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Blog: Back in the Ring – 04/14/21

Like most folks, I’ve played a lot of really hard games throughout my life that I might even call punishing or unfair, but none of them have challenged me anywhere near as much as Ring Fit Adventures does. While Ring Fit Adventures isn’t going to throw endless hordes of bloodthirsty enemies at me or require pixel perfect platforming and reaction times, it does do something more sinister than any other video game I’ve ever played before: it puts my in physical pain…

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Blog: Crowdfunder – 03/31/21

Crowdfunding can be a beautiful thing that allows people to directly support the ideas and products they believe in, giving folks the chance to truly vote with their wallets. Aside from the dystopian nightmare of people crowdfunding their medical and legal bills through services like GoFundMe, as well as the vaporware projects that either never make it to market or are just flat out scams, crowdfunding is a great concept. It’s also a really good way to get me to spend even more money on tabletop role-playing game systems and paraphernalia than I already do. So here are some of the money-pits that I’ve recently tossed my cash into that luckily for you and your wallet, are either finished or about to finish up their funding campaigns. You’re welcome…

By Ari Posted on

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Review: Adios

I don’t know if I’ve ever actually experienced anything quite like what I did when I played through Adios. I don’t mean to imply that I was awestruck by it by any means, because I genuinely found it to be an incredibly underwhelming game to play. Yet despite its numerous mechanical shortcomings, this narrative-focused, first-person adventure game delivered a really impactful story that left me feeling pretty raw emotionally…

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Blog: Poor Planning – 03/24/21

Over the past month or two, I’ve purchased a handful of video games that I’ve been dying to play for one reason or another. Often these are games that I just never had the time to get around to when they released but decided with this lull in the release calendar (at least in my eyes), I could finally see what all the fuss was about. The problem is, despite how much I enjoyed any single game that I purchased, I eventually bounced off of each of them and returned to doing nothing instead…

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Blog: St. Drizzt’s Day – 03/17/21

Well it’s Saint Patrick’s Day already, which means it’s time to go out to the pub with the lads and knock back a couple of brews and eat your body weight in bar nachos. Oh wait, it’s a pandemic still, don’t do that. I can’t say I’ve ever really celebrated St. Patrick’s day in any real capacity at any point in my life, and this year doesn’t seem like the best time to start. So instead I’ll just sit here and talk about an upcoming game that has nothing to do with Ireland or even the color green at all. We’re talking about the upcoming cooperative action game, Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance…

By Ari Posted on

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Blog: 3 Years Strong – 03/10/21

Almost three years ago to the day I launched this silly little blog, unaware that it would go on for as long as it has. When I launched the blog itself, it was mostly a way to just get some consistent content up on the main page to supplement the glut of videos we made. Oh how hard the pendulum has swung in the other direction however, with several different features and articles existing in stark contrast to the zero amount of videos we make. While having to write something every week for the past 3 years might sound like a burden, it’s actually been exactly what I needed to keep me going creatively…

By Ari Posted on

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The Master of Disaster: Alternative Thinking – 19

One of the best things about tabletop role-playing games is just how much versatility a player has in any given situation. Any good GM should be able to accommodate any reasonable request from their players, but the real fun come in when a player completely sideswipes you with some genuine shenanigans. Having to adjust and improvise on-the-fly is an absolute thrill that really tests my abilities to honor the request of the player while adhering to the rules and story. It’s a tough thing to develop, but it’s a necessary skill to have when running a game…

By Ari Posted on

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Blog: Back in the Ring – 04/14/21

Like most folks, I’ve played a lot of really hard games throughout my life that I might even call punishing or unfair, but none of them have challenged me anywhere near as much as Ring Fit Adventures does. While Ring Fit Adventures isn’t going to throw endless hordes of bloodthirsty enemies at me or require pixel perfect platforming and reaction times, it does do something more sinister than any other video game I’ve ever played before: it puts my in physical pain…

