Video Games

LootCrate

Posted on by GumballsPlaysGames

I learned about LootCrate from a Chris Pirillo video and it seems like it’s pretty cool. You can watch him unbox his lootcrate below (The unboxing starts at 28:29. Tried to link to that time but it didn’t seem to work):

For just under $20 a month they’ll send you a variety of random geeky products worth up to $40 a box according to their website. I think the idea is pretty neat and hope the service thrives. Right now they have less than 500 subscribers, and the first 500 subscribers are entered to win a Google Nexus Tablet! You can use the coupon code LOCKERGNOME (via Chris Pirillo) to receive a discount on your subscription as well. I look forward to receiving my first loot crate.

Family Feud and Friends

Posted on by GumballsPlaysGames

So a lot of people at work have been playing Family Feud & Friends on their phone and it seemed like a fun time. It’s certainly fun to battle it out with strangers and come up with “good answer”(s). However after downloading the free app myself I’ve run into nothing but problems.

First off, the game requires coins to play, and each game of Family Feud costs 2 coins. You start out with 10 coins and get 2 coins for leveling up (you level up by earning money). However after no more than 20 minutes I was zero balance on my coins. So I have the option of paying anywhere from $1.99-$99.99 for additional coins. $1.99 will net you a total of FIVE games of Family Feud, or 15 minutes or so of fun. Most definitely not worth it. And anyone who spends $99.99 on an iPhone game (or even thinks about it for that matter) needs some help.

Every day you get to spin a slot machine to earn more coins, but most often you’ll only get 2 or 3 coins. So you can play one game a day if you don’t shell out cash.

What’s worse is the fact that the app itself never works. Most of the time I open the app I get a never ending connecting to server and an error saying the app failed to retrieve information from the server, try again later. Great so I can’t even get my daily spin to earn free coins so I can actually play the game.

This in app purchase model is not a winning model. I would rather pay $2-5 for the app then have to continuously dump $2-5 a day into it. Even if you bought the $99 coin package I doubt that would last a person a year. What a shame, the game is fun, but it apparently doesn’t want to be played.

Gaming update

Posted on by GumballsPlaysGames

As I think of something more relevant to write about, I figured I’d follow up on some previous posts. Since beating Diablo III on Normal I haven’t played it once. Well I continued on and played the first few quests of Act I on the next difficulty, but it was so repetitive and boring I gave it up. I never found cool gear, never had the gold to guy gear in the auction house, never had the desire to ‘grind’ for gold and gear (that’s not playing a game in my eyes) and certainly will never spend real money on in game items, so yeah. Diablo III was a pretty big waste of money for me.

Also I sold the Wii I bought from eBay on eBay for $80 (included 2 games and a new controller, so in the end I lost a good $50…). Never really used the Wii after the first week and wanted some extra money for gas, so that’s that.

In other news the next game I buy will be Madden 13 which will hold me over until Black Ops 2 and Halo 4 come around. Those will likely be the only games I buy for the rest of the year. Exciting, I know.

 

Bought a Wii

Posted on by GumballsPlaysGames

So I was browsing eBay one day and decided to bid on a Nintendo Wii. I ended up getting one for $60 and I’ve had it for about two weeks now. My game library is pretty small, I have Twilight Princess, Skyward Sword and Red Steel 2. I also have New Super Mario Bros. Wii and Super Mario Galaxy from GameFly at the moment.

I’ve only played Skyward Sword and New Super Mario Bros. so far but it’s been pretty enjoyable. I haven’t really had the time to get deep into either game but they were fun to play for a few minutes here and there. I look forward to getting deeper into Zelda as the controls feel great with the Wii Motion Plus controller and the game world is pretty interesting.

I’m glad I made the purchase.

Finished Diablo III on Normal

Posted on by GumballsPlaysGames

Yesterday I finished Diablo III on Normal as a Barbarian. Overall I can say I enjoyed the experience, especially after I dumped the idea of spending all my gold on blacksmithing. Instead I used my gold to buy better gear in the auction house and greatly increasted my DPS making the game much less difficult. I will say that ACT IV felt sort of rushed and was the quickest of all of the acts in the game. This makes little sense since it’s the climax of the game where you’re chasing down Diablo in an effort to destroy him once and for all. The final battle was also pretty anticlimatic and lasted at most 5 minutes which was disappointing. Of course now there’s Nightmare mode, where I get to start the grind all over again. I can only hope a future expansion will develop the game further. Until then let’s grind for gold and gear, shall we?

