“Mann Co. acquires Blood Eagle assets in landmark sexual harassment case”.

HEADLINE: Mann Co. acquires Blood Eagle assets in a landmark sexual harassment case. Diamond Sword purchase excess BLU mercenary surplus as part of settlement negotiations.

VS.

Saxton Hale
Mann Co. CEO
Australian Extraordinaire

In a press conference held today with Saxton Hale, CEO of Mann Co., the landmark harassment case was discussed involving the acquisition of resources held by the Blood Eagle Clan.

Reports indicate that Blood Eagle tribesman references Saxton Hale as a “girly wuss”. Mann Co. replied by allowing Mr. Hale to airdrop in to an unknown battlefield while wrestling with poisonous cobras that caught fire during the freefall. After using the now charred snake skins as replacement hat bands, Saxton proceed to “Beat the crap” out of a tirbesman who referred to himself only as “a pathfinder” upon finding out that the tribesman’s only job was to “run away”.

Tribal warriors still seeking to remain actively employed have been offered temporary mercenary positions within Mann Co. pending a probationary period.

Negotiations were vicious, but a court appointed mediator assisted with the dealings before running away for “undisclosed reasons”.

More reports will follow upon Mr. Hale’s return from a gorilla punching expedition currently scheduled for Friday.

Okay, that was fun and all, but I don’t think it’ll ever get approved by the TF2 or Tribes communities as a whole. But hey, it’s fun to play with photoshop.

Regardless, this isn’t what I’m posting about today.

Instead, it’s about cross training.

Cross training you ask?

Yes… Cross training. And not the dumb kind that involves shoes, or exercise, or any legitimate effort. Screw that noise.

Instead, I speak of cross training of the video game type.

I have been heavily involved with two FPS games over the last couple of years. Team fortress 2 and Tribes.

We already know that I’m a filthy sand raker (Though Blood Eagle is quickly gaining steam in my book for some reason), but when it comes to TF2 I’m never quite sure if I’m more of a BLU or a RED fan. Both are awesome, BUT, unfortunately, (because I’m usually a blue team kinda guy), RED is taking the lead because BLU uses dumbass apple style products.

If there is one thing I stand by, it’s that fact that I CANNOT stand anything the supports the Apple mindset, culture, or mentality. iScrew iThat!

iDumbasses!

ahem… back to the topic at hand.

I’ve been playing these two games.

I’m usually a medic or an engineer type when I play Team fortress. Not a lot of aiming required and I can let the machines do most of the work for me. I like that. Not a lot of skill, and plenty of time to look good while I help others on my team. Yay for being a team player, right? Right!  TEAMWORK! (Queue up some Tenacious D right there).

Now, in tribes, I started as a soldier because I didn’t wanna be a heavy, and pathfinding wasn’t my thing. So, I spent my time and I learned to shoot at people. I then unlocked technician (I’ve been playing since early beta) and found that I really liked this class. Turrets are awesome but I’m still HEAVILY involved in actually shooting at people.

I worked on my aiming skills.

Spinfusors? Hell yeah!

Machine guns? Bring it.

Thumpers? *giggles*. Yes, I do love this weapon.

I’ve learned to shoot. I’ve learned to aim. And I’ve learned to lead my shots and actually hit stuff.

This is something that I had never really learned how to do in Team Fortress. I just could never quite figure it out. My shots were “too slow” in my opinion.

I’ve gotten good with the spinfusor again and my thumper is warm from use. I’ve gone fast, I’ve dropped turrets, I’d repaired generators, and I’ve shoved grenades down the throats of more brutes than I can care to count. It’s been glorious good fun. 

Anywho, I fired TF2 backup again today after being in tribes for a little bit during the last week or so. I sat down and picked soldier since there were too many engineers on my team. I saw the scout screaming across the screen in the distance (They really aren’t THAT fast ya know.”, and I let a rocket loose.

KER-BLAM!

That scout just took a rocket to the friggin FACE!

Suddenly, after spending WAY too much time with a spinfusor in my hands, I could aim and shoot rockets. This is new. This is exciting. This is reason to giggle as I proceeded to run around the server and shoot people in the friggin face. I’m not any good with a sniper rifle or even with the knife of a spy, but when it comes to rockets and pipe bombs of a demo man… I’m freaking dangerous!

