Backlog: The Embiggening – April, 2016
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 04/01/16 at 01:58 PM CT
April’s fools are out in droves, feverishly pre-ordering (or importing the Asian version) “King’s Field 8,” while simultaneously forming masturbatory circle-jerks in order to prepare their e-peens for the raw rubbing that game will give them. For the rest of us, April looks like yet another month of bland crap… except for 3DS owners, who will be seeing the most interesting single month of releases since the thing launched. The other upside of April is that every platform will be getting at least one exclusive! Yay?
No traditional shovelware again this month. An optimist would take this dearth as a sign that publishers have finally decided that preying on the fans of a given IP with a terrible game isn’t the best way to win a reputation… but I’m not an optimist. The only shovelware coming in April is an annual ‘R.B.I. Baseball’ release.
To make up for the lack of traditional shovelware, plenty of devs and pubs are shoveling games from platform to platform via …
He’s Everywhere! 10 Videogame Characters that Remind Me of Chris
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 03/27/16 at 03:45 PM CT
When you are best friends with someone for a quarter of a century, you really get to know them. And, as is universally known, familiarity breeds contempt. As only children, MeltedJoystick’s Community Manager (and database slave), Chris and I are practically brothers, so some good-natured brotherly ribbing is not unexpected… especially when someone seems to go out of their way to be as bizarre as Chris. My familiarity with his idiosyncratic looks and habits has conditioned me to see Chris-ness and Chris-like behavior everywhere, from the Warhammer Fantasy universe’s Squigs to Universal Pictures’ Minions to “Southpark’s” Eric Cartman. I often see these resemblances in videogame characters as well. Inspired by my recent exposure to the number one character on the following list, and in honor of Chris’ birthday at the beginning of March, I’m mildly-annoyed to present a Belated Birthday Roast for MeltedJoystick’s favorite indistinct lump. I only used one rule in …
Upgradable “Consoles” are the Logical Next Step
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 03/20/16 at 03:42 PM CT
The world of gaming news and rumors has been blowing up this past week due to rumors coming from sources exclusive to the debased Gawker Network regarding the potential release of an updated PlayStation 4 revision that is not only different in form (like all of the PlayStation console revisions of prior generations) but different in functionality, supposedly with much higher capabilities than the PlayStation 4 that released in 2013. This theoretical PlayStation 4.5 rumor follows in the footsteps of other rumors circling the Xbox One and its own alleged Revision.
While these rumors encircling the 8th Gen consoles should be taken with a grain of salt, Nintendo, being the closest thing to an innovator in the current console market, has already successfully (more or less) tested the public’s willingness to re-buy the same console with a minor update, though in Nintendo’s case the word “console” should be replaced with “handheld.” Both the DS and 3DS have received mid-life …
Xbox on Windows 10: Microsoft Does Everything Wrong
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 03/13/16 at 02:59 PM CT
I have been extoling the virtues of the death of Xbox as a line of consoles and its rebirth as a dedicated gaming platform within the Windows operating system for years. With Windows 10, it seemed that Microsoft finally saw reason and decided to move toward merging Windows and Xbox into a single platform. Unfortunately, Microsoft is no longer a company that innovates, but is instead a company that mimics already-established technologies. And instead of mimicking Valve’s Steam or CD Projekt’s GOG, which are both loved by PC gamers, they decided to mimic Apple’s iTunes, which is hated by everyone with the least bit of technological savvy.
Microsoft’s job of uniting Windows and Xbox should have been painfully easy. Of course, Microsoft already tried (and failed) to create a unified PC gaming platform with the horrible always-online DRM known as Games for Windows LIVE, so they have a history of screwing-up the implementation of such things. Microsoft’s current debacle is the …
Review Round-Up: Winter 2015
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 03/05/16 at 04:48 PM CT
Welcome back to another installment of the MeltedJoystick Review Round-Up. Here’s what our staff has reviewed since last time:
Nelson’s Reviews:
This Winter, I played through new WiiU games as I received them, ensuring that the only backlog that gets bigger is the one Lord GabeN hath bestowed upon me. The MJ Crew also managed to co-op our way through “Fight the Dragon,” but since Chris has not yet successfully fought the dragon and since Nick is on strike from even clicking a star rating, let alone writing a review, I’m the only one who got it reviewed by the deadline.
