You Don't Have To Be A Nerd To Play Minecraft

It's been a while since my last post, so instead of going outside and enjoying Sol I figured I should write about what I've actually done over the past few days.

Sometime in the past week, I decided that I was going to design a new world for Dungeons and Dragons complete with sketches of the towns and cities. I got distracted by a TV show I used to watch as a kid, Avatar: The Last Airbender. I thought that if I could adapt this idea to DnD somehow it would be kind of cool to play... It's a little more difficult than that though, partly because everyone would want to be the Avatar, but I don't think getting rid of the Avatar altogether wouldn't fix the problem either. Then, of course, there's the elemental manipulation problem... And the six-legged, flying Bison...

So yeah, that's what I've been trying to do.

I have also noticed a spike in Minecraft activity in my friends list. It mostly seems to be girls who play it though, either that or guys just don't want to tell anyone about it. It seems that you don't have to be a Nerd to play Minecraft anymore. But I have seen people openly against the game, and I think I understand why. Its probably because of the graphics of the game are intentionally... blocky. But what I don't understand is why that should matter. Anyone who plays any game should be playing games because they have good stories or the gameplay is good. Ok, Minecraft doesn't have a lot of story, but it's fun to play, and I for one would much rather play Minecraft than most games out at the moment.

I'll keep this post short, and I'll try to post again soon.

As always, Comment on this post, tell us what you think, and Share us with your friends, we always appreciate new readers.

Oli

Lord of The Strings- Igor Presnyakov

I wanted to show you what a Guitar God looks like. Turns out He's Russian. And infinitely better than I could hope to be. I came across one of his songs that I just had to hear, the Skyrim Theme. This wasn't the first time I saw his videos though, he also does covers of many, many songs, from Maroon 5 to Lady Gaga... But, don't worry, they're good. If you like guitar you'll definitely want to watch this brilliant guitarist.

Honestly, first time I saw him, I had to stop watching because, and this is a true quote, "No ...He's too good... Just no". I understand if you prefer Sungha Jung to Igor for some reason, but in my opinion, no-one can match Igor for skill, or the sheer amount of video hats (seriously, watch his videos, and you'll see that he has a different hat in almost every one).

If you haven't played, or seen Skyrim, first of all, where have you been for the past 6 months, and secondly, Igor has an answer for that as well, in the form of a Super Mario guitar cover. Because a true Guitar God is diverse in his musical teachings.

So, if you have an interest in Guitars, or you just like to listen to music every now an then, try watching a few of his videos, he has an album out on iTunes, and a load of covers on YouTube all ready and waiting just for you.

Happy Nerding!

Oli

Team Fortress 2 Celebrity Match

As you could probably guess, I am not into many sports. The last time I watched a football match it was the World Cup, unless you count playing FIFA [whatever number they're up to now]. So when I saw a celebrity match of Team Fortress 2 being commentated much like a game of sports, I just couldn't resist watching.

I already knew before I started watching that Notch (creator of Minecraft) and the guys from Yogscast (a YouTube channel for gameplay videos and brilliant commentary), Simon and Lewis, were playing so I was looking forward to half an hour of gameplay, seeing the skills of the people I watch play games daily. As the video started playing, I saw that it wasn't just these celebrities playing, Freddie Wong (YouTube channel: Freddiew) and many other gamers of note were playing.

I remember when I was younger, there used to be a whole TV channel, just devoted to competitive games, I think they canned it though, anyway, it was showing matches from Unreal Tournament, and other FPS games, live, and they were talking to the teams between games, and I loved that. It opened up a whole new world of "competitive sports". This was something to aim for, instead of football, you could find a team of gamers, train them, and enter tournaments all over the world. I'd like to do that, I'm not nearly good enough, and when I originally wanted to do this I was too young.

I'm going to keep this post short and sweet, because I can see this evolving into something not even close to my original point. Here's the first video of the game, introducing the players, and the first match. As always, comment on our blog, doesn't have to be this post, and share us with your friends.

Happy Nerding!

Oli

Adventures in Minecraft 360

It's been a long time since I last posted, so I wanted to write about the most recent game I found on XBLA.

Minecraft!

I have been looking forward to this, ever since Tobuscus started making Minecraft gameplay videos (His first video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVAcd-ffIMg) where he has adventures in WorldBuscus. Anyway, that's how I started learning about the game, and it's a good way to waste an hour or two. And also a good distraction from writing this post.

So, I just started playing Minecraft, this being my first time actually playing, and I want it recorded for future generations so they can learn from my many, many... many mistakes. Seriously, at one point I left my house and I fell onto Creeper (I fell down the ladder to my house) and his friend caught me by surprise, killing me, and destroying my poor house in the process.

Let me walk you through my unfortunate first few hours of the game.

So I started on Peaceful, because I wanted to get a feel for the game. And it was good, for a while. But, it turns out, that I picked the only mountain in the game which was nowhere near a single block of coal or iron. And. as I found out in a very unfortunate accident, very close to a pool of lava. Seems I wasn't ready for peaceful...

Sometime later, after mastering the controls, and my urges to swim in lava, I had built another House on the highest point of the map, it was intended to be my own version of Mount Olympus, I even brought water and tilled earth to grow my own crops up there. I was, and still am proud of my creation. From there, I could see most of the Surface-World and the lights of the random torches I placed across the world.

It was going well. So I got bored...

