Guild Wars 2 Impressions - Almost a little step forward for MMO's

Several months ago I got caught up in all the hype surrounding Guild Wars 2 and I decided that I needed to place a preorder and get in on the ground floor.
I have to admit that my excitement for this non-subscription based MMO has since dwindled significantly, but I was still looking forward to jumping into the game this weekend, when the head start launch kicked off.

It's now Tuesday evening, I have probably spent around 10 hours playing GW2 in total and I can't say that I am feeling a massive pull from the game.

Don't get my wrong though, in lots of ways I think that GW2 is a very competent game and I even believe that it is showing a positive innovative way forward in certain areas.
But at the end of the day this is another 3rd person fantasy MMO where you click on skills on your skill bar, run quests for various NPC's that seem incapable of completing even the most basic of tasks without your heroic assistance and generally spend your time doing things that you have done hundreds and thousands of times before in WoW, Rift, SWTOR, Everquest and so on and so forth.

Guild Wars 2 proudly carries on the MMO tradition of completely practical armor designs for female characters...

When I first started playing GW2 the thing I immediately enjoyed was that the combat is much more fast paced than in most MMO's. If you've played Tera Online (which you probably have not, if the sales figures are to be believed) then you have an idea about the GW2 combat system.
Instead of simply standing around and mindlessly clicking your skills until such time as either you or your enemy keels over the combat in GW2 relies much more on you moving around, dodging attacks like a medieval Max Payne. It's a nice change of pace, and together with skills being dependent on cooldown timers rather than a mana/wrath/discipline/etc-meter it creates a faster flow in the games combat.

This also means that the traditional "holy trinity" of MMO's with a dedicated tank, healer and damage dealer class has been mostly gotten rid of. In GW2 every player is expected to do a little of everything and not be narrowly focused on one of these specific roles. Another great move in my opinion.

The Diablo 3 Ruby Pump'n'Dump - How I lost 10 million gold in 2 hours

Diablo 3 is a game full of economic opportunity. There are always money to be made if you know what you're doing.
There's also a crap ton of money to be lost if you don't and you try to get in on a wild wave of commodity pricing speculation.


Incidentally, it is the latter of the two options that I amused myself with yesterday evening after having read the Blizzard post about the Paragon system that we'll get in the upcoming patch...

Free Gold just waiting for me to pick up?! Throw in some magic beans and you have a deal, good sir!

Basically the Paragon system is going to be a way of alternate leveling that will increase your base stats and, more importantly, boost your gold and magic find to an eventual point where magic find and gold find on gear because completely irrelevant.

The Paragon levels will be gained through normal XP and this is the critical part.

The Old Republic Goes Free-to-Play - Will I fall to the Dark Side once again?

With the newly announced free-to-play option for Star Wars: The Old Republic I've been thinking a lot about if I want to jump back into my lightsaber rich adventures once more.
Back when SWTOR launched in December I played the game for quite a lot of hours and managed to get my lightning tossing Sith Inquisitor up to level 50 and complete his storyline.

While I did have a lot of fun during my time with SWTOR, I found it to ultimately be a disappointment for me and I ended up only paying for a couple of months of subscription before my enthusiasm for the game dried up like a Gungan in a Sarlacc pit.

Soon all of these lightsabers can be yours for 0 monies!

The big problem with SWTOR for me is that my motivation for playing it comes largely from experiencing the story, but to fit the game into the structure of a MMO Bioware padded out the trip through your character story with many many hours of uninteresting side quests and awful space combat missions.

On the other hand I found the character stories compelling enough that I wanted to play them all, but I felt like I was being conned out of my money by being forced to spend so much time doing things that I had no interest in.

3 Reasons Diablo 3 Gems show us the "Real" value of your Gold

It's been a few weeks since Blizzard gave us Diablo 3 players a chance to sell our piles of virtual dosh for some real world cash.

A lot more cash than what I have managed to earn selling Diablo 3 gold..

I've personally used this to unload 10 million gold for 25 Euro, which I was quite stoked about.
But when I tried repeating this success with another batch of 10 million gold I found that my auction did not sell, even after posting it three times in a row.

Naturally this is a direct consequence of Blizzard's institution of a minimum price on gold.
You are not allowed to sell your gold for any less than 2,5 Euro per million, which effectively prevents the normal mechanisms of supply and demand from working efficiently.

Charts make everything look more professional!

What is happening is that Blizzard has set a minimum price that is apparently higher than what the market is generally willing to pay compared to the massive amount of supply that is being offered at this price.
The result is that sellers throw their piles of gold in an increasingly bulging pile, while the buyers come in once in a while and take a few pieces from the heap.

But if 2,5 Euro per million Diablo 3 gold is not the "real" market value how can we find out what people are actually willing to pay?

This is where the gem market comes into play. Here are the reasons that gems are such a great tool for finding out what the "correct" value of gold is:

3 Risk Free Methods of Making Gold on the Diablo 3 Auction House

There are many ways to make your fortune in the dark world of Diablo 3.
Playing the auction house is a nice way to earn piles of shiny gold without stooping to such lows as actually killing monsters or looting chests.

It's also a nice way to completely piss away all your hard earned virtual yellows if you don't know what you are doing.
There are thousands of AH sharks out there that are all seeing to continue growing their wealth by snapping up every good deal they see, so it takes more than a casual interest if you want to really make the big score on the AH.

Flipping items on the Diablo 3 AH require a bit of finesse..

However, what if you don't need to make those multi-million gold wins that the big fish are all going for?
What if you are happy making 10-50.000 gold per deal and prefer not to risk the money you've already worked hard to accumulate?

