Amped Gaming

NYCBM

Jim Chaliz — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 03:12:42 +0000

All right so I’ve been sitting on this for about a week now. And I gotta tell ya… there was a reason for that. Remember how I said something about any news that might come up I’ll report on it. Well… yeah… There really wasn’t any.
But what there were a lot of comics and what made this con special was the amount of people truly devoted to them. So instead of trying to exaggerate any minor news I might have gotten. I’m just going to show some of the things that I found particularly interesting. I promise I’ll try to squeeze chicks in tight outfits into this. I swear.

First and formost. While riding the subway and checking some emails I noticed that my bad was somewhat lighter than usual for something like this. Lo and behold I forgot my camera. Yes. Awesome. Go to an event sans camera. Brilliant, but not to worry. The trusty iPhone to the rescue. So there ya go.

So the New York Comic Book Marketplace is a one day annual event held in the center (or heart, if you will) of Manhattan. Across from Madison Square Garden. As soon as I walked in I was greeted by the first counter selling rare comics. Awesome. This will probably be the only time I’ll get close enough to touch the first Issue of Spider-Man or the introductory issue of Robin, because they are Fu-king expensive. If you didn’t already know that.

10 cents my ass. Try $6,900.00 and I think thats on the low scale for the issue. I know you cant see it very well but I love the little price tag with the big number. All right moving on. To this guy.

This is Yogen and he is awesome! I mean that. Seriously, he was awesome. Super nice guy and he dressed as a Jedi for a reason outside of the fanboyism. He’s part of “New York Jedi”, basically I guess you could call them a theater/ performance group dedicated to saber battles. They also make and sell light sabers that you can actually beat the hell out of. Pretty sure they are unlicensed versions, but who the hell really cares when you’re sitting there whacking your friend over the head with a lit up saber that wont break and if it does guess what? The blades are replaceable. You can check them out here.
www.NewYorkjedi.com

Some more walking and a ridiculous amount of comics later I ran into this. Now some of you may not be as excited about this as I was, but this was a set up I haven’t seen since maybe 1989.

Come on isn’t that great. I was five in 89 if anyone was wondering. The blurry guy in the background was selling stuff I think but I cant be sure. All right. Final two bits and I’ll be out of your hair.

The guy on the left is Jimmy Tran. If you’ve picked up any recent Ninja Turtles dvd’s specifically TMNT: Fast Forward it means you’ve probably seen his work as a colorist. What you may not have seen is his work as an illustrator. Which blew my mind. A really talented guy. I urge you to check it out at
www.jtapp.com .

Finally the guy on the right. This is Chris R. Notarile. You may not know who he is but you will probably know some of the films he’s done. He’s the writer/director/actor in Blinky Productions versions of comic films. Like Mr.J, Blinky’s rendition of how the Joker and Harley Quinn met. Obviously done on a small budget, but they are fun to watch and these two are in it.

HA! I said I’d get chicks wearing skimpy outfits into this post. Anyway, this is Kim Santiago and Johanna Telander. Both of which are heavily featured in Blinky Production films.Telander actually plays Harley Quinn in the Mr.J series. Sadly I wasn’t able to get them in costume. I’m the guy that got the photos of them after they changed.

Still beautiful girls. Sadly, I just missed the spandex and gratuitous cleavage.
But back to the films and rounding this out. After speaking with Chris for a while we got to the topic of a Street Fighter film that he would like to do. He mentioned trying to get the rights and told me the plot outline. I hope he’s able to get it done. Because it would almost definitely be better than the live action crap thats out now. He did shoot a trailer though. Check it out and other films at www.Blinky-Productions.com

All in all the experience was great. The people were really friendly and I bought a bunch of comics for a dollar. So against all odds and weather this thing got off the ground and was fantastic. At least for me.

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AmpedGaming Podcast Episode 6

Jon Huie — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 01:21:36 +0000

In this weeks podcast, Arsen is back and catches up with his comments on Mass Effect 2’s ending. We then have a lengthy “What you been playing?” section which includes demos, Heavy Rain, new internet sensation Chat Roulette, and more. We then end the show with the crazy news stories that came out of this week’s headlines.

The NSFW Chat Roulette related link that Arsen sent to Matt and I can be found here.

Please feel free to email us at podcast AT ampedgaming.com and be sure to rate us on iTunes.

