Month: August 2012

GAME VIEW City of Steam Pt II

Posted on by Madarame-Harunobu

City of Steam is a steampunk-themed MMO/ARPG that pushes the Unity engine to deliver quality 3D/HDTV game play through a state of the art. I ended up with an Alpha key to the game after my attempts to get by buying an auctioned key off listia that seemed to have been used for over a week during the third weekend Alpha stress test. But after talking with support at the CoS site I was given a usable legitimate Alpha Key and proceeded to install and prepare for the last Alpha weekend gameplay.This is definitely a steampunk gearworks game, automatons, AirShips and gear mechs . I won’t be giving away too much on the storyline, the core game as a whole is recovering from a major mishap and you start out as a refugee among others and your family.

After logging in at the City-state of Nexus, character creation and class are in order. You have 9 races, a male or female for every race and four classes to choose from. I played as a Riven Gunner. When you get involved, the game takes you through a short tutorial basically teaching you how to interact with the UI and how the switches and and bells and whistles work. The tutorial is mandatory you have to go through it to get to the city . User Interface, pretty standard, Avatar and map topside, you have chat, skill stats and resource bars on bottom left hand side by defualt.

Some the cool points of the game.

The opening screen. Very well represented and designed.
The art. was well addressed for a steampunk genre game, it’s has the gears, and clockworks that anyone want for.
The Salvage option. you can turn stuff you’ve picked up and turn it to something useful during quests and such. Not bad if you like to play the pack rat type of adventurer.
The Bad

I get why the tutorial there, when it’s the first time it’s very useful, but afterwards they should add in a optional check box before release of the game itself.
Popups in the tutorial could be set as an optional script. It just takes away the gaming experience.
Programmable keys hot keys would be a nice optional add in. .

The wants
Jump and Double jump if possible
Supposedly and this is just rumor mill but the optional of horses and maybe even steam based vehicles will be allowed for your character after release day at some point, then again it’s a rumor.

Swap characters while you’re logging out and building up your other character. It’s just not there as an option at the moment it seems. Let’s hope they can make that correction before release day.

Gameplay was smooth, there were no glitchy animation errors but there was block volume corrections that I pointed out and reported in some of the areas. I can tell, that the enemy AI are somewhat intelligent and responsive attack in hordes if you’re not watchful.
After completing the tutorial you’ll arrive at the city and after that you’re free to do you please. There are quests aplenty to complete on several post boards throughout the town, plus you can go exploring dungeons, hop on a train to the next area if you want. Some of the dungeons designed for single-player are fun to dive into so partying up is optional as well and slightly fun for all too.

Obviously City of steam is still under development and in need a few corrections in block volume and texturing tearing in some areas, but I approve of what I’ve seen so far. Access is easy all you have to do is install the unity player and the game runs in your browser (I used Chrome myself) . On low settings the unity engine is quite balanced even on the lower end machine you can get a semi-decent FPS count 45/60. The detailing was superb you could get a sense of immersion to it. I loved the fact that it tries to pull you in and in some cases succeeds in doing so. I will say this was one Alpha test I didn’t mind one bit.

Star Wars Book Review and some general ranting……..

Posted on by Madarame-Harunobu

48 Hours till the BBC America Doctor Who Marathon to Season 7 kick off with Asylum of The Daleks. Even though the kids are back in school they‘ll watch The Doctor rather than watching (Shiver) Minecraft videos on YouTube. I don’t get the whole Minecraft obsession, it’s and 8 bit engine with some bells and whistles on it. I prefer an engine with much to engage with personally. Then again I’m also someone who’s selling off pieces of himself (Toys and Books) to gain access to something I really wanted to get into.

Robotics yes I’m still working on the Omnibot project slowly but hopefully before I hit the dirt nap I’ll have at least built one the projects that keeps my attention focused remarkably on track. I have maybe 4 maybe 5 items I’m going to place up on eBay, and will hit ez-builder.com and ask some the guys there if they might want to take a crack of some the items I have for sale before I place them up for auction.

I’ve even placed up my 2nd edition Shadowrun RPG Core Rulebook, 6th printing but in very decent condition. I will probably place up my palladium robotech and rifts books up for sale as well. I mean I don’t use them anymore, no one out here where I live is interested in playing that rpg system anyway, and it will lighten the load of things have when I exit this world and wouldn’t leave much of a mess when I am done and buried.

I have to ask a strange question to myself and some of you out there. Why do people act stupid? What I mean by asking, is why do people feel a need to hurt others by trolling them, or even just talking badly about them when it’s been a at least a few years since you talked about or to any of them save for maybe Face book, or DA, or maybe MySpace or twitter? What good does it do them, save for making themselves feel somehow more superior, or empowered because who they’re talking about can’t talk back in their defense or even justification at other times pending the situation.

I just get sick of it, it makes me angry, not angry I mean “ANGRY” I want punch my fist thru steel type of anger. Of course that gets me nowhere at al save a trip to the ER and $ that can be better spent elsewhere as well as lost time from work. But it still doesn’t resolve the fact that there are those who don’t know me, save for interacting with me on the net for X amount of time at a website/msg board and they think they can talk badly about me and I’m not going to find out about. It’s not about lurking or creeping about a board you’re not welcome at, I have no interest in that.

