(This review was completed on the Xbox 360 version. Please note that the Windows release is due out on May 24.) Avast! Thar may be some of ye out there who have not yet played a bloody Lego franchise game… Ye scurvy sons of wenches, this be an unacceptable course! *COUGH COUGH* Ok, enough with the Renn Fest moment. Look, I know it’s all too easy to look at something like a Lego game and assume it’s a “kiddie game.” For those of you that are Padinga readers, let me say this. How does a game sound that has you,…
Author: RurouniQ
It’s that time again, folks! The magic clock on the wall tells us it’s time again for Howdy Doo… I mean, E3! T-minus 29 days, as of writing. Woooooo! Yeeeahh! Alright bro! Fuck yeah! *Fist bump* *Chest bump* *Head butt* *Beer bong* Ok, now that we’ve gotten that out of our system… It’s time for PUNDITRY! That’s right folks, with every great impending event, it’s up to the media to make baseless, pointless suppositions regarding the scope, impact and announcements in the event itself. Guess who’s got a media baaadge? (Hint: Answer after the jump.)
You ever been through a serious relationship only to have it end in a nasty breakup? Sure you have. Months later, what happens? You find yourself, like it or not, still saying their phrases, emulating their gestures, repeating their habits. You are marked, influenced; they are a part of you, however small a part, forever. Guess what? Games work the same way! (As does any form of art, really.) The AAA titles we play today are forever influenced by games gone by, like evil exes come back to haunt. Hell, even Pablo Picasso is quoted as saying “Bad artists…
The imagineers over at Penny-Arcade have once again shot their load of awesomeness all over our collective chests. Too far? Pre-orders are being taken for this epic shirt poking at the continued PSN disruption and subsequent data leak. Orders will begin shipping by May 6th. Jump on the Sony-hate bandwagon and go place your order now. I know I’ve already got mine ordered, and will most likely be wearing it to Sony’s E3 press briefing, where I’m expecting Kevin Butler to announce a game where you fight giant servers, just like in ancient Japan, and hack them while they’re on…
Church of Spirital Technology, this ain’t. Yesterday was Easter across the world, and a Minneapolis-St. Paul metro-area church, The Crossing Church (What are they crossing? The street? Our T’s?), used a unique but effective tactic to get people in the door. They gave away multiple 3D TVs and Nintendo 3DS handhelds to their hopefully-future parishioners through random drawings, and the only way to be eligible was to attend Easter Sunday service. Over $8000 worth of prizes were given away. Now, I’m not one to get into religious debates on a public site. Sure, the tactic could probably accurately be labeled…
From the twitter of Arclite. I wish I’d had a professor this cool. – RurouniQ
It has begun. The rumors, the speculation, the excitement. Unofficial confirmation has landed the Wii 2 announcement firmly on the doorstop of E3, and the intarwebs are rife with discussion. What’s a highly-successful video game company to do, to win back the hardcore audience it has lost over the past two generations? The answer? Fight the fuck back. Take back the night. Dominate the competition. Form your own colloquial phrase depicting total victory. Let’s face it, people. Sure, the Wii has moved a metric shitton of units, but it’s moved those units to people that would not have owned a…
The opinions stated in this article are the sole opinion of Mark Ross and do not reflect the opinions of Padinga.com or its partners. So say we all. Fuck you, Jack Tretton. Fuck. You. Dearest reader, I’d like to take you back on a journey. Hop into the Wayback Machine with me, and let’s turn the dial to 2003. A darling little company by the name of Nokia is ready to release a darling little product called the N-Gage, a.k.a. the Awkward Side Taco, that for all intents and purposes was ahead of its time. A game system that’s also…
Ok, confession time. Hey, don’t judge me, we all have guilty pleasures. Mine just so happen to include Yellowcard and Zack Snyder movies (except Sucker Punch, that movie is the Rebecca Black’s Friday of action movies), but that’s besides the point! Don’t stop reading yet! This confession is about VIDEO GAMES. So just… don’t go anywhere yet. I loves me some Dynasty Warriors. Technically speaking, I’m actually a bigger fan of the Samurai Warriors spin-off series, but the sub-genre as a whole keeps me on the edge of my seat. Now, I know what you’re thinking. “But Q,” your brain…
