Steam has several games on sale including 80% off the best digital laxative ever:

Amnesia: The Dark Decent is survival horror done right. You have no weapons so you best run, Nancy. Tired of running? There’s hiding. Tired of hiding? There’s puzzles. Tired of puzzles? There’s unsettling… creatures that A) Want to taste you and B) Will drive you insane if you so much as look at them. Good times! Go get it.

Good Old Games offers a number of classic spine tingling horrors including the classic series:

That’s right, Sierra’s classic supernatural psyhco-thriller trilogy, Gabriel Knight is on sale for $2.99 an episode. It’ll set you back 10 bucks, but it’ll be good for you. Go on it’ll put hair on your chest and gibblies in your shivers.

Finally, there’s Direct2Drive’s sale that… sorta has the same stuff on sale that Steam does. But! You can save five cents on another bowel opener:

I think that image says it all, really. So Happy Halloween all, and enjoy your scare!

Until next time, Good Gaming!

-Dan

Games in this category are commonly refered to as abandonware, and exist in a legal grey-area. I’m as capitalist as the next guy, but when a company stops enforcing its own copyrights, hey! Them’s free eats.

Mmmm, that MicroProse flavor!

In closing, let me just say that we’ve got a long and storied history of video games behind us. You have no excuse other than ‘I’m too lazy to play great games from the past.’ or ‘Dear god the graphics/sound effects/story elements make me want to die.’

Until next time, Good Gaming!

-Dan

Dear WotC, I think you're dreamy! Do you like me? Yes ( ) No ( )

That went to sort of a weird place. Anyway, here’s what I’d love to see Wizards of the Coast do with digital.

•Create an online, cloud-based content management system with an attractive front end like Steam and include the other elements of the DDI.
•Through this UI, sell content for all editions of D&D. Not just the current stuff, anything you own, throw it up there.
• Make the books cheap. I’m not talking about making them $5.00 off the cover price, I’m talking making them $5.00.
•Have sales often like DriveThru RPG.
•Use a specific file type that can’t be opened outside of the application. Make it so users can’t copy the content out of the UI, but can copy the content within the UI, and share it with friends who also have the application. Give users the ability lend books to each other for an hour or three with a 24 hour cool down so that friends can access the books during games.
•Sell 3rd party content, and take a percentage of the profits in return for hosting and marketing.
•Make this application an App for iPads, Color Nooks, and Kindle Fires.
•Work with a tablet manufacturer to create a dedicated tablet with this Application front-and-center and sell that in retail stores.
•Sell gift cards for the application in retail stores.
•Continue to sell hardback limited editions of core rule books, tokens, minis, and map tiles in retail stores.
•Kill off Wizbook, and buy Obsidian Portal for godsakes, they know how to get players involved in their games digitally.

There. That would be awesome. It would also be expensive as hell, and probably not worth the return. But a man can dream though. A man can dream… What would your ideal Wizards of the Coast digital strategy look like?

Until next time, Good Gaming!

-Dan

Until next time, Good Gaming!

-Dan

P.S. I added an RSS widget. Enjoy!

Wyatt Salazar is one of my favorite bloggers. He owns a little corner of the internet called The Spirits of Eden. Not only is he a good writer getting better (that alone is enough reason to keep tabs on his blog) but he’s like a physical manifestation of the 4chan boards /a/, /v/, /tg/, and /lit/… But without all the idiocy and torture porn. Following him on Twitter (@WyattSalazar) is recommended if you’re looking for humorous observations that you can later claim where your own. Anyway, Wyatt was kind enough to write a the following post for Low On XP all about his Sci-Fi/Fantasy RPG setting, The World of Adel.

For me, writing The World of Adel on my blog, The Spirits of Eden, is its own hobby. For most GMs, a setting should be the barest bones that they can run a session from, and they don’t have time for more detail.  And I could run World of Adel without even three quarters of the material I have written for it. But I love to go down one layer deeper than before and look at certain elements more closely. I’ll probably never get the chance to use half the things I write, but just exploring that world is intensely entertaining for me. So in my spare time, for the past few years, I’ve expanded my campaign setting a lot. I’ve also destroyed it and rebooted it once with new ideas and a fresh take.

