1 minute Dragon game

So I’ve got another “1 minute” game for you.  This time, here there be dragons.  Yep.  Those big winged flapping lizard-like creatures.  You have 1 minute to list as many video games that have dragons in them.  Be they bosses, pets, or just in cut scenes.  It should be easy, right?  So . . .

On your mark . . . .

Get set . . . .

Go . . .

You got started off really fast.

You’ve named a couple but are you sure they really have dragons in them?

Oops, is that a duplicate?

Come on keep going.

You’ve run out of ideas already?

Okay . . . and time’s up.

How many did you get?  Here’s my list.  I have a few maybes on it and I’ll have to explain those.

 

My list:

Legend of Dragoon

Final Fantasy X

Final Fantasy VII

Dragon Age: Origins

Dragon Age 2

Skyrim

Spyro the Dragon

Spyro the Dragon: Ripto’s Rage

Sypro the Dragon: Enter the Dragonfly

Blue Dragon

My maybes:

Dark Stone

Balder’s Gate

Champions of Norath

Summoner

Untold Legends: Brotherhood of the Blade

Gauntlet

So I got 10 that I know of for sure that have dragons.  I could have probably listed all of the Final Fantasy games but I wasn’t sure if they all had a dragon in them.  I’m not even totally sure with FF7 but I’m hedging my bet that it does.  And I'm know there are more Spyro games that what I have listed but I can't remember any more than what I put down.

As to the maybes I have various excuses or doubts about including them.  I might have to do some research to see if I’m just imagining things with these games or I got it right.  Unless someone wants to do it for me and put it in the comment’s section. 

It’s been a very long time since I played Dark Stone and then I didn’t even get very far in the game.  I’ve been meaning to go back and what I remember of the game it’s perfect to have a dragon.

It’s also been a very long time since I’ve played both Balder’s Gate and Champions of Norath.  They are also a couple of games that have got to have a dragon or two.  I’m pretty sure that my brother dain and I have finished both of those games but nothing comes to mind specifically about dragons.  Even if not a boss but just something terrifying to look at in a cut scene.

Summoner is the game dain and I are supposed to be finishing for the PS2.  When I think of “summoners” I think of magic and summoning dragons.  So there’s got to be a dragon in that game right?

Untold Legends: Brotherhood of the Blade is a game I’ve been playing on the PSP.  It’s another game that I’m not very far in but seems perfect to having a dragon in the game.  If not a boss, then some eye candy instead.  There’s another game in the Untold Legends series that I have but I can’t remember the name so I didn’t count it.  Warrior’s Code.  Or maybe, Warrior’s Guild.  Or something like that.  Since I can’t remember what it’s called, I’m not counting it.  Even as a maybe.

Gauntlet is a game my brother dain and I have finished a couple of times.  On the N64.  On the PS.  And on the GameCube.  And maybe more systems and versions of the game.  I can’t remember if there are any dragons in the game.  If there are they’re probably fought while on the ground.  At least I don’t remember any aerial combat battles in any of those games.  And since I can’t remember any subtitles for any of those versions I’m only counting them as one game.  And that’s only a maybe too.

Personally I’m disappointed with myself.  I thought I would have done better than that.  Especially since one of my favorite genres of video games is RPGs and those are usually fantasy games.  And aren’t dragons, in one form or another, a requirement in fantasy games?  Maybe if I played more of those games . . . or at least played more IN all of those games that I have I could have done better.  How well did you do?  Leave your results in the comments.  And if you’ve got some ideas for more “1 minute” game ideas leave those in the comments as well.  I’ve got a few more ideas I want to explore but it won’t hurt to have more.

Poll Results - Befriending based on gamer pic/avatar

Better late than never, right? Here's the latest poll results and (what you've all been waiting for) my opinion.

Have you ever befriended someone based on their gamer picture or avatar?

Yes, their gamer picture was hot = 0 votes
Yes, their avatar was hot = 0 votes
Yes, their gamer picture AND avatar were hot = 0 votes
No, I don't like making friends = 8 votes

With my system crapping out around the time of this poll I can't remember if I voted or not. If I did I would have/did vote for "No, I don't like making friends". And based on how everyone else voted it's kind of amazing that any of us have people on our friends list.

Here's how the poll started.

