Well, there hasn't been much to make the blog lately.

Work has been a bit subdued lately - which is good, because I think they're getting ready to give me a bunch of stuff, so I've been enjoying the respite the last week or so has afforded.

Most of my free time has been spent either A) playing some Wii games, or B) working on some roleplaying games.


Mini Ninjas was (and continues to be) *lots* of fun. If you take a rather relaxed pace, the game is about 12 hours long. I beat it in about 13. I've played it about 14, now looking for some of the remaining statues (there are a certain number in each level). The game has a lot of replay value - not so much in terms of story, but simply because it's just plain fun to play and allows you to go back and replay levels you've already completed at any time.

My Life As a Darklord has been very entertaining as well, though it's getting pretty tough. I replayed the same level 4 times yesterday trying (unsuccessfully) to keep out those pesky adventurers before giving up for the night.


I'm currently gearing up to start a new D&D game for a few friends on Friday. It's been almost a year since I've run one. This is intended to be less a "campaign" and more of a "mini-series". I set out to make some simpler, smaller, episodic adventures for us to enjoy... ...the problem is, the more you try to understand and explain, the less possible "simple" becomes. Some would say that when you have a 2.5 page outline of stuff that happened before the PC's arrive on scene, you've passed that which can be reasonably called "simple".
The premise itself felt reasonably simple when i started, but in detailing the situation fully enough that it could become a living entity (i.e., a situation that could alter and react to the PC's actions), it was found to contain several facets that needed to be addressed for it to really work. "Simple" might not be the best word for it. Still, it's scale fits the general feel I'm going for and I *do* think it will be a lot of fun to play.

The resumption of Mouse Guard was exciting and went really well - I'm really looking forward to continuing that one too.

We've also resumed Patrick's Star Wars game, and I've been trying to do a little work on my character's backstory & pursuits for that... ...but I don't really know as much about the Star Wars universe as the rest of everyone... ...I know the original trilogy very well and anything Lego Star Wars may have taught me, but not much beyond that...

Still kicking around some ideas pertaining to my pet system project, but not really anything else to say about that.


~PS

At. Last.

We finally got our Wii back. It had been left in IN over the holidays on account of us getting snowed in in OH. I make this sound like it took forever, but it was really only a couple of weeks and not that big a deal. I wasn't curled up on the floor babbling through withdraw or anything. At least, I don't think I was.

Anyway, getting our Wii back meant that I could finally play my new game - a game I've been waiting for and wanting ever since April of last year: Mini Ninjas. It's a cartoony 3d adventure game. I'm a few hours in and, so far, it is awesome. It's a little more linear than I expected (actually divided up into 'levels', as opposed to being a more open-exploration game like Zelda or Okami), but that is the only aspect that hasn't matched my expectations (while many other aspects have exceeded them)... ...and I'm not even sure that that's bad. In fact, most of the levels are quite large and require quite a bit of exploration to find everything in them - so the difference may well boil down to semantics.
It is very, very fun. Multiple playable characters that you can swap out any time, awesome ninja moves (wall walks, ledge-grabs, hat boats!?), great magic abilities (possess animals, find secrets, and of course, sling fireballs), interesting specials (matrix-like multi-attacks, mesmerize foes, exploding fireworks arrows)... ...oh, and enemies turn into cute, fuzzy animals when you defeat them. Yeah, I expect I'll be addicted to this for some time.

In addition to Mini Ninjas, I/we also have a few other new games. I mentioned before that I got Super Mario Wii for Sheri for her birthday, and we've still got quite a bit of that to get through (hopefully with some help from our friends :) - the multiplayer is hilariously fun). I was also given Lego Indiana Jones for christmas, which is proving to be as amusing as Lego Star Wars. Finally, I've downloaded full versions of My Life As A Darklord and Nyx Quest: Kindred Spirits - a couple of Wiiware games for which I'd played and greatly enjoyed the downloadable demos.

I still have Muramasa: The Demon Blade, the Metroid Prime Trilogy, and probably a few other games on my wish list, as well as looking forward to the new Zelda game and the sequel to Mario Galaxy I've heard about...