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Risen Review

Jon Huie — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 23:11:38 +0000

When I was asked to review Risen, I actually had not even heard of the game before. It was made by Piranha Bytes, the developers responsible for the Gothic series, and had been released last year on the PC. While there are definitely some graphical hangups and some minor control issues, Risen ended up impressing me more than I thought it would. Though I can’t recommend this game to just anyone, people who enjoyed older open-world type RPG’s should check this 60+ hour title out.

One of the first things that had me kind of concerned about this game is how it looks. The environments, the people, and the enemies just were not nearly as good looking as you would think an Xbox 360 game would be. Based on gameplay videos from the PC version, the 360 one took a bit of a hit when it got ported over. On top of that, there seemed to be a very limited amount of character models used in the game. So, if you are someone who absolutely has to have the most advanced, crisp graphics out there all the time, this may not be for you.

Another aspect of the game that had me a little put off at first was the combat. Everything about it just seemed awkward in the beginning, especially when there were multiple enemies on screen, thanks to the sometimes too sensitive camera. But with some patience, eventually you’ll find that after some combat training, it’s not so bad. You can also pretty much pause the combat at any time by accessing your inventory. For some reason though, after you close the inventory screen, you are out of combat mode and have to quickly try and get back into it again, something that, on quite a few occasions, caused the potion that I drank to be pretty much wasted after losing the health I just gained back.

The storyline in Risen is actually pretty interesting. You play as a stowaway on a ship that ends up getting shipwrecked on the island of Faranga. As you explore the island, you discover there are two factions you can join up with (which also dictates which class you’ll play as), The Don’s bandits or the Inquisitor’s magic users/warrior monks. Both factions eventually end up working towards the same goal, saving the island from impending doom. The character that you play as is quite funny at times, poking fun at quest givers and just generally being a jerk, something I can definitely appreciate.

Questing in Risen was kind of a mixed bag for me. There are a ton of quests to do, especially during the first parts of the game. Even questing towards the option to buy the first bit of armor as a bandit (that I actually wanted to wear) took quite a while to do. The only thing about them that bothered me just a bit was the quest log. It seemed only a little useful at times, reminding you of what exactly was said in dialogue with the quest giver while placing a sometimes misleading dot on the map to show you where your objective might be.

Which brings me to to what I think is actually one of the more respectable things about this game: there’s not really a ton of hand-holding to be found here. Too many games nowadays seem to spoon feed everything to you and get rid of the need for an instruction booklet by making the first portion of the game a tutorial that tells you everything you need to know. Not to say that the build-up to choosing your faction/class is not a tutorial of sorts, but it definitely did not tell me everything. For instance, I was sent by The Don to invade a nearby Inquisitor owned camp with some NPC fighters. Things seemed to be going fine, but then I realized that the enemies were not dying like the wolves and boars that cease to exist once their health bars are empty. These guys were regaining their health and standing back up again, ready to continue beating on us. This eventually led to them killing off my NPC party members and capturing my character, forcing him into service of the Inquisitor. While it was interesting that I didn’t just have to reload an earlier save, it was a path I did not want to take. I ended up finding the ability to kill an NPC in the instruction booklet and decided to start over again from the beginning, since there were quite a few that I wanted to get rid of.

One way Risen does end up giving you direction is through the enemies you encounter throughout the world. Unlike other open-world games like Oblivion, creatures don’t scale to your level. If you’re going to an area you shouldn’t be in, a monster that will either kill you in one hit or take many of your hits without getting damaged lets you know you’re out of bounds. This added a bit of tension for me while exploring the island, unsure of when I’d run into something that would show me the reason why I save every 10 minutes.

All in all, Risen is a solid, old school style open-world RPG. Those that are too use to the modern, in-game walkthrough style of game design may be in for a bit of a shock, while those that crave the lack of direction that was found in older RPGs will thoroughly enjoy this.

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Coverage from The New York Comic Book Marketplace

Jim Chaliz — Sat, 27 Feb 2010 00:46:20 +0000

The Comic Con that won’t give up. Now I know that sounds a bit extreme, but here in New York the weather has been just that. With snow piling up the New York Comic Book Marketplace is making sure that it’s doors will be open for it’s annual event and I’ll be making sure to bring any and all news from the show floor.

