Holding Z: A Loving Look at Forgotten GameCube Intros

Today, I’d like to take a nostalgic trip with you all and look at a very specific part of video game history that is near to my heart: intro movies and levels from niche GameCube games that still give me chills, make me laugh, or both. The golden years of the GCN encompassed my entire adolescence, and as such it is the console I’ve put the most time and money into. My brother and I owned our black, little, magic, lunchbox-shaped console from Christmas of 2001 until six years later when the disc-drive finally died and we traded up to a Wii (I’ve since bought a silver GCN and am slowly amassing a collection once again). While the Wii allowed us to play our massive hoard of GCN titles, it never really felt the same to me, not even in playing the spectacular Wii version of Resident Evil 4.

For one thing, Brawl was disappointing. But mostly, the GameCube was around at a time in my life when I was naive enough to give Nintendo 100% of my loyalty, but at the same time I was blossoming into a hard-core gamer, albeit on a $5-20/week allowance. This growth and passion led my brother and I to explore every unturned stone in the GameCube’s library, thanks in large part to my subscription to Nintendo Power, which lasted almost precisely as long as our console itself. There’s no way I can tell you, as an aspiring critic, if all the games we played were good (my rose-colored glasses are so thick when it comes to the GCN that red Pikmin are invisible to me). I can tell you, however, that they all helped form my current preference palette when it comes to modern games. All of them, too, were charming in their own way, at least to a budding tween who had a hard time making friends in high school but couldn’t wait to get home and grind away at Phantasy Star Online (played offline and splitscreen, of course).

PSO, and news of its soon-to-be-released (and very much-anticipated by yours truly) sequel, in particular has inspired me to share this retrospective with you, and so I think it’s fitting that I leave out any Nintendo first-party franchises. The titles I select may not even be exclusives. Don’t get me wrong, between my brother and I, we played almost every Mario, Zelda, Metroid, etc. But my goal is to show you, gentle reader, some stellar parts of the GCN’s life I loved that you may have missed, as well as glory in times gone by. As the very quirky red-headed stepchild of its generation, the GameCube gets dissed a lot, and undeservedly so. I never miss an opportunity to bring up a few of the old girl’s pearls so, without further ado, set your WaveBird to frequency 1 and let’s do this.

The Startup Screen

The first thing you saw when you booted up your Nintendo GameCube, the start-up screen is every bit as memorable as the jingle accompanying that little rolling, purple box. But did you know that if you (or four players simultaneously) hold down the Z button at startup, the music will change!? I’m willing to bet many GameCube owners never discovered this Easter Egg, but it’s just one more example of the loving detail Nintendo put into the little cube that could. This may not be a game intro, but it was part of every new game experience on the console.

Summoner 2

Atmospheric, dramatic, and captivating, Summoner 2′s intro is a good example of how intro movies from this era got you excited for the game but told you virtually nothing of the story. They also left the mechanics and even the genre completely up to the imagination. Fans of the game will remember Volition’s Summoner 2 as a unique action RPG with strange rules and even stranger locales. It was an epic, though, with many memorable characters and plotpoints, and it holds up surprisingly well.

P.N.03

A mostly forgotten member of the Capcom Five, P.N.03 was a GCN exclusive, one part third-person shooter, one part music/rhythm game, and five parts sex appeal. Its director, the highly-regarded Shinji Mikami, would go on to help create  several other original action games including the nigh-perfect God Hand. It seems to be Mikami’s curse (or gift?) that most of his games are not well-received out of the gate but earn oodles of respect with age. P.N. 03, though, I feel still hasn’t gotten the recognition it deserves. Similar in aesthetic to Vanquish, the game has style oozing out of its bionic pours, and Vanessa Schneider is one of the most seductive heroines in gaming. It’s hard not to get distracted by her contortions as you blast away enemy robots to the rhythm of heavy techno tunes, as witnessed in this trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJIXk_sHR5M&feature=related

Gauntlet: Dark Legacy

I admit, this is a bit of an arcadey guilty pleasure of mine, but you have to hand it to the voice-actor playing the wizard; after listening to his monologue, how can you not take up his challenge? “No one has dared try”, you say?! Well I’m about to f***ing wipe the floor with this demon jerk! I feel only a bit of shame telling you that my brother and I both levelled our characters (yellow Jester and blue Wizard respectfully) to 99, which is no small feat, and beat the game together after several dozen hours.

