First and foremost, Technorati here is the claim verification: 93N9XFNJCMWA. So now my blog will be visible in a proper blog directory website. Now on to business.
Dragon Age 2, a review.
Now at the start of this I will begin to say that I have not completed the game, so far I have only been able to devote about 15 hours to it and I am very much so a completionist so am only partway through act 2. Now the very first impressions I got when playing the game were something along these lines, "Oooo its nice and shiny, and wow it has this mass effect dialogue system I really liked." However, I noticed that excitement started to dwindle quickly. Don't get me wrong they did a lot of things right, but since they still changed even more they made quite a few mistakes also. The game-play, at least from what I heard since I only played a mage, is incredibly different from 1 starting class to another. Thats good, it gives the game replay value, or at least some as that replay value gets destroyed by other "features." The quick paced battles were actually quite fun as a mage, bombarding people with fist of the maker, pulling them in and then launching a fireball into their faces. There was one incredibly glaring problem with the game-play though and that was the quests, there were more than enough quests, the game was actually overflowing with them which is good because it gives more play time right? Wrong, the actual size of the game world was so small that stuffing so many quests inside is just bad, they never really change anything about the game world and the few places that exist for only one quest are just copy-pasted other dungeons and in the end felt like they were just trying to stuff in everything they could.
The story, this here was where I felt the major let down. The story in a sense just meanders about for most of the game. At the beginning you were going for a deep roads expedition, and I am like "Wooo that should be awesome, slaughtering endless waves of dark spawn while I hunt for treasure for the main story line." Well, that did not exactly go the way I had hoped. Then in Act 2 the story is about an uprising, which still is not the main plot point, and finally Act 3 is a battle between Templar and Mages. This was the major weakness of the game, mostly due to its sequel status. It just did not have its own defined story. The first game had a great one, last the Grey Warden, and a Blight all your own. Dragon Age 2 on the other hand, had just going about doing nothing major and finishing the first games story of the Chantry against the Mages, although on a completely different continent so I don't see the connection there.
Overall, I see no proper replay value in the game. At first I thought it would have some, because people commented to me before I got it on how different the classes played, but it was completely overshadowed by the lacking story and over packed quests. I still enjoyed it though, it was a nice hack and slash, good graphics, and I personally liked the interface better than the first along with the ability trees. Even the armor system I found better, not having to really worry about your companions armor as they can't switch their main clothes and just concentrating on yourself freed up plenty of space in your backpack for carrying junk to sell. So in the end it was fun, but I most definitely won't be playing it a second time.
~ The Lurker
Saturday, April 2, 2011
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
A Question
Now, I am sure at least some of you guys that read this are programmers, and since it was asked of me in an interview I would like to hear what you guys would respond with. The question was, "What is the most innovative or creative idea you have ever programmed?" Now let me explain my answer and thought process.
In Fallout 3 I did a number of very interesting ideas, I implemented an Oblivion-esque magic system, however this was not terribly innovative since all it called for was a global value for the current mana levels, a slight rework of the wait/fast-travel system for that time to count towards mana regeneration, and spells were basically explosion effects with an invisible projectile.
So I did not use this, my second thought for an answer was my, not working terribly well, RTS system. Due to the limitations of the engine I never got it properly working as it crashed after a certain point due to memeory usage, usually when you had a sizable base. But it did offer the ability to build your own base from scratch, raise an army and use a squad based combat system for fighting larger battles.
The final idea, and the one I answered with was a single weapon I made for Fallout 3 with interesting physics effects, called the Railway Rifle X-treme, something anyone who has played my mod is familiar with. Now I presented this with the basis behind its working for its innovation, as it technically fired a projectile that moved 4 lightyears in distance every in game second. Since no engine could actually allow that and trying to make it function would make a physics engine programmer cry I used a work-around. I built a make-shift hitscan function, and when this function started the entire game froze at its time giving a temporal distortion effect for realism and allowing all processor usage in computing. Now this function created the projectile technically already inside whatever it hit, so before the gun had fired the projectile had already hit its target, and when the game restarted the projectile left the weapon and moved to the already in place hit. However, it also had its faults in that you had to hit something. If you missed everything (firing into the sky) then the hitscan function could never find where to place the projectile, so the game restarted and the firing scripts couldn't find the ending location causing the game to use the built-in bullet functions which could not handle the projectile speed causing the game to crash.
Now my question is two part, first is whether or not you think I made the right choice of the three and the second is to include what you would have answered with, I am curious.
~The Lurker
In Fallout 3 I did a number of very interesting ideas, I implemented an Oblivion-esque magic system, however this was not terribly innovative since all it called for was a global value for the current mana levels, a slight rework of the wait/fast-travel system for that time to count towards mana regeneration, and spells were basically explosion effects with an invisible projectile.
So I did not use this, my second thought for an answer was my, not working terribly well, RTS system. Due to the limitations of the engine I never got it properly working as it crashed after a certain point due to memeory usage, usually when you had a sizable base. But it did offer the ability to build your own base from scratch, raise an army and use a squad based combat system for fighting larger battles.
The final idea, and the one I answered with was a single weapon I made for Fallout 3 with interesting physics effects, called the Railway Rifle X-treme, something anyone who has played my mod is familiar with. Now I presented this with the basis behind its working for its innovation, as it technically fired a projectile that moved 4 lightyears in distance every in game second. Since no engine could actually allow that and trying to make it function would make a physics engine programmer cry I used a work-around. I built a make-shift hitscan function, and when this function started the entire game froze at its time giving a temporal distortion effect for realism and allowing all processor usage in computing. Now this function created the projectile technically already inside whatever it hit, so before the gun had fired the projectile had already hit its target, and when the game restarted the projectile left the weapon and moved to the already in place hit. However, it also had its faults in that you had to hit something. If you missed everything (firing into the sky) then the hitscan function could never find where to place the projectile, so the game restarted and the firing scripts couldn't find the ending location causing the game to use the built-in bullet functions which could not handle the projectile speed causing the game to crash.
Now my question is two part, first is whether or not you think I made the right choice of the three and the second is to include what you would have answered with, I am curious.
