TallGuyCalif's Computer Gaming and Entertainment Site

Tag: RPG

  • Game download service Impulse seriously broken

    Note: I will temper my diatribe below by saying that buried in the emailed receipt is the DLC code.

    I wrote some good things about the Impulse game download service some time ago when I compared Impulse to Steam. At the time, I said that I would prefer to get a game over Impulse rather than Steam if they were the same price. Well Impulse is giving me fits and here’s why:

    When you get a boxed game, you get all sorts of little pieces of paper that have various codes you need to enter to activate the game and activate downloadable content (DLC). Occasionally you get a manual, too.

    Now when you buy a game from Steam or Impulse, you may or may not get a PDF of the manual (buried somewhere in the game folder), but you don’t get all the activation codes on pieces of paper. Instead, they will show the game activation code in the launcher app (actually Steam shows it to you when you launch the game, which is nice). Impulse makes you ask for it via a right click, but it is not hard to get.

    So what’s wrong with this?

    I bought Dragon Age: Ultimate Edition from Impulse because it was on sale. I already had a disk version, so I uninstalled that before doing anything. The new game downloaded and installed OK and was properly activated with the serial code. Then, when the game was launched, none of the added content (Ultimate Edition, remember) was there. Apparently what was supposed to have happened was Impulse should have popped up a window to show me the code to activate the DLC. That didn’t happen. And since I don’t have a simple slip of paper, I don’t have the DLC code. I’m not the only one with the problem – the forums are full of people in the same boat. It turns out (perhaps) that because I already had Dragon Age installed before, perhaps some update service was left when I uninstalled, so that broke the little DLC code window, or something.

    So now I’ve uninstalled and have to install again. Yes, that means another 12GB download. If I had the DVD version, I’d be done already. Perhaps these download services aren’t so useful after all…

  • On “Freemium” Games

    I’ve been playing a lot of “freemium” games lately and have had some thoughts on them. A freemium game is free to play, but builds in mechanisms for the user to pay real money for premium features or goodies. Some of my favorite freemium games include Pocket Legends, Lord of the Rings Online, Pocket Frogs, and ElementZ HD.  In all these cases, the game is free to download and play and you don’t have to put any money in to have fun. There are other games that are very money grubbing and annoying about needing money to play well. Examples of that include GodFinger for iPhone and pretty much all the “farm” and “kingdom” games on iPhone and iPad. In these money-grubbing games, the grind would be made easier if you just had more mojo or power or whatever valuable stuff, and the game maker would be happy to sell you some. In most cases, you can earn mojo or power or gold, but at a pretty lousy rate. I’ll discuss premium features of the games I like in turn below.

    Some games, like Pocket Frogs, are freemium, but that doesn’t take away from the enjoyment one bit. In Pocket Frogs, the consumables are coins, stamps, and potions, each of which can be bought in the store for real money. The good news is that if you play the game “right,” meaning you play to earn experience to rise in level, you spend a bit of time out in the pond with your frogs gaining experience. In the pond, you occasionally come across gifts, most of which are a few coins, a stamp or two, some potions, or another frog. Sometimes, however, you hit a red gift that has 300 coins or a new habitat (usually worth a lot. Never buy habitats — you’ll get all you can use in the pond.). So if you have a modicum of patience and like taming the frogs in the pond, which I do because it is relaxing, then you can play the game without ever putting in a penny. While I really like this model and this game, it may not be making too much money for the game devs.

    In ElementZ HD, the commodity is “coins.” Certain special buttons that can provide significant advantage cost some number of coins to use, and while coins are occasionally won during the game, the total quickly dwindles if you use those power-ups. Since my wife and I play ElementZ HD for fun rather than trying to always beat the high scores (which we’ll never do), we have lots of coins and never use the power-ups, so again, not the best business model, but a fun game.

    Lord of the Rings Online, however, might have a viable business model. You can have fun without paying a penny, but if you put a little bit of money in, the game will be a lot better. Things you can buy from the LOTRO store include quest packs, more inventory, horse riding skills (and horses), small character upgrades, and potions and such. Some of the items, such as the quest packs, are unlocked for all characters in an account, while specific upgrades are linked to a particular character. The store also has occasional sales, so wait for them to buy things like quest packs, which you will get to later, but probably don’t need just now. I have bought the riding skill, inventory bags, quest packs, and perhaps one minor trait upgrade. You can buy horses in game for 500 gold, once you have the riding skill, but that took me a long time to get as a newbie character (but I did it). The truly lazy can buy horses in the store for somewhere around $8-10. The game awards Turbine Points (the LOTRO store currency) for certain deeds, but it does so at a slow enough rate that plonking down $20 will allow you to have more fun and less frustration (particularly with inventory – buy the bags).

