How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Mass Effect 3 Ending

After all the brouhaha I heard about the ending for Mass Effect 3, I was a little hesitant to actually complete the story.  I stayed spoiler-free (mostly), and eventually forged my way to the end after a long night and all-day playthrough today.

So, here is my official response to everyone that's calling for Bioware to change the ending to Mass Effect 3:

..|..

Yup, that's right: sod off.  Or more specifically, "Grow a quad emotionally and sod off, you mouth-breathing, keyboard-turning, cultuarlly-immature sacks of hot air."

I'm not saying the ending was a flawless dismount for Bioware's incredibly popular (and incredibly risky) space opera series, just that the criticisms I've seen don't hold water for anyone who appreciates storytelling that's more emotionally mature than, say, The Cat and The Hat.  Or the Twilight series.

Disagree with me?  GOOD.  Let's talk about it.

SPOILERS AHEAD.  YE HAVE BEEN WARNED. 

New Ventures

It's official:  I'm part of the staff now over at VideoGameWriters.com!  I'll be writing news for the site, which is a newcomer to the video game news scene that I've been following since it launched last year.  The challenge, of course, will be making it fit in with that pesky day job...

But enough about why local news is grinding my soul into a fine powder: you didn't come here to see me being emo.  This is not Live Journal.  Let's talk about why I like VGW, and why you should too.

IT'S ALIVE! Pt. 2

That's right, that's me and my buddy Jeramy gettin' our podcast on.  Expect that to happen more often.  I've been wanting to get into podcasting for a very long time, with mixed results, but finally I'm getting to do what I like to do best:  talk about geeky things with other geeks.

We plan to do a weekly podcast that looks back at "the week in geek" and talk about what caught our attention, as well as what's coming up that we're interested in.  These are the kinds of conversations we used to have around a pool table at the local dive, around the D&D table, or around the corner booth at Taco Bell during lunch.  After I moved away we continued to have these discussions over Skype, and eventually got around to recording them and slapping them on the internets.

So, keep an eye on it, send an email to GIRpodcast@gmail.com with suggestions or questions, and we'll keep on geekin' out.

A New Beginning

After much planning (and more hand-wringing), I finally went forward with plans to do a second blog, this time dedicated solely to one of the games I play.  In this case, Star Wars: The Old Republic.

Hokey Religions and Ancient Weapons is now live over at HRAAW.com, and will be the place I talk primarily about what I'm doing in SWTOR and about stuff going on with the game and the community.  Hopefully I'll be able to kick my butt into gear enough so I can do regular posts on it throughout the week, and we'll see what happens with it further down the road.

The Last Straw?

I recently took a break from WoW after helping my guild raid team get to Ragnaros and snuff him out. Work had taken a turn for the busy, and when Skyrim came out I got sucked into Tamriel so hard I didn't really have time for Azeroth.

Every time I considered logging back into WoW, I found myself asking... "Why?". I had everything I really wanted from raiding, I had a stable full of alts I wasn't really keen on leveling, and the thought of enduring another horrific pick-up dungeon group filled me with disgust. And now they have pick-up RAID finders now. Why would I want to subject myself to 20 or so meter- and self-obsessed PUG twats filling the chat with various slurred versions of "You suck and I rock" over and over again just to make it to the gear level I needed to be at to raid effectively?

The answer, as I finally allowed myself to admit, was that I didn't.

Come to the Dark Side: We Have Crazy Hats!

Sith fashionistas everywhere were rocked, ROCKED I say, by the Inquisitor's electrifying appearance at SWTOR.com Friday.  Always dressed to impress terrify, the Sith's darkest souls will certainly be... festooned as they conquer world after world for their Emperor's bidding.

The Inquisitor's progression video certainly played to the strengths of the class: lightning, double-bladed lightsabers, and scaring the bejeezus out of small children and rank-and-file Troopers everywhere.  The brash scarlet and dusky darker tones play well off the occasional blood stains that Sith inevitably find decorating their clothing.

SWTOR: An Opinion

It seems hardly fair to call this a "review", since the only access I've had to the game has been beta testing for a little more than a month.  Likewise, there have been plenty of "impressions" already put out there, and I didn't want to repeat that when I sat down and committed to digital ink what I thought of Bioware's entry into the MMO market proper. I say proper, because you cannot tell me Neverwinter Nights wasn't massive, multiplayer, and online, not to mention a really great moment in D&D's digital history and roleplaying online in general.

Therefore, let the record show that this is simply an "opinion" of The Old Republic, its potential, its gestation, and its impending birth into a world of fans angrily clamoring for The Second Coming of the MMO, Star Wars, or Both.

Be warned:  I sense spoilers in the Force after the jump...

Syrim: A Day in the Life of a Warlock-Assassin

From the personal research notes of Morgrimm, warlock-assassin of the Dark Brotherhood.

8:15 a.m. - Woke up at the Candlehearth Hall in Windhelm.  Stayed up late experimenting with some new potions; brewed a tea with a black, bitter herb I bought off a khajiit trader to compensate.