When I started Adel, I wanted a different take on fantasy settings. My inspirations are really varied. Hindu and Asian mythology forms a part of it. Modern geopolitics are there a bit. There’s some japanese Anime aesthetics (people with tails, martial artists, capacity for child heroes and such). Polytheistic religion is a big one. Adelians are animists and true polytheists, and their gods, the Spirits, walk the world too.

Adel is, essentially, the post-apocalypse of an older world. The Cataclysm brought destruction to the Lost World, but also revitalization. The new Adel is beautiful and somewhat peaceful, with Five Nations that keep order and provide protection and services to people. I modeled these nations more after real political units, rather than the usually despotic and essentially helpless nations that exist in common D&D-type games. Adel’s Spirits are needed for the ravaged world to stay lush and beautiful. Without spirits, the world would be dead.

However, that’s not to say everything in Adel is well. Though it is a more livable place than typical “points of light” style settings that are beset every day by horrors, Adel has problems of its own. The center of the continent is a dead wasteland filled with demons and insane beings. Buried beneath the world are ruins and relics of the Lost World, ancient technology that will periodically come to life and ruin someone’s day. As well as the ravages of nature – things like dragons and sabertooth tigers and whatnot – there is plenty of conflict.

My mindset when I’m building the world is to write things in layers. There’s the layer that typical readers and GMs would need: a map, the names of places, and generalized information about religion and other customs. I put all of that in one section, a superficial look at the world. From there I go deeper. What is the Adelian view on technology? On sexuality and gender? What is their food like, what are their homes like? What kinds of traditions and communities do they have? All of this lets me create ideas for adventures and to give more texture to the world, and to give stuff for interested players to mine for ideas. I wanted to give a sense that these people aren’t “fantasy Europeans” or “fantasy Hindus” but rather their own people who think about their problems and culture in their own way.

One thing I wanted to do was to create a setting that isn’t trapped by a medieval European mindset about society. In the World of Adel men and women are equal and can do any task. What’s more most people in Adel are very tolerant of bisexuality or homosexuality. Bisexuality can be considered to be “normal” for the Adelians, except for the really elitist rich folk who are staunchly about heterosexual marriages to beget heirs and consolidate wealth. I’m bisexual myself so this reflects me. But I also wanted to include some room for romantic conflict in a part of the setting that usually works for that: monied heirs.

There is no racism. None of the characters are really human though, but their features can accord to any human culture you want to be. A lot of people have told me this sacrifices conflict, but I disagree. The conflict in the World of Adel is the enemies and monsters that exist, the mysterious dungeons of the Lost World, and human problems such as thievery, intrigue, jealousy that create antagonistic character interactions. Widespread bigotry isn’t necessary.

One problem I ran into with the first incarnation of the setting, was that I had included too many ideas that expanded the scope too much. There were too many races, too much space, too many nations and places. It even went into outer space! I didn’t want it to be this huge and convoluted, so that’s when I rebooted it. I took out the old index and made a new one, with a new plan. From there I’ve been much more satisfied with my output, because I’ve refocused my ideas with a new mindset. You can have a big setting without having twenty nations, twelve different races and five systems of magic. What really matters is that the elements you do include are each interesting and expandable, and that they can be used in different ways. I focused more on having interesting elements than having lots of elements.

The World of Adel started off in D&D 3.5, migrated to D&D 4e, but ultimately, I felt constrained by game systems. So I just write now, and I try to give tips or hints on how you can adapt the material to your own games. It’s still essentially a world for fantasy adventures, but it has its own melange of elements that I hope set it apart and make it an interesting place to draw inspiration from.

Thanks again to Wyatt for taking the time to make this happen. I look forward to more news from Adel in the future. You know, I can’t help but smile at the potential of playing in the setting. Until next week, Good Gaming!