~The Lurker
Friday, March 25, 2011
Heroes of Newerth 2.0.21
First of all, Sorry for not updating very much this week I was really looking forward to hear you guys responses on what I have going for the classes, but alas I have spent most of my time job searching. Don't worry though, hopefully I should be back on track with posting soon, I may squeeze out a bunch of updates this weekend. On to more fun news, another Heroes of Newerth patch and a new hero to boot.
The majority of the patch was bug fixes so I will not go over them, here is a link though http://forums.heroesofnewerth.com/showthread.php?t=237418. But who cares about any of that stuff, we got ourselves a new hero.
His name be Tremble and by god if it isn't a new and improved Broodmother from DotA. Hellbourne Agility hero Tremble with an amazing 310 base movespeed.
Hon Hero Spotlight: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31x4lb8eYk4&feature=player_embedded
Dark Swarm:
Type: Magic
Radius: 300
Mana Cost: 90 / 100 / 110 / 120
Cooldown: 12.0 Seconds
Required Level: 1 / 3 / 5 / 7
Activation
Summons a swarm of bugs for 5 seconds. Enemies within the swarm take 20 / 40 / 60 / 80 Magic Damage per second, while enemies outside the swarm deal 8 / 16 / 24 / 32% less damage to Tremble.
Terrorform:
Create and tunnel through Terror Mounds. Terror Mounds grant Invisibility with a 2 second Fade Time, {15,20,25,30}% Move Speed, and {2,4,6,8} Health Regeneration. Also gain the ability to Terror Port every {120,100,80,60} seconds between Mounds.\n\nMaximum of {3,5,7,9} Terror Mounds.
Impalers:
On Attack
Applies Impalers to target for 2 seconds.
Impalers grant 5 / 10 / 15 / 20 bonus Magic Damage and 5 / 10 / 15 / 20 HP heal on inflict.
Impalers
10 / 20 / 30 / 40% Movement Slow
Shudder:
Cast Time: 1.0 Seconds
Mana Cost: 140
Cooldown: 90.0 / 75.0 / 60.0 Seconds
Required Level: 6 / 11 / 16
Activation
Summon Shudder at your location. If Shudder is already summoned, kills the previous Shudder and resummons it.
Shudder has 50 / 75 / 100 Attack Damage, 800 / 1100 / 1400 HP, 350 / 375 / 400 Movement Speed, and 1 / 1.5 / 2 second Ensnare. His Razor Carapace grants 10 / 20 / 30 Deflection and {-2,-4,-6} Armor on attack.
He has access to the same level of Terror Form and Impalers as Tremble.
This guy has everything, he can gank well and control runes through just one level of terrorform and with impalers has excellent chasing ability. He is definitely built to have the ability to carry, and comes with some survival and healing from abilities which is nice. Most interesting is his ability to counter pushes by porting back to base. I definitely am interested in how things pan out and how the community uses him. But my recommended carry build as I shall give for every hero, is: Ghost Marchers cause that wonderful no clip - Battlefury to help farm and mana regen - not straight, probably last item to finish Symbol of Rage for the extra lifesteal - Wingbow for some damage and attack speed - Brutalizer for disabling - and Rift shards for the damage. Good luck with 'em everyone. And one last tidbit is some music I stumbled upon, Abney Park http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c81jBqYs24A&feature=related try it out.
~The Lurker
The majority of the patch was bug fixes so I will not go over them, here is a link though http://forums.heroesofnewerth.com/showthread.php?t=237418. But who cares about any of that stuff, we got ourselves a new hero.
His name be Tremble and by god if it isn't a new and improved Broodmother from DotA. Hellbourne Agility hero Tremble with an amazing 310 base movespeed.
Hon Hero Spotlight: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31x4lb8eYk4&feature=player_embedded
Dark Swarm:
Type: Magic
Radius: 300
Mana Cost: 90 / 100 / 110 / 120
Cooldown: 12.0 Seconds
Required Level: 1 / 3 / 5 / 7
Activation
Summons a swarm of bugs for 5 seconds. Enemies within the swarm take 20 / 40 / 60 / 80 Magic Damage per second, while enemies outside the swarm deal 8 / 16 / 24 / 32% less damage to Tremble.
Terrorform:
Create and tunnel through Terror Mounds. Terror Mounds grant Invisibility with a 2 second Fade Time, {15,20,25,30}% Move Speed, and {2,4,6,8} Health Regeneration. Also gain the ability to Terror Port every {120,100,80,60} seconds between Mounds.\n\nMaximum of {3,5,7,9} Terror Mounds.
Impalers:
On Attack
Applies Impalers to target for 2 seconds.
Impalers grant 5 / 10 / 15 / 20 bonus Magic Damage and 5 / 10 / 15 / 20 HP heal on inflict.
Impalers
10 / 20 / 30 / 40% Movement Slow
Shudder:
Cast Time: 1.0 Seconds
Mana Cost: 140
Cooldown: 90.0 / 75.0 / 60.0 Seconds
Required Level: 6 / 11 / 16
Activation
Summon Shudder at your location. If Shudder is already summoned, kills the previous Shudder and resummons it.
Shudder has 50 / 75 / 100 Attack Damage, 800 / 1100 / 1400 HP, 350 / 375 / 400 Movement Speed, and 1 / 1.5 / 2 second Ensnare. His Razor Carapace grants 10 / 20 / 30 Deflection and {-2,-4,-6} Armor on attack.
He has access to the same level of Terror Form and Impalers as Tremble.
This guy has everything, he can gank well and control runes through just one level of terrorform and with impalers has excellent chasing ability. He is definitely built to have the ability to carry, and comes with some survival and healing from abilities which is nice. Most interesting is his ability to counter pushes by porting back to base. I definitely am interested in how things pan out and how the community uses him. But my recommended carry build as I shall give for every hero, is: Ghost Marchers cause that wonderful no clip - Battlefury to help farm and mana regen - not straight, probably last item to finish Symbol of Rage for the extra lifesteal - Wingbow for some damage and attack speed - Brutalizer for disabling - and Rift shards for the damage. Good luck with 'em everyone. And one last tidbit is some music I stumbled upon, Abney Park http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c81jBqYs24A&feature=related try it out.
