Kate

I was born in southern California and have spent most of my life nose deep in games. It began with the Atari and from then on I was hooked. From MUD's, MMO's to tabletop RPG's I love everything games.

Minecraft – Not your Average Indie Game.

 Indie Games, PC, Technology, Video, Video Games  No Responses »
Mar 152011
 

I’ve been absent a while from Troll in the Corner and I think this game is partly why.  What game could pull someone away from writing for so long you say?  Well its a little game I like to call crafty, buildy, scary thingie. In other words Minecraft.

If you’ve never heard of this Indie game Minecraft I’m here to make sure that you don’t blind yourself when you get out from under that rock.

Minecraft is as retro style, survival, horror, exploration and building game.  Its pretty much Lego from a first person view, where you can make tools and build immense structures.  At night there are  hoards of zombies, skeletons, spiders and creepers that spawn and want to kill you.

The one that stands out the most and is a fan favorite is the creeper.  They often sneak up on you and do a kamikaze explosion as soon as they are close enough.  When they are about  to blow up they make a “SssSsSSss” sound that is like a fuse being lit.

One of the addicting qualities of Minecraft is the audible ‘POP’ you hear after picking up or destroying a block.  Its akin to the pop you might hear from bubble wrap.

I’ve been playing Minecraft since it was in the Alpha phase and its been a pleasure to watch the game and its fan base grow in a huge way.

Indie game developer Markus Persson (Widely known as ‘Notch’) created the game Minecraft in his spare time.  Eventually he was able to quit his job and live off the sales of the steadily growing games fan base.  The game became so popular that Notch was able to build a company fully staffed and immediately start work on another game.

Being in the alpha and seeing the game grow while watching Notch tweet his every move, was something I don’t know that I will get a chance to experience again.

Be sure to check out the game at Minecraft.net.  The creative version of the game is free to play.

I also did a small adventure spanning around 9 episodes on youtube.  Check out the first one below.

Amazing new Aion Footage!

 PC, Video, Video Games  No Responses »
Nov 242009
 

This is footage that is for features that are on their way.  I was happy to see characters swimming, on mounts, underwater battle and tons of little features that you just need to watch and see.

I hope you enjoyed the video as much as I did.  Now I just need to jump back into Aion and start leveling up my character again.

[tags]Aion, NCSoft, video, youtube, expansion[/tags]

Final Fantasy 13 NA Release Date

 Console, Troll in the Corner, Video, Video Games  1 Response »
Nov 162009
 

The anticipation is almost over, there is finally a release date.  This video has some interviews with some of the developers of the game as well as at the very end the release date.

So on March 9th 2010 the game is released.  I’m looking forward to next year more and more each day.  They also announced that Leona Lewis will be doing a song for the game, that the game will be their first true HD game and gave us some more game play footage to drool over.

[tags]FFXIII, Final Fantasy XIII, Square-Enix, Leona Lewis[/tags]

Borderlands.

 Console, PC, Troll in the Corner, Video Games  No Responses »
Nov 112009
 

What?  Another Wasteland?  Another Vault you say?  Sweet another Fallout! Oh wait whats that, its not another Fallout game?  What the heck is it then?

Ahhh Borderlands Its only been out for a short while but in the end I couldn’t wait to get my hands on it.  This game is an Action RPG.  What makes this game an Action RPG?  Well in this game when you shoot something little numbers pop up when you do damage to a creature.  The part that makes it an action game is that the controls are all based on how you would plbrdlnd-20091110-230524ay a shooter.

If you’ve ever seen me broadcast any FPS games you’d get a nice visual of me stumbling around lost.  I love to run into things, get stuck on things and back myself into walls.  But because I suck at shooter does not make me shy away from them.  Actually In Battlefield Heroes I think I’m quite good.

Borderlands is pretty tough, I’ve seen people run out of bullets in the first battle only to die and I had to revive them.  The toughest part about the game is managing your loot.  If your weapons and shields are not up to par with where your at in the game, things are gonna get really tough.

Yes I said that I was fighting with other players.  This is a Multi player game which you can play co-op with up to 4 people.  With the 2 or 3 games that I played in co-op mode I can tell you that the action gets pretty crazy when you hit more than 2 people.  I was playing solo and went into an area and it was pretty calm.  But the same area with multi player was tough with some crazy monsters I had never seen before.