-Dan

Step 1) Cull the herd. Look at all those games, goddamn. It’s a whole wall covered in brand names, logos, and carefully planed out box art. How can you possibly make a decision? Well your first step should be to cull the herd my friend. Make a decision on what kind of game you’re going to play. wRPG, jRPG, FPS, RTS, 4X, Platformer, Driving, Fishing, Fighting, Sim, Casual, Puzzle, a short game, a long game, Xbox, PC, PS3, Wii, iOS, 3DS, male protagonist, female protagonist, dog protagonist, whatever. Just pick a category and make a quick list of the games you own in your chosen category. Now that you’ve culled the heard, it’s time to…

Step 2) Choose: Continue a game, or start a game. Ok so you’ve got your titles all laid out. Don’t wuss out here and pick a different category, go with what you got. Now it comes time for another round of decisions. Separate your list of games into games you’ve started, but haven’t finished, and games you haven’t started. Now for each game in the continue list, close your eyes and ask yourself ‘Do I ever want to continue (insert name of game here)?’ If the first answer that comes to mind is ‘no’ then cross it off the list. If the answer is ‘YES! GOD YES!’ Then get to playing, son! If, however the answer is a drawn-out ‘maaaaybe’ then keep it on the list for now. Do the same with the list of games you haven’t started, only ask yourself ‘Do I ever want to start (insert name of game here)?’ Again, no’s go away, yes’ you play, and maybes get to stay.

Step 3) Make the marketing work for you. Chances are that there’s been some sort of marketing for the games that remain on your list. And you can probably find it on the internet without a lot of effort. Well, go forth and get excited, fool! You have the game for some damn reason or another. Rekindle the magic! Hit up YouTube or the ancient, abandoned website for each game, and see what sparked your interest in the first place! Who knows, after that second official trailer or dev diary, you’ll finally be ready to transform and roll out, crack heads into urinals, or get that blessing from Saint Cuthbert.

If you’re still having trouble getting into the game, then maybe you’re just not in the gaming mood. It’s cool, it happens to everyone from time to time. Go take a walk in the sunshine. You know, get some Vitamin D 20 minutes a day cures what ails ya! Or go listen to some music, read a book, watch a movie. Do some laundry… Anything! Just don’t sit there paralyzed with indecision or you’ll waste your whole day.

Until next time, Good Gaming!

-Dan

The Dungeons and Dragons Insider monthly subscription program (in which I participate) leaves much to be desired by anyone even remotely aware of available web, content management, and cloud based technologies. The bit torrents are rife with pirated copies of every D&D book ever made in multiple languages. And whenever they try to make a change for the better with their digital initiatives, they enrage neckbeards and grognards from here to Helsinki. And everyday, more and more folks are discovering completely serviceable alternatives like Pathfinder or DriveThru RPG. But why is that? Why would the company with the most to lose be so slow in going digital? The answers may surprise you.

Firstly, who do you think the primary customer for D&D is? When Wizards of the Coast counts up its D&D recipts at the end of the day, what demographic is their biggest spender? Believe it or not, it’s not gamers. It’s retail stores. Be it local mom-and-pop stores, or retail giants like Barnes and Nobles or Books-a-million. And it’s been that way for a long, long time. Wizards of the Coast has only recently gotten into the racket of direct customer sales, much to the chagrin of their best customers, the retail chains. In the eyes of the people who cook the books at Wizards, going fully digital would lose them their best customers.

Secondly, when it comes to D&D, Wizards of the Coast is in the business of making and selling physical books. It’s how they measure success and brand health, and a meaningful percentage of their workforce is dedicated to the process of acquiring physical materials, printing the books, performing book QA, and physical shipping of product. If they went all digital, that portion of their workforce would either become unnecessary or need to learn new skills in a hurry.

Finally, there’s the expectations of the majority of their secondary audience, us. As much as I would love digital content, books are easier to pass around a table. Plus, I like seeing them sitting there behind the glass in the gaming room. I guess I could put a USB stick in there, but it just wouldn’t look the same, call me an old softy. So what can Wizards of the Coast do? Honestly, I think they just need to keep on trucking. They may be slow with the digital initiatives, but they have a precarious and unenviable balancing act they need to keep up. And we should wish them the best of luck.

Until next time, Good Gaming!

-Dan

TANGENT: When he was 8 years old, some relatives took my boy to see The Dark Knight against his will, and it scared the hell out of him. I didn’t find out about it until after the fact, but seriously, who brings an 8-year-old to that movie? Anyway, what was I saying?