I was messing around with my avatar trying to find something I liked. I went into the game based extras that you can get to trick out your avatar. Nothing really excited me (except for the lightsaber, but I'm too cheap). I had a small odd amount of points to use so I bought a corset from Fable II. Then I started building an outfit and an avatar around that. I wasn't happy with the results but I left things alone for a couple of days to think about it.

In those couple of days you wouldn't believe the number of friends request I got from total strangers. It seemed that every match I played (no matter what game) someone would send me a message about my avatar or send a friend request. Some I deleted right out. Some I gave a chance too. And some have since been deleted. But it got me thinking.

I remember when our friends list was limited to, I think, 99 people. I had a friend who I have played with since the old Star Wars Battlefront days that didn't have room on his list to add me once I got my 360. He had to delete someone to make room. In the original Xbox, and prior to Party chat on the Xbox 360, you would be stuck in a room listening to everyone who was playing on your team. Sometimes that was good. Some times that was down right horrible. But despite that, I picked up a few friends along the way.

Not having the ability to restrict who I talked to like we can in a Party Chat I got to know MadMax, c5ride, Fbody, cyberWRAT, and a number of other people who are now on my friends list. Since we started to have the ability to use Party Chat I haven't been able to listen, talk to, or get to know anyone I'm playing with outside of my chat circle. Since then my friends list has remained pretty much static. Until I changed my avatar.

Thus the idea for my poll was born.

If we're not talking and getting to know someone via their game play, how else are we making friends? Maybe it's their gamertag (see the "hot chick" posts I did awhile ago). Maybe it's their gamer picture. Maybe it's their avatar. Apparently, based on this poll, nobody likes to make friends.

It's not that I'm not happy with the friends I've already got. You all keep me very entertained on a nightly basis. But sometimes a girl would like a friend who will finish an old game (like Gears of War) on insane mode because she can't do it alone. But, NOOOOOO, that friend is going to trade that game in to get Modern Warfare 2. Come on! My friendship can't be traded in for the latest game out there.

Or maybe a girl just wants a friend to kick back with and play a little arcade game every now and then. Gauntlet is sooooo much better when played with friends. And there's so many arcade games to choose from. I'm just saying.

But if any of you are wondering if your avatar is hot enough to get someone's attention, my dog, Zoe, really likes to jump up to the screen and stare at cyberWRAT, Genghis Khan, MasvHdWndHarry, and Zenra Nukenin's avatars. She hasn't seen Zenra's Halloween wolf yet so maybe she'd change her vote if she did.

The gauntlets had been thrown down

I'm not talking Gauntlet as in Elf and Wizard traveling through a maze picking up treasure chest and destroying enemy spawning generators ("Elf just shot the food.") I'm talking gauntlets that knights wore on their arms during joust (not that game either) and fighting.

A friend of mine made a post on the website Xbox 360 Gaming World that if you wanted to play Battlefront and have someone to kill "Pengwenn's good for at least 10 kills". With a challenge like that I couldn't let it go unanswered.

It had been awhile since I played Battlefront. And I had the decision to put the disk in the 360 or dust off the old original Xbox and fire it up. Playing Battlefront on the 360 is okay with one exception. Water effects. Whether you're running around on Kyshyyyk or in the ice caves of Rhen Var. Looking at water can be distracting. I decided to fire up the old system, but that took some doing since I have to find all the chords to connect to it. Man, it's been awhile.

I played for about 40 minutes before I had to get off early for the night. It only took one map to get back in the swing of things. And only twice did my deaths get into double digits. I didn't get to play two of my favorite levels: Jabba's Palace and Kamino. And I never got the chance to use a wrist rocket. Man, I love those things. I might have to go back and play that game more often. How many games do you know that have been out for some time but still have a community dedicated to playing the game. There's not as many people playing Battlefront as there use to be, but there are still some people who play it every night. Good games like that don't come around that often. And the fact that it's Star Wars is a bonus.

So after my brief game play last night I think it's safe to say that I might not have been the best player in the game, but I picked up those gauntlets and showed I wasn't some easy kill either. Oh the memories.

Do you swap gender?

Game Informer online has an interesting article about a study a university did about gamers swapping gender when they play online. It got me thinking.

I think the first time I noticed a gender difference (or choice) was playing Gauntlet in the arcades. It was nice to have a female Valkyrie since everything up until that point was male only characters. I've noticed in shooter games the character is almost always male. But in fantasy games you start to get a lot more choices for female characters. Unfortunately those characters tend to be range attack or magic users.