9:30 a.m. - Dropped off the excess results from my experimenting at the White Phial.  Used some coin to purchase more canis root and charus eggs, necessary for the paralysis and invisibility potions I've been making.

10:15 a.m. - Met the mercenary, Stervan, outside Candlehearth.  Shared a flask of whiskey on the steps until the target, Gaius Maro, arrived in the city.  According to the schedule I stole from his father's men, Maro the younger will be touring the city's defenses and guard rotations before staying in the barracks tonight.  Luckily, the city is still on edge because of a series of murders by a killer being called "the Butcher", so the barracks will be nearly empty tonight while the guards do extra patrols.

Tastes Like Turkey

Via GameSpy

This Thanksgiving blog post almost turned into a #FirstWorldProblems-themed thing, but nuts to that.  Instead, here's some things from the gaming world that I am truly thankful for:

- I'm thankful for games that autosave when you walk through a door or enter a new area, giving me just enough of a safety net for the times I'm having too much fun to think about saving my game.

- I'm thankful for companies that listen to their players and actually respond to their half-cocked, MONSTER-and-Cheetos-induced verbal sludge that are most video game forums.  It leads to amazing, "I never thought they'd do that" moments.

- I'm thankful for a gamer wife who still is practical enough to hit me over the head when I'm neglecting important things, like cleaning the litter box or personal hygiene.  Love you, babe.

- I'm thankful for the ability to change difficulty on the fly, because sometimes you feel like a challenge, and sometimes you feel like you just... need... to clear... this level...

- I'm thankful that even while video gaming looks like it's being swallowed up by massive corporations, independent developers still prove a good idea like Minecraft is worth its weight in diamonds.

- I'm thankful that I have fresh, reliable batteries waiting at home for my Xbox controller, because playing Skyrim ran the ones I had DRY.

Happy Thanksgiving, and happy holidays ahead!

Back to Square One, Bethesda-Style

So I just spent 75 hours racking up 37 levels and about two dozen dragon kills in Skyrim.  I maxed out Smithing, forged and enchanted some badass armor, and turned into a werewolf.

Then I ran into a game-halting bug that's forcing me to roll a new character.

Basically, the last dungeon of the main quest line has a door puzzle that bugs out for some people.  You can halfway fix it, but it's almost a guaranteed game-killer because the area can't be fast-traveled out of and you can't get past the door to complete the quest.  The best solution online so far:  "Wait for a patch."

To be honest, I knew this was a possibility going into the game.  With something this big it's practically impossible to do all the QA needed to fix things like this.  It's kinda disappointing that a significant bug late in the main quest line made it through that process, but it's a reality when dealing with A) Bethesda, and B) a game of this immense scope.

So, here's a few tips should you decide to go adventuring into Skyrim that may help you avoid my fate:

I am Skyrim

I have fought dragons and emerged victorious, their souls filling me with knowledge and fury.

I have earned the respect of jarls and Nords, and been named a thane of their people.

I have forged weapons of skysteel and filled them with enchantments of fire and lightning, bringing forth the twin fangs Ember and Skywrath.

I have ascended the Seven Thousand Steps to the Throat of the World and communed with the ancient, mysterious Graybeards at High Hrothgar to learn the secrets of the Voice, and thus taken the first steps toward my destiny as Dovakhiin, which means Dragonborn in the ancient tongue.

I have plucked butterflies from the air and learned the alchemical secrets that can be teased from their diaphanous wings.

I have delivered traitors to justice and honor to my brethren, the Companions, who will fill their meadhall with songs of my glory, and add my name to their legendary rolls.

I have known fear and conquered it, drinking in the fearsome blood of the beast to become a werewolf, and thus strike fear into those who would hunt me and my packmates.

I have seen an ancient warrior heave a sigh filled with regret and longing, staring into the fires of his hall as he considers how he will be judged for the things he has done in this life.

I have seen a great dragon in flight, only to pause in wonder as the sky around it is filled with the shimmering curtains of the northern lights, and stood mute as the leather-winged beast swam amongst it like a salmon in a stream.

I have seen a giant tending his mammoth herd kick a starving bandit so hard the man flew into the side of a nearby mountain.

I have learned to stay away from the giants.

The End of an Era

Last weekend I sold my Wii back to Gamestop.  It felt like a big decision, like a sacrifice I was making in the face of an austere personal budget colliding with a a fall release schedule overflowing with awesome games.

This week, I hardly noticed it was gone.  Turns out I'd already made the sacrifice a long time ago.

The Open Range Rides Again

This weekend I kicked off my newest 4E D&D campaign, set in the Wild West-y world my friend Jeramy and I have been designing for some time (tidbits can be found over at our D&D blog, LevelAndClass.com).  I had previously written about the world and ran a couple of gaming sessions in it, but I haven't been able to run a full-fledged campaign in the world to really put it through its paces, so I'm excited.

The players are PhD students from my wife's program, some of whom have never picked up a D20 in their lives:  a scandalous situation for any college student, let alone those who liked school so much they want to make their careers out of it.  One of the players is a very experienced D&D player (and a freelance designer like me), so he and my wife are helping the other new players learn the ropes while I have my hands full wrestling down the campaign setting so their players can hog-tie it.