Oh yeah, so the kid is afraid of Batman. He’s afraid of the joker, he’s afraid of two-face, and I was pissed. Fast forward to when he’s 10 and we’re discussing super heroes. I talk about the silly batman from the 60s, and he doesn’t believe me. He assumes I’ve made it all up! Minutes later I have him watching the 1966 Batman movie on Netflix and he’s laughing his ass off. When it’s done we go out and find Season 1 of 1990 Batman Animated Series, and he loves that! The point is, Batman always wins.

Do you see where I’m going with this? In Batman Arkham City, Batman is going to win. He’s going to beat up all the bad guys, buy-out all the evil businesses, and run over robots with the batmobile or something. It’s just going to happen because (say it with me now) Batman always wins. So you know how it ends. You know that the Dark Knight, will come out on top. This isn’t some Assassin’s Creed/Da Vinci’s Code bullshit, this is the Goddamn Batman. He’s going to win. So my question is, why are you willing to pay 70 bucks for the base game plus god knows what for DLC for a forgone conclusion? What are you, crazy?

Ah, but now you say “I’m not playing it for the ending! Of course Batman wins! I’m playing it for the experience! For the story!” And that’s when I start my maniacal laughter. Slow at first, but building to insane heights. And after a deep breath I say “Just as planned.”

You see, I plan on buying the game for the same reason. I plan on playing it with my boy just as I played Batman Arkham Asylum with him a few months ago. But if you’re playing it for the story and the experience, and you don’t care about the ending, then why rush out to buy it at launch, when it’s most expensive? Why give so much money to the publishers, just to have them deliver an incomplete experience that you have to then pay extra to complete? Why give them money to support their version of Project $10?

Remember what I said in a previous post about not letting the publisher’s marketing departments determine your spending habits? Well, remember it this time! Taking care of yourself in a shitty economy means making your non-essential purchases at the right times for the right prices. If you hold out for 6 months you can get the Game of the Year edition for $40 and it’ll have all the DLC, all the content, and none of the hassle.

Yes, I know waiting 6 months sucks but it sucks less than paying $60 +tax and wasting $10-$20 EXTRA on unnecessary DLC when there’s no multiplayer and you already know how the game is going to end in the first place. Ok, maybe you can’t wait for 6 months. Can you wait for 2? Because in 2 months, Steam will start its holiday sales, and you can grab the game then for stupid cheap. Hell, they’ll probably throw in a copy of Arkham Asylum for $.99 or something.

And again, don’t worry about the sales of Batman Arkham City. With the hype for the game, and the reviews it’s getting, there’s no way it won’t sell at least a million copies in the first week, and become a GoTY contender. Just bide your time with your backlog or some of the cheap alternatives I’ve mentioned before, and get the game when the Price is Right. Also, spay and neuter your pets.

Until next time, Good Gaming!

-Dan

Back? Ok! So Small World on the iPad. I’m pretty awful at reviewing games I don’t like, because this is another ‘buy’ game. I’m sorry, I’ll try to review something I hate next week. until then bear with me as I gush all about how great this game is, or skip down to the bottom for the bullet points. Anyway, what makes Small World on the iPad so good?

First let’s talk about portability. If you’re traveling by plane, boat, or Amish dairy cart, you probably don’t have a lot of space to set up even a two player game of Small World, what with all its bits and pieces. And have you ever tried to get an Amish dairy farmer to stop the cart on a count of a lost die? Yeah, that’s not going to happen. The iPad, being the sexy little wundertablet it is, is amazingly portable, and requires no extra pieces. All the in-game pieces you need are logically laid out and you have access to them when you need them. Speaking of access when you need it, the rules are available whenever you want to browse through them, right from the game’s UI. There’s no exiting the game to load up a webpage, it’s all there and ready for you.

The game also plays by the rules. The biggest issue that makes me think twice about buying a game on the iPad is how well it’s programmed. There’s a lot of crap in the App Store, so read those negative reviews before you buy a new game. Thankfully, Days of Wonder did a great job with the Small World app, and not only does it work, but it works well. I’ve never had the game crash on me. The dice rolling appears to be truly random regardless of difficulty. And you probably won’t come across a strange case of ‘why is the CPU cheating’ like with other iPad versions of board game (I’m looking at you, RISK).