I enjoy many games. These two are my current favorites. And while I didn’t expect to get any better at one because I played the other, I found that the unexpected side effect resulted in way more than I could have hoped for.

-R.H

*edit: Because Words

Advertisement

30 Day Blog Challenge – Day 6

Okay, day 6 states that I have to post a picture of somethign that makes me happy.

I looked at that challenge and said, “This is simple. BAM! A picture of Andrea”.

 

But I realized that this is what I ALWAYS do. No, not this time.

As much as I LOVE and adore my wife and children, this time this will be about something other than my family that makes me smile. Don’t get me wrong, my family makes me happier than most anything on this earth, but since we assume that this is a given, we’ll move on to the next best option.

 What you are seeing here is a rendered version of a scene from Descent. Now, it isn’t this game in particular that I want to write about. The shot is more of an analogy. Maybe a metaphor. Possibly some other word that says it means something other than it looks like. I forget, but that’s not important.

The thing I’m trying to represent here is video games in general. I play them. I enjoy them. Some of them make me smile. Some piss me off. Some make me think. Some I just like to look at. Others I am finally begining to play.

There is so much of my life that has been affected by video games.

I have a few that top my list of favorites and those I believe I will point out in the future.

…

Well, it’s TECHNICALLY the future now from when you read those last lines, so I guess I’ll tell you about them now.

GAREN’S TOP xx FAVORITE VIDEO GAMES

 

5. Super Mario Bros. series on NES

I spent way too many summers playing this bugger. Be it with or without cheats, I enjoyed it. I played with my brothers and sisters in nearly every house I lived in growing up. This is the epitome of nostalgia in my book. LOVE IT!

4. Metroid

Metroid is one of those games where I love the premise of the game. I love the physics. I love the controls. I love the exploration and the ability to wind up in some really strange places…. but…. I never beat the game. Hell, in all reality, this game scares the ever living daylights out of me. Dunno why. But it’s still one of my favs.

3. Tribes

“Trust me, I work at Gamestop”. Worst words ever to hear. Best game that could have ever been suggested by that guy. I still think he was a tool though.

2. Warcraft Series

From RTS, to point and click, to MMO… The warcraft and Starcraft universes  make me smile. I love the lore. the storylines. the graphics. the ideas behind the game. And hey, Jaina is kinda hot. LOL. Regardless, with the amount of time invested in this series, it’s up there in the top 5 for a reason.

1. Descent

I played descent for way too many years. I still pick it up from time to time even. The game makes me sick to play. It’s scary at times. And no one I know plays because they were never able to get ansy good at it. Let’s not forget though, I have the super power known as ADD, so a lot of things like this I wind up being really good at. Take battletech for example. I’m CRAZY GOOD at that game.

But that isn’t the point. The point is that I enjoy video games, and some board games. And it is those forms of entertainment that give me the opportunity to escape the real world for a little bit, enjoy some time either alone or with others, and let my imagination run wild.

So, what is it that makes me happy? (Other than my family which is my true #1)

Video games.

Sorry, it’s true

 

-G

The butchers have our flag.

How do you think those around you would feel if they knew that 2,000 years from now the central point behind all of the major wars would be contesting around who has posession of a flag?

 

I recently picked up Tribes: Ascend. You can read about it HERE. I realize that I don’t have many friends that play the kind of games that I play, but it doesn’t stop me from trying to put the resources out there for people to use. If you recall, I put together a post like this about the game Descent a while back.

Anyways, this post is a lot like the one I did about Descent, except I’m doing it about Tribes.

The majority of the information I’m putting up here was gleaned from the Hi-Rez Tribes Forums. The post can be found HERE.

Simply put, Tribes is a game of massive multi-player warfare where teams consist of 32 vs. 32 players. It’s on an epic scale. It can be deathmatch, Capture the Flag, or a handful of other game modes. Deathmatch and CTF being the most popular.

While you can run around on the ground, you also have a fancy jetpack that can propel you forward or up in to the air. Adding this extra dimension of movement makes the game faster, more difficult, and way more entertaining than you would think it could be.

There have been a number of Tribes games that have released over the years.  Now, to save you some heartache, I’m only providing information for two or three of them because some don’t get played anymore.