Well, in that case there are several niches on the AH that will allow you to score a small profit without very much risk on your part.

For all three of these methods the thing to keep in mind is that everyone loves a free lunch.
The reason that these methods of earning money are almost risk free is because they have a very steady market price and high market demand.

Therefore there are a lot of people that compete for these same items, so don't expect to just walk through piles of easy gold ready to be picked up.
Basically you are getting low risk for your investment but will also have to contend with a market that's also full of other bargain hunters.

Diablo 3 Auction House Money Making - Back Into the Grind

When Diablo 3 released I was ready to try to recreate my usual gold earning routine that I most recently used with some success on the auction house market in Star Wars: The Old Republic, which you can read about in my articles about making money in SWTOR.

All for me! All for me!

Now was the time to get into the gritty world of Diablo 3 and make some gold in the auction house, diving into the buffet of great money making deals with all the enthusiasm of a starving Frenchman at an all you can eat frog legs buffet.

Of course the real cherry on top of the pile of steaming hot frog legs (that's a thing, right?), is that Diablo 3 gives you a chance to turn all that sweet sweet virtual gold into some real life digital coin, through the use of the real money auction house (RMAH).
So not only do you get the chance to cackle like a madman as you rake in those fictional pieces of yellow coinage, you also get to earn a little cash from playing a game!

Well, if that is not the best offer since low priced buffets then I don't know what is.

But of course the big question is, now that I've had a chance to take part in this feast of buying low and selling high that is the Diablo 3 experience, have I actually been any good at it?

Well, both yes and no I would say.

Mass Effect 3 Review - An adequate farewell

If you read my initial impressions about Mass Effect 3, then you already know that I was not completely overjoyed with my first few hours of playing the game.
Despite my great affection for the Mass Effect games, or perhaps exactly because of that, I could not help but feel a little let down by the first impression I got from this final chapter in the trilogy.

Problems with awkward animations, flat voice work, bad lip syncing and a universe that felt a lot smaller than in the previous two games made me really concerned that BioWare had managed to do a "Dragon Age 2" on Mass Effect 3.
For those of you that are unfamiliar with Dragon Age 2, you can replace "do a Dragon Age 2" with "completely fuck up a great franchise".

Presentation has always been a fairly big part of Mass Effect.
The Mass Effect games have played heavily on providing the player with a very cinematic experience, so when I was met with bad animations and dull voice performance that was a major issue for me.
Luckily the quality of the voice overs, the lip syncing and, to some extent, the look of the animations all improve a lot once you get deeper into the game.

"Sweet, I can see my house from here !...Oh crap!"

The plot of Mass Effect 3 sees the invasion of the advanced sentient being nom-nom-nom'ing Reapers, who have arrived to rid the galaxy of all advanced life, a routine that happens every 50.000 years or so and is generally what most of aforementioned advanced life would consider "a bit of a downer".
As you take control of commander Shepard it's your job to travel across the Reaper infested galaxy and recruit the various civilizations into joining into a combined force that will be strong enough to take on the Reapers.

Being a story about large scale politics and saving all advanced life in the galaxy, Mass Effect 3 focuses much less on the intimate personal stories that were such a big part of Mass Effect 2, though you'll meet plenty of familiar faces from both of the first two games.
And as is the trademark of the Mass Effect series, the familiar faces that you run into will react differently to you depending on how you handled them in the previous games. Provided you didn't get them killed, in which case you'll be meeting new and unfamiliar faces, which again affects the way that things are going to play out.

World of Tanks Review

Today I have another guest post for you. This one comes in from Penny Cooper and is a review of the MMO blast-em-up "World of Tanks". Take it away, Penny:


Game: World of Tanks
Publisher: Wargaming.net
Type: Team based MMO
Score: 7/10

When video game makers release a game for free-to-play, many assume it not of the best quality. But World of Tanks breaks that notion and exuberates a grandeur that you are unlikely to have expected of a free game! What makes World of Tanks a class apart from other MMOs is its graphics. A straight “A” for the effort the makers have put in designing the tanks and the maps. World of Tanks can surprise you, if you play it without any expectations in mind.

An Introduction to the game

World of Tanks is a game developed by Wargaming.net, a Russian game studio. It is a massively multiplayer online game which is set up in the period of World War II. The tanks of Germany, the US and the Soviet Union are designed accurately keeping in mind the actual war tanks of that period.

Gameplay

It is a First person shooter game where instead of being a human shooter, you will be a tank! This might seem funny for someone who has never heard of this game, but once you start playing, it keeps you hooked. There are more than 100 tanks to choose from and up to 60 players can be involved per battle. There are two teams, each consisting of a maximum of 30 players. The first mode is a deathmatch, where each team is assigned a player randomly. The eventual rounds are the clan and flag deathmatches, where the player has to play hard to fit in the team he/she likes.

As a player, you have to find enemy tanks and destroy them. It surprisingly helps in busting stress but then again, the experience depends on the rest of the players too.

The Mass Effect philosophical corner: Was the Genophage okay?

While I'm chewing my way through Mass Effect 3, which has both its ups and downs, I've run into several interesting moral dilemmas that I've started to think about.
I've decided to make of couple of ultra nerdy posts, where I want to talk about issues in the Mass Effect universe their surrounding issues.

The first Mass Effect subject that I'd like to discuss is the Genophage.
The Genophage is a biological weapon that was developed by the Salarians during the Krogan Rebellion wars, which was a decades long war between the Krogan and the Council races. The Krogan Rebellion was a result of massive Krogan expansion, which eventually started to transgress onto other Council races planets. The rebellion was looking to end up in the Krogans' favor until the Genophage was deployed and started to thin their ranks.