Let’s talk price. The game is a steal at $6.99, but it occasionally goes on sale for cheaper. If you want to wait to enjoy this game when it’s cheaper then by all means please do so. Keep an eye on the Games category page of the App Center and pounce when it’s in your price range.

Sadly, it’s not all gumdrops and berserker hill giants. There are a few negatives. Firstly, the game only supports 2 players. Small World is a game that excels when played with a group of 3 or more. It’s a laugh riot and surprisingly competitive. Being limited to two players is kind of a bummer. Next, the expansions. There are 2 base games and 6 expansions in the Small World game line, and only 2 expansions can be purchased in-game. Boo! I want more! Finally, there’s the occasional glitch. I know this goes against my ‘but it works well’ praise. It wasn’t a game ending scenario and after the first time it happened it was easy to avoid. Just be sure you put down your heroes, fortresses, and other such things in your Redeployment phase, otherwise they might come off the board and vanish. Silly I know, but it’s there.

PROS:

• Great digital version of a great board game
• Cheap
• Just as fun as the original

CONS:

• Only 2 expansions can be purchased for the game
• The game only (currently) supports 2 plays
• The occasional hero, fortress, what-have-you placement glitch

VERDICT:

• This is a fun game with no free demo available. It’s cheap at $6.99 and it occasionally goes on sale. If you have your iPad with you and you’re looking for something to enjoyably kill 30 minutes alone or with a friend, then I suggest you give the Small World iPad app a go!

   BUY (this and the board game too)

Uncle’s Games is a regional chain of traditional game stores in Washington State. Though it started out as a side business in the corner of a popular Spokane bookstore called Auntie’s Books, it’s since outpaced Auntie’s and now has four locations as well as an online shop. For now let’s talk the one in Redmond Town Center, because it’s the one I frequent the most.

There are many resons why this is my favorite game store, but let’s start off at the top. First reason? The People.

The Uncle’s staff is professional. You’ll never get an indignant ’WHAT DO YOU WANT?’ from an Uncle’s employee. Plus everyone bathes, so there’s no 3rd day at SDCC odor. In addition to smelling nice, they’re also very friendly.  9 times out of 10, they’ll stop what they’re doing and play a game demo with you if you ask them. Everyone is also very knowledgable about their games, as they tend to only sell products that they’re passionate about.

Next reason: The store itself. Uncle’s Games has plenty of space for gaming. It’s well-lit and laid out. All the ‘hardcore’ games like Decent and Axis & Allies are in the back, and all the shiny kid’s stuff is up front. Card games behind the counter, and snacks in the mini fridge. Oh and there’s a whole wall of puzzles in case that’s something you care about. It’s not really my bag, but 3 out of 4 walls get me going every time.

Next next reason: The schedule. Every day of the week there’s a scheduled event, be it Magic on Thursdays ,Wargaming on Wednesdays, or the Pokemon CCG league on Saturdays (so you can drop off your kid and take the wife somewhere special for dinner). There’s always something going on at Uncle’s.

Next next next reason: The stock. They never seem to have a problem getting a hold of games and merchandise. I visit Uncle’s at least once a week and every time I do there’s something new and exciting to add to my game collection. If there’s something you’re looking for and you can’t find it, hit up of the employees to get it on to their special order list, even if it’s out of print and impossible to find they’ll do their best to find it for you. They really go the extra mile in this regard.

Final reason: The discounts. If you’re a frequent shopper at Uncle’s, or if you’ve organized an event or 3 at their store, chances are you’ll end up getting a discount. Or if you’re not interested doing either of those, if you time your purchases to coincide with right day on their schedule, you’ll automatically get a 15% discount. Which is more than enough reason to hibernate your PC long enough to get out of the house and hit them up at least once a week.

So if you’re ever in the Redmond, WA area, stop by Uncle’s Games in Redmond Town Center. They’re always willing to answer any questions and help out as best as they can. More so than any other game store I’ve been to in the past, they’re just as invested in you as you are in your hobby.

Until next time, Good Gaming!

-Dan