~The Lurker
Monday, March 21, 2011
A Programming update
Well, it is time that I start to code the player abilities, since most of my time has been spent on the RTS element. Dynamic trading and economy also kept me working for quite a long time, but I feel that those are going along well so I am looking for opinions on the player capabilities within the game. Now there are 4 classes for your hero, the rogue, the archer, the wizard, and the warrior. Later this week I will post about specific abilities and ask for your opinions on that, but right now I want to pitch an idea about just general player management.
The Player Leveling System:
First, the player starts at level 1 and the maximum level is 26, where at each level including the first the player is allowed to choose an ability. However, since there are only 26 abilities for each class you can not choose any at any level. For levels 1-5 there are 5 abilities but by level 5 you will have all, and they continue in 5 level brackets to 25, and at 26 you get the major end all be all ability for your Lord.
Experience is fairly standard, especially since I haven't put much thought into it, you gain experience by doing actions: trading, building, combat.
Skills. The one main point that I wanted to draw attention to and ask about is not the choice of skills system, although feedback is still more than welcome about that. You get 26 skills/abilities and each of these abilities will be scalable. As you use certain abilities like shield slam or fireball you get better, so up to a point of mastery their effectiveness would increase, more damage, less energy to use. So that while your abilities are preset you get the choice in character of which abilities you focus on to define your Lord.
Please, any and all feedback and remember I will go over specific abilities later this week.
~The Lurker
The Player Leveling System:
First, the player starts at level 1 and the maximum level is 26, where at each level including the first the player is allowed to choose an ability. However, since there are only 26 abilities for each class you can not choose any at any level. For levels 1-5 there are 5 abilities but by level 5 you will have all, and they continue in 5 level brackets to 25, and at 26 you get the major end all be all ability for your Lord.
Experience is fairly standard, especially since I haven't put much thought into it, you gain experience by doing actions: trading, building, combat.
Skills. The one main point that I wanted to draw attention to and ask about is not the choice of skills system, although feedback is still more than welcome about that. You get 26 skills/abilities and each of these abilities will be scalable. As you use certain abilities like shield slam or fireball you get better, so up to a point of mastery their effectiveness would increase, more damage, less energy to use. So that while your abilities are preset you get the choice in character of which abilities you focus on to define your Lord.
Please, any and all feedback and remember I will go over specific abilities later this week.
~The Lurker
Sunday, March 20, 2011
Portal 2 New Trailer
We got a new Portal 2 Trailer coming out. From the looks of it it should be the starting cutscene for the Co-Op mode within the game. For anyone that hasn't played the first Portal I shall openly state it is the best game ever produced and you HAVE to go play it immediately.
Portal 2 is supposed to contain all the same elements of portal physics from the first game, but add a lot of new mechanics. One of the more interesting was slick slime jets that can coat a surface on the other end of the portal causing you to accelerate impressively. For all of those that did play Portal, which should be all of you, I am sure you have the same worries as I do. Portal was a game of such magnitude that it really challenges the developer to make a good sequel. If they change too much the fans won't like the differences, saying it is not the good ol' Portal they remember. However, if they don't change it enough players will say its just a remake with nothing new to offer and hate it for that. This conundrum leaves Valve in a very precarious place and I sincerely hope that they can get a perfect balance to make Portal 2 even better than the first.
~The Lurker
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Sins of a Solar Empire
I know that its kinda out of nowhere, but for some reason I really felt the want to play it. For those of you who don't know the game Sins of a Solar Empire is an epicly scaled space RTS. It does have multiplayer but my experiences were cut short as our LAN connection couldn't take the data. It features only skirmishes, no campaign, with up to 10 players each controlling one of three races. The TEC, the Advent, and the Vasari.
The TEC: or Trader Emergency Coalition are the humans of the game. When it comes to skirmishes their technology boosts their mining and trade higher than Advent or Vasari so while they can't stand in open conflict they are able to marshal ships faster and in greater number.
Advent: Are a highly spiritual race that was focused on culture and knowledge. However their knowledge was spent on non-military methods so their weapons of warfare do not surpass the Vasari, but does offer them a level playing ground. Psi-Tech and psionic abilities are completely normal among the population and gameplay focuses on spreading your culture to offer you bonuses even when attacking enemies systems.
Vasari: The Vasari Empire was bent on complete domination of the universe and was succeeding up to a point. They were driven from their home systems by a mysterious force that follows them forever, and even with the loss of the majority of their fleet and resources, their military technology vastly surpasses that of the TEC and Advent giving them the major combat bonus when engaged in open combat in skirmishes.
Game-Play: Actual game play is really good, you have the distinction between capital ships and frigates, capital ships are self explanatory and offer many purposes and the back bone of your fleet. Frigates can also fulfill almost any job and be far greater in number, 16 capital ships and 120 of the best frigates with max population, but are nowhere near as effective and lack the ability to gain experience. The point of the game is to take over the universe, and these universes can be pre-built small universes or custom made maps containing over one thousand different systems to conquer which means games can go very long. Each side goes about conquering in a different manner, the TEC use economics to out produce others, the Advent culturally assimilate you from the safety of their colonies, and the Vasari just march a fleet through the other's front lines.
Overall the game is superb, and I recommend that any RTS fan buys it as it is certainly a great game
~The Lurker
The TEC: or Trader Emergency Coalition are the humans of the game. When it comes to skirmishes their technology boosts their mining and trade higher than Advent or Vasari so while they can't stand in open conflict they are able to marshal ships faster and in greater number.
Advent: Are a highly spiritual race that was focused on culture and knowledge. However their knowledge was spent on non-military methods so their weapons of warfare do not surpass the Vasari, but does offer them a level playing ground. Psi-Tech and psionic abilities are completely normal among the population and gameplay focuses on spreading your culture to offer you bonuses even when attacking enemies systems.
Vasari: The Vasari Empire was bent on complete domination of the universe and was succeeding up to a point. They were driven from their home systems by a mysterious force that follows them forever, and even with the loss of the majority of their fleet and resources, their military technology vastly surpasses that of the TEC and Advent giving them the major combat bonus when engaged in open combat in skirmishes.