Krogans: They like killing stuff

The Genophage affects the entire Krogan species and leaves most of the Krogan females infertile, resulting in the slow and steady decline of the population of the species due to extremely low birth rates.

First of all let's start off by establishing that deploying a biological weapon against an entire species that is designed to produce infertility is clearly a horrible thing to do.
The Genophage is effectively a weapon that attacks the Krogan population regardless of whether they are men, women or children and no matter if they are a soldier or a civilian.
So the arguments for accepting the use of this weapon would have to extraordinarily strong!

I think that the arguments for using the Genophage against the Krogans can be boiled down to three:


1) The Krogans were moved out of their "natural environment" and were not yet at a point where they were ready to start traveling between the stars. 

The Krogans were originally not a space faring species.
They lived on their native world of Tuchanka where they spent their time fighting among themselves. Indeed their infighting was so fierce that they turned the planet into a radioactive wasteland by deploying nuclear weapons.

The Krogans did not posses advanced space technology, on account of Krogan scientists being too busy finding new ways of blowing their fellows into small pieces. But this all changed when the Salarians helped the Krogans off Tuchanka and gave them access to advanced technology.

Mass Effect 3 Impressions - A mixed bag of massed effects

I've spent the last few days trying to save the galaxy from the Reapers in Mass Effect 3, clocking up about 20 hours of dialogue wheeling and Cerberus blasting.
I'm still a little ambivalent about my feelings of Mass Effect 3, but from a shaky start I'm now really warming up to the game and find myself itching to get back in the thick of Reaper busting.

As you may know from my previous article about the things that I was looking forward to seeing in Mass Effect 3, I'm a huge Mass Effect fan. The Mass Effect games are some of the very few RPG's where I actually go out of my way to clear all side content instead of just barreling straight through the main story.
I really love the fiction of the universe and the characters feel excellently realized, in no small part due to the great voice acting and cinematic camera work during dialogue.

Shoot Brutes in the face for maximum chance of sending them into a murderous rage

Naturally I was therefore extremely excited to finally getting to play the final installment in the ME trilogy.
The demo, which I've previously given my impressions on, reminded me about how much I love these games, so as soon as I got my hands on the game I wasted no time importing my Shepard and getting down to business.

But after the first couple of hours with ME3 I started to get more than a little worried about BioWare's efforts.
Much of the first hours of the game was spent listening to voice work that felt flat and badly timed, with lines often being delivered without any sense of appropriate emotional intonation and responses sometimes coming after several seconds of awkward silence.
Furthermore it seemed that whoever was in charge of lip syncing the game is a heavy drinker or a tragic stroke victim, with dialogue several times coming out of characters' mouths in ways that made it look like they were in some kind of redubbed B-movie.

Finally, while the initial part of ME3 does a good job of setting the scene and showing you some cool looking set pieces, I felt that I was being lead down straight corridors with no room to explore or choose my own approach.

"Oh Mass Effect 3!" I cried to no one in particular "What have they done to you?! You were supposed to be a seductive Asari, beautiful and perfect, but you look more like a scarred up Krogan".

Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning impressions - I reckon I'm not impressed

Back in January I played through the Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning demo and was none too impressed with it. The demo left a rather poor taste in my mouth, like bad ale washed down at the local inn, but I hoped that my worries would be proved wrong once I got my hands on the full game.

Therefore I was cautiously excited when I finally got a copy of the PS3 version of KoA. Would I be immersed in a fantastic fantasy world of adventure and excitement, or would my fears of a game that was rougher around the edges than an axe crafted by a drunk Dwarf prove to be all too valid?

I think you're going to need a bigger sword, dude

Well, I'm only six hours into the game by now, but the smell of dwarven booze is wafting at me strong and rank.
Let me preface this impression by explaining that I pretty quickly concluded that I am probably not the target player for KoA. There is a lot of exploring to be done in KoA and lots of quests to do that are completely unrelated to the main narrative, which makes the game slightly reminiscent of Skyrim.
I am very much a story driven gamer and while I do enjoy a fully realized gaming world to frolic around in, I generally need a strong narrative motivation to spend hours clearing dungeons and collecting flowers. So if a big world with tons and tons of side quests to dump countless hours into is really your thing, then maybe you will love KoA, despite the numerous dagger stab wounds that I am about to deliver into its head and neck area.

First off my biggest problem with KoA has to be that it simply feels half baked in a lot of places.
The game feels like it was shipped about 6-9 months before the developers had time to smooth everything out and really polish up their digital baby. The UI looks a bit coarse and the inventory management in particular feels clumsy and unwieldy with long lists to scroll through to find what you're looking for.
Then there is the way that you can only ever see one quest on your world map (though on the local map you'll see markers popping up if you get close to your non-active quest). Oh, and speaking of quests, you better be prepared to ignore a lot of quest givers or scroll through a huge ass list of quests, since you can't abandon a quest after it is accepted and the amount of side quests means that you probably won't finish them all, unless you're really OCD about completing every quest in your log (in which case this game could quite possibly drive you insane(r)).

New video from Firaxis spills the alien beans on the upcoming XCOM: Enemy Unknown

A while back it was revealed that we will not only be treated to the FPS take on the old X-COM franchise, but that there is also a "proper" new game in the works, which is going to take us back to the base building and turn based combat goodness of the original games.

