I sense a D&D next rant coming...be warned.
WotC is still staffed by cheese-weasels, and Pathfinder online is going to be a hideous clone of some other shitty game.
Take care folks, I'll try not to range so far this time.
Been awhile, hasn't it. There was no question mark because it wasn't a question (see what I did there?) It was a statement of being absent far too long.
I still game - as often as I can (which isn't very often), and have revived my old Dragonstar campaign. Love that game - Spelljammer with plasma cannons :)
As for me, I found a job with ONLY a 1 hr 15 min commute, and basically lost myself in the gridlocked rat race of existence for awhile, or exactly one year, as I was laid off again 3 days after my 1 year anniversary. Company needed a little more payroll overhead for the new executive team they hired. Sigh.
So here I am hopeless, but hopeful for better things. In fact, I applied for a job as a community manager for 5th planet games where a good friend of mine is working as a software developer. If any of you know these peeps, let them know that Donny_the_DM is legit :)
Otherwise, just watching the kids grow up, and teaching them geekery of the best kind. Family game night is either spent on Munchkin (sometimes quest), Talisman, or Clue Jr. (three guesses which night I have to put my imagination away). My kids are totally geeks in training, and doing well.
I apologize for a meager catch-up, but I retrieved my lost PW on a lark, and didn't have anything else better to talk about- though I sense a D&D next rant coming...be warned.
WotC is still staffed by cheese-weasels, and Pathfinder online is going to be a hideous clone of some other shitty game.
Take care folks, I'll try not to range so far this time.
Jun 28, 2011
So like a battered and broken partner that I am, I decided to let D&D back in...
But only a little bit! Really! I'm drawing lines on the floor now. There is a strict rulebook that we now follow, and morale-raising measures have been taken, lest the floggings return.
Greetings and salutations readers - It is I, Donny the DM passing along an interesting factoid to those of you who havent been here since the beginning. Did you know that you are reading a blog that has actually been abandoned TWICE!? Okay, so that really wan't all that interesting - sue me.
I'm not actually back. Really, I'm not. I noticed that even after disappearing since February or some shit that I was still adding followers...What the hell? Ummmm....welcome :)
To those 48 of you bravc souls who still have the patience to read my nerdy semi-coherent rantage, an update: I am a Microcosm of the American dream - at least the economy side of it. Unemployed for 17 months now, trying to modify various debts and such. Cue the violins, please. Life has been...interesting for awhile now, and while I hear about this supposed recovery we are in the midst of, I keep wondering when it'll trickle down this way. It will eventually, but I must admit to a bit of impatience :)
On the bright side, after a 6 week hiatus in what had been an almost unbroken weekly D&D game, I decided that I still love D&D, I just think that the management sucks - at least as far as anything digital that comes from WotC. In any event, I am now playing in two games and running a third which has helped a lot in learning how to just love the bomb.
Looking into starting a traveller game on the side though - will keep you informed.
Still waiting for 4E future :)
Now for some questions @ the peanut gallery:
1.)How often is everyone actually using skill challenges?
2.)Has anyone been able to Productively use the VTT? I've been working on it, but...look - I'm a CAD drafter and engineer by trade and if I am having a difficult time figuring it out then the UI sucks. Does anybody else agree? Am I a total moron that just doesn't get it? The forums seem awful light on negative critique - what say you?
3.)Anyone else disappointed with Daggerdale (the PC game)? D&D licensed RPG's used to be some of the best games out there (see Baldur's Gate series, Neverwinter nights series, SSI gold box series, etc.) There are several unlicensed game worlds, and a plethora of developers out there - Where is the Dragonriders of Krynn? Escape from castle ravenloft? Against the sorceror-kings? How about a game that starts as a run of the mill Elder scrolls 4 clone until you reach 5th level and a giant anchor falls out of the sky from the clouds above?
I'm a consumer, I can't help but want.
Game well folks.