First was Starsiege: Tribes

This is was created the genre of tribes style games that included the jetpack. It doesn’t get played much anymore and those that do are usually on the higher end of elite and don’t take well to newcomers. If you consider yourself a glutton for punishment though, you can snag it here.

Then there was Tribes 2.

Man, this game was AWESOME. It is still being supported by the fan community over at TribesNext. You can go there to download the entire thing. OR… you can just click HERE.

Some people complained that they wanted a storyline above the shoot, kill, repeat model that had been in place for years. So, they brought out…

Tribes: Vengeance

This game was good in my opinion. I enjoyed the story. The game play was solid. There were a few new features and I had a good time with the single and multiplayer.

The game isn’t played online by many people anymore, BUT, the single player campaign is TOTALLY worth playing.

Want to give it a shot? Click HERE

Okay, now we have moved into the modern era …

Tribes: Ascend.

Again, you can go look at the post I put up about it for more information (I reccommend this!), but if you wanna just skip the whole thing, then you can always just GO HERE and download the game. It’s quick, easy, and fun to play.

So, there you go. It’s all the basic info you need.

DOWNLOAD LINKS:

Tribes 1

Tribes 2

Tribes Vengeance

Tribes Ascend

An AMAZING explaination of the Game and the mechanics.

Click Here for that.

And my personal thoughts on the whole thing.

Right here!

Pick it up. Play it. Enjoy it.

It really is fun.

I promise.

-G

The cheapest drug an internet addict can get.

The internet is an amazing tool that will allow even the heartiest adventurer to succomb to the paings of addiction.

Be it Stumbleupon, bloggin, online gaming, cats on youtube, memes, or even the fine art of trolling, the internet provides us a wide array of addicting substances.

While I enjoy each of these addictions in kind, I have found recently that the one that is providing the most joy for me is blogging.

I have written about a large number of things. Work, Religion, my wife Andrea, personal life, and even a post or two about video games. Each of these topics have been very entertaining to me as a writer. Actually, I’m not really a writer. I just think of an idea and belch it out onto digital paper and hit publish. Hopefully someone at leasts find my posts entertaining or worth their time. The last thing that I want is for someone to read something I wrote and just blink at it and exclaim tl;dr.

Regardless of what people currently think, todays post is going to be based on something compeltely different. I’m going to talk about “What People Currently Think!”. (See what I did there?)

So, with this in mind, I am asking you as a reader to actually take the few minutes required and give me some feedback. That is afterall what the comments section is for.

What would you like to see?

Video Game related topics?

Religion related topics?

More stories from my personal life?

Stories and pictures from work?

More political commentary?

If I can find out what people WANT to read, then I can find what it is in that topic that interests me and I can write on it more often. Hell, I can even write on it somewhat regularly.

Now, I pointed out that blogging is one of the internets addictions. And while that may be true, the big part of blogging for me that holds the addiction is the view counter.

HOW MANY PEOPLE READ WHAT I SAID?

That’s what I like to see. I like to see that number grow saying people have read my blog post. Maybe even told their friends about it.

So, with this in mind, I am willing to do the following:

I will post regularly. Maybe even on a schedule.

I will post on those topics that my readers would like to see.

I will read the blogs of people that comment on mine. I will even comment on yours.

in exchange for this, I just ask that you tell me what it is that you want to see.

Because if you don’t, I’m just going to keep doing what I’m doing and I don’t think I’m doing it right.

-G

“If you liked Descent, you’ll love this… Trust me, I work at GameStop”

ONCE… Just once has a suggestion from game stop actually been worth the effort.

This was back in 1999. I believe I was still living at home and was associating with my good friend Rocky at the time.

The suggestion was thus, “You would like to play Tribes”.

I had never heard of tribes, and didn’t know what the game was about. It was a FPS with a twist, you had a jetpack and could ski across HUGE amounts of land very quickly. Of all the game I think I have ever played, this one is by far the fastest playing and requires the most amount of twitch.

Well, after playing tribes for a bit, I realized that this game was quite entertaining. I mean, REALLY entertaining.

So, after figuring that out, as a child of the era when the internet was still new, what did I do? I uttered the rallying cry that wasn’t even a phrase yet…. “TO THE INTERNET!”.