Today the developers, Firaxis, has posted this video look of the game, giving us the first chance of actually seeing it in action:

I'm personally really excited after watching this video!
Some people may disagree with the somewhat cartoony art direction that the game seems to be sporting, but I don't mind it at all, and I think that the new "glamour" cam that they were showing off looked awesome and will help add to the immersion of combat.

I'm definitely much more interested in XCOM: Enemy Uknown now and looking forward to playing it later this year (no firm release date is available yet, though).



 Subscribe in a reader

City of Steam sneak peek thoughts

On February 28 the City of Steam "Sneak Peek" event kicked off.
The sneak peek lets us get a very early glimpse of the steampunk MMO, allowing players to jump into the steamy world of the game and go slay monsters and explore dungeons, all from the comfort of your internet browser.

City of Steam is indeed a browser based game, but while "browser based" might conjure up horrible images of "Farmville" in your head, don't think that this design choice means that City of Steam is a ghastly looking game.
While it's clear that City of Steam does not stand a chance of living up to the graphical splendor of something like Star Wars: The Old Republic, it manages to make itself look perfectly presentable and functional as it chugs along in your Chrome window.

You won't confuse City of Steam with Guild Wars 2, but the graphics aren't bad for a browser game

The game itself reminds me of something a bit like a mix between the original Diablo, with several elements from the standard MMO tool box bolted on.
You'll be moving around your character from an overhead or behind-the-back view by left clicking on the ground. When nefarious enemies rear their brassy gear endowed heads you'll left click on them to fight them with one of three standard attacks, or you can use your skills from the quick slot bar at the bottom of the screen.

Mass Effect 3 Launch Trailer features more Reapers doing their reaping thing

Mass Effect 3 is launching next week and, in an attempt to drive us into a Krogan-like state of Mass Effect fueled frenzy, BioWare has just put up the launch trailer for the game.

Oh yes, I'm ready for another ride with the good Commander!



 Subscribe in a reader

Guns of Icarus Online stocks up on gears and cranks for the upcoming closed beta

Back in December I had the chance to interview Muse Games about their upcoming airship-em-up Guns of Icarus Online. Since then the developers have been beavering away on the game, presumably using brass computers that require a constant influx of coal, and they are now almost ready to start closed beta testing.

Using Kickstarter, which was recently made famous by Double Fine's project to fund an adventure game, Muse Games have gathered more than $35.000 and gotten over 1.500 beta testers.

An airship grill party goes horribly wrong

While the closed beta slots have thus already been filled, you can go visit the official Guns of Icarus Online site and sign up for the open beta, which will take place at a later date.

The closed beta is planned to kick off sometime during March.



 Subscribe in a reader

Dawn of War 2 multiplayer continues to please the God-Emperor

It's funny how some games can be like a pair of well worn pants.
Every once in a while a game comes along that just really clicks with you and you can just keep on coming back to it and still be immensely entertained. Other games will come along that are more fancy, luring you away with flashing explosions and displays of cutting edge technology, but eventually their charm will fade and you'll look for that comfortable, form fitting embrace of your old trusty favorite game.

This is the experience I've been having with Dawn of War 2 lately.
I've sunk countless hours into the competitive multiplayer of Dawn of War 2 ever since it was available for open beta play several months before its release back in February 2009 (so like 50 years ago in internet age).
Plenty of other games have come and gone in that period but somehow DoW 2 still feels as crisp and appealing to me as when I first started playing it over three years ago.

A Land Raider and Terminators. Someone is about to have a very bad day indeed

I have to say though, that when I started gearing up to play Star Wars: The Old Republic back in December, I really felt that I was done with DoW 2.
I had stopped watching the commentated video casts of matches and I had gone many weeks without logging into the game at all. And indeed, once I got my hands on SWTOR I dumped all my gaming time into a galaxy a long time ago, instead of into a galaxy a long time into the future.
But sure enough, eventually the strong glare from SWTOR faded into little more than a weak flashlight and I pulled the plug on my account, sending me into a temporary gaming void.

And in that void I found my old friend, clad in polished power armor and ready to take me back with not even the slightest of bad feelings.
Despite several months of absence and a few balance patches having been applied, my hands soon remembered their old routines and familiar build orders came unbidden into my mind, dragged from the dusty corners of my memories. Soon I was felling Orks, Eldar and Chaos scum with glee, once again feeling the simple joys of sending in a giant Land Raider into the enemy base and watch them panic and scatter, or the tense moments before the first engagement where you have no idea if your opponent is going to stomp your face in.

I'm not sure why I find DoW 2 multiplayer to be such a perfect game for me.
Perhaps it is the setting, which uses Warhammer 40k, one of my favorite science fiction universes of all time.
Or maybe it's the simplicity of the game design, where you have pretty much no base building and can just focus of fielding units and then controlling them tactically to win the day.
It could also be the wonderful detail in the animations, which do a great job of conveying the visceral and brutal nature of the combat to you.

Whatever the case, I'm just glad that I'm playing Dawn of War 2 again and still having loads of fun.
It won't last forever, but three years of entertainment is pretty good for a game, I'd say.



 Subscribe in a reader

Wii U - Wiill it be any good for U?

Today I have another guest post on the digital menu here on Light Speed Gaming. This one comes in from Andrew Grush, who will take us through the magical world of the upcoming console from Nintendo, the "Wii U".
Take it away, Andrew:

The eighth generation of console gaming is nearly upon us and it starts first with Nintendo's Wii U. While some might argue that the Wii U is next-gen thanks to slightly more modest processing power than the 720 and PS4 are rumored to have, the truth is that it isn't just graphics that make something 'next-gen', it is instead the new ways it pushes gameplay and the way we interact with gaming experiences.