You can check out the website here: www.nycbm.com

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Super Mario Galaxy 2 Trailer From Nintendo Media Summit

Jon Huie — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 19:59:06 +0000

Nintendo has released a new trailer for Super Mario Galaxy 2, set to be released May 23rd. I loved the first one and I suppose this means May 23 is the date I need to get another Wii by.

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Street Fighter IV iPhone Gameplay Video + News

Jon Huie — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 20:37:24 +0000

iPhone game centric site Slide to Play has put up a video of some hands on time with Street Fighter IV on the iPhone. While things look great, it seems like it’s going to be a huge pain to pull off the special moves. According to Gamepro, it’s scheduled to come out in March and will cost $9.99, featuring seven of the franchise’s usual cast of characters: Ryu, Ken, Guile, Blanka, Chun-Li, Dhalsim, M. Bison along with new addition to the series, Abel.

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AmpedGaming Podcast Episode 5

Jon Huie — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 00:26:40 +0000

This weeks episode is the next to last time we’ll be talking about Mass Effect 2 (aside from future DLC of course). Arsen couldn’t make it this time so we’ll give him a chance to talk about his ME2 experience in a couple weeks.

Matt and I spoil the last half of this epic game and finish things off with a short discussion on some of the other things I’ve been playing recently.

Intro and outro music clips this week are from the Mass Effect 2 inspired song by Kabuto the Python, Those Minerals.

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Quick Starcraft 2 Beta Impressions and Random Screenshots

Jon Huie — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 04:17:09 +0000

In anticipation for the upcoming Starcraft II beta, my roommate and I decided to buy the first one again digitally off the Blizzard Store. After figuring out strange work arounds to get the game to display correctly in Windows 7, we were once again stuck playing this 11 year old game for hours.

Yesterday marked when Blizzard finally let people in to the highly anticipated sequel to what appears to be South Korea’s national sport, Starcraft. I got my invite and as soon as everything was done downloading and installing, I dove right in.

One of the things that Blizzard has been talking about releasing along side of Starcraft II Is the new Steam/Xbox Live-like Battle.net system. It’s definitely a nice set-up and I can’t wait to see how well this integrates into the other games this will connect with, World of Warcraft and Diablo 3.

After spending a considerable amount of hours in the past few days playing Starcraft I, the way the sequel looked struck me more than it would have otherwise. Everything is how one would expect an 11 year old game who’s graphics have been updated to fit today’s standards would look. If anything, it seems to have a bit of future proofing. My PC is a pretty powerful one and it is not able to handle the High settings without a considerable amount of lag.

The gameplay remains to be something I’ll have to comment more on later since I haven’t had a chance to play more than two matches so far. But before I get back to playing, here are a few screenshots.

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Mass Effect 2 Mineral Gathering Inspires Rap Song “Those Minerals”

Jon Huie — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 03:56:57 +0000

Anyone who listened to last week’s Mass Effect 2 filled podcast knows how much one of my podcast cohorts, Arsen Nazaryan, loves scanning and gathering minerals in the game. This mundane activity in Mass Effect 2 normally makes me feel a need to put the TV tuner card in my PC to good use, but YouTube user Kabuto the Python took it as inspiration for a song. A pretty good one at that. Definitely worth checking out below or here.

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Fable 3 Co-op To Be More Interesting Than In Fable 2

Jon Huie — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 03:24:07 +0000

Fable 2’s co-op was very disappointing to me. The few times I did actually play the mode introduced in this sequel just proved to be a waste of time for the player who was entering the other’s world since you couldn’t join with your custom made character nor could you bring back any experience.

Peter Molyneux, head of Lionhead Studios, intends to change this in Fable 3.

On last week’s 4 Guys 1UP podcast, Molyneux detailed improvements to the co-op portion of the game. Not only will the actual character that you play with in your game be able to go into other people’s worlds, your dog and weapons will remain with you as well. As a bonus, he’s throwing in the ability to wander away from the world’s owner, a much welcomed addition for both parties involved, especially for anyone who’s had someone else walk away from the console for a while mid-play.

There was also talk about how you should be careful of who’s invited into your game. Apparently there’s going to be actual consequences if the other player decides to mess things up. The “touch” functionality was brought up as well, with Peter explaining that you could either walk down the street holding hands or drag your friend to your dungeon for some fun.

I’m pretty sure with my previous Fable II track record, I’ll begin with option one and end with option two.

Source (iTunes link)

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