via Jess

I am going to create a character in City of Heroes and name it that RIGHT NOW and I don’t care what Mr. Man has to say about it breaking immersion. He’s such a name snob. But to be fair I’m a ye olde snobbe when it comes to fantasy faux medieval stuff, particularly when I have to speak olde English speake.

Cody sent me this. Think he’s trying to tell me something?

GameSpot has a pretty good featured section on buying gifts this year with options about platforms, target age groups, various levels of interest - which might need to be taken with a grain of salt or two. While I don’t plan on buying Karaoke Revolution Vol 3 or Need for Speed Underground 2 for my folks they seem to think I would. It’s supposed to be updated in real time as prices and ratings change though so hopefully it’ll get better.

Also, if you care, a group led by the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility (who I’m guessing aren’t talking about fiscal responsibility) have come up with a list of this years most offensive games. They also criticize the ESRB as being too vague in their ratings and stores not enforcing the ratings system universally.

I wonder what these people would find to complain about if the game companies actually agreed with them and stopped making sex and violence freely available to their twelve year olds?

And for the younger kids there’s a website run by the Coalition for Quality Children’s Media (who I’d like to note don’t have a religious agenda or an arbitrary ratings system but encourage parents actively reviewing material with their kids instead of just relying on other people to tell them what is and isn’t ok for their own children) that reviews cdroms and interactive dvds as well as audio and video for our little budding technophiles out there.

Guild Wars sucks, according to Mr Man. Despite being made by the guys who originally created Warcraft, StarCraft, and Diablo. I think the quote was “It’s just like Diablo II but not nearly as good and doesn’t work as well.”

If you want to find out for yourself there’s a free playable preview for Gamespot members.

There’s also a preview for Rollercoaster Tycoon 3 and the announced well over a year ago Jump to Lightspeed expansion for Star Wars Galaxies. Which I don’t plan to bother with.

If you’re a Fileplanet member you’re guaranteed a spot in the open stress test before the open beta for World of Warcraft. And the characters you create in the stress test will transfer to the open beta.

This is what did it. It was the proverbial straw that broke my admittedly weak camel’s back. But it broke so, yes, I bought the Sims 2. I thought I could resist but it’s too late now.

Since I still haven’t installed Makin Magic I assumed it would take me at least a month to install Sims 2. But curiosity won out and I’ve been playing it all day. I’ve only just started messing around with build mode which is confusing as all hell. But my designer’s mouth started watering when I found out I can now build four floors.

I made a Sims 2 version of us and had fun figuring out the new career path, desire list stuff. It’s very complex with odd nuances. Even some unexpected career choices and changes. Here’s a good example - one time when he came home from work CodySim brought home a friend - that looked eerily like Jocelyn’s boyfriend with shorter hair. Really!

As far as gameplay is concerned I have to admit I’m very impressed. I do miss my usermade objects and Sim pets though.

In other gaming news I just got an offer from the maker of kung fu madness to beta test his new game, Drugrunners. I’ve been given codes for three other betatesters so let me know if you want to try this new game out.

I also have something like twelve gmail invites so just ask if you want one of those too.

There’s a pretty good review of Sims 2 on Gamespot. I haven’t really been very excited about it because I guess I have too much invested in the first one. I’ve been playing the original Sims game since its release in 1999 and have been collecting downloads of player-made objects since they first became available.

In fact, Cody was among the creators before Transmogrifier, when creating became much easier and it became possible to add animations. He created the original indoor grill from the stove and the ‘pot of shrooms’ from the cheap tv which you can still get at the sims resource just look for Syniq.

So I’ve spent five years - just slightly less time than the length of my marriage - downloading stuff for my game. I have just under ten gigabytes of downloads and I don’t want to think about what I spent on memberships and donations to get my greedy hedgehog cursor on some of those files. There has been some incredible creativity out there and I’m pretty attatched to my objects.

Also, this sequel seems to be much more about actually playing the game. Oddly enough in all my years of playing the Sims and all its expansions I’ve logged very little actual playing time. My fun is the building and decorating. I don’t usually care who owns the lot or what they do or look like - I just use cheat codes to make them rich enough to build really cool houses. The only interesting thing I’ve heard about this sequel is that there might be the ability to build a third floor now.

So I’m not really that enthusiastic about this release but I know a lot of Sims fans are. I never played the Sims Online either because, again, it was about actually playing. I do understand why people would get excited about the genetic thing. Reminds me of the fun with breeding in that old Creatures game. All the pre-release downloads that I’ve seen from user sites have pertained to skins and genetics so it could appeal to people who are really interested in that.

Video Game Gals take it off for Playboy

is a very funny game. A stick figures disco bandit fighting undead elbow macaroni with a mean pair of tongs. No, really. And it’s free. check it out

Avast ye mateys I be playin Puzzle Pirates and watchin me two favorite silly Piratey movies. I should check out that Roman Polanski one sometime.

I go by the name “Angrylucie” in the midnight ocean so come say ahoy.

Either that or I’m at the gym or dog park. Or sleeping. Arrr!

Yohoho! Puzzle Pirates