Yeah, I know this is kind of lame. Deal with it. I’ve been in Vegas for the past couple days, and just in case, I’ve been walking around with my 3DS on so StreetPass had a chance of picking up someone. It was a long shot, but one’s gotta hope, you know? Lo and behold, I turned on my 3DS on the shuttle back to my hotel last night, and there he was! It’s-a mii! No, literally. The name of the guy is “me” and he’s from California. Slightly unimaginative, but I can see where some people would be concerned…
So you’re one of the few. The proud. The elite. The… slightly pathetic first adopters. It’s ok, I am too. I can admit it. I’ve got my preorder from the nearby evil-corporate-big-box retailer, and I’m waiting with baited breath for Sunday’s release date to grace me with its holy-Sabbath presence. But if you’re like me, you may be wondering what exactly is in store for you on Sunday, and what your new 3D pal will need from your hard-earned dollar. There will no doubt be a slew of accessories available wherever you’re picking up, and one of the largest sets…
Sure, it’s no big news that Harmonix releases a pack of DLC for Rock Band every week (although perhaps it’s more noteworthy in light of recent buyouts and layoffs). But this one holds a special place in my heart. The February Heartache Duets Pack contains the following songs, which can of course be purchased separately: Animotion – “Obsession” B.o.B. (featuring Hayley Williams) – “Airplanes” Bonnie Tyler – “Total Eclipse of the Heart” The Human League – “Don’t You Want Me” Lady Antebellum – “Need You Now” Meat Loaf – “Paradise by the Dashboard Light” Stevie Nicks – “Stop Draggin’ My…
Padinga needs your help! Mayhap you’ve heard of a little tool called Alexa? It’s a browser extension that reports the sites you go to into a central database and ranks all sites based on their visitation. The problem is, the folks at E3 are looking at press outlets’ Alexa ranking to determine how many badges will be given out, and Padinga’s rating is… well, it’s a fixer-upper. Most sites are better. So we need your help! If you would, please go to Alexa’s website and install the Alexa Toolbar in any browser you use to view Padinga. Visit Padinga frequently!…
Another year is upon us. And by “upon us”, I mean riding on top of us, bucking wildly, waving that riding crop in the air and shouting “Giddy-up you fucking nag, or I’ll turn you into crafting materials!” No doubt, one way or another, this year is going to be a wild ride, complete with dance numbers, shaky camera angles, and heroes walking slowly away from massive explosions. Of course, the biggest object of interest to us, the hardiest of the hardcore gamers, is going to be games. And of course, each person is going to have their personal looking-forward-to…
First, let me preface this by saying that despite the title (and the attached image), I am not actually a Sony hater. I am simply someone who prefers how the other Big Two companies do things. I don’t hate Sony, I just don’t appreciate them as much as Sony fans do. Some of their practices in the past have really pissed me off, but the PS3 has become a very stable and viable system, so it’s obvious they have made some good decisions lately. The “Sony hater” label seems to have come from the fact that I have been pretty…
Champions Online (a.k.a. City of Heroes 2) has relaunched today as Champions Online Free For All. Using the increasingly-popular free-to-play-pay-for-extras system being adopted by more and more MMOs, the game will now be playable by the general public for free. Nothing. Zero. Zilch. Shinola. So tell us, now that a moderately-well-received MMO costs nothing to play, will you play it? Are free-to-play MMOs worth it at all? Will Batman escape from the Riddler’s fiendish one-eyed dingo army? If you’re interested, go grab your free launcher at http://www.champions-online.com/.
Greetings all you STOaways! It is with sadness that I bring you the following news. Troll and Richie are no longer able to do the show. They have both found that their inability to find time/money to put into the game has become detrimental to their contributions to the show, and have elected to part ways. We wish them the best with their endeavors! Troll will be focusing on his participation in the KC Ren Faire, and Richie will be focusing on school. That being said, we need new cast members! Without them, we don’t have a cast! I will…
The STOaway Team disembarks from Spacedock, featuring: An exclusive interview with Diana Sherman, a writer for Cryptic and Star Trek Online! Thank you very much to Diana for joining us on the show! To join our official fleet, Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra (or DJT for short), please find @RurouniQ, @Mykalson, or @Friedrich ingame and send us a message. We’ll let you right in! As always you can follow us on Twitter (http://twitter.com/stoawayteam) or email us at our gmail account. Also, we are accepting listener content, so feel free to send it our way! Download the M4A here.