Sonic Adventure 2: Battle

Having never owned a Dreamcast, I missed out on a lot of Sonic’s early 3D phase, but SA2: Battle was a great port. Once again, the intro tells you little more than the bare essentials. Sonic has beef with Shadow, you can grind on rails, and this game is going to rock. That’s all you need to know, really. I particularly love the music in this game, my favorite being  the ever-so-catchy Escape From the City from the first level. After all these years, I still mean to go back and finish off the Biolizard, who I was never able to beat, sadly.

Custom Robo

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I had never heard of the Custom Robo franchise until this video released, but after seeing it I knew it was something I had to experience. The music, the arena, the variety of giant robots going toe to toe. It seemed better than a dream. Yes, one of those robos did fire giant, purple, dragon-beams at another, and you do get to do that in the game! A solid arena fighter (with some RPG elements and a mid-sized story), Custom Robo proved to be a great time for a 15-year-old. And even after all these years, the trailer still works for me.

Soul Calibur 2

First of all, let me say I think the music in this game is incredible, particularly in the trailer. The soaring brass fanfare, the thundering drums, the strangely appropriate electric guitar power chords, the singing, agitated strings, the Spanish guitar interlude, and the mellow trumpet solo as we circle the peak atop which Nightmare stands triumphant; all these work together to provide a framework for a story “eternally retold” (as witnessed by the continual release of subpar sequels).

But the way the music works together with the video really makes the intro one of the all-time greats. Seeing most of the cast fight, each in their own way, and even getting to know them a little through character scenes (like Raphael hiding in the dark alleyway) is still completely exhilarating to me as an adult. As a teenager, this game had the biggest draw a fighting game has ever offered me: a chance to play as one of my favorite avatars, the incorruptible Hero of Time himself, Link, from The Legend of Zelda. Diligently, I took him from level 1 to the high 70s after months of playing through the still-wonderful Weapon Master mode, a feature sorely missed in later installments. I still break out this game every once in a while, just to recapture that sense of utter joy of landing Link’s throw from the perfect position and sending my opponent hurtling into the abyss below. A tale of souls and swords, indeed.

Lost Kingdoms

I love this game. There are some titles on this list that I’ve lost touch with, and all the nostalgia in the world won’t help me rekindle those old flames. But Lost Kingdoms and Lost Kingdoms 2 hold a very special place in my heart. Not so much for their intros or the games themselves, but for what they represent. How many great action role-playing card-battlers can you name off the top of your head? None? That’s what I’d guess. But I can point firmly at Lost Kingdoms and say, “Ah, here, we see the genre is perfectly valid.” And if you didn’t own a GameCube and didn’t know about this game, chances are that you missed it.

But it’s more than that. The mechanics of collecting runes to power your cards, the tensity and desire that comes with attempting to capture a mighty new monster (similar to that of Pokemon), the strategy of building and playing your monster deck, the sheer depressingness of the atmosphere in the land of Argwyll, the lone Princess Katia standing as the only hope for her kingdom, all of this combines to create an extremely memorable gameplay experience. It may surprise you to know that From Software, the maker of Demon’s and Dark Souls, was the developer of Lost Kingdoms. That fact speaks volumes about both From’s journey and the Kingdoms games’ quality. The sequel went a step further and allowed yourself to become a monster too through special new cards, but the original will always be the best to me. As you may have noticed, many games on this list feature strong, heroic characters, men and women alike. As a gamer, I’m always attracted to these avatars who laugh in the face of danger and strive constantly against evil, no matter how dark the fog gets. That’s who I want to be playing. That’s who I want to be.

Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean

Another card-battler RPG (this time, turn-based), Namco’s Baten Kaitos (which means “belly of the seamonster”) details the epic of Kalas and his party in a story of fantasy, conspiracy, love, deceit, and redemption that is far too complex for me to state here. Spanning two disks, it contains a twist that completely floored me and left me eager for more. The best part, again, is the combat system, in which you build and play a deck for each of three characters in your party, who you can swap out for others in the cast if you wish. Gameplay starts simple but ramps up quickly as you gain access to bigger and bigger hands. By the end of the game, you’ll be trying to lay cards in sequences of 9, and in the heat of battle, it’s incredibly difficult to stay cool under the pressure as huge boss monsters barrel into your band of comrades. Before this game came out, I would watch this intro/trailer every day for months, hardly able to breathe as Xelha took off into the sky or as the whale hung for what seemed like an eternity above the glistening ocean.

Tales of Symphonia

Tales of Symphonia, one of several entries in the Tales series, features a story fairly similar to that of Baten Kaitos. Lloyd and his group of misfit warriors must unravel a dastardly plot employed by the government of the realm, and the story also contains a similarly shocking twist. Many of the themes and aesthetics are the same, but it’s the style and gameplay that set it apart. First of all, the anime cutscenes provided a sense of realism I’d never known in a JRPG before. Watching the characters I spent over 90 hours with throughout the game come to life in high-quality cartoons pleased me to no end, and I always was searching for that next story arc that would inevitably be played out with grandiose music and heart-wrenching dialogue. The combat and character customization, too, held my attention, and every boss battle, played out in real-time, was a nail-biter. Occasionally, I’d have a few of my friends take control of the supporting characters and we would all duke it out for the fate of Sylvarant. And on bad days, of course, I would watch the intro movie over and over, reveling.

Metal Arms: Glitch in the System

One of these things is not like the other. Metal Arms is neither an RPG nor is it Japanese, but it is one of the greatest third-person action games ever made. Sadly, this is also one of the most overlooked gems of all time, so much so that I couldn’t find a video of the intro cutscene without commentary. But it’s absolutely worth watching, if only to listen to the general call out Screwed and Hosed one more time (guess how long they last in the war against the Mil-Bots). Aside from being just a really fun game to play, Metal Arms has a wonderful sense of humor that modern games just don’t get (Lollipop Chainsaw, I’m looking at you). In every cutscene and character interaction, you’ll catch jokes that are still laugh-out-loud funny. And the expository black-and-white video used to reboot Glitch’s memory will always be one of my favorite gaming moments. I had never played a Fallout game, so this kind of meta, self-referential, dark, social commentary was entirely new to me in games, and I was excited by the writers’ daring in Krunk’s colorful, barely-bleeped language. While the game ends with a cliff-hanger, sadly, a sequel at this point seems hopelessly unlikely. Swingin’ Ape Studios was bought by Blizzard and the next game was put on seemingly indefinite hold.

Phantasy Star Online: Episode 1 & 2

At long last, we finally reach the game that inspired this nostalgia trip for me. Some of my best memories of my GameCube feature my best friend at the time, my brother, and I sitting anxiously on a couch together and playing this game splitscreen for hours ad infinitum. The thrill of exploration, teamwork, grinding and leveling, raising our Mags, amassing a huge wealth of Meseta, and taking on towering boss monsters that would make some of Demon’s Souls’ bosses quiver were too much for our teenage minds to handle. Every day we’d run through the same areas, doing new quests. Over and over we’d fight the same enemies and we’d never get enough of it.

It would be this game, I believe, that ultimately led me to my fascination with the Souls series, as they too capitalize on exploration, level/creature design, learning through repetition, extremely solid combat mechanics, and atmosphere. But while the Souls games encourage emotions of doubt and withdrawal, PSO has never been anything but uplifting to me, if a bit daunting. The soaring soundtrack accompaniment and the ever-present optimism of the characters inside the Dome on Ragol always spurred me on, pushing me to test my limits and defend the civilians from hoards of Rag Rappies.