People I know who have been or are at X boards and sites they mention it if I’m talked down upon or badly, and others think oh he’s lurking and such or OH NO he’ emailing me and I can’t bear to tell him to stop! Or here’s the one that gets me “I don’t know why he’s my Face book friend, but the other day on FB chat (who uses that?) He sent me the following message: “meow” D: D: D: “I know *why* heather, it’s because I was taking my family to Florida and asked you for some questions on places of interest while we were in Orlando, but to do so I had to friend request you, and the only reason I used “meow” was to grab your attention since it seems hard to get it otherwise.

But that’s been resolved since I removed the friend request. So if you ever come across this? You know that you don’t have to worry D: D: D: about me “bothering” you anymore. It’s not like you wanted to talk to get to know me anyway. Or at least that is the image you’re projecting. Why do any of you even talk about me anymore anyways? Why did I attempt to bother talking to any of you there any more for that matter? You ostracized me and alienated others by your behaviors and constant trolling or nagging or plain asshattery; I’m not point fingers at one particular either.

The sad part is I’m point at a whole community that has had maybe 2 “new” people join since the loss of the Original board and 3 different incarnations. I was asked by one of the communities I had some bad blood with to come back the ban had been lifted on my profile and so far it’s been ok no trolling some mutual feelings and some where we just agree to disagree but not in a vindictive or hateful way, I guess some communities can grow and move on whereas some others just sit and stagnate or fester in some cases.

Prime example would be your FB Group it’s been there and hasn’t been used in almost over a year or more, so WHY have it at all if you’re not even going to use it to begin with? And Facebook Chat let me say TONS of people use it, just because you don’t use it? Doesn’t mean others feel or think that way either RAWR! Waste waste waste. At least if I create something people do make use of it and KEEP making use of it for the most part, unlike other FB groups I’ve seen.

Rant over; back to whatever….Where was I? AH Book! I’ve been going back to my roots (book wise) this was done last year in Nov. 2011 Star Wars GN Darth Vader and The Lost Command Published by Dark Horse comics. This Graphic novel gives some in depth to what happened after the clone wars and what goes on between Ep.3 and Ep. 4. Seems While on an about 19 years before the battle of Yavin. An Expeditionary mission to the ghost nebula goes MIA and Palpatin orders Lord Vader to take some of the 501st and investigate what happened and to retrieve the survivors.

More to the fact that Moff Tarkin’s son was the one leading the expeditionary mission and Tarkin wants his son back. Lord Vader does as he is told of course and during the travel time and throughout the mission he keeps being visited with visions of “What might have been” if he had not turned to the dark side and if Padame had lived, however his vision was blurred because there was only 1 child in the visions not two. During his waking time through the mission the troops under his command fight way through two cities and two planets and crushing everyone that may get in the way of the mission save for the Lady Saro, who says will help them find Moff Tarkin’s son but in reality, she is in cahoots with the very person Lord Vader is looking for and once the truth is revealed, Lord Vader plans to kill the traitorous son and his would be queen/seer.

The Senator approves of this deception to Moff Tarkin and allows Lord Vader to kill the traitor to the empire and the insurgents and report in as an accident that happened during the rescue mission and it was the insurgents that killed his son and not Lord Vader, fueling his hatred for rebellions and further increases his loyalty to the empire and his “master”. This was/is an excellent book and I have to say you must read this to grasp what I’ve written down after reading this three times now already to make sure I didn’t forget anything. DO not let this review spoil it for you, I urge you to read it yourself and decide if it’s a good read or not?
Alright well that’s it for this post talk to you later and remember, forgiveness only goes to a point before you’re just “Whatever” and walk away…………….

GAME VIEW City of Steam

Posted on by Madarame-Harunobu

Greetings Ladies & Gamers alike!

 

Madarame here to do a small report on a new game that hit the scene last month and seem to be looking for recruits for testing. I’m talking about City of Steam By Mechanist Studios based out of Fuijin China, www.mechanist.co .This is a steampunk world mixed in with splash of D & D old school races, yes that means elves, orcs, trolls and other mythical creatures while being steam mechs and weapons all driven by the Unity Engine.

This mmo has a very turn of century feel to it and I am not one to be shy about it, I am hoping to get involved in the alpha myself so I can experience the gameplay as well. I admire the work that was placed in this from what I can see via the media clips and the artwork that was done.

 

This reminds of what London might be like if D&D and Steamology had been a thing of reailty. 😉

The Classes the player takes on are the usual type of hero archetypes, each with a unique set of abilities. Working as a party will more or less get you through the most part of the quests but eventually you will need to part ways as to some of the quests that will befall you. But the riches and weapons you gain will be most helpful on future tasks that seem to come by too soon 😉 I am sure that if given the opportunity to get into this alpha, that it will prove to be quite enjoyable and entertaining. Here’s to hoping !