This is no denying that the Wii changed the way the users around the world interacted with their games. While not everyone fell in love with motion-sensing technology, it is very clear that the Wii had a major impact on the way games are played during the seventh generation of consoles. Unfortunately, Nintendo's Wii wasn't built with the same longevity in mind that the PS3 and 360 targeted and so the time has come for a next-gen HD replacement, the Wii U. So what exactly is the Wii U and in what unique ways could it change the way we interact with gaming in the near future?

Let's start by taking a look at what we do know about the hardware:

Wii U Hardware

The Wii U is capable of full HD, while most current-gen games only support 720p HD, all Wii U games should have basic support for 1080p. The Wii U is said to be at least 50% more powerful than the current-gen Xbox 360 and PS3.

The processor inside the Wii U is a custom 45nm multi-core IBM PowerPC processor with embedded DRAM, although we don't know the exact specifications or speed of the processor. We also know that some form of AMD Radeon HD graphics will be equipped in the new console.

While we do know that the Wii U will have high capacity discs (though it won't run Blu-ray movies), it is going to be fully compatible with Wii games, remotes, and even the Wii Balance Board.

Out of all the hardware features touted by the Wii U, the biggest is without a doubt the addition of its new Wii U Tablet controller. This tablet is a 6.2-inch device that has an accelerometer, gyroscope, dual analogue sticks, rumble feedback, a D-Pad, a front-facing camera, triggers and shoulder buttons, and even a built-in microphone.


In What New Ways Does The Wii U Change The Way We Game?

The touch-screen can certainly offer many new ways to play. For example, imagine playing a real-time strategy game like Starcraft 2 with this bad boy. All your commands could easily be issued with the swipe of your hand from the touch-screen while you could control the cursor through the more traditional 'gamepad' elements like dual analogue.

Outside of this, there is a huge potential for first person shooters thanks to the use of the devices motion-abilities. The control can be used as a 'scope' of sorts for your gun and if you move the control left or right it can change the way your character moves. The traditional buttons, like triggers, would make perfect sense for firing off your weapon in a Call Of Duty-type shooter experience.

Game Rage - The Good, The Bad and The Horrible Way of Coping

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Mass Effect 3 Take Earth Back Trailer

In case you still needed a reason to want to play Mass Effect 3, take a look at this juicy new cinematic trailer that BioWare has just released:

I can't wait to dive back into the Mass Effect universe!



 Subscribe in a reader

Book Review of "Deliverance Lost" - The Horus Heresy is heating up

I'm a big fan of the Warhammer 40k universe and I've read a ton of Warhammer 40k books. The "Horus Heresy" series, which actually takes place in the 31st rather than the 41st millennium, is probably my 40k book series, because it tells the tale of how the 40k universe ended up as the dystopian nightmare that it is, ruled by fanatical priests and bureaucrats, lorded over by a entombed God-Emperor.

The series is not all high points, but I was very happy with the last installment "The Outcast Dead" and I therefore had high hopes that the next book could continue on this high level.
Many of the later Horus Heresy books have concerned themselves too much with telling various side stories that don't really focus a lot on Horus or the Emperor, and which don't really move the main plot forwards. So for Deliverance Lost, which focuses on the tale of the Raven Guard and their struggle for survival after Horus' attempt to massacre the whole legion, I was hoping for a book full of primarchs and maybe even some more insight into the mind of the Emperor himself.

I'm happy to say that Deliverance Lost manages to deliver pretty well to all of my expectations. It's not quite up there with the best of the books in the series, but it's definitely a worthwhile addition and contains plenty of heretical goodness that makes it a great read for any Warhammer 40k fan.

As I mentioned, Deliverance Lost tells the tale of the Raven Guard legion of Space Marines.
The Raven Guard were among the legions that were ambushed at Istvaan V, when several loyal Space Marine legions came under attack from Horus and his allies, some of which were masquerading as still being loyal to the Emperor.
We join the Raven Guard primarch, Corvus Corax, as he makes his desperate escape from the planet of Istvaan together with the tattered remains of his legion, and heads for Terra to seek help from the Emperor himself. 

Your chance to play a sneak peek build of City of Steam!

I'm very happy to be able to announce that the guys over at Mechanist Games have given me 20 keys to hand out for their upcoming sneak peek event for the upcoming MMO "City of Steam".
I've previously had a rather in depth preview article about City of Steam, which is a browser based F2P MMO that features a cool looking steampunk setting, complete with a huge gear-shaped world and mechanical dwarves.

Here are some highlights of the game from Andrew Woodruff of Mechanist Games:

Key Features:


While not all of these will be perfectly working during this sneak peek we hope they will be apparent for future tests and give a taste as to what’s to come.

-Graphics! Sets a new audiovisual standard for browser gaming
-Lightweight! Play from any computer without bulky client installation
-Big World, Tiny Footprint! Intricate, immersive scenes take up mere megabytes
-Gameplay! Hardcore or casual, ten minutes or ten hours
-Teamwork! Go it alone or adventure with friends
-Flavor! Even the smallest detail is suffused with the history of an ancient world
-Customization! Augment weaponry with visible components
-Abilities! Each class wields a unique array of stunning combat effects
-Backgrounds! Each character has a personal history to explore
-Monsters! An extensive bestiary balances raw power with intelligent tactics

Mass Effect 3 Demo impressions - Reapers with a side order of Krogan

I just finished playing through the Mass Effect 3 demo and I'm pleased to say that I'm still very excited to play the full version of the game, when it releases later this month.
The demo gives you a chance to play through two different segments of the main storyline, where one is primarily focused on the narrative and cinematic effects, while the other mission is more about showcasing Mass Effect 3's combat.
After the very mood dampening experience that it was to play the demo for "Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning", I was almost scared to try out this demo, in case BioWare had managed to ruin my favorite gaming franchise.

