Leveling Down

The results of being hacked: losing all of your equipment yet having a nice amount of gold…

This past weekend, I received an email from Blizzard Entertainment informing me that my account password had changed. The email went on to state that if I had requested the change, to disregard the email. But if I did not request the change, then I would need to contact Blizzard immediately in case my account had been compromised. I did not request the password change, so I got a bit worried. I tried to log onto my account on the battle.net website, and surely enough, my password was no longer valid. Someone had actually somehow hacked into my battle.net account! This freaked me out. Read on to see what transpired…

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I had a hard time determining my five most anticipated titles for 2010. This may have to do with the fact that not a lot of stuff has been announced for the second half of the year or the fact that maybe there’s just too many sequels coming out in 2010 that I’m not completely interested in. While I should be more excited about them, I’m thinking I’m just mildly anticipating them because many of them could potentially suffer from either a new development team behind the sequel or the first game wasn’t so great to begin with. I loved Dead Rising 1 and BioShock 1, but with them both being developed by different studios, who knows how they will turn out? And will Lost Planet 2 and Star Wars: The Force Unleashed 2 be that much better than their relatively mediocre predecessors? Of course, Assassin’s Creed 2 was an awesome follow-up, so there is hope.

In any case, to recap on my most anticipated titles for 2009, the list included: Steet Fighter IV, Dragon Age: Origins, Bayonetta, Alpha Protocol, and Starcraft II. Only the first two from my list made it out in 2009, and both were highly respected games. Bayonetta also just released at the beginning of the year to good reviews as well. Now that I have it in my hands, I hope to get some time with it and will share my thoughts on it soon. Alpha Protocol got a “stealth” delay to this year, meaning there was no announcement of any sort that it got delayed so some people even found out on the day of release that the game was delayed to summer 2010. While I anticipated that game a lot last year, this year it’s off my list. Starcraft II is still on my list for 2010, but what are the other four?

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Crazily enough, this site has been around for over a year already. Looking back, I noticed that my first ever post was on my top 5 most anticipated games of 2009, and here I am, anticipating 2010 with two repeats from that list. That’s kind of sad, but at the same time my excitement keeps building and I am hoping all these games live up to the hype…in my mind.

The games I listed last year were Mass Effect 2, Starcraft 2, The Conduit, The Beatles: Rock Band, and Halo Wars. Halo Wars and The Beatles: Rock Band turned out to be pretty awesome, The Conduit, not so much, and Mass Effect 2 and Starcraft 2 are still MIA. So what am I looking forward to this year?

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Please Valve, do not release Left 4 Dead 3 in 2010!

With cmfl3x and me going on a blogging holiday break starting tomorrow, this entry will be our last post for 2009! Similar to cmfl3x, I also several holiday wishes for 2010 but I’ve narrowed it down to three possible wishes that would make me a happy gamer next year and they all relate to sequels: BioShock 2, Starcraft 2, and Left 4 Dead 3 (well, Left 4 Dead 2, to be more exact).
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World of Warcraft & Team Fortress 2 continue to give PC gamers updates

It’s interesting for me to see the “evolution” of the PC gaming landscape. Growing up on Doom, Quake, and Duke Nukem, I’ve lived through the rise and decline of the PC gaming scene, from the introduction of first person shooters, real-time strategy games, online multiplayer, 4X strategy games, and now MMORPGs. If you’ve also grown up with fond memories of Doom & Quake, I highly recommend checking out the book, Masters of Doom. It’s a well-written book that chronicles how John Romero and John Carmack met, formed id Software, and completely shook up the gaming industry. Having said that, today’s entry will contain my more general thoughts on the PC gaming landscape, and why I’m still excited for its present and future.
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I know I sound like a broken record, but Halo Wars continues to provide hours of enjoyment. Last night, during an epic 2v2 battle, I was reminded of why I love playing multiplayer real time strategy so much. First, nothing can top defeating a human opponent. There is a major difference between fighting the AI, who is following a certain algorithm and only adheres to it more carefully as the difficulty increases, and taking on another human player, his or her brain, and all the strengths and flaws that are contained therein. Second, in a multiplayer match, you need to constantly shift your strategies, take risks, and in an evenly matched game there is always that point where you need to risk it all in order to win. Third, I love RTS for the way it encourages multitasking, you always need to be doing two, three, or four things at once, and that multitasking is what makes the games feel so frenetic and out of control (at least that’s how I play). Finally, long RTS battles force you to have “video game stamina”, in battles of attrition, the waning desire to keep playing really threatens your ability to pull out a victory.