Game-Play: Actual game play is really good, you have the distinction between capital ships and frigates, capital ships are self explanatory and offer many purposes and the back bone of your fleet. Frigates can also fulfill almost any job and be far greater in number, 16 capital ships and 120 of the best frigates with max population, but are nowhere near as effective and lack the ability to gain experience. The point of the game is to take over the universe, and these universes can be pre-built small universes or custom made maps containing over one thousand different systems to conquer which means games can go very long. Each side goes about conquering in a different manner, the TEC use economics to out produce others, the Advent culturally assimilate you from the safety of their colonies, and the Vasari just march a fleet through the other's front lines.
Overall the game is superb, and I recommend that any RTS fan buys it as it is certainly a great game
~The Lurker
Monday, March 14, 2011
Some kinda late Heroes of Newerth stuff
Well as I found out yesterday night Heroes of Newerth did another patch while I was busy playing Poke'mon.
Patch Notes in full: http://forums.heroesofnewerth.com/showthread.php?t=231959
Well the new unicorn rampage alt-avatar has me a bit worried, as people that don't play rampage properly end up feeding badly with horrible charges. So the resulting buying/playing will be painful for a couple days.
Aluna: Got some major buffs here, her deja vu skill that was supposed to be her escape should actually be somewhat useful now with the unit walking and slow always attached instead of just after an emerald red. But more importantly she doesn't spend all her charges at once, only one at a time. Now this is going to make her even more mana dependent which could hurt her be forcing her to get more regen instead of straight damage, but allows her to use her abilities more effectively and not waste ulti charges.
Some nerfs to Myrmidon which could be useful, as his double stun combo was extremely effective.
A lot of orb effects no longer propagate to illusions and that is a major change. Geometer's bane is no longer as useful without the extra instances of attack modifiers it gives but more importantly that is a major nerf to my favorite hero sand wraith. His late game damage came from his illusions and without the attack modifiers for slows they just won't have the same damage uptime from a running enemy, and while this more refers to pubs it will be harder to trick unobservant enemies into using their CC on an illusions before porting as it won't apply a slow effect.
Other than that there has just been a bunch of optimization for how the game runs so hopefully that should make a noticeable difference in the servers especially if it is optimizing how they are sending/receiving data packets.
~ The Lurker
Patch Notes in full: http://forums.heroesofnewerth.com/showthread.php?t=231959
Well the new unicorn rampage alt-avatar has me a bit worried, as people that don't play rampage properly end up feeding badly with horrible charges. So the resulting buying/playing will be painful for a couple days.
Aluna: Got some major buffs here, her deja vu skill that was supposed to be her escape should actually be somewhat useful now with the unit walking and slow always attached instead of just after an emerald red. But more importantly she doesn't spend all her charges at once, only one at a time. Now this is going to make her even more mana dependent which could hurt her be forcing her to get more regen instead of straight damage, but allows her to use her abilities more effectively and not waste ulti charges.
Some nerfs to Myrmidon which could be useful, as his double stun combo was extremely effective.
A lot of orb effects no longer propagate to illusions and that is a major change. Geometer's bane is no longer as useful without the extra instances of attack modifiers it gives but more importantly that is a major nerf to my favorite hero sand wraith. His late game damage came from his illusions and without the attack modifiers for slows they just won't have the same damage uptime from a running enemy, and while this more refers to pubs it will be harder to trick unobservant enemies into using their CC on an illusions before porting as it won't apply a slow effect.
Other than that there has just been a bunch of optimization for how the game runs so hopefully that should make a noticeable difference in the servers especially if it is optimizing how they are sending/receiving data packets.
~ The Lurker
Sunday, March 13, 2011
Poke'mon
Well, I am pretty sure at this point within the Nintendo franchise every web comic and blogger is essentially required to post something about the new Poke'mon game, so here it goes. Now since I played Poke'mon all the way from the start I fell in love with the original 250 Poke'mon. Yes 250 since the first episode that was in development for the show was made while the game was featured Ho-Oh a legendary from Gold/Silver. Well that aside, my party is of course comprised of 6 Poke'mon from those and I see nothing I like really in the new Poke'mon. In fact most of them seem to be bad rehashes of older Poke'mon. So I went and grabbed Black earlier today and decided that I would just do a Nuzlock challenge until I beat the Elite 4 of this game then transfer over my old favorite party. Feel free to post your opinions on the new game and your favorite Poke-Party below, would love to hear what you guys think of it.
~The Lurker
~The Lurker
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Opening cutscene(requires imagination)
Now, since my game which really needs a name, I might think of some ideas soon and put up a poll or something. Is still in its very early stages, as I am still working on core mechanics and the GUI, it is not really all that pretty right now, they are almost all still placeholder 30 second polygon jumbles. However, I still was able to finish the scripting required for the opening cut-scene. Now here is where the imagination comes into play, and remember this is medieval fantasy we are talking about here:
Fading in you see your lord, which hopefully will be player designed instead of stock, in his bed with the advisor sitting on a chair next to him. With your lord slowly waking, "My liege, finally you are awake. You have been asleep for quite some time now, I told you that you shouldn't have ventured to the south."
You sit up in your bed, staring intently at your advisor as he calls in food and drink for you. "Quickly now, you must regain your strength as the world has gone to hell while you were asleep."
Pan over dead and dying settlers in a small village "The plagues in the south-west have been growing rapidly." Change scene to a large tower locked behind walls. "The Wizards guild has shut itself in from the world." Now a picture of trade caravans "The Vaisseau trading company has completely taken over all trade." Final pan of a battlefield where two large armies are fighting, "And the wars have grown more rabid."
And finally back to the lord and advisor in the bedroom, "We are stuck in the middle of all of this and can only hide for so long before it reaches us. Something must be done, we need to secure ourselves as a part of the world. There is plenty to do my liege, the choice is yours." and fade out.
Tell me what you think, I would post a fraps of the cut-scene, but as I said still using place-holder models and I even lack music so just giving you a script of what it does and says is all I can offer.
~The Lurker
Fading in you see your lord, which hopefully will be player designed instead of stock, in his bed with the advisor sitting on a chair next to him. With your lord slowly waking, "My liege, finally you are awake. You have been asleep for quite some time now, I told you that you shouldn't have ventured to the south."
