MMO Monday - City of Heroes

My next notable foray into the MMO style of game was with one that was a far cry away from anything else I had experienced thus far. Through Asheron's Call and Everquest, my fantasy tastes had been well satisfied (or so I had thought), but NCSoft's City of Heroes reminded me that there was more to my interests than just dwarves, dragons and magic.

It's sleek, blue, near-future design was very appealing. The HUD and menus all made me feel like I was moving through the pages of a Marvel comic book. The characters around me were as varied as those in the comic universe; there were spandex-clad classic superheroes, like my own Ironfist, but there were also cybernetic soldiers, or clunky clockwork robots, or undead heroes, or celestial-born mental masters, or spirits and ghosts and demi-gods and aliens and mutants. Every team I joined had a vastly different composition, and I learned through this game that MMO's meant more than role-playing.

Changing Course and Setting Sail

No video post this week. Instead you're getting an additional written post, you lucky blog-reader, you!

So if you've read last Friday's post, you'll know that I've been facing some difficulty with continuing The Visitors - Season One. My foray into the science-fiction/suspense field of writing was met with wide eyes and high expectations, but after about three chapters into it, only one phrase entered my mind.

I over committed.

MMO Monday - Everquest

MMO Monday - Part Two

Everquest

While this game also released in 1999, months before Asheron's Call, I didn't experience it until it's first expansion was released in 2000. My closet gamer was salivating over what this game offered, though, when I finally got around to investigating it. Unlike Asheron's Call, Everquest offered a full world to explore, not just a single continent. While that world was broken into multiple zones, complete with loading screens and everything, the promise of adventure from landmass to landmass was too much for me to ignore. Not only that, but it also gave me the opportunity to explore other races besides Human, and races that I had, up until this point, only read about in J.R.R. Tolkien's fantasy masterpiece The Lord of the Rings. Wood Elves, High Elves, Dwarves, Trolls, and more were all available to play, and I couldn't wait.

But what drew me in was the cover art for the first expansion, The Ruins of Kunark. Whoever designed that must have known what captured my attention, because this did immediately as I spied the game box on the shelf at Target so long ago...

Writing Through the Wall

Writing Through the Wall

So I've done it. I've done what I've always wanted to do. I've published a book. Not only that, but I don't have any plans to stop now. I, in fact, have three more books planned between now and the summer of 2015. Cybersaurus: The Awakening wasn't exactly a hit (in fact, very, very few people know about it, in the grand scheme of things), but I am certain that the more books I put out, the more I'll start to get noticed, and the more they may pick up steam.

I've decided shortly after finishing Cybersaurus: The Awakening that I wasn't going to visit Cybersaurus Season Two: Revolution until 2015, and that I would take quarter 4 of 2014 and quarter 1 of 2015 to pursue two other novels. Some friends of mine seemed excited for me to begin writing a suspense and horror novel, and so I set out to do just that, titled The Visitors Season One: Quarantine.

Yet it has taken me an abysmally long time to write Episode One of that season, and the entire time my mind keeps wandering back to Cybersaurus. Is this the Wall that every creative mind encounters? Or is it a general disinterest in my own work?

Experience Points Vlog Post - MMO Mondays & How to GM Videos

MMO Monday - Asheron's Call

MMO Monday - Part One

Asheron's Call

With the newest expansion of the world's most successful massively multiplayer online RPG releasing inside a month, it has inspired me to take a retrospective look at how this genre of video games has influenced how I look at gaming, role playing, and the online community as a whole. I've played my share of online games, and tried subscriptions to various MMOs, World of Warcraft being only one of them.

This post is the first in a four post series that will go through the most influential MMOs in my gaming history, and how they have shaped who I am today. So, for starters, we're going back to the year 1999.

Marvel Movie Line-Up

Marvel Movie Line-Up

Assembling the films of Phase One and Two in preparation for a new Age

As we close in on the end of Phase Two of Marvel's Cinematic Universe, and I fell completely short of my planned reviews of each of the Phase Two films (in fact, I think the only film I actually wrote a full review of from the MCU was the original Thor, simply because it surprised me with its quality). So, in an effort to give some sort of recap, now that we've seen everything leading up to Avengers 2: Age of Ultron, I'll grant you an overall round-up of the MCU, arranged in the order that I enjoyed them, from least to most.

Please note that this does not mean that the film listed first is the one I hated. Far from it, all of these films I found incredibly entertaining in their own degree. Those who know me well know that I often judge a film by how well it accomplished what it set out to accomplish first and foremost, since that is the culmination of the visions of the writer, the director, and the actors, not to mention everyone else involved.