Fletch, You Fools!

At the insistence of Aaron I have signed back into my old Runescape account, after more than a year and a half's absence. 

I may have a bit of catching up to do...

D&Dumb

Last night saw day two of our great quest in our Dungeons and Dragon's campaign and our mercenary group, The Scarlet Steel, ain't exactly off to an epic start.

We started back where we left off: In a dilapidated ruin filled with the now dead tentacle monsters of the week before. John and Jake are taking turns throwing various objects down the giant pit taking up part of the room, from sunrods to urine, waiting for something to jump out and latch onto their faces.

When that fails to entertain them past five minutes we finally begin tackling our greatest quandary: Which door do we check first? With four to chose from and five of us to argue over it little progress is made, until John takes the initiative and runs face first into one of the doors.

Stepping over John's dazed form we discover the door in fact has a handle, though this information helped us little since the damn thing was locked.

Jake, our resident thief, our thief, decides that, like the walls around us, surely the door must also be magical. One failed arcana check later and Jake is convinced that not only is the door magical, but there appears to be a strange symbol upon the door exactly in the shape of John's face. Surely this can mean but one thing.

The prophecies have spoken. John is a god. PRAISE BE TO KAMPO!!!!!

I...I don't even....

It is at this point my character, Mara Ironfist, sulks off to meditate on the level of stupid she just witnessed.

Meanwhile it is agreed upon by the more able-minded among us that perhaps the door's lock and the strange platform over the pit might be related in some way. Maybe. We weren't sure. Mat solved the issue by picking up one of the dead tentacle guys and chucking on top of the platform. A loud kerchunck, or perhaps more of a sheeeeeeeck (many arguments were had over exactly what sound was made) announced the opening of the doors.

Marissa, our Druid, and I barged through the first door, ready to kick ass and chew bubble gum. Sadly we were all out of gum, and sadder still we were blasted by a fire rune for our trouble. Curiosity may not of killed these cats, but it certainly singed our whiskers.

That door sucked, so we tried a different one. This one proved to be far more promising, housing a couple of goblins discussing their baby-dinner plans. Things to kill? Check. Morally sound reason for said killing? Check. Time to party.

And by party I mean watch Mat kill everything. Oh well, at least my maul didn't get dirty.

Pokenoucments

Who doesn't love them some Pokemon? It fills a nerd's baser urges for cute, murderous animals as well as our crippling hoarding habits.

Soul Silver, my most recent attempt to 'catchem' all', was a remake of the original Pokemon Silver, one of the games in the series' second generation.

The Poke-franchise is now six generations deep or whatever, with over 700 of the little bastards to catch. Or something. I seriously lost count.

Anyway, imagine my surprise when I saw the recent announcement that a new remake was on the horizon: Pokemon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire, based off of the third generation of the series.

You're scaring all the Pidgeys away!

When will this stop?

Honestly I love Pokemon, Red was the first video game I ever bought myself. But much like a delicious pepperoni pizza sitting on the counter for a couple days it's beginning to smell and should probably be thrown out lest someone accidentally eat it.

In other news, Geeky Cat's jumping on the Youtubes!!

Ladies and germs, meet Jake, our newest initiate into the Geeky fold! He and Aaron will be playing all sorts of weird and random games, like Attack on Titan, Ace of Spades, and more!

I'll also be throwing in some good old table top madness, with the introduction of our brand new Dungeons and Dragons campaign. Day one started with me standing in various hallways, our good buddy John lying on the ground every other turn, and Jake up there stealing literally our only light sources, for no other reason than because he could.

Methinks this quest has potential.  

Adventures at ACen, Part 2

Last weekend Aaron, myself and five of our friends made the yearly pilgrimage to Anime Central (ACen), an anime convention in Rosemont, Illinois. 

Saturday:

Saturday began much like Friday, with new costumes to perfect in front of the room's giant mirror. Also just like Friday we started the day in the merchant room, a place we spent a rather large amount of our time, despite the empty nature of our wallets. This was not a fruitless trip, however. I managed to get my corset tightened by a gruff but hilarious pro and Aaron discovered a pack of his own kind.

Merchants all around let out a simultaneous tinkle

But to our group Saturday can mean only one thing: Drunken Mech battles.