You sit up in your bed, staring intently at your advisor as he calls in food and drink for you. "Quickly now, you must regain your strength as the world has gone to hell while you were asleep."
Pan over dead and dying settlers in a small village "The plagues in the south-west have been growing rapidly." Change scene to a large tower locked behind walls. "The Wizards guild has shut itself in from the world." Now a picture of trade caravans "The Vaisseau trading company has completely taken over all trade." Final pan of a battlefield where two large armies are fighting, "And the wars have grown more rabid."
And finally back to the lord and advisor in the bedroom, "We are stuck in the middle of all of this and can only hide for so long before it reaches us. Something must be done, we need to secure ourselves as a part of the world. There is plenty to do my liege, the choice is yours." and fade out.
Tell me what you think, I would post a fraps of the cut-scene, but as I said still using place-holder models and I even lack music so just giving you a script of what it does and says is all I can offer.
~The Lurker
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
Mid-terms
Well my Mid-terms for this semester are finally done so I can get back to posting regularly. They went fairly well, had to present preliminary stuff for a project in my game design class but you guys really don't want to hear about this sort of stuff. Well I have another cast up on you-tube, loaded it a while ago actually, but never got to posting about it here so the link follows: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3n3VbGH7edU
Actually really late on this train thanks to mid-terms, but Skyrim trailer is awesome. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbmBYT8Dwf4&feature=relmfu. Been waiting for the next elder scrolls game for a long time, and from the video you can see just how heavily they modified the Gamebyro engine to their own uses. I mean yeah they said that they made some changes but that is incredible. I am, just like I'm sure many other Elder Scrolls fans are, now replaying Oblivion and Morrowind before Skyrim comes out. If anyone has any good mods for Oblivion they would want to point to feel free in the comments, already got a good selection but always willing to try more.
I have a lot more to post on and will do so later, cuanta vida.
~ The Lurker
Actually really late on this train thanks to mid-terms, but Skyrim trailer is awesome. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbmBYT8Dwf4&feature=relmfu. Been waiting for the next elder scrolls game for a long time, and from the video you can see just how heavily they modified the Gamebyro engine to their own uses. I mean yeah they said that they made some changes but that is incredible. I am, just like I'm sure many other Elder Scrolls fans are, now replaying Oblivion and Morrowind before Skyrim comes out. If anyone has any good mods for Oblivion they would want to point to feel free in the comments, already got a good selection but always willing to try more.
I have a lot more to post on and will do so later, cuanta vida.
~ The Lurker
Saturday, February 26, 2011
Aluna - the comic inspired hero
Well the release has come out and with very mixed ideas about how it is and by mixed I mean that the forums seem to have a seething hatred of her for trying to do something knew and the possibility of even a semi maybe hard carry int. I mean really, the QQ present is enormous and all the people not QQ'ing just want to shove her into a support role and be done with her and all the rest want her scrapped and made into windrunner. Personally I am liking her a lot, due to the ulti-power throw similarity to Kaldr I love being able to get kills with a careful shot like that.
Now for the actual hero herself, long ability descriptions so just a link for that I shall provide. http://www.hon-utilities.com/guides/aluna-guide-hon-aluna-items-gameplay-strategy-guide/1410/ - note that when I create this that the Hon-utilities site does not contain any guides or item builds for Aluna.
I would suggest stun - throw - deja vu - throw - throw - ulti then max throw - stun - deja vu in that order all before stats picking up ulti at 6/11/16.
The reason being is that her nuke - ulti combo loses a lot of its effectiveness the later the game goes on, while in the early levels I found it very easy to snipe a retreating enemy or just one sitting in a lane with low health for an easy kill.
Now since I play my heroes of sustainability along with damage I'm going to recommend starting with scarab 2 runes of the blight and 1 mana pot. After that go into a sustainer for early health/mana regen and ghost boots since I love noclip. After that build a Hellflower - Bloodstone - Harkons to really keep the damage up and if your game lasts to the point of getting that which would surprise me afterwards I suggest getting savage mace for the extra damage and sheepstick for some extra control.
Her Release Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eeFcK3Af2Y&feature=player_embedded
Now for the actual hero herself, long ability descriptions so just a link for that I shall provide. http://www.hon-utilities.com/guides/aluna-guide-hon-aluna-items-gameplay-strategy-guide/1410/ - note that when I create this that the Hon-utilities site does not contain any guides or item builds for Aluna.
I would suggest stun - throw - deja vu - throw - throw - ulti then max throw - stun - deja vu in that order all before stats picking up ulti at 6/11/16.
The reason being is that her nuke - ulti combo loses a lot of its effectiveness the later the game goes on, while in the early levels I found it very easy to snipe a retreating enemy or just one sitting in a lane with low health for an easy kill.
Now since I play my heroes of sustainability along with damage I'm going to recommend starting with scarab 2 runes of the blight and 1 mana pot. After that go into a sustainer for early health/mana regen and ghost boots since I love noclip. After that build a Hellflower - Bloodstone - Harkons to really keep the damage up and if your game lasts to the point of getting that which would surprise me afterwards I suggest getting savage mace for the extra damage and sheepstick for some extra control.
Her Release Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eeFcK3Af2Y&feature=player_embedded
Thursday, February 24, 2011
More Heroes of Newerth stuff
Well the last post was about the recent major balance changes they did, but now we also have a new hero Aluna. To my knowledge they haven't released any hard numbers or tool tips for any abilities but it does appear that her ulti is a less rng based but still similar to Blacksmith in that it augments her other abilities rather than giving her another one.
Official Upcoming Hero Thread:
http://forums.heroesofnewerth.com/showthread.php?t=224744
Official Teaser Video:
Now the interesting thing is probably the ending since of course like the others it is perfectly staged. She clearly has her ulti effect her Power Throw ability in an attack against Pebbles all the way across the map in his well. Now my first thought about this is going back to Kaldr the Ancient Apparition hero in DotA and my love of his ulti for sniping retreating heroes all day. Now this is just my thoughts that the hero may end up acting like Kaldr since we don't know anything exactly, but Legion do seem to be getting a lot of love lately and we could really use some more Hellbourne int. Post in the comments your thoughts on how her abilities work, but be quick she is coming out hopefully tomorrow.