I fired up google (Because I used google before it was a verb), and looked up tribes. I found screenshots and such from the game. And honestly, this is pretty much what I was playing…

Nothing fancy. Well, the internet told me that there was going to be a sequal. I even knew roughly when the release date was.

Since game marketing was still young, the best you could get was a display in the electronics portion of the local walmart or fred meyer.

While at the electronics department of the freddies down in Bremerton Washington one afternoon while I was with Rocky, we spied something. It was what appeared to be Tribes 2.

I looked at rocky and exclaimed, “It’s Out!” and ran over…

The following is a decent account of what took place as I stepped up to the display.

The boxes on that display were empty. The game wasn’t supposed to be out for a few more days at least. What is really sad is I knew this. What is even MORE sad is that I had seen this comic that morning before Rocky and I went down to Fred Meyer.

Yeah, that’s right, I got suckered in to a display. Honestly, it sucked. So, I waited the extra week and sure enough, the actual game was out.

I purchased my new game, I went home, I installed it, and started running the updater. (All while Playing Descent 2 on Kali in the background).

  

After the updater was complete (I already knew it was a horrible update system they were using after glancing it it), I was faced with a situation a lot like this one….

I took my beating and the update completed. I was playing tribes 2.

Much better eh?

Well, time passed, games come and go, and I moved on.

Well, here I am, 10 years later and I found a link to a new game. Tribes: Ascend.

Just like Team Fortress 2 (GREAT GAME BTW!), it was free to play.

In my head, I started doing the “No-Pants, I’m so happy Dance”.

I clicked join.

I clicked install.

I clicked update. (No kicking this time)

I clicked play.

What did I see?

BAM!

  

(Oh yeah, click the pics to make them bigger… will ya?)

Bar far, this is the best tribes yet in the way of looks.

But how does it play? Well, it’s still as fast as the first two. It’s still got all of my favorite features. But it’s a tad different.

Lets look at this video before we get too far. Just to give you an idea of some of the things that take place in this amazing game.

It used to be that you couldn’t change your loadouts on the fly anymore, they have since fixed that, but it wasn’t a big deal because your life expectancy isn’t long enough to really matter.

Oddly enough though, after my first few minutes, it reminded me a lot of playing Halo. The first one. Something about the way the gun is carried. The general feeling of the architecture. The overall mood seemed kinda like something Bungie would put out.

Honestly, I’ve only had two hours logged in game when I wrote this, but I’m really enjoying it. Little things like the the damage effect, the key layouts, and the ability to use grenades are pleasing to see.

Will I keep playing? Probably. Do I want my friends to play? YES! Yes I do.

Would I be crazy excited if my wife and/or son decided to play with me? HELL YES!

I’m a little excited honestly. Okay, maybe a little more than I like to admit. But regardless, it’s a hoot.

It’s not even a real sport!

 

GGOOOOOOOAAAAAALLLLLL!!!!!!

This is something that you will hear screamed by entire crowds at a soccer game across the world whenever someone makes a goal. Well, it’s ‘football’ everywhere else, but I refuse to even admit that it’s a real sport.

There are only two real reasons to even watch soccer.

First: The hopes that a riot will start.

Second: Waiting for the bleachers to collapse and half ofEuropeto die.

Seriously, I don’t want to spend three hours watching a bunch of guys run back and forth across a field only for the game to end with a 0-0 tie. Screw that.

Anyways, soccer, football, and rioting Europeans have nothing to do with this post. I just realized I came up with a lame goal and that little tirade kinda just popped in to my head.

 

Anyways, on with the real post.

 

I think I just acquired a goal.

 

It’s a dumb one, but I think it took me a good solid 15 years to finally figure this one out.

I was playing Descent underway the last few days in an effort to keep my mind off of other more pressing issues, and in the process, I was asking myself, “Where is my after burner, and why haven’t I found any flash missiles yet?”.

Well, after looking at the map structure, it turns out I have been playing Descent 1, not Descent 2 like I had imagined. Being the 6DOF afficinado that I like to consider myself, I’m surprised I didn’t notice this earlier.

Well, since I am officially on level 12 of the 24 level set, I figure I’ll just keep going and see what happens. As this progressed, I came up with my idea.

I am going to complete the ENTIRE Descent series while I am underway this summer.

That’s nearly 83 missions.

I have never legitimately beaten any of these games. I have always just spent my time in Multiplayer.