In the end, though, it’s always this intro video that I inevitably come back to. “It’s a long, long road to the palace in the sun” the singer says, and that image personifies perfectly my emotions as I stare, unblinking at the fast montage of characters, all sporting different, exotic weaponry, each looking ready to tear into a group of Giga Boomas. The music, the art, the sweeping camera across vast vistas, it all still holds me fascinated. I can hardly believe that Sega is putting out a sequel, but, at the moment, it’s my most anticipated game. PSO is one of those rare games that, once you’ve given a bit of yourself to it, it pays it back in spades, and it’s always better with a group. Hope to see you on Ragol.

End Notes

Well, there you have it folks, my list of my favorite not-so-well-remembered GameCube intros. Feel free to drop me a like and tell me what you think if you are so inclined! I’m always eager for feedback. And if you have any specific GameCube memories of your own, niche or mainstream, I’d love to hear more stories about one of my favorite consoles.

I’ll leave you with one of the many great tracks from Wind Waker. See you next time.

Indoctrinated

Hello again, faithful readers and newcomers alike, I hope you’ve all been well. It’s been a month since my last post but I hope it gave you enough to chew on until now. I certainly hope you’ve at least thought about checking out Ready Player One. If not, well you’ll be kicking yourself when the movie comes out in the next few years, and I will say I told you so. But let’s leave paper and binding aside for now (although I just started reading Stephen King’s newest novel The Wind Through the Keyhole and I must say the Dark Tower has me tight in its magnetic field once again). Let’s ride a mass effect relay into the far reaches of the imagination, where ruthless, single-minded alien robots called Reapers are attempting to wipe out all life and one Commander Shepard has more than a few vital choices to make…

I should warn you before you read further that this article will contain light SPOILERS on Mass Effect 3′s story. Go finish the game first and then come back to this if you haven’t already. You’ll get more out of it, I promise.

Today I’ll be providing you with my  thoughts on one of the biggest blockbuster video games of the year and a subject of much controversy (dare I say scandal): Mass Effect 3. First, let me explain my relatively uncommon perspective with this game and the Mass Effect franchise. I’ve never had a chance to play Mass Effect 1. I was a PS3 owner until this year and my computer is woefully unequipped for the job. When Mass Effect 2 released on PS3 last year I was beyond psyched. The hype for the game was enormous, all my podcast buddies heralded it as one of the best games ever, and I was ready for the game to knock me flat. What I got was more disappointment than I’ve felt from almost any game. Maybe my mental bar was just set much too high, maybe the PS3 load times got to me, maybe I wasn’t in the right state of mind, but after 10-15 hours I let the game go and never looked back.

Flash forward to this year. Mass Effect 3 seemed to meet the expectations of the majority of fans right out of the gate and easily exceed them. Many claimed it was even better than 2. I began to feel hopeful. Then anger for the ending spread like STDs would if Planned Parenthood suddenly closed their doors and culminated in a metaphorical rash gamers like myself are still trying to scrub themselves clean of. Thousands of overly-entitled, selfish, though well-meaning gamers signed a petition for Bioware to change Mass Effect 3′s ending. This didn’t dim my enthusiasm for the game, however. I was disappointed again, but in a section of the community rather than the game itself. Endings are never what I consume media for and they are notoriously terrible (at the very least, too short) in video games. Besides, I actually liked the demo (minus the manipulative child death, which in the end turned out to be even more manipulative). If all else failed I could still enjoy the multiplayer.

The positive energy around the game stuck with me and two weeks ago Mass Effect 3 arrived in my mailbox via GameFly. I popped it in my 360 with high hopes but few expectations (and no Prothean DLC). I loved it. The pacing was just right. My actions had meaningful consequences. I felt empowered (maybe a bit too much but it was an improvement over the powerlessness I felt in 2). I laughed (as a hungover Ashley begged me not to order Joker to sing over the intercom), I cried (as Tali sailed over the edge of a cliff when I refused to stop the Geth from destroying her fleet), and I loved Traynor as she loved me, from board game/shower lust to white-picket-fence musings. I was willing to overlook the many shortcomings, a privilege I could not afford ME2.