Official Upcoming Hero Thread:
http://forums.heroesofnewerth.com/showthread.php?t=224744
Official Teaser Video:
Now the interesting thing is probably the ending since of course like the others it is perfectly staged. She clearly has her ulti effect her Power Throw ability in an attack against Pebbles all the way across the map in his well. Now my first thought about this is going back to Kaldr the Ancient Apparition hero in DotA and my love of his ulti for sniping retreating heroes all day. Now this is just my thoughts that the hero may end up acting like Kaldr since we don't know anything exactly, but Legion do seem to be getting a lot of love lately and we could really use some more Hellbourne int. Post in the comments your thoughts on how her abilities work, but be quick she is coming out hopefully tomorrow.
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
So much to catch up on.
Well the first blog will have to be about the recent mass retuning patch that happened in Heroes of Newerth, patch 2.0.14 and subsequent bug fixes (2.0.14.2, 2.0.15). Due to the extensive nature of this patch I will just include a link to an S2 post containing the information:
http://forums.heroesofnewerth.com/showthread.php?t=222338
Major item changes:
Alchemist bones, definitely a good one for enabling you to build up charges for those instances at which you are busy engaging the enemy and can't run off to the forest to get a creep.
Behemoth's Heart was brought much more in line with the DotA counterpart.
Some more expensive items have had their costs decreased to allow for quicker buying and less farming for hopefully more action.
The Post Haste change is interesting, the increase to move speed is ehhh but the move speed buff after teleport guarantees max move speed after teleporting.
Hero Changes:
A lot of buffs for support heroes along with movement speed increases for a bunch of heroes, the corrupted move speed buff does worry me however as giving him too much.
A ton of bug fixes for different heroes.
Demented Shaman's new spell - Unbreakable: Target allied hero is affected with Unbreakable (state) for 6 seconds. Affected hero gains 15/30/45/60 Attack Damage and if he receives fatal damage while affected by Unbreakable, he does not die and is instead restored to 150/250/350/450 health is clearly making him more like his dota equivalent however this is much stronger than shallow grave.
Legionnaire has a nice counter system on his spin which should help those of us without the luck to get many spins to at least get one once in a while, while jungling.
Magmus now has an open slot for an attack modifier since volcanic touch is no longer one, should be interesting to see what people go for, or if they do, my thoughts would be shielder breaker personally.
Ophelia judgment damage got needed normalization. Charges on command for getting creeps after a team fight late game is easier. And a buff to commanded creeps move speed so they are no longer lagging around and easily kitable.
Painful nerfing to Sand Wraith, when the only reason he has been seen so much lately was the trilane meta-game which is the problem that need be fixed not sand wraith, who people were asking for buffs for before trilaning.
Thats it for major changes with the recent patches, I have 2 more posts planned and hopefully they will be out later today or early tomorrow.
http://forums.heroesofnewerth.com/showthread.php?t=222338
Major item changes:
Alchemist bones, definitely a good one for enabling you to build up charges for those instances at which you are busy engaging the enemy and can't run off to the forest to get a creep.
Behemoth's Heart was brought much more in line with the DotA counterpart.
Some more expensive items have had their costs decreased to allow for quicker buying and less farming for hopefully more action.
The Post Haste change is interesting, the increase to move speed is ehhh but the move speed buff after teleport guarantees max move speed after teleporting.
Hero Changes:
A lot of buffs for support heroes along with movement speed increases for a bunch of heroes, the corrupted move speed buff does worry me however as giving him too much.
A ton of bug fixes for different heroes.
Demented Shaman's new spell - Unbreakable: Target allied hero is affected with Unbreakable (state) for 6 seconds. Affected hero gains 15/30/45/60 Attack Damage and if he receives fatal damage while affected by Unbreakable, he does not die and is instead restored to 150/250/350/450 health is clearly making him more like his dota equivalent however this is much stronger than shallow grave.
Legionnaire has a nice counter system on his spin which should help those of us without the luck to get many spins to at least get one once in a while, while jungling.
Magmus now has an open slot for an attack modifier since volcanic touch is no longer one, should be interesting to see what people go for, or if they do, my thoughts would be shielder breaker personally.
Ophelia judgment damage got needed normalization. Charges on command for getting creeps after a team fight late game is easier. And a buff to commanded creeps move speed so they are no longer lagging around and easily kitable.
Painful nerfing to Sand Wraith, when the only reason he has been seen so much lately was the trilane meta-game which is the problem that need be fixed not sand wraith, who people were asking for buffs for before trilaning.
Thats it for major changes with the recent patches, I have 2 more posts planned and hopefully they will be out later today or early tomorrow.
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Long time Update
Well it has been a while since I last updated, been busy with the usual junk. Been playing a ton of Dead Space 2, awesome game. No major work updates for now
Heroes of Newerth Update:
- New Monitor game feature
* Right click a friend or clanmate who is ingame to Monitor them, getting basic stats that update every minute
- Casual Mode changes
* Decreased creep bounty to normalized Normal Mode values, down from 1.25x
* Hero bounties to 2x of Normal Mode values, up from 1.5x
* These changes are aimed at addressing the dominance of carries by reducing creep farming rate and increasing the gap between killer and victim so early game power is more significant
- Added a new Alt Avatar for Soul Reaper, the Grim Reaper
- There are now keybinds in the options menu to level up each of your skills
* Default bound to ALT+Z, ALT+X, ALT+C, ALT+V, and ALT+O for abilities and stats
- Fixed a bug where mousing over the minimap would sometimes turn the cursor into a targeting cursor
- Fixed bugs with many of the models in the game. Results in a small performance increase
- Predasaurs no longer have evasion, now have additional Armor (same effective HP against attacks)
- Vagabond Assassins will not longer automatically purge nearby players
- Sporespitters no longer has +15 free damage per attack
- Antlore Healers will no longer heal themselves
- Empath
* Range on Illusory Veil changed to 800
The changes for the next 2 sub patches were just bug fixes so no need to write up on that. The Predasaur change is nice, no longer will they evade 5 attacks in a row in the most annoying thing ever and the monitor ability is going to be good for those of us that play commonly with friends.