    Since Pocket Legends is an MMORPG on the iPad (and iPhone), it too is made more fun with premium features. The items available for “platinum,” the store’s currency, include weapons and armor, outfits, potions, and quest packs. I bought some armor and a good weapon in the store for just a few platinum (less than 5 total, I think, so less than a dollar’s worth) and it made the game a lot more fun. I played with two others few some levels last night and it was terrific. I was a level 7 warrior, and my compatriots were a level 9 magic user and a level 5 archer, which was a great combination. While I tanked, the magic user healed us and blasted enemies and the archer did ranged damage. With my new armor, I was able to handle more punishment from the zombie hoards and my new weapon kicked butt! I haven’t bought quest packs yet, since I’m just getting started, but will do so soon. I don’t yet know if quest packs are account-wide or character specific, but I assume the weapons and armor from the store are character specific.

    So the bottom line is that putting some money into premium features makes good sense for the freemium MMORPGs, but perhaps less sense for more casual games. In any case, the amount of money needed is fairly small to make noticeable enhancements to the MMORPG games. With each of these 4 games, the feeling that you need to pay money to play is not prevalent and obtrusive, as it is in some other freemium games that I don’t want to play for that reason even if they were fun.

  • Free MMORPGs for all!

    I’ve been enjoying two free-to-play MMORPGs a lot recently. Lord of the Rings Online is a terrific MMORPG for the PC with good combat, skills, and even crafting. I’ve been working on my prospector and jeweler crafting in order to be able to make good stuff for my kinship. I joined a pretty terrific kinship that supports each other and helps those of us that get stuck sometimes. One member loaded me up with good armor and a staff that was way better than what I had collected. I went on a fellowship quest into the Great Barrow with several of my kin yesterday. It’s a good thing. Join LOTRO and find a good kinship.

    I’ve also written about Pocket Legends a bit. It’s an iPad (and iPhone) MMORPG that is easy to pick up and quick to get into the quests and find a group to play with (okay, it’s pretty much automatic, if you let it choose for you). It’s pretty darn cool to play with people from all over the country or world while just tapping away on the iPad. Very nifty!

    Now I see that Champions Online is going to go free-to-play. I’ve heard very good things about CO, but I think I will hold off, since I’ve already got way too many games and not enough time.

    Finally, I’m enjoying Star Trek Online’s weekly episodes. They have some pretty tough ground battles against interesting opponents. I know STO isn’t free, but I already paid for the lifetime membership, so it seems that way to me. It is still a bit annoying with the Cryptic Store where they want you to buy ships and more, but the hustling for money isn’t quite as acute as in Pocket Legends or LOTRO. I did put some money into LOTRO to buy some quest packs and some inventory space, so I’ll have to see if I continue to enjoy Pocket Legends before I put much money into it.

    By the way, I saw a tweet that said the closed beta for the Android version of Pocket Legends has started, so it will be available to even non-Apple folks. Of course the lack of consistency in the hardware (resolution, speed, etc.) may make the UI more challenging, but I’m glad they’re making the effort.

  • More Pocket Legends

    Though I have managed to fix my gaming PC’s power supply, I’ve been playing a bit more Pocket Legends, the iPad and iPhone MMORPG, because it is fun. I’m also posting some pictures so you can see how good it looks on the iPad screen (though for some reason, the less-than-helpful WordPress iPad app resized the images to 640×480 when I selected the “Large” size – apparently they’re still living in 1987 when 640×480 was respectable, though not good).

    In the first picture, I’m in my zombie costume having talked to Halloween Hal and being told I need a costume to participate in the Halloween activities. Isn’t the zombie costume a costume? Apparently not, as old Hal wants me to buy a costume in the store for 5 platinum, which is tough, since I don’t have any platinum pieces and not too many gold either. So that’s a bummer.

