Time for Gaming?

It's been quite a while since I've done much gaming outside of casual games and a handfull of virtual worlds for kids (Habbo Hotel, Garden Party, Elf Island, etc.). A variety of reasons for this, I think.

As much as I love gaming and my Xbox 360, I think I overloaded myself a bit last year. I played a ton of games, and several of them were rather long, dull and overall mediocre. At that point, gaming was starting to feel a lot more like a chore than a form of entertainment. Blue Dragon was one of those games... it's a long and plain old average game and as much as I struggled to make myself want to play it, I just couldn't. One day I'd like to go back to it, though. As you can see from my GamerTag, the last game I played was Halo 3, which I'm also not a fan of. I liked the original Halo just fine, but after that I lost interest in the series... but, what kind of gamer would I be if I didn't play one of the biggest releases of the year? I played through it and didn't particularly enjoy it, which probably didn't do much to help my burnout.

Secondly, my Xbox 360 has been having a few technical problems. I'm sure this is something I can easily fix, but I haven't gotten around to it since I've been a bit burned out anyway.

Third is work. I started a new job back in April and it's kept me somewhat busy. Fortunately, I really like the job, and since we're developing a virtual world, it conveniently allows me to fill some of my gaming needs.

Recently I started playing Star Wars: The Force Unleashed. Other than a few glitches, I'm really liking the game. Of course, I may be biased because I've always been a huge Star Wars fan.... at least, a huge fan of the old stuff. The new trilogy just lacked the depth of the originals and focused waaay too much on the action and CGI and not enough of characters and story. Oh well.

I've got a rather large pile of games I've been meaning to get to and my burnout resulted in me missing on a LOT of games... Xbox games, Xbox 360 games, PS2 games, PS3 games... and a Wii game or two. Not a fan of the Wii, obviously. I doubt I'll get through all of these games anytime soon, but I might as well get started!

Elf Island Open Beta

The Secret of Elf Island (http://www.elfisland.com/) just recently started their open Beta. I joined in on day 1 of their closed beta and have seen a lot of improvements since then.

Elf Island is a fantasy MMO for tweens where you can play mini-games, chat, trade, and embark on GoodQuests that allow players to "do good" in the real world.

If you have any kids from age 8-14, or if you're a kid at heart, make sure to check them out. Their current hours of operation are from 10am-1am EST. My username is Glacian (just like everywhere else) so if you see me say "hi!".

Garden Party

As I mentioned a few posts back, I've been spending a lot of time exploring virtual worlds for kids. My all-time favorite was Virtual Magic Kingdom, but anyone who is familiar with it knows that Disney closed it down last summer. It was a really sad time...

Anyway, since the closing of VMK, I'd been looking for a new virtual world to call home. I've tried all sorts of worlds, like Habbo Hotel, Club Penguin, Kaneva, Build-a-Bearville, and many more. Not too long ago I came across Garden Party, which has become my new favorite.

If you've got young kids (or you're a young kid at heart), Garden Party is just perfect! The Mods are very approachable, the world is beautiful, there are plenty of neat mini games (including some educational ones for the children!), there's a safe chat filter, overall it's just tons of fun!

While a game about gardening might not sound like a lot of fun, you'll likely enjoy growing plants in order to obtain unique in game items and apparel. Most exciting of all, you never really know what kind of items you might grow, so you'll often find yourself surprised.

My only concern is with a bit of the Moderation features (I'm not sure how much chat moderation there really is) and a few bugs here and there. However, it's still in the early days of Beta and surely deserves a chance!

http://www.gardenpartyworld.com/

Starcraft 2... a trilogy?

Without a doubt, StarCraft is my favorite game ever made. A superb storyline, awesome characters, deep and balanced gameplay, and three fascinating and unique races... it's just a great game!!!

Obviously I'm really hyped about SC2 (although, I'm not much of a PC gamer so I expect I'll need a new computer to play it). Up to this point my only fear wast that I was so used to the ol' StarCraft that playing this "new, fancy looking StarCraft" just wouldn't be the same. Could it possibly live up to my enormous expectations? Of course, I can deal with change and Blizzard has a history of making great games. So that fear was minimal.

But now, I unfortunately have a new worry... Blizzard just announced that StarCraft 2 will... be a trilogy? Each game will focus on one of the three races. WTF?