Pushing the Envelope of Stupidity

The video gaming world is full of bullies, idiots, misanthropes and mouth-breathers.  The Gentleman Gamer knows this, because they all wound up in my Zul'Gurub dungeon run last night.

Even though the GG has preached the mantra of patience and subscribes to Wheaton's Law, I fully recognize that sometimes you just can't fix stupid.

So how does the Gentleman Gamer handle himself when surrounded by jerks and jackanapes?

Turning A Corner

An epic congratulations goes out to the Progression raiding team in my WoW guild, The Risen on US-Thorium Brotherhood.  Not only did they get their first Ragnaros kill this past week, they scored the server-first kill for the Horde.  It's the first time in the guild's history we've accomplished something like that on the raiding scene; for years players like us have been living in the shadow of guilds like Bloodrite and never actually considering that we could get a kill like that without being uber-hardcore.  Last week, we liberated ourself from that kind of limited thinking.

Of course it couldn't have happened without Blizzard's changes to their design philosophy, the efforts to make content more accessible to guilds like ours.  We have teachers, professors, students, lawyers, and other professionals that all have full-time jobs and full-time social lives, but still manage to put in one or two nights a week to join nine other online friends and slay some digital dragons.  And I couldn't be happier for them.

My own team, the Core raid group, also turned a corner Tuesday night by killing three of the Firelands bosses in one night.  We one-shot Shannox, two-shot Rhyolith after taking a wrong turn and ditching into the magma, and then four-shot Beth'tilac to get our first kill on her.  Before we'd been struggling to just kill one boss a night, so going in and kicking down the door that quickly on three bosses means big things, and hopefully a Rag kill of our own sooner rather than later.

RISE UP, SONS AND DAUGHTERS OF THE HORDE!

My Wife, the Slayer

In D&D, there are a number of different players personality types that show themselves over and over again.  The folks at Wizards of the Coast have put labels to most of these, such as Spotlight Gamer, Power Gamer and Explorer, to help DMs and players understand these tendencies and motivations better so that they can run better games and keep their players involved and committed.

When my wife first joined my D&D games, she gravitated toward an Observer role.  She was a new player with several experienced gamers, and was more comfortable providing quiet support while enjoying the clash of the other personalities at the table.

After we moved down to Louisiana, however, I noticed her tendencies had shifted in a direction I hadn't expected.  And it led to me letting her down as a DM on several occasions.

New Developments

There's been a lot going on since the last time I posted, both in my life and in the world of gaming, though it didn't seem like it at the time it was all happening.

First, work took a turn for the uber-stressful, just as temperatures hit record levels back in Arkansas. The past year has probably been the most stressful I've worked in television besides my very first year as a producer, and if something doesn't change in the next couple of months things are going to get hairy.

On happier topics, I'm starting another D&D game with some PhD students from my wife's theatre program.  Once my other game finishes the heroic tier in a couple of months I'll turn over DMing duties to another player in the group. I'm debating whether I want to stick with the group as a player or if I want to set it aside completely and focus on my other game.  Considering the time and stress I'm dealing with at work, it'll probably be better not to try and two too many things at the same time.

The Manifesto of the Gentleman Gamer

Though I am not the first blogger to call themselves a "gentleman gamer", I believe I am the first to really get down to the brass tacks and outline what it means to truly live and game as a gentleman.  So herein do I proclaim my manifesto, and may all...

Wait, what?  What's this "Wheaton's Law" you're talking about?

Dammit.

Ah, who cares; keep recording.  I worked all afternoon on this, may as well hang onto it.

Do We Need a Revolution?

Reading through the E3 coverage of Star Wars: The Old Republic, I across a weird common thread in their hands-on articles and descriptions of what people should expect from the game.  It's summed up quite well in this comment:

"Overall, I found SWTOR to be enjoyable, though nothing particularly revolutionary for the MMO genre."
- Massively


I assume that's a fair assessment, given that the author has had actual hands-on experience with the game (though apparently SOMEONE didn't actually play the game, according to the end of the article).  Considering my beta invite is still AWOL, all I have to go on are videos of dev walkthroughs, combat, and mission-running/questing/what-the-hell-ever they're going to try to call it, and what I've seen backs that statement up.

My question is... does TOR really need to be a revolution?

Out Of Control-ler

My wife joined our D&D game recently to get some dice-slinging in over the summer break.  She wanted to play something a bit different, so she made a melee-focused valorous bard.  She prefers to stay at range and decided to go ahead and try a front-line leader to help out the party, which is a little ranged-heavy.

Last week's game took the intrepid members of the Unsung (and their new bard friend) into some cramped quarters:  they were investigating the disappearance of several children from a local merchant caravan, which they tracked to a rundown soap-making plant in the seedy part of town.  It was also rumored to be the center of the local kingpin's drug operation, which the players confirmed once they were inside and fighting their way through the Soapworks' lower levels.

But those cramped quarters wound up putting her at odds with another member of the party who just couldn't resist the opportunity to do some damage.