Day: September 16, 2008

Wrath of The Lich King – Rune SystemWrath of The Lich King – Rune System

As the Wrath of the Lich King beta lives on, the world (and software behind it) is ever changing. Apparently, the rune system has changed a lot since its first inception. This requires a delicate balance, as the goal is a well rounded Death Knight class without epically overpowered features. Too much power and people will feel cheated while others feel overly destructive. End result, everyone would be a Death Knight.

The rune system that Blizzard has created is more straight forward than the initial system because it contains less variables. The Death Knight has a secondary bar, much like a Warrior, that starts empty and slowly climbs with “Runic Power,” an energy generated when you cast spells and expend rune energy. It works much like the warrior class, as it builds it will open up some abilities in your bar that were “grayed out” because they couldn’t be cast yet.

What the heck is a rune? Above your character profile you’ll have six little circles, called runes, these little guys work much like the rogues energy. The three styles of runes are: Blood, Frost and Unholy runes and they’re coordinated with your spells and sword strike abilities much like a paladin or warrior. Each rune “goes dark” when you expend its energy – this limits your access to use the Death Knights abilities much like expending all your rogues energy stops the rogue from using their neat features. However, once its energy is expended, it will grow your runic power a slight bit, “charging” it for later use.

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Casual Gamer Chick’s Peggle Nights Review!Casual Gamer Chick’s Peggle Nights Review!

Last year Popcap developed Peggle, a title which received 2007 casual game of the year and dozens of media and industry accolades. Now, Popcap has produced the next game in the Peggle series called Peggle Nights. If you’ve never played Peggle, you can read a full review of the game as it will apply to Peggle Nights as well.

It’s tough to think Popcap can improve upon a sleeper success but it just might be possible. Peggle Nights brings back the famous Peggle masters with their classic power-up moves and increases the master count by one with a new Squid Peggle master known as “Marina.” In this installment, you’ll experience another 60 newly designed levels with five stages per Peggle master, this time with a “dream world” theme.

Peggle Nights is as close to an expansion as you can get without directly calling it an expansion. At first glance, you’ll probably say to yourself “this is Peggle with new levels” and, for the most part, you’re on the right track. Popcap stuck to the magic that made the first title a hit, including the same characters, the same game play elements and the same addictive quality.

Our first impressions were a bit lack luster as we spent time looking for how the game differs from the original. Six or so stages into the the game it started to grab our attention much like the original title did, causing everything from addictive shakes and strong desires to continue playing. Peggle Nights matures the level design greatly, stages are crisp artwork backgrounds with many animated pegs and bricks which you’d only find in later tough stages in the original game.

Head over to CasualGamerChick.com to read the full review!

Read on for full press release details.

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Wrath of the Lich King – Dazed and ConfusedWrath of the Lich King – Dazed and Confused

It’s tough playing an expansion when new updates have changed a few ways the system works. I’ve also had some troubles because most of my addons do not function in the Lich King beta. There are a few quests that have left people confused and screaming “how do I turn in the horse quest?” when the repeated response “press 1 to turn in quest!!”

Along with new terrain comes new questions and new solutions, many World of Warcraft gamers are used to the areas found in Azeroth and throughout much of Burning Crusades content. One of the fresh new experiences of an expansion is being able to play the game you love, but with new experiences not simply “more experience.”

It took me roughly fourty minutes to figure out how to get on my mount and ride off into the sunset. Because they’ve changed a bit about how the mount is placed in your inventory, instead being in the “pet” tab in your character profile; this new addition was a slight adjustment to my usual method of play.

Although information is growing on Lich King and its content you’ll find the general chat the best place to get answers as others have already experienced much of the introduction areas once or twice; some folks are on their third iteration of their best Death Knight.

Thus far, the introduction areas are a great way to exercise the powers of the Death Knight and best understand your abilities. You’ll find yourself gaining epic amounts of experience with ease, pushing 12,000 experience for a basic quest. When you’re at level 55, you’ll need a ton of experience to level up so the newbie areas tends to doll out tons of experience to give you a clue how the game mechanics.

Initially, you’ll probably be wondering what runes are, runic powers and what the talents the Death Knight holds under his/her black cape of doom.

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TD Gaming Podcast 88: We Love Carebear ServersTD Gaming Podcast 88: We Love Carebear Servers

This weeks gaming podcast covers a bunch of hot topics along with a bit of gaming history. We take a flashback look at Tapper, a great arcade classic and we’ll hit up some popular news articles:

This weeks history covers the Havok physics engine and we stand upon our soap box and talk about the rumor Starcraft 2 will arrive after Diablo 3 hits the store shelves.