In the world of Starcraft 2 in a last but not least part of the update I did cast that match. Was only able to do one match that wasn't even a very good match and due to my unfamiliarity with the software I was only able to upload to youtube in 360p if someone knows how to get higher when using fraps for the video capture and virtualdub for the compression say so in the comments. I will be casting another as hopefully Protoss since they are my main race but if I get a good Terran match sooner I will do that one, if you guys post that you like the casts on the videos I will continue to do those also.
Heroes of Newerth Update:
- New Monitor game feature
* Right click a friend or clanmate who is ingame to Monitor them, getting basic stats that update every minute
- Casual Mode changes
* Decreased creep bounty to normalized Normal Mode values, down from 1.25x
* Hero bounties to 2x of Normal Mode values, up from 1.5x
* These changes are aimed at addressing the dominance of carries by reducing creep farming rate and increasing the gap between killer and victim so early game power is more significant
- Added a new Alt Avatar for Soul Reaper, the Grim Reaper
- There are now keybinds in the options menu to level up each of your skills
* Default bound to ALT+Z, ALT+X, ALT+C, ALT+V, and ALT+O for abilities and stats
- Fixed a bug where mousing over the minimap would sometimes turn the cursor into a targeting cursor
- Fixed bugs with many of the models in the game. Results in a small performance increase
- Predasaurs no longer have evasion, now have additional Armor (same effective HP against attacks)
- Vagabond Assassins will not longer automatically purge nearby players
- Sporespitters no longer has +15 free damage per attack
- Antlore Healers will no longer heal themselves
- Empath
* Range on Illusory Veil changed to 800
The changes for the next 2 sub patches were just bug fixes so no need to write up on that. The Predasaur change is nice, no longer will they evade 5 attacks in a row in the most annoying thing ever and the monitor ability is going to be good for those of us that play commonly with friends.
In the world of Starcraft 2 in a last but not least part of the update I did cast that match. Was only able to do one match that wasn't even a very good match and due to my unfamiliarity with the software I was only able to upload to youtube in 360p if someone knows how to get higher when using fraps for the video capture and virtualdub for the compression say so in the comments. I will be casting another as hopefully Protoss since they are my main race but if I get a good Terran match sooner I will do that one, if you guys post that you like the casts on the videos I will continue to do those also.
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Some more Starcraft 2
Earlier today, or possibly last night I don't usually pay much attention to the little Starcraft 2 news in the homepage of the game. They released the PTR patch notes and there isn't much there just some bug fixes but I will post none the less.
General
A special sneak peek at new ladder maps is now available!
Matchmaking has been updated to better match players queuing with pre-made teams in 2v2, 3v3, and 4v4 brackets.
Bug Fixes
General
Fixed an issue where the title of a conversation window was scaling rather than truncating.
Fixed an issue where the Match History score screen was displaying "Null" for the map info for all games played before Patch 1.2.
Fixed an issue that would sometimes cause players to be improperly disconnected from a game.
(Mac) Fixed an issue that would cause the Control key to become stuck when holding Control and minimizing the game window, then going back to the game window and attempting to use Control+1 to create a control group.
Maps
Fixed an issue with foliage that would die and become visible through the fog of war when a player spawned as zerg.
StarCraft II Editor
Fixed an issue where copied-and-pasted units were not set to the correct height in-game.
Fixed an issue where the table view scroll-bar position was reset when switching objects.
Fixed an issue where secondary sort priorities were not working properly. Model name is now the secondary sort so that models are listed in alphabetical order after being sorted by the mod they are contained in.
These are PTR notes though so they are definitely subject to change. Now the new maps I haven't gotten to try yet but hopefully later I can get into the PTR and try 'em out to tell you guys how they are. I will also since I talk so much about Starcraft and Warcraft being a Blizzard fanboy, cast and post a game of myself sucking so you guys can have a quick laugh.
General
A special sneak peek at new ladder maps is now available!
Matchmaking has been updated to better match players queuing with pre-made teams in 2v2, 3v3, and 4v4 brackets.
Bug Fixes
General
Fixed an issue where the title of a conversation window was scaling rather than truncating.
Fixed an issue where the Match History score screen was displaying "Null" for the map info for all games played before Patch 1.2.
Fixed an issue that would sometimes cause players to be improperly disconnected from a game.
(Mac) Fixed an issue that would cause the Control key to become stuck when holding Control and minimizing the game window, then going back to the game window and attempting to use Control+1 to create a control group.
Maps
Fixed an issue with foliage that would die and become visible through the fog of war when a player spawned as zerg.
StarCraft II Editor
Fixed an issue where copied-and-pasted units were not set to the correct height in-game.
Fixed an issue where the table view scroll-bar position was reset when switching objects.
Fixed an issue where secondary sort priorities were not working properly. Model name is now the secondary sort so that models are listed in alphabetical order after being sorted by the mod they are contained in.
These are PTR notes though so they are definitely subject to change. Now the new maps I haven't gotten to try yet but hopefully later I can get into the PTR and try 'em out to tell you guys how they are. I will also since I talk so much about Starcraft and Warcraft being a Blizzard fanboy, cast and post a game of myself sucking so you guys can have a quick laugh.
Monday, February 7, 2011
Work Update
Well I actually have some work done now, Chapter 5 is finished being typed up and saved and what not. Still needs thorough proof readings later but I can just sit down and reread the whole thing once I'm done. I started this book with the November book writing competition motivation thing and really sucked at it. Supposed to have finished some awesome long fiction in one month and here I am just having finished chapter 5 in February. I would post the chapter along with this, but I am not terribly trusting of Google and its Intellectual Property rules.
On a less writery note and more programmer note, 2 of the only 3 things I do the last being kick ass at video games, I completely failed at making any progress in pathfinding. Surely there are some fellow programmers out there that could maybe point me in the right direction. I am doing this almost entirely in C++, a little java mixed in here and there, with the middleware Irrlicht. So any insight into how one goes about a pathfinding AI or links to guides in the comments would be appreciated.