And Tony and I still have to beat Final Fantasy.

I'm not quite on the level of our friend the Llama in terms of a backlog of games to play, but, as I'm usually a much more casual player, I think I've got enough to keep me busy for quite a long time...

~PS

So Sheri and I were watching the Muppet Movie the other night and I found that I was really enjoying the music in it. Like, enough that I actually wanted to learn to play some of it. So I got out my guitar and started searching the 'net for chords or tab for "Rainbow Connection" and "I'm Going To Go Back There Someday". After about an hour, I could play through both of those passably and have been very amused by this.

Sure they're a little sappy, but they're actually good, well-written songs. You really can't say that about music from too many family/kids movies...

~PS

"...we had to walk a mile up hill in the snow to play an rpg..."

I think this deserves and honorable mention on my blog.

Last thursday was slated as a date for Patrick's Star Wars game. Since Sheri was going to need the jeep that evening, Doug (one of the other players) came to pick me up.

Somewhere between my house & Patrick's (approx. 40min trip), it began to snow very hard. By the time we were exiting in Kingsport, the roads were slippery, and we actually slid through the intersection at the interchange and a red light down the street (when we came to a stop in the middle of the intersection). Doug had said he had wanted to stop at a Hardees near Patrick's place to get some dinner, but wasn't sure he wanted to make another stop in this weather.

Around this point, Patrick called us to see how we were doing, how the weather was, and to tell us that Tony had parked down at the Hardees and was walking up to his place since he didn't want to take the roads in his car.

By the time we got to Patrick's neighborhood, there was a nice coating of snow on all the roads, and one of the hills proved to be impassible - meaning when we got halfway up, Doug's little quasi-suv ceased moving forward. I call Doug's vehicle a 'quasi-suv' because, while it does have traction-control, it, unfortunately, does *not* have any kind of 4wd.

Now, I say the q-suv 'ceased moving forward', which was true - but what I didn't mention about that just now was that, after it did so, it immediately began sliding backward. It finally came to a stop about 20ft back down the hill in front of a driveway, which we slid back into, turned around, and did a (mostly) controlled slide back down the hill whereupon we decided we'd take a cue from Llama's strategy. We headed back down to the Hardees, got dinner as originally planned, and started walking toward Patrick's.

When we made it as far as the big hill - this time on foot - as the snow poured down on top of us, I turned to Doug, and, with a wry smile, that was what I said.

~PS

Still trying to get back into the normal swing of things after a couple of relaxing weeks.

We had a great time over new year's with a bunch of awesome friends. We basically spent the long weekend hanging out and playing lots of games - including a midnight game of New Year's Kubb. Robb & Edie were awesome hosts in their spacious new house, and it was great to get to see Jerry, Amanda and Stacey again. Plus Llama and Tim were there, which always makes for entertainment. :) I've got some pics of the festivities up on facebook.

I've finished compiling most of my favorite photos from 2009 (and the ones that I think are "good" from a technical perspective), and have created a home for them on my Gallery page.

On a more musical note (ha!), I'm still not sure whether I'm going to make another attempt at completing RPM this year. I really *want* to, as I've been upgrading some hardware & software in my "studio", have been helping Steve record some tracks, have been streamlining my approach to the recording process and have learned quite a bit regarding the enhancement of the quality of the tracks I put down... ...unfortunately, when it comes to actual material to record, I am all but completely dry atm. I've been trying to come up with some stuff for the last week or so (albeit, pretty sporadically), but haven't had any luck. If I can come up with a few likely tracks before Feb 1, I'll probably give it a go... ...otherwise, I may sit out this year.

In other news, I'm trying to work out some scheduling get my gaming group(s) back together after the chaos the holidays generally bring regarding this hobby. I've been working on my Mouse Guard campaign, which I'm excited about. I'm intending to pick up a few other games reasonably soon as well and I'm hoping to run and/or play with some greater-than-usual variety this year.


~PS