“Penny Arcade’s On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness 3” – 4.5/5
“Penny Arcade’s On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness 4” – 4.5/5
“Yoshi’s Woolly World” – 4/5
“Legend of Grimrock 2” – 4/5
“Deadfall Adventures” – 2.5/5
“The Last Tinker: City of Colors” – 3.5/5
“Until Dawn” – 2/5
“Xenoblade Chronicles X” – 3.5/5
“Fight the Dragon” – …
Backlog: The Embiggening – March, 2016
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 02/27/16 at 04:30 PM CT
Spring is sproinging, and with it comes the promise of new life and vibrant renewal. The world has been sleeping under a frozen blanket for months, and we’re ready for the hibernation to end – especially those of us who enjoy videogames. Sure, sitting inside playing games when the weather finally gets nice again is a waste, but the release slump we’ve been in since, oh, the 8th Gen started really needs to come to an end. Will it? Nope!
Shovelware is hard to come by this month. There is no traditionally licensed shovelware coming in March based on TV shows, movies, or other terrible ideas. Instead, the only shovelware being heaped upon us is a handful of annual sports releases: ‘MLB The Show,’ ‘EA UFC,’ and a PC port of the latest ‘WWE’ wrestling title.
But the ports… oh God, the ports! It seems they are becoming more and more numerous as the 8th Generation trudges on. This month, PC is getting the very old “Hitman” and the very new “FarCry Primal” …
The Good and the Bad of D&D 5th Edition
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 02/21/16 at 02:56 PM CT
The third and final part of my look at the flaws & features of various editions of the Dungeons & Dragons tabletop RPG will bring us into the present, with D&D 5th Edition, which released in 2014. I will be skipping 4th Edition entirely because, as I mentioned in a previous article, it garnered a lot of hate from long time D&D players due to being very much un-like D&D and more like the tabletop version of “World of Warcraft.”
4th Edition was an obvious failure on Wizards of the Coast’s part, as it released in 2008 and was replaced by 5th Edition in 2014 – a mere 6 year lifespan. 5th Edition, however, rectified all of the problems with 4th Edition, not to mention many of the issues that have dogged the world’s oldest RPG since the very beginning. While 5th Edition is, unfortunately, not directly compatible with any previous version of the rules, the new mechanics and behind-the-scenes workings have been streamlined to the point where it is fairly easy to convert all but …
The Good and the Bad of D&D 3.x Edition
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 02/14/16 at 02:43 PM CT
Last week, I took a look at the best and worst aspects of classic Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, the version that introduced new players to the concept of tabletop RPGs for over 20 years. This week, I’ll be looking at AD&D’s successor, Dungeons & Dragon’s 3rd Edition… and 3.5 Edition… and Pathfinder.
After TSR’s collapse as a business, Wizards of the Coast – at the time a heavy competitor to TSR focusing on Trading/Collectable Card Games instead of RPGs – bought the remnants of the House that Gygax built and went about transforming the world’s oldest RPG into a form more suitable to the 21st Century. In 2000, Wizards of the Coast released the first ‘version’ of 3rd Edition, which kept most of the flavor of AD&D while simultaneously explaining how everything behind the scenes worked, clarifying rules concepts that had previously always been foggy, and generally clearing out all of the arbitrary weirdness that commonly got House Ruled out of AD&D, while also …
The Good and the Bad of AD&D
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 02/07/16 at 02:37 PM CT
In honor of Wizards of the Coast finally doing the right thing and opening up the new 5th Edition of the world’s oldest tabletop RPG, Dungeons & Dragons, via the Open Gaming License, I’ve decided to dedicate February to taking a look back at the more long-lived editions of the game and seeing what they did right… as well as where they went wrong.
I never had the opportunity to play Original Dungeons & Dragons (or OD&D, as it is commonly called nowadays), as it was before my time. Instead, my first experience with the world’s oldest RPG came via Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (AD&D), which, itself, went through some minor revisions, that divided it into a 1st Edition and a 2nd Edition. There is actually very little difference between 1st and 2nd Edition AD&D, as the majority of differences took the form of additions, clarifications, and options rather than revisions, rebalances, and tweaks. Thus AD&D is typically perceived as a monolithic edition with an immense amount of …
Backlog: The Embiggening – February, 2016
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 01/31/16 at 02:18 PM CT
Now that the gaming industry has had time to recover from its New Year’s hangover, we should be seeing some better stuff start trickling out. “Should” being the operative word. Instead the industry’s unabashed love affair with selling old material as though it was new continues unabated, with a glut of ports, compilations, and remasters padding what would otherwise be a very unimpressive month. Let’s get to it!
Is there shovelware? Of course, there is shovelware. Like the poor, shovelware will always be with us. February is bringing us three new anime-inspired games: a ‘Digimon’ PS4 exclusive – which apparently ties-into the 2015 anniversary of the original TV show, another ‘Naruto’ fighting game, and a typical Tecmo-Koei large-scale Beat ‘em Up with a coat of paint inspired by a Japanese novel series entitled “The Heroic Legend of Arslan.” Honestly, the ‘Arslan’ game sounds like it would be pretty interesting… if it wasn’t just another “Hyrule …
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