Sure, I still occasionally felt the fatigue and boredom of babysitting my team, making near-mandatory loading screen pause-trips to and from the Normandy and Citadel after every mission. But most of the time, I was doing those things for narrative reasons, not just for masturbatory satisfaction. Sure, there was some bullshit, like the busy-work, plot-dump ordeal inside the Consensus and the nightmare sequences. But the stories told inside that virtual reality and dream state were necessary, and they weren’t told through a text box or dialogue encounter. I never really felt compelled to explore the long, unfriendly list of sidequests I accrued, most of the time involuntarily. But that allowed me to make my playthrough quick and fairly linear, just like I wanted. The combat is still lacking, but it’s addictive, fun, and heightened by the much-improved level design and character level-up system ( and the multiplayer is worth several dozen hours of devotion if you have a well-trained, regular team of friends to call upon).

And, yes, I do think the ending is a  horrendous, undermining, disappointing, disheveled, mucked, slap-in-the-face to hard-core Mass Effect lovers. But, as I said before, video game endings have always been bad, and I wasn’t expecting anything more from ME3. Hoping, but not expecting. The ending does bring the story to a succinct close, and that’s really all it needed to do for me. I hope it will be heavily edited by the as-yet-unreleased DLC, but I don’t feel it’s a step Bioware needs to take. And it’s definitely not worthy of a petition when there are infinitely more important things to be furious about, like the fact that most critics of other mediums and the majority of the population in general still do not take the immense story-telling power and potential of video games seriously.

For that wish to be fulfilled, Bioware, even being renowned as the story-telling heavy-weight of video games as they are, needs to step up their game by several notches (or biotic enhancements if you like). But these things take time, and as far as baby-steps go, Mass Effect 3 is a successful stumble well above the average, timid shuffle. It’s a game summarized best as much greater than the sum of its parts. Fundamentally flawed and ambitious, entertaining and bittersweet, Mass Effect 3 has a huge, synthetic heart. And I hope you’ll come to adore it as I have.

Shepard out.

Well there you have it, folks; a sample of my thoughts on Mass Effect 3. Have a question or comment? Feel free to leave it and a rating below or shoot me a message any way you like.

What’s next for GAMH, you ask? I have a few things planned, but I’ll only tell you about one of them today. Next week, my brother and I are sitting down to discuss our favorite movies of all time and recording it for your listening pleasure. This, I hope, will be a much higher quality podcast than my previous work, complete with editing, sound clips taken straight from the movies, prerecorded music and more. As such, it will take me a lot more time to bring you the final product. But, again, I hope, it will be a far better aural experience. Please be patient. As always, faithful readers, I hope to see you then. Until next time.

Retro Mondays #7: Ready Player One: Book Review

Welcome to another issue of Retro Mondays, where we prepare ourselves for the future by walking perpetually backwards down memory lane!

This week I’d like to bring you a short book review of a novel that released last year. I know, I know, something that came out last year can’t possibly be retro, but trust me, all you retro junkies are going to love this.

So, without further ado, here’s my review of a novel that topped many “Best of” lists last year: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline, published in August 2011.

See? I told you. Retro.

First things first, here’s some obligatory background information. Ready Player One is a slightly dystopian sci-fi novel set in the year 2044. It centers around the life of the protagonist, an impoverished, misanthropic, orphan teenager by the name of Wade Watts. Wade is a lot of things, but above all he’s a gunter. What’s a gunter? Let me explain. In the future, a man named James Halliday (a sort of Steve Jobs/Willy Wonka figure) invents virtual reality and christens it the OASIS. The OASIS is basically the internet and World of Warcraft rolled into one. Everyone spends most of their time inside the OASIS via their haptic suits and visors. In the OASIS, you can go anywhere and do anything, as long as you have enough credits. You can go to school, take on adventures, meet people, travel to worlds that would never be possible in real life, etc. The best part of the OASIS is that it’s absolutely free, just like James Halliday wanted it to be.