By Ari Posted on

Blog 0

Blog: Vaccination Station – 04/07/21

At the beginning of March I managed to get myself the first dosage of the two-shot Moderna COVID-19 vaccine, followed up by the second dose I received yesterday. Since the moment I made my first appointment right on through to today, I’ve felt a genuinely high amount of anxiety about the whole situation. I fully believe in the efficacy of vaccines and think everyone should be rushing to get their own COVID vaccination scheduled and administered, but there’s just a gravitas to this whole situation that was and continues to be intimidating to me…

By Ari Posted on

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Blog: Crowdfunder – 03/31/21

Crowdfunding can be a beautiful thing that allows people to directly support the ideas and products they believe in, giving folks the chance to truly vote with their wallets. Aside from the dystopian nightmare of people crowdfunding their medical and legal bills through services like GoFundMe, as well as the vaporware projects that either never make it to market or are just flat out scams, crowdfunding is a great concept. It’s also a really good way to get me to spend even more money on tabletop role-playing game systems and paraphernalia than I already do. So here are some of the money-pits that I’ve recently tossed my cash into that luckily for you and your wallet, are either finished or about to finish up their funding campaigns. You’re welcome…

By Ari Posted on

Articles 0

Review: Adios

I don’t know if I’ve ever actually experienced anything quite like what I did when I played through Adios. I don’t mean to imply that I was awestruck by it by any means, because I genuinely found it to be an incredibly underwhelming game to play. Yet despite its numerous mechanical shortcomings, this narrative-focused, first-person adventure game delivered a really impactful story that left me feeling pretty raw emotionally…

By Ari Posted on

Blog 0

Blog: Poor Planning – 03/24/21

Over the past month or two, I’ve purchased a handful of video games that I’ve been dying to play for one reason or another. Often these are games that I just never had the time to get around to when they released but decided with this lull in the release calendar (at least in my eyes), I could finally see what all the fuss was about. The problem is, despite how much I enjoyed any single game that I purchased, I eventually bounced off of each of them and returned to doing nothing instead…

By Ari Posted on

Blog 0

Blog: St. Drizzt’s Day – 03/17/21

Well it’s Saint Patrick’s Day already, which means it’s time to go out to the pub with the lads and knock back a couple of brews and eat your body weight in bar nachos. Oh wait, it’s a pandemic still, don’t do that. I can’t say I’ve ever really celebrated St. Patrick’s day in any real capacity at any point in my life, and this year doesn’t seem like the best time to start. So instead I’ll just sit here and talk about an upcoming game that has nothing to do with Ireland or even the color green at all. We’re talking about the upcoming cooperative action game, Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance…

By Ari Posted on

Blog 0

Blog: 3 Years Strong – 03/10/21

Almost three years ago to the day I launched this silly little blog, unaware that it would go on for as long as it has. When I launched the blog itself, it was mostly a way to just get some consistent content up on the main page to supplement the glut of videos we made. Oh how hard the pendulum has swung in the other direction however, with several different features and articles existing in stark contrast to the zero amount of videos we make. While having to write something every week for the past 3 years might sound like a burden, it’s actually been exactly what I needed to keep me going creatively…

By Ari Posted on

Articles 0

The Master of Disaster: Alternative Thinking – 19

One of the best things about tabletop role-playing games is just how much versatility a player has in any given situation. Any good GM should be able to accommodate any reasonable request from their players, but the real fun come in when a player completely sideswipes you with some genuine shenanigans. Having to adjust and improvise on-the-fly is an absolute thrill that really tests my abilities to honor the request of the player while adhering to the rules and story. It’s a tough thing to develop, but it’s a necessary skill to have when running a game…

By Ari Posted on

Blog 0

Blog: Please Make This – 03/03/21

They say there’s a product for everything, right? If that’s the case, then where the hell is the asynchronous Dungeons & Dragons game that I’ve been imagining in my head for the past few years? Surely I can’t be expected to go out and develop a video game on my own, so I’ll do the only thing I know how to do decently and write an article complaining about it. So let’s talk about the D&D game that should exist by now, but miraculously doesn’t…