You can drive vehicles with this game and each vehicle can hold up to 2 people, one driver and one gunner.  It can be pretty fun with 2 vehicles going around slaughtering monsters.  I especially love to drive over them, who doesn’t like roadkill?brdlnd-20091110-225928

I can’t emphasize enough about how much I love the loot system.  I see one of the red cases that I know has guns in it and I get all tinglie inside.  It does help that when you find a case of weapons your character talks.

I’ve been having a blast with this game and suggest it to everyone who asks me about it.

So grab a gun, jump on the bus to Pandora and get ready to duke it out with some ugly skags.

[tags]2K Games, Borderlands, Co-op, Gearbox, multiplayer[/tags]

Champions are you ready?

 PC, Video Games  1 Response »
Oct 302009
 

I’ve been wanting to check out this game since it came out last month.  I unfortunately did not have the resources to get the game, so Ben the creator of “Troll in the corner” graciously stepped in.

When I first started the game I was presented with a download like most MMO’s.  It was 700mb and downloaded rather quickly.  Every day after that I have had to download a 150mb patch.  Now I don’t think this is really a “Normal” thing, I think its just because I just happened to start playing the game near Halloween.  They are running events, adding new content and likely patching their patches, so its OK.

When you create your character you are given a ton of choices.  The first choice you are given is which power set you want to choose.
champo-20091029-122826
I would say that the character creation is standard but its anything but that, as you can see from the picture (Left) there are a good number of powers to choose from.  The best part is they give you the option to mix and choose between powers which is selected in the picture.  Next they give you the option to pick your gender and change your face. They present you with a series of pre set options as well as a custom setting.  Inside of the custom settings there are a ton of sliders for just about every feature of the face, so that you can truly make your face unique.  Next the selection of your body type.  You are also given a few main body types to select from as well as a custom settings with sliders.
champo-20091030-001707
The next major part is the costume or clothing.  This is the most detailed part of the character creation process.  It is quite similar to the City of Hero’s / Villians costume creation but there are some area’s where its more in depth.  There are not as many options as there are in CoX but I blame that on the fact that the game is still pretty new.  You can create an interesting array of characters, robots, beasts, aliens, undead or just a snazzy looking human.  What really stood out are the extra color options, you can touch up on all the little nicks and cranny’s in your outfit.

champo-20091030-001749The only problem I find with these huge character creation games is the amount of time it takes to create your character.  I guess showing it off later is the real prize.

The game starts off with a tutorial, you are in Millenium City which is being attacked by aliens.

A crash from across the street alerts me as I am drinking my morning cup of tea.  I quietly excuse myself to the lady’s room, slip on my goggles, dawn my suit as I like to call it and squeeze out of the bathroom window.  Just down the street I see the police talking to champions.  I make my way to the broken building and and officer pulls me to the side.  This is where my story begins.

Next I’ll start going into game mechanics and what I like and don’t like about how they work.

[tags]Champions Online, CO, MMO, MMORPG, Video Games, Cryptic, Super Heroes, Atari[/tags]

Leaked Left 4 Dead 2 Trailer

 Console, Movies and TV, PC, Technology, Video Games  2 Responses »
Oct 262009
 

I saw this and just had to pass it along. I love the first Left 4 Dead even if it does scare the heck out of me.

There’s a new set of people and it looks like there’s new types of zombies as well. I’m ready to get scared all over again. November holds so many great releases I just can’t wait!

[tags]L4D, L4D2, Left 4 Dead, Left 4 Dead 2, Valve, Ea[/tags]

Pulp Wave Fiction.

 Technology, Video  2 Responses »
Oct 202009
 

I have been a fan of Google Wave since I saw the long introduction video of theirs about 2-3 months ago. But I recently saw a video on youtube that threw the usage of how google wave can be used over the top. Check it out. (Harsh language from Pulp Fiction warning.)

I found it humorous and really educational on what you can really do with Wave. Most people think that Google wave is just another chat program, but its so much more.

Its supposed to be an open source email program where they took the concept of a chat and forum like structure where you can add maps video’s and see everything updated in the wave as its done. Its truly a next step in email and the fact that its open source is really showing Google wants to share their work.

Particularly I like the part where you can send someone a document and everyone that you’ve added to the wave can edit the document and improve it. Its like Google documents without all the hassle of getting someone else to sign up so they can edit with you.

I hope you all are as hyped up as I am to get to try Google wave. In all honesty this video just fanned the flames!

[tags]Google, Google Wave, Pulp Fiction, Pulp Wave Fiction, youtube[/tags]

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