Last night’s battle was amazing because over half of it we played 2v1. Normally, playing 2v1 should be a huge advantage, but the player who was left was obviously much better than us and he had us on the brink of elimination multiple times. It was a match that my partner and I never thought we were going to win until we finally did, and afterwards I was so tired I didn’t even really want to play anymore. Major props to our opponent, and I am incredibly sad that Halo Wars does not support replays.

What does support replays, however, is Starcraft 2, and the media has been asked to submit their beta requests by June 19th, so my anticipation is building. I really hope the game supports matchmaking, though I don’t know if Blizzard does that sort of thing. One of Halo Wars few advantages over the original Starcraft is that I don’t have to type 2v2 Lost Temple!!!!!! every time I want to play. Regardless, I am confident Starcraft 2 will live up to its pedigree and I cannot WAIT.

Perhaps one of the best GBA games most people will never get to play?

Mother 3
On my new commute to work these days, I am now playing Mother 3, which is the sequel to Earthbound (Mother 2) here in the United States. Apparently, the game was never released in America due to several reasons such as it being a bit too controversial for children (it looks cute but its storyline is mature), too many potential copyright infringements (the music team behind the Earthbound games love the Beatles, among other things), and it is a Gameboy Advance game that released in Japan when the DS already took off in the States. Suffice to say, the only way to actually play this game is by downloading a fan translation that patches the Japanese version of the game. It’s a stellar translation and Nintendo isn’t telling the group to cease and desist because the company decided not to release the game in the US, so no one holds the copyright. The translation group has even gone one step further and put together a 240 page full color guidebook with tons of original art and is selling it for $20. I almost want to buy the guidebook just to support their effort, but the thing about guidebooks with me is if I buy one, then I will have to depend on it as a crutch the rest of the game since I’ll worry I’ll miss something so I’d rather just play it freely. Plus, I’m in the subway and I’d be a little embarrassed reading a strategy guide and playing the game at the same time on my way to work.

Dawn of War II
I spent most of this week’s gaming time finishing off the campaign for Dawn of War II, but I haven’t had a chance to try out multiplayer enough to warrant a review. I’m surprised though that Steam is telling me I’ve already logged 40 or so hours into this game, so suffice to say, the game is pretty lengthy on the hardest difficulty. Review will definitely be out next week as this weekend should give me some extra needed time to spend with the multiplayer.

Defense Grid
Been playing this a bit this week since it’s on sale for $5 and I’m actually enjoying it a lot. It does a great job in the first few levels of keeping things simple and slowly adding more enemy types and towers to use. I also like that there’s a feature for speeding up the enemy movement, so you’re not always sitting around waiting when you don’t have enough to make/upgrade towers. Great deal at $5 and I’ll try to write some detailed impressions up for it next week.

Starcraft
Starcraft rounds out my heavy PC gaming week, as I’ve gotten back into the PC gaming side pretty strong thanks to Steam’s sale, Dawn of War II, and the impending Starcraft II release. Now that the Starcraft II beta is imminent, I’m continuing to play the game to brush up on its mechanics. Having completed the Terran campaign, I’m now knee deep in the Zerg campaign. All these memories keep coming back as I play this game – one of my more memorable aspects of playing Zerg that I got to experience again is having 4 Hatcheries next to each other and spawning a full hotkey of units at once.

Does this screenshot bring back memories or what?