Well, since I am 50% of the way through the first campaign, I’m just gonna keep on trucking.

 

I have a little over a half a million points so far, 15 extra lives, and I have only died twice where I happened to restore from a save.

 

Like I said, it’s a lame goal, but I’m going to try and pull it off.

Comments to the peanut gallery

Just a few short things I’ve wanted to say bu haven’t had anyone to say them to.

– I am participating in a funeral on the 8th. I get to dress up in my bravos.

– I’m the assigned EOW for ECC for all of the drills on the boat now. Not a huge deal, but kinda cool.

– I beat level 10 on Descent 2. Strangely, it’s the farthest I’ve ever gotten.

-My friend Rob is transferring off of the boat. It makes me sad.

– I lost a really big filling the other day. It hurts.

That’s all I guess.

The Power of Sound

The Power of Sound

I was playing two different games recently. Well,

actually, three. But, it’s only kind of related. When playing World of
Warcraft, the sounds aren’t required, but the dialogue that goes back and forth
is amazing. This was a recent thought of mine while I was playing Descent 3
online.

I was flying around in Skybox and obliterating people
recently (Which is not really normal for me because I’m not very good) and I
realized that there was no voice communication going on. Now, I know that D3
doesn’t have integrated voice comms, but having something like that would be
great. Especially if I were playing a team game. (Memo to me: Get people to use
Vent!) Anyways, this caused me to think back to when I played on PXO. I had
four typed taunts, and four audio taunts. My typed taunts were lame, and if I
recall, they were the system defaults. But my audio taunts, those I really had
fun with. 

Right here, my memories would
cross me over to when I played Descent: Freespace while my internet connect
wasn’t stable. The great thing about Freespace is there are some amazing radio
communications that go on between yourself and your squadron.  If you shoot a buddy, they yell at you. If
you complete an objective, it tells you. If you kill an enemy fighter, your
squadron buddies comment on the kill. 
This was great. I loved it.

But… How to utilize this in Descent?

After some file extraction, and some hacking and slashing
of audio files, I created four audio taunts. I imported them in to Descent 3
and I put them to use.

While getting my butt kicked in the beginning, if I died

horribly, then I would play taunt number 4:

“AAAAAGGGGggghhhhh……. *static*”

THAT WAS AWESOME! I was able to express the feeling of
being blown apart when I wasn’t as good as the guy next to me.

Well, a few minutes later, I got in to a dog fight with
someone of equal skill, and after circle strafing and firing like a madman, I
finally went down in flame. I punched audio taunt 3:

“Good kill pilot.”

I was able to successfully congratulate him. I’m grinning at this point.

An hour later, I’m in a CTF game and one of my blue team
mates isn’t paying attention and is just laying in to me with a plasma cannon.
My response? Audio taunt 2:

“CEASE FIRING PILOT!”

Oddly enough, he stopped.

Well, this was awesome, but not everything should be
strict radio comms, so I have audio taunt 1. This one I use when I am chasing
down two or more other people. While in the middle of a three way combat, I
smash on number 1 and get:

“I’ll be there in a second, I have to finish killing
this guy over here.”

Seriously, how awesome is that? Sarcasm with the push of
a button. That’s the kind of feature that I really enjoy.

So, I fly my ship, I shoot the other guys, and I can

communicate as I need. It’s kind of dumb, but it makes me grin.

Oh… and if you have NO idea what I’m talking about,

shoot me an e-mail… We’ll talk!

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Descent: 6DOF

Here is an interesting off topic post. Not much to do with World of Warcraft, or church, or personal life, or much of anything like that. It’s more of a nostalgic post with a bit of an attempt to draw some attention to something I personally enjoy. Here are a few pictures to give you an idea of what I’m about to talk about.

So, with all of that in mind, I want to talk about something that I have been involved with for the last 15 years.

DESCENT

Descent was a video game for the PC that was made by Interplay back in 1995. It utilized a lot of the same things that made DOOM popular. The big difference was that it added a third degree of freedom to your play. Instead of running around on the ground (Hence the term “Ground-Pounder”), you were given the ability to move forwards, backwards, left, right, up, down, and rotate a full 360 degree clockwise and counter clockwise. This gave you unlimited freedom of movement. Interplay dubbed this “A full 360 degrees of freedom”, or as the player community called it “6 Degrees of freedom (6DOF)”. This was a HUGE advancement in game play that the other gaming communities just couldn’t compete with. The problem with this though was if you had a weak stomach, there was always the chance for vertigo to set in.