Greetings and salutations readers - It is I, Donny the DM passing along an interesting factoid to those of you who havent been here since the beginning. Did you know that you are reading a blog that has actually been abandoned TWICE!? Okay, so that really wan't all that interesting - sue me.
I'm not actually back. Really, I'm not. I noticed that even after disappearing since February or some shit that I was still adding followers...What the hell? Ummmm....welcome :)
To those 48 of you bravc souls who still have the patience to read my nerdy semi-coherent rantage, an update: I am a Microcosm of the American dream - at least the economy side of it. Unemployed for 17 months now, trying to modify various debts and such. Cue the violins, please. Life has been...interesting for awhile now, and while I hear about this supposed recovery we are in the midst of, I keep wondering when it'll trickle down this way. It will eventually, but I must admit to a bit of impatience :)
On the bright side, after a 6 week hiatus in what had been an almost unbroken weekly D&D game, I decided that I still love D&D, I just think that the management sucks - at least as far as anything digital that comes from WotC. In any event, I am now playing in two games and running a third which has helped a lot in learning how to just love the bomb.
Looking into starting a traveller game on the side though - will keep you informed.
Still waiting for 4E future :)
Now for some questions @ the peanut gallery:
1.)How often is everyone actually using skill challenges?
2.)Has anyone been able to Productively use the VTT? I've been working on it, but...look - I'm a CAD drafter and engineer by trade and if I am having a difficult time figuring it out then the UI sucks. Does anybody else agree? Am I a total moron that just doesn't get it? The forums seem awful light on negative critique - what say you?
3.)Anyone else disappointed with Daggerdale (the PC game)? D&D licensed RPG's used to be some of the best games out there (see Baldur's Gate series, Neverwinter nights series, SSI gold box series, etc.) There are several unlicensed game worlds, and a plethora of developers out there - Where is the Dragonriders of Krynn? Escape from castle ravenloft? Against the sorceror-kings? How about a game that starts as a run of the mill Elder scrolls 4 clone until you reach 5th level and a giant anchor falls out of the sky from the clouds above?
I'm a consumer, I can't help but want.
Game well folks.
Feb 20, 2011
DDI has convinced me that the blue pill may be the better choice.
So there it is.
Today, I let my DDI account lapse.
I could go into detail as to why, but have done so already. I am tired of "my" game being beholden to a bunch of people that don't really seem to get how gamer's think or work. The corporate overlords in Renton seem to only be capable of (poorly) repackaging (Cough, essentials, cough) the same crap we have already paid for in yet another shiny color, making their supposedly core based system little more than a Magic game filled with players hitting the WIN! button with whatever new booster de- I mean splatb- I mean supplement happened to drop this week. Don't even get me started on what is the final death of Dragon and Dungeon magazines, though in truth their suffering is over now.
I'm tired of the obfuscation and the marketing BS. I'm tired of being sold the same product again and again. I'm tired of the game changing halfway through due to piss-poor playtesting, and paradigm shifts following the now annual (and totally unneccesary) layoffs. I'm done with Dungeons and Dragons.
Here I thought my granite wall of writer's block was due to an internal failing, but it wasn't. I'm just done with D&D. I just wasn't ready to admit it, after nearly 17 years of living and breathing D&D. Now I'm walking away and feel as if a great weight has lifted from my shoulders. Not gaming, however, just D&D - big difference.
In fact, I am looking for a science fiction type game to play, some alpha-omega or Dragonstar might fit the bill...I've always wanted to play Traveller, among other things.
Should some nameless wage-slave from Renton happen over here, tell your overlords that they done fucked up. This group is done with their bullshit and will be seeing if their competitors know how to handle a product + community any better.
DDI had so much potential - squandered by the hand-picked pets of Hasbro. I hope you remove your heads from your arses, until then it's been a wonderful 15 years, and a not so wonderful 2 after that - here's to things getting better.
Anyway, to summarize - Screw WizBro, Screw subscription models that charge you more while removing features, and screw whatever mouthpiece of the quarter they drag up to try and put a smiley face on the utter failure of the 4E relese and followup.