You get a chance to spec out your Shepard before you start the demo, so you can choose if you're going to play as a male or female, your background story and also select which class that you want to play as. Sadly you don't get to import your save game Shepard for the demo, but I guess that would be a bit overkill as you'll be through the two missions within an hour or two.

"Oh crap, Reapers! This is going to significantly reduce local property values"

After a nice intro sequence the demo kicks off with the first mission, which sees Shepard back on Earth where he has been stripped of his military rank after an incident that you could play through in the last bit of DLC for Mass Effect 2.
When reports of human colonies going dark suddenly start pouring into Earth military command, Shepard is brought before the armed forces leaders to confirm the obvious; the Reapers have finally shown up and have begun nom-nom-noming on the sentient beings of the galaxy.

Events really pick up when Earth itself comes under attack by Reapers and Shepard needs to escape the military compound while it is being assaulted by Reapers and the zombie-like "husks".
Your old buddy Admiral Anderson is also there to help you out, as you scramble through the apocalyptic war zone, which also acts as a tutorial for introducing you to the various controls of the game.

Mass Effect 3 Demo is hitting the web today

Just a friendly reminder for those of you that may have missed it that today is the day where we get a small taste of the space opera goodness that is Mass Effect 3.
The content of the demo is sounding pretty juicy as BioWare presents it on the official Mass Effect 3 webpage:

"Crap. I should have brought my ship"

"The demo begins in dramatic fashion with the spectacular opening attack on Earth, after which you're thrust headlong into a mid-game section showcasing the groundbreaking interactive storytelling, adrenaline-pumping action, ruthless and intelligent enemies, and deep customization that make Mass Effect 3 the must-have title of 2012."

In addition to whetting our appetites for the single player blowout, the demo will also offer you a chance to try your hand on the brand new multiplayer part of Mass Effect 3.
You'll get to try two co-op missions that sees you and your fellow players facing off against the invading enemy hordes, in a heroic defense of planet Earth.

The demo will be available for PC, Xbox 360 and Playstation 3.

I'm interested in seeing if any of my top 5 things I'm looking forward to seeing in Mass Effect 3 things are present in the demo.



 Subscribe in a reader

Light Speed Gaming Week in Review: February 6

The end of another has blown right past us again, leaving me dazed and confused, with an unexplainable craving for potato chips. Such is the infinite mysteries of the space-time continuum!

Let's see what I pulled out of my wrinkly brain bag last week, shall we?

The demo of Jagged Alliance. Back in Action did not exactly put the game on my "must buy" list..

My first post of the week was another one of my semi-regular gamin' complainin' posts, this time the target of my bile was the massive sequel overload that we're seeing in the gaming scene at the moment.
Getting older really does make you a lot more susceptible to getting pissed off by current trends, I guess. Can't wait for reaching new stages of intolerance once I hit 30 later this year!

Next up was a good bout of self back padding as I announced that Light Speed Gaming has now serviced more than 50.000 viewers since the launch back in September.
Aside from giving me a chance to bask in my own blinding glory of success, this post also provided me with the opportunity to give a big THANK YOU to everyone who has passed by the site.

Returning to producing something with slightly higher public service qualities than listening to me bitch about the state of gaming or reading about my insignificant internet achievements, I wrote up my experiences with the Jagged Alliance: Back in Action demo.

Kicking off the weekend was a guest post, which gave impressions on The Darkness 2. I've never personally played either the original or this brand new sequel, but from the sound of this quest post it sounds like I might have to pick it up and give the old demonic snake routine a try.

Closing out the week was yet another of my posts about making money in SWTOR.
This time my focus was on my own experience of grinding out money on the GTN at a slow and casual rate, which has so far worked out well enough to get me around 700.000 credits over the course of around a month.

Stay tuned to Light Speed Gaming for more on science fiction and video games!



 Subscribe in a reader

SWTOR Money Making Status - The slow but easy way to 700.000 Credits

There are lots of ways to earn money in SWTOR. You can earn credits from doing your space missions or from running all your daily quests for example. These are both two sources of pretty decent income and will quickly line your pockets with space money. But what if you, like me, are kind of lazy and loathe the idea of wasting your game time on grinding out the same missions over and over?

Want to be rich like a Hutt? Got the energy level of one as well?
Fear not, there is hope for you still!

Being a veteran WoW player I have had more than my fill of daily questing. I can get behind the idea of having daily quests in a MMO. It's a way for the developers to ensure that the players will always feel they have something to do in the game, even when they've reached max level and completed all the normal quests.
However, it's also a way of creating content that will eventually suck out your will to live straight through your skull.
No matter how interesting a daily quest is (and the daily quests in SWTOR are not that interesting to begin with), the magic will be long gone by the time you're making your way through it for the 20th time that month.
So that's why I personally have forsaken the daily quests in my attempt to preserve my gaming sanity.

That's why I've taken a more comfortable route to earning my SWTOR money.
I've already shared with you how I got 100k at level 25, and I've also posted about making money on the GTN auction house and further elaborated on this practice in a later post.
Today I thought I'd share my own story about where I'm at now with earning credits and how I've been using a slightly less aggressive method of the one I've outlined in my previous posts.