By Ari Posted on

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Gut Check: Outriders Demo

Recently a demo for the upcoming Square Enix game, Outriders, was released to the public in what I can only assume was to get people like myself to finally stop asking, “what the hell is Outriders?” Seriously, I had no idea what this game was or when it was announced or who was making it, but ads for started cropping up everywhere so I figured I’d just try the demo and seek out the answer for myself…

By Ari Posted on

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Blog: Lemon Days – 02/24/21

Sometimes you can just buy and thing, rip it out of the box, plug it in and just go without any problems, whereas other times you might buy a thing, turn it on once, later learning that it would be the last time it would ever turn on again. That plug and play appeal has been a big selling point for a lot of products like gaming consoles and at one point, Apple devices just to name a few. But no product is immune to defects, something we all have to learn at some point in our lives. For some of us, we learn this lesson every few months thanks to our superhuman-like powers of bad luck…

By Ari Posted on

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Gut Check: Tastemaker

I recently spent some time playing a little restaurant management game that I found thanks to a post on Reddit by the creator themselves. Normally I don’t take game recommendations from the infinite void that is Reddit, but it was interesting and cheap enough for me to take the chance on this early access title. It’s called Tastemaker and it needs a lot of work, but there’s definitely something there that’s got me hopeful enough to keep an eye on its progress…

By Ari Posted on

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Blog: A Mini Mario – 02/17/21

Last week the incredible yet nearly forgotten Super Mario 3D World, formerly a Wii U exclusive, was re-released on the Nintendo Switch. That game alone is very good and you should certainly check it out if you’re one of the many people who missed it when it was initially released back in 2013. That’s all well and good, but what I really want to talk about is the bundled game that comes alongside this new port of Super Mario 3D World, a little game called Bowser’s Fury…

By Ari Posted on

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Valentine’s Play

Even though our 2020 Game of the Year coverage is dead and buried with the rest of 2020, there’s still one list that I felt needed to be published in regards to the games I played last year. See, my partner and I started dating towards the end of 2019 and like most people, were put into a really challenging position when it came to maintaining our relationship while we were both quarantined. Luckily we both had Nintendo Switches and were able to have “date nights” where we’d just play games and talk for hours, something we still do only now in person thanks to them moving closer to my place. So in celebration of Valentine’s Day, here are some of the games we played and continue to play together that they have specifically called out as their most memorable games that we’ve played together in no particular order…

By Ari Posted on

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Blog: Blog? – 02/10/21

Look, I’ll be honest, there isn’t really a ton to talk about this week. I’ve been struggling with what the hell I would actually write for this blog, and I’m just kind of flying by the seat of my pants here. I’ve been playing some stuff here and there, including the excellent Hitman III and the less excellent but still good Super Mario 3D All-Stars collection. It’s just been a pretty uneventful week honestly. So yeah, no blog today. Thanks for checking in though. There will be an article going up on Friday that I’m really excited for. Oh, and Super Mario 3D World + Bowser’s Fury comes out on Friday as well, and that’s one of the best 3D Mario games out there, so that should be fun. Anyway, enjoy the rest of your day, and we’ll be back with an actual blog next week…

By Ari Posted on

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Review: Cyber Shadow

There’s a moment when playing an action game where you fall into a rhythm and everything just clicks, making your deft dodging and precision platforming feel less like conscious choices and more like you’re just acting off of pure instinct. When a game manages to get you into that zone, it can be the difference between enjoying said game and loving it. Cyber Shadow is a game that’s filled with these moments of pure 2D action and platforming bliss, but it’s also filled with a lot of bullshit that can rip you right out of that rhythm. Yet none of the lows of Cyber Shadow are enough to outweigh its highs…

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