But when Halliday dies, the big question everyone wants the answer to is: who’s going to control the OASIS now that he’s gone? Well, Halliday, being the genius he is, devises a virtual Easter egg hunt. Whoever can finish the hunt first and find the egg will inherit everything Halliday has left behind, including complete control over the OASIS. Hallliday places the egg itself, three gates, and three keys throughout the OASIS and also leaves behind a set of clues for people to follow.  The keys, gates, egg, and clues all have something to do with the things Halliday treasured the most: 80s/90s pop culture and retro video games.  The individuals who have dedicated their lives to solving Halliday’s riddles are known as “gunters,” and Wade is one of the most passionate. To win the hunt, Wade must face a slew of trials and obstacles, not the least of which is IOI, the evil global corporation bent on winning the contest in order to charge people access to the OASIS and make the world kneel to their will. It’s a race against time, and Wade will have to make some friends along the way if he hopes to succeed. Game on.

Phew, okay, you still with me? Good. Now to the nitty gritty.

I really loved this book. Seriously, if you consider yourself a nerd or gamer in any capacity, you will enjoy it and take a lot away from it. Cline’s writing, while maybe not the most original or clever at times (he sometimes uses tired cliches) is entertaining and vivid. And thank goodness for that, because the scope of what Cline is trying to convey is just mind-boggling. The OASIS is massive! There are thousands and thousands of worlds at play in Cline’s book, and Cline is skilled enough to show us just what we need to know, when we need to know it. About half of the book is spent inside the OASIS where Wade assumes the role of his personal avatar and is empowered. But we also get to see just how clever Wade is in the real world, and how strange meeting in real life someone you’ve only ever talked to online can be. The book addresses some pressing issues and asks a lot of moral questions that the world is struggling with right now. The seemingly age-old question: “how much of ourselves are we willing to sacrifice for convenience and escapism?” is always at play.

Speaking of escapism, I’d like to address the self-indulgent nature of Cline’s novel. Now, normally, I’d say “self-indulgent” is a bad quality for a book to have. And maybe I’m just smitten by the material, but in Ready Player One, I think it works. And not just because of the subject matter. In order to solve the hunt, Wade learns all manner of video games, TV shows, music, film, art, comics, etc, and Cline makes reference to much of what Wade studies. Maybe this becomes tedious at times, but it’s wonderful to discover what inspired Cline to write the book in the first place. I think it’s also perfectly in character for Wade. If I were a teenager faced with the same challenge, I’d probably write my story in much the same way, documenting a lot of what I was studying because it would be extremely important to me. At any rate, those who already know a lot of what Cline references will feel completely validated whenever they come across an obscure title or song lyric they already know by heart.

I could go on and on about this book, but I think you should really just experience it for yourself. While it’s technically listed under adult novels, I’d say it’s really more of a young adult read. But that shouldn’t stop anyone interested in the subject matter from picking it up and giving it a try. If you need a little more incentive, the audiobook is read by none other than Wil Wheaton, who’s name actually shows up in the novel at one point. I’d also highly suggest doing some research on Ernest Cline, he’s practically James Halliday himself! The man owns a DeLorean! Talk about retro cool. It’s also available in eBook format, of course.

You can find everything you need to know about Cline on his website: ernestcline.com. Shortly before the book was released last year, Cline finished the screenplay for the novel. Yessir, Ready Player One is going to be a major motion picture! And you want to get in on the ground floor of this project, don’t you? I know you do, so pick it up today!

See ya inside the OASIS!

The Sunday Reflection: 3/11/12

Hey everyone! Well, here’s another issue of the Sunday Reflection, the day when I get to tell you all about my life and you all get to sit back and take it!

As you can probably tell, the biggest news on the blog right now is: I’m blogging again!

Also, I like faces way too much.