I didn't really start to put any effort into squeezing the most out of the GTN until I was done with my Sith Inquisitor storyline. At that point I was level 49 and with little motivation to do more questing, I decided that it was time for me to dive into buying and selling on the auction house and see if that could earn me some space bucks.
My credit balance was a reasonable 637.000 credits at that time, which was the result of following the basic tips of only having gathering crew skills and not spending any money on the GTN as I was leveling.

The Darkness 2 - The Shining Light of Over-the-top shooters?

It's time for another guest post. This time coming in from Dani, who has jutted down his thoughts on the latest entry in the "FPS with crazy snake/eel arms" genre (it's a pretty narrow genre, I'll admit).
Take it away, Dani:

The first Darkness game was an enjoyable over-the-top shooter with a strong focus on gameplay as opposed to an engrossing plot or realistic graphics. It told the story of Jackie Estacado, a young mafia hitman involved in an attempted assassination, hiding in a cemetery when an ancient demonic force called the Darkness contacts him and kills his assailants.

The game then becomes a fairly standard first person shooter with the added powers of The Darkness, which form tendrils at your side. Throughout the course of the game, Jackie also visits the otherworld to further develop the plot and sees his powers grow. One of the strongest gameplay features allow for dual-wielding of weapons whilst also using the Darkness powers, in a mechanic unofficially called ‘quad-wielding’.

Despite favourable reviews hovering around the 7.5-8 region, The Darkness was never deemed that much of a hit; however has sold a million copies and warranted enough demand for a sequel.

The Darkness 2, one of the latest game releases, continues the story of Jackie Estacado who has risen to the top rank of the mafia and now wants rid of the Darkness. I won’t explain the full details of the plot; however it is safe to say that they have really upped the stakes in the storytelling department.

Featuring an updatable ability tree that can be progressed with by collecting the hearts of the victims, as well as a stronger focus on the Darkness, particularly the Darkling. This feature allows Jackie to kill enemies from greater distances, interact with environments and access otherwise unreachable areas and paths.

A clear improvement over the original, the Darkness 2 has really found its feet and established it’s placed in the shooter genre; however unfortunately still suffers from a relatively short single-player campaign and continued issues in multiplayer (which was also one of the biggest complaints of the original).

Suspend your beliefs, crank up the sound system and immerse yourself in the comic-book world of Jackie Estacado – however, if you’re after another Modern Warfare or Battlefield-style playstation 3 games, you’re looking in the wrong place. For one of the best gameplay experiences of the year, as well as a ludicrous yet enjoyable story, packaged in an unconventional yet satisfying game, you can’t go far wrong with the Darkness 2.

 Subscribe in a reader

"Jagged Alliance - Back in Action" Demo Impressions - Casuals need not apply

Hey, remember back in the days when video games were cruel and unforgiving bastards that would happily destroy your pre-pubescent face with a sadistic level of difficulty?
The days where we got stuff like the "kicking-sand-in-your-eyes"-hard X-COM, which can still kick my ass and crush my spirit to this day.

Would you like to relive those times of "real challenges" and once again spend your time with a game that wants nothing more than to break your will to live? Well, then you're in for a treat with "Jagged Alliance - Back in Action"!

"I will devour your soul and make you cry tears of blood!"

Back in Action follows in the footsteps of the original "Jagged Alliance" from 1994 and the sequel from 2004.
You control a team of mercenaries through a series of missions in your attempt to overthrow the ruthless dictator of the made up country "Arulco".
Missions play out from an isometric 3D overhead view, where you can give orders to your men in real time.
Back in Action also allows you to pause the game and set up a chain of orders for your men to execute, kind of like Dragon Age only more advanced.

Controlling your men with the utmost of military precision is key in Back in Action demo, as the enemies in the demo mission are absolutely lethal and will also summon their equally lethal friends as soon as they catch sight of your merc mug.
I say "military precision", but perhaps it would be more accurate to say it requires completely anal attention to detail.
Now granted, I am not the most hardcore of tactical game players, but I've spent my fair share of time with stuff like the old X-COM games and the "Commandos", which are not exactly a walk in the park. But I found myself being constantly blown to small mercenary giblets in this demo, even when I tried very hard to be smart about my positioning and took down my targets carefully.

More than 50.000 Hyperspace travelers serviced!

It seems like only yesterday that I set all engines to ludicrous speed and launched Light Speed Gaming, but it's actually been almost five months.

Today I'm happy to be able to say that the blog has now been viewed more than 50.000 thousand times, or about 10.000 views per month on average!
When I initially started up Light Speed Gaming I had absolutely zero blogging experience and really had no idea if I would be able to get anyone at all to spend time reading my inane ramblings. I'm pretty blown away by how many people actually took time to stop by and waste a bit of their day here.

A big thank you to everyone that has read my posts! I hope that you're enjoying your time here and, as always, I'll be more than happy to receive any feedback you have regarding the site.

Here are a few fun facts about Light Speed Gaming after the first five months:


-The average time spent on the site by a reader is 59 seconds 


-Returning visitors make up about 10% of the traffic

-The most popular post, 5 Things I can't wait to see in Mass Effect 3, has had almost 2.600 views

Since the start of the blog I've had to ease off a bit on my ambition to deliver a new post every single day, and I've "cheated" a bit on some days and just posted a trailer that caught my eye.

I've also noted that writing about your hobby is a lot more hard work than you might think, and you got to be careful about it unless you want to ruin the enjoyment of spending time with it!

I can see that the daily traffic numbers are slowly increasing, so I'm sure that the 100k views mark will be reached a lot faster than 50k. Not that more traffic in itself means all that much, but it's nice to know that the stuff you spend many hours a week on creating actually gets viewed by an audience.