I decided that moving up to easy would be a good idea to help keep my interest. You have to take your time on things like this. I started a new World, and built a new house before nightfall, (complete with windows!) still unable to find coal once again, probably because I was cooking some windows, instead using cacti as a barrier vs. Creepers and hid in my dark and lonely wooden hut. What fun that was, but we've all done it, right? The cacti were effective though, at times they were even keeping me away from the house. And for the first few days I felt kind of safe. This is where I decided to move houses, and I built one above ground, so that I needed a ladder to reach it. That's where it started to go wrong. I should have stayed with my friendly neighbourhood cacti friends, because this is when I fell from the ladder and met my new Creeper friend...

For any beginners out there, I have three basic Rules that I hope will help keep you alive longer. Just a shame I forget about them...

Rule One: Check your surroundings before you open the door. I cannot stress this enough. It may be that I'm just unlucky, but it seems that everytime I leave the safety of my house, there is always a Creeper, or a skeleton just hanging out by the cacti, waiting for me. Granted, it did get better once I made torches, but still, I think the game is out to get me.

Rule Two: Never underestimate the power of shutting the door behind you. I won't go into that, just trust me.

And finally, Rule Three: Make sure it's definitely Day Time before leaving the house. No amount of torches or cacti defenders will help if a Creeper decides he doesn't like your face.

If you ever thought before that you wanted to see what all the fuss was about with Minecraft, the Xbox version is great, but as development started months ago, Notch (the creator) and Mojang (the developers) haven't been able to keep the Xbox version the same as the current PC version, so there are some differences. I do recommend this game for Xbox though, as there will be updates soon, and even though it isn't fully up to date yet, I've still wasted most of my last few days playing Minecraft. There's always something to do, and it can keep even the most easily distracted occupied for days at a time.

Happy Gaming!
Oli

Trials Evolution: A Review

Hey guys, Cam here and I am going to be doing a review on....... Trials Evolution. I know this is a little late and it did come out a month ago but after playing multiplayer I think it is still worth talking about, because this game is .... AWESOME!!!

I've never felt such a range of joy an anger in a game, it is hilarious but frustrating, however it's not annoyingly difficult. It's hard to explain but I do think this game is the best XBLA game on the marketplace at the moment.

It has online multiplayer where you and three friends can compete in speedway and trials maps, to see who can get the most points over the set amount of track (maximum of seven) or there is also an awesome looking local multiplayer where four people can play speedway tracks against each other on the same Xbox with much fun to be had, a great example in the link below.

However, the jewel in the crown of this game may be however the insane map editor allowing custom created maps to be shared. There has already been some insane maps being made in the first month of the games release, imagine how awesome these tracks will be in a few months time!!! We already have loving recreations of Valve's Portal and James Cameron's T2.

So guys, if you haven't got this game you are missing out on some seriously fun gameplay, and if you do have the game comment below, let me know what you think of it and please follow, much more reviews and rambling to come.

CAM OUT!

Will Do Zombie Stuff For Brains

With the release of The Walking Dead game, we must once again start thinking about how we would survive the seemingly inevitable zombie-infested apocalypse. It's not enough to have a 'solid' plan, you can never be sure if something will happen to change the plan for you. So, do you raid the supermarkets, find a good defensive area and hide out until it passes (if it ever does) or try your hand at being a hero, save everyone you can and risk your life for the safety of strangers?

I'm pretty sure that our audience, being Nerds, have many, many plans to do with this already, I know I do. But, because of Hollywood zombie films, I imagine some people are starting to think that it will be easy to survive with little or no help. I mean, a World of Warcraft veteran, with a double-barrel shotgun who had trouble with a single zombie-girl in his own apartment just randomly meeting a zombie killing machine? That's just not going to happen. And the victory scene at the carnival, complete with bright lights and a cacophony of music? There wouldn't have been time for a make-out session with the surprisingly hot girl you randomly found in a country at least 5x the size of the UK (I mean, I'm assuming they wanted to live, and considering the WoW vet's state of virginity, I think he definitely would) there was a whole town of zombies out there, and I'm guessing Tallahassee doesn't have the infinite bullets he would have if he were playing Left 4 Dead. Of course, I'm not saying that they definitely would have been overrun with zombies, I'm just saying that it's unlikely that a few weren't lagging behind, or maybe, had lost limbs and couldn't run as fast as their other zombie-friends... poor legless zombie... all alone... without a brain to munch on... "Don't give him your brains kids, he'd only use it for drugs!"

Will Do Zombie Stuff For Brains!

Not bad for Paint, while being continually interrupted by fire alarms!

(Speech Bubbles: "What's Zombie Stuff?"

"Dont Look At Him Kids, If He Wants Brains, He'll Have To Get A Job Like The Rest Of Us!")

Oversharing?.. Anyway...

Regardless of what I have just been saying, small groups do have good points, while smaller groups can remain unseen for longer and don't require as much food they don't really work for a long term plan. And of course, larger groups are the opposite. Larger groups have higher defensive capabilities, can stay in one safe location for longer before moving and can maintain larger stocks of food before having to venture into the unknown to restock.

So, if you remained interested after my partial rant and slight descent into madness, I would like to know what you think. How would you survive the apocalypse? Would you find a group of people you could trust and roam the post-zombie world in search of food and a place to live? Would you stay in one place, using your wits to find and grow your own food, and taking in survivors whenever they appeared? Or would you do something completely different?

Comment and tell me what you think you would do.

Oli