    So I gave up on Halloween and went back to my quests, which are more fun anyway. The great thing about Pocket Legends is that it is very easy to get to your quests. In the quest description, there’s a button to take you there. So I zapped back to the dungeon to find some things and kill a particularly nasty zombie. As you can see from the image below, there were 3 other players there, and we all worked together to beat the quests. It was somewhat hard, because the tough zombie was really difficult and wiped us all out once or twice, but we finished the quest and got through.

    Playing with a group is good, and this was a good group (you can see from the chat in the image below that one of my compatriots thought so as well). We had a couple fighters, an archer, and a magic user, which is a great mix. Having a magic user is key, because they can do group heals, which is essential with the fast zombies. You can see my health is low, so I needed the healing help.

    Pocket Legends is good fun and well worth a look on both iPad and iPhone. I’m thinking of trying a magic user character next time…

  • Pocket Legends

    Because my main gaming PC is still down for the count because of power supply problems, I started playing Pocket Legends on the iPad. This is a pretty interesting MMORPG that looks very good on iPad (and is playable on iPhone too). The user interface is very simple, with a tap to designate a target, a tap to commence attack, and other tap buttons to for special powers or attacks. Swiping sideways rotates the camera view (I would like to be able to reverse the direction, as it seems a bit unintuitive the way it is, but there doesn’t seems to be an option).

    I started as a warrior, which is usually the safe way to go. I had armor, a sword, and shield to start. After a few cakewalk solo training missions, the game puts you in a town where other players gather. Once you get a quest, you can transport to the start of the quest. The first quest started off really easy, but the difficulty level got brutal, as some very tough and fast zombies appeared. Luckily, other players are around to help thin the enemy, but they are all at different stages of the mission, so may have different goals, so player groups tend not to be coordinated. A few levels in, even though I had better gear, I was regularly being wiped by zombie hoards. I stopped there, so I don’t know if it gets better. I do know that I saw magic users doing huge damage and healing, so perhaps that would be a better way to go. I will have to revisit it.

    In short, if you are interested in an easy-to-pick-up MMORPG that looks good on iPad (and iPhone), try Pocket Legends. It’s free and really nifty.

    As an update, I just checked out PL on the iPhone. The same character is accessible there, since it’s in the cloud. Since the screen is so much smaller, navigation is done by a virtual joystick, but otherwise, chat and actions are available. Kinda cool, but I think I’ll stick to the iPad version and its larger screen size.

  • Enjoying Lord of the Rings Online

    I’ve been playing LOTRO when I get a little while between being busy with other things, and I’m enjoying it (mostly).

    The crafting system is pretty nifty and I’m working my way up as a prospector, cook, and jeweler.

    I also finally managed to buy a horse. In order to get said horse, I had to buy the riding skill for Turbine Points (real money) and then use 500 silver (in-game money). Once I raised the money, I went to the horse farm north of Bree to get my horse, bought it, then couldn’t find the action to use it. Instead of putting the horse icon in your inventory, like all the FAQs and guides say, it hides it away in a tab on the character sheet. Once I found the thing and dragged it to my action bar, I’ve been riding like crazy.

    I also got invited into a kinship. Seems like a nice bunch of folks who are helpful and reasonable, unlike the fleet I was recruited into for Star Trek Online. So far I haven’t seen any of them in-game, not even the one that recruited me, but I’m sure I’ll need their help with a few quests shortly.

    Anyone who isn’t playing LOTRO, get it. The cost is nothing, so even if you don’t like it, you’re not out more than a few GB on your hard drive.

  • More LOTRO pictures

    More LOTRO pictures

    I have been playing a bit more Lord of the Rings Online and am mostly enjoying it. I started a hobbit hunter, but after a quick meetup with Frodo and Sam, he ended up in the same introductory quests as the human character. So then I started an elf lore-master, and that had a completely different intro quest that (I think) was a lot more fun.

    Now for some pictures: The water looks very nice, as does the night sky.

    The elf starts out in the snow.

    Finally, sunrise in The Shire looks really good (and my elf looks a bit effeminate in his hat).

  • Thoughts on Mass Effect 2

    Though Mass Effect 2 is old news, I am reminded of it because I recently managed to pry the DVD out of my drive, so it is sitting on a pile of other games on my desk. I don’t mean that it was in my drive because I loved it so much, but that I literally had to pry it from my Sony DVD drive which refuses to open if something has been in there more than a few minutes. Luckily I also have a Samsung DVD drive that works reliably for short-term disks. Anyway, on to the game.

