Dragon Age: Origins…

… the game that has been the talk of many of my fellow friends and of the NWN Community.   I started playing about a week ago, and I believe I’m almost finished with the game now.  There is really only one word to describe it:  Awesome.  If you haven’t gotten it yet you should.  There’s no point in me doing a review (as is Maerduin’s very suggestion as well), so I’ll just mention of few of my more major nuances.

I’m very impressed with the world BioWare has created, although there’s been a few parts of the game I wasn’t fond of.  The going back and forth in Orzammar with their huge load times was ridiculously annoying, not to mention there’s about 6 dungeons to go through and 3 very tough bosses to fight.  The three tough bosses wasn’t as much of a complaint, but they certainly added to the amount of time I had to spend there. 

The area design of some of their exteriors, however, leaves something to be desired.   I suspect it has something to do with the console versions, but who knows.   The only areas I thought were decent looking were the two snowy areas in the game.  From what I can tell in the game also, there are no DayNightSettings.  Not sure if this is true with the toolset yet, but I guess I’ll find out soon enough.

And my last nuance has to do with mages, in particular, that of Morrigan.  If you don’t know about it, you might find out.  I just thought it was sort of a letdown, but maybe BioWare has something planned for DA2, who knows.   And my biggest gripe: the mage hats.  They make any mage you have look like a jester.  Come on, there has to be at least one cool looking mage helm out there…. BioWare?

And I remember reading that there’s supposed to be some very difficult decisions to make.  Honestly, haven’t found one yet, unless its still to come.  The line between right and wrong is still there, and its easy to tell who has been right and who has been wrong (unlike The Witcher where they’re both just wrong).  Well, enough about that.

I haven’t really decided if I’m going to do anything with Dragon Age yet.  Probably will, but unless I’m in a group, I probably won’t have the time to do a full-fledged module unless I plan it a few years in advance.  So we’ll see.  I have yet to crack open the toolset.

On another note, I found this video the other day.  I can’t wait for this game, but I do hope they change his haircut… it looks aweful:

http://g4tv.com/videos/41458/The-Witcher-2-Assassins-of-Kings-Gameplay-Trailer/

Can’t wait!!

Middleforest

I’ve recently discovered a new project recently by chance.  On the side of Amraphael’s blog, there was a blog listing I had never seen before called Middleforest.  So, I decided to give it a visit to see what it was about.  I was pretty amazed at the attention to detail he put into his cityscape.  It’s probably one of the most realistic cityscapes I’ve seen in NWN2.  So if you haven’t seen it yet, go check it out:  http://middleforest.blogspot.com/

In other news, Zork has been out for awhile now.  I get to be a lazy area designer next week and finally play this module and perhaps a few others I haven’t been able to play yet, like Subtlety of Thay 2, Dark Avenger 2, and a few other modules I have on my list.

Not much to report, however I’ll leave you all with two screenshots from Shattered Dreams (well one is from SD and the other is test design for an area in the module).

For larger versions of the file, you can open these links instead:

http://ravenloft.bouncyrock.com/screens/NewTorch.png

http://ravenloft.bouncyrock.com/screens/TribalVillage.png

Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion

A few weeks ago I had been rewatching a series that I had previously finished watching while I was in my dorm (and thankfully I won’t be in a dorm ever again).   The title of the series is an anime called Code Geass:  Lelouch of the Rebellion.   It is only two seasons long (50 episodes), most of which is dedicated to furthering the plot.  There are a few episodes that are there for humor as is the case with many animes. 

Some of you might not be huge fans of animes, but this one in particular is probably the best one I’ve seen.  Its pretty much a no nonsense series that’ll keep you engaged for hours on end, perhaps even consuming your entire free time you should’ve been spending working in the toolset.  But, everyone needs a break every now and again, right?  Getting down to the point:  If you have not watched this series, then I recommend Code Geass highly.   If you have kids that are pretty young, then this isn’t the show to watch during the day, although most of the concepts – philosophical and not – would fly right over their head. 

 

So, what is Code Geass about you ask?  The series is set after Japan’s conquest by the Holy Britannian Empire their powerful new weapons, the Knightmare Frames, stripping Japan and its citizens of all rights and freedoms and renaming their country Area 11. The titular Lelouch is a Britannian prince who was disowned by his father, Emperor Charles zi Britannia, after his mother was murdered, and has vowed to destroy his father, the Emperor and Britannia. He gains an ability through the mysterious power of the Geass and becomes the leader of the resistance movement to fulfill his greatest two wishes: to seek revenge for his mother and to construct a world in which his beloved sister, Nunnally, can live happily in.

You can find all 50 episodes on the internet pretty easily.  If you just want to see if the show is to your liking, I’ve embedded a video to this post for your viewing pleasure.  If you want to see more, you can. All you have to do is go on YouTube, search for Code Geass and look for Bandai Entertainment as the author.  They have all episodes for Season 1 posted there.  

Until next time.

What Type Of Story Do You Enjoy The Most?

This is not a poll, but merely an inquiry on my fellow blog readers.  There’s really no limit on how you can respond to this, so I did not make a poll for this as I would likely receive a ton of votes going towards Other.   So, give as much info as you can, and if you can throw in examples, then all the better.  And for those of you that did not have Blogger accounts from before, you should be able to leave comments now.  All you need is an email address and a name to go by.

Previous Poll:  While on the topic of polls, the number of votes for the other poll has slowed down over the past few days.  However, it does tell me alot about the remaining members of the NWN2 Community.   The massive majority are interested in Gameplay.  Its a vague term, which might be why the other 28% of the voters did not vote for it.  

Runner up would be Story.  No real surprise there.   The next two are closely tied at 32/31/30 votes for Setting, Exploration/Sandbox and Modding respectively.   This is, of course, coming from the NWN2 Community, so it’s not much of a surprise to see these three higher than the rest, especially that of modding.  If you used this same poll on the WoW crowd, you’d probably see a gajillion votes for Gameplay and MMO (yet there were only 2 that voted for MMO).   I’m a little surprised to see Exploration / Sandbox that high however.  This could be the SoZ lovers influencing the poll and the previous owners have since left the community, but the SoZ lovers are still a dedicated part of the community.   I’m personally not a very big Exploration fan as every game that focused on it fell short on what I believe to be more critical parts of the game. 

Innovation and Multiplayer come next at 16/18 votes respectively.  Innovation is special and not usually the focus of most games you’ve probably heard of.  However, innovation is the crutch of almost all Indie games as they don’t have the resources to have full voiceovers, state-of-the-art graphics or the time to dedicate to the game’s creation.  Multiplayer, however, was a bit of a surprise to me.  Multiplayer is the one thing that has kept NWN1 going for so long and it still continues to do so.  Recently, I’ve seen a NWN2 PW shut down and reopen a NWN1 PW which has been doing very well for itself since the conversion.  Without a good multiplayer, you’re basically limiting the number of replays for that game, and as thus, I believe Dragon Age may hurt from its lack of MP at first until they patch it into the game (if the rumors on this are true that is). 

I would like to thank everyone for voting and even moreso to the people who left comments (either on my blog or on the boards).  You guys have been helpful

Soon, you’ll be seeing a massive update on what this module is about and what the BouncyRock team has been crafting in the shadows.  I’m currently waiting on a few bits and pieces to make this announcement, as Jolly Jenkins would put it, EPIC!  There’s alot of content being poured into this module, and it’s really beginning to shape up.  So keep an eye out for the update!

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