Bitter doesn't even begin to describe it, I am tired of apologizing to people for liking your game. End of story.
To any of my readers that may still remain, if I bumped into you in a FLGS, and we struck up a conversation, what game would you try and convince me to give a chance? anyone who says pathfinder will be summarily executed using 3E grappling rules while being forced to watch me make a singing combat bard.
Today, I let my DDI account lapse.
I could go into detail as to why, but have done so already. I am tired of "my" game being beholden to a bunch of people that don't really seem to get how gamer's think or work. The corporate overlords in Renton seem to only be capable of (poorly) repackaging (Cough, essentials, cough) the same crap we have already paid for in yet another shiny color, making their supposedly core based system little more than a Magic game filled with players hitting the WIN! button with whatever new booster de- I mean splatb- I mean supplement happened to drop this week. Don't even get me started on what is the final death of Dragon and Dungeon magazines, though in truth their suffering is over now.
I'm tired of the obfuscation and the marketing BS. I'm tired of being sold the same product again and again. I'm tired of the game changing halfway through due to piss-poor playtesting, and paradigm shifts following the now annual (and totally unneccesary) layoffs. I'm done with Dungeons and Dragons.
Here I thought my granite wall of writer's block was due to an internal failing, but it wasn't. I'm just done with D&D. I just wasn't ready to admit it, after nearly 17 years of living and breathing D&D. Now I'm walking away and feel as if a great weight has lifted from my shoulders. Not gaming, however, just D&D - big difference.
In fact, I am looking for a science fiction type game to play, some alpha-omega or Dragonstar might fit the bill...I've always wanted to play Traveller, among other things.
Should some nameless wage-slave from Renton happen over here, tell your overlords that they done fucked up. This group is done with their bullshit and will be seeing if their competitors know how to handle a product + community any better.
DDI had so much potential - squandered by the hand-picked pets of Hasbro. I hope you remove your heads from your arses, until then it's been a wonderful 15 years, and a not so wonderful 2 after that - here's to things getting better.
Anyway, to summarize - Screw WizBro, Screw subscription models that charge you more while removing features, and screw whatever mouthpiece of the quarter they drag up to try and put a smiley face on the utter failure of the 4E relese and followup.
Bitter doesn't even begin to describe it, I am tired of apologizing to people for liking your game. End of story.
To any of my readers that may still remain, if I bumped into you in a FLGS, and we struck up a conversation, what game would you try and convince me to give a chance? anyone who says pathfinder will be summarily executed using 3E grappling rules while being forced to watch me make a singing combat bard.
Dec 17, 2010
I really, really, really, really dislike the new character builder.
Web-based 4E character builder - it stinks. I'm paying the same for less? The saying, "Smooth move, ex-lax" comes to mind...complete with my dad's condescending tone. Now I know how he felt.
Essentials characters...fit awkwardly....into what is now a "custom" party.
If you errata the Rules Compendium - I'll kill 10 kittens and a beagle - I swear it! Their blood will be on your hands.
RE: DDI in general - I'm leaning towards not renewing my subscription. Unlike your digital characters, paper ones are yours. I'm just not seeing enough innovation or even intelligence to make me feel my money is well spent.
Do you keep your programmers locked in cages or something?
Do you folks even read your own forums?
Where has the last year gone?
I need a drink. Game well folks.
Essentials characters...fit awkwardly....into what is now a "custom" party.
If you errata the Rules Compendium - I'll kill 10 kittens and a beagle - I swear it! Their blood will be on your hands.
RE: DDI in general - I'm leaning towards not renewing my subscription. Unlike your digital characters, paper ones are yours. I'm just not seeing enough innovation or even intelligence to make me feel my money is well spent.
Do you keep your programmers locked in cages or something?
Do you folks even read your own forums?
Where has the last year gone?
I need a drink. Game well folks.
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