Myoozak!

Hello everyone! I've recorded some bits of tasty ear-food, which can be found above under my new "Music" tab.  Listen, enjoy, be frightened!  Also, as mentioned under my new page, I am more than willing to compose something for any indie dev's out there who have an interesting project they need sounds for.  I'm creative, have the time to commit, and will work for peanuts or their monetary equivalent if I think your project is worthwhile!  My email can be found on my new page, let me know what you have cooking.

Cheers!

Rune 2 petition

Okay, so not an official "comeback" of the Rambler, but I came across this on the Steam forums and had to share it. Rune, despite its flaws, is frackin' fun; and here is a petition for Rune 2 -
http://www.petitiononline.com/rune2/petition.html
Effective? I don't know, but as of now there are just under seven-thousand sign-ees. Add your vote to the pile, would you kindly? Here's a link to the Steam page for said game: http://store.steampowered.com/app/210950/

The Return is Nigh...

Planning a redesign of my blog, and hopefully adding some original music done, um, originally, by me as well. I've been gaming, and being creative as always and hope to begin sharing here very soon.  Been gone awhile, and be back soon... till then, here's a picture of my stealthy cat...

Losing My Souls

So I'm kind of a masochist. Not in that Fifty Shades of Stupid(witty, right?) sort of way, however; which might be unfortunate for my blog, since apparently vivid descriptions of torturous sex acts bring the readers in droves - who knew? Nope, sorry dear readers we're sticking to talking about video games here. You'll just have to borrow that certain trilogy from your neighbor or mom or whatever. Moving on...

Freaking Dark Souls! And on top of that... freaking Demon's Souls! Both games make me clench my jaw as well as other muscles that I don't regularly clench. They make me sweat, and sometimes cry (inside only - I mustn't outwardly show my weakness to the Souls games, lest they cleave me in two). And sometimes, only sometimes, they make me want to quit playing video games altogether because: they crush my spirit, and make me feel completely inadequate, like I'm Uwe Boll attempting to team up with Quentin Tarantino for my next film, only to find that by the second day I... well, I'm Uwe Boll, enough said. But, on the flipside, each time I finish off a mini boss, or an actual boss boss, the feeling of joy and accomplishment is so great that I can't imagine any other game giving me that kind of rush I feel when conquering even a small part of one of the Souls games. So what happens when I actually complete one? Will it be such a grand and fulfilling experience that the prospect of Half-Life 3 and a new Deus Ex will merely bring a shrug of the shoulders and a "meh" tumbling from my lips?
Okay, so the answer is "no"; and while much of this is hyperbole, some of it does ring true. When it comes to games, I am quite the masochist, and the Souls games whip it real good in the places that count, baby. But there's another layer to my history with these damn games, one that stretches beyond mere gameplay, but is inexorably tied to at the same time. *Queue dramatic music*

Basically, I think I'm slightly cursed when it comes to playing Dark & Demon's Souls. I purchased Demon's Souls the December after its release, fully aware of the experience I was about to embark on, and loved the crap out of it. Not pleased with my first character, I started a new one and began kicking some ass. I was maybe halfway through the game, when my PS3 decided to quit loading games and any other disc-based media. I was pissed, and scared that all my game saves were trapped forever. After three months of weighing my options regarding various fixes found on Youtube, I went with the wrong one. Of course. I ended up erasing and reformatting the entire harddrive, losing all of my saves. On the bright side, my PS3 was functional again and I began another new game of Demon's Souls. Did I back up my harddrive then, you ask? Pfft! Hell, no! I set off like Mister Magoo and began stumbling my way through the game from the beginning again.

After a period, I actually had about 80-90 percent of the game behind me, and then my PS3 died. Completely this time. Wouldn't even turn on. I tried dismantling it and cleaning the innards out, but it required more work to fix than I felt like putting forth. So, I bought a new one ('cuz I'm rich, like that), with a squeaky clean 120 GB harddrive just waiting for yet another of my Demon's Souls saves.
I began Demon's Souls once again with fervor, because on top of having a new Playstation that surely wouldn't poop out on me, I was now playing on a beautiful 70inch LED TV that really has no business being in my house. The game was prettier, and I had at least two years of off and on experience to throw behind yet another character. This one was special though, this one was to be my last. The one I beat the game with. He would triumph where others had been struck down by acts of God and other random calamities. But...

Don't fret, oh readers! For he is still alive, and safe on my now year-old PS3's harddrive. But he got pushed aside for now, because my curiosity was too great not to purchase Dark Souls for my PC.

And here's the much less tragic, yet still somewhat annoying second-half to my Souls games story.

I knew I wanted Dark Souls when it released for PS3 and 360, yet I waited. I had to complete Demon's Souls first, I told myself. But then Dark Souls released, with DLC included, for forty dollars and I couldn't wait any longer.

So, how awesome! PC versions are always better than their console counterparts, right? Better graphics, and settings for fine tuning performance? Well, after purchasing I perused the Steam forums to see what people were saying and found that. lo and behold, Dark Souls for PC was considered one of the worst console ports ever made. And I suppose that's true, but really, if you have the machine to run it, you still get the same experience as the console version with a slightly more stable framerate. Slightly. Very slightly.