A company called Virtual World provides the playground for every Gundam fan out there in the form of six giant robot cockpit pods. Inside there's all the controls you need to control your very own murderbot, which you get to pick from the dozens of choices available in one of the four size categories: Light, medium, heavy and assault classes.

So we all got good and liquored up. When we finally made our way to the mech room it was already about 10 or 11 pm, with another hour to wait our turn. I naturally picked the Arctic Wolf mech, because damn that's an awesome name, then I sat down on the floor and waited. And waited. Have you ever waited for something while drunk? It's torture. So I got bored and asked for a piece of paper.

Don't drink and draw, kids, mkay?

Sadly my illusions of victory were just that, illusions. I got last place.

Sunday:

It almost looks good enough to eat. Almost.

Alas the con cannot last forever, and it was now time to pack up the room and head for home. We threw our belongings and freshly acquired swag into the van and hit the convention center one last time. Aaron and I squeezed in one last panel (on self publishing), laughed at the poor suckers in the Full Metal Alchemist line (which was so big it had to be broken up into like eight other lines just to be managed), then met back up with our friends. We finished our weekend with a group selfie (minus Mat and John) taken by a horse.

Back at the van we discovered someone had graciously gifted us with an entire submarine sandwich, deposited on the wall directly in front of our van. Sadly we had already planned on having lunch at Wendy's, so we left the sandwich for a hungry pigeon, or perhaps a less discerning cosplayer who may have eaten nothing but ramen and pocky for three days.

Halfway to Wendy's we discovered part of the sandwich had decided to hitch a ride, with a single tomato elegantly draped upon Aaron's side mirror.

That tomato stayed there the whole way home.

Does This Mean We Level Up?

I promised part two of the ACen post today, but in light of recent events (namely me checking the calendar for once) I'm making a substitute post.

It has been 10 years today since Aaron and I set out on the greatest quest of all: Love.

Before you ask, my favorite cheese is mozzarella.

Anyway, this quest has been one wrought with peril. With Goblins nipping at our heels and Dragons BBQing our backsides we've made it to the top of Mount Doom, Mount Danger, and Mount Obviously Evil and back in what most experts would agree is one piece. 

Thank you my dearest Player Two for 10 amazing years. 10 amazing years of gaming and geekery. 

I love you, Aaron, happy anniversary. 

Here's to the rest of our lives.

Adventures at ACen, Part 1

Ah Anime Central... That marvelous time of year when the gang and I all cram ourselves into a tiny hotel room for the purpose of dressing like morons and partying for three days straight.

Man it sure looked nice... For about five minutes

Anime Central, or ACen, is a rather large (more like friggin' humongous) anime convention held every year in Rosemont, Illinois, a mere hop, skip and a jump (plus four hours, give or take) from home. 'Tis a tradition we have upheld for many years now, with each new year bringing new cosplays and new shenanigans.

Like last year we chose to stay the the Aloft Hotel, a place that, while nice and quiet for a convention hotel, was also about a mile walk from the convention center. All the better to combat the all junk-food diet during conventions, I guess.

Unlike last year it was unnaturally cold outside. It's May, mother nature, no need for friggin' snow conditions. Thankfully Aaron and I chose somewhat warm cosplays.

Somewhat.

Day one we decided to be characters from the anime Kenichi: World's Mightiest Disciple, with me dressing as Kisara Nanjo (or Valkyrie) and Aaron rocking it as Ukita Kozo the Thrower. Saturday we glammed it up with a corset and layered skirts for me and a suit for Aaron as he cosplayed Wolf, his favorite of the four Payday guys.

Thursday:

Naturally we start our adventure with a last minute panic to get everything ready and packed, with me taking quick breaks in order to finish the mask for Aaron's Payday cosplay, because of course it wasn't finished. We hop into the van a mere two hours after our intended take off time, making multiple stops along the way to grab all the last minute things we forgot to grab before hand.

We managed to get to the hotel at an uncharacteristically decent time this year, rolling into the lobby around 4 or 5 pm. Of course such a  flawless execution cannot go unsullied, as one of our number realized at the hotel that he had forgotten all of his bags, including the badge needed for entry to the convention, at home. We spent the remainder of Thursday evening cramming seven people's stuff into a two person hotel room and play-testing our game Employee of the Month while waiting on our forgetful friend.

