Stephen’s Corner: News and views for RPG Nerds Everywhere!
Who: Stephen. Co-creator of one of the greatest stories never-told of all time.
What: Anything someone who is into RPGs of any kind would be interested in.
When: Whenever Stephen feels like it.
Where: This special page is setup up for just Stephen and anything he feels like sharing.
How: Stephen dislikes blogs and social networking, other than with people he already knows, he sends out bi-weekly emails every opposite Tuesday and then I post them.
Why: Stephen is an amazingly intelligent albeit misunderstood person, in order to provide a forum for his great ideas and opinions I have set up this place for him.
SUMMER WARS – Sat 2/27/2010 8:15 AM
Hey all,
I just wanted to share a film with you that I saw last night. It’s an animated movie from 2009 called “Summer Wars”; you can easily find torrents of it or sites that stream it (though it’s not on Netflix as of this writing). It’s a bit slow to start, and it has some (I thought) frustrating scenes, but it’s got some UTTERLY AWESOME scenes that more than carry it. Just sit back and enjoy it.
-Stephen
BIOWARE – Mon 2/22/2010 9:51 AM
So, I finally finished Jade Empire on Saturday evening. Good game. Sunday afternoon I started Mass Effect 2. I’ve completed the prologue, and gone right into recruiting Mordin Solus, who is one of the most fun characters I’ve ever had in a RPG party; I love how he speaks his entire thought process out loud. Stopped right before taking on Archangel.
I love being able to import my old character in and have it affect things in this game; it really makes the game feel like a true sequel and not just “another one”. I don’t care for how they introduced ammunition (“thermal clips”) when in the last game it was unneccesary; it feels like a step back in technology rather than forward.
As always, I’m looking forward to the traditional romance sub-plots of all Bioware RPGs, though I must say that I really don’t care for the initial female option that they provide (Miranda): I don’t think her facial model is very good; she looks vaguely masculine for one thing, and I’ve never liked the “thaw the ice-queen” types. I’d much rather go for the cute little yeoman (Kelly), but I doubt she’ll be a true option. Hopefully they’ll provide another female option, or at least let me go back to Liara. Speaking of which, I’m not sure if it’s cool (“here’s your old girlfriend!”) or cruel (“that you can’t have anymore!”) that there’s a picture of her on my desk in the captain’s quarters…
So far, though, I love what’s going on as well as the mechanical aspects (especially the fact that you can a) rack up both paragon and renegade points and b) the active-time moral events). I kinda miss the mystery of the first one (“what the hell is that giant hand?!”), but the opening of ME2 is one of the best I’ve played.
-S