Obviously this has the potential advantage of MORE STARCRAFT! W00t! As a huge fan of the game, I'd be lying if that prospect didn't get me excited. On the other hand, I also don't want to have to pay for 3 separate games, which is what I'll need to do to see the whole storyline and as all three races. Sounds like a scheme to pull in more cash, huh?

Not to mention, I'm horrified that I'd have to purchase all three just to get the full multiplayer experience of all three races and their unique units and abilities. Of course, this hasn't been confirmed, but it's scary to think that I might have to keep dishing out more and more cash just to be competitive. Naturally, I expect to see bonus features in an expansion and I also realize that these features should be limited to those that purchased the expansion (like in Brood Wars)... but I DON'T expect to see gamers DEPRIVED of features just because Blizzard wanted an excuse to divide the game into three parts. This could hurt the perfect balancing that the original StarCraft had and really limit the online play.

Oh well, I guess we'll see how it goes. Clearly this has me worried because it inspired me to finally update, which is something I should do more often. Read about it below:
http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=20603

Elf Island Trailer

Over the last year or so I've gotten into some online communities. I'm not talking about hardcore MMOs like Eve Online, WoW or FFXII... I'm talking about games like VMK, Moshi Monster and Habbo Hotel. It's nice to play something a bit more mindless now and then...

Anyway, here's a trailer for an upcoming new kid's virtual world called Elf Island.

So what we missed?

Wow, I haven't updated this in forever. A few reasons for this:

1. New job... kept me fairly busy
2. My Xbox 360 has been having problems, I'm not a Wii fan, and I'm on a PC all day at work so don't do much PC gaming nowadays - so all in all I haven't been playing a lot of games. However, when I get my Xbox 360 fixed and find some time, I have several games piled up that I really DO want to play.

Anyway, since the last time I updated Just-RPG has posted all sorts of cool stuff. Here's just a peek:

• Asda Story Screens
• Demigod Screens
• Atlantica Online Screens
• Disgaea DS Trailer
• Two Worlds Epic Edition Screens
• Brave Story Review
• Just-RPG Looking for staff
• Wizard 101 Screens
• And Much, Much More!!!

www.just-rpg.com

4/11/08 Issue at Just-RPG!

This week's issue is filled with screens from some exciting upcoming games. Check 'em out at the link below!

http://www.just-rpg.com

• New Summon Night: Twin Age Screenshots
• New Drone Tactics Screenshots
• New The Chronicles of Spellborn Beta Screenshots
• New Metin 2 Screenshots & Trailers
• New Lineage II: Hellbound Screenshots & Dev. Diary
• New Requiem: Bloodymare Screenshots
• And More!!!

Still Alive...

Wow, I've been busy lately. There's been plenty of news going on related to RPGs, but I just haven't had the time to report on it. Apologies.

Anyway, I'm in the process of starting a new job and that has kept me very much occupied. At the same time, my current job is closing down.... so that stinks. It's just been a very busy and stressful time for me, but I do hope to start doing updates again soon.

Thanks for reading!

Two Worlds Tries to Tempt Us

SouthPeak has announced that Two Worlds Temptation is set to hit stores this fall on the PC and Xbox 360.

Temptation is an expansion to the open-ended RPG Two Worlds for the Xbox 360 and PC, taking place right after the events of the original. It features improved voice overs and animations, retooled horseback riding and a totally revamped combat system.

“Our entire development team is now putting their all into making Two Worlds: The Temptation a game that is far and away better than the original,” said Miroslaw Dymek, Chief Developer with Reality Pump explained. “We’ve taken to heart all the comments made by gamers about Two Worlds and we’re going to give them what they want with the sequel.”

Grimoire of the Rift headed to DS

Square Enix has announced that gamers will be making the return to Ivalice this summer with the release of Final Fantasy Tactics A2: Grimoire of the Rifts on June 24th.

This title is the sequel to the popular Final Fantasy Tactics Advance on the GBA and brings the popular franchise to the DS for the first time.

Final Fantasy Tactics A2 will feature a familiar grid-oriented battle system with intuitive use of the DS stylus, as well as new jobs and character classes. The game will feature over 400 quests, vibrant dual-screen presentation and improved gameplay.

Final Fantasy Tactics A2: Grimoire of the Rifts will be available in stores June 24th, 2008 for $39.99. For more information, visit: http://na.square-enix.com/ffta2/