The STOaway Team disembarks from Spacedock, discussing The Tribble is alive! Cryptic’s Release Calendar Engineering Reports More details on Klingon upcoming content Details on what is live on Tribble can be found at: http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=134008&highlight=dstahl Come on, respecs! Don’t make Daddy wait! Got any questions you’d like to ask of one of Star Trek Online’s writers? Send them to us at stoawayteam@gmail.com, or post them in our forums. We’ve got an interview in the works for the coming weeks, so send us your questions now! Also, to join our official fleet, Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra (or DJT for short),…
Part of a Science Fiction Double Feature! I forgot to post show details on Padinga for last week’s show, so it’s being posted on the same day as the new show! The STOaway Team disembarks from Spacedock, discussing Wiki Editing and Not Enough STO Upcoming Raidisodes The State of the Game A Sweet Theorycrafting Blog The theorycrafting blog can be found at: http://theenginescannaetakeit.wordpress.com/ Holy hell there’s a lot of numbers here! Sure to satiate your need for perfection! BREAKING SUPER IMPORTANT NEWS! Got any questions you’d like to ask of one of Star Trek Online’s writers? Send them to us…
Part of a Science Fiction Double Feature! I forgot to post show details on Padinga for last week’s show, so it’s being posted on the same day as the new show! The STOaway Team disembarks from Spacedock, discussing iTunes Reviews! More Klingon Content Coming Explorable Ships Coming Rear Admiral 10 will be free Buddy keys now available A fan-made character builder! The fan-made character builder can be found at: http://sto-builder.binarybit.ch/ It’s not complete, but it’s still very useful, and if it’s a sign of things to come, then hells yeah. Also, to join our official fleet, Darmok and Jalad…
The STOaway Team disembarks from Spacedock, discussing What it takes to run STO The upcoming STO book STO hits 1 MILLION accounts The best STO wiki so far The STO wiki in question is located at http://sto-intel.org. Here are the results of our research for a good STO machine: Motherboard $110 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813121396 CPU $125 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115222 RAM $106 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231193 Video Card $70 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130395 Power Supply $60 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817152035 Hard Drive $70 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136218 DVD Burner $27 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106289 Windows 7 $65-$110 http://www.microsoft.com/student/discounts/theultimatesteal-us/default.aspx http://microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0318879 Total cost: $633 – $678! To join our official fleet, Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra (or DJT for short), please…
The STOaway Team disembarks from Spacedock, discussing The formation of DJT Issues with the Head Start Cryptic’s incoming content The best forum post evar. The best forum post evar can be found at: http://forums.startrekonline.com/showthread.php?t=90778 It is a list of things all STO players should know, and I guarantee you there’s at least something on this list you didn’t know about! Also, to join our official fleet, Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra (or DJT for short), please find @RurouniQ, @Mykalson, or @Friedrich ingame and send us a message. We’ll let you right in! As always you can follow us on…
The STOaway Team disembarks from Spacedock, featuring RurouniQ, Richie and Troll! This week, we discuss: The Impending Launch DelTaco shenanigans SyFy’s pre-order offer Whatever happened to Accolades? Download the M4A here.
The pilot episode of our new podcast launches! The people behind the longest-running video-game related podcast now bring you a podcast dedicated to Star Trek Online: The STOaway Team! We discuss all things related to the STOverse and we don’t hold back, showing a lack of restraint only found in the cast of The Game Show. Starring RurouniQ, Richie, and newbie Troll! Disembarking from Spacedock to discuss all things Star Trek Online, including: Beta Impressions How the Game Works Membership Details Download the M4A here.
So Sony has leaked (how can it be a leak if it comes officially from the company?) information on the PSP 2, or, as they are calling it, the PSP Go. (UPDATE: It seems as though it’s more like the PSP-4000. Nothing indicates there are any hardware upgrades present.) I’ve read over the information we have so far, and what, you may ask, is RurouniQ’s opinion on this? Utter fail, for one major reason: There is still no second analog stick. Some might say that it’s not kosher to condemn a new system based on one aspect of it, but…
So I’m going to have to ask you guys to bear with me today. For once, there shall be a post that is not even remotely game-related. I know, I know, heresy. It could be worse. I could go on a rant about the superiority of the Jaguar over all over video game consoles. It would be game-related, but it would be painful at best. Not to mention the fact that it would be wrong. Some of us play games as a hobby, as something to pass the time. Some of us play games as a way of life, a…