E3…meh

Posted on by GumballsPlaysGames

A lot of people are all excited about E3 right now, but I’m not one of them. It just seems like one big commercial these days. Nothing all that amazing. I read a quick summary of Microsoft’s conference or whatever you want to call it, and the Xbox SmartGlass idea sounds nice. Otherwise there’s Halo 4, Gears of War and Kinect stuff. Who would’ve ever imagined? Totally breathtaking developments, huh? I mean Halo 4, wow, totally surprised.

Seriously though, everything is just some sequel that we already knew about forever. And you really expect me to use a Kinect to say “Hike” in Madden or “Kick the ball” in FIFA….Really? What are you smoking Microsoft, what’s the point?

That is all.

I no longer use physical media

Posted on by GumballsPlaysGames

A year ago if I wanted a movie I’d go to the store and buy the blu ray, or if I wanted a video game I’d go to Gamestop and buy the disc. I had already given up CDs as a medium for music (I’ve been all iTunes for quite some time), but I hadn’t completely given up on physical media yet. The main reason was my internet at the time just wasn’t good enough to handle my media consumption.

Now things are different. I want a movie? I buy the digital copy on Amazon or now on Vudu, in HD (or HDX on Vudu) and it looks just as good as a blu ray to my untrained eyes. As for video games, most new releases aren’t instantly available in digital form (on the 360 at least) but when they are I prefer digital over a disc any day.

Having a stack of DVDs just doesn’t appeal to me. They take up shelf space for no good reason, it’s not like they’re appealing to look at every day. Plus when I move it’s really annoying to use up precious box space for a ton of DVDs. Having a digital movie collection is awesome. I can browse my collection on my laptop, tablet, or TV and watch what I want in an instant. I never have to hunt down a disc, I never have to put anything in, just click and enjoy. When I’m done the movie stays on the server far away and takes up no space in my room or on my hard drives.

Even better I can access my collection from anywhere. Over at a friend’s house? No problem. I have access to my entire movie library by simply logging into an account. On vacation? My movies are there waiting for me.

I know a lot of people are slow to give up on something they know. They say they like seeing their collection, or if they pay money for something they need something to hold in their hands. Believe it or not there are people who still buy CDs. So be it, but it’s not for me. I welcome the digital age with open arms. I love the cloud.

GameFly — free to play PC games

Posted on by GumballsPlaysGames

I used to be a GameFly member back home and always enjoyed it. I’ve finally gotten settled into my first duty station and decided to subscribe to GameFly again. When I did I discovered something new and exciting about GameFly. They now offer free to play PC games to their GameFly members. All you have to do is download the GameFly client (which is in a sense like Steam, however you can also manage your GameFly queue from within the client) and you can start downloading the free to play games. The games available aren’t crappy games either, notable titles include Bioschock, Civilization IV, Saints Row 2 and Assassin’s Creed. You can download the titles and begin playing through the GameFly client.

I’m downloading Saints Row 2 at the moment, so I haven’t had a chance to try it out yet. Still, when I resubscribed to GameFly all I really expected for my $15.95 a month was access to Xbox 360 games like before and the free to play PC game library is an awesome surprise and is a great value for members.

I’d expect as more titles start rolling into the library and as more users take advantage of the service GameFly may decide to go the route of Netflix and charge a little extra for access to the digital library (think of it as Netflix’s streaming add-on for physical disc subscribers). This is just speculation, but it’s my guess. If quality titles keep appearing in the library it may well be worth an additional $5-10 a month (what I’d pay at least).

Also I would guess that maybe with the next generation of consoles GameFly could come up with a “streaming” rental service for consoles (in a sense). No physical discs, no mail, you just rent directly to your console. Though if Microsoft and Sony would make this happen they’d most likely set up a rental service themselves so they get the money directly.