PC Gaming

My Endgame Is More Than Dungeons

Posted by Gryph on June 10, 2015

Posted in: MMO, PC Gaming, Secret World Legends. Tagged: #The Secret World, #TSW. 2 Comments

Monday night I was kidnapped (otternapped?) by my awesome friends from the OtterDown cabal to finish up my Elite dungeons in The Secret World. It’s only after completing those dungeons, and then beating the GateKeeper, that one becomes eligible to run the highest level dungeons in game – the Nightmare dungeons. I had a wonderful time dungeoning with the Otters (video here) and beat the GateKeeper later that night. My main is overdue and in all honesty overgeared for the fight so it was about time. Continue Reading

Filth and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: Mounts in TSW

Posted by Gryph on June 3, 2015

Posted in: MMO, PC Gaming, Secret World Legends. Tagged: #The Secret World, #TSW. Leave a comment

As some of you already know, one of the big deals in The Secret World this week was the patch that dropped today. Other than gaining a new mini-dungeon, achievement reward vendors, and assorted other things, TSW has added mounts for the first time. Continue Reading

The Secret World: Issue 11

Posted by Gryph on May 12, 2015

Posted in: MMO, PC Gaming, Secret World Legends. Tagged: #The Secret World, #TSW. 3 Comments

Well, I’m a day late posting, and this will be a somewhat condensed entry. I had a doctor’s appointment on Monday – everything is fine, but we’re trying me out on a new prescription. The side effects at the moment include making my thinking awfully muddy and fairly unfocused, so I’m not exactly in a great position to think deep thoughts! I’m not entirely certain I can word coherantly at the moment, so this should be interesting.

Still, I’d like to at least touch on some of my first impressions of The Secret’s World’s Issue 11 content. This new issue came out for subs and lifetime members on May 6th, and opened up for everyone else on the 9th. (Though they decided to also allow Early Access for those who had previously bought The Fall of Tokyo pack, a great move on their part.) Spoilers ahead for anyone who hasn’t has the chance to play yet! Continue Reading

Can We Just Stop Using “Fanboi/Fangirl” As An Insult?

Posted by Gryph on May 4, 2015

Posted in: Communities, Console Gaming, Gaming Culture, PC Gaming. Tagged: gamers, offsite articles, storytime. 1 Comment

[Announcement: If anyone missed it, my first article for Holosuite Media is live! Holosuite is the parent company for the Beyond the Veil podcast, and I am super excited to join the team as a staff writer. Article can be found here: Reboots, Remakes, and Sequels – Oh, *Facepalm*. ]

I had a different plan for today’s blog; I’d started writing my thoughts about the Silent Hill franchise and the cancellation of Silent Hills. I had an experience that bothered me while gaming last night, though, so here we are. Continue Reading

Hardcore and Casual Labels – Why?

Posted by Gryph on April 27, 2015

Posted in: Communities, Console Gaming, Gaming Culture, PC Gaming. Tagged: gamers, newbies. Leave a comment

For those who don’t know, a friend of mine does an online gaming culture show called MUD2MMO. I don’t always agree with Tyger’s points, as he knows ^^, but it’s a solid show and good at starting conversations. His most recent episode deals with Defining Hardcore and Casual Players, which is something I’ve contemplated myself.

In short, I more often see the labels doing harm than good. Continue Reading

Minipost: The Hour is Late – The Secret World ARG’s

Posted by Gryph on March 16, 2015

Posted in: ARG, Communities, MMO, PC Gaming, Secret World Legends. Tagged: #The Secret World, #TSW, events, puzzles. 1 Comment

On Friday, folks browsing The Secret World forums got a surprise. A thread had been started by one of the ingame NPCs. The post asked for help, and provided a short number sequence and a garbled audio file. Today, there was another post from that NPC – this time with a longer number string and a longer, still garbled audio file. Part of this second post’s puzzle has been solved, leading to a free trial key meant for new players interested in the game, but the rest of it is still being puzzled over by the community. Continue Reading

Minipost: Ch-ch-changes!

Posted by Gryph on March 11, 2015

Posted in: MMO, PC Gaming, Secret World Legends. Tagged: #The Secret World, #TSW. Leave a comment

You’re welcome for the earworm. 😉

This week, there were a lot of changes going on in my favorite MMO, The Secret World. Our Game Director, Joel Bylos, announced that he will be moving on to a different Funcom project and the massive Enhanced Player Experience update went live. (detailed patch notes are also up)

This is still going to be a short post, for a couple reasons. Continue Reading

Minipost – On Gamepads For PC Games

Posted by Gryph on March 2, 2015

Posted in: PC Gaming. Tagged: new games, old games. 1 Comment

I ordered USB versions of the SNES and N64 controllers (NES was on backorder) during a recent online sale. I didn’t pick them up to use with emulators, though. I ordered them because I own a number of games on Steam that seem like they might play nicely with the controllers I grew up using. There’s some nostalgia involved in wanting to play with those specific controllers, of course, but that’s not the entire story. Continue Reading

Gryph is Playing Myst Online: Uru Live (Again)

Posted by Gryph on February 25, 2015

Posted in: Communities, Gryph is Playing, MMO, PC Gaming. Tagged: Myst, old games, puzzles. 1 Comment

I’ve spent the last few days rediscovering an older game, one that I mostly missed the first time around. The short version of its history (with thanks to Dilandau3000’s Let’s Play videos and the Uru website) is that when Uru: Ages Beyond Myst came out in 2003, the live multiplayer aspect planned for it was delayed. That live online portion continued to be delayed for official release, until finally being scrapped completely. Fans of the game and beta testers managed to keep a live version going on their own servers, and later on an official Cyan server, until it was picked up by GameTap in 2007…and then canceled. Cyan eventually got the rights back, releasing it as open source on their supported servers in 2010 as free to play. There is an option to donate towards server maintenance, but it’s not required. This back and forth is why the current incarnation is referred to as “Myst Online: Uru Live (Again).” Continue Reading

On Minecraft and Multiplayer

Posted by Gryph on February 11, 2015

Posted in: Communities, Console Gaming, Creating, Gamers Doing Good, MMO, PC Gaming. Tagged: Minecraft, VGA. 1 Comment

I was slow to get into online multiplayer games. When I was a kid, most multiplayer was in person (cue sad trombone over the “death” of couch multiplayer) and when I was older I just didn’t have interest. Most of my adult life has been spent in retail management. After spending all day interacting with so many people I tended towards being pretty asocial after work. I just didn’t have much interest in spending my freetime with anyone other than my close friends. Sometimes not even them. Continue Reading