Apparently it’s PC gaming week for me this week, as I’ m in the midst of moving and my 360 is packed so I’ve spent my hours this week with the following:

Starcraft – Believe it or not, I have gone back and installed Starcraft and Brood War on my PC. (I also re-installed Diablo II and Warcraft III as well, but for now I’m just sticking with Starcraft.) After watching the new Starcraft II Battle Report that was released recently, I’ve gotten totally excited about the game and decided I want to play through Starcraft’s campaign missions  to “get back into the game” before the inevitable Starcraft II beta releases in the months to come (which I hope I get picked for). It still holds up today, and I’m already almost done with the Terran campaign. Man those siege tanks bring back memories. I don’t know what it is, but building clumps of a siege tank, a turret, and a bunker full of marines really makes me happy. It doesn’t look like siege tanks are in Starcraft II though, which make me quite sad.

Dawn of War II – I’m really enjoying the campaign mode for the game. I think I’m almost done, but I must have spent over a dozen hours of gaming already since I’m playing at the hardest difficulty. And it is honestly pretty difficult. But after playing Starcraft some and realizing that there’s no difficulty setting in the campaign, the difficulty of Dawn of War II was a welcome change as now I’m actually being challenged rather than steamrolling the AI. This is the first game that has challenged me in a while – maybe not as crazily as Left 4 Dead on Expert, but this is a game I do need my full concentration for. Hopefully I get around to the multiplayer at some point next week.

Halo Wars – While the demo was enjoyable, it didn’t scream out as a Day 1 purchase for me. Still trying to decide, as the controller makes it pretty simplistic but it does have campaign co-op. But cmfl3x and I haven’t even finished Red Alert 3 co-op yet…

Dead Rising 2 - About time! Hope with the new developer it’s as good as the first one was.

Infinite Undiscovery - Wow. The game is actually a lot more enjoyable on these harder playthroughs. Who would have thought?

Starcraft - had a dream about it this past week. Talk about crazy – I haven’t played it in years, and here I was dreaming I was in a RT 2v2 mirror match with a Terran and Protoss on both sides. After an initial skirmish with my Terran and the enemy Terran, all was pretty quiet as I massed ground units. My Protoss partner was massing Carriers, and apparently so was the enemy Protoss player. I soon discover that the enemy Terran player was massing Battlecruisers, but I’m stuck with all these siege tanks and no air. Great. I plop down 4 Starports (where did I have this kind of money?) and begin massing Wraiths. I then send my squads of Wraiths to take out his Battlecruisers, and scan once in a while to take out the enemy Observer. Not sure how it ended up but then the alarm went off and I woke up. What the heck kind of dream is that? I don’t remember the last time I actually dreamed I was playing a game, especially in this much detail. It wasn’t even like made up stuff that would occur in a dream – all of these Starcraft game mechanics were still quite present and adhered to.

What’s up all? cmfl3x here. I recently volunteered to contribute some material to Leveling Down so I’ll be making posts every once in a while. A little bit about myself, and like espion4ge I’ve been gaming since the 8 bit era. Some of my favorite games from previous generations are Final Fantasy IV, Super Mario 64, Punch Out!, and Goldeneye. As you can see, I was a huge Nintendo fan. I still am, but am pretty disappointed in their offerings for the Wii right now.

As for current systems, I own a XBox360, a Wii, and a DS, although I lent my Wii to my fiancee. With a 360, I obviously play a lot of first person shooters, and I also enjoy RPGs like Fallout 3 and Mass Effect. Other than that, you should probably know that story trumps all other aspects of games for me, so if I like the story I can forgive annoying gameplay errors or bad graphics. Although everyone seemed to think Grand Theft Auto IV had a great story, which I disagree with. GTA had a promising story, but it was way too long and drawn out. But I digress…

Anyway, like espion4ge I put together a list of titles that I’m looking forward to this year. If you guys think we should have added anything to our lists, feel free to post in the comments! What are you excited for?

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