When I first found this game, it was the shareware version of Descent on my father’s laptop from work. I was enthralled by this concept. I played every chance I got. I was always a little afraid of dying in the game, or of getting in over my head, but I still figured it out and I loved it.

Fast forward a couple of years and Interplay released a sequel. Descent 2. It was the same successful formula of game play, but added better graphics, new weapons, new robots to fight, and improved multiplayer support. Now, this is where I get in to the meat and potatoes of this post.

Descent 2: Multiplayer! There used to be an online gaming community called HEAT.NET. Heat.net was awesome because you could talk to people on the internet in a chat room type of fashion, and when you wanted to play a game of Descent, you just clicked the icon, and you were able to play with up to 8 people in one game. It was great. I spend almost two years straight playing on HEAT.NET before they shut down. That was a sad day for me. But, I found a replacement. Kali.net. It was just as good, but it turns out that this is where the “greats” of Descent played. All those people that essentially ran the gaming community hung out here.

When I started playing on Kali, I used the free version of the software which would let you play in a multiplayer game for up to ten minutes at a time. Now, I have ADD so 10 minutes was an eternity for me, but I was happy to play like I did. After I realized that I loved playing this game as much as I did, I broke down and made my first online purchase. I spent $20 to buy a registration key for Kali. My addiction to 6 degrees of freedom only got worse at this point.

Then… I met Andrea!

I started dating the girl that I eventually made my wife. I would go over to her house and connect my 800 MHz laptop to her 300 MHz desktop by way of a direct serial connection and we would play Descent together. She died a lot in those games. A whole lot. But she married me anyways. Anyways, as we played in her guest bedroom, I would let her log in to Kali occasionally and play online with my friends. Then something happened. I figured out that I was serious about this girl. To this day, she still doesn’t know this story (Surprise Andrea!) How did I figure out that I wanted to be with her forever? Simple. I went home, logged on to the Kali.net, and I purchased her a registration key. I bought my girlfriend access to my online gaming community. Pretty dorky huh?

Fast forward a few more years. The guys that made the first two made a third. Descent 3. This added the ability to get out of the mines and fly around outside as well. This was a huge advancement. It added improved online play through Parallax Online (PXO) and the introduction of two new ships to fly. I’ll get in to the ships and all of that in a few minutes. But this made the addiction worse. I would get my friends to play with me. I would throw LAN parties where we would play descent until people just got so tired they couldn’t play anymore. It was amazing.

Then life changed. I got married. I joined the Coast Guard. I had a child. Then I picked up World of Warcraft.  Then I had another child. Then I moved. Then I moved again. Eight years I was detached from the community that I loved.  And now, here I am. I’m stationed on a boat that is gone for weeks on end. I am rarely home. And I had to find something to fill my time.

Something that I could do for a few minutes. Something that I could do for a few hours. Something that I could do without internet. Something that I could with the internet. Something that I could play that would keep my brain occupied while the boat rumbled around me for hours on end.

Descent!

That was it. That was the answer.

I went down in to my basement and I dug out my old joysticks. I pulled out an old copy of the game. I snagged a copy of those games and expansion packs that I didn’t have any more. I downloaded the add-ons, the level packs, the upgraded texture packs, and the art to make my own cases, CD labels, and game play books. I went to www.kali.net and I downloaded the software. I dug out those two dusty Kali.net registration keys and I plugged them in. I installed my games, configured them, hooked up to my trusty iPhone internet tether, and then it happened. The words that primed me for this post.

Prepare for Descent

I sat there for a moment. My ship hovering in the entrance corridor of level 1. The Lunar Outpost. This was it. I was playing again. I was actually doing it. For a few brief moments, life felt… happy. Nostalgically happy. I slammed the throttle forward, gripped the joystick tightly, and prepared to unleash hell in a game play environment I hadn’t touched in almost a decade. And it was good.

Now, this post is only about half over. While the words that I have typed are personal experience and I hope you can take some sort of joy or entertainment value from them, the next few paragraphs are the part that I hope pique your interest. I hope that you can read them and say “Wow, this looks kind of cool.” Or “Hey, I should really consider this.”.  So with that, here it is.