    I quite enjoyed Mass Effect 2, probably even more than Mass Effect 1. The problem with Mass Effect 1 was that the writers went to so much trouble putting together encyclopedia entries for every thing or concept in the game and I felt guilty for not bothering to read many of them. I think Bioware has learned its lesson, so Mass Effect 2, while still having a large amount of information, doesn’t do as much to shove it down your throat.

    I liked the combat, and the team members were pretty good. In general, the missions varied from good to great and featured lots of cover-based shooting against various nasty enemies. The boss fights were pretty awesome, as well.

    I also liked the new Normandy, with its captain’s cabin to store trophies and fish and such, Overall, the important parts of the game were better than those on ME1.

    So what was bad? Well, scanning planets in order to mine them was the most tedious, carpal tunnel syndrome inducing activity ever. Essentially, you have to hold down the mouse button while sweeping over swaths of a planet from orbit. It is a horrible interface. It probably would be better on a console with a game pad, but I played on a PC, so it was awful! Curses on developer that thought it was a good idea!

    The other thing I didn’t like was that some of the missions to help your companions can’t be “won.” In other words, if you do the right thing, you piss off the companion, who then won’t be as fully capable in later fights. If you make the companion happy, people die or other bad things happen. Even in conversations with some crew members, the conflict is manufactured so that you will have to choose one over another, making one dislike you. While this isn’t a show stopper, it is an artificial way to add drama that the writers could have done better.

    Finally, there is a point towards the end of the game where half your crew is captured. If you delay too long in rescuing them (as part of the final sequence), half or almost all will die (depending on your actions). And, as you rescue them, you have to choose team members to escort them back to the Normandy. If you make a bad choice, those companions, and perhaps some crew, will be killed. I only prevented these bad things by looking at some wiki or another for hints.

    But overall, Mass Effect 2 is an excellent game and a lot of fun.

  • Finished Halo Reach

    Well, I finished Halo Reach, which both ends the series and brings everything full circle. I thought I had a long battle sequence left that would take a while, but really I just had to kill a couple of Elites and a Zealot and then a Covenant cruiser, and that was it. I won’t spoil the ending, but it certainly wasn’t a fun ending, as you would expect from the opening scene of the game.

    Perhaps I can convince my wife to try co-op with me sometime, but otherwise, this one goes in the drawer. Now, time to finish Star Ocean, play Lord of the Rings Online and Star Trek Online, and maybe even check out some of the Dragon Age and Mass Effect 2 DLCs. And the Fallout New Vegas comes out… Can hardly wait!

  • Lord of the Rings Online

    This weekend, I signed up for the newly free-to-play Lord of the Rings Online. It is a fairly generic sword and sorcery massively multiplayer online role playing game (MMORPG). Its hook is that it is set in the Tolkien Lord of the Rings universe (okay, Middle Earth) and you play a role (insignificant for the moment) in the upcoming war to destroy the ring. You get to visit places from the book (or movie for those that don’t read), like Bree. As a human player, I am near the Shire, but unsure if I’ll get to go there or not. If you start as an elf or dwarf, you start in Thorin’s Halls to the west of the Shire, which should be cool, so I may have to start another character sometime. You also get to ride horses, which could be nice.

    The game looks pretty good, though the textures are not up to the standards of my 2560×1440 monitor. The water effects look very good, however, as you can see from the following screenshots.

    The combat is quite standard, with swords and shields and occasional class abilities. I’ve seen people using magic, so I’ll have to try that sometime. So far, I’ve been killing spiders (why do all these games love spiders?), wolves, boar, and some bad guys.

    The quests are simple, so far, and I’ve been able to do them alone without dying. On the other hand, some of the higher level quests will probably need a group (called a “Fellowship” in this game). Unfortunately, LOTRO doesn’t seem to have henchmen, like Guild Wars does, so I’ll probably have to join with actual people. I know that’s the point of MMORPGs, but I don’t particularly like joining with other people, though I’ve done so a number of times in Guild Wars, Eve Online, and Star Trek Online.

    The game seems pretty good and is free to play, so everyone with a reasonable PC should check it out. The download was 10GB and took hours, which is a bummer. I will probably put it on hold while I try to finish Halo Reach and Star Ocean, but I’ll be back in Middle Earth soon!