Here's the rub: my machine just couldn't hack it. I had a dual-core processor from six years ago and a low-end video card. Still, I was stubborn. I persevered through the 10 to 20 fps for many hours, until I realized that my eyes were beginning to hurt. Yes, Dark Souls for PC caused me physical pain. Okay, not to whine, but it was still uncomfortable. So I quit. As I quit, was forced to quit, Demon's Souls many times before. Oh woe is me, and all that.

So now, months after purchasing Dark Souls, I finally have a PC that can run the damn thing - even with Durante's amazing fixes enabled. And it looks great. It plays, well, as great as it can play. Which is fine. I'm happy, and blazing forward once again until something comes along to either distract me or breaks my game saves. Wait, Dark Souls II was just announced at this year's VGA's??? Here we go again, dammit!

Even the Ents are bastards

On Being a Patient Gamer. And Kind of a Cheap-Ass.

I buy a lot of video games.  A lot.  However, my purchases have become much more frugal over the years as I've learned that saving money is actually a good thing (who knew?).  In my late teens and early twenties, when the cruel hand of inevitability thrust me out into the real world and my parents stopped buying me games for my birthdays and Christmas, I threw all kinds of green at the game industry.  The excitement of being "free" for the first time consumed me and I did everything I had always wanted to do.  I made some bad decisions and some sort of okay decisions; but my focus here is that I purchased every game that caught my fancy, and bought them brand-new at that (90 percent of them anyway). I was in nerd heaven, and showing some financial support to my favorite game developers along the way.

Fast forward a bit (nevermind you how long) and I now tend to shy away from the day-one, sixty dollar game purchases. I have my exceptions - Elder Scrolls and Portal 2 to name a couple - that I simply cannot wait to play when released. However, I've found that, for the most part, I can wait to play any game I'm looking forward to. Sure, after the hype has died down it seems less exciting to finally purchase and play a game that's been out for a year or two - but, not really. After the logos pass by, and main menu loads up with whatever theme music has been chosen for the game, I find myself just as eager to play as I would have been on day one. And my reward for waiting all this time? The same game or games for a fraction of the cost, which means more money in my savings, in my gas tank, in my belly, and sure, sometimes into another long-overdue but now wildly cheaper game.  Case in point: last year I purchased Halo 3, ODST, and Halo Reach for around sixty dollars, give or take. Three games for the price of one. I also just purchased the fantastic Uncharted 3 for a mere twenty dollars. Patience rocks.

                                                   Yup. Ass Reed II for $19.99

Okay, so what about the online component of all of these Halo games - I've missed out on years of Halo multiplayer! For some, this would be unspeakable, but hey, I'm not in the online FPS camp. I played through story mode on each game, jumped into multiplayer a bit on each one, and they now adorn my game shelf until I feel the need for some more Halo campaign. If I were more of a multiplayer enthusiast, I'd of course shell out full price for these games. Playing with strangers just doesn't do much for me. So... Yeah...

Let's wrangle this ramble down and get to my focal point - if you've missed out on a game and all the hype has passed, do yourself a favor and shell out your chump-change for what may be an inexpensive, but still fun as hell game.  Also, if you have a decent PC, budget gaming should be your bread and butter. Check out all those digital game distributors online for crying out loud - gog.com, Desura, and the mighty Steam to name a few. The sales on these sites are absolutely insane - like, "Hi, I'm Crazy Larry better come lock me up" insane. Also, let's give a nod to a plethora of discounted older PC titles, and the bustling Indie scene made even more bustlinger(?) by Steam's Greenlight program.

So what if you're short of cash, or just don't feel like spending sixty dollars for something new and shiny. You can still game it up like Grandmasta Puff n' Game* if you know where to look and can wait patiently while prices drop. Now, like I said, I just picked up Uncharted 3 for twenty dollars, so if you'll excuse me...

*Yeah, he's not real. Yet.

Still Alive

Good golly it's been ages since I posted anything on the Ol' Rambler.  I was getting some good view numbers for a while there and then I'm pretty sure all my readers perished at the same time in their Game Rambler fan bus - shame I would've signed autographs.  Anyway, after ho-humming about lack of views I focused my writing time on fiction - which I still am.  It's a busy life, and with a full-time job and many hobbies I find myself spread pretty dang thin.  No fear, reader, I plan on returning to ramble a bit more regular-like in the coming month.  There are games to be played, and lines of text to write about the games being played, and other stuff, I think.  So pop in, won't you, in a few weeks' time, and let the Ol' Rambler tell you a story...

What the Crap Have I Been Doing?

Just thought I'd update a bit as to what I've been doing.  Well, playing games, of course!  Also I've been toiling away at my book.  It's a story about a cat who journeys across the country to find his master.  And I have to admit I'm pretty excited about it.  It began with my mother constantly nagging suggesting that I write a childrens' book.  At the time I was trying to focus on my other project, a large medieval fantasy novel that was fun to work on but also definitely kicking my ass.  I know what I want it to be, but it's a huge project and I decided what I needed was more practice.  And so was born the "childrens'" book.  It has a title, though I'd rather not speak of it right now.  Also, I wanted to forgo the whole "picture book" idea my mom had in mind, so I'm instead writing it as a YA book - or, Young Adult book.  Other YA books would include The Hunger Games, Harry Potter, etc.  So I wanted to write something that was appealing to both kids and adults, perhaps explore some more mature themes and whatnot.  Anyway, it's turning out to be quite the adventure and I can't wait to find a publisher for it.  I can dream, anyway...