~The Lurker
On a less writery note and more programmer note, 2 of the only 3 things I do the last being kick ass at video games, I completely failed at making any progress in pathfinding. Surely there are some fellow programmers out there that could maybe point me in the right direction. I am doing this almost entirely in C++, a little java mixed in here and there, with the middleware Irrlicht. So any insight into how one goes about a pathfinding AI or links to guides in the comments would be appreciated.
~The Lurker
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Awesome stuff I am doing instead of working.
Well, nobody likes to actually work right especially when its programming. So I guess I'll update this in a further attempt to waste time.
Awesome Starcraft 2 replay http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6ahVp-kKuw casted by none other than H to the usky Husky, over an hour long best of 7 ZvP. Check it out it will be worth the watch.
And of course like always here is the link of the, well can't really say day since I usually update what like twice a week on the old site, so link of the when I feel like it of music. Two different Legend of Zelda music pieces that were redone in reverse.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJwtj-nG6Jw&feature=related Ikana Valley
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SiCOBlwJ9GY Song of Healing, yup I shouldn't have done that ARG for the win.
Due to lack of anything else to do I should probably get to work again. Going to get some coding for the pathfinding A.I. in my video game but its being a real pain and then I have to write up chapter 5 of my story.
~ The Lurker
Awesome Starcraft 2 replay http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6ahVp-kKuw casted by none other than H to the usky Husky, over an hour long best of 7 ZvP. Check it out it will be worth the watch.
And of course like always here is the link of the, well can't really say day since I usually update what like twice a week on the old site, so link of the when I feel like it of music. Two different Legend of Zelda music pieces that were redone in reverse.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJwtj-nG6Jw&feature=related Ikana Valley
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SiCOBlwJ9GY Song of Healing, yup I shouldn't have done that ARG for the win.
Due to lack of anything else to do I should probably get to work again. Going to get some coding for the pathfinding A.I. in my video game but its being a real pain and then I have to write up chapter 5 of my story.
~ The Lurker
Heroes of Newerth
Well, after moving websites I will have a lot to catch you guys up on. I could no longer pay for the website hosting so alas it is gone for good, hopefully here I will be able to add in an archive all of the old data. On to more, or less, serious business. I will probably update frequently for the first few days to get things back up and running.
As many HoN fans know the new Hero Empath came out this weekend, a hero designed strictly for support and in not anyway meant to carry. Well, for those that know me I made a carry build anyways and will add that later but first we should discuss the hero and normal play. (All Subject to Change as Hero was just released and will probably be nerfed into oblivion)
Empath Ranged Intelligence hero - Support/Initiator
Essence Link: Creates a link between self and target enemy unit, stealing (30/45/60/75) health per second for 5 seconds. If the maximum distance is reached on the link, the life steal stops but the linked enemy is stunned (1/1.5/2/2.5) seconds.
Illusory Veil: Range 1000, Mana Cost 100, Cooldown 18 seconds, 600 Width Wall lasting for 2/3/4/5 seconds and dealing 50 dps to units within 150
Synergy: Grants all allied heroes (0.75/1.5/2.25/3) + (0.05/0.1/0.15/0.2)% of Max health in Health Regeneration.
As One: Bonds Empath with target allied hero, buffing the host’s Attack Damage and Attack Speed by (40/60/80). While inside, Empath may cast spells and use items as normal. Grants a sub-skill, “Faster!” which grants her host a large but short speed burst.
Great sounding support, the ability to heal herself and stun depending on what is needed, a placeable wall that unlike behemoths allies can walk through but enemies can't. Synergy is an awesomer version of Glacius' aura which gives scaling health regen, Glacius should get scaling mana, and her Ulti makes her able to sit in the middle of the fight to be able to support fully.
For builds i would suggest: Ghost Marchers - Astrolabe - Nome's Wisdom - Barrier Idol - Sheep Stick - Hellflower - then scrap Astrolabe for Codex because if the game has lasted this long the extra damage will help more than a 250 heal.
For a more Carry oriented build: Ghost Marchers - Hellflower - Sheep Stick - Codex - Spellshards - Frostwulfs skull. Granted in neither case should you expect to actually finish these builds as that is an enormous amount of farming required. Well that brings you guys up to speed on the new Hero Empath so I will post again later on other events.
~ The Lurker.
As many HoN fans know the new Hero Empath came out this weekend, a hero designed strictly for support and in not anyway meant to carry. Well, for those that know me I made a carry build anyways and will add that later but first we should discuss the hero and normal play. (All Subject to Change as Hero was just released and will probably be nerfed into oblivion)
Empath Ranged Intelligence hero - Support/Initiator
Essence Link: Creates a link between self and target enemy unit, stealing (30/45/60/75) health per second for 5 seconds. If the maximum distance is reached on the link, the life steal stops but the linked enemy is stunned (1/1.5/2/2.5) seconds.
Illusory Veil: Range 1000, Mana Cost 100, Cooldown 18 seconds, 600 Width Wall lasting for 2/3/4/5 seconds and dealing 50 dps to units within 150
Synergy: Grants all allied heroes (0.75/1.5/2.25/3) + (0.05/0.1/0.15/0.2)% of Max health in Health Regeneration.
As One: Bonds Empath with target allied hero, buffing the host’s Attack Damage and Attack Speed by (40/60/80). While inside, Empath may cast spells and use items as normal. Grants a sub-skill, “Faster!” which grants her host a large but short speed burst.
Great sounding support, the ability to heal herself and stun depending on what is needed, a placeable wall that unlike behemoths allies can walk through but enemies can't. Synergy is an awesomer version of Glacius' aura which gives scaling health regen, Glacius should get scaling mana, and her Ulti makes her able to sit in the middle of the fight to be able to support fully.
For builds i would suggest: Ghost Marchers - Astrolabe - Nome's Wisdom - Barrier Idol - Sheep Stick - Hellflower - then scrap Astrolabe for Codex because if the game has lasted this long the extra damage will help more than a 250 heal.
For a more Carry oriented build: Ghost Marchers - Hellflower - Sheep Stick - Codex - Spellshards - Frostwulfs skull. Granted in neither case should you expect to actually finish these builds as that is an enormous amount of farming required. Well that brings you guys up to speed on the new Hero Empath so I will post again later on other events.
~ The Lurker.
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