I remember playing RPG games at home and wondering why all the female characters tend to be the magic users. Their strength and defence numbers were low but their magic and spirit numbers were high. It bothers me a little bit but I just figured if I had to play as a male I would. When given the choice (and an equal balance between the genders) I usually pick female.

I don't mind running around in Rainbow 6: Vegas as a girl even if a lot of my friends gave me grief for that. And when I created a character for Mass Effect I made her female. But then I know of a couple of guys that made their characters in games (even 3D Mini Golf) female so that as they played they would have something "nice" to look at. It's nice to see a female character's stats not adjusted because of their gender. And nice to see guys playing as females even if it's just to ogle them.

I've also learned not to judge a person's real gender by the character I see on the screen. Guys can be girls; girls can be guys. What I do find interesting is after seeing what type of character someone picks and then learning what type of person they really are in real life. Does that gruff, grizzly, hardcore gaming dude run around as a Priestess in a dress? OR does that quiet, soft-spoken female maxes out her warrior, but with matching armor?

My Favorites Games - Game Cube

Okay, you'll still have to wait on the my favorite games for the N64. I know I've got more games stashed somewhere I just haven't found them yet. So I'm moving on to the Game Cube.

My brother and I both had a Playstation 2 and would meet up every Saturday at my parents house to do laundry. We'd play games all day long. I remember when the Xbox and Game Cube came out. Neither one of use was making enough money to get both systems so we came up with a plan. He would get the Xbox and I would get the Game Cube (he was making more money than me at the time). When we'd meet up on laundry days we'd bring those systems and share. (See mom and dad we can share our toys.) The only problem was the games.

We both wanted to play games from the other system at other times of the week. I wanted to play Hunter the Reckoning to blow off some heads. And He wanted to play some Pikmin to throw little leafy head creatures around. Within a month or two we both broke down and bought the other system. And while that put us both on a very tight budget for awhile neither one of us are sorry we did it.

Here are my favorite games for the Game Cube:

#1 Pikmin 1 & 2
How could you possibly NOT love this game? I knew practically nothing about it when I bought it. It looked bright and comical so I thought I'd give it a shot. I'm so glad I did. I've played this game through to the end 3 times but have never gotten past the last boss. I keep restarting it trying out a different strategy. And I don't regret any minute of doing that. When Pikmin 2 came out I was excited . . . but also a little intimidated. Now you have 2 pilots to control and 2 groups of Pikmin to order about. It's been twice the fun . . . and twice the frustrations sometimes but completely worth it.

#2 Super Monkey Ball 1 & 2
Monkey Target is a blast. Monkey Bowling is a hoot. And Monkey Baseball can get really hilarious. And that's not even getting into the mazes that will open up all those mini-games. Most of the can be down right frustrating until you discover the secret to getting through them alive. Once you figure that out it can be a little disappointing on some of the level but there's always more that will make you say "yeah right. How am I suppose to get through that?"

#3 Ikaruga
This was another game I knew very little about but could get cheap. I'm all for cheap game as long as they're good. And Ikaruga is good. In an old school kind of way. You fly a ship in a vertical scroller firing at things along the way. You have the ability to switch between a light and a dark ship that fires corresponding missiles at the enemy. Based on your ship color and the enemies bullets depends on how much damage (or health) you'll take. Figuring the whole thing out is half the fun. Can you do it?

#4 Mario Cart: Double Dash
I love cart racing games. And this time you can love it twice as much. You're not the only one racing to win the game. You've now got a passenger your opponents will have to deal with. You can mix and match who you place in the cart (and even mix and match your cart to your people) and each person has a different quality and ability they'll add tot he game. Do you want to toss a giant banana behind you as a special attack? They you better pick Donkey Kong or Diddy Kong as one of your players in your cart. And since your players can swap out between driving and throwing red koupa shells around there must be hundred of ways to tailor the perfect driving experience.

#5 Super Mario Sunshine
This is the Game Cube game I'm suppose to be finishing along with my brother. I have to admit I haven't played it much but I still like the game. Who knew cleaning graffiti off of the town walls could be so much fun. Or cleaning up what appears to be oil slicks. Have you ever wanted to fly or propel yourself forward with the power of water? Well now you can. I still have a ways to go in the game but I think my brother made a good choice when he put it on our "must finish" list. May only compliant is why does Nintendo still insist on putting the word "Super" in all their game titles (at least at the time this game came out)?