After all, I have a blog because I want people to see and respond to my work, otherwise I would have started a diary!

If I can make a small request to you as readers, it would be two things:

1) If you spend a minute here reading my posts, I would be incredibly grateful if you would use an extra 10 seconds to leave a comment. Comments are the best way for me to know if you like and/or are finding my writings useful. As a writer there is nothing better than reader feedback.Somewhat more commercial in nature. 

2) You may have noticed that I'm running a few ads on the site. 

Light Speed Gaming is not intended in any way to be a big income source for me, but I do spend a lot of time on the site every day, either creating posts or simply promoting the site or working behind the scene. I have also had a couple of giveaways that have come out of my own pocket, so it would be nice if the site could at least pay for itself. 

Therefore it would be much appreciated if you used the ads, whenever they seem interesting to you. I'm not asking you to just click away on every ad you see, but if you're in the market for a gaming mouse and you just happen to see an ad for one here on the sight, then why not take a second and check it out?

Again, I'd like to offer a big and sincere "Thank you" to everyone that has dropped by Light Speed Gaming.

Rest assured that I will work continuously on improving the site! 

 Subscribe in a reader

Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning Review Round Up

A little while back I played through the Demo of Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning both on Xbox and on the PC. I was somewhat disappointed by the experience, but not enough to completely destroy my anticipation.
Therefore I have been eagerly awaiting the reviews of the full game to try to get an impression of how the full game holds up.

"It gives a great review score or it gets the club again."

The reviews are starting to flow in now and it looks like my lukewarm reaction to the demo is more or less echoed in the reviewers articles:

Gamespot Review: 7.5 / 10

Giant Bomb Review: 4 / 5

IGN Review: 9 / 10

Edge Review: 6 / 10

The general impression seems to be that there are some very great and enjoyable elements in Reckoning, most notably the free flowing combat system and the ability to spec out your character however you want to play the game, but there are also some serious flaws with the game, like an over abundance of uninteresting quests and lack of a strong narrative.

I'm still waiting to get my hands on a retail copy of Reckoning, but from the reviews that I've seen so far it will probably be a game that manages to keep me entertained until the release of Mass Effect 3, but without leaving a lasting impression.



 Subscribe in a reader

Feeling Frustrated From Franchise Fatigue

Is it possible to have too much of a good thing when it comes to your favorite games? With great games such as Assassin's Creed or Uncharted, should we as gamers not simply be overjoyed that developers are cranking out new installments of a consistently high level at regular intervals?

Well no, for me at least I've reached the point of "Franchise Fatigue". I'm getting tired of watching the same old circus horse being paraded around the ring, even if the horse gets a new fancy headdress every time, and even if it *is* very impressive for a horse to be able to jump backwards through a flaming metal ring while reciting Edgar Allan Poe.

"No no, this is completely different from Brotherhood.
Look, you have a *hook* in this one! Madness!"

I think the realization struck me a few days ago as I was starting up Assassin's Creed: Revelations.
Assassin's Creed 2 was probably one of my favorite games of 2009 and I also liked Brotherhood a whole lot. But after just a few hours of Revelations I was just not enjoying the game at all. The story didn't grab me and the gameplay felt decidedly stale.
I realized that it was not really the game itself that was at fault. Assassin's Creed: Revelations is a high quality game that, at least in my opinion, is as good of a game as its two predecessors.
The problem is that I've already played this game twice before. Sure, I'll get to visit a new city and I'll get to add a couple of new gadgets to my already terribly overburdened Assassin, but it's very much the same game that I played last year.

I had a similar feeling with Uncharted 3 and Batman: Arkham City. I recognize that both of these games are, objectively speaking, very well put together and represent some of the highest quality gaming experiences of 2011. But in both cases I felt a horrible sense of deja-vu when I played them, to the point that I lost interest and gave up on finishing either one of them.

Light Speed Gaming Week in Review: January 30

People of Earth, do not be afraid! Though your planet has now concluded another seven complete rotations on its own axis in its continued impression of a cosmological dog chasing its own non-existent tail, be assured that these aforementioned rotational movements have not been wasted by yours truly.

Or to put it in another way; Another week has gone by and it's time to check out what went down here on Light Speed Gaming.

Last week was a bit slow, game releases are a rare beast in the early weeks of the year, and I've been spending some time on non sci-fi and gaming related activities (heresy, I know).

"Disappointed in SWTOR? I find your lack of faith...disturbing"

Nevertheless I did take some time and sit down to write the closest thing I'll be doing to a full review of Star Wars: The Old Republic.
Rather than trying to do a full review of SWTOR I decided to write about what I feel are my most important point about the game. The title of the post, "Why Star Wars: The Old Republic is ultimately a disappointment", will probably clue you on to guessing that I'm not altogether impressed by the game that BioWare has put together for us.

Aside from incurring the wrath of Star Wars fanboys I also dared to potentially upset another community of equal devotion, by writing up a review of "Magic The Gathering: Duels of the Planeswalkers 2012".
But unlike my scribbles about SWTOR, this is a much more happy outcome for all involved parties, as I quite enjoyed my time as a card battling Gandalf.

Finally the week was capped off by me staying up too late into the night and subjecting you all to a bit of spontaneous fiction writing in a short bit of writing that I call; The Perils of Space Travel and You.

That's all from me for now. Though the sudden onset of winter is threatening to freeze off several of my favorite body extremities, be assured that more posts will continue to make their way onto the site this week!



 Subscribe in a reader