Ahem, ummm what else can I tell you. I applied to the University of Utah School of Music for grad school, and guess what? I got in! I probably won’t find out what kind of assistantship I’m getting until April 15th, so I still don’t know if I’m going to Utah for sure. But hey, it’s something right?

Something cool I did two weeks ago was I was the first trombonist in Regina High School’s production of the Music Man! It was kind of last minute: I was called in to replace someone else who didn’t have time for the show anymore, so I only played for two dress rehearsals and the four performances. Needless to say, it was a little difficult to learn the show in only two days, but I made do as best I could. The last two shows, at least, were a real success and I had a lot of fun performing again. Plus it’s always nice to get paid to play.

Unfortunately, since I was performing, I wasn’t on Hey! Listen! two weeks ago, but I was this week! You will be able to find the show at Jayson’s blog at pressXtoJayson.com. If you want to listen to the show live, as well as my brother’s show No Shame Radio, be sure to tune in to KRUI’s the Lab, Fridays from 2-6 pm. You can catch the live stream here!

As far as video games go, I haven’t been playing much recently. I don’t know, I guess I’ve just been really busy. But I did beat God Hand on Normal mode two weeks ago, and I consider that a major feat worthy of a bit of a break. I’m still plugging away at Modern Warfare 3 every now and then, but I’m not nearly as serious about it as I was about Black Ops last year. Especially not since Infinity Ward added 5 more prestiges. Even I have my limits. I did start playing Guild Wars, though, so if you’re interested in forming a regular playing group, please don’t hesitate to contact me. I’m also in the middle of a Let’s Play of EarthBound, which you can find on my YouTube channel, as always.

Lastly, I finished a book last week! A darn good one too: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline, which I will talk more about tomorrow for Retro Monday (*hint hint*)!

In the immediate future, I’m interviewing for a night stocker job at a local HyVee, because I’m poor . If you don’t know what a HyVee is, you’re probably not from the midwest, but it’s basically a grocery store chain. I’m also still doing Hey! Listen!, of course, and I may even be renting Mass Effect 3 from Gamefly soon. I’m not getting my hopes up for it, but the game at least sounds different enough from Mass Effect 2 that there’s a possibility of me liking it.

And that’s it! Keep reading, I’m gonna get some exciting stuff up this week!

My 10 Favorite Video Games page (it’s up there^^^^^^!)

This is just a blog update for the site. I’ve created a page at the top which will always contain a list of my ten favorite video games at any given moment. This list is definitely subject to change, and I wouldn’t dare to put it into any kind of order. But I think it provides a nice lens for readers to view the site through and gives me a little more perspective. Enjoy the new feature!

Legend of Grimrock coming in April!

So, it’s been a while peeps, but I swear I’ll be blogging more from now on. I made it into grad school, so for most of the foreseeable  future I’ll be able to spend more time on this.

Anyway, today I’d like to bring you some happy news. Legend of Grimrock, an old-school RPG in the style of games like Wizardry and Dungeon Master, is coming in beta next month! It was going to be released last year but had been delayed until now.

The game looks like everything I’d want from a modern Dungeon Master. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but this particular genre of RPG doesn’t get much love these days. Personally, this is one of my most highly anticipated games of the year. Compared to last year, we’ve got a virtual wasteland of game releases on our hands after this month. If you’re not that into Mass Effect or Diablo (like me), great new RPGs are going to be hard to come by. So why not try out this reanimated dinosaur? Especially if you’ve never played a game like this; you’re in for a real treat. And a real kick in the ass I’d wager.

You can find all things Grimrock at grimrock.net!

Grue Cast Ep. 6

Welcome!

I know, I know...you're just as excited for the new episode as she is

This week I talk about my trombone work, the book You Deserve Nothing, Tim Minchin, the Exorcist, my upcoming Let’s Play and much more!

Also added this week is the new segment: the Question of the Week!

This first ever question is: What class do you usually play in RPG’s and why? Let me hear your answers!

http://gruecast.podomatic.com/entry/2012-01-14T20_53_15-08_00

Enjoy!