Friday:

Because Tetris

We start the day by cramming ourselves into our tiny bathroom area to get ready. With five cosplayers all jockeying for a spot by the sink, I wandered, mostly dressed (in costume, of course), toward the lobby bathrooms, picking up a follower in the process. A woman wearing a tube top and a scraggly black boa tailed me awkwardly into the bathroom, where after a long pause told me she loved Valkyrie and asked if she could hug me.

With Aaron and I costumed up we hit the con. We spent the day taking in the sights, for better or for worse, and perusing the merchant room. When drooling over what couldn't be got boring we hit the game room, a space consisting of a couple dozen gigantic old tube TV's and home game consoles like the NES and PlayStation. Aaron thoroughly whooped myself and our friend Ares at Tetris before the gang moved over to a couple quick rounds of Mortal Combat 2, where I had mild success with my frantic button-mashing strategy.

Toward the end of the afternoon we returned to the hotel for a rough game of Pick the Pizza Place, after which Aaron and I hit up a two hour improv workshop. After barely getting in the door (place was packed) Aaron took a ticket to participate while I took a seat to watch.

The workshop consisted of four 'team leaders' all wearing different Pokemon shirts, an Ash Ketchum, and a nurse Joy. You might think this means there was a theme. It didn't. I still have no idea where Pokemon factored into this.

After 30-45 minutes of watching the 40 or so participants circle the room walking like ogres and squeaking like mice they broke off into four groups, Aaron falling in with the Pikachu's. 15 more minutes were dedicated to either singing or passing back and forth an unwanted imaginary platter of spaghetti in Italian accents of varying levels of offensiveness.

Finally there were four short improve shows, each put on by one of the groups, during which any of the group's members could jump in at any time and the plot changed erratically. Now, I won't say they were bad. I certainly couldn't have done half as well. What I will say is it was with a warm wave of relief when the final group concluded their performance. But hey, we learned a few things for LARPing and D&D AND Aaron won a Pokemon movie DvD.

Added bonus: We got to watch a guy get arrested on the way back to the hotel room.

This con's just getting started, folks. Check back tomorrow for the good stuff in part 2!!!

Aaron's Payday: Part 1

The weekend is a time for barbecues, road trips and relaxing. My weekends consist of cooking meth, robbing banks and killing off cartels. I'm not living in an episode of Breaking Bad, I am just playing Payday 2.

I gotta pay for this bitchin' get-up somehow

Now that I am probably on most government watch lists and this blog and my home is probably under surveillance, let me explain Payday 2. Payday 2 is a 4 player cooperative first person shooter. The player controls one of the four men as they perform crimes all over Washington DC. Players are able to choose from several different jobs including uncovering a corrupt senator, killing off high members of a cartel, robbing a bank and stealing experimental technology. The number of jobs and heists grows with each update that is released.

Payday 2 can be played both as a single player game and an online multiplayer game. While there is no centralized plot to the game other than you are a career criminal, there is a story to each heist you partake in. Each heist wraps up it's story by the end. As I mentioned before there is a job where the person hiring you wishes to uncover a corrupt senator. The job of the player is to then break into an art museum and steal several paintings. The paintings then have cameras installed into them and are sold to the senator's people. Once the paintings are hung in the senator's condo, the player uses the cameras to sneak in, steal personal electronics that have proof and details of illegal arms trading, plant cocaine in the senator's personal vault and steal the senator's illicit gold fund.

Each successful, and sometimes unsuccessful, mission yields money and experience for the player. Experience is used to level up which gives skill points to be used in certain class skills as well as unlocks other weapons and body armor. The money is then used by the player to purchase the new weapons and modifications for them. The money seems to have little use other than allowing the player to respec their skills, purchase items to make jobs easier and purchasing certain jobs to make more money. That's right, the player has to purchase a job from the contractor if they wish to perform a certain heist at a certain difficulty. Otherwise the player sits at the mission screen until they see a job they want to do.

The exciting world of organized crime!

The game does try it's best to disapprove of needless violence. If a player is to injure any civilians they are penalized with a large monetary fine and the game raises the difficulty level. The game does emphasize that no civilians should be harmed which is a feature that most first person shooters either touch lightly on or ignore completely.

Payday 2 is available now on PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and PC.

Be sure to watch for part two of my look at Payday 2 where we look at my experiences behind the mask.