Honorable Mentions:
Mystic Heroes, Crystal Chronicles, Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, Gauntlet: Dark Legacy, Evolution Worlds

Finished a Game?

My brother and I popped in Gauntlet Legends for the N64 this last weekend as I tried to refresh my memory for a favorites list. After looking around for a bit (and breezing through the first level) we picked a level (in the middle of a circle of Runes) and dived in.

Apparently it was the final battle and we were faced battling Skorne. Our characters were level 80+ but we had a hard time getting his health bar down. I guess we should have warmed up more than just that first level. And while the style of game play was familiar I had a hard time remembering when we played the game.

Did we beat Skorne and finish the game? Did we get this far and decide to take a break and come back later? Did we try (repeatedly maybe) to beat him and failed? Why can't I remember if I finished a game?

We hacked away as best we could and argued a little bit about whether we finished or not. He said yes. I'm not so sure. I can't imagine either one of us just giving up on a game this close to the end. Yet I don't remember what happened at the end. Did we find other games to play instead? Maybe other systems? I'd love to cross one more game off my list as "played-completed" but can I rightfully do so if I don't remember doing it.

There's only one way for me to make sure I really did finish that game and that's to play it all over again. On Sunday, back at my place, I hooked everything up and breezed through the first 3 levels. Everything came back to me. I knew what the levels looked like, where the tough guys would be and how to get through the whole thing without wasting keys or magic potions. I still couldn't remember how it all ended. But I did remember how tedious hacking and slashing through all those levels were. Did I really want to go through all that again just so I could say I finished the game with a clear consciences? Especially when I have so many newer . . . and better looking . . . games I want to play.

I don't think Gauntlet Legends is a bad game. I loved playing the original Gauntlet in the arcade and I remember when this game came out and the top down 2-dimensional world came alive in this 3-dimensional game. But the graphics haven't held up very well. The style of game play is still around in games like Hunter the Reckoning, Balder's Gate and the likes. It's just your typical hack and slash. But I don't know if I'm ready to progress through all those levels staring at out dated graphics with a controller that no longer feels as comfortable in my hands as it once did.

So, did I finish this game? I'll have to think about that one and let you know.

All That Hard Work for Nothing

I love hearing that bleep and seeing that little pop up that says you've just unlocked an achievement. But come on developers, at least make it worth something!

I'm not talking about all those 5 point achievements for completing the training exercises. How much more inventive can the control scheme get for a first person shooter? You point and you shoot . . . or you die. I'm talking about an achievement that was worth 0 points. Yep, that's right. Zero. Zip. Nada. Zilch.

On Labor Day Xbox slashed the price of some of their Xbox Live Arcade games. A friend of mine took Microsoft up on the deal and bought the discounted games. Now, he's not a person that plays the arcade games so he roped in a few friends to make the experience more enjoyable. After a round of Gauntlet (one of my old-time favorites that I don't play nearly enough) he moved on to Small Arms.

Once he got the game settings taken care of I jumped in and we all started wailing on each other. (It's really very therapeutic for our friendships - honest.) During the first game I heard the bleep and earned a 2x achievement. WooHoo! Now we're talking. We pounded on each other and had an open player slot so people would jump in the game and we'd pound on them too . . . and then they'd jump out. A little while later when the game ended after someone jumped in (don't remember who) I heard that little beep and saw the pop up for the "Six Degrees of Small Arms" achievements. None of us knew what this was for so we all took a moment to look at our achievement list. And boy were we surprised.

The achievement reads something like "play the game with someone who already has this achievement." Fine. Okay we get it. It's one of those "virus" achievements. You know "the Mingler" or "secret achievement - play with someone who has this achievement to unlock." These achievements seem to serve the purpose to get people to play their games online. Mix it up. Go against real humans instead of the AI all the time. So you would think that this achievement would be worth something.

What was the "Six Degrees of Small Arms" achievement worth. You guessed it. Zero. What's the point of that. It's like saying "we want you to play online with other people but we don't want you to be rewarded for it." Is that any way to encourage people to get out there and play? Why go through all that hard work and effort (okay, maybe it wasn't that much work or effort and it was kind of fun) but then not give a payout in the end. It's almost as bad as those achievements you get in some games for just putting the disk in the machine. There's no effort in that at all (at least for most people).

Make it mean something. Or is all that hard work for nothing?