DESCENT: The reason I have been flying blind since 1995!

Let me start with some of the technical aspects of this game. What it is, and what’s available.

Descent: First Strike – This is what started it all.

Descent 2: Counterstrike – The new and improved version. This is my personal favorite.

Descent 2: Vertigo – The expansion to the wildly successful Descent2.

Descent 3: Retribution – This was the amazingly beautiful version that took you out of the mines.

Descent 3: Mercenary – The expansion to Descent 3.

Doom didn’t just introduce the masses to a first-person, action 3-D shooter, it spawned a variety of first-person clones. Some of these clones, like Dark Forces, were welcome additions to the genre. Others were just more of the same. Only one 3-D shooter adds a whole new dimension to the field: Descent. No exploding body parts or fireball-vomiting demons here–Descent puts an industrial spin on the genre by taking you into the bowels of huge factory-like space stations to fight mining robots gone mad.

Consider this: in space, there is no up or down. Descent uses that concept to hit you like a 9G turn with a labyrinth environment and free range of motion on the x-, y-, and z-axes. Nudge your spaceship into a room, and watch out—attacks can come from your left or right, from above or below you. You’ll spin your ship around while firing missiles and lasers until vertigo isn’t just an Alfred Hitchcock movie, but a way of life. Surrounded by this chaos you must rescue scattered human hostages and gather powerups while trying to keep your firepower and shields at their max. A 3-D rotating map is available for those who can’t handle the bewildering turns of each level.

Now, the multiplayer for me is where the money is at. Shooting at friends is fun in things like Quake and UT2K4, but it gets even better in this kind of scenario.

Now, I wanted to try and explain a bunch of the facets of this game in this post, but I find that my creative prowess right now is a bit stifled. So with that, I’m just going to say what I’m thinking instead of making it awesome.

This game is fun. It’s TONS of fun. There is a high learning curve, I won’t dispute that. A lot of people that play it for the first time walk away after two minutes saying it’s too hard. But those of you that are reading this right now know that we play hard games. (World of Warcraft anyone? Crazy hard when the theory crafting is involved) So, seriously, take a look at some of the links that I have below. Do a little reading on it. Download a demo or two. Hell, try the full game. If you are interested in what you are seeing or reading, then shoot me a message and I’ll hook you up with some AWESOME stuff. But seriously, this game was epic before epic was purple. (Actually, the Fusion Cannon was purple and was considered epic.)

Anyways, I’m going to quit prattling on and get to the awesome resources that are available. Enjoy.

Forums and Message Boards:

http://www.planetdescent.com – This was the second most used forum for the game. The casual player went here for discussions and most everyone came here for downloads, demos, maps, and other sundries for the game. If you want the demo, this is the place to find it.

http://www.descentbb.net – This is where the hardcore players hang out. It’s primarily a forum, but still has good discussions considering the small size of the Descent community. A must for assistance with some of the more difficult aspects of the game.

Downloads:

Descent 1 Demo – The noise that started it all. Low-res, but a classic.

Descent 2 Demo – This was the mainstay of the multiplayer community for years. Better resolution, but still fairly low res. This one is my personal favorite.

Descent 3 Demo – This brought you out of the mines for a new experience. Better online support, better graphics, better sound, and an actual story line. If you want something single player that’s good fun with an actual goal, this is the one for you.

Improvements:

Now, Descent was awesome on its own, but to make it better for online play, there was an update made by a group from Denmark called D2X-XL. This made it so you could have insane resolutions and better network support. It’s a MUST for anyone who wants to play online.

D2X-XL Home Page

Online multiplayer support:

Http://www.kali.net – This is the chat interface that will let you find people to play with. This one is a must if you want to try it online (Which is recommended.)

http://www.slyclan.de/ – This is where you get VORTEX. It’s the software that lets you chat and play Descent 3 online. If you decide to pick up the game, then this is where you get your multiplayer from.

If you have read this far, then you are most likely interested in what you saw. Just drop me a comment or an e-mail or hit me up on AIM (rubyhunter4) and I’ll do what I can. I’m looking to build the community. Maybe you want to help.

Peace out. Hopefully, I’ll